Sometimes a Great…Ellen?
What. The. Frak?
That was one of the first things that went through my mind when Ellen Tigh was outed as the final Cylon — due in equal parts to my shock (totally didn’t see that one coming), dismay (in addition to it being a bit of a narrative let-down, it means Helo — Karl Agathon was not, in fact, the final Cylon), and fascination (thanks to what Ellen said during the reveal).
But let me come back to the beginning of the episode for a bit. As the good reader will know, I was live-tweeting “Sometimes a Great Notion” as I watched it, and while I didn’t hit every point, I will be using the various thoughts I wrote down as a kind of guide.
To begin, I think I should say that I really don’t know what to think of this episode. On one hand, I want to think that it was great…but on the other hand, I want to think of it as sub-par. I spent part of the weekend, and some of this morning, looking at the various reviews of the episode, and they’re mixed (to say the least). Barbara Nicolisi didn’t like the episode at all, and I agree with a lot of her reasoning. At the same time, I think the blogger at Galactica Variants does well in enumerating and praising the many high points that the episode had going for it, although I just can’t quite bring myself to agree with him(?) and call the episode “superior.”
To be honest, I preferred “Revelations” and how the season-break cliffhanger was realized; the show took us from the heights of exultation to the depths of despair in under three minutes, and everything about the revelation of Earth as a post-apocalyptic wasteland was just superb. Bear McCreary’s choral-orchestral work, in particular, is worthy of mention in that regard.
And actually, speaking of Battlestar Galactica’s composer, it’s instructive to read his blog post concerning scoring the latest episode. In fact, having just done so, I’ve come to something of a conclusion about the episode: as a finalé to the series, it would have been superb. As a bridge episode to connect the first half of the season to the next, it doesn’t work as well.
Ashen Planet
Earth is an abandoned nuclear ruin, and cannot be inhabited by human life. This is made clear pretty early on in the show, with Gaius Baltar confirming that the radiation is in the plant life and water table; it is not safe to stay on the planet, and it is of no use to humanity.
Roslin’s grim quip — “It’s perfect. We traded one nuked civilization for another.” — captured the exact mood hanging over everything and everyone at this point in the series. Earth — ostensibly the “promised land” of Pythian scripture — has been found, and found wanting (and then in the most extreme way possible). This can be seen to have massive ramifications in the fleet as the episode progresses (vandalism, breakdown in discipline, despairing people cluttering the halls of the Galactica, etc.), and will likely have yet more ramifications on down the line (more on that in a bit).
In my live-tweet, I posted a couple of remarks which are relevant here:
BSG LIVE-TWEET: the planet was nuked 2000 years ago? #
BSG LIVE-TWEET: so does that mean the 13th tribe came to Earth, and then were nuked? #
Answering the second question first, that general conclusion would seem to fit the established timeline of the series. Answering now the first question: yes, that is what happened. Which, as I’ll note in a moment, is an interesting detail.
Dating the Holocaust
The Thirteenth Tribe appears to have left Kobol about 4,000 years prior to the events of the series, with someone traveling from Earth to Kobol around a thousand years later to convey information about the planet and its night sky. This would also appear to coincide with the placement of the beacon found in the nebula in the third season.
What’s interesting is that the holocaust on Earth appears to have happened at about the same time — 2,000 years prior to the story — as did the holocaust that consumed Kobol, forced the exodus of the Twelve Tribes, and motivated the suicide of the goddess Athena. I’m going out on a limb here, but to me this does not seem to be a thing of mere coincidence.
Who were the Thirteenth Tribe?
Given the evidence unearthed on Earth, it would appear that the Thirteenth Tribe was made up entirely of Cylons, and then not a collection of multiple instances of identical models — from the various flashbacks, it seems clear that the Cylons that made up the Thirteenth Tribe were all distinct. Moreover, one gets the sense that they didn’t have resurrection capabilities until the very end, and that even then only certain individuals were included in that scheme by Ellen Tigh and whomever else it was that were party to the arrangements she mentioned had been made.
So the question becomes, I guess: were the Thirteenth Tribe always Cylons — e.g. when they left Kobol, was that basically the fracture between humanity and the Cylons of the day, the parting of the ways? Or were there humans and Cylons in the Thirteenth Tribe, and did the Cylons eventually supplant (by violence or by other means) the humans?
One thing I’ve liked about BSG’s props department has been their skill for crafting things at once alien and familiar. The most striking example, I think, is still the radiation symbol on the nuclear device Baltar gave to Gina, which doesn’t look much at all like the hazard symbol it is derived from, yet which is still instantly familiar. The remains of the Cylon Centurion discovered on Earth are similar; at once foreign, yet instantly apparent for what they are.
Two Karas, a Viper, and Leoben
The subplot involving Kara Thrace (Starbuck) was, I think, my favourite part of the episode. I admit that I kind of figured it was coming, spoiler-junkie that I am, but I still loved how it was realized. I thought it would take longer, on the order of another episode or two, to get to the scene where Kara lights her own funeral pyre, but it worked so well where it was placed, and I’ve no complaints. Indeed, of all the extant loose plot threads, this is the one I really want to see resolved the most.
So…who or what is Kara? She’s not the final Cylon, but she’s also not the same person who died in “Maelstrom.” The Kara who died in the upper atmosphere of the gas giant is not the same Kara who stepped off the Viper after the battle of the Ionian Nebula…probably. But then, the Kara who died in the upper atmosphere of the gas giant shouldn’t have been as intact as her body and Viper fuselage were on Earth. That pilot, and that Viper, were reduced (or so it looked) to very tiny pieces; in contrast, the Viper fuselage and its pilot that Kara and Leoben Conoy discovered was substantially more intact.
So…who or what is Kara?
I’m of two minds about Kara and what she is. On one hand, I’m thinking that she might be a manifestation of her purified self — the pristine condition of her Viper could speak to this — that was created in the aftermath of her spiritual encounter with the entity that took Leoben’s form, the encounter that came to a head as the original Kara plunged her Viper into the gas giant and was destroyed. Certainly, there’s something about Kara’s death and rebirth that is intimately connected to the notion of becoming purified, of casting off the old self and putting on the new.
Having her old self literally killed off, to be replaced entirely — as though no time had passed, and with no lapse in her memory of events — by her new, purified self would be a very literal expression of that motif, but it would work.
Of course, this being BSG, things won’t quite work that way. Indeed, Edward James Olmos noted in one interview that the explanation of Kara’s transformation/replacement is “not an uplifting understanding…It’s as dark as everything else. You sit there and you go, “Oh my God, you guys are sick!” They’re pushing the envelope. And the network is allowing it.”
Which brings me to my second thought regarding what Kara might be, in which my thinking returns — as is the case for many, I’ve noticed — to the original Battlestar Galactica and the story arc involving Count Iblis, who was basically an avatar of Lucifer. Iblis, the astute BSG fanatic may recall, was discovered because of what Apollo found inside the ruins of a destroyed ship on a desolate, blasted world. Theories about what Apollo might have found abound; it might have been former followers of Iblis’, or the man whose image Iblis had taken on. Regardless, that’s how it played out.
I’m not saying that Kara is the devil incarnate, however; I think Ron Moore might be taking the idea in a different direction.
Toward the end of the third season, a lot of effort was devoted to linking Kara and the goddess Aurora, who is the herald of the dawn in Roman mythology. Could it be that Kara is herself an avatar of Aurora? Could this be the reason she had to be purified — by fire and death, even? — before she could continue on in her purpose?
There is also that the First Hybrid said, that Kara is the harbinger of doom who will lead “them all” (The Humans? The Cylons? Both?) to “their end.” This ties into my overall supposition that BSG is, at its core, an eschatological tale — for how else can Kara be both a harbinger of doom (which implies an end, and then an apocalyptic one) and caught up with Aurora (who heralds the coming of the light), except that Kara is somehow the means by which the end of all things comes to pass, or is ushered in?
It will be interesting to see where this storyline ends. It is, I think, the richest narrative vein in the show at present.
Dualla and the Breakdown of Order
Anastasia Dualla’s death caught me by surprise, somewhat, and yet fit the narrative pretty darn well. Dee was, for the duration of the episode, the barometer for the attitude in the fleet, and the overall degradation in morale that was evidenced during the episode marched more or less in lockstep with her mood. She held it together to begin with, hoping (I suspect) for a miracle. The discovery of the jacks — a child’s playtoy — in the dirt of Earth upset that balance, and by the time she was on the Raptor bound for Galactica, she was visibly mumbling to herself in a desperate attempt to hold it together.
And there’s even a moment in the show where you can see a look crossing her face that tells you she’s failed to do so.
All the rest is just “going through the motions” for her; taking care of Hera Agathon, hanging out with Lee Adama, and the glowing air she puts on for Felix Gaeta are just shadows of her former self, which is now all but consumed by despair. She didn’t even hesitate when she raised the gun to her temple.
And we saw echoed in the corridor scenes the same mentality; crew members slumped over or brawling, “Frak Earth” scrawled on a wall — Galactica became a slum, where once it had been a warship.
Dualla’s suicide may have been the first, but it won’t be the last; the population count will probably drop sharply in the next few episodes. Indeed, The 13th Colony notes that the depth of despair felt by the people of the Colonies is so deep and dire that nobody — not even Saul Tigh, who bids her farewell — thinks to ask after the identity of the final Cylon. They just don’t care anymore.
One little area
I just have to ask: is there something significant about the area in which they land? Because everything seems to have happened there: all of the Final Five once lived in or around that piece of land, the evidence of all their having done so being found within a few hundred square metres. And Starbuck’s Viper landed only a few hours’ walk away.
What gives?
Leaving Earth
The Fleet will be leaving Earth, that much is certain. Which raises an interesting question (expanded upon shortly) concerning the “promised land” of Pythian prophecy; I suspect that Earth, all along, was not it.
D’Anna Biers elects to remain on Earth, however; that character will now apparently exit the show for good. Pity; she had become so interesting. Still, I think I agree with Galactica Variants, who notes that it is emblematic of the attempt to break out of the cycle of history that has thus far only led to holocaust and death, again and again.
D’Anna also became the means by which Cavil was dangled back into view of the audience; her mention of him catching up with the Fleet foreshadows, I think, the epic-scale confrontation that is supposed to take place in the closing episodes of the series.
And yes, D’Anna is out of the story now, for good.
Faith and Reversals
This episode has interesting implications, as well, for the prophecy of Pythia that, to this point, had been the guiding force for the journey to Earth. Lee Adama can be heard mocking Pythia in one scene, and Laura Roslin burns her copy of Pythia’s writings in another. On the other hand, in a curious reversal, William Adama — “Admiral Atheus” — takes on an almost Pythian tone when he vows to guide the fleet to a new home, and begins giving orders that will hopefully help the Fleet seek out a habitable world.
Indeed, Bear McCreary notes, in his blog, that the music in the scene was intended to give Adama more the air of a preacher than that of a military man barking out new orders. Something is in the works here.
Similarly, Leoben seems to part ways with his former faith in Kara, as he scrambles away from her in the wake of her discovery of her own body in the burnt-out remnants of the Viper in the field. Similarly, D’Anna’s resolve that the cycle of history remain broken is on a knife’s edge, culminating in her decision to abandon herself to death on the burnt-out and irradiated Earth.
I’m not convinced, pace what Lee Adama exclaims, that the Fleet has really “freed itself from the ramblings of Pythia.” I think the prophecy is still valid, and that the Sacred Scrolls‘ message of a promised land, to which a dying leader would escort the exiled people, is still in the process of being realized. Earth was the false hope that people conflated with that prophecy, and nobody can see — yet — that Earth was never the means of deliverance. But I think, in another episode or three, we’ll see this antipathy reversed.
The Final Cylon
I’ve got really mixed feelings where Ellen Tigh is concerned. On one hand, the reveal was kind of…cheap, and certainly not worth the hype given over to the extra three minutes that it took to show off. At the same time, what Ellen says during the revelation is interesting to the extreme; it reveals that the Final Five do have a means of resurrection (and I think this dangles before us the probability that Ellen herself will turn up again, and then not in a flashback). It also reveals that some plan or orchestration was behind the destruction of society on Earth.
And I can’t help but wonder, apropos of my earlier remarks about the synchronicity between Earth’s destruction and the disaster on Kobol, if perhaps that orchestration extended not only to the people (Cylons) of Earth, but to the people of Kobol as well, and possibly to the gods themselves? What, exactly, is the scope of Ellen’s machinations? Who were her co-conspirators?
One question I fired out to Twitter, a bit after the episode was done, was:
Post BSG thought: apropos of Ellen’s comment, how old was the now-destroyed Resurrection Hub? #
I wonder if this won’t become significant later on: did the Colonial Cylons build the Resurrection Hub, or did they stumble across it? Or were they led to it?
Indeed, one is left to wonder: exactly how do the Final Five resurrect?
Ellen as the Final Cylon makes sense, I suppose, in light of the first season episode “Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down,” which ends with Baltar telling Head Six that he’ll “never tell” whether Ellen passed or failed his Cylon detection test. At least this retrojection fits into the narrative, rather than being something which creates a discontinuity.
Grace felt a bit gypped by the reveal, though, in light of Baltar’s line in the aforementioned episode, and I agree with the sentiment: in light of “Sometimes a Great Notion,” “Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down” is a spoiler that even a spoiler-junkie like me finds distasteful…even in light of the fact that the identities of the Final Five were not settled until the writers were working on the third season.
Now, what about that other great litmus test for the final Cylon, the prophecy of the First Hybrid?
Soon there will be four, glorious in awakening, struggling with the knowledge of their true selves. The pain of revelation bringing new clarity and in the midst of confusion, he will find her. Enemies brought together by impossible longing. Enemies now joined as one. The way forward at once unthinkable, yet inevitable. And the fifth, still in shadow, will claw toward the light, hungering for redemption that will only come in the howl of terrible suffering. I can see them all. The seven, now six, self-described machines who believe themselves without sin. But in time, it is sin that will consume them. They will know enmity, bitterness, the wrenching agony of the one splintering into many. And then, they will join at the promised land, gathered on the wings of an angel. Not an end, but a beginning.
Previously, the line about how the “pain of revelation bring[s] new clarity and in the midst of confusion, he will find her” was thought to be a reference to Lee being the first to see Kara return in her Viper, during the battle at the Ionian Nebula. But certainly, it could just as surely refer to the pain Tigh felt at the discovery of an Earth in ruins, and his subsequent confusion about purpose and life’s worth that, I’m sure, must have motivated his walk out into the ocean in emulation of the suicidal foxes that Bill Adama had earlier told him about.
Because in the midst of that confusion, he did (in a sense) “find” Ellen.
And then there’s the remark concerning how “the fifth, still in shadow, will claw toward the light, hungering for redemption that will only come in the howl of terrible suffering.” This could certainly apply to Ellen, in light both of her betrayal of the Resistance on New Caprica and the suffering it brought onto Tigh when he poisoned her.
The only other question, I suppose, is: was it Ellen that D’Anna apologized to? I suppose we won’t find out now…not that it really matters. I’m still convinced it was Samuel Anders — after all, D’Anna very nearly shot him dead once.
Parting Thoughts
Perhaps the intent of this episode, in light of the fact that it is not the series finalé, can be considered to be something of a myth-breaker; it de-deifies the Final Five Cylons, and casts Pythian prophecy into doubt. Only Baltar’s cult remains intact (and, indeed, largely unmentioned), and I think we’ll see this explored in the episodes to come; the matter of God, and the purpose of Head Six, Head Baltar, and Kara’s Leoben guide have yet to be settled or explained.
In looking again at the First Hybrid’s prophecy, I note one other curious thing — the landing at Earth does not really match the Hybrid’s description of the arrival at the promised land: “The seven, now six, self-described machines who believe themselves without sin. But in time, it is sin that will consume them. They will know enmity, bitterness, the wrenching agony of the one splintering into many. And then, they will join at the promised land, gathered on the wings of an angel. Not an end, but a beginning.”
Significant to the prophecy is the fact that at the time the prophecy above was made, D’Anna and her line had not been boxed; although Razor aired after the third season, it is set (chronologically) in the latter part of the second season (if memory serves). The prophecy, thus, might make more sense now that D’Anna has voluntarily excepted herself from the cycle of history, and has been removed from the show for good.
The “wrenching agony” part has come to pass, granted, but what’s really interesting is the last part. The splintered Seven were supposed to join at the promised land, wherever that might be. One notes that the most recent webisode series, “The Face of the Enemy,” takes place after the fleet has departed Earth…but gives no indication that the Fleet has yet encountered Cavil’s forces.
Which gets back to what I said about Pythia’s prophecy, doesn’t it?
So, all in all: a confusing episode that had more business being a finalé than a half-season opener. Still, a lot of interesting and powerful stuff happened in it, and it put in place some interesting narrative groundwork that I hope the writers have been able to build upon.
Great post. I liked that you revisited the First Hybrid’s prophecy.
RE:
The Thirteenth Tribe appears to have left Kobol about 4,000 years prior to the events of the series, with someone traveling from Earth to Kobol around a thousand years later to convey information about the planet and its night sky. This would also appear to coincide with the placement of the beacon found in the nebula in the third season.
There are actually three dates cited for the exodus of Thirteenth Tribe: 4,000 years prior to the Fall of the Twelve Colonies, 3,000 years after the Fall simultaneous with the Lion’s Head nebula beacon being created, and 2,000 years prior to the Fall when along with the other Twelve Tribes. I don’t know if this is sloppy writing, or intentional to show multiple exodus waves.
Also, where they landed, I’m not convinced that’s our Earth. They made a big deal out of the ruins of the Temple of Aurora, but the only Temple of Aurora that ever existed on Earth (so far) is in the Roman Forum Boarium with its Temple of Mater Matuta/Aurora/Eos. However, the model showing this temple does bear a resemblance to the drawings in the books we’ve seen. Still, we haven’t seen any clearcut landmarks to show this is our Earth. It could be a planet the Thirteenth Tribe settled on and called “Earth.”
Thanks! That prophecy really is the litmus test, isn’t it?
This is true. Admittedly, I’m using the BattlestarWiki timeline as my baseline here, as I think it presents the most plausible analysis of extant clues regarding the Thirteenth Tribe’s exodus to Earth, but I do concede that there is some variability in the dates themselves.
Although I think we can probably cross the 2,000 years (e.g. simultaneous exodus) theory out the airlock at this point.
As to sloppy writing, I note that in their Thirteenth Tribe article, the editors at BattlestarWiki do note the following:
I’m going to go with writer error, but I will again note that I hold the 4,000 years theory to be the one that best fits the evidence seen thus far, and leaves room for the possibility of someone traveling back to Kobol from Earth (knowledge of those constellations had to come from somewhere!).
Nor am I, although that will now have to be material for another article; I published the article above before I saw that interview with Ron Moore in which he’s…careful…about identifying the planet as Earth.
By the way; you mention the similarity in star patterns across multiple locations. Pick up a freeware program called Celestia and play around with it; it’s a good way to see just how similar things like constellations look at nearby points in space.
There’s an argument to be made that the broken bridge closely resembles the Brooklyn Bridge, although that could be just one more clever deception for all I know.
I can’t speak to the Roman angle, so I’ll take your word for it.
One interesting follow-on remark, though, concerns the respective religions of the Colonials and the Cylons. Were the 13th Tribe polytheistic, or monotheistic? One would expect, if (pace your own speculation) they were “children” of “The One Who Cannot Be Named,” that they’d be monotheists (the Temple of Five observation supports this as well).
Why, then, does Earth have a temple dedicated to a goddess of the Roman Pantheon?
Lisa Paitz Spindler, Danger Gal»Blog Archive » The Cylon Future and Past (January 20, 2009, 2:00 pm).
[...] bit of fun commenting over on Brad Templeton’s Battlestar Blog and Kenneth Hynek’s post Sometimes a Great. . .Ellen? about the Fifth Cylon reveal. I’ll recount here what I’ve said there and also add in a [...]
I’m partial to the 4,000 year date too. I agree that someone had to travel back to Kobol from Earth since the artifacts get older the closer they come to Earth.
The interview with Moore, is the one in the Chicago Tribune what you’re referring to? I just wrote a post today on the new episode and included some info from that article.
I saw your post on Celestia — great idea.
The drawings of the Temple of Aurora show three bridges, so I’m not sure the Brooklyn Bridge idea correlates with that. However, it does seem like the model of Rome does.
I agree, I think the Thirteenth Tribe were monotheists. I’ve been definitely wondering the same thing about the presence of a polytheistic goddess in a monotheistic society.
Regarding my experiments with Celestia, and granting in turn that the software probably has a certain level of inaccuracy, it’s probable that if this isn’t Earth, it’s within a relatively short distance of Earth — measured only in dozens of light years, not hundreds or thousands.
Although, now that I think about it…have you ever spent time out in a sparsely populated rural area, and if so, have you ever had occasion to spend an evening stargazing in such a setting? The volume of stars is substantially above what can be seen in even a moderately-sized city.
I remember one instance in which my father and I, driving down an Alberta backroad on a cloudless night, stopped at a particular point on the road. No towns were nearby, nor even any farmhouses; the area was almost perfectly unlit, save by the lights in the sky (and as a bonus, the Moon wasn’t out, so it was nearly pitch black).
I’d never seen so many stars in the sky before.
Also, I’d never had such a hard time finding the Big Dipper. Now, I realize that Galactica has complex and powerful astrographic computing abilities (presumably), but I have to wonder: a constellation is a useful reference, but it’s also a visual reference, one that depends on being able to identify distinct stars in specific patterns against a backdrop of…well…more stars.
I could barely find the Big Dipper standing out on the side of that backroad. And that makes me wonder: is it all that easy, when one is out in space, to pinpoint any of the constellations?
*
The problem with the drawing of the Temple of Aurora is that it’s the same drawing prop that was used for the ancient city on Kobol. I’m not sure how reliable a source it is.
*
I’m planning to do a blog post later this week, or early next week, about some of the religious bits and pieces in BSG, and I’ll try and give some thought to what the Temple of Aurora is doing there. It’s such an odd inclusion that I can’t help but think of it as being highly important.
And yet, who knows? They’re apparently leaving the planet behind for good, so we won’t be seeing the temple again.
Kenneth Hynek » Blog Archive » Earth and Kobol (January 30, 2009, 10:05 am).
[...] my thoughts out concerning the first episode of this second half of the series’ final season (Sometimes a Great Notion), I noted the following: What’s interesting is that the holocaust on Earth appears to have [...]
Kenneth Hynek » Blog Archive » My belated “No Exit” review (February 18, 2009, 12:45 pm).
[...] were polytheistic at first. The question of whether they were polytheists or monotheists came up in a discussion I had on the blog a while back, and at the time we couldn’t say with certainty what the deal was. Now, [...]