MAUREEN RYAN
The Watcher A Chicago Tribune Web log
Originally posted: March 5, 2007
The 'death' of Starbuck and the mindblowing 'Battlestar Galactica' season finale.
Given what happened in Sunday’s episode of “
Battlestar Galactica,” you may have questions about Kara “Starbuck” Thrace (Katee Sackhoff) and whether she’s dead or alive.
I have questions too, but they’re different ones: How do the creators of this show keep coming up with such gripping season finales? And if fans are in a tizzy now, what will they think of the mindbending season finale? I can’t even imagine.
Sci Fi Channel sent certain members of the media the last few episodes of “Battlestar Galactica’s” third season. And it’s my fervent hope that nobody, including me, spoils the major details of the end of the season for “Battlestar” fans.
Having said that, we can now talk about Sunday’s episode, and I think it is safe for even those who like to avoid spoilers to check out a January
interview executive producers Ron Moore and David Eick did with the Tribune. They
said then that Starbuck would be involved in a “major event” with “lasting reverberations,” and they certainly were right about that.
Regardless of whether Starbuck is dead or not, it must be said that if there were any justice in the TV award-giving world, Sunday’s episode would win Sackhoff (more from here
here) an Emmy nomination. The episode, which involved flashbacks to her life with her mother, allowed her to show her full range and not just do that rebellion thing that she does so well, but to play the rage and heartbreak of an abused child who still deeply loves her parent.
If anything, I would have loved to see even more scenes between Kara and Socrata Thrace – how did Socrata know that her daughter had a special fate? Why did Socrata end up bitter and alone?
Regardless, the episode was quite compelling, and one scene between Apollo and Starbuck was truly poignant. Starbuck was talking to Apollo, her former lover, about the fact that he and his wife, Dualla, were still together and doing fine. Apollo and Starbuck were just friends now – “and that’s all we’ll ever be,” she said sadly. The restrained performances in that scene were very effective.
As far as the remaining three episodes of the season go, I can say without spoiling anything that they are, like Sunday’s Starbuck episode, a rousing return to form after some uneven standalone episodes
In particular, Feb. 25’s intriguing but ultimately disappointing “Dirty Hands,” which concerned labor troubles aboard the fleet’s fuel refinery, was a good idea that suffered from frustrating execution. I thought the way Laura Roslin (Mary McDonnell) was portrayed wasn’t consistent with what we’ve known of her in the past, and the way the writers portrayed her wasn’t even consistent within the episode – it felt as though Roslin’s personality was changed to suit the need of each story point.
I would have loved to see how Roslin and Adama would have dealt with a full-on labor strike at a critical facility. But we didn’t really get that, given that the actual strike didn’t happen until late in the episode. We saw some extremely interesting class issues raised, and then suddenly Tyrol was in the brig and Adama was threatening to kill Tyrol’s wife. What?
Much of my frustration with that episode stems from the fact that Tyrol is someone that Adama and Roslin know and trust – why wouldn’t they take his concerns more seriously earlier on? And what if the refinery ship did blow up due to the fact that it was in poor shape? Why weren’t Roslin and Adama more pragmatic and concerned about that critical problem? And I’m all for showing class and labor issues in the fleet, but surely Adama and Roslin are smart enough to handle them with more subtlety and less offhand dismissiveness.
And that final scene in which Roslin was so amenable and friendly to Tyrol was jarring, to say the least – I have to wonder if several scenes were cut from this episode, because their relaxed conversation, given what had gone before it, felt out of place.
But I’m willing to let that go – every single one of my favorite shows has had a frustrating episode or two. That’s just the nature of the beast. And it's my opinion that the last four episodes of the season more than make up for any wobbles earlier in Season 3.
And in any case, the last two outings of the season, in particular, are among the best work “Battlestar” has ever done. There are absolutely transfixing moments in those episodes, and in the season finale, which airs March 25, Jamie Bamber (who plays Lee “Apollo” Adama) and Michael Hogan (Saul Tigh) do some particularly fine work.
And watch for an unexpected moment of levity involving the word “butterfingers.”
Now I’ll tell you to bail out if you don’t want to read a single spoiler about where Season 3 is headed.I’ll do this next bit in the form of a Q&A, in an effort to ask and answer the biggest questions that might be on the minds of “Battlestar” devotees.
Q. Is Starbuck dead or alive?A. Good question. We saw debris from her ship, but perhaps she ejected before it was destroyed. And was there a Cylon ship nearby which could have rescued her – or was that a figment of her imagination?
One thing to keep in mind is that in their January
interview, Ron Moore and David Eick were very careful to never use the words “death” or “dies.” They called what happened to Starbuck “a major event,” and when I asked directly if she would die in “Maelstrom,” Moore said, “I don’t know that I want to say that directly. I think people will have to watch that episode and judge for themselves what happens.”
I'll just say I find that comment telling.
Q. Moore and Eick said in January that a cast member's name would be off the credits after “Maelstrom.” Whose name is gone?A. Katee Sackhoff’s name is gone from the opening credits as of the March 11 episode. An interesting side note: The opening credits in the last few episodes appear to be slightly different for each episode. In “The Son Also Rises,” the March 11 outing, there’s a brief shot of Starbuck’s photo being pinned to Galactica’s memorial wall honoring the dead.
Q. Do the members of Galactica’s fleet think Starbuck is dead?A. Yes. In the March 11 episode, Admiral Adama (Edward James Olmos) is seen weeping over a picture of Starbuck from her official file (which of course contains both commendations and several disciplinary reports). Apollo is also grieving, as is Sam Anders (who has an interesting way of dealing with his pain)
Q. What happens next?
A. “The Son Also Rises,” the March 11 episode, sets the stage for Baltar’s trial for treason, and we meet Baltar’s lawyer, Romo Lampkin, who turns out to be a pretty fascinating guy (despite my initial fears, which turned out to be unfounded, that he had a David Caruso “
Sunglasses of Justice” acting style).
Q. What happens at Baltar’s trial?A. Well, now, you’ll just have to see that for yourself. But a lot of secrets are revealed and many ugly incidents from the past come out at the trial, which occupies much of “Crossroads Part 1” and “Crossroads Part 2,” the final two episodes of the season. And let’s just say that the trial does not lead to happy times for the Adama family.
Q. Do we find out who the final five Cylons are?A. There is new information about Cylons before this season ends, a fact that David Eick revealed in an
interview with TV Guide. If you’re asking whether a character or characters we have already met in the Galactica fleet are revealed to be Cylons, the answer is yes.
Q. What were your favorite parts of the two-part season finale?A. The last two episodes contain some great Saul Tigh scenes (including one with Caprica Six), an intriguing scene involving Laura Roslin (Mary McDonnell), Caprica Six (Tricia Helfer) and Athena (Grace Park), and there is one scene in the finale, which is several minutes long, in which Jamie Bamber hits it so far out of the park that I think the ball landed in another galaxy. In every way, from the plot to the performances to the dialogue to the closing revelations, the season finale is simply enthralling. Kudos to Mark Verheiden and the "Battlestar" writing staff.
Q. Would you like to leave us with a cryptic clue?A. Why yes, thank you. One final clue – music is a major thread in the last episode of the season. But I’ve said enough now, the hour's getting late.
Photos: Dorothy Lyman as Socrata Thrace, Katee Sackhoff as Kara "Starbuck" Thrace, Mark Sheppard as Romo Lampkin. 
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Subject: Re: BSG: Season 3, Ep 17 - Maelstrom (March 4, 2007) 
Mon Mar 05, 2007 6:17 pm
