Battlestar Galactica 4.20 “Daybreak, Pt. 2”
Written by Ronald Moore
Directed by Michael Rymer

Since this is a bookend, I went back and read my first few reviews of the series.  My review of the first part of the mini-series wasn't exactly glowing.  Clearly I was still wary of this remake.  I was an unapologetic fan of the original series and had series doubts about this new version.  By my second review that vanished.  I was convinced this was a good thing and my only real concern was that SCI FI (now being renamed Syfy?  WTF?) wouldn't have the good sense to greenlight a regular series.  My third review was out and out gushing for this brand new Sky One series.  That's right, it actually aired in Britain first.  You wonder why I doubted SCI FI's sanity?

Clearly the new series was a work of exceptional depth and quality that towered above its predecessor.  It kept a handful of elements from the original but they quickly took on a nostalgic feel rather than a sign of how good the original was.  Really it seems the only reason to re-watch the original is for nostalgia.  It seemed great at the time but now just looks shallow.  It's kind of like comparing Heath Ledger's Joker to Jack Nicholson's Joker.  The original was great but now seems fairly shallow and goofy.

The second coming of BSG is best described by its depth.  The major characters are all extremely well drawn and developed.  There isn't a simple predictable character in the bunch.  Every one has strengths and weaknesses, shifting senses of alliance, sacrifices and moments of selfishness.  But perhaps more impressively is the way the themes of the series constantly mirrored and commented on our world.  Not in simplistic platitudes but in ways that force debate and discussion.  Civil liberties, military power, religion, the nature of government, human frailty, mortality, terrorism, torture, gender issues, free will, destiny, evolution and identity were all issues tackled by the series and regularly handled with grace and intelligence.

Someone once asked me if the heavy presence of religion in the series bothered me as an atheist.  The answer is no.  And why should it?  Just because I don't believe in a god doesn't make the mention of one in a work of fiction offensive.  Considering the lengths BSG went with its social commentary, I think I'd be offended if it religion was excluded.  It wouldn't ring as true without it.

The reason I specifically mention the religion issue is that it forms the backbone of the finale.  If you haven't actually watched it yet, go away.  I'm not going to avoid spoilers here so consider yourself warned.  One of the longest running questions about the show concerns just what Baltar is seeing when he sees the Cylon in a red dress.  The #6 running amuck in his head has baffled us for years and with this episode, we finally get the answer.  She's an angel.  I think.  There's another angel that looks like Baltar and haunts the mind of Caprica Six as well.  And it turns out they know each other.  More on that later.

In this episode, Admiral Adama launches an assault on the Cylon colony, in a desperate bid to rescue Hera, who everyone believes is the key to the future of their species, although no one really seems to know why.  This results in a spectacular white knuckle battle sequence as Galactica embarks on her final military mission with suicidal intensity.  BSG doesn't spend a lot of time concerning itself with visual pyrotechnics, instead preferring to focus on character and story.  But when it does go for the eye candy, it does not disappoint.  Here we have a massive scale battle with everything on the line for humans and Cylons and it takes place in the accretion disc of a black hole.  Talk about going all out.

Hera is rescued and brought back to Galactica with Cylons in hot pursuit.  I love that old school Centurions got in on the action for this final battle.  Roslin's vision of the opera house comes into play here as she stumbles after Hera, along with Baltar, Caprica and Athena.  That vision finally resolves itself as they all arrive at CIC to find the final five waiting.  Joining the party is Cavil, who takes Hera hostage, forcing a standoff.  Baltar, of all people, talks him down, brokering an agreement in which the final five agree to give Cavil the secret of resurrection if he promises to forever leave the humans alone.  He agrees.  To do this, the final five have to do a mind meld thing in Anders' slime pool.  When this happens, Tyrol discovers that Tory killed his wife.  Enraged he breaks the meld and snaps her neck.  Cavil freaks out, assuming he's been double crossed.

Here we have a sudden intervention on the part of destiny.  Or maybe just dumb luck.  One of the Raptors, loaded with nukes, but out of control since it's crew was killed early in the battle, hits a big rock.  The pilot's dead hand slips, hits a button and fires the nukes.  They converge on the colony and things start to go seriously south for the Cylons.  Adama orders Starbuck to jump the Galactica but she doesn't know the coordinates for the rendezvous point.  So she finally pieces together the notes in her head since childhood, punches them into the computer and jumps.

Galactica reappears at a point unknown and quickly endures a heart wrenching collapse.  The old warhorse's back is broken.  She will never jump again.  That's probably the first time I've ever shed a tear for a spaceship.  But the mood quickly changes as we switch to an overhead view as she flies above a familiar grey cratered surface.  The camera tilts up to look past the moon and Galactica to the sight of Earth.  Not the nuked out Earth of the thirteenth colony but our Earth.  This wonderful shot made my breath catch in my throat for a moment.

Now, I've wondered since the miniseries about the nature of Earth in this show.  What sort of civilization would they find there?  And the answer was surprising (to me at least).  We head down to the surface to a majestic grassy plain, where our heroes are lying in the grass, peering through binoculars.  I'm dying to know.  What are they looking at?  The answer is primitive humans.  So primitive they have no language to speak of.  Finally we understand that this series occurs in our ancient past, by about 150,000 years.  Wow.

The humans then make a startling decision.  They are going to settle the planet and give away all their technology.  These primitive humans are genetically compatible.  The colonials will merge with them and start from scratch.  Hopefully they can avoid the mistakes that led to this cycle of destruction between humans and Cylons.  They start to scatter.  Tyrol goes off to be completely alone.  Adama takes Roslin to build that cabin they always talked about.  One she will sadly never live to see.  And Starbuck simply disappears.  What exactly she was remains a bit of a mystery.  All we know is that she knows her journey is at an end and it is time to go.  Anders flies the fleet into the sun.  Baltar and Caprica get ready to become farmers.  The last shot we see of this past is Hera, staring into the sky.

We then kick forward 150,000 years.  As we fly over New York City, a narrator tells about the discovery by archaeologists of the remains of a human skeleton that is the mitochondrial ancestor to all humanity, presumably Hera.  And walking through the city are the angels Baltar and Six.  They talk about commercialism and worry that the cycle may repeat itself anyway.  They talk of god's plan and Six points out that it doesn't like being called that.  And then we end on a montage of Japanese robots while Hendrix's version of “All Along the Watchtower” plays over it.

That is about as an epic an ending to a series as you can get.  A series that ends with the foundation of our very species and strong indications on the meddling of god in human events is definitely swinging for the fences.

Like everything in this series, the finale will be endlessly debatable.  Some will view it as an anti-technology screed.  Others will view it as clearly religious.  And I will try to take the nut position and disagree with both of those ideas.

First, the dancing robot ending.  I don't think the point was to say that technology is inherently evil and will lead to our doom.  More likely the point was allude to the creation of the Cylons but at the same time indicate that it isn't the technology that is the problem but the decisions that we as humans make.  Technology is just a tool.  It can be profoundly helpful or massively destructive.  What we do with it is what matters.  In the course of the series we've seen spectacular technology that literally creates life and makes immortality a possibility.  But controlling our baser instincts is far more important.  Cylons couldn't reproduce because they couldn't love.  The final five created the skinjobs to be as close to human as possible.  They recognized the importance of love over hate, a lesson the Centurions didn't seem to be able to learn.  Mostly the skinjobs failed as well but a couple turned the corner and thus found a way to reproduce.  It all comes down to human emotion.  It is what defines us and what doomed the Cylons who failed to understand it.

By showing us those dancing robots at the end, the message was that calling technology the problem is to miss the point.  Humanity rose to heights of astounding technology and then back to a completely primitive culture and back up the ladder.  It's not the machines that are the problem but the people using them.  So as Six and Baltar walk away, they wonder if we can learn from our mistakes.  Can we evolve beyond petty emotions and find peace?  No answer is forthcoming, which is appropriate since we don't know the answer ourselves.

Now, the question of religion is thornier.  Much of the series was a religious debate.  You had the monotheistic Cylons on one side and polytheistic humans on the other.  On an individual level there was the atheistic Adama heading the military and the religious Roslin leading the civilian government.  And of course, the angels.  They served continuously to try and guide humanity to follow god's plan.  Of course those pesky humans and Cylons had a tendency to swerve all over the place, paying little heed to the guides.  Free will and destiny were perpetually at odds.  In the end it seems like the humans were better followers and survived, while the Cylons mostly ended up dead.

But are we really talking about god here?  Yes, someone was guiding them to Earth.  But the series provides no evidence of a human creator.  Humans themselves were the creators of Cylons, who in turn created new types of Cylons.  What we see of humans is a species with a nasty tendency towards self destruction, which leads it to careen across the galaxy, rising and falling.  Someone is trying to guide them but not having a lot of success.  Every previous attempt at a human or Cylon civilization has failed.  The one that leads to “us” is a work in progress. 

The final comments by the “angels” are fairly enigmatic and force debate on the issue.  Their very presence can easily be taken as evidence for god but their words are less assuring.  Six talks of civilization repeating endlessly until some random variation forces a change that ends the cycle, sending civilization off on a new course.  That's a pretty decent analogy for evolution.  Couple that with the comment that what they have often described as god doesn't actually care to be called god and you have reason for pretty strong skepticism about the supernatural.  It could be that what we are talking about is a species so advanced as to appear god-like to humans who has taken an interest in seeing humanity evolve beyond its destructive tendencies.  I will admit my personal bias on this issue but that does seem to be where the signposts are pointing.

So, to conclude, I thought this was a brilliant ending.  It wasn't one of the awful series finales that tries to wrap everything into a happy schmaltzy ending.  It was thoughtful, epic and ambiguous.  Those are traits that easily describe the rest of the series.  And Battlestar Galactica is what I believe to be the best sci-fi series of all time.  And the finale was perfectly in character with such a series.  I will miss this series rather severely.  Hopefully the spin-off prequel series Caprica can approach its quality.

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