Caught in the Act

On last Thursday's Community, a furry little paw grabs Annie's purple pen:



A second later, it's gone:



Let's go to the video:

Also available in animated .gif format.

Screenshots From The Aerodynamics of Gender

I loved Abed's Terminator vision in last week's episode. Here are some screen shots:

Community's Episode Within an Episode

One of my favorite things about NBC's Community is the little jokes that it puts into the background. Last night they seem to have managed to squeeze an entire second episode into the background. Ostensibly about how the death of Pierce's mother brings all of Jeff's anxieties about his own mortality to the surface with a subplot about Britta and Annie's mutual competition and jealousy (as well as Shirley feeling left out by the two younger girls), it also includes at least six little ten to thirty second vignettes about a subplot with Abed helping a pregnant girl who goes into labor and catching a lot of grief from her hotheaded boyfriend.

1. Abed is seen in the background talking to a very agitated pregnant girl outside the study room. He touches her belly and places his head on it to listen to the baby.
   
   


2. Pregnant Girl follows Abed and grabs his arm as she looks around nervously while Britta in the foreground explains that the current Gulf oil spill is worse than 15 Exxon Valdez spills. When they are joined by a redheaded dude, the pregnant girl places herself in between Abed and the dude as some students laugh at Britta when one of them points out that "Nobody is on the other side of this issue."
   
   


3. Redheaded Dude takes issue with something that Abed says. He shoves Pregnant Girl out of the way, knocks a Slurpee out of Abed's hands and pushes him. Pregnant Girl grabs her belly and doesn't look well. Redheaded Dude tries to start a fight but Abed runs off. Pregnant Girl throws up a hand in disgust. All of this is going on behind Annie while she's talking about Pelicans.
   


4. Abed is sitting in the cafeteria talking to Pregnant Girl and Redheaded Dude as Ian joins Jeff for lunch in for foreground. Redheaded Dude shows some pretty angry body language. He gets up and tries to storm off but Pregnant Girl begins to have contractions. Abed and Redheaded Dude (the baby's father?) both help her limp away. She's clearly in labor at this point.
   
   


5. Pregnant Girl is seen behind an angry Shirley giving birth in a van. Abed has his back turned but it's clearly him assisting in the birth. Redheaded Dude is holding Pregnant Girl's hand.
   
   


6. Girl and Redheaded Dude are seen behind Shirley holding a new-born baby as Shirley asks Abed about his day.
   
   

The Good Guys—A Pleasant Summer Surprise

"I've got enough to worry about! I've got strip clubs. I've got champagne rooms and free buffets and an economy where clients are cutting back and they're sleeping with their wives again. Their wives!"

The ring leader from the latest episode of The Good Guys.

The Good Guys isn't the best show ever but it is a fun diversion at a time when network television is clogged with reruns, reality shows, and unwatchable garbage shows. An enjoyable mix of low-brow humor and 70s style buddy cop action, The Good Guys is as flat out fun.

The main appeal of the show is its villains which exude quirky desperation rather than the usual vaguely bland menace we've come to expect from more serious shows. With procedural cop shows, the bad guys tend to melt into the background in order help the show milk the mystery and keep the audience guessing until the very end. The Good Guys reverts to a much older formula where the identity of the bad guys is almost never in doubt. As a result, the show is free to imbue its villains with a quirky sensibility which makes them as enjoyable as the cops who chase them. This makes for a fun alternative for the grim, forensic porn which so many procedural cop shows seem to aspire to today.

Tracy Jordan's Non-sequitors in Emanuelle Goes to Dinosaur Land

[In the copy shop stairwell remembering his childhood.]

TRACY: It's all coming back to me! Oh my God!
I slept on an old dog bed stuffed with wigs!
I watched a prostitute stab a clown!
Our basketball hoop was a rib cage. A rib cage!

Why did you bring me here? I blocked all of this stuff out for a reason.

Oh lord! Some guy with dreads electrocuted my fish!

DOTCOM: Tray, use this pain to get your Oscar.

TRACY: I hate pain! I'm doing Garfield III and as soon as I make some copies of my passport I'm never coming back here! Move!

[On the movie set.]

Well, I'm sorry Sean and child actor whose name I can't remember. You haven't walked in my shoes. All my life I've tried to forget the things I've seen.

A crackhead breastfeeding a rat.
A homeless man cooking a Hot Pocket on the third rail of the "G Train." The G Train Nermel!
There's something inside of me that needs to come out! And if Garfield III: Feline Groovy can't tell my story, then I'll win my Oscar elsewhere. Or I'll die trying!

[Back in the stairwell.]

I've seen a blind guy bite a police horse!
A puppy committed suicide after he saw our bathroom!
I once bit into a burrito and there was a child's shoe in it!
I seen a hooker eat a tire!
A pack of wild dogs took over and successfully ran a Wendy's!
The sewer people stole my skateboard!
The project I lived in was named after Zachery Taylor, generally considered to be one of the worst presidents of all time!

I once saw a baby give another baby a tattoo! They were very drunk!

Community, the Best Comedy on Television

I can't stop watching Thursday's episode of Community. This show is really firing on all cylinders right now combining brilliant pop-culture parody with lovably weird characters. Set among a Spanish study group at Greendale Community College; a small, not very well regarded school; Community has created a surprisingly rich tapestry to tell its stories with even minor background characters like "Leonard" and "Starburns" getting their moments to shine. As for the main cast of characters, they all seem to be searching for either redemption or acceptance. Jeff, the disbarred lawyer; Pierce, the ex-CEO who has never really had or wanted friends until now; Britta, the embittered slacker; Shirley, the recent divorcée; Annie, the overachiever and former pill-popper; Troy, the immature dumb jock; Abed, the pop-culture loving kid who can't seem to connect with "normal" people—at times the show feels like Lost with robot jokes.

While Thursday's episode continues Abed's obsession with movies and TV, it also shows a strong emotional edge as Abed finally finds a way to connect with people by getting them to all speak the same language—"chicken." Abed's inability to express himself and connect to people has been a running theme all throughout the series. In the pilot Jeff speculates that he has Asperger Syndrome. Abed's father is constantly frustrated by his son's oddness and only comes to accept his behavior when he explains it through a movie that he makes. So while Abed does insist that he has "self-esteem coming out of my butt," he definitely has a serious problem dealing with other people. Thus when he gets his opportunity to relate to people through his control of Greendale's popular chicken finger snacks, Abed takes it and runs with it. But this connection is tenuous and it is easy for him to see that it will disappear when people get tired of the chicken fingers. That's an awful lot of character development to put into a half-hour show and still manage to squeeze in a brilliant mob-movie parody and a lesson for Jeff on the consequences of exploiting your friends for your own gain.

'Til Death—Directionless and Less Than the Sum of its Parts

'Til Death originally started out as a fairly generic Everybody Loves Raymond type of sitcom that got by on Brad Garrett's energy and some occasional wackiness by the supporting cast. Fast forward to the present and Garrett's energy is gone, the wackiness level is through the roof, and the show has gone from an overachiever to and underachiever.



'Til Death is probably the most self-aware sitcom on television right now with Eddie's son in law Doug having developed a "mental condition" where he believes that he is on a TV sitcom. As a result, the show trots out every sitcom cliche in hopes that it will somehow be fresh because they are winking at it. The trouble is that TV shows have been breaking the fourth wall for decades; so when 'Til Death does it, the winking self-awareness doesn't feel fresh.

That's not to say that the show doesn't work hard to be inventive. I'm currently watching an episode where the cast is dreaming of Doug and Ally's wedding filmed entirely as a series of cartoons. But ultimately, it all feels like the writers are throwing darts at the wall hoping that something will stick. And right now, not enough is sticking.

While the over the top performances by almost the entire supporting cast do guarantee the occasional laugh, this show used to get more laughs without trying half as hard as they do now. This raises the question of what happened and I think that the answer is that they've essentially taken their star, Brad Garrett, and turned him into a straight man. It reminds me of the "What Up With That?" skit on Saturday Night Live which is an interview show where there are so many ridulous distractions with singing and dancing that the host never gets around to interviewing his guests. At this point in its existence, 'Til Death is a lot like that skit. There is so much over the top silliness that there is little room for anyone to be consistently funny.

Best Barney Episode Ever!

I noticed this on Cracked. There is something so satisfying about seeing something like this after a long hard day. I just had to laugh.

Why People Pirate

It seems that Hulu will no longer be offering Season three of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. I suppose that's not a big deal for most people. Buffy is a ten-plus year-old show and most of its hardcore fans probably already have DVDs of it. But it does remind me of the big problem with web video.

It's unreliable. You depend on a website to stream video to you—video which can be pulled at any time for any number of reasons. For example if the studio which owns it wants more money.

Now compare that to a video sitting on your hard drive. Maybe you ripped it from your legally bought DVDs. Maybe you downloaded it illegally. Maybe you bought it legally through something like iTunes or Amazon Unbox. But the point is that the video is "yours" in the sense that it is on your computer and you can control it. (Now that's not necessarily true in the case of DRM encumbered video that you can buy legally but I think you get my point.) Video on the web can go "poof" at any time.

The movie and TV industries bitterly complain about piracy but it's largely a phenomenon of their own doing. Hulu largely exists because the TV industry wanted to have a place where they could stream their shows and maintain control of them, providing users with an alternative to piracy. And yet it is still hard to find complete series of many of Hulu's shows. And pulling shows doesn't help. (It's called "Video on Demand" not "Video When the Studios Feel Like Giving it to You.") The bottom line is that until people can rely on web video to always be there, they will be tempted to pirate movies and TV.

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised—But It Is Being Twittered

Image by Zoolcar9 via Flickr

Following the Iranian election on Twitter is turning into an addiction for me. Television reporting during the early hours of the story was pretty sporadic but people keep talking about it despite the Iranian governement's repeated attempts to tamp down on the it. I guess this is the future of news. People gossiping to each other online about what's going on in their area and hopefully we'll figure out what happened when the smoke clears.

It's interesting at this point to turn the clock back to the past and ask how we got here. This isn't the first time that political turmoil has changed the way we get our news. Back in the '90s CNN rose to prominence in part because of its coverage of the fall of the Soviet Union and 24/7 cable TV news became the dominant news medium. Before that television replaced radio and and radio replaced newspapers. Note that all along the line, each medium "replaced" the one before it in only the broadest possible sense. Newspapers while they are struggling to survive today, still continue to publish. Similarly, radio continues to be a powerful medium even if it has been replaced in terms of influence by television. And more people was the network evening news that cable TV news. So now that the Internet is replacing other media as the dominant source for news it's in parts because we have been linking to New York Times articles and MSNBC video and Twittering about stories we've seen on television.

Think of information as a sphere that surrounds you. As communication technology advances, that sphere expands and fills up with sources of information that we can use to access it. But until the Internet, there was nothing to hold it all together. The Internet acts a glue that helps its users hold on to information. It's no wonder the mainstream media is struggling to integrate itself with Internet services like Twitter, sometimes with embarassing results.

Digital OTA Maps

Here's something for digital over the air television. Crunchgear reports that the FCC has has a Google Maps mash up of digital television coverage. With the cut-off for analog television less than a week away. It might make for a good companion to antennaweb.org.

Mmm...TV

Hulu has released a standalone application for viewing it shows. It gives a very nice viewing experience—nicer than the website which is pretty nice in its own right. Thanks to modern TVs which can easily be attached to computers I can definitely see myself vegging out on the couch to this application. Of course I already do that with Boxee, Windows Media Center, Youtube, and Hulu's own website but another way to waste time in front of the TV is always welcome.

Update: By now I've had a chance to install both the Mac and Windows version of the Hulu Desktop and I have to say that the Mac version is better. This is mostly because of the way it handles remote controls. Hulu Desktop's support for the Mac Mini's Apple Remote is fairly seamless and it works exactly the same way that it works in Apple's Front Row media player application. Its support for Windows Media Center remotes however is much more limited and the experience suffers as a result.

J.R. Ewing Meets William Adama

TV Squad has a great mash up Battlestar Galactica scenes with the theme from Dallas. It really works for me.

Hulu Ad Nauseum

Hulu is great for watching TV on your computer. And since newer TVs often have VGA ports, it's easier than ever to hook up your computer to your TV. All in all it's a pretty sweet experience. But sometimes the ads can get a bit annoying....

PBS Video Goes Into Overdrive

Boing Boing Gadgets reports that PBS is now streaming episodes of its shows online. Actually, PBS has had a strong web presence for years and has been posting its shows for years. But they were always clunky and weird with programs split into segments which required Quicktime or Windows Media to view and would often crash your browser. Those pages are still around and provide valuable supplemental information. But the new PBS Video page is much slicker and features good ol' flash video in a smooth interface which allows viewers to see the shows in much the same way that you would on TV. As a big fan of Nova and Frontline, I find this to be great news.

TV Calendar, a Website For the Couch Potato

One of the great things about Usenet, really about all forms of Internet discussion is that you never know where they'll lead you. A recent Usenet post lead me to TV Calendar, a website which does exactly what it purports to do. It displays a nice monthly calendar with all your favorite TV shows. In this age of TiVo, we sometimes forget how useful the humble TV show grid can be for organizing and planning our leisure time. TV Calendar is definitely a useful tool for those of us who watch way too much television.

Blood on the Scales—One Journey Ends

"Blood on the Scales" was an interesting conclusion to the coup which began in "The Oath." With the series ending, the possibility of the bad guys winning, felt very palpable last week. But "Blood on the Scales" dispenses with this very quickly. Just as last week we saw the coup unfold in very straightforward manner, this week we saw it unravel in a similarly straightforward manner. While last week was plot driven action story, this week was more of a character piece as we see each character choose sides and react to the facts on the ground.

We begin where we left off last week with Tigh and Adama knocked out by a flash grenade and captured by marines loyal to Gaeta while Narcho rushes to destroy Roslin's Raptor. Unfortunately for the rebellion, Hotdog is flying with Narcho and insists on playing it by the book and delays attacking long enough so that Roslin can broadcast one message. Hotdog refuses to fire on the Raptor and it escapes as Narcho's missiles hit the Rebel Baseship.

Onboard the Rebel Baseship, Roslin must battle Cylon skepticism the only way she knows how, with an impassioned speech. Last week Roslin and Baltar got into it with an argument over the way each of them has exploited religion during their careers. This week Roslin is preaching the Gospel of Bill Adama.

Gaeta and Adama confront each other again with Gaeta telling Adama to tell Roslin to surrender. Adama defiantly removes his admiral's pins and refuses. By this time the Baseship has moved into the fleet and cannot be attacked. Gaeta orders the ship be isolated and prepares for the human fleet to make a jump.

As with last week, we are being told the time. Tom Zarek and Colonial One arrive at 1116 hours—roughly four hours after the mutiny began. Zarek is joking with Racetrack. Starbuck and Apollo are spying on them as they board the ship.

At 1118 hours Roslin is trying to make another broadcast. This time, Gaeta's people have successfully blocked it. In the brig Helo is still unconscious and the Cylons are still awaiting their fate. Gaeta and Zarek are still disagreeing over tactics. Gaeta's idealism mixes with his past to form the rebellion's Achilles Heel. He insists on a trial for Adama. It's important to keep in mind that Gaeta himself was secretly tried for collaborating with the Cylons on New Caprica so part of his desire to "do the right thing" is colored by this fact. Is Gaeta really interested in justice or does he merely want to take out his pain on his former commander? I doubt that even Gaeta knows for sure.

By 1131 hours Tyrol is skulking down Deck D Corridor 2. He hides as Romo Lampkin, Baltar's lawyer from the end of season three, is escorted down the hall.

By 1148 hours Zarek is charging Adama with treason among other things and he make Lampkin his lawyer. Zarek appoints himself as judge. Adama continues to be defiant and sarcastic. He knows the trial is a joke and refuses to cooperate. As Roslin continues to try get through to the fleet, a Six updates us on their situation. The fleet has scattered and the Baseship is surrounded by Vipers some of which are trying to provoke the Baseship to attack. Tyrol sneaks into a large vent.

By 1222 hours Zarek is speaking to the Quorum. Much like Roslin talking to the Cylons about Bill Adama, asking them to give him time to retake Galactica, Zarek talks to the Quorum about Felix Gaeta, telling them that he's the man to turn around the fleet. But ultimately, he's less convincing than Roslin. The Quorum asks Zarek to leave. Zarek asks a couple of marines to execute the Quorum. It's a stark contrast between Gaeta, calling for trials and pulling his punches with Adama and his people and Zarek, ruthlessly slaughtering his political rivals. When we first meet Zarek, he is in jail for terrorist acts and even after being made Vice President, he never hesitated to dabble in a little violence for example conspiring to assassinate Adama and Roslin on Kobol. Tom Zarek is nothing if not consistent.

"The Truth is told by who ever is left standing."

—Tom Zarek

As he leaves and the shots begin to ring out Zarek sends Aaron Kelly to get Gaeta. By 1245 hours, the Quorum is dead. Gaeta is shocked. Zarek tells him some uncomfortable truths about how coups work and how they require ruthlessness. He also makes it clear that Adama has to go.

As Tyrol crawls through Galactica's access tunnels, I can't help but be reminded of Star Trek's Jeffries Tubes. These little tunnels where the unsung heroes of the show, allowing the good guys to go wherever they needed to go to save the day when the Enterprise on the many occasions when it was taken over by bad guys. Galactica's access tunnels are *a lot* smaller and much dirtier than Star Trek's Jeffries Tubes.

By 1248 hours the Cylons want to jump away. Roslin continues to rattle off rousing speeches off the top of her head and she continues to preach the gospel of Bill Adama, holding him up as the last hope for both humans and Cylons. The big subtext here is that Roslin and Adama are, not merely lovers, for all intents and purposes they are practically husband and wife at this point. And it really shows in the conviction that Roslin uses when she builds Adama up as an almost mythical figure.

Unlike Star Trek's Jeffries Tubes, Galactica's access tunnels do not allow Tyrol to escape. After all his hard work Tyrol finds himself staring at the barrel of Kelly's gun as of 1305 hours in the Munitions Locker. He jokes about his predicament —a Cylon in the middle of an anti-Cylon rebellion at the mercy of an armed anti-Cylon rebel. Kelly joins him in laughter and in nostalgia for Galactica's better days. Kelly lets Tyrol go.

Now is as good a time as any to go over Kelly's history on Battlestar Galactica. We first meet him during the original BSG mini-series, as one of the officers (Gaeta is the other) who tell Adama what an honor it has been to serve under him. We later see him briefly serve as CAG when Lee sides with Roslin when Adama overthrows her. It's not a distinguished tenure as it becomes immediately apparent that Kelly is in over his head as CAG. His military career ends when it is discovered that he is planting bombs and trying to kill Baltar during his trial. So it's interesting to see him Adama's side here when he was initially released from the brig because he was trusted to side with Gaeta. As with many of the major characters, Kelly is a screw up who is seeking redemption. Kelly has screwed up more than most and he doesn't have the advantage of being listed in the show's credits so the general impression is that he probably won't make it out of this episode alive....

Lampkin tries to convince Adama to sign a statement of his innocence. Adama won't even dignify his trial with his testimony. Lampkin reminds him that he has people who are fighting for him and urges him to stall as the guards com for them.

Pee breaks aren't supposed to be deadly but they can be if Starbuck is sneaking up behind you and wants your gun....Back on the Baseship Baltar is sulking.

1337 hours—Starbuck and Apollo argue over the best way to take out the guards at a holding cell. A grenade distracts the guards and great hair twins take them out. Apollo also has some fun at her expense when he reveals that the didn't pull the pin on the grenade. They bust the Cylons out of their cell. A fire fight in the corridor leaves Sam shot in the head and near death. Lee and Tigh go after Adama.

1342 hours—As expected, Adama's trial is more a shouting match than a legal proceeding. When Zarek is informed that the imprisoned Cylons have escaped, he announces that Tigh has been killing during an escape attempt. You have to admire Zarek's ability to lie on his feet. This gives Gaeta some more determination and Adama doesn't want to talk anymore. Zarek declares him guilty and just as chaos is about to ensue, Roslin manages to get through on the wireless again.

As Starbuck struggles to get Sam to Dr. Cottle, she receives help from an unexpected source. Lampkin is being walked out by a twitchy guard who winds up being stabbed with a pen. While he's reluctant to help Starbuck at first, he finally relents.

By 1435 hours Gaeta is back in CIC and finds out that at least ten ships have shut down their FTL drives in response to Roslin's message. He orders that the remaining ships be given jump coordinates and ordered to jump. He also orders Adama's execution. More tension between Zarek and Gaeta.

1447 hours—Adama is being walked to his execution by marines. Kelly is at the back of this pack. He lags behind, sitting at the Wall of Remembrance. He throws away his gun and begins to cry.

Apollo and Tigh arm themselves as Athena stands guard and Tyrol continues to crawl through access tunnels. They find Kelly who is eager to help. He gives them the location of Adama's execution and insists on coming with them.

Adama is shot in a dream by Baltar. It seems that Baltar is feeling guilty about his cowardice despite having a Six who is eager to pleasure him. But he doesn't see his most recent escape as an act of cowardice. He admits that he hates the people who form his cult for their superstition. But he also feels responsible for them and wants to go back for them.

1502 hours—Adama is about to be executed.

1524 hours—Roslin makes another broadcast from the rebel Baseship. Gaeta's hands are shaking as he drops Adama's admiral's pins on his desk and orders Narcho to carry out the execution. "Yes sir," he responds with Tigh's gun pointed at his head. Adama is free and he's pissed. Narcho is apologetic but his hatred for the Cylons won't let him follow Adama's orders. Tigh is about to kill him but Adama orders that he be tied up.

Tyrol has found a bigger access tunnel and is now moving more quickly—a little like a chimp striding along a grassy field.

Zarek responds Roslin telling her that Tigh and Adama are dead and demands that she surrender. This only makes her angrier. She vows to "use every cannon, every bomb, every bullet, every weapon that I have down to my own eye teeth to end you. I swear it. I'm coming for all of you!"

1528 hours—Gaeta is not happy about Zarek's antics in CIC. He orders a jump. But Tyrol has reached the engine room. He's locked out of the FTL control so in classic BSG fashion he starts taking the FTL machinery apart. By now, Adama has a rather large phalanx of troops heading for CIC. As the FTL goes offline, Zarek begins issuing orders but Gaeta is feeling nostalgic instead. "One day soon, there's gonna be a reckoning" he says to himself just as Adama said to him earlier. Gaeta orders a weapons hold as Adama storms CIC bloodlessly. It's over and Gaeta knows it.

"Restaurants shaped like food."

—Felix Gaeta

1532 hours -- As Tyrol looks over Galactica's FTL machinery, he spots a massive gash in its walls. Adama and Roslin have an emotional reunion. Gaeta talks about his youthful ambitions with Baltar. It's hard to tell at this point if this interview is actually happening in real life or in Gaeta's mind as a kind of final statement of how he wants to be remembered. The next scene is Gaeta and Zarek facing a firing squad commanded by Adama. They smile at each other and Gaeta's stump stomps itching as the squad fires.

I'll say one thing about BSG, it always surprises. This episode was surprisingly contemplative, exploring its characters through their reactions to Gaeta's attempted coup. Certainly the depth of Roslin's feelings for Adama are never shown more clearly than they were here. Gaeta's idealism and sentimentality almost certainly doomed his coup from the start. He consistently pulled his punches, blunting Zarek's ruthlessness at every turn. Had he simply executed Adama on the spot when he took over CIC he would have had a better chance. But Roslin's anger and determination when she was told that Adama was dead suggests that even if Gaeta's coup had succeeded, it would have been followed by massive bloodshed.

Indeed it's hard to imagine this coup ending any other way and not just because the good guys were on one side and the bad guys were on the other. The human race on this show is down to a little more than 36,000 people. The more they divide among themselves, the easier they are to pick off and the more likely they are to kill themselves off once and for all.

So we're back to the status quo or what passes for the status quo on Battlestar Galactica. Bill Adama is the commander and Roslin in the president. Presumably a new Quorum will be elected. It will be interesting to see who winds up in the brig and who is forgiven for their transgressions. Kelly who miraculously appears to have survived despite having the word "redshirt" written all over his face is likely to have earned his freedom. Racetrack, who has been around since season one, is likely to be trading in her flight suit for whatever constitutes prison colors in BSG. Up in the air are the fates of Helo and Sam. They probably survived since we didn't see them die on screen but if we never see them again, it is pretty easy to assume that they died given the severity of their injuries.

The biggest question is where Galactica's journey will end. Earth has been eliminated as a new home for the moment. Cavil's Cylons are still out there hunting humanity. And we still don't know a whole lot about the Final Five Cylons and their role. The remaining episodes will certainly have a lot of ground to cover.

The Oath—Attack of the Day Players

One of the difficulties of an episode like "The Oath" that involves a significant portion of the cast turning on the rest is that unless it calls for a series-ending bloodbath (which given BSG's track record and the fact that this is it's final season, is not out of the question), it will require a lot of little-seen day players to come to the forefront. Because of this, a lot of the effectiveness of such an episode will depend on people who normally get only one or two lines per episode if they appear at all. Luckily for BSG, this show has been around for a long time and has a large supply of day players and red shirts.

First and foremost among these secondary characters whom must rise to the occasion is Felix Gaeta. While Alessandro Juliani has always given a nice, nuanced performance in the role and Gaeta has been on the show since the beginning, until recently he has always been a second tier character who mostly labored in the background. Perhaps this is why he has slowly ascended in status and air time over the years, because the writers needed to build someone up to take the fall when the main characters would have to be put through the crucible. Ron Moore is a harsh master indeed.

Our story begins at 0620 hours in the Admiral's Quarters. In his podcast, Moore explains that the purpose of these chirons announcing the time and location was to make the episode feel more fast paced and to give viewers a sense of the scale of the ship. The latter worked very well for me, making the ship feel like a giant set of interconnected shooting galleries—sort of like the environment of a first person shooter. The former however was a little less successful, while Gaeta's machinations as he orchestrates the mutiny become fascinating upon repeated viewing, in the first viewing the action feels a little slow.

Last week's problems are still with Galactica, the civilian ships are still resisting the Cylon upgrades which Adama feels are needed to keep the fleet going. Roslin has effectively abandoned her post as president for the time being and Bill is shouldering the load by himself. But they are happy. Bill and Laura have essentially settled down and are openly a couple. Neither makes an attempt to hide their relationship despite Tigh's obvious discomfort with it.

Twelve minutes later Gaeta shows up in the brig to spring Tom Zarek and the mutiny is underway. As they plot, the first seeds of dissension are being sowed in the co-conspirators. In discussing the Quorum, Zarek without mentioning his name brings up the idea that Lee Adama will have to be killed and Gaeta balks suggesting that Zarek can "push his buttons."

While Laura is still reluctant to get back into politics, she can also sense Bill passively-aggressively trying to push her back. While she stands her ground initially, their conversation suggests that his silent prodding is starting to work. She'll be back sooner rather than later.

In the hanger deck, Racetrack complains about a fuel leak and has the deck evacuated to clear the way for Gaeta to take over. Laird complains that Zarek's shuttle has no permission to take off. While Gaeta tries to smooth things over, Zarek takes a more direct approach, killing Laird with a heavy wrench to the back of the head. Skulls has more lines here than he has had over the entire course of the series in declaring "good riddance" to the former Pegasus and now former Galactica deck chief. Gaeta and Zarek argue again as one of Baltar's chippies witnesses the murder from afar. Zarek's speech about how revolutions can be stopped by even the slightest hesitation suggests on possible way that this mutiny will end.

By 0704 hours, Gaeta is in CIC providing cover for Zarek's escape and setting his plan into motion. Gaeta suggests that the DRADIS is failing and convinces Adama and Tigh to take it offline for a diagnostic. By 0741 hours, Zarek is back on Colonial One claiming that Admiral Adama has backed down. In a gym on Galactica Seelix brings up her non-relationship with him as a ruse for the mutineers to kidnap our favorite Cylon ex-jock. The beat down is brutal but they let him live and take him prisoner in accordance to Gaeta's plan.

Back to CIC. It's now 0809 hours and Gaeta reports a fire onboard close to ship's main antenna array. This fake fire harkens back the series pilot where a fire onboard breaks out during the initial Cylon attack. Recall that eighty-five deck hands were killed in that scene when Tigh ordered the burning compartments to be vented and exposed to space to stop the fire. So shipboard fires are a serious matter on Galactica. Gaeta suggests that because of the location of the fire, which could potentially cut off Galactica's communications with the rest of the fleet, might be the result of sabotage. Adama agrees and orders that a Marine fire team accompany the damage control team and that the deck be evacuated.

There is a blink and you missed it moment in this scene as Adama calls a young crewman, Private Jaffe, by name. I missed it the first time that I watched this episode and it turns out to be an interesting if not critical reveal as this boy who has never been seen before is now marked for death because we know his name at a time when a lot of people are expected to die.

By 0812 hours Starbuck is making fun of Hotdog for his new son in the Jr. Officer's Quarters. Vernon Costanza (Vernon? Really?) comes back and Kara can't take what she dishes out. As the evacuation order comes in Kara is suspicious and talks to Narcho. His brusque reaction makes her even more suspicious and when she spots civilians raiding the weapons locker, it's pretty easy for her to put two and two together. She tries to report it to CIC but Gaeta gives her the brush off.

Back on Colonial One Lee tries to call Adama about Zarek's release and is again cut off by Gaeta who claims to not know anything about the release. Zarek makes an attempt to manipulate Lee into joining him but it's pretty easy for Lee to see through it. He chooses instead to return to Galactica and thus walk into a trap. This is something of a personality trait for Lee, clever insight and idealism mixed with impulsive stupidity. On Galactica Gaeta reports a crisis as the "fire" has spread and cut off Galactica's external and internal communications.

By 0902 hours, Lee is back on Galactica being beat up by Skulls and some marines. It seems that Gaeta's confederates aren't fond of Lee. Defending Baltar at his trial and cutting a deal with the Cylons can do that -- they prepare to kill Lee. Luckily for Lee, Kara has been itching for an excuse to start shooting people and kills the marine who has a gun to Lee's head. She also shoots Skulls and a Caprican stand off ensues. Lee and Kara escape as Racetrack tends to Skulls but she's eager to be followed.

Athena is feeding Hera when Helo hears some commotion. It's too late as the mutineers break in take Athena and the kid and one of Thorn's (Thorn was the torturer from Pegasus who tried to rape Athena and was killed in a fight with Helo and Tyrol way back in season two) friends has Helo beaten bloody and senseless. This is interesting as it's the first time that main character is really hurt in this episode. Normally, the viewer response would be muted as Helo is probably an important enough character that you don't expect him to die. But this is the final season of BSG and they pretty much announced that people were going to die when Dee offed herself two episodes ago. So there is some genuine concern that Helo might not make it out of this one alive.

It's still 0902 hours by the time Starbuck and Apollo make it to Dry Stowage 5-3A-01. A typo? Or is Dry Stowage 5-3A-01 merely right next to the hanger deck? Either way, it feels confusing given that we just switched from Lee and Kara to Athena and Helo and back to Lee and Kara. Presumably these events are happening at the same time but you'd think that more time had passed. Anyway as Lee worries that they might have already lost, Kara plants a big kiss on his lips as she signals that the original Starbuck, the hard-drinking, hard-fighting hotshot who likes to frak around is back and that Apollo needs to come back too. They decide to go after the president.

By 0908 Tigh is furious at the lack of damage reports and Mr. Hoshi is starting to report inconsistencies between the ship's own sensor readings the claims that a fire is ravaging the ship. Gaeta tries to finesse things by claiming that the sensors might have been damaged by the fire but Adama sends Jaffe down to check on the damage control team.

Athena and Hera are hustled into a cell with Caprica Six and Sam Anders. Caprica is terrified thinking that they will be killed but Athena is confident that the mutineers need to keep them alive to use as bargaining chips against the rebel Cylons. As far as explanations of why these main characters have been spared go, it's a pretty good one.

By 0913 hours Starbuck and Apollo are fighting their way down Deck F Corridor 6. The scene is appropriately chaotic as they try to reach the president.

By 0922 hours Private Jaffe reports back there is no fire. Gaeta is forced to call on the marines loyal to him to take over the bridge and take Adama prisoner—likely sooner than he intended to do so—so he is probably improvising at this point. The marines have itchy trigger fingers and as the only named red shirt in sight, Jaffe is quickly cut down along with several marines who are not part of the mutiny. Gaeta is doing his best to keep the body count down but Adama isn't going quietly.

They confront each other. Adama talks about loyalty and the oath and how they've crossed a line from which there is no coming back. And Gaeta says some uncomfortable truths. He talks about Adama being blinded by sentiment and loyalty to his Cylon XO. It's interesting that while Gaeta is essentially right about Adama's blindness he picks the target wrong target. Adama is in fact much more blinded by his relationship with the Laura Roslin than by his relationship with Tigh.

In any case, Adama and Tigh are taken prisoner along with other senior staff, including Mr. Hoshi. The latter is curious as anyone who has seen the most recent BSG mini-sodes knows that Gaeta and Hoshi are a couple. Of course, the mini-sodes weren't filmed until after the series ended, so some continuity errors are to be expected. Of course one could argue that Gaeta and Hoshi's relationship ended following the mini-sodes and before Gaeta hatched his plot. As the mini-sodes are set after Galactica abandons Earth, it's a tight fit timewise. The only room for the mini-sodes would be in the week in between "Sometimes a Great Notion" and "The Disquiet That Follows My Soul."

By 0925 hours Starbuck and Apollo have reached the president and fill her in on the details of the mutiny. Laura's first thought is of Bill and it propels her to action. The steely politician is back.

By 0934 hours Gaeta's confederates are struggling to establish control of the ship. Many of them lack experience with the operation of Galactica's huge CIC and their progress is slow.

By 0942 hours Baltar is preparing his escape and making excuses to the members of his cult. Tyrol is helping to organize them to possibly defend the compartment. Being fanatics, they buy his cowardly lies hook, line, and sinker. Tyrol is considerably calmer and more organized. Starbuck and Apollo bring the president to Baltar's compartment where Tyrol informs her that the Admiral has been arrested. Tyrol offers to help get them and Adama off the ship, "the old man deserves a better fate than what he'll get from them."

By 0947 hours Adama and Tigh are still being walked down to the brig. Adama talks to one of the marines, Neward, about his role in the assault on New Caprica. The other marine, Maldonado, is less talkative. Adama works him over verbally, forcing a confrontation, daring them to kill him. Tigh attacks Maldonado and Adama takes Neward's gun and shoots Maldonado. They take Neward prisoner. If Jack Bauer and Tony Almeida from 24 were old men, they'd be Bill Adama and Saul Tigh.

Roslin talks to Baltar. She wants access to his wireless unit so she can address the fleet. Roslin talks smack about the sincerity of Baltar's conversion and Baltar points out that Roslin herself was rather religious when it suited her politically. She concedes that, "maybe we're both frauds and this is our last chance to atone."

By 0956 hours Tigh and Adama are prowling the halls of the ship, spying on the mutineers and interrogating Neward.

By 1012 hours the fleet is calling in to Galactica asking what is happening. Gaeta talks to Zarek. He's disappointed that Adama is still alive. They are interrupted by a wireless broadcast by President Roslin. She calls for peace with the Cylons, reminding the fleet that there supplies are dwindling and insisting that the alliance with the Cylons is humanity's last hope. Gaeta's co-conspirators are unable to stop the broadcast, forcing Gaeta to abandon his post to do it himself. The fleet starts calling for Roslin when her broadcast is finally cut off.

By 1017 hours Starbuck and Apollo find Tigh and Adama. Starbuck wants to kill Neward and they let him go instead. Starbuck is furious, "They are not you men anymore. They are your enemy!"

By 1021 hours Roslin and Adama are in a secondary storage bay where Tyrol is preparing their escape. Baltar suggests that they both chose their aides poorly when they were president.

By 1023 hours Starbuck, Apollo, Tigh, and Adama are in Waste Water Stowage. Apollo and Tigh argue, tensions between Cylon and human are high even in Adama's extended family.

At 1027 hours Baltar tries to call Gaeta. He begs him to stop and brings up Gaeta's reason for having attempted to stab him with a pen during Baltar's trial. Again, this brings us to the recent BSG mini-sodes which also address the pen attack. Gaeta notices an unaccounted for Raptor. It's Tyrol's escape ship.

By 1032 hours the Raptor has reached the Secondary Storage Airlock. And so have Starbuck, Apollo, Tigh, and Adama. Adama and Roslin share a disturbingly passionate kiss. Tigh and Adama arm themselves and tell Starbuck, Apollo, and Tyrol to leave. They prepare to make a final stand against Gaeta's people as Roslin and Baltar escape in the Raptor. It's an impressive yet incongruous sight, two badass old men arming up for a gun fight.

By 1041 hours Roslin's Raptor is in flight. Gaeta pauses before he orders it shot down.

As Gaeta's men begin to breach the bulkhead, Adama calmly opens fire and settles down for a fight. Gaeta's men through a grenade through the breach and it goes off as the screen fades to black and the words "to be continued" flash on the screen.

Other than Clint Eastwood in Grand Torino and the occasional Die Hard sequel by Bruce Willis, action movies are generally a young man's game. One of the advantages of Hollywood's emphasis on youth is that a lot of older movie actors often become available for television roles. It's hard to imagine Jamie Bamber and Katie Sackhoff—even though they are both good actors—pulling off this confrontation with the style and aplomb that Edward James Olmos and Michael Hogan show here.

And it's not just a man thing. Broadcast and cable television is full of older Oscar caliber actresses like Mary McDonnell and Glen Close. Who says there's no upside to ageism?

One last issue that I'm interested to see addressed is whether Roslin's absence from her duties as president facilitated and encouraged the mutiny/coup. I would say that it did, if there was ever a time when the fleet needed its president it was when Earth turned out to be a nuked wasteland. Of course, Roslin was hit as hard, if not harder, than anyone else by this and she had been weakened by cancer and chemotherapy. But it's hard not to think that her funk created a vacuum that helped Gaeta and Zarek's uprising happen.

In the end, "The Oath" is a powerful and stylish start. Whether the payoff will be as strong is an open question. I'll have to stay tuned.

The Tick—A Superhero Show About Nothing

I'm not sure when exactly The Tick came out on DVD but I've been watching it recently. Based on a successful comic and children's cartoon, it was an ideal, if unsuccessful (it only lasted nine episodes) vehicle, for Seinfeld's Patrick Warburton whose clueless alpha male persona is perfect for the role of an indestructible but dimwitted superhero. Despite having been a relatively short-lived sitcom, The Tick in many respects fits quite neatly into the zeitgeist of it's day with a similar feel to that of more successful 90s sitcoms like Seinfeld and Friends. You rarely saw its superheros doing anything heroic, they would usually just sit around at a restaurant talking about their lives, their relationships, and their jobs. (How exactly do you fill out a report explaining that you had to stop a fifty foot cow with flaming teats by throwing a dump truck at it?)

Perhaps this is the reason why this show was so short-lived—most viewers would expect to see superheros actually performing acts of heroism. But the show also had other problems. It could be uneven at times with some episodes trying unsuccessfully to use superheroes and their sidekicks as a metaphor for something else like homosexuality or relationships. But the show ultimately worked best for me when it really explored its premise—the mundane side of being a superhero.

My favorite episode, The Tick vs Justice, did this very well. This episode follows the trial of "Destroyo," a super villain captured by The Tick and Arthur. The preternaturally dense Tick is quickly found to be in contempt by the judge and put in jail. This leaves Arthur who has no super powers beyond the ability to fly with his winged suit vulnerable to Destroyo's henchman with no one except Bat Manuel (who is really only into the superhero thing because chicks dig the suit) to protect him. Destroyo meanwhile takes advantage of attorney client privilege to brag about his crimes and tries to convince his guards to commit suicide. But Destroyo meets his match in Captain Liberty, a needy super heroine who sees his psychological manipulations as a way of scoring some free therapy for herself. But ultimately Destroyo is foiled not by the Tick's super strength or by the justice system but by Arthur who uses his past as a doughy ballet dancer to get him to confess his crimes in open court. When Destroyo is freaked out by Arthur's taunts of "dance, fat boy, dance" it makes for a hilarious climax to the episode.

Overall, The Tick is hardly a classic TV show but it was an enjoyable little comedy that was always watchable and entertaining.

A Disquiet Follows My Soul—Hard to Rate, Hard to Hate

Battlestar Galactica probably reached an all-time emotional low last week with Sometimes a Great Notion and they continue to wallow in that emotional trough this week as well. Despite its darkness, this week's episode is surprisingly quotable. I don't know how much of the dark humor in this episode was intentional—Ron Moore's podcast this week suggests that at least some of it was—but I found myself strangely amused by everyone's pain in this episode.

"Try looking with your eyes...eye."
—Doc Cottle to the one-eyed Saul Tigh

Unlike last week's episode with its many revelations, this episode was a more slow-paced mood piece. And while the mood is largely foul, little things tended to stand out; little things like Bill Adama stooping over to pick up trash—quick trivia bit, in the podcast for this episode Ron Moore says that he had the wardrobe department fit Adama's costume with pockets so he'd have someplace to put the trash he was picking up and Edward James Olmos loved lording the fact that he finally had pockets over the other actors whose uniforms lack them (military uniforms without pockets, talk about unrealistic)—a sign that he's finally back after descending into despair last week. Cottle and Tigh smoking in front of a pregnant Caprica Six was particularly hilarious.

This brings us to Felix Gaeta who is about as bitter and angry as a one-legged man who has been systematically robbed of all his hopes and dreams and seen his die one by one can get. His increasing distrust of the Cylons builds gradually through this episode leading to a pretty impressive conclusion. His verbal brawl with Kara was hard to watch but helps to prepare us for the reveal where we see Gaeta cooperating with Tom Zarek. Zarek's return as a political antagonist is exciting both because of his history with both Bill and Lee Adama and because he is played by Richard Hatch who played Apollo in the original BSG. Hatch has grown a lot as an actor in the thirty years since the original series and it really shows in his performance this week.

"Their technology—our technology—is way ahead of ours. Yours."
"Maybe you'd like a chart to keep it all straight."
—Tyrol and Tigh

Galen Tyrol has been on a pretty rocky road since discovering that he is a Cylon and has only become more and more isolated from his human crew mates as is seen by his pronoun troubles. This only continues as Tyrol advocates for citizenship for the Cylons in exchange for using Cylon technology to upgrade the fleet. It's interesting how as his arc has progressed, Tyrol has remained an advocate and an activist. When we first meet him in the pilot, he stands up to Tigh and is outraged when his plan to save the ship costs the lives of eighty-five of his Tyrol's own deck hands. On New Caprica he is a union leader as well a leader in the resistance against the Cylon occupation. Back in the fleet, he leads the Tylium ship when they form a union to fight for better working conditions. And here he is again this week fighting for the Cylons to be included in the colonial fleet. While the circumstances of the character have changed drastically since the pilot, the man remains the same. His trust and respect for Admiral Adama also remains the same.

Tyrol's discovery that Nikki isn't his son serves two purposes, it helps to further isolate him and push him into the Cylon camp and it keeps Helo and Athena's daughter Hera as the only Cylon-human hybrid.

Laura Roslin is still pretty low but as she stops taking her cancer drugs she finds that she has more energy and slowly begins to climb out of her pit of despair with a little help from Bill. She's basically neglecting her duties as president to jog, work out, and be happy and Bill is letting that happen. It's an interesting look at how the "old man" thinks. He's very sentimental and is willing to let the rest of the fleet suffer a little for the sake of his loved ones. Even from the first season, he deployed the entire fleet to look for Starbuck when her Viper was shot down. Now he is letting the situation in the fleet get worse to give Laura time to feel better. Even Tyrol trusts that he'll sacrifice the fleet to keep his oath as an officer.

"So I guess a pity frak is out of the question then?"
—Felix Gaeta

If there is someone more bitter and angry than Gaeta, it's Kara Thrace. Starbuck is also perhaps the one person whose life is in greater turmoil than anyone else on the ship. She's angry and mean and bitter and it's not a pretty sight.

Zarek uses Roslin's absence to manipulate the Quorum into passing an anti-Cylon resolution which allows ship captains to resist Cylon upgrades. There is a lot of emotional appeal to his argument and not one bit of reason to it. But it works and Lee as the lone dissenter on the Quorum is outvoted. It's precisely this chaos which makes Laura's unwillingness to return to duty so critical. And while Adama tries to make her face this reality, he ultimately relents and lets her go on ignoring her duty a little longer.

"What manner of forgiveness are you seeking? Is it that of disobedient children? Are you children? Obviously you're a child. We have some children here. But to the rest of you..."
—Gaius Baltar

Baltar and his cult are back and with the recent setbacks, his hedonistic message is growing more popular. It also makes a fine backdrop for Tyrol to confront Hotdog, Nikki's real father. Emotions are already running high and Tyrol and Hotdog's fight triggers a near riot. Baltar just sits back and smiles at the chaos—a subtly masterful bit of gallows humor.

"I don't know anything about being a father."
"It sucks, except for the parts that don't."
—Hotdog and Tyrol

Tyrol introduces Hotdog to his son. They will take turns watching him in the hospital. Hotdog gets the first shift which Tyrol informs him will last until he sobers up. Ah, alcoholism and child neglect—it's comedy gold!

"You know there are days when I really hate this job."
—Bill Adama

Zarek's resolution triggers a crisis as ships start refusing Cylon help. The Tylium ship mutinees, killing a Cylon and two marines. The Tylium ship jumps away with Zarek's support. Adama has Zarek arrested. In the brig, a game of chicken ensues. Adama tells Zarek that he has enough dirt on him to ruin his reputation. His logic is that Zarek will happily die or go to prison as a martyr but is terrified of being outed as a corrupt politician. He wants the location of the Tylium ship and Zarek gives it to him. Again a serious scene ends with a comedic beat as Tigh takes a peak at the Zarek's crime file. "Laundry reports?"

But Zarek has one last card to play as it is revealed that Gaeta is planning a mutiny with him. But again the seriousness gives way to a moment of levity or at least relief. As the news of the Tylium ship's surrender arrives, Adama and Roslin are in bed to together it's both sweet and weird at the same time. Usually depicting sexuality among older people is used a joke on television. And the depiction of a cancer victim in bed with a lover is pretty unheard of. It's a remarkable end to a difficult episode. After having hit bottom last week, the crew of Galactica is slowly coming back.