The Hand of God

This episode is absolutely critical - from this point on Galactica is as much about finding earth as it is about simple survival. This also marks the point where both Roslin's and Baltar's intellectual and emotional lives undergo a drastic transformation.

For Baltar this experience starts in "33," and "Six Degrees of Separation" expands on the theme. Both of these episodes, however, are restricted to dealing with threats to Baltar. In this episode Baltar's seemingly random choice of target ends up saving the fleet. This has an enormous effect on his world outlook, since he makes an irrevocable decision to move away from his rationalist, materialist mindset to a faith-based understanding of reality. The final scene, where Baltar stands in his robe looking up at the sky (and we are looking down at him) is typical of Baltar's ego and his sense of grandiosity (it's also pretty funny), but it has a core of truth since it appears that divine intervention DID guide his hand to the right target.

I find the fact that Six is the source of religious instruction fascinating. She seems unlikely since she is essentially a seduction machine, very jealous and capable of violence. (In "Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I" she says, "I can rip it [Baltar's heart] out whenever I want to.") There's nothing warm and fuzzy about her, but she still mouths pieties like, "God doesn't take sides. Give yourself over to his love." and ".... surrender your ego, remain humble." 

Roslin's evolution starts in "Flesh and Bone," when she has dreams that predict the future. Now, however, she is having visions (or hallucinations, depending on your point of view) that require explanation. Roslin's use of chamallah as an "alternative" treatment for cancer soon becomes the vehicle for her understanding of the Colonials' founding story and her place in that story. 

The episode opens with Roslin's press conference about the latest crisis. She starts out in usual presidential form, but as the vision of the snakes becomes more disturbing she becomes incoherent and distracted. The snakes are a particularly creepy symbol (at least to this writer).

Like Baltar, Roslin's personal experience convinces her that she is playing a role given to her by the gods. Like Baltar, she is a rationalist and is even ignorant of her society's religious belief system, making her "conversion" seem a logical and legitimate change in her sense of self. Mary O'Donnell's expression depicts with stunning verisimilitude Roslin's version of falling down on the road to Damascus. Unlike Baltar, this transformation doesn't seem (much) to inflate her ego. It does however give her a sense of purpose that offers more than just safety, but also hope.

The end of the episode offers a nice touch when Six's interpretation of events matches Elosha's. 

The rest of the episode is a ripping good yarn. The special effects are great and it is a lot of fun watching the battle scenes, especially as Lee & co. destroy the refinery. There are also some nice twists as Lee takes on qualities of Starbuck and Starbuck is forced to step back and assume a role inimical to her personality. This is a rite of passage for Starbuck (as Adama says, "Welcome to the big league.")

Of course we are forced to sit through the usual Lee histrionics when he bitches and moans that everybody likes Starbuck more than they like him, and his daddy has to sit by his side and stroke his ego and prove that he loves Lee more than he loves Starbuck, blah blah blah. In fact, the only Lee moment I liked was at the end, when he looks at his father while he is smoking a cigar. Not surprisingly, Lee doesn't say anything, which is probably why the little scene is a success.

What I really liked

• Elosha, whose personality conveys a magisterial authority. Her deep voice and cynical reaction towards Roslin's initial description of her experiences, as well as her embrace of Roslin's role in bringing the prophecies to fruition lend credence to this important new story line. After Elosha dies, she is replaced briefly by the priest who delivers the oath of office. The guy looks like a typical mainstream Protestant minister, who matches our (or at least mine) experience of traditional religion. By season 4, however, the representative of religion is this wishy-washy new age type that I personally cannot take seriously.
• When Tigh says, "It'll cost us." His tone of voice, which is slightly hoarse, and his serious and even pained facial expression convey the image of a leader embracing a necessary evil (the death of his men) to achieve a larger purpose (the safety of the fleet). I suppose that this is the whole point of war, even though the only "just wars" I can think of are the American Civil War and World War II.
• The depiction of an active, free press during a press conference that resembles U.S. presidential press conferences. Despite the extraordinary circumstances, the structure of colonial society survives, including a legitimate government following rules established before the Cylon attack, and journalists playing their role as conveyers of information as well as devil's advocate. 
• Adama's and Roslin's glasses reflecting the green light from the light board. I also noticed that once the mission completes Adama briefly takes off his glasses, his equivalent of letting his guard down.

One thing I thought was really really stupid

Everyone standing around the light table (which I guess served as a map) while models of ships are pushed around to indicate how the battle is progressing. Come on, CNN can do better than that, why can't Galactica? I realize that this is one of Galactica's deliberate anacronisms and I assume that the intent was to allude to those old RAF / Battle of Britain movies where everyone stands around stiff-upper-lipped, but I thought it was stupid for the following reasons:

• Space is 3-dimensional but the model was 2-dimensional
  
• I couldn't figure out why they weren't in the CIC in the first place
• Gaeta's function seemed to be restricted to repeating everything Adama or Starbuck said. I kept wondering why they couldn't just speak to Dualla directly and eliminate the middleman. It kind of reminded me of the movie "Galaxy Quest," where Lt. Tawny Madison's job was repeating other people's commands to the computer, and then repeating what the computer says to everyone else.

Cool stuff they do with the camera

Honestly, this is the most technical phrase I can come up with to say what I have to say in this post. Sorry.

In any event, I am encountering a real stumbling block finishing up everything I want to say about the miniseries, there is just SO MUCH there. But, enough already, I think it's time to move on. Before moving on to "33" I just want to write a little about the way characters and events are filmed. A lot of these techniques or whatever are used in the miniseries and show up consistently throughout the entire series. 

For example - I didn't pin this one down right away, but I noticed that a lot of time THINGS or PEOPLE seem to be in the way preventing me from getting a good look at what is going on or who is talking. I finally started making connections in the "Collaborators" episode when Gaeta was about to take a one-way rip out the airlock. When Chief Tyrol is talking to Gaeta someone's leg is in the way, obscuring vertically about 1/4 (maybe more) of the screen. I was like, don't these people know what they are doing? I can't see all of Gaeta's face. But I also felt that I was part of the scene, as if I was seeing things from Tyrol's viewpoint while he is crouched down talking to Gaeta, who is kneeling.

So I went back and started looking consciously for this, especially in episodes I really like, and I found that they do this all the time and have done it since day one of the series. The perspective is often like looking over someone's shoulder (and seeing that shoulder, btw) from the back of the crowd.

For example, in the miniseries, right before the nuke hits Galactica (scene 11), there are actually three times, one right after the other, where someone walks in front of Adama as he says, "Brace for contact my friend." Try stepping through the scene and you will see that I'm right. I noticed this when I watched the scene at full speed, but I had something of a visceral reaction. It was only when I started thinking about the way I perceived these scenes that I started to try and figure out how they did it. In any event, this is what happens in real life, you look at someone or something and someone walks in front of you. It gives a real "you are there" feeling as you watch the action.

I would have loved to see them rehearse the scenes in the CIC when the nuke hits, because I think they are really well choreographed. Now, I am assuming that they didn't shake the whole set (as if), so the entire cast must have rehearsed falling and jolting at the same time, because it is really convincing. Moreover there a lot of different shots of the scene so that you view everyone falling from different angles. I kept trying to find a snippet where someone's timing is off, but there just didn't seem to be any. The same thing happens on the hangar deck, when the arm and then the body of a figure off-camera falls into the frame. The result is pretty convincing.

It's fun to compare this to the original Star Trek, when a siren wails and everybody pretends to be jolted side to side. Even back in the sixties it looked pretty silly.

Galactica also uses a lot of hand-held camera type stuff (hey, I am not terribly astute about what these things are called, I just know the effects that they achieve), which creates something of a documentary feel to the show. They are taking a completely artificial environment in a place that is not quite like ours, and giving it a very strong sense of authenticity.

I learned a lot about this approach to filming by watching an excellent, extremely underrated film called "Children of Men" (directed by Alfonso Cuaron), which, coincidentally, is about a speculative not-too-distant future when the human race is on the verge of extinction. That movie has a LOT of scenes with handheld cameras, and I really felt pulled in to the action and the experiences of the characters (the opening scene of walking away from a coffee bar that is suddenly blown up by terrorists is riveting).

Towards the end of the film there is a really long, unbroken sequence where the lead character, Theo, is running through a firefight to get to a building that is under siege. They filmed it with the cameraman running alongside the actor (Clive Owen). Sometimes you can see Theo, and sometimes you can't see him but you can hear him breathing while he is running and you can can experience some of the terror and confusion directly from his point of view. The net effect is to break down the barrier between spectator and participant.

It was pretty interesting to learn how they filmed this scene. Apparently they did a lot of rehearsals because it was so expensive and difficult to rebuild the set after every attempt. I think it took 3 or 4 tries, and in one of the unsuccessful attempts the cameraman actually fell while running (please don't quote me, I just don't have the energy to re-locate the reference for this information). On the last try something red splashes on the lens of the camera when Theo is running through a wrecked bus filled with people trying to hide from the shooting. Cuaron was like, "oh no, we have to do it again," and everyone else said no, this is really great, so they kept it. It adds a lot to the documentary feel.

In fact, as I write this, it suddenly occurs to me that Galactica and "Children of Men" are both about apocalyptic "what-if" situations, and they both use the same techniques to add verisimilitude to what is otherwise a totally artificial construct. The effect of all this camera work is to give an element of gritty reality and draw the viewer in to the action. The setting of Galactica, while not entirely unfamiliar, is nevertheless sufficiently different so that we recognize early and often that this is NOT our world. These effects mitigate the difference by conveying a recognizable documentary evening-news type feel to the series. I think it works really well and, in a lot of ways, Galactica feels more like news than like a television show.