Hello, and welcome to Who Are You? This is the reasonably well done sci fi watchcast hosted by two former strangers now friends who are currently working their way through 2004's Battlestar Galactica. I'm Ja'far.
Laura:And I'm Laura.
Xhafer:And today we're joined by
Beth:It's me, it's Beth. Hi.
Laura:Hello, Beth. I don't think you've been on this podcast before, have you?
Beth:I haven't. I have not been on this podcast before. This is my first time.
Laura:but it doesn't feel like it because I talk to you all the time on our other podcasts.
Beth:Same. Exactly. And you know, Ja'far, I occasionally also talk to.
Xhafer:once in a while
Beth:Sometimes, yeah.
Laura:What is our other podcast? Do you want to talk about it?
Beth:Oh, yes. So we have another podcast. It's me and Laura and Glow, who has also been on this year's podcast that we're on now. Our podcast is called Cool Girls Don't Look at Explosions, where we watch dude TV, but quickly because we also have to watch all of Battlestar.
Laura:Yeah, we do.
Beth:So we got
Laura:Yeah, I just assume that you and Glow are both watching Battlestar with us, yeah?
Beth:Yeah. Well, I'd seen it. I saw it back when I was like in middle school, because that's when it came out. And my parents were watching it. And, you know, it was great, but I don't remember it. So it's like I'm watching it with you again for the first time.
Laura:great. I love that for us. Yeah,
Xhafer:The age gap is just enough where Battlestar Galactica replaces Babylon 5.
Laura:so, Beth, what was your logic for choosing this episode to be on?
Beth:so this one. is the most extra episode, and I like to make a splash, a big entrance. And I thought the one with the cool ass arrow, and the baby reveal, and the mutiny was the right one,
Laura:I think it's a good choice. I can't wait to talk about it.
Xhafer:There's a lot going on.
Beth:Yeah! It, it too is a chaotic gremlin, much like I am a chaotic gremlin, so this episode, one could say, is the most relatable episode for me.
Xhafer:Alright, we ready to get into this episode?
Laura:I sure am.
Xhafer:You ready to talk about this fucking episode? It's Battlestar Galactica Season 1 Finale, Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part 2. We open on Crashdown's crash site. Evacuating the survivors from the rafter. The Chief, Callie, everyone's out but Gaius, who is caught behind a fire. 6PT kind of replaces Crashdown to get him out.
Laura:Uh huh.
Xhafer:raptor explodes and Gaius is simultaneously an accidental renaissance painting and also a photo of me when I get home from the office on Fridays as he just collapses into a heap of tall grass.
Laura:There is so much Christ ing in this episode.
Beth:Oh, my God. Yes. We owe that last shot. We're going to talk about it
Laura:We're gonna open on a Christ, and we're gonna go out on a Christ, everybody.
Beth:but also nobody panic because Darth Maul did survive. He's doing well. Darth Maul has some tasteful cuts face framing cuts all over his beautiful face. He's good.
Xhafer:Made it.
Beth:He made it.
Xhafer:I don't know about you, Laura. Beth and I are watching the Blu ray release at the moment. But the theme song has finally changed. Did it? change for you?
Laura:I didn't notice.
Xhafer:Okay, so the theme song we've had for the last 12 episodes has been kind of like tribal drumming like, like with some coral. And this one is similar instrumentation, but a completely different song. And this is like the iconic Battlestar Galactica theme. When I think of the Battlestar Galactica theme, this is the song I think about. I forgot it had another theme because this had just replaced it in my brain meats. I personally very excited.
Laura:Huh. Man. I guess I'm going to have to go back and watch my, like, compare the two themes from part one and part two, because I didn't notice anything.
Beth:This one has a lot of like, you know, in it
Laura:Yeah.
Beth:guttural.
Laura:it could be. We're also watching just, like, a Purchased iTunes version, I think. So hopefully it's not that they did something horrible to
Xhafer:Yeah. I mean, it could just be the, the, what we happen to be watching. They changed it for this episode. It's weird to change it before the season break, I would think, but you know, whatever. I'm not, I'm not making TV. I,
Beth:fan of it. It's
Laura:Yeah. Yeah. I don't think Steve Jobs really wants, people talking about the sentient machines too much. That would I
Beth:like, I feel like we all as a people now know better than to give the robots we make do things for us super strength. Maybe we don't do that anymore.
Xhafer:I really want a lot of people. in my industry in particular to watch this show again.
Laura:Right?
Xhafer:important for them to do so.
Laura:Oh guys, the other day, my statistics professor, you know, you're in statistics, eventually like machine learning is going to come up, right? So he's just kind of talking and he's, he's a math guy, right? So he's not the most structured person in the world. Like sometimes he's just a free form flow of stream of consciousness guy. And he starts talking about how people aren't really thinking. About how, if, you know, machines replace too many jobs, what's going to happen? And I'm sitting there like, I just really want to, like, I think people have thought about that if you read enough science fiction. And I believe that he does, but he's, he's thinking of, you know, like the
Xhafer:people who should be making the decisions. Yeah,
Laura:yeah, yeah, yeah.
Xhafer:every post I see on LinkedIn that talks about AI coming in and doesn't talk about UBI in the same breath is a fucking travesty.
Laura:yeah, yeah. And you know, I've been off of the social media a little bit too. I've popped into Facebook here and again every now and again just to check on my friends that I love and I'll be scrolling through the feed and there's like AI videos again that people are sharing and they cannot tell that it's ai. And I'm like, oh,
Xhafer:Yeah, AI literacy, digital literacy is So important that you don't get trapped by Cylons. Speaking of getting trapped by Cylons, after theme, we go to Caprica Yellow. It's day 51, where Sharon has brought Hilo to the Delphi museum because he wants way off of Caprica and she says, well, yes, this is where the arrow of Apollo is. At this moment, I had to pause. And just appreciate, air quotes, the plan. So at the start of every episode, the Cylon's like, Oh, you know, they're doing the thing and they have a plan,
Laura:you have a plan?
Xhafer:Right, it's the thing that they say constantly. right now, the Cylons clearly know about the fleet. The fleet is at Kobol, or knows the location of Kobol. To the point where Sharon knows someone would be coming for the arrow. She must have known that. A month ago, when she started to drag Hilo's ass up there. That they were going in the right ish direction, or that they would find Kobol. To get him there in time. It also explains why they didn't nuke the shit out of this giant military installation that's right next to it. Right?
Laura:yeah. Uhhuh.
Xhafer:Cause they talk about how Delphi is like this giant military installation city. Right? It's Fort whatever, it's all military. And why wouldn't you nuke that immediately? Well, because that's where the arrow is. So, this has been known quantity for at least a month. It stands to reason that everything that we see in this episode is part of the plan. I don't want to say too much more without, because I don't want to say anything I shouldn't. I'm wondering how much of this is me constructing it in my brain. And seeing all the pieces of line, all the math is floating around my head, and how much of it is, like, known to you as a first time viewer, Laura?
Laura:hmm. I guess I hadn't really thought about. Where they were going and that Sharon would have a night. Hmm. So, With the Cylons winding up at Kobol,
Xhafer:Yeah.
Laura:didn't really think they wanted anything out of Kobol. I thought they just were like, ah, fleet here, time to deal with them. And, If they also want the arrow and to take it to the place and do the thing, What do they want from Earth? They, they want to go to Earth too?
Xhafer:if, they wanted to do that, it stands to reason they know where the arrow is, they know where Cobol is, they would have done it.
Laura:Right.
Beth:I think they were just, like, trying to prevent the hoomans from taking the arrow and doing the thing. That's how I interpreted it.
Laura:Yeah, Sharon could just be going there to like, take the arrow.
Beth:yeah. And deliver it, or something.
Laura:or, I mean, she could be genuine about how she feels about Hilo. And we're just trying to get Hilo somewhere we, she, okay, she doesn't have to know that Well, I was gonna say, she doesn't have to know that they're coming, trying to go to, look at Ja'far, he's doing a little dance in his seat. But she knows, like, we're not nuking Delphi because this arrow is there. But she could, she could just not give a shit about the arrow, but then why don't the Cylons just nuke the arrow if they don't give a shit?
Beth:cause maybe it was like a whole prophecy thing. And then like,
Laura:The Cylons know prophecy.
Beth:they do,
Laura:I mean, bin was just quoting chapter and verse at us.
Beth:yeah. Spitting those verses,
Laura:yeah.
Beth:but like, I don't know. Maybe this all had to happen.
Xhafer:Have they said what the purpose of the Yeah, we know what the purpose of the arrow is. The purpose of the arrow is to find Earth. Right?
Beth:You do the thing and then you
Laura:You take it to Athena's whatever or something, and
Beth:Athena's underground cavern. that sounds like a porn. I'm so sorry.
Xhafer:A month ago, Leoben told Starbuck she was gonna retrieve the arrow and point to Earth. He said those things to her. It's like, you're gonna, you're gonna point the way, you're gonna get the, you're gonna use the arrow, you're gonna, you're gonna find Earth. He said those things. I don't think he specified what arrow, and it was kind of more ambiguous then. Clearly, part of the plan.
Laura:yeah. Is this a forced evolution thing, like the shadows like. The Cylons have this plan to make humanity do what they want, which presumably is
Xhafer:it is revealed exactly what is happening here. I don't know if they come out and say it exactly, like, this is why you had to do this, this is why this was the plan, um, but the goal is kind of found out at a certain point and why the goal is important is kind of found out at a certain point.
Laura:Hmm.
Xhafer:So I don't want to, like, play my cards, I don't want to ruin shit, because, I mean, I would have to start talking about, like, season four stuff here.
Laura:Oh
Xhafer:Um, so we're not gonna, we're not gonna do that. If it was a couple episodes or something, I'd just say so, but, I just was curious because like going back and rewatching this show and I, I talked about this in spoiler town in our discord, get in the discord. and if you want to talk spoilies over there, you can. You just have to ask to join the spoiler channel because it is hidden explicitly from Laura
Laura:From. Me.
Xhafer:and anyone else who doesn't want to see it. Um, but I had to change discord admin rules and stuff so that Laura couldn't see it. Um, we're talking about it over there. Um, became really apparent to me how well written. Like, I mean, obviously this show's well written. Like, and when we see stuff like Baltar having two conversations at the same time, it's like, oh yeah, this show's really well written. But this kind of plotting, this kind of, like, even if it wasn't all 100 percent figured out, which we know it wasn't at this point, Like, just knowing what happens, and either being a good enough storyteller to plant enough seeds to harvest later, or being good enough at connecting dots to make things that were not important, important later. I just really fucking am appreciating the shit out of it in this moment, in this episode.
Beth:So, I'm realizing something as you're talking. Two things. One is unrelated, and that is that Ellen is kind of like early 2000s that, like, Big tall vampire lady from Resident Evil. Like, I feel like there's the same kind of energy like, happening. Like, yeah, but two, Y'all, I don't think I watched up to season four. Of this show.
Laura:So you're going to be watching first time with
Beth:Yeah. Cause like, high school hit, and then it was like, AP classes, getting ready for our auditions, like doing all this stuff, so I didn't have time for TV.
Laura:Yep. That's totally why I never finished Voyager. Well, I have finished it now, but like, when it was
Beth:But like, when it was on, exactly, yeah, no I get that. Yeah.
Laura:no, it was actually shockingly recent that I finished, finished Voyager, so.
Beth:Ooh! But you finished it, and that's
Laura:Yeah. It was really, guys, when it came down to it, when I did the rewatch, it was really only, like, maybe the last half of season seven that I hadn't seen. Maybe not even half. Maybe it was even a quarter. It was very little. I was like, why did I not do this earlier?
Xhafer:I could have known that they got rid of Neelix forever ago.
Laura:it's like the third to last episode or something. But yeah, I had never seen it. It was weird. All We, uh, we made it to Delphi and on Galactica, Adama and Ty are discussing Starbuck and they call it Rosalyn. And, uh, she admits to her coercion. I don't know if it's coercion. She didn't lie to her, but strategic of the truth is also a form of coercion. and she says her obligation to the fleet outweighs her respect for the military, and Adama goes nuts.
Xhafer:Yeah, he threatens to terminate her presidency. The whole deal and just like we're sending people over and she's all like, oh, well, you know, that's great news for the, you know, the whole fleet because the whole press corps is here listening to this conversation right now. He's just like motherfucker and slams the phone down. He's so mad.
Beth:there are not a whole lot of people left, right?
Laura:47 something thousand.
Beth:yeah, it's on the board. like, I don't know, does the press matter that much when, well? I guess they'd matter more, because there are fewer people. I don't really know how that would work.
Laura:This is hard to make jokey jokes about.
Beth:I know.
Xhafer:Yeah.
Laura:For reasons.
Beth:She said, Oh, you're doing a coup and I got clammy and my chest got tight. I did
Laura:Yeah. Suddenly I saw people with tiki torches on the capitol steps or
Beth:Yeah, dude with bison horns. I don't know.
Laura:Uh
Xhafer:So he hangs up. And Adama is just like, the first thing he says is if she can turn Starbuck against us, she can do anything. And I'm just all like, bro, you are the one who fucked that up. You are the one who lied to her. You are the one who could have just been up front and been honest and been all like, no, we don't know where Earth is. And she would have been real back with you. She's been so, so the president's asking me to do this thing. I kind of want to fucking do it like, and maybe she even convinces him. You know,
Beth:And like, high key though, like, out of the two of them, Adama should have known better, because Rosalind doesn't know Starbuck that well. Like, Adama has known Starbuck for longer, and in all sorts of
Laura:She's his daughter. I mean, practically.
Beth:Yeah, exactly. So you're gonna know how somebody you know that well is going to take you lying to them like that.
Laura:Yup.
Beth:And, like, he did it anyway, so, like, this whole thing is on him. Like, better, bro.
Laura:Yeah, I, did alignments in the last episode. We haven't got to hear that yet, but I had pegged Adama as just like a true neutral. And as this episode is like going on, I'm like, Oh no, I don't know anymore. Oh, did I mess that up real bad? Uh
Xhafer:I'm just like uh, I don't know when we were doing that. It's all like, I don't know what I can fucking say.
Laura:Well, this certainly doesn't seem super lawful, so I feel good about that. Yeah,
Beth:ultimately, he's chaotic good because, like, I believe that he believes that what he was doing was right. And he still belie and he believes that getting rid of the president is the correct thing to do for the people. That feels chaotic good to me, but,
Laura:don't know. We talked ourselves into it, I
Xhafer:he took, the only thing that hypothetically would have been able to nuke that base star and get away with it. Which is, when you're talking about that, you're not talking even necessarily about nuking that base star. This is something that you're probably going to have to do a number of times. And to throw it away, like, it is the most important military asset that they have. That raider is arguably more important than any other ship outside of the fuel refiner and Galactica itself. So,
Laura:so he's gonna strike Colonial One.
Xhafer:Yeah, he decides that uh, this has gotta go. So while Lee and Ty start planning things, Adama goes to ask Boomer to go on a suicide mission to nuke the base star.
Laura:Why would she take that, you think?
Xhafer:Wow. He knows what he's doing here.
Laura:Yeah, I guess he doesn't even have to know about the Cylon thing, does he? To get what he wants out of this.
Xhafer:I mean, he doesn't.
Beth:You
Xhafer:has successfully jumped to Kobol. Transponder works as hoped. She approaches the planet. As Sharon tells Helo, she has real feelings for him. She has real feelings in general. He is unwavering in his fuck off toaster. And that's when she tells him She's pregnant.
Laura:The P Bomb. Oh my god. Uh, So, hmm, okay.
Xhafer:called this a couple episodes ago.
Laura:Yes. Yeah. I picked up on the very subtle, like, I'm throwing up all the time signals. Yeah, the quotation marks are key there. Uh, Now I'm doing mental math in my head. It's been 51 days.
Xhafer:Yep.
Laura:How many weeks is that?
Xhafer:I would say it's been maybe a month since they fucked. I feel like that was like
Laura:You don't stop throwing up that early. Well, I guess if you're a Cylon, it's whatever,
Xhafer:I mean, yeah, she can also run for days, so, you know.
Laura:Okay. All right. I don't, I know nothing about their physiology. I will allow this to slide.
Beth:yeah, I don't really get how that works cuz aren't they robot? Is it a robot? Baby?
Laura:I mean, they're meat robots, so
Beth:Haaaaa.
Laura:This is why I'm, I'm, like, barking up the forced evolution tree, right? Because it seems like the Cylons want to do this, because it seemed like Six and Doryl were really pushing Sharon to get pregnant and have babies with Hilo. And so I'm like, are you trying to evolve the human race and use them to expand your genetic material so you have more than just 12 models of Cylon or something? I don't know!
Xhafer:I mean, 6PT calls it the next phase of life, I think,
Laura:Yeah.
Beth:Yeah.
Xhafer:the baby in the opera house later in the episode, so.
Beth:So Baby in the Opera House is very, is a very good name for Mountain Goat's album. So if the Mountain Goat's, if John Darnielle listens to this podcast, first of all, oh my God, you've made it. And second of all, there you go, there's your album title.
Laura:Freebie.
Xhafer:would love the shit out of a Mountain Goat's Battlestar Galactica album. There's that guy on TikTok who does songs and, like, that aren't Mountain Goat songs in the style of the Mountain Goat, so he makes Mountain Goat songs about random things. Please, Battlestar Galactica, guy on TikTok whose name I don't know.
Laura:Yeah, hmm. This is all very juicy. We love a gossip storyline. Okay.
Xhafer:Boomer and Racetrack jump to Cobalt as Lee and the Strike Team approach Colonial One. Rosalyn urges her staff to go hang out with the civvies just in case, but Billy leads the refusal. They will all stand with their president. I am Spartacus.
Laura:I was so disappointed in Lee throughout this. I was like, why is he going along with this? What the fuck?
Xhafer:Well, exactly for the reason why, based off his actions later, that's exactly why he's there. He knows what he's
Laura:Yeah, Yeah, I, I was worried for a moment. I was like, did we just take all of our characters and throw everything out the window? But we didn't. So Starbuck arrives at the Delphi Museum. She uh, takes her anti radiation meds, just a quick, uh,
Xhafer:her right away.
Laura:you know,
Xhafer:She begins to search for the arrow as Boomer and Racetrack find out, rather dramatically, that their transponder works as well.
Laura:yeah. Not even visual, like, identification, I guess, from the raiders flying all around. Or, they know what's up, but they don't care, cause it's all part of the plan.
Xhafer:Mm hmm. I mean, we didn't see Starbuck take eyeballs out of that Cylon radar, so.
Laura:Yeah. I mean, you would think there would be something like bouncing some kind of waves off of stuff and going, hmm, that ain't the right shape.
Xhafer:Yeah. One would
Laura:Whether or not it has eyeballs.
Beth:They're basically just orcas in space. Space orcas. Exactly.
Laura:Orgas are deadly. We know that. Yeah.
Beth:And they use echolocation. I don't know, maybe Cylons are into shark liver? Maybe there's also that similarity? We don't really know.
Xhafer:I'm just glad we've got space whales, even if they're not how I anticipated. Over on Cobol, Crashdown is the ranking officer, but TRL has real Miles O'Brien vibes when he's just all like Can we stop being stupid and maybe take cover? Like, guys, we're being dumb. I'm, I'm not the ranking officer, but I am probably the most experienced officer here.
Laura:I feel kind of bad for Tyrell because he's clearly got his head on his shoulders. But Crashdown is in charge for reasons and I feel like that's going to come up later.
Xhafer:Yes. Yeah, Crashdown, he's trying, but this really isn't, this isn't his wheelhouse.
Laura:Yeah, I mean, even when we've seen him before, he's been with Boomer in their little raptor and she's kind of been a little bit bossy, I think. Like, she was in charge of him, it seemed like. So, eh,
Xhafer:Speaking of Boomer, the nuke's release clamp fails. So Boomer and Racetrack decide they're going to dock in the Cylon Base Star in hopes of finding a place to land, manually release the nuke, and then get the fuck out.
Laura:yeah. Racetrack is not as comfortable with this idea as Boomer is for also reasons. Boomer's ready. Racetrack not so much.
Beth:I wonder why? What?
Laura:Yes.
Beth:of poking of the, the meat.
Laura:Yeah.
Beth:When they land there's, there's meat poking. That's very uncomfortable.
Laura:Yeah, I was wondering why this ship needed to be so meaty looking inside. And then I kind of had a moment where I was like, Oh, it's very Babylon 5 nostalgic because we definitely had meaty ships in Babylon 5. Sticky gooey things with like phlegm.
Xhafer:I mean, none of the RoBits are RoBitty. Which is, you know, it's consistent at least.
Beth:I love this and I'm not at all viscerally.
Laura:Well, speaking of things that don't viscerally freak me out, uh, Gaius is hallucinating 6PT again on Cobalt's surface.
Xhafer:hmm.
Beth:But she's got a different dress. It's very cute, very cute paneling happening. Just
Laura:white now, yes,
Beth:a fashion moment we're experiencing. I like the organic with the inorganic fabric. I wonder why that was the costuming choice for this scene and possibly a later review in the episode.
Laura:Yeah, she asks him in this scene to save her life, too. And he stands and she leads him towards some ruins. And this whole time I'm like, are they, are they really going or is he still like, just hallucinating?
Beth:And the color grading. Right. And then there's also the weird color grading that's happening the entire time. Like, it's so distractingly weird. It's like the whole planet is radioactive, which, you know, but like,
Laura:It seems to indicate imagination rather than actual reality at this point. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so on Colonial One, the President's staff is loading their weapons while our priestess is praying.
Xhafer:Billy and Dee play telephone for Adama and Rosalyn. fun, seeing them, like, trying to be all like I want to say be safe, but also, like, my boss is right here.
Laura:Uh huh. And they're like saying the official things, but then they're going, God, this isn't really happening, is it? Like, what the fuck?
Xhafer:Same. Done a lot of that the last two months.
Laura:Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's very cute and sad and well written. So good job, Ronald D. Mm
Xhafer:truly,
Beth:there were parts that just felt like sci fi West Wing y, almost, and this was one of them.
Laura:Yeah, yeah, for real. Back on Caprica, hey, we have like three different place settings in this episode. That's a new thing. It's been either like Galactica, or a ship, and Caprica, that's it. But now we've got two planets. So, on Caprica, Starbuck has found the arrow. And this is obviously too early in this whole thing for this to just go according to plan. Yeah.
Xhafer:Boomer gets out of the ship to take the payload off the rack and arm it. And this is when Bear McCreary fuckin earns his paycheck. The music in this montage is so fuckin good.
Beth:You also have a Big Ol Crush on Bear McCreary.
Xhafer:He's so
Laura:I mean, me too! I've been listening to the Season 1 Battlestar Galactica soundtrack as like, study music, but I've been very careful not to look at the titles of things, just in case.
Xhafer:Yeah.
Laura:You know? I feel like there could be like, major spoiler as a title on the soundtrack. It could
Xhafer:Yeah, like, blank reveal the Cylon is like a track title, and you're just like, fuck!
Beth:This character's DEATH. You know, just like,
Laura:Uh huh. Uh huh. And I didn't go into the later seasons out of, also, that same fear.
Xhafer:Good call. yeah, so we cut between Six and Starbuck, Marines moving in on Colonial One. They make their way, and there's a standoff between some Marines and Secret Service. Rosalind is just staring Lee down. This whole
Laura:yeah.
Xhafer:And this is when Boomer starts to wander off to a room of weirdly naked
Laura:think she wanders off, right? She's just like, walking around her ship, very close by, and they all like, come
Xhafer:So, Racetrack, like, watches her walk away for a minute. And is like, where are you going? Like, she comments on it.
Laura:Yeah.
Xhafer:And then, so that's when all the Sharons show up, and then in a couple of scenes, we see Boomer surrounded by the naked Sharons next to the Raptor. And I'm like, where the fuck is the window Racetrack was just looking out of?
Laura:Yeah. I feel, I feel like it's like, the window clearly has blind spots, right? And so she walks not that far, but out of the, the, you know, peripheral that you can
Xhafer:Yeah. There's the front window and a side window.
Laura:Yeah, she's just right next to the ship the whole time and all these naked Sharons are just out of racetrack view. Hahaha!
Beth:are they naked? It makes no sense. It makes no sense for them to be naked. What the fuck? AGHHHHHHHHHHHH
Xhafer:Yeah.
Beth:That is a super weird spot to put the male gaze, like, even for the male gaze.
Laura:It's not enough just to have robots in your show. You have to have sexy naked lady robots. Yeah, yeah. Hahaha!
Beth:bodies, just swishing together, doing the sex.
Xhafer:The writer's room is like, So, glowing red spines while fucking? Yeah! So, room of naked Sherins? Let's fucking do it! Just like, they are like a 90's energy drink ad of energy about
Laura:Yeah,
Beth:In fact, they all shotgunned at power thirst before writing this scene.
Laura:Was this one of those times that they were, like, just, doing coke in the writer's room? I don't know. Oh,
Beth:Oh, for sure, this was the early 2000s. Though honestly, if they really wanted to, like, male gaze it up, they could've, like, made Boomer's spine glow red when she was looking at all the naked Sharons. Just really make everyone uncomfortable. Just, just really, yeah.
Laura:A whole bunch of naked me's. Suddenly I'm aroused.
Beth:Exactly, like, really, just let the cocaine take the wheel. Fuck you, Jesus, cocaine is taking the wheel this time,
Xhafer:So, uh, Six
Laura:Oh, also, they all love her. I need to say that.
Xhafer:Oh yeah, oh yeah, they're weirdly touching her face and stuff.
Laura:They're like, we love you, Sharon.
Beth:It was very Furby esque.
Xhafer:It was, it was so much.
Laura:I don't even know if that was here. I just glanced down at my notes and they're like, they love her and they always will. Oh, anyway. Okay. Jafir, take us back. Take us back to the
Xhafer:Six kicks Starbuck's ass as Hilo rolls in, but Starbuck turns Six into a fall pad just in time for Hilo to see it. Over on Caprica 1, Lee has had enough, says we want to, we aren't doing this. Ty insists, so Lee pulls his gun on the XO, and that's when Rosalind surrenders to avoid bloodshed and orders everyone to put their guns
Laura:No guns, no
Xhafer:the fuck are they doing? This is like a commercial liner. You see space from the window surrounding them. This is the worst place to bring a gun or fire a gun in the fleet. It is a tiny metal tube. This is so fucking stupid.
Beth:Because they took down all the, Stop! Warning! No gun in tube? Besides, it's got a frowny face kitten. Next to it. It's a cartoon kitten. It looks really sad.
Laura:Yeah, yeah. But if no guns are allowed in tube, and I'm the person who brings the gun in tube, am I the strongest person in tube?
Xhafer:got guns! We see
Laura:Why does everyone have guns! in tube, Yeah,
Beth:Yeah, everybody guns in tube.
Xhafer:There's a litany of guns in this tube.
Laura:yeah, even her people were loading up their guns in tube, yeah,
Beth:It's true. Hella guns in tube, if you will.
Xhafer:I mean, Rosalind's like, I don't want bloodshed, but also like, if one of you fires this fucking gun, we're all gonna fucking die. Please stop.
Laura:It's just gonna be a standoff forever, if everyone is smart, which I, mm, mm,
Xhafer:and Rosalind are arrested.
Laura:yeah.
Xhafer:at this point, we cut over to Boomer. Oh, we already did this bit. Yep.
Laura:the Sharons love her. I did skip ahead, but I couldn't stop.
Beth:I do have an important question. so, in Babylon 5, there was space cocaine. Or space speed, yes.
Laura:hmm.
Beth:Um,
Laura:it. made you a telepath.
Beth:That's dumb. They should have done better.
Xhafer:Duuuust. You can't say it like the word dust. It's pronounced
Beth:I'm not doing that. This is not the 90s. We're not doing an extreme hair gel commercial. Um, but is there space, speed, slash cocaine? In Battlestar Galactica? Because if so, there sh definitely shouldn't be guns in tube.
Xhafer:Yeah, they've got stims that they give the pilots in 33 to keep them awake for the rotations. So there's definitely, there's definitely space speed. Maybe it's space
Beth:Okay. Okay.
Laura:I wonder if that will come up later. It feels like it should, but it may not. Who knows.
Xhafer:Yeah, we need our Walkabout episode, but before we get there,
Laura:Eh.
Xhafer:gotta get addicted to stims. Uh, if I had to pick a character, Lee, it seems, it seems, the most appropriational, which is really what I'm looking for when a sci fi series does this. So
Beth:I mean, Lee does have the most baby girl energy out of all the characters. Cause, cause part of being baby girl is you are concerned. About them all the time and I am genuinely concerned about Lee all the time.
Laura:hmm.
Beth:that makes sense
Laura:I bet, I bet we'll have different answers throughout the show. That'll be fun, too. Just periodically, we're like, okay, who's
Xhafer:Nick, next time, yum yums on, we gotta be all like, who's going on walkabout. I want your distinctly Australian opinion on this.
Laura:the most, uh, qualified opinion.
Xhafer:Hundred percent. Hilo gets Starbuck up here, and she sees Sharon, puts two and two together, IMMEDIATELY, and just opens fire.
Laura:Yeah, Starbucks got a little bit more context than poor Hilo did.
Xhafer:Yeah. And he's all like, no, you can't kill her. She's pregnant, and Starbuck has this, like, look of confusion, turned to, like, mortified, turned to rage, turned to weeping.
Laura:Yeah.
Beth:and like honestly Give Katie Sackhoff a fucking Emmy already. I know this show came out several years ago we don't have to go into how many years and Give her the Emmy now, fuck it.
Laura:Stop it, Shafir. Stop that.
Beth:That was so inappropriate and so rude.
Xhafer:the math with my hands, listener. It's, sorry, I know it's an audio format, so, we lose that sometimes.
Laura:we were so obsessed with how much the Sharons love each other on the ship that we didn't, we glossed totally right over the fact that as they're leaving, Boomer is leaving and doing her thing, one of the Sharons comes up and like caresses the nuclear bomb and sees that, oh, Hmm. Probably can't stop this. And then the whole Bay Star explodes. But the way she like touches the bomb is also hysterical to me.
Xhafer:For sure. It's just so fucking weird.
Laura:All the cys are like when they're, when they're in their most silent, it feels like they're hypersexualized,
Beth:Yeah. And that bomb was pretty phallically shaped, man. Like,
Laura:Like most bombs. Yes.
Beth:most bombs.
Xhafer:so we get Gaius, we see this great landscape, and then we uh, go over to the he finds himself mentally transported to the Opera House on Kobol. And if you're like, hey, this place kind of looks familiar, that's because this is the Orpheum Theatre in Vancouver, and it's in like, a billion y things. Um,
Laura:Aww, I love that for them.
Xhafer:I mean, this was one of the first shows that was really, when like, the Vancouver film scene was like exploding. This was one of the big shows that was taken advantage of it. But before that, Highlander the series was filmed in Vancouver, in the 90s. So that has a scene here. Fringe was filmed in Vancouver. That has a scene here. Um, and there's a bunch of stuff. It's, iconic place. The Orpheum Theater. I really want to go see something there at some point. Just for nostalgia and nerd stuff. but our characters approach and in the center of the stage, a crib, a baby girl,
Laura:Uh, What?
Beth:She's just like, Hello, welcome to Opera House! Is Baby.
Laura:Yeah. A new member of our family. You and me, Gaius.
Xhafer:baby.
Laura:of our family. Uh, Okay. I really want that to be explained in the next episode, but I bet it's not.
Xhafer:It's totally not! I haven't even watched it. Don't fucking worry about it. I can tell you that you've got a while on that
Laura:I was going to say, this feels like one of those, it's going to be a minute, isn't it?
Xhafer:This is,
Laura:need to know.
Xhafer:this is planting a seed for significantly later.
Laura:It is so hard not to Google stuff after the show sometimes, you guys,
Xhafer:I google stuff all the fucking time to remember stuff, so I understand.
Laura:I, sometimes I just like, I needed to explain it to me, but it's like, no, this is what probably what the writers intended for you to not understand. And you do get to watch it faster than the whole universe did when it came out. So you should just chill, but it's hard.
Xhafer:audience appreciates your strength.
Laura:Thank you. Thank you, listeners.
Beth:am also experiencing the clenched butthole timeline of things, um, because I didn't want you to have to clench on your own. So I too am resisting the urge to Google stuff, even stuff I have an inkling. Of remembering I'm not Googling. I will clench my butthole along with you. We have, we are in butthole harmony
Xhafer:Uh, Rosalyn gets locked up in the brig. Lee's in handcuffs in CIC. Adama makes a point of being so proud of Boomer in Racetrack. That if there were comments, he would have tagged Lee in them.
Laura:Yeah, yeah, he speeches to Boomer, but at Lee.
Xhafer:for sure. It's like, so great of you to follow through on your mission, and follow orders exactly to the letter, and do everything that I asked of you. I'm so fucking proud,
Laura:Dad's proud of one of you.
Beth:steady, so proud of how you didn't let your emotions cloud your judgment. Boomer. While looking at Lee,
Xhafer:Daddy Adama only loves the children who listen to me and not their own judgment, yes.
Beth:obedience is the only way to earn daddy's love.
Xhafer:Daddy's so proud of you.
Laura:don't know how I feel about Daddy Adama anymore, guys,
Beth:Come, let daddy swaddle you in his bosom of pride. Only the pride, only daddy's pride bosom for his Good kids.
Laura:I'm going to go ahead and take a second here, Aaron, to nominate Daddy's Pride Buzz around the title.
Xhafer:Like, we're both, Beth and I are muted because we're recording in the same room. We've just been cracking up for like a minute and a half over here.
Beth:Most of our relationship is just trying to make the other person uncomfortable. That is how we express love.
Xhafer:We do it quite often. We've gotten rather good at it. But, in the middle of this speech here things move very quickly. Boomer shoots Adama twice immediately, just like, pistol out, pop pop. He is sprawled out over the planning station in the center of CIC, his blood covering the white lit panels. As Leetai and Dee literally hold him together, Boomer realizes what she's done, and we get the pullout for the Christ pose that ends the episode and sends us. To our credits. Holy shit. guys.
Beth:Yeah. That was not accidental renaissance. That was very purposeful renaissance. Is
Laura:Uh huh.
Xhafer:For sure.
Laura:Yeah. Uh, We may have a little lurker in the audience at this moment, and I just want to tell him that that is when I sent you the holy fucking shit, guys, or whatever I sent to the Discord was sent. When I watched this episode, not part one.
Beth:Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. Holy shit.
Laura:Yeah,
Xhafer:That's the
Laura:So, yeah. And 6PT in part one had told Gaius that he didn't want to be on the ship when stuff happened. It was dangerous or whatever. While this is dangerous to Adama, I don't know how dangerous it is to Gaius, so it
Xhafer:president. He's the vice president. It's not about shooting Adama, it's about the coup.
Laura:Oh. Okay.
Xhafer:if you're
Laura:would be in a position.
Xhafer:gonna arrest the president That you don't want to be the vice president on the military ship when that shit goes down.
Laura:Hmm.
Xhafer:Yeah.
Laura:Okay. Okay. I was like, I don't see how that was I was thinking when she was talking about, you know, Oh, you don't want to be on the ship. Dangerous. Whatever. That there was an actual, like, bomb or something again. But, yeah, that would have been too easy. Too boring.
Xhafer:Too many bombs. So many bombs.
Beth:Too many bums. Too many bums. Too many bums. Too bums.
Laura:Too many bombs, but also, like, Oh, the coups are so hard. Ha ha.
Xhafer:think bombs might be Battlestar's version of the murder cold open.
Laura:ha. Yeah. Or the assassin cold open in Babylon 5.
Xhafer:Yeah. Alright, well, uh, that's the episode. As is our way, we will now rate this episode on a scale of one to ten. To 12 Colonies, Beth, as our guest, babe, I get to ask you first, what'd you think of this episode?
Beth:I'm gonna give it 12 out of 12 colonies and 12 out of 12 daddy's pride bosom as well. Um, I think that daddy Adama would be very proud of this episode. It had everything. It had, you know, in, This show is so fucking well written, alright? This is such a fucking well written show. Like, my god. And the cinematography, except for the weird color grading, is incredible. It's impeccable. Everything is thought out. Truly, the wardrobe, the costuming is always thought out. Too, there are little clues and everything. Ugh, it's so good. Okay, I'm done now.
Laura:Yeah, I definitely didn't want most of the things that happened in this episode to happen, but god dang they were good. So I gotta give it a 12 too. Like, this was good. Yup.
Xhafer:Yeah, I'm gonna, so, we, we, the scales tipped one way, I'm gonna tip the scale the other way. So we've, we've done 13 out of 12 for Earth. Um, I guess Kobol would be zero? That's not the case though, I want it to wrap back around. Um, so in recognition of that I guess this is a 13 out of 12 for me, for Kobol. Fuckin great fuckin episode. So fucking good.
Laura:Yup. I, I hate all of the stuff that's happened to our characters here. I don't like Rosalind in jail. I don't like Lee also arrested, which probably worse somehow. I don't like his dad being shot. I don't like Gaius and doing weird shit on Cobalt. I don't want that for them. I want better things for these people and they're not getting it. I'm so sad. But also very compelled, and I can't wait till the next episode.
Xhafer:So with all of that said, Next week, we're not back. we're Yeah, we've got, well, we've got a season break. We're gonna have a couple weeks off, as is our way. It will not be the length of time between seasons 1 and 2 of Battlestar Galactica. It will just be a couple of weeks. But we like to take a couple of weeks off. If you're new to the podcast, you weren't here for our Babylon 5 coverage, Every season, we take a couple weeks off, a little rest, a little recharge for us, lets us build up a little bit of runway. Uh, So that way, yeah, we can do things like fuck off to Malta for a couple of weeks without having to worry about recording podcasts. That's just uh, the way we do things around here on WhoRU. So, we'll be doing that, we'll be off for a couple of weeks. We'll be back April 16th for Season 2, Episode 1. Scattered. Ben is going to be joining us from last time on.
Laura:Excellent.
Xhafer:forward to that, Ben. Classic podcast guest here on who are you? With Adama out of action, Colonel Tai takes his position as the commander of the Galactica, Boomer is in jail and the cat is out of the bag. She's a Cylon. It is quite possibly the worst episode description I've ever read because all it does is tell us stuff that happened in the episode we've already watched.
Laura:Yeah, that's, that's good. I like it
Xhafer:Yeah, I found that one. I didn't make that one.
Laura:Oh good, you didn't have to
Xhafer:I didn't have to, I did not change a word of it. But before we get there on April 16th, we have to leave you with a few things. Beth, why don't you tell them where they can find you?
Beth:So you can find me on Blue Sky under Beth Danger Powers. Um, that's basically it. Um, you can also listen to my podcast with Laura and Glow. Um, it's called Cool Girls Don't Look at Explosions. Um, we are also available in the Discord. Of this here network, What Happened Here Productions. and we have an email address. Coolgirlsgoboomatgmail. com
Laura:know how much unhinged laughing at Daddy Adama will stay in this episode, but if you like unhinged laughing at silly things, Cool Girls is gonna be your place. laughing
Beth:and misogyny.
Xhafer:I love your guys's podcast. I'm a, it's, it's hilarious. Every time I listen, I'm laughing. I listened to the most recent episode of, of our recording that aired was the uh, Stringfellow Dong one, which just completely deteriorated at one point into hysteria. It was fucking hilarious. I had it on, on the car ride home and that was like, I'm fine, I didn't get in an accident, but I should not have been driving while listening to that podcast. That's how funny that podcast is. So, go, go check it out.
Beth:Yeah!
Xhafer:and while you're checking stuff out, why don't you go ahead and check out Jeremy Siegel. Hey, Jeremy. JeremySiegel42. Bandcamp. com. Appreciate the hell out of you, buddy. Thanks so much for putting together our theme music. You can find more of Jeremy's work on the aforementioned Bandcamp website, where he's the only Jeremy Siegel that makes music, or on streaming services as Nuclear Jaguar. I
Laura:on Instagram for the podcast artwork, which I do believe I'm looking at. Yes, Traffair?
Xhafer:am wearing a Who Are You t shirt right now with our podcast logo on it. It was a test run. Um, we need to get that going and,
Laura:We'll talk. We'll talk stuff. Yeah.
Xhafer:So hopefully these will be available for people soon.
Laura:Yeah, because I
Beth:The fabric is, yeah, and the fabric is really soft and, and nice, and the quality's lovely. I haven't stolen it from him to wear yet, but I felt it, and it's real, it's real nice.
Xhafer:They're nice t shirts. I wanted to make sure before we literally put our names and faces on something that it was high quality. So had to do a test. Uh, yeah. Uh, Hey, Aaron, thanks so much for adding this podcast. Really appreciate you putting in the time and making a sound coherent and getting rid of all of our hysterical laughter. Uh, thanks so much. Maybe some, I don't, I wouldn't know how much he gets rid of to be perfectly honest, uh, but yeah.
Laura:A tasteful amount,
Xhafer:Oh,
Laura:Oh, well,
Xhafer:implicitly listener, to try and make the best of your week. We'll see you April 16th.
Laura:we could tell them if they just can't wait
Xhafer:Oh, yeah. Yeah, come to the Discord if you just can't wait. Hang out in the Discord. The Discord's a cool place. It's poppin
Laura:We would love to have you.
Xhafer:Love to have you there. Yeah. Alright, Bye, internet.
Laura:Bye.
Beth:Bye.