Battlestar 4.18 - "Deadlock"

Only four more episodes to go after this one.

Who has the sniffles?

I certainly do, after seeing what an excellent job Michael Hogan was able to do this episode. To me, way before this final five idea took center stage, Tigh was one of the most intriguing characters on the show. He certainly wasn't the most likable, but in my opinion, the episodes of the second season that dealt with him taking over for a comatose Adama were some of the show's best. They proved both to fans and critics how realistic these characters can actually be.

The revelation that Tigh was a cylon was certainly the hardest pill to swallow out of all the plot twists, but Tigh's reaction to the entire situation has certainly been the most interesting out of all the final five's. Michael Hogan deserves quite a bit of credit, he has to make Tigh appear as a man's man, who now has to accept the fact that he is actually a machine.

Throughout the beginning of this season, it was difficult not to feel sad for Tigh. Imagine having such an intense hatred for your enemy, that you would poison your own wife for consorting with them. Then imagine finding out you are actually one of the enemy group. I can't think of a worse predicament.

By this point, the end of the fourth season, Tigh has shown major signs of accepting what he really is. Just as Tigh has begun to move away from a state of denial, so has the members of the human fleet. The mutiny that had us on the edge of our seats only two episodes ago was spurned on by the idea of humans not being able to accept Cylons into the fleet. Now, only two episodes later, there is a section of the remembrance wall dedicated to Cylons who have died since they joined the fleet.

Once again, another hard pill to swallow for cynics. For a show that has been praised for being so realistic in its depiction of fantastic things (I am definitely guilty of showering the shows creators with such praise) this recent switch in the perspective of the majority might seem a little far fetched.

But the question is, when are we allowed to accept a bit of optimistic fantasy in our depressingly realistic TV show. With only four episodes left, now is the time. It is time for one of the main ideas of the show to be brought to the foreground. Tigh said it best in this episode, "Just human is too weak, Just Cylon is too weak. We need something in between." That is the direction this show has been going in, ever since Athena and Helo conceived a child in the first season. In the next four episodes, we will see massive integration between the humans in the fleet and the cylons.

I wouldn't be surprised if in the final episode, or maybe even an episode or two beforehand, the show's narrative jumped many years into the future, where we could get a glimpse of a society made up of interracial beings, part human and part Cylon.

Even the damn ship is being "filled with Cylon blood" as Gaius pointed out. The Cylon workers continue to repair the extensive damage done to Galactica using their own technology. On a side note, that sequence really annoyed me this week, and took me out of the story. How many freaking times were they going to show Adama watching that worker Six with a worried look on his face? I counted about five before I gave up.

Of course, there will be quite a few horrible occurrences before the show is over. The perfect example of this is the fact that Tigh's son died before he could be born. If you felt bad for the man beforehand, I don't know how you couldn't be affected by the scene where he watched his little 'Liam' die.

Only four more episodes left, people. Hopefully, they will go light on the baby killing and continue with the superb acting.