"The Passage"
Airdate: Friday, December 8th, 2006

This is really not a good season to be a recurring character. Just as we're sort of coming to terms with losing Lady Tigh, Kat is overtaken by some scary, cancer-making radiation and bites the dust. She also magically acquires a shady, mysterious past, but we'll talk about that in a second.

In this eppy, the fleet is experiencing a food crisis and everyone has to fight over the meager remaining rations. One can almost sense some of the other pilots shooting surreptitious dirty looks in FormerlyFat Apollo's direction. Sharon finds a planet where there is a bunch of disgusting-but-edible algae. Unfortunately, the fleet has to cross a dangerous, radioactive-y nebula to get there. A plan is hatched that involves some crazy jumps and pairing up civilian ships with Raptors in order to guide them through.

Meanwhile, some creepy guy recognizes Kat and calls her "Sasha." Said creepy guy looks exactly like a Lifetime Movie-of-the-Week's idea of "Generic Drug Dealer," so we sort of know where this is going right away. Turns out that Kat used to be a drug runner and Lifetime Dude was her supplier. Of course Starbuck gets all up in her business about this by sticking her face really, really close to Kat's and whispering intently and providing plenty of fodder for all the gleeful fanfickers out there (as if last week's episode didn't give us enough material for that sort of thing).

At this point, I kind of knew Kat was doomed, but was still holding out hope that Galactica wouldn't take the route I was predicting. For one thing, the show is way better when it does something that I completely don't expect. But more importantly, this feels like an awfully odd and sloppy way to dispose of a secondary character. She's anointed with A Past to make her more interesting, then summarily dispatched. I think this storyline might have been better -- and would certainly have carried more weight -- if Kat's revelation and redemption had been spread over more than one episode. But because of the way it goes down, rather than concentrating on the storytelling, I'm wondering if Luciana Carro landed a series regular gig elsewhere and therefore the character had to be dealt with speedily.

Anyway, the mission is about as brutal as expected. Hotdog and Kat both lose civilian ships and Kat starts to go just a little bit crazy and radiation-y -- the symptoms are hair loss, vomiting and sex with Lifetime Dude. On the final leg of the mission, Kat lingers too long in the nebula in an effort to save one of the civilian ships. She guides the ship through successfully, but exposes herself to a bunch of radiation in the process. She's greeted on Galactica with a Slow Clap from everyone, even Starbuck. Then she dies. Sigh.

In addition to being disappointed that Kat's offing is sort of weird and sudden, I'm also just sad that she's gone. I liked that she was one of the few people who could go toe-to-toe with Starbuck and her presence was a welcome one in the series-enriching cast of second string characters. And who else is going to yell, "Watch that pretty face!" the next time Lee and Kara have one of their frakked up boxing matches?

I will say, however, that the death scene itself and everything after is executed beautifully. Love, love the interaction with Kara, who seems to be reclaiming tiny pieces of her humanity as this season progresses. Teared up when Adama told Kat her past didn't matter and made her CAG again. And pretty much lost it completely when Kara put the photo of Kat up on The Wall.

Oh, yeah, I almost forgot to mention what's going on in the melancholy piano-infused world of the Cylons. Well, Baltar finds out about Lucy Lawless Cylon's little suicide game and this somehow leads to the duo visiting one of those nutty Hybrids. Baltar tries to touch the Hybrid and gets a bunch of gibberish for his trouble -- gibberish that he interprets as another clue to finding Earth. He also still thinks he might be a Cylon. Yeah, I think Baltar has officially taken the title of Most Insane Person On This Show back from LLC. It's pretty awesome to see them have their little Crazy Off every week, though, and I can't wait for more.

Oh! I also almost forgot to mention one of my favorite parts, which is Adama and Tigh getting the giggles. Hilarious.

Anyway. I'm really hoping that we're not going to lose anyone else for a bit, but the folks who aren't in the opening credits -- yeah, I'm looking at you, Cally, Gaeta, Racetrack, etc etc -- might want to be extra, extra careful when they're in the vicinity of airlocks and radioactive nebulas.

iTunes Links

Battlestar Galactica - Series
Battlestar Galactica - Season 3
"The Passage"