6.19.2008

Analyzing BSG Season 4, Part II Teaser

[Spoilers/Speculation - as always]
The very few seconds (about 8) of images Sci-Fi Channel has given us for a teaser for Season 4, Part II still tells us a lot [video below]. It teases the very next episode, which writers from the show have said is essentially the latter half of a two-parter which began with Revelations [and a new video blog on Sci-Fi reveals were shot concurrently]. We're going to get Kara's Death Part II. We won't get to see it until January at the earliest, and more likely March or April. Howling wind and a somber dirge of music lends dark atmosphere to the teaser images.

First we see Tigh angrily aiming a gun at Adama's head for some reason (on the Galactica). Tigh still has access to weapons? Boy, now that's blanket amnesty. Adama gives his old toaster, er, friend, yet another chance?


Next, Kara reads from a book of handwritten script. This looks to be the small book of her own notes we saw on the Demetrius. She didn't start keeping notes until she "came back from dead." Or, more likely, it is the Colony Bible and she's looking for answers in the text but decides instead to use the pages as tinder? She has been told about her "special" destiny again and again, including by a Colony Priestess in the past.

As I pointed out in a post after the first episode of this final season [4.6.8], Kara is a clone. We saw her Viper explode. The story has already foreshadowed her having an ovary removed from her while a captive in a medical facility on Caprica [The Farm, Season 2] when she got the Arrow of Apollo and rescued Anders (a scar we never saw again nor was referenced again).


Clone Theory #1: Leoben (perhaps in a Cylon Heavy Raider which could withstand more atmosphere) was at the Vortex and gathered up Kara's dead body and managed somehow to download her brainwaves to a Cylon computer to be put into a new body he grew for her. Only Leoben would do this, unless the Hybrid is involved for her own purposes. They can rebuild her (and the Viper), they have the technology. Here is an image showing an extra vessel was present (and not Kara's POV - so it's not part of her hallucination).

The fact that Kara is a clone is why she's been spacey and subdued since her return. She's also started writing the journal and has a desperate need to find out answers because - she is an incomplete copy.

Kara is NOT the Final Cylon. In the original BSG miniseries her very first encounter with a Cylon is a Raider that scans her. It made "eye contact" but did not turn tail and stand-down as they all did when Final Fiver Anders was similarly scanned. Kara's been scanned countless times in her dogfights in space with Cylons and many have tried to kill her - remember Scar?

The bonfire we see next in the clip is Kara burning her past, shall we say. If she's a clone then what happened to her original body? Hmmmm. Is that a funeral pyre? That means her original body did make it to Earth - so the Vortex is a gateway somehow, which brings us to Clone Theory #2: Kara's Viper did break up and she died, but her body made it through the Vortex's wormhole (or whatever) without Leoben's help enough for the Final Cylon on Earth to find it and fashion the clone and manufacture a pristine new Viper. She was restored, her memory altered to keep her from knowing what had happened. [Note: Scientist Stephen Hawking now says that wormholes are not possible] What this means: There is a technology center on Earth in which this restoration and the manufacture of a perfect Viper copy could be done. This is technology beyond 21st Century humans of the burned-out cinder we saw at the end of Revelations [Season 4, Part I]. If the fifth, and Final Cylon, is the original "Maker" - or copy thereof - then it will bring some logic to what is to unfold for the remainder of Season 4. We'll get the mad scientist explains it all for you scene [which I'm not against at all, mind you].

Then the clip shows a split-second of a hand holding dogtags - a big, rough man's hand - probably Adama having looked at them and knowing what it means.

Next second shows another man's hand (with lousy nail-care) rubbing a rock wall (probably Tyrol - they're stubby fingers). Hard to figure what that means - the subplot probably. Is it all that remains of the Temple of Aurora? He is good at finding temples.

Next the clip shows a teary-eyed Adama (Is all this man ever does now is act emotional? Where is the rock? The leader?), saying over a draped dead body (on the Galactica), "You're the fifth." His tone is plaintive, hurt, yet compassionate [that's what a good actor can do with one short line]. It could be Roslin's body, but we're being faked-out. It is likely Kara's original body and Adama incorrectly assumes that since there is now another Kara that she is the fifth and Final Cylon. He doesn't know she is merely a clone.

The most compelling shot of the teaser vid is the funeral pyre, and Kara sitting alone. This probably denotes that she wished to send off her old self yet remains the outsider. The Cylons probably don't consider her one of their own, but can't make out how another version of her could exist (can't wait for Lucy Lawless's chewing on those lines), and the humans now really don't trust her.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

Just a quick comment on your theory about Adama declaring the dead body to be the Fifth-he's not actualy shown saying it to the body. He cries over the body, but you hear him saying it after the screen goes dark. SciFi is good at lifting voice clips for trailers. :-) I just don't trust it enough to build a hypothesis around it.

radii said...

The Sci-Fi/Space/Hulu trifecta of trialers [all approved by Sci-Fi Channel] also tends to accurately portray what is to unfold in an episode (remember the Tory backhand to Callie?). They give away too much but I can't remember when they successfully pulled a fake-out (even the D'Anna telling Roslin she's the Fifth [trailer] and then laughing it off [episode] may be a way for D'Anna to keep her close by until she understands why Roslin is the last to know).

Anonymous said...

My guess, re: Adama saying "you're the 5th"...he's saying it to his reflection in a mirror. Hell, maybe even into the Ikea "Frack" mirror.

Anonymous said...

Ummmm... I might be wrong, but I think that's Tigh saying "You're the fifth." It sounds too high for Adama.

Listening again, yeah, I'm pretty sure that's Tigh.

Anonymous said...

It sounds like Tigh saying "You're the fifth", listen closely. The gravel from Adama's voice isn't present. Forget the visual aspect of the trailer and listen. It's Tigh. It makes sense that one of the Final Five would find the last cylon model.

Anonymous said...

The individual(s) saying, "you're the fifth," is both the oracle from Maelstrom and Leoben (just as in that episode the lines where shared between the two characters).

Anonymous said...

Remember Col Ty was tortured by the cylons so the scanning has been some new revelation they have added of late????? Is it because they have now been activated that they know or is it something that has been added to throw us off???

radii said...

I believe it is Adama's voice, he's just choked up with emotion.

Anonymous said...

I'm not so sure that the Kara is the one reading the book. The hands look a little too aged for her, maybe it's Laura instead.

Anonymous said...

Looking at that pic from Maelstrom, it's clear that the extra ship is Kara's Viper.

The three ships present are the heavy raider, Kara's Viper (MK II) and Lee's Viper (MK whatever).

Anonymous said...

The person saying "You are the fifth" is clearly Saul Tigh. I don't understand how anyone can mistake this voice for Adama's or anyone else's.

Crazy4Who said...

I just think it is beyond rude to promise that all will be revealed every single frackin week and then make us wait till 2009!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

I think too that's Tigh's voice, Adama's "Huskier" XDD

And I agree too it's not Kara reading the book, but Roslin's since seems to be The Book of Pythia, and there's a ring on the finger with definitely not belongs to Kara. Maybe the fire and the book have smthg to do with that thing Roslin was firing up in the Last Supper Photo and now it's gone. If it's The Book of Pythia it would make sense she's throwing he beliefs to the fire. She's the one suposed to led the fleet to earth and look what's waiting for them there. She must be very disappointed with Pythia and the Gods. She's been fooled since she didn't believe in that stories in the first place.

For the body, makes me think it's Kara or Lee, 'cause they're the only I remember with tags and rings -Lee lost his somewhere in S3 but his wearing it again so, I maybe wrong but makes sense to me-. But we could be out of track here because we're assuming tags and ring belong to the dead body.

Don't know! This waiting's driving me crazy!

Anonymous said...

It's obviously Tigh talking to the Fifth, you guys...

Anonymous said...

As Eristi stated, Kara isn't the one reading the book. Pause it and look at the hands. Clearly they are the hands of an older woman, with decent nail care (i.e. not Kara Thrace). They look much more like Laura Roslin's hands.

And it's so totally, obviously Tigh's voice we hear stating "You're the Fifth". I thought that the first time I heard it and still think that after hearing it several more times.

Anonymous said...

sounds to me like Tigh is the one saying "You're the fifth!" as opposed to Adama?

radii said...

Could be Tigh, but the voice is rather husky, like Adama's ... I missed the hands, so maybe it is Roslin flipping through the book and tearing out pages - at Kara's funeral pyre? We'll know soon enough, with the episodes airing Jan. 16 and 23rd we'll get those answers.

Anonymous said...

You were right. Theory #2 panned out. Well done.