I think that this whole “each download gets more painful” is something new. What if it’s a disease that only affects Cylons when they download? Humans don’t download and wouldn’t be affected. Did anyone else think it was off in Downloaded that the Cylons even bothered to dig out trapped agents? I mean the agents could have just killed themselves (ala Cavil) and woke up in a new body. And does a Cylon consciousness travel at the speed of light? Is it possible that GINA downloaded a year later?
From statements made by Caprica Boomer in captivity, and the experiences we’ve seen in Downloaded, the process of death and resurrection is generally quite unpleasant. Cylons seem to feel pain as acutely as humans, so if death isn’t instant, getting dead is a real drag. After they wake up in that glowing goo, they appear to need a sizable support group just to talk them down from the pain and anxiety they’re experiencing, so rebirth doesn’t look like a barrel of fun either.
All of us could probably stab a knitting needle through our arms, grind it around a little, yank it out, and be none the worse for wear after a brief recuperation. Just because we can doesn’t mean we’d be all that eager to do so, though.
Yes, I heard that too. But technically, if this is the same Leoben they spaced earlier in the series, then he’s on his sixth.
Leoben seems a little different than the rest though. A bit of a nut-case to begin with. High pain tolerance. Heck, he almost seems to enjoy it when Starbuck plays rough, and dying doesn’t seem to phase him.
Just to be sure, and to be fair, we need to see him wake up naked in a vat of goo.
Well I do, anyway.
I’ve always assumed it’s much faster than that. More like the instantaneous-ish FTL jumps they make. When Cally shot Boomer and later we saw her resurrect, didn’t the show begin with “six weeks earlier” or some such? It seems the only thing that slows them down is if a lot of Cylons are dying and their consciousness has to wait in a queue.
Distance has something to do with it…the whole point of destroying the resurection ship was to prevent the pursuing cylons from downloading. Not sure if that would mean an absolute maximum distance exists beyond which downloading is not possible, or if it meant that dead toasters would have to download to a location too far away to rejoin the pursuit…
The more microanalysis I see, the less convinced I am by the “And they have a plan” line in the opening sequence. It looks more like the characters (and the writers) just careen wildly from story idea to story idea with no real cohesive story arc tying it all together.
