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Battlestar Galactica
"Final Cut"
TV episode
Written by Mark Verheiden
Directed by Robert Young
Original air date: September 9, 2005
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In response to resentment against the
military by the civilians of the fleet, Adama and President
Roslyn allow a reporter unrestricted access aboard the
Galactica in hopes of putting a human face on the lives of
the warriors that protect them all.
Read the story summary at the Battlestar Wiki
clone site
Notes from the BSG
chronology
This episode takes place after the end of the
Returner comic book
storyline (concluded in "Dreams"). In
addition, Colonel Tigh mentions in this episode that there has
been no Cylon contact for the past 10 days, meaning it must be
at least 10 days since the end of "Dreams".
Didja Know?
The opening titles show the fleet at 47,853 survivors, down
two from "Home" Part 2. The two
were a pair Zarek's accomplices killed in
"Home" Part 2. Of course, in
PopApostle's BSG chronology, a number of other people also died
during the course of the
Returner storyline published in the comic book series by
Dynamite Entertainment in between "Home" Part
2 and our current episode.
This episode is the first television appearance of
D'anna Biers, though she has appeared previously in PopApostle's
BSG chronology in some of the comics published by Dynamite
Entertainment.
This episode reveals that Dualla's first name is Anastasia.
This episode reveals that Racetrack's full name is Margaret
Edmondson.
Bell's video camera is a modified Panasonic DVX-100.
Characters appearing or mentioned in this episode
D'anna Biers
Bell (D'anna's cameraman)
President Roslin
Commander Adama
Colonel Tigh
Lt. Gaeta
Dualla
Ellen Tigh
Racetrack
Starbuck
Apollo
Kataris (Caprican poet, mentioned only)
Hot Dog
Kat
Lt. Joe "Hammerhead" Palladino
Baltar
Number Six
Chief Tyrol
Private Scott Kelso
Lt. Jarrell "Fuzzy" Hief
Helo
Caprica-Valerii
Doc Cottle
Dutch (mentioned only)
Captain Kelly
Billy Keikeya
Didja Notice?
At 6:01 on the Blu-ray, Commander Adama is seen reading a
magazine called Caprican Life. The cover story is a day
in the life of a Caprican family. A highlighted excerpt from one
of the articles is "Each child knows that they're special no
matter what happens."
The warning painted on the mirror in Tigh's quarters "From the
darkness you must fall," is revealed to be a line of poetry by a
Caprican poet named Kataris. Starbuck quotes from the poem,
"From the darkness, you must fall, failed and weak, to darkness
all."
When D'anna and Bell follow Hot Dog and Kat into the officer's
bunks, Kat looks into their video camera and happily yells, "Hi,
Mom!" Is Kat's mother alive in the fleet?
When they run into the officers' bunks, Apollo refers to Hot Dog
and Kat as "Tweedledum and Tweedledee". This is an odd,
modern-day Earth reference, to the twin characters that appeared
both in an epigram by English poet John Byrom (1692–1763) and in Lewis
Carroll's 1871 novel Through the Looking-Glass, and What
Alice Found There.
Number Six tells Baltar he needs to attract the attention of
D'anna Biers and let her do an interview with him, saying,
"Trust me. This one can help us." This may be an indication
that Number Six knows that D'anna is actually a Number Three
Cylon.
After speaking briefly with Baltar in the corridor, D'anna
remarks to Dee, "What a strange little man." This is similar to
Roslin's comment about him in "33", "He's a
strange one, isn't he?"
At 16:25 on the Blu-ray, the cockpit fuselage of the Raptor
tells us the pilot is
Lt. Jarrell "Fuzzy" Hief. The callsign "Fuzzy" was seen on the
chalkboard in the war room in "The
Hand of God", but this is his first actual appearance.
Gaeta reveals he got a tattoo of a cat on his chest after a night of
too much ambrosia.
During her interview with Tigh, D'anna states that he was in
command of Galactica for over a week. This, of course,
refers to his time in command while Commander Adama recovered
from the assassination attempt suffered in
"Kobol's Last Gleaming"
Part 2.
At 23:12 on the Blu-ray,
a locker labeled as Dutch's can be seen in the background in the
gym. We never meet a character by that name in the series.
The video cassette tapes D'anna and Bell use to record their
reporting appear to be of the MiniDV variety.
The crew of CIC uses the term CBDR, "Constant bearing,
decreasing range", to describe an incoming Cylon vessel on
collision course with Galactica. This is an actual
navigational term, used mostly in seafaring.
During her interview with D'Anna, Dee reveals that she had a
heated argument with her father, who disagreed with her
decision to join the military, telling him she never wanted to
see him again, just three weeks before the Cylon attack that
annihilated the Colonies.
During the skirmish with the two Cylon Raiders, D'Anna films the
events in CIC and we get a montage of snippets of her camera
view interspersed with the "live" actions in CIC. In several
instances, the images of D'Anna's camera can be seen to have
been sped up in order to fit the scene's running time, the
figures in the background obviously moving at double speed.
After her squadron intercepts and destroys the incoming Cylon
Raiders, Starbuck tells them, "Let's head back to the bird
farm." The term "bird farm" is military jargon in the U.S. Navy
for an aircraft carrier.
At 35:24 on the Blu-ray, D'anna is seen handling a disc that
looks like a CD or DVD...with the patented Colonial corner
cut-offs!
As the end of D'anna's report plays, music familiar to fans of
BSG70 can be heard playing softly behind her commentary. And
then, a custodian sweeping the corridors of
Galactica is heard whistling it!
The closing credits reveal that Lt. Palladino's callsign is
Hammerhead.
Notes from the podcast commentary by Ron Moore on the
Blu-ray release
Moore states that the news cameraman who appears in this episode
is an actual documentary cameraman.
The name slugs appearing in the documentary news footage are the
first mentions in the series of the first names of Felix Gaeta
and Anastasia Dualla.
Unanswered Questions
Was D'anna's plan for the documentary about life on the
Galactica changed once she discovered Caprica-Valerii was
still alive and pregnant? Would she have cut together a more
negatively-slanted piece if not for this discovery?
How did the Cylons get the complete report by D'anna? The Number
Three in attendance at the screening remarks they lost two Cylon
Raiders relaying the images back. These were the two Raiders
that were destroyed by Starbuck's squadron near the end of the
episode...but that occurred before D'anna's report was finished!
So how could they now have a copy of the finished product?
Why does
Caprica-Valerii never reveal that D'anna Biers is a Cylon?
Surely, at some point, she sees the documentary or another news
broadcast by the woman.
Memorable Dialog