Battlestar Galactica

Episode #208 - "Final Cut"

This document is ©2005, John Larocque. All rights reserved.

47,853 survivors in search of a home called Earth.

The Cylons were created by man. They evolved. They rebelled. There are many copies. And they have a plan.

Synopsis

She's taken to Colonial One to meet with Adama and Laura. Adama asks, "Where did you get that tape?" "From an anonymous patriot. So, is this a social call or are we on the verge of another coup?" "Funny." "Just something to break the ice. I take it I am here because you're unhappy with my story on the Gideon Massacre?" "What happened aboard the Gideon was a tragedy. But it was not a massacre." "But the tape shows your men firing into a crowd of defenseless civilians." "My Marines tell a different story." "Not to me. I've submitted a dozen interview requests, all denied." Laura informs her, "Well, that's about to change. You've been lobbying to do a story on the Galactica for months. Commander Adama has agreed to give you unlimited acceess to his crew and his ship." "Well, access won't buy you a propaganda piece."

"We don't want one. Ms. Biers. This tape of yours has thrown fuel on a fire that was about to die. People are angry, they are distrustful of the military." "Yeah, with good reason, ma'am." "In some cases with good reason. But I want to show the people what life aboard the Galactica's really like. I want to put a human face on the officers and crew who protect us against Cylons and guard our freedoms every day." "You might not like that face when you see it." "All we really want is a balanced story. Show us what the men and women of Galactica are really like." "That's it?" "That's it. And I need you to do it now, before we tear each other apart."

In CIC, Tigh is complaining about supply problems. "The CAG had better start cracking some heads. Half our supply runs are behind schedule." Dualla receives a phone call from Ellen, calling him to her quarters. "Gods! Oh, I'm so scared." Someone has painted a message in red paint on their mirror which reads, "From the darkness, you must fall." She asks, "What does it mean?" Adama's taking the Raptor back to Galactica and asks Racetrack where she got a stack of magazines. "They were left over from a civilian run. I've been meaning to throw them out." "No. Put 'em in a safe place. Hold onto 'em." Adama asks Biers, "You're filming this?" "We've been rolling since Colonial One. President did say total access." "You'll have that. But you start shooting anything that compromises the safety of this ship, then it'll be cut."

Kara and Lee are drying off and getting dressed after a shower. She complains, "We just finished a 15 hour rotation." "Yeah, well you better get used to it. We're gonna be short on pilots till the rest of the fleet pulls the stick out of its collective fat ass." "More fallout from Tigh's moment of glory?" "You heard about his death threat?" "Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. I just can't believe that I haven't been called in for questioning yet." "Oh, you were top of the list. But don't worry, I told Tigh that you wouldn't know Caprican poetry if it was hot-soldered across your helmet." "'From the darkness, you must fall, failed and weak, to darkness all.' Kataris. Not one of his best. Can I be a suspect again? Please?"

Kat is chasing Hot Dog through the halls, trying to snap him with a wet towel. They're told to keep the noise down as people are sleeping. Biers and her cameraman arrive, Kat performs a mooning gesture before the camera. "This is for my buddies on freigther 212. Yeah! That's for you!" Lee asks her what she's doing. "I was just saying hi to some of my buddies in the fleet, sir." "Right. So you were literally talking out of your ass." "Kinda." "Go on, get dressed." He tells Constanza it's the last time he comes into the senior officer's quarters. He speaks to Biers, dressed only in a towel. "So, you must be the reporter we were expecting." "Well, you didn't have to dress up for me. D'anna Biers, Fleet News Service." "Captain Lee Adama, commander of the air group. That's pronounced, CAG. And I suggest you find yourselves an exit as soon as possible. And that's pronounced ASAP." "Think we've seen all we need to see here." She leaves, and Lee asks, "Who's brilliant idea was that?"

Biers and Dualla are in the hallway and pass by Baltar. Baltar says to Number Six, "I'm the Vice President. She's supposed to be interviewing me, isn't she?" "Well, of course she should. Your title alone commands respect." "Of course it does. It's a rare commodity around here. I mean, I'm the Vice President. I'm not gonna beg, I'll tell you that much." "Now, Gaius, you may have to beg. You'll do whatever is necessary to protect our child. Politics may not be your strong suit. But it serves us in the moment. Trust me. This one can help us." Yet when he gets Biers' attention, he rebuffs her offer to interview him at that moment. "But if you get in touch with one of my aides, there might be small window tomorrow. I'm not promising anything, obviously. But I might be able to give you an interview then... if ... if... that's what you would like." They part ways and Biers comments, "What a strange little man."

Lee later has a private interview with Biers. "Captain Adama, I hardly recognized you with your clothes on." "Look, I'm sure you thought it was, uh, clever, busting into the pilots duty locker. But the area's off-limits for a reason. It's the one place where my people can unwind and be themselves." "You seem to think your pilots deserve special consideration." "Actually, I do. Like everyone else, my pilots have lost their families, and their friends, everyone they ever cared about. But on top of that, they're asked to put their lives on the line every single day for a fleet that seems more interested in what they do wrong than in what they do right. They're not asking for your pity, but they damn well deserve your respect."

Biers is filming in the hangar bay. Tyrol is arguing with Kat and wants to hold back her Viper from flight. "Something doesn't feel right." He finds a tube out of place and removes it, spraying oil. "I knew it. How the hell did I miss that?" "Maybe if your knuckledraggers spent more time on maintenance, less time frakking around." "This knuckledragger just savedyour ass, sir." "Why don't you say that a little louder, Chief? I don't think the camera heard you." "You know what? Frak the camera." Kara tells Kat to knock it off. "Chief, fix her ship. You, get the hell outta here now." Kat kicks some equipment on her way out. Kara tells Lee, "She has been pissing me off all week... I'm taking her off rotation till she gets her head rewired. I mean..." "Uh uh, can't do it. We need the pilots. Besides, if I scratched everyone who... popped off at the Chief, the cooks would be flying the missions." "Son of a bitch." Kara is upset that Biers is filming their conversation, and Lee instructs her to walk away.

Biers is interviewing the Marines who boarded the supply ship. Private Kelso explains, "We were never trained for crowd control. First order of business when under attack is defend yourself and your squad." "But these were civilians." "I have ten stitches that say we were under attack. The truth is, it was a command frak-up the moment Tigh put us on that supply ship. I'm not suprised someone's trying to take out that drunk son of a bitch." Palladino interupts, "All right, private. Belay that." "Colonel Tigh's been threatened?" "No, this interview's over. Shut that off."

Adama escorts Biers and her cameraman to CIC. Tigh reports, "Fleet's quiet. No enemy contact for the last ten days. No Cylon contact, anyways." "Well, they have their job to do. We have ours. Did you hear about the meeting on Cloud Nine?" "Reps flying in from every vessel in the fleet for a king-size bitch session. Yeah, I heard." "Well, they sent us an invitation to send a delegation. You're it." "I'm not exactly the most popular guy in the fleet right now." "Well, it'd be good then to, uh, let your critics see that you're not afraid of them." "That what you think? I've been hiding?" "You've been doing this too long to be worried about ulterior motives. You're going because you're not afraid, and people should see that. Plus, it'll also give people a chance to vent their feelings instead of seething in private. And finally, I think you need a little R and R. So consider this a mandatory shore leave. Take a swim. Get some sleep." "Sir..." "And stay away from the bar."

Tyrol's crew are preparing Tigh's Raptor for takeoff. Kara tells him, "Good luck, Colonel. Have fun on Cloud Nine." The doors close and smoke suddenly appears. Tigh asks, "What's going on?" Tyrol replies, "The main buss is totaled. Looks like someone took a hammer to it. If this had blown in transit, the cabin would have vented in space." Ellen says that someone is trying to kill him because of the Gideon incident. "Ellen, we don't know that." "Of course we do. D'anna Biers left two messages already. She's giving you a chance to tell your side." "I don't have to explain myself, especially to her." "Roslin wants to placate the fleet, put the great Bill Adama back on his pedestal. Fastest way to do that is by hanging you out to dry. Why do you think Adama wanted to send you to Cloud Nine?" "The Gideon happened on my watch." "Yes. But you didn't order those jarheads to open fire... This is so like you, Saul. Always the proud soldier. Taking the heat because it's honorable. When are you gonna realize... we're all alone out here?"

In Helo's documentary segment, he tells Biers that the hardest thing is turning off the human part of him, "because that's what'll get you killed. But, when you're out in the field it's not that easy." Kara is boxing when Biers talks to her. "Captain Adama said that I could ask you about the new pilots." "Yeah, well, Captain Adama likes to push my buttons." "So, what do you look for in a new recruit?" "Coordination. Good reflexes. Total commitment. And most of all, someone crazy enough to follow me into combat.

Racetrack describes being told to act as if she's already dead when she's in combat. "That sounds ghoulish, but dead men don't get scared or freeze up under fire. Me, I'm just worried that hell's gonna be a lonely place. And I'm gonna fill it up with every toaster son of a bitch I find." Gaeta is smoking a cigarette and talks about his background. "All I ever wanted was to be an officer on a battlestar. I trained my whole life, trained harder than anyone in my unit. Basically, I put my life on hold until I was assigned to Galactica. Then the Cylons hit. And I realized that this is all that I know. Tech manuals, commands, tactics. I'm not saying that I'm unhappy. Just wondering if there's something more." "And what have you discovered?" "I hate cigarettes (Gaeta coughs). Ambrosia's good with a chaser. And if you have enough ambrosia... didn't really hurt that much." He shows off a tiger tattoo on his chest.

Biers prepares Tigh a drink in a conference room and tells him it's to keep the interview painless and casual. "I had heard a number of rumors that you had death threats leveled against you. Is that right?" "This is a military vessel. We have rumors for every occasion." "Was it hard for you to take over your friend's command when he was shot?" "I didn't take anything. Command fell to me, and I did my duty." "But you were in full command of Galactica for more than a week. And in that time, there were a number of controversial actions taken." "You're talking about the Gideon. I made a military decision. Given the same circumstances, I'd do it again." "So you have no regrets whatsoever?" "You're trying to set me up." He throws the glass across the room in anger. "Why do you think there was no official investigation into the Gideon Massacre?" "Get out of my face!" She asks the cameraman if he got it. "Got it." "Someone's a mean drunk."

She brings up the incident with Adama, who apologizes for Tigh's behavior. "Seems like a lot of people have been apologizing for him over the years, Commander. So level with me. Why has Colonel Tigh not been charged in the Gideon incident?" "We're at war against an enemy with a vastly superior force. I will not sacrifice the few people we have left on the altar of public outrage." "So, four civilians are dead, and Tigh and the shooters take a walk." "Nobody takes a walk. They all gotta live with it."

Kat fails to land her Viper into the landing bay, as she's coming in too low. Kara is with Biers in the landing bay and exclaims, "What the hell is going on? This is her third wave-off." Kelly wants to wave her off but Kara insists she land. "No, she's putting down! Kat, full throttle, now!" A panicking Kat crashes her Viper into the runway. Kelly comments, "She missed the trap. Damage control, medics, report to portside hangar bay." Lee asks, "What the hell happened? Kat's made the trap a hundred times. Yeah, I guess 101 was a real bitch, huh?" Kat has lost it and is being restrained. "No! Let go of me! Lemme go!" "Hey, Kat! It's Starbuck, you're OK. You're home." "Home? Home is dead! We gotta get outta here! They're gonna kill us!" Kara finds something in her pocket. Lee examines them and says, "Stims. And by the look of her, she's been taking them by the handful." In the documentary, Kat tells Biers, "When you come back after a successful run, let me tell you. It is better than a great meal. Better than hitting a jackpot. It's better than sex."

Helo notice something wrong when he visits Sharon's cell. There's blood on Sharon's hands, and she looks very ill. He tells the guard to call Dr. Cottle. Sharon is taken to sickbay where Biers sees her as they bring in Kat and she records the conversation between Sharon and Cottle. "Don't you dare touch me! What are you doing?" "Listen to me! I am trying to save your baby. Hold her." A guard forces out Biers. "This is a restricted area!" Adama meets with Biers. "That woman looks like the late Lieutenant Valerii. Why would Galactica be harboring a Cylon." "The tape, please." She hands him the camera. "Did the baby survive?" "Do you understand that even a hint of this could be devastating to the morale in the fleet?" "You're the master of understatement. You know, after the Gideon, this could turn the entire fleet against you." "Then the real question is whether or not it matters to you." "You know, I am sick to death of people like you questioning my patriotism. We all want this fleet to survive." Adama takes the tape and gives her back her camera, and after he leaves, we see that she has the original tape and Adama has taken another.

In her interview with Baltar, he tries to flatter her, and Number Six tells him, "Cut to the chase, Gaius. Tell her why you desreve to lead this fleet." He tells Biers, "As I myself discovered when I was stranded on Kobol, I found that the stress of survival revealed leadership qualities that previously I didn't even known I possessed, really." "Yeah? I understand your party took several casualties." "That was very unfortunate. They were heroes, every one." As they talk, an alarm is sounded and Gaeta reports over the P.A., "A condition one throughout the ship. Incoming Cylon raiders. This is not a drill." Two raiders are closing fast. Biers is in CIC where Gaeta tells Adama, "The Cylon raiders are on CBDR with Galactica." Dualla explains to Biers that it means "constant bearing, decreasing range. Collision course." Tigh asks, "Where the hell's the CAP?" "Other side of the fleet, sir." Adama orders, "Scramble the alert fighters. Set condition one throughout the entire fleet. Have them spool up their FTL's just in case."

In her interview Dualla tells Biers, "My dad went crazy when I enlisted. He thought the military was a joke. Refuge for emotional cripples and patriotic fools." "But you signed up anyway." "I guess I just wanted to believe in something." "Did you ever come to terms with your dad." "I wouldn't let him. The last time we talked, it got... heated. I told him I never wanted to see him again. Three weeks later, the Cylons attacked." In CIC, Biers asks Dualla, "OK, so I'm new at this. Should I be scared?" "I am." Wireless chatter between CIC and the Vipers indicates they destroyed the raiders. Adama announces, "This is the Commander. Cylon raiders were intercepted and destroyed. Good work, people... Secure from action stations. Set condition three." Biers asks Dualla, "Does this get any easier?" "No, ma'am. It gets harder." In the hangar, the cameraman asks Lee, "How did it go out there?" "Well, we didn't lose anyone. That's a good day."

Biers and her cameraman are looking over footage in the editing room. On the tape, Kat is chasing Hot Dog, and Palladino is reading a book in his bunk. "I'm not sure I've found a story in all this yet... Go back a bit. Here, here. I know that book. That's by Kataris." In Tigh's quarters, Ellen is gagged and bound, and Palladino knocks a bottle over Tigh's head. "What's wrong, Colonel? Need a drink?" He pours the bottle over Tigh. "You can go to hell." "I've been there. It was called Gideon. I can't eat, I can't sleep. I saw their faces. Those weren't Cylons we tagged, those were real people. Who looked like my dad, who looked like my little brother." He points a gun to Tigh's head. Tigh tells him, "Well, this isn't gonna change anything." "Well, at least the people on the Gideon will have their justice." "If that's what this is about, then do it... Somebody has to pay for what happened on that ship. I was in command, I sent you there. It's my fault. Come on, son. Do it." Palladino won't shoot and Tigh retreives the gun. "Gideon was an accident. This is a choice." A guard enter his quarters and Tigh tells him they're all right.

In the documentary, Kat explained why she turned to stims. "I was tired. Haven't gotten any sleep. Felt like I was losing my edge. I didn't know what else to do?" "Couldn't you talk to someone?" "Who am I gonna talk to? We're all in the same hole. There are no replacements coming up. There's no downtime. This it it. So I started taking stims." "You made a mistake. It happens." "Yeah, except now my flight's a pilot short. These guys, they're just as tired and they're just as messed up as I was... I've worked my ass off defending this ship. I've been frustrated, I've been angry. I've been everything that you can possibly think of. This is the first time that I've felt ashamed."

Tigh and Adama are watching the final cut aboard Colonial One with Biers. "I've seen enough... It's a hatchet job. The fleet already thinks we're just a bunch of trigger-happy assassins. This just confirms it. You show us with our pants down and our asses hanging out." He asks Adama for his opinion. "I think it's great. I think she did exactly what we asked her to do. That she put a human face on the guardians of the fleet. Warts and all. I'm proud of it. You can show it to the entire fleet." "It doesn't get any better than that. Laura and Adama asks to see the end. It shows the Galactica crew at work at various locations in the fleet just doing their job. "The story of Galactica isn't that people make bad decisions under pressure. It's that those mistakes are the exception. Most of the time, the men and women serving under Commander Adama get it right. The proof is that our fleet survives. And with Galactica at our side, we will endure."

On Caprica, the human Cylons are viewing the documentary in a movie theater. Aaron Doral tells Number Six, "That was shown across their entire fleet." "Their resilience is remarkable." A Sharon model asks to view the footage that was cut, Cottle's emergency operation on Sharon. "I'm still alive. She's still alive. I told you." "That's incredible. And the baby?" Another copy of D'anna Biers answers. "It was saved. We lost two raiders relaying the images back to the fleet, but I think the sacrifice was worth it." Doral adds, "We must proceed with caution. The child's life must be protected at all costs." "Yeah. Truly is a miracle from God."

Ron Moore's Commentary

9/9/2005 -- This episode is the first of a few standalone episodes that we're doing here in season two. This is the first episode after "Home, Part II," where we wrapped up many different plotlines. Instead of launching into a brand new giant arc of longterm storytelling, we decided to tell some standalone episodes, some things that weren't so buried in mythos and do a different flavor of episodes now that we are into this part of the season. By and large, this is exactly the kind of episode that new audience members should feel comfortable watching the show for the first time. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- This is of course Lucy Lawless' first episode for us. Lucy was David Eick's idea. David had worked with Lucy on Xena: Warrior Princess, which of course is what she's most famously known for, back when he was working for Renaissance. We had talked about having her on the show before this [in the first season], and it didn't work out for whatever reason. As this role came up, David mentioned her for it, and it seemed like the right fit. And he checked with her and she was into it and decided to do it... The motto for this character was a Christiane Amanpour type character. By that we meant, a very no nonsense going after the story type of reporter, not a muckraker, not a tabloid reporter, not somebody out for their own glory, but somebody who has a story and is going to bite into it, is going to keep it going no matter what. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- The genesis of this story began when we were talking in the first couple of episodes... Someone developed this story about doing an episode where we would cut down into that room where all the press was gathered and trapped [after "Fragged"] and follow one reporter as he or she figured out how to get a story, and tell the whole episode from that point of view. The reason we opted not to do that, was that we needed those early episodes to tell a great deal of other stories... and it just became to cumbersome to try to use that device and make it work. But, in any case, the idea of a reporter being on the ship, or doing an episode from the reporter's point of view was something that we never let go of. Eventually we decided, "Let's do the documentary episode, where we really shoot a documentary on the ship." Actually, for this episode, Robert Young, who directed this episode and also directed last year's episode, "Six Degrees of Separation" is a noted documentarian. He has done many feature films and made acutal documentaries in his day. It felt like a natural fit to have Robert do this. I felt that it was important to give the director, writer and actors as much space to improvise, and to really embroider on the characters and on the life on Galactica. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- It's worth mentioning this little device we're using. Every time we go to the documentary camera, you'll note that we clip the corners off, which is a nod towards the aesthetic that we've established in this world, that they tend to clip corners off things. That happens to be an aesthetic style that they like in this universe. They like books with the corners cut off, they like picture frames with the corners cut off. The idea of clipping the corners on the documentary is actually one of the very last things that we did. I kept struggling to try and make the documentary footage stand out and feel different from the objective camera... the challenge was how to distinguish the look between the two. I was looking at it in the editing bay and it occurred to me. I said to the editor, "What if we clip the corners off the documentary footage." It was such a very small tweak but it really works, it really sets those images apart instantly and visually. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- [The cameraman] is a real cameraman... It was much, much better to have an actual cameraman working the camera within the scene than relying on an actor who is essentially trying to act like a camerman, if you had any hope of using the footage... [However] we were constantly having to juggle this documentary footage in such a way that we weren't picking up members of the actual film crew which were filming the scene. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- In a couple of drafts, Tigh and Ellen were both going [to Cloud Nine], and at some point we decided to keep Ellen aboard Galactica. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- There were episodes last season where we had strike teams in the Raptors, and we had ground crew in the Raptors, and we simply didn't have the money to outfit all of them in a flight suit. Plus, they all look kind of goofy when you put that many flight suits together in a cockpit. We kind of limit the flight suits to the necessary personnel, the pilot and the ECO. And that allowed us to make this leap, that Tigh would not be wearing a flight suit. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- You might have noticed this is the first time that Gaeta got a first name. His first name is now Felix. I don't know why that makes me laugh, but it did. I was looking up ancient names on the Internet when it came time to do this episode, because I never named Gaeta or Dualla, even in the show bible. And there it was, Felix. That's him, it's Felix Gaeta. It has to be. And he's going to live with Gaius Baltar. And can two middle-aged former officers of the Galactica live together without driving each other crazy? Also, Dualla's first name is Anastasia, which I thought was quite lovely. Kandyse is a quite lovely lady who deserved a pretty first name. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- A lot of the dialogue here between the LSO and the pilot was contributed I believe by David [Weddle] and Bradley [Thompson], who specialize in that verisimilitude in our military jargon, in planning with some consultation with our military consultant. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- You might have noticed that several of the little subtitles that show people's names and ranks and what have you in the show have a couple of acronyms after them. For those of you who obsess upon these sorts of things, and you know who you are: CF is Colonial Fleet, CFR is Colonial Fleet Reserve, CMC is Colonial Marine Corps, and then CMCR is Colonial Marine Corps Reserve. So you can write that down and add that to your book of tricks. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- Lee Adama has an R after [his CF designation]... and was heading for the reserves at some point. Lee was someone not on the full career path... He was going to pursue a different path [from his father], a more solitary path and become a test pilot. That kind of changed over the course of the last two seasons. As we got deeper into the character, we always liked the idea that Lee very much didn't want to follow in his father's footsteps. He had gotten far enough to be a pilot and did that out of certain notions of obligation and duty and service and all that. That he did share that with his father. Then at some point, he did not really want to make this his life. And so we tossed around ideas like that Lee's real life dream was to leave the service and go open a little bar someplace... in a way running away, hiding from his father's life and the life he thought he should have had. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- This whole last bit of narration was something that I wrote in post as we were going through the footage. I just wanted to give the thesis of the show... There's a nobility to these people, there's a heroism to these people who are flawed and screwed up and dysfunctional and deeply human. And they get up every day and they go out and they do their jobs and they hold off the Cylons, and they protect the fleet. And they keep doing it and they don't quit. Despite everything that you've seen in the series and despite all their flaws, and all their infighting and all their deeply human, sometimes deeply bad choices in their lives, that they are the protectors. They are the guardians of the fleet. They take that job very seriously and they do it every day. And they never try to shirk it. That is ultimately the thing that sets them apart, it makes them special. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- Oh, this is great, the use of the original Battlestar Galactica theme. He starts whistling it, the music comes in, and the crowd goes wild. And some will curse us for using it, "How sacreligious!" But I kind of like it. Something very sweet about it. (source: Final Cut podcast)

9/9/2005 -- I think this is my favorite ending so far... No matter how many times I've seen the show, I always get up to this moment and forget that D'anna is a Cylon. It's such a great, unexpected twist. it just lays in there so nicely and so well... There's something great about not even suggesting to the audience that there's going to be a surprise. That you've seen the show and you feel very safe and comfortable with everything you've just watched, and then the zinger in the last minute. (source: Final Cut podcast)

Commentary

After Biers arrives, Dualla tells Biers about an oxygen recirc unit they heard in the hallway. "We have about dozen CO2 scrubbers aboard Galactica. They all work 24 hours a day." Later, she tells her that the vegetable stores and canned goods are kept in titanium lockers to ensure maximum freshness.

The magazine that Adama is reading is titled Caprican Life.

Baltar complains that D'anna Biers hasn't interviewed him yet. But he rebuffs her offer to interview him immediately, preferring it to be done in his office. Later on, Number Six convinces him to provide reasons for why he should lead the fleet.

Lee believes that his pilots deserve special consideration. "They're asked to put their lives on the line every single day for a fleet that seems more interested in what they do wrong than in what they do right. They're not asking for your pity, but they damn well deserve your respect."

According to Kara, Kat has been pissing her off for weeks. She wants to take her off rotation "until she gets her heard rewired", but Lee can't do that because they need the pilots.

Private Kelso believes it was a command frak-up the moment Tigh put the Marines on the Gideon. "I'm not suprised someone's trying to take out that drunk son of a bitch."

Adama places Tigh on mandatory shore leave to attend the meeting on Cloud Nine, something Tigh describes as a king-size bitch session. "You're going because you're not afraid, and people should see that. Plus, it'll also give people a chance to vent their feelings instead of seething in private." He tells him to stay away from the bar. Tigh is ready to leave aboard a Raptor, but it has been sabotaged.

Ellen Tigh believes Adama is hanging Tigh out to dry to placate the fleet. When Tigh owns up to the Gideon incident, she complains that he is taking the heat because it's honorable. "When are you gonna realize... we're all alone out here?"

"All I ever wanted was to be an officer on a battlestar. I trained my whole life, trained harder than anyone in my unit. Basically, I put my life on hold until I was assigned to Galactica. Then the Cylons hit. And I realized that this is all that I know. Tech manuals, commands, tactics. I'm not saying that I'm unhappy. Just wondering if there's something more." This is Gaeta on the career choice that he made. Gaeta has at tattoo of a tiger.

According to Biers, Tigh was in full command of Galactica for more than a week. Tigh explodes when Biers pushes his buttons over the Gideon incident. "Someone's a mean drunk." Regarding the Gideon incident, Biers reminds Adama that four civilians are dead and "Tigh and the shooters take a walk." "Nobody takes a walk. They all gotta live with it."

Sharon is bleeding and taken to Dr. Cottle. Adama explained that if news of Sharon's pregnancy leaked out, it could be devastating to fleet morale. "After the Gideon, this could turn the entire fleet against you." She lectures Adama on questioning her patriotism. She manages to switch tapes before Adama takes the recorded footage from her camera.

In Dualla's interview, she revealed that her father went crazy when she enlisted. "He thought the military was a joke. Refuge for emotional cripples and patriotic fools." "But you signed up anyway." "I guess I just wanted to believe in something." She never reconciled with him prior to the Cylon attack.

"We didn't lose anyone. That's a good day." This is Lee's answer to question of how the encounter went with the Cylon raiders.

Kara was familiar with the poetry passage on Tigh's mirror. "'From the darkness, you must fall, failed and weak, to darkness all.' Kataris. Not one of his best." Biers also recognized a book by Kataris when she went over the film footage in the editing room. This is what led the Marines to Tigh's quarters where Palladino was holding the Tigh's hostage.

In the documentary, Kat explains she is ashamed of her stim abuse. "We're all in the same hole. There are no replacements coming up. There's no downtime. This it it. So I started taking stims."

D'anna's documentary was sent back to the Cylons on Caprica, including the cut footage of Cottle's emergency operation. Another copy of D'anna revealed that the baby was saved. "We lost two raiders relaying the images back to the fleet, but I think the sacrifice was worth it." Doral says that the child's life must be protected at all costs.

This is the entire text of the narration at the end of the documentary:

"I came to Galactica to tell a story. In all honestly, I thought I knew what that story was before I ever set foot here. How an arrogant military let their egos get in the way of doing their job safeguarding the lives of the civilian population. But I found the truth was more complex than that.

"These people are not Cylons. They're not robots blindly following orders and polishing their boots. They're people. Deeply flawed, yes. But deeply human too. And maybe that's saying the same thing. What struck me most is that despite it all -- the hardships, the stress, the ever present danger of being killed -- despite all that, they never give up. Never lie down in the road and let the truck run them over. They wake up in the morning, put on their uniforms, and do their jobs. Every day. No pay. No rest. No hope of ever laying down the burden and letting someone else do the job. There are no relief troops coming, no Colonial Fleet training new recruits every day. The people on Galactica are it. They are the thin line of blue separating us from the Cylons.

"Lt. Gaeta told me a remarkable statistic: Not a single member of Galactica's crew has asked to resign. Not one. Think about that. If you wore the uniform, wouldn't you want to quit? To step aside and say, 'Enough. Let someone else protect the fleet.' I know I would. But then, I don't wear a uniform. Most of us don't, most of us never will. The story of Galactica isn't that people make bad decisions under pressure. It's that those mistakes are the exception. Most of the time the men and women under Commander Adama get it right. The proof is that our fleet survives. And with Galactica at our side, we will endure! This is D'anna Biers, Fleet News Service."

Laura's whiteboard reads 47,852 survivors.

Here are the names of the various people in the documentary:
Anastasia Dualla, PETTY OFFICER 2nd CLASS, CFR
Lee Adama, CAPTAIN, CFR
Scott Kelso, PRIVATE FIRST CLASS, CMCR
Margaret Edmonson, LIEUTENANT, CF [ Margaret is "Racetrack" ]
Karl C. Agathon, LIEUTENANT, CF
Felix Gaeta, LIEUTENANT, CF
Saul Tigh, COLONEL, CF, EXECUTIVE OFFICER, GALACTICA
Dr. Gaius Baltar, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE TWELVE COLONIES
Louanne Katraine, LIEUTENANT, CF

Two of the pilots are named Grayshirt and Kingston.

"I thought about Christiane Amanpour, but I wanted to go a little closer to home [accent-wise]. She's got a pretty plummy accent. But I did kind of based it on her, because I wanted the performance to be visually annoying. With all respect to Christiane Amanpour, but you know how she turns her collar up? I just wanted to have things like that. I wanted her to be threatening, just in terms of that... I wanted her to get people's backs up from the start. My character's got all the bells and whistles and will not apologize for it, thank you very much... I really was covering things. They really were going to use the footage that I and my sidekick were taking. Sometimes he was on the camera, sometimes I had the camera, but we were really rolling video. We were making a film within a film." -- Lucy Lawless on 9/1/2005 (source: Zap2It)