Battlestar Galactica season 4 episode 7: Guess What’s Coming To Dinner

Another build up episode, I felt, this week, although still a damn good one. Bets are on as to what the climax in a few weeks will be – the Cylon human alliance fighting the other models? The big reveal as to who the fifth final fiver is? The President’s death? Comment below if you’ve got an inkling.

As for this episode however, it’s split between the President seemingly schooling Lee in the ways of politics, and the Demetrius story. Just a thought – it’s not hard to imagine Adama Jr running for President once Roslin’s bought it? She’s certainly not going to let Tory take over if she can, and chastises her for fraternizing with Baltar. If it weren’t Laura Roslin, famous iron-willed airlocker, then I’d be worried about Tory’s revenge.

The rest of this plot line rests on Gaeta, who, sadly, has to lose his leg. To alleviate his sadness he sings folk songs to himself in bed, which, depending on the steely heartedness of the viewer, was either incredibly touching or vom-inducing. Sadly, there’s no Starship Troopers style reconstruction tank for Gaeta, and he just gets Doc Cottle and a big saw, but maybe he can get himself one of those metal Centurion legs, and start really kicking some butt as a cyborg!

Enough with the pleasantries, anyway, and on with the main story. Tigh demonstrates his eerie Cylon powers, as he manages to stop Adama attacking the captured base ship, unable to identify itself to the Galactica as the Demetrius didn’t manage to simultaneously jump to the right co-ordinates as planned. Call me cynical, but it was just a tad predictable – allowing Tigh to exercise his giant, pulsating Cylon brain, and the episode to start with a bit of a nail biter.

With the uneasy alliance established, the spokeswoman Six strikes a deal with Adama and Roslin – they want to unbox the D’Annas, and to do so they need to go back to the resurrection hub. This could be the biggest prize the colonial fleet has ever found – the ability to make all Cylons, as Roslin quips, a mortal enemy. It’s risky, though – even if they think it’s not a trap, I can’t imagine the Cavils et al won’t have the hub protected with everything they’ve got, potentially lining the show up with the biggest battle it’s ever seen… and if successful, the last Cylon will be revealed. The real question is will Tigh, Anders, Tory and the Chief sabotage the mission to the hub? And will the ‘insurance’ Six, Leoben and Eight discussed jeopardise the whole truce?

Finally, the episode’s two shocks come in relation to the visions of the opera house, shared by the captured Six, Athena, Hera and Roslin. After a particularly disturbing vision, in which Baltar and the Six take Hera and leave the opera house, shutting the door behind them, Athena wakes up to Hera saying ‘goodbye’. Turns out she’s been drawing the Six over and over again, and as Athena’s looking at the drawings her little girl runs out of the door and away… to the Six. After a frantic search, Athena finds her with the Six… and kills her. The Six, I mean. At the same time, on the captured base star, Roslin asks for the hybrid to be plugged back in… and as soon as it’s awake, it jumps the ship!

All in all, there was a certain amount of filler in this episode – Gaeta’s warbling could definitely have been trimmed, but the two shocks right at the end were classic Battlestar.