BSG: Season 3, Episode 14: "The Woman King"--Spoilers

Cafe Society
81

[QUOTE=Corner Case]
I agree with all the points that tear at the credibility of this episode: baby’s blood curing cancer but not disease; Helo accepting one laywoman’s opinion over many other opinions; Caprican medical records saved in humanity’s desperate flight; Cottle doing an autopsy but not doing a simple blood check; etc.
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Cottle lied about that. He didn’t do either - he was just trying to get Helo out of his office.

Not necessarily. It’s pretty typical to order 13 episodes and, if they’re being received well, increase the order to a full 22.

-Joe

82

Does anybody speak whatever language is used in the opening theme? I need to have some syllables to run through my head while it plays. According to Wikipedia, the words are:

[QUOTE=Wikipedia]
OM bhūr bhuvah svah tat savitur varēnyam bhargō dēvasya dhīmahi dhiyō yō nah pracōdayāt
[/QUOTE]
Can anyone provide phonetics?

83

I am intrigued by your newsletter and seek enlightenment.
THe article says this mantra is in the US version? :slight_smile:

84

[QUOTE=Oslo Ostragoth]
Does anybody speak whatever language is used in the opening theme? I need to have some syllables to run through my head while it plays. According to Wikipedia, the words are:
Can anyone provide phonetics?
[/QUOTE]

from here

85

I’m not concerned with the translation, I want to know how to pronounce the syllables. I guess I need to listen to it and put down the nonsense my brain comes up with. BBL.

86

[QUOTE=Rubystreak]
He didn’t. I rewatched the ending to make sure I wasn’t crazy. Helo got all paranoid, went to check on her. She said that Dr. Robert gave her something that “kicked the frak out of her.” Turns out it was just a tranq.

However, Helo was still right about Robert, just not about him poisoning Dualla. Simultaneous with Helo’s frantic check on Dee, Tigh had mobilized to arrest Robert. Cottle was with him, admitting he blew off Helo’s crap earlier but later autopsied Mrs. King’s son and looked into the other accusations by Helo, revealing that Robert poisoned other Sagittarons.

Remember, Robert said on his way out in chains, “I didn’t harm her!” Helo responded, “That’s right… she’s one of the good ones.” With obvious (glaringly frakkin’ obvious) parallels to his wife.

I mean, yeah, this ep sucked, but let’s call it sucky for accurate reasons. :wink:
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Huh. I interpreted that scene differently. I thought Doctor Evil hadn’t given Dually the poison shot but hadn’t given her the vaccination either. But you’re right, the “she’s one of the good ones” comment does imply he was treating her correctly.

Honestly, I wasn’t paying a ton of attention in that last scene. I was still reeling in disgust at the suckitude of the episode!

87

That’s a valid point. The baby’s blood was played up as magical. A source that is able to stem uncontrolled cell division from acquired mutations to DNA would seem able to remove foreign viral material (if the disease was viral or bacterial - I don’t remember if that was mentioned). But I over estimated it.

I see Cottle as a man too arrogant to worry about lying. He’ll say you’ve got 2 days to live while blowing smoke in your face. So I felt he was telling the truth saying he did autopsy the kid (he just did a cursory job since he didn’t suspect anything at first). But Cottle is also not above saying whatever he wants (“I did that, now get out”) just to get someone off his back. So, yes, he might have just been blowing Helo off.

He’s going to cast doubts; implicate others; and Six is going to testify. Everyone will be confused. Some will think Six is just playing down Baltar’s role so that their favorite Cylon quisling will not be executed and might still provide useful intel. By the way, how’s Cally’s trigger finger?

88

Any idea why Dee is the only black Sagittaron? Is that how you tell the “good ones” - skin color?

The show doesn’t have to require so much tolerance of continuity issues from its viewers as it has, but then neither do most others.

89

I think I finally figured out what I didn’t like about this episode…

There were no “grey” areas… earlier episodes, even BlackMarket, left enough shadows for conversations, debates, “I woulda” and the like… most episodes (up until this season) left even more room for insightful conversations as well as “how the frak are they gonna get past that?” stuff… and the constant wondermunt (thanks to head 6) of what the cylon plan was.

This one?

notsomuch.

90

[QUOTE=simster]
There were no “grey” areas… earlier episodes, even BlackMarket, left enough shadows for conversations, debates, “I woulda” and the like… most episodes (up until this season) left even more room for insightful conversations as well as “how the frak are they gonna get past that?” stuff…
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You know what would have made this a great episode?

Go ahead and do the plot with Helo suspecting the civilian doctor of offing certain colonists. Keep the bit with those colonists rejecting medical efforts. Keep the epidemic story.

But reorganize it.

Teaser: establish the epidemic, and the Sagittarons’ religious beliefs. Also, establish that Helo is part of the officer corps tasked with keeping the refugee effort running smoothly, but he’s not in charge.

Act one: introduce the civilian doctor, and establish Helo’s suspicions that all is not well, but that Cottle etc don’t find the accusations plausible.

Act two: resolve that storyline. Helo exposes the doctor, who is attempting to control the epidemic by offing the people who are most likely to be the worst vector for the disease. Helo’s reward is being put in charge of the refugee room, now that he’s won the trust of the civvies.

The rest of the show: Now that Helo’s running things, he’s confronted with the tough choices, and finds himself tempted to cut corners the way the civilian doctor did. Not by killing people, no, but by doing what is necessary instead of what is clean and morally correct. He discovers that, by saving the Sagittarons from the Killer Doc, he’s made a huge headache for himself, because the doc was absolutely right about one thing: the Sagittarons are, indeed, going to make the epidemic worse. So now Boy Scout Helo has to decide if he takes civvies’ trust in him and immediately throws it away by forcing the Sagittarons to undergo medical treatment prohibited by their religion, in the interest of serving the larger needs of the fleet.

Wouldn’t that have been much more interesting, and much more in keeping with the approach of the show? Or, at least, what we’ve come to expect based on past episodes? The story starts out like it’s a cliche, the lone crusading investigator, then throws a curve ball and goes somewhere significantly more provocative.

Dangit, they need to hire me as a writer. :stuck_out_tongue:

91

Or even still, make it a moral dilemma for the presidency…

1.) Do we declare that certain religous convictions are out the window when we need all the survivors we can and we can’t afford a true epidemic, so anyone with disease x will be treated regaurdless.

2.) Create a “leper community” for those that refuse…

See, that’s more interesting (and a little more timely) then the “racism is bad” angle that they played.

92

[QUOTE=Cervaise]
Wouldn’t that have been much more interesting, and much more in keeping with the approach of the show? Or, at least, what we’ve come to expect based on past episodes? The story starts out like it’s a cliche, the lone crusading investigator, then throws a curve ball and goes somewhere significantly more provocative.
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Yeah, better. Anything but the relentlessly telegraphed series of clichés would’ve been an improvement. And, heck, I did not dislike “Black Market” even. So my standards? not so difficult to meet.

Actually, I would have preferred that Helo be wrong. He’s such a one-note boyscout of a character, it would’ve been an improvement had Mr. Do The Right Thing actually done the wrong thing for once.

Which is ironic for this series, since they’ve already taken formerly-likable characters and made them annoying because of the wrong choices those characters have taken (cf. Apollo, Starbuck, Dee, …). Helo is annoying, too; just not because he’s made a mistake, though.

It’s a bad sign when the former Object of My Disaffection, Sam Blanders, is in the small number of secondary characters that don’t annoy me nowadays (along with Tigh and Zarek).

[QUOTE=Cervaise]
Dangit, they need to hire me as a writer.
[/QUOTE]

Wonder if we can get you on before next week’s episode… those previews looked rather dire.

Although, really, I wouldn’t mind nowadays if Cally got sucked out into space forever. Might miss the Chief, a bit, tho’ they’re working on making that not so, too.

93

[QUOTE=simster]
2.) Create a “leper community” for those that refuse…

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That should be easy enough with space ships.
“Just like the Cylons put us in tent cities!” :slight_smile:

94

[QUOTE=Lightray]
Actually, I would have preferred that Helo be wrong. He’s such a one-note boyscout of a character, it would’ve been an improvement had Mr. Do The Right Thing actually done the wrong thing for once.
[/QUOTE]
That was kind of what I was getting at: demonstrating how doing the “right” thing may not actually be so right after all. I don’t mean stopping the murdering doctor — I mean taking the religious fanatics at face value and working around their issues. He could be right about the killer but wrong about the policy he tries to uphold in the immediate aftermath.

95

[QUOTE=Rubystreak]
I think he’s going to pull some really incredible, manipulative shit and tie the whole human race (what’s left of them) in knots.
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That actually makes a fair amount of sense. Baltar is a genius at deflecting blame and casting doubt, and a trial will give him a very public forum to do it for months and months. But that isn’t what Zarek said at all.

96

[QUOTE=MaxTheVool]
That actually makes a fair amount of sense. Baltar is a genius at deflecting blame and casting doubt, and a trial will give him a very public forum to do it for months and months. But that isn’t what Zarek said at all.
[/QUOTE]

Zarek said that everything would be disrupted, there would be civil unrest, sectarian violence, assassination attempts, and society would shut down… “a hurricane, Laura.” He didn’t say why he thought this would happen, just that it would be overall chaos and bad craziness. He wants her to declare martial law.

I think he might be afraid of whatever Baltar might say, on a personal level, and is making it sound like he’s worried about society as a whole. Zarek is kind of a weasel himself and is not without blame for what happened on New Caprica. He backed Baltar’s horse, after all.

97

[QUOTE=Rubystreak]
Zarek said that everything would be disrupted, there would be civil unrest, sectarian violence, assassination attempts, and society would shut down… “a hurricane, Laura.” He didn’t say why he thought this would happen, just that it would be overall chaos and bad craziness. He wants her to declare martial law.

I think he might be afraid of whatever Baltar might say, on a personal level, and is making it sound like he’s worried about society as a whole. Zarek is kind of a weasel himself and is not without blame for what happened on New Caprica. He backed Baltar’s horse, after all.
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I think a lot of people are probably worried, on a personal level, about what Baltar may say. I know Roslyn issued her general pardon, but that doesn’t mean people are going to be thrilled when any cooperation/deals/collaberations they may have had with they cylons to come out into the open.

I’m surprised people aren’t already demanding his execution. Someone took an entire bar hostage to demand Adama turn over Athena when she first came on board.

98

[QUOTE=MaddyStrut]
I’m surprised people aren’t already demanding his execution. Someone took an entire bar hostage to demand Adama turn over Athena when she first came on board.
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Aren’t they? I think Zarek was alluding to this with his concern about assassination attempts. I think he wants her to execute him now, which is his impatience that Roslyn was asking him to rein in.

99

[QUOTE=Corner Case]
That’s a valid point. The baby’s blood was played up as magical. A source that is able to stem uncontrolled cell division from acquired mutations to DNA would seem able to remove foreign viral material (if the disease was viral or bacterial - I don’t remember if that was mentioned). But I over estimated it.
[/QUOTE]
Here’s what was said during Epiphanies:

The important thing here is that Hera’s blood is resistant to disease, not cancer specifically.

Later, when Sharon is exposed to a virus which kills Cylons, she discovers her body generated antibodies against it from carrying Hera. Strange that Hera carries no anitgens yet somehow conferred immunity against a virus to Sharon. How would that work? Hera must have picked up the immunity from Helo’s DNA or something, then “magically” transferred it to Sharon.

I think it’s fanwanking at this point to assume Hera’s only immune to breast cancer, or just cancer. I think it’s sloppy writing her blood cures cancer and confers immunity against viruses then she gets the sniffles when convenient for the show. And how did Hera end up under Evil Doctor’s “care” anyway? Neither Sharon or Helo brought her there and I’d think the Cylon kid would automatically be brought to Cottle, not into a known infectious hot zone.

[QUOTE=Lightray]
Actually, I would have preferred that Helo be wrong. He’s such a one-note boyscout of a character, it would’ve been an improvement had Mr. Do The Right Thing actually done the wrong thing for once.
[/QUOTE]
I don’t see it that way. The deleted scene shows Helo wanted to atone for killing the captive Cylons. This episode was all about Helo proving himself and getting back in Adama’s good graces. Why not? How often have Starbuck and Apollo gotten a free pass or a second, third, fourth, fifth chance, etc?

[QUOTE=MaxTheVool]
But that isn’t what Zarek said at all.
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Zarek said: “You will have sectarian violence, you will have assassination attempts, you will have civil unrest on a scale we’ve never seen. Work, labor, everyday routine in this fleet will come to a complete halt. This trial is going to bring down this entire fleet down.” When Roslyn said she’s never seen him afraid like that before I think the writers were drawing a big, fat underline beneath Zarek. Zarek is afraid of Baltar. So is Gaeta. But why Zarek? He was in custody during the occupation because he refused to cooperate. He must be afraid of something else, perhaps prior to the occupation.

From the podcast: Zarek and Gaeta are afraid of information coming out about something to do with the Sagittarons, who were supposed to play a larger role in Baltar’s trial. But RDM scrapped that and the trial will move in a different direction, so we may never know.

100

[QUOTE=levdrakon]
I don’t see it that way. The deleted scene shows Helo wanted to atone for killing the captive Cylons. This episode was all about Helo proving himself and getting back in Adama’s good graces. Why not? How often have Starbuck and Apollo gotten a free pass or a second, third, fourth, fifth chance, etc?
[/quote]

Unlike Starbuck, for example, the show always bears out Helo as being right. He was even right in this story, despite the fact that he was actually wrong about Dualla being poisoned, and by all logic and sense should have been wrong about Dr. Robert. The writers are making it so Helo’s self-righteous, demented crusades are always borne out by fact in the end, and the characters who we feel are most sensible and sane turn out to be wrong. Then we get scenes where Adama apologizes to Helo, who was insubordinate and acted against orders. That feels wrong to me. IMO he’s often wrong-headed and goes about things in a shitty, obnoxious, “Army of One” way that undermines his superiors, and sometimes arguably the human race. I for one want him to get taken down a peg. Why does he always know what’s best? It’s annoying. JMO, YMMV.

Even if they take out that bit, RDM can still spin Zarek as being afraid of Baltar’s revelations for personal reasons. Who knows what machinations and conniving could be revealed?