"Almost too good" is what a friend of mine said during a recent chat we had about "Sometimes a Great Notion," the first of the final stretch of "Battlestar Galactica" episodes on Sci Fi Channel. "Notion" aired a few days before the inauguration of Barack Obama, making it either the second or third biggest deal of mid-January, depending on where you'd place the season premiere of "Lost." This run of 10 episodes, set to conclude on March 20, will bring to an end the rebooted "Galactica" series, which those in the know consider one of the finest televisual achievements of the young century.
Before I go into more detail about the episode, let me first say that it took long enough to get here. "Notion," and the episodes that will follow, were originally supposed to be part of "Galactica"'s fourth season, but the writers' strike cut that short. Fans are referring to this final pod of episodes as Season 4.5. If you haven't been following the series, there's not much I can do now to catch you up.
If you are a fan, though, then you know that last week's episode laid the foundation for two things -- sheer awesomeness and complete heartbreak. We've all tried to pretend it wouldn't happen, but now it is: what may be the best show on TV is coming to an end. You know they'll do it with class, but you still don't want them to do> it. "Almost too good," indeed.
So, the episode. I watched it Friday night, along with everyone else, and had all my opinions about the caliber of the show confirmed. There was one scene in particular, between William Adama and Saul Tigh (if you've seen it, you know the one I'm talking about), that would earn Edward James Olmos an Emmy nomination in any just universe. I'd call it a high point of the episode, but the episode was basically all high points. In the best serialized sci-fi tradition, "Notion" answered some questions even as it gave way to new ones, and shocked us to no end. (Dualla's suicide! Starbuck finds her own charred remains! The thirteenth colony were all Cylons! The Four were on Earth 2000 years ago! Ellen Tigh, holy shit!)
It's still too soon to draw up top-ten lists of "Galactica" episodes, but "Sometimes a Great Notion" is likely to make mine when all is said and done. This was one of those hours of television that can be watched over and over again, studied and appreciated in new ways. The camerawork alone is worth a repeat viewing -- just pay attention how how certain scenes are constructed and filmed. They know what they're doing over there.
I'm pretty sure we're going to see all the stops pulled for this final run of episodes, and if the reveals from "Notion" are any indication, the worst and the best are yet to come. "Galactica" has made a habit of outdoing itself in the last few years, and thankfully it hasn't kicked the habit just yet. I’m not usually the type of person to get really sucked into a show, but with "Galactica" it’s a bit different. I mean, don’t get wrong -- I love television, but you watch enough of it and you start to get savvy to the tricks and conventions, the limits imposed by the form. Even the best TV is often too ridiculous, by its very nature, for you to build up a serious emotional investment.
But every now and then, you get a show that's written, acted and edited so well that it lets you suspend your disbelief. Once that happens, once the show gets an opening, it grabs you by the throat and shakes you up in a way you can't ignore. That's when you become one of those guys who are always proselytizing about the show to people who don't watch it and probably don't care. "Galactica" is one such show, and when it's gone we'll be talking about it for years to come.
Sadly, "Galactica" is a genre show, on the most genre of channels, and a lot of viewers don't seem to see past that (although plenty do, and more power to them). At this point, practically every critic who writes about TV has taken a moment to observe how "Galactica" is not only a show about spaceships and robots but also a show about love, paranoia, and ethics in a time of war, and thus, despite its farfetched circumstances, a show that couldn't be more relevant to the American experience of the moment. No less an authority on television than Nancy Franklin of The New Yorker has written about "how timely and resonant the show is," so if you don't appreciate that dimension of it, you have no one but yourself to blame.
So what can we expect from season 4.5? In a word, complete and utter madness. I was wrong about the Fifth Cylon, so I may not be exactly qualified to make predictions, but what the hell. Will we see Ellen team up with Cavil? She may come back angry as all get out; don't forget that Saul was the one who killed her. Is she some sort of Cylon Queen? Could be. I think that everyone may in fact just die -- except for Apollo and Starbuck, leaving them to jump-start the human race once again. On the other hand, it might just turn out that everyone is a Cylon after all.
From what I understand, the producers want to keep certain aspects of the show a mystery, never to be answered. I want answers, damn it! One week is far too long to wait for a new episode. It's both great and horrible when TV can make you want to see it this badly.
