'Battlestar Galactica': 12 Things We Learned This Year

1. LEE ADAMA GETS WHAT HE WANTS BY NOT WANTING ANYTHING
As be-sunglassed lawyer Romo Lampkin pointed out, the Man Who Once Was Apollo has stumbled from greatness to greatness. First, he's Galactica's CAG, a job he didn't want. Then, dear old Dad hands him the keys to the Battlestar Pegasus — even when Lee blanches at the commander role. When Lee decides, after helping spring Gaius Baltar from the hoosegow, that he's had his fill of the military, along comes Tom Zarek to offer him a spot on the Quorum of Twelve. And now, Lee's president of the Colonies, without ever being voted into office.


2. BILL LOVES LAURA
We'd watched the relationship grow from an antagonistic seed to a mutual-respect flower, but in ''Sine Qua Non'' Adama made explicit what had previously only been implicit: ''I just can't live without her.''


3. STARBUCK CAN BE REALLY ANNOYING
Kara Thrace used to be a cocksure fighter ace, whose confidence in her own skills masked a bundle of neuroses. Even though her personal life was a shambles, she was always a steely-eyed professional when it came to the mission. But when she ''came back from the dead,'' Starbuck's mission seemed to be to whine and cry and scream when she didn't get her way. What a way to hobble a previously substantive character.


4. BALTAR IS HEFNER. ALMOST.
Satin robe? Check. Surrounded by a bevy of adoring, amorous acolytes? Ditto. All Gaius needs to do is publish his own magazine — filled with great fiction and classy nudes — and the transformation will be complete.


5. THE QUORUM OF TWELVE IS, MAYBE, THE WORST ITERATION OF DEMOCRACY
Near as we can tell, here's how the Colonial government works: A bunch of people in suits get into a room and yell at each other. Now, that's no way to run a civilization…Unless you're British.


6. THE CYLON CENTURIONS ARE SENTIENT
We knew the centurions, as well as the raiders, were alive, but we didn't know that they had free will — a free will that was being subjugated by the ''skin jobs.'' This realization was the axis around which the Cylon Civil War revolved. The Cavils wanted to lobotomize the raiders, so they'd never again disobey orders, while the Sixes wanted them to retain their independent thought. Guns were drawn, sides were taken, and lots of machines died.


7. VISIONS NEVER LEAD TO HAPPINESS
Sharon Agathon's cold-blooded murder of Natalie Six because a vision told her to should underline the obvious: Nothing good ever comes from these visions. Every time someone sees something in their mind's eye — be it Roslin seeing drug-induced hallucinations, Baltar tooling around in the Opera House, or D'Anna catching the faces of the Final Five — bad things follow. Why can't anyone just have a vision of carrot cake?


8. AWARENESS IS DRIVING THE FINAL FOUR CRAZY
Tory killed Cally and is schtupping Baltar, Tyrol has shaved his head and gotten removed from his post, Anders is pretty much ready to tell anyone who looks at him funny that he's a Cylon, and Tigh is frakking around with Caprica Six. All of which sounds just a little nutty, given who they are.


9. THE SIX MODEL IS THE MOST COMPLEX CYLON
Not only does Tricia Helfer end up playing at least two different Six versions in every episode, but the Sixes have a lot going on in their heads. While the Cavils are devious perverts, the Boomers are fickle with their allegiances, the Leobens are infatuated with prophesy, and the D'Annas are the curious cats, the Sixes have emerged as something else entirely. They seem to be like a synthesis of the other models, taking a piece of what makes each of them tick and incorporating it into the whole. Fitting for the model halfway between one and 12.


10. SAUL TIGH DOES NOT SHOOT BLANKS
The one-eyed XO is still a virile member of Galactica's crew, and he's been making every one of those visits to Caprica Six in the brig count.


11. FELIX GAETA HAS NICE PIPES
It wasn't until the CIC mainstay was shot in the leg during a mutiny on board the Demetrius, and had it amputated by Doc Cottle back on Galactica, that we were exposed to actor Alessandro Juliani's hidden vocal talent. You see, Gaeta sings a mournful aria whenever he feels a phantom twinge. As Laura Roslin says, while sharing a sick bay with the forelorn Felix, ''What a way to discover such a beautiful voice.''


12. MOTHER EARTH AIN'T WHAT SHE USED TO BE
Apparently, humanity wasn’t very good to planet Earth: When Galactica finally found the big blue marble, the surface was radioactive, the skylines were ruins, and there was nary a soul to be seen. Did we mutually-assured-destroy ourselves into extinction? Who knows? But one thing is clear: the Garden of Eden is empty.