Episode Name: Rapture Episode Number: 311 Written by: David Weddle & Bradley Thompson Directed by: Michael Rymer Original Air Date: 1/21/07 on SciFi Channel Review Posted: 1/27/07
Teaser:
After having to wait over three months for the conclusion to the Season 2 mid-season stand-off between Adama and Cain, we only had to wait six weeks for the resolution to the stand-off between Adama and the Cylons. This time, the Cylons blinked (mostly). In the meantime, Lee and Anders' stand-off is resolved when Lee orders Dee to go find Kara. Thankfully, this is only one of three scenes that deal with the Lee-Dee-Kara-Anders soap opera. Yes, we know there were more scenes involving those four, but those other scenes were within the context of the episode's main story.
The Cylons avert the nuking of the planet and the Temple of Five, but find that they have a new crisis in that the entire Three series has become defiant of the rest of the Cylons. For all the audience had previously known, Caprica Three/D'Anna's extracurricular suicide activities were isolated to her, but with another Three backing D'Anna's run to the planet, the audience and the other Cylons learn that the entire series has grown unstable.
Back on Galactica, Athena has decided to do exactly what everyone knew was coming since Boomer told her that Hera was alive: Athena's going to go get her daughter back. How she goes about it is a surprise, except to a couple of speculators who actually guessed it weeks ago. She has not only decided to die so she can get resurrected, but she begs Helo to do it. It made for a great dramatic scene, but couldn't she have spared Helo that anguish and just gotten herself killed in an "accident?" Of course, that would have also precluded the next scene between Adama, Roslin and Helo.
Act 1:
After the break, we're right back at Helo and Athena's quarters. Athena's blood is still splattered everywhere and her body is being wheeled out. Roslin gives Helo another one of her lectures about jeopardizing the safety of the entire fleet out of personal (selfish) interests, while Adama expresses his own concerns about Athena's knowledge of codes and tactical plans. Helo shrugs them off by saying that Athena promised him that she could resist the will of the other Cylons and that if she couldn't be trusted, Adama wouldn't have granted her access to them in the first place.
That brings up the still unanswered question as to how Athena went from living in the brig with a constant armed guard to a trusted officer under Adama's command. How/why did Adama allow that to happen? Did he need a substitute for Kara? And will it ever get explained to the audience? Helo also gets to point out that the whole situation is Roslin's fault in the first place because she switched babies by staging Hera's death. Roslin admits to the act, but is self-righteously unrepentant for the decision or the continued deception that followed. The writers had to get to this scene somehow and having Helo pull the trigger was the shortcut.
On the Cylon basestar, Athena wakes up to find Caprica (Baltar's) Six waiting for her. Six has to ask what happened, which is interesting since Three was waiting for Six when she was reborn and seemed to know exactly what happened to her and later to Boomer after she was reborn. Apparently, the Cylons can access the knowledge of the conscience that has downloaded, but not always. Athena's resurrection would be too pat if not for Caprica Three's established ability to keep her own repeated deaths a secret from the other Cylons. Anyway, back to Athena, who (all too) easily snows Six with a story about the humans keeping her from seeing Hera. Athena then asks about Hera and finds out that she's ill and getting worse.
On the planet, Dee and Sergeant Fischer start to move from their recon position and immediately take fire which kills Fischer. Dee runs off like the non-combat officer that she really is. It's actually nice to see a Dee scene that's not all about the relationship mess, although her running off in a panic isn't much of an improvement for the character. Over at the temple, Tyrol is still stumped as to what all the glyphs say. So close and yet still so far.
Baltar and D'Anna have made it to the planet where they look across to the temple. D'Anna doubts herself, but Baltar bucks her up even as his Inner Six claims he is the Chosen One, not D'Anna. There's nothing like one deluded character being encouraged in her delusion by another deluded character, but Lucy Lawless and James Callis have been pulling it off all season. Over to an ambush point where we get treated to a Caprica Resistance reunion between Barolay, Anders and Hilliard before three Cylon Centurions approach the trap.
