Early Final Five Hints

nangadev · January 30, 2009, 2:28am

I’m sure this has been discussed, but I haven’t yet come across posts mentioning two early clues to the Final Five… even though apparently RDM didn’t decide on them until much later.

Ellen’s first appearance in “Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down” when Baltar “clears” her with the Cylon detection device but then when Head Six asks what the real result was, Baltar basically admits it was actually positive when he says “I’ll never tell.”
Tyrol’s nightmares at the end of season two when he beats the crap out of Callie, and his visit with Brother Cavil yields that he has a secret death wish because he thinks he might be a Cylon.

I haven’t heard RDM mention this in any of his interview… did he just have a premonition about who the Final Five would be before he even knew?

Cavatar · January 30, 2009, 2:34am

Maybe he took from those scenes later? Or maybe it was stirring in his subconscious or something?

Konrad · January 30, 2009, 3:38am

As much as I’d love to believe this was some from the start master plan… I’m going to go with RDM’s “yeah we just made it up as we went” explanation.

Chicken_Pie_Cylon · January 30, 2009, 5:09am

It is interesting to look back and see where pieces fit now that they have all been revealed despite them not being thought up until after.

Gachnar · January 30, 2009, 6:56am

At least when RDM makes it up as he goes along, it makes some sort of sense in a grand scheme. Unlike on some other (cough!Heroescough!) shows that shall remain nameless.

CylonMATRIX · January 30, 2009, 8:16am

My favourite moment was in Tigh me up; Tigh me down where Ellen surmises that she is the Final Clyon, goes Boo! and quite literally scares the crap out of everybody at the dinner table. :eek:

I absosorryBarbinglutely love it when RDM says it like it is; and then actually shows it being done! haha

clickclickboom · January 30, 2009, 8:26am

Agreed. RDM said that they hadn’t decided til Season 4 who they were and those instances were much earlier in the show.

Colonel_Forte · January 30, 2009, 9:08am

cough George Lucas cough

Armando · January 30, 2009, 9:14am

I think it may be a chicken/egg question. Practically, they made it up as they went. It seems, though, that the choices the writers made on the Final Five ended up fitting at least some established elements of the mythology so as not to end up looking like the writers are shooting from the hip (something I wish George Lucas would pay attention to from time to time).

EDIT:

cough George Lucas cough

heh heh. I read this after I posted. Great minds, Colonel. Great minds.

CylonMATRIX · January 31, 2009, 2:07am

As a budding writer, I need to remind y’all that RDM may say that he pulled things out of his sorryBarb; but he’s been writing tv scripts for over 20 years and things like story structure, beats, arcs, et a, are all second nature for him and he doesn’t really need to sit down and think about it.

bigdamnhero · January 31, 2009, 3:23am

I think RDM probably had ideas or inklings about who he thought he would choose as the FF all along, but didn’t want to commit himself until necessary… I think if we really look back, there are a few instances of RDM leaving the door open to a character being a cylon.

Leoben’s “Adama’s a cylon” comment turned out to be a red herring, but the line serves the dual purpose of 1) screwing with Roslyn’s head, and 2) leaving the door open for RDM, if he wanted to make one of the Adama’s a cylon (from a storyteller’s perspective, it’s a nice bit of foreshadowing if he chose to go in that direction). RDM even said he considered Papa, but threw out the idea early on.