Written by James Poniewozik, time-blog.com,
on 03-12-2007
Views : 851
Not nearly as much to comment on in this week's Galactica, though, after all, you can't expect them to kill off (or pseudo-kill off) a major character every week. While I was glad they got back to the fascinating character of Baltar, I was less interested in the legal machinations, especially the business with Space Ramsey Clark, or whoever it was they got to handle Baltar's case. It always throws me a little when BSG has plots that center around media sensations, trials of the century and other such stuff--not because they're unrealistic, per se, but because it doesn't seem like a decimated civilization struggling for survival would have the psychic energy or simple infrastructure for media circuses like that.
Case in point: whenever President Roslyn has an issue to address, she's always speaking to a healthy-sized White-House-gaggle of reporters. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the human population of the fleet down to around the size of a county seat in the Midwest? In America, that size community would be lucky to have a weekly paper that wasn't full of wire copy. But BSG seems to contain its own media universe. Proportionally, journalism must be the biggest civilian employer inside the fleet.
Don't get me wrong, though: It's always nice to think that, in the event of a potentially species-eradicating catastrophe, I'd still have a job. How many TV critics you think there are in the Galactica-verse?
Battlestar Galactica ‘The Son also Rises’ reaches into the headlines one more time for the beginning of its three part finale, this time giving us its pastiche of trials for deposed leaders, complete with assassinated attorneys and opinion splitting manifestos. While Baltar remains convinced, along with the rest of us, that a fair trial is not even within the realm of possibility, he finds an interesting ally in Lee Adama, and a shrewd cat-touting attorney named Romo Lampkin.
The episode recalled – as many episodes of Battlestar Galactica do – real life details from a certain middle eastern conflict, in particular the tale of a certain deposed President. Taking place a few weeks following the devastating lose of Kara ‘Starbuck” Thrace, we get a little bit of the emotional aftermath of that, checking in with Sam as he pines for his fallen love with drunken overtures on the flight deck, to Adama who secretly weeps over Starbuck’s personnel file, to Lee who seems to be struggling with his own moving on, but is further ahead than anyone.
This is the fifth in an on-going series of entries covering all the major themes in the Battlestar Galactica score. If you missed them, check out Part I, Part II, Part III and Part IV.
Military Theme
This melody, almost always accompanied with snare drums, was originally scored as a bansuri solo, set against Apollo briefing the viper pilots in the first episode of Season One. It quickly developed into a theme for all military aspects of the colonial fleet, becoming especially associated with the friendship between Bill Adama and Saul Tigh.
The theme first returned in Season One's You Can't Go Home Again, played tragically as Adama relieves Tigh of duty in a blind rage. In the following episode, Litmus, it underscored Bill thanking Saul for saving his life, this time playing the loyalty and brotherhood between them.
As those closest to her deal with Kara’s death, they are concurrently thrust into the trial of Gaius Baltar. Nothing like getting involved in the trial of the century to take your mind off the pain. But, as Admiral Adama told his son he’ll do his job. Lee is openly distraught over the loss of Starbuck, while his father tries to put forth an air of stoicism. It’s not easily maintained as chinks in the Old Man’s armor begin to show. In the end, a son rises from the shadow of his father.
Every man deserves a fair trial, and by extension full legal representation. The thing about using terrorism for justice is that justice is never served. Of course, some people do something so heinous that the ends seem to justify the means. But boy oh boy does that not beg the question, “How do you know they’re guilty?” Which is where trials come in. Someone aboard Galactica didn’t feel Baltar had the right to an attorney, and felt so strongly that they planted a bomb that killed the man. So, needing to attempt a fair trial a new lawyer is found for the good doctor.
Our good friends at Galactica.tv have released their March edition of their online magazine. This month the feature interview is Jamie Bamber, also interviewed is Brad Dryborough who played Lt. Hoshi. Read more at Galactica.tv
