As I mentioned in the original post, free is, after all, free.

Then again, maybe not. After watching the recent mutiny episodes (Adama the insulted power junkie, Roslin the crazed vindictive delusionary), and now reading a plot summary of the latest, I realize that “free” isn’t totally void of cost. I’ll never get these clumps of 45 minutes back. So money or no money, I’m done squandering life.

Besides, I have a feeling the writers sat me in front of the firing squad with Gaeta. Fair enough — I’m sure in their minds I deserve it!

Drop me a line to tell me how the series ends …

Good call — although it would seem that the number five could not be completely arbitrary. In the very beginning, we know there are 12 models, and we meet them one by one. When we have seen n models, then the myth can only be about The Final 12-n

Yes yes, but I still take exception to the fact that n was arbitrary, based only on how many cylons remained unrevealed up to the point it became convenient and cool for Baltar to spend time on a basestar.

Why do the cylons even use the term Final Five? They experienced no gradual series of reveals. Moreover, since they shun prying into hidden identities, they should have no expectation of any final reveals. The cylons would instead refer to them as the Unknown Five, the Secret Five. If anything, Final Five is the writers’ mental jargon popping out of cylon mouths, where it doesn’t belong.

Or maybe you jumped back on when episodes became available for free online watching?

Thou hast said it. As I mentioned in the original post, free is, after all, free.

To the point, I think Ellen is a very odd choice for the Final Fifth.

So are Samuel Anders and Tory Foster. To start, neither Ellen nor Anders were expected to survive the nuclear holocaust. Anders is in the fleet only because of Starbuck’s religious/hallucinogenic-inspired trip back to their homeworld. The surprise of Ellen’s survival and presence in the fleet was used by the writers as a plot curveball in an earlier season. So we’re to believe that the cylons, who knew their Holy Five lived among humans, were content obliterating those same five in a deluge of nuclear explosions? I don’t buy it.

Foster wasn’t even a cast member until season two or three. Granted, we can suppose her cylon nature gravitated her toward power until she became Roslin’s right hand person. But we simultaneously can’t help but recognize that the writers had no plan, at the beginning, for who the cylons would be. (If dead Ellen is a cylon, couldn’t they have made Billy a cylon, and brought him back? It’s not as though he’s busy: his recent show, the new Knight Rider, has been canceled.)

And now they’ve got their work cut out for them to explain Starbuck.

And not much time to explain it in: this last half of season four is all they’ve got (Galactica is being dropped). I’m sure they’ve got it all worked out and intend a fun ride forward. My fear, though, is that Starbuck will turn out to be a god, who in turn will be the cylon God.

Which brings us back to point 7 above: Too much of a good thing is too much. Only three suspense questions remain. Will the human/cylon alliance find a home? Will they escape Cavil and the remaining cylon fleet? And who or what is Starbuck? One out of three is a lot of show to hang on one already overdrawn character.

So does this mean you’re watching again? I thought the point of this post originally was that you gave up. Or maybe you jumped back on when episodes became available for free online watching?

To the point, I think Ellen is a very odd choice for the Final Fifth. She’s just so peripheral. And now they’ve got their work cut out for them to explain Starbuck.