Another look at "Crossroads, pt. 2"

Okay, I'm a little more calm now :)

Adama & Roslin's telephone exchange at the beginning of the ep made me giggle. I wonder if she was turned on by him yelling at her. And though Anders & Tory getting together seemed out of left field, my initial "huh?" faded quickly. I think Seelix was surprised, though.

I really liked the use of "All Along the Watchtower." While not great, both versions [the Indian-style music our cylons kept hearing, and the version at the end] were done well enough. For your entertainment, I include here the lyrics to the original Bob Dylan version:

"There must be some way out of here," said the joker to the thief,
"There's too much confusion, I can't get no relief.
Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth,
None of them along the line know what any of it is worth."

"No reason to get excited," the thief, he kindly spoke,
"There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke.
But you and I, we've been through that, and this is not our fate,
So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late."

All along the watchtower, princes kept the view
While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too.

Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl,
Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl.

As to the choice of the song, I dunno. Some of the lyrics can pretty easily be used to reflect situations on the show, but such an analysis kind of makes me think of astrology - so many possibilities and so many vaguaries that could all be significant to something. One thing I will grab & run with is the line, "But you and I, we've been through that, and this is not our fate." Over & over we've been told this has all happened before and it will all happen again. Well, maybe this is the turn around the wheel when things change, when it won't all happen again, and the fates of these players is no longer a repeat of the same story. Heh, won't Leoban be surprised.

Compared to some of the other goings on, Baltar's not guilty verdict seems almost incidental. Lee's "testimony" clearly persuaded his father, but it left me disappointed & irritated. At the very least, I find it hard to buy that his speechifying would have been allowed in a trial. He was answering no question, addressing no specific factor in Baltar's case. He was using the stand to give the defense's closing argument, and my suspension of disbelief was stretched pretty fuckin' thin by the acquiescence of the prosecuting attorney and the judges. The verdict, otoh, was satisfactory. They only had two choices and either one could open the door to many different eventualities. I certainly liked the scene following the trial, in which Baltar parts company with his counsel. The smirks on Lee's & the attorney's faces were priceless. And now Baltar is on his way to a new life...as what? I wonder if the folks who hustled him away have anything to do with the peace-with-the-cylons group from season 2. We know some of them 'sploded when the nuke took out Cloud Nine at the end of last season, but we don't know anything about how many of them were on other ships. Unfortunately, that movement seems to be an element of the story that was dropped, even though it could have been well used this season, especially during the occupation of New Caprica.

Chief Tyrol, Saul Tigh, Roslin's aide Tory & Sam Anders all believe they are cylons. I believe it, too. I have to reiterate how cool Tigh is. His "Whoaaaa!" when he walked into the room with the others was great, and the speech he gave was his best ever. It's interesting that all four of them were active in the resistance. We have no reason to necessarily believe the final five are just like their brethren, and their differences could be pretty significant. Are they somehow guardians of the fleet, the reason the humans haven't been completely wiped out? They keep claiming the cylons have a plan, but we haven't been given much to show that - perhaps it's the final five who have the plan and it's to get the humans to Earth.

What is going on with Roslin/Athena/Caprica/Hera and their dreams? Is Hera experiencing these dreams the way the women are? What was Caprica referring to when she said that should be impossible, Hera being there? I'm guessing the Baltar that appeared in the last sequence was Caprica's head-Baltar. It seemed as though they were trying to take Hera to the final five, but why? I don't know what the hell's up with that.

Of course Starbuck is still around! It's not a long shot to guess that she's not the Starbuck we knew, and there are a few options for who that was in the viper. An intriguing idea is that Lee is a cylon and that the Starbuck who returned is in fact in his head. I loved that we actually saw Earth at the end of this ep. Of course, nothing's as simple as it looks, so at the least Starbuck's knowledge of how to get to Earth is anything but straightforward.

Regarding that two-hour special SciFi announced for the end of this year, Ron Moore said in an interview with Salon that it'll be about the Pegasus, before it met up with the Galactica. He doesn't say anything about Michelle Forbes [the actor who played Admiral Cain], but he does mention Cain, so I'm hoping we see her again. Though it'll be set in the past, he says the story will have relevance to season 4. Which brings me to an observation about believing anything anyone associated with the show says - we were told unequivocally multiple times that Katee Sackhoff would not be appearing in the last three episodes of season 3, and yet there she was. Liars.

There are other things floating around in my head, but they're going to stay there for now. I will end this ramble with a fantastic thing someone on the SciFi message board posted: "If I were a rich man I'd buy every cast and crew person a hooker!"

Fuck yeah!