GWC Podcast #156: BSG 4.5 Daybreak, Part 1

Podcasts Galactic Watercooler
#81

In the novelization to the BSG miniseries (which I do NOT recommend you read… there’s 6 hours of my life I’ll never get back) it explicitly says Six killed the baby as an act of mercy to save it from the coming holocaust.

I wonder whether the novel is canon? I prefer to leave it debatable…

Oh, and since it would have been awkward otherwise, the author gave Caprica Six a name. I don’t remember what it was (I long ago traded the book in for credit at a used bookstore), but I remember thinking I preferred it when she was nameless. I don’t know if this was a reaction to the breaking of the mystery, or if it was just a stupid name that she didn’t look like… :wink:

On another topic… a naked singularity, eh? That’s pretty cool, I didn’t catch Racetrack’s line, and they didn’t cover them in my physics class, just the concave and convex ones. It appears their existence would be disallowed by quantum gravity, but hell, we don’t have a good quantum theory yet, so why not? (As to why they know a not-yet-existent theory will outlaw something, that’s way beyond my level.)

#82

Very interesting. What if the song has the ability to create, or resurrect or bond two species.

#83

Cool idea! I really hope they rescue Hera before Cavil does anything…

I thought it was hilarious in “Daybreak, pt. 1” when Baltar says something like, “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name,” as Six jumps on him and they start making out. I suppose Baltar never did find out her name and after they hooked up, he was too embarrassed to ask? (Like that classic Seinfeld episode.) Hehe!

#84

I saw that article too and thought of the connection, but I wasn’t sure if Racetrack said “naked singularity” or just “singularity”, an actual black hole. I also doubted that the writers saw the article as the episode was writen many months ago, before it came out. But I suppose Dr. Kevin Grazier, their science adviser, might have told them about the phenomenon. In this interview, he tells them about how he might have inspired the algae planet in a similar fashion. It’s at about the 5:55 mark. If nothing else, it’s a good explanation for BSG’s relationship with science.

//youtu.be/tM6OIFZHeu0

Thanks, that’s a good catch.

#85

Racetrack and Skulls call it a singularity and a black hole (which is correct), later Starbuck calls it a naked singularity. A black hole is modest; it is not a naked singularity.

I am guessing writer goof…

#86

I had the same thought when Hera handed the drawing over to Kara. It brought an immediate flashback of the X-Files episode when Scully is comparing her sisters DNA to the little girl Emily. Then again I may have watched way too many cop shows.

#87

After watching the “line in the sand” scene and seeing Baltar contemplating whether or not to the cross the line, I’m convinced he will go with the Galactica to rescue Hera. Not because he wants to do something for the good of someone else but because this will be the only time to play out the Opera House scene. With the exception of Baltar all the other players will already be on the mission to rescue Hera. It’s always Baltar and Caprica who catch up to Hera in the visions Caprica, Athena and Roslin shared.

I fully expect to see Baltar a part of the mission and to see just why those visions are so important.

#88

A naked singularity wouldn’t have an accretion disk, would it?

#89

Neat, thanks for the article link :slight_smile:

#90

If it was big enough, sure.

Naked in the case of singularities means no event horizon. Meaning you can see the singularity–light can escape from it. In a classic black hole the singularity is behind a gravity well so steep not even light can escape, so you can ever directly see it.

To paraphrase Stargate:

Rodney: You can’t see a black hole.

Cam: That’s what makes it cool.

#91

Hrm. It’s been too long since I read “Singularity,” but I thought it’d have to be a mighty small black hole in that case.

#92

I just looked it up on Battlestar Wiki, and it said in the novelization that her name was Natasi. That’s really dumb. Almost as bad as Sonya (okay, I had a dog names Sonya, maybe that’s why I don’t like that one).

As for the dead baby, I know that the actress herself says it was a mercy killing, but I just can’t get there. The whole way that scene was presented was all about C6’s fascination and curiosity with the actual physical build of the baby. She said, “It’s so fragile,” and then suddenly–pop–it was over. She looked surprised. She looked bewildered and scared as she walked away. I don’t think she meant to do it.

Tricia Helfer later said in an interview (maybe in the extras in S1?) that she didn’t realize how evil her character was until some of her Head Six scenes in the actual series. This was near the beginning, when we kind of assumed Head Six was an echo of C6 or something. Anyway, I remember her saying something like, “I know she killed the baby and all, but it didn’t really hit me until she started threatening and manipulating Baltar.” That’s a paraphrase from memory. But it seems like early on, Tricia had no concept of playing that scene as a mercy killing. It seems to me like she retconned it in her own mind later.

[obligatory backpedal]Not that Tricia Helfer isn’t a great actress and doesn’t know her character.[/backpedal] That’s just my perspective on the matter.

#93

My read on it was that Caprica 6 thought of it as a mercy killing, from her rather messed up Cylon perspective. That defined for me what sort of villains the Cylons were and one of many reasons BSG is awesome. I thought Tricia sold it perfectly being as I am Captain Oblivious. I understood it just fine.

The Cylons have since evolved so that some Cylons are good and some are more of the traditional bad guys. That’s cool as you can only be the conflicted villain for so long before you become the stupid moody villain who can’t make up her bleeping mind.

#94

I agree that Roslin’s trip to the fountain was something that she did while in that first numbness of grief. She’s a responsible adult, but she left her house without closing the door, and she was walking in the city, while she was weating her pajamas, robe, and no shoes. We saw a lot of families with kids at the fountain, so perhaps this was a favorite spot for her family, and she just walked there automatically. Walking into the fountain was a spontaneous act of grief.

As for the fountain itself, many people comment at funerals when it rains, that we “cry the rain down.” Rain after a death always seems like tears from heaven. I think that Roslin automatically went to a favorite family place, then felt that the fountain itself was crying and went out to feel the tears and finally let out her tears.

#95

I agree. Roslin was in deep, deep shock and acting with the altered logic of grief.

#96

Two things.

First off, Adama in the Civilian cloths, the flash backs were happening a few years before the attack, so there was probably a good deal of discussion about decomissioning the Galactica, but Adama wouldn’t be involved with them at this stage. Also, he would have been in uniform for those meetings if that were the case. So I think that he was probably meeting a lawyer about something.

Next, Caprica 6 and Baltar. C6 is a seducer. She will do what it takes to pull someone to do what she wants done. With Baltar, sex won’t seduce him. He gets more than enough and he has little respect for the women that he does sleep with. But, C6 took care of his dad and made his dad happy, and that is what seduced Baltar to seeing her as something more than a sexual conquest and pulled him in. There is a an old canard about negotiations that you need to find out what the other party’s needs are, because sometimes it’s not about the money. C6 did that with Balter, his need wasn’t sex, it was taking care of his dad.

#97

I like any 'cast that references carpet-bagging.

#98

Adama in civilian clothes -
I think it was a some type of job offer. Something that to Adama seemed crass and beneath him. Why he would even consider investing, even an hour’s worth of time, I can’t figure. Maybe he owed someone a favor.

#99

Brilliant point. I do think that part of C6 was genuinely concerned with Baltar’s dad, the part that was still a little naive and was just realizing that there were real people about to be wiped out by what she was going to do.
But I wonder if there was also part of her that looked down in judgment on humanity and saw their treatment of this old man as one more reason why they didn’t deserve to live (I think she sees differently now, but back then, she was more single-minded).

So it may have made her feel better/more superior about herself and helped her cement her relationship with Baltar. After you’ve helped a guy’s father out, he can’t exactly dismiss you as an accessory to his life, like the many other women that pass through the revolving doors of his affections. She got a lot done with one little task.

#100

I’m 1:24 into the podcast so it’s time to use an SAT Word sentence.

I used to GM a FASA Star Trek RPG with my friends. The list of player characters skills was repleat with astrogation, dimplomacy, phaser-shootin’ skills and more.