Battlestar Galactica 3.19: "Crossroads, Pt. 2"
Airdate: Sunday, March 25th, 2007

So what do we have when all is said and done, when we've finished lamenting that mean, mean "See you in 2008!" teaser, compiling our latest thesis on what it truly means to be a Cylon and trying to figure out which products Roslin uses to keep her hair looking so...presidential?

A few amazing scenes, to be sure. Some appropriately startling set-up for next year. And weirdly, a bunch of stuff crammed into the last few minutes, right before the aforementioned mean teaser. I was blown away by parts of this eppy and merely flummoxed by others.

It isn't quite giving me the same heart-in-the-throat, "best frakkin' television EVER" sensation that both season 2's time skip and season 3's nuke-tastic mid-season break left me with. I'm kind of wishing that they had wrapped up the trial business a bit sooner -- say, a few eppys ago - so we had more time for the whiplash-inducing introduction to Galactica's next chapter.

About the trial: the conclusion is dramatic and well-executed and gives Bamber the opportunity to rip into a blazing speech about why everyone just wants to punish Baltar because, you know, he's kind of a tool. The crowd looks on in shock and awe, perhaps noting that Lee's bulging forehead vein throbs like a mofo when he gets all het up. Gaius is found not guilty, and Adama actually votes for him to be not guilty!

And then, refreshingly, rather than take the humble way out, Gaius reverts to his pompous, tool-y self, which is actually pretty awesome. He oozes pure jerk as only he can, even though he has no place to go and almost everyone hates him. I guess his minions, one of whom is played by Dr. Diane from Jake 2.0, will take care of him.

I did dig the way this storyline ended, because it takes Lee somewhere really interesting and sets up some potentially intriguing stuff with Gaius and his new groupies. At the same time, it's a bit of a momentum killer, because then we've got precious few minutes left for this season's final twists: it's sort of like "trial, trial, trial...OKHERE'SABUNCHOFIMPORTANTSTUFFGOTITKTHANXBYE!"

After the fleet jumps to the Ionian nebula, Tigh, Chief, Tory and Anders gather during a sudden power outage and declare that they're Cylons, drawn together by the great force that is Bob Dylan. I want to feel completely mind-frakked by this, and I guess I sort of do - I mean, it looks like Hera just might have a little playmate out there in the form of Chief Jr. And who would have ever guessed Tigh as Toaster? But I also don't completely buy it - something about it feels like a twist for twist's sake and they're going to have to do a decent amount of explaining next year to get me onboard.

In other Cylon-related doings, there's also a little thread involving the shared visions of Six, Roslin and Sharon. It has something to do with Hera, and I mostly just wish we'd gotten a tiny bit more of this storyline, for it has interesting implications as well (and Roslin looks quite fabulous and maybe just a little bit Dynasty in the visions).

As the eppy draws to a close, our Galacticans suddenly find themselves under Cylon attack. Lee decides he's a pilot after all, hops into his Viper and notices a random ship off to the side. And yes, here's where I started stage-whispering "Starbuck, Starbuck, Starbuck" and suddenly, there she is, flying alongside Lee, smiling her glorious Kara Thrace smile and telling him that she's been to Earth and she's going to take the humans there. Is she a Cylon? Was she resurrected some other way? Who cares? She's there. The only thing that will piss me off is if they make her Lee's HallucinoPerson, because this show already has enough of those.

Overall, this is a fairly thought-provoking, somewhat maddening, slightly frustrating end to a mostly kick-ass season. And now I'm going to take that ecstatic feeling over seeing Strabuck again and hold onto it tightly, with both hands, until 2008.

iTunes Links

Battlestar Galactica - Series
Battlestar Galactica - Season 3
"Crossroads, Pt. 2"