Jammersreviews

Note: This review contains significant spoilers.

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Battlestar Galactica: "33"

With no sign of relief, the human convoy must remain a step ahead of a 
pursuing Cylon fleet that stages an assault every 33 minutes.

Air date: 1/14/2005 (USA)
Written by Ronald D. Moore
Directed by Michael Rymer

Rating out of 4: ****

Review by Jamahl Epsicokhan
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"33" is a relentless hour of riveting television empathy, where by the end 
you will know what it *feels* like to be threatened with a Cylon attack 
every 33 minutes for five straight days, having had little or no sleep.

You will also come to know, without any doubt, the gravity of the situation, 
in which humanity is down to its last gasp, on the run, with the looming 
possibility that the entire survival of the race depends on the fleet's 
successful execution of the next FTL (faster than light) jump cycle in 33 
minutes.

On Colonial One, President Roslin has a white board with the "head count" 
written in dry-erase marker, which stands at just below 50,000. She makes 
revisions throughout the episode -- mostly downward -- to reflect the new 
survivor count as the latest casualty reports come in.

Yes, "33" is most definitely grim and heavy, exhausting and unremitting --  
and quite powerful. If you're not interested in going to a fairly dark 
place, this will not likely be your cup of tea. Here's a story that believes 
with utter conviction what it's conveying. It feels like it is *actually 
happening* -- rare, for an hour of television. Filmed nearly a year later, 
the story takes place almost immediately after the events of the 
miniseries/pilot. As a follow-up to the events of that story, in which the 
12 colonies were attacked and the handful of survivors were forced to flee, 
it grabs you by the throat and doesn't let go. It's the necessary miniseries 
epilogue that shows what is at stake.

The teaser sequence is a tour de force of execution -- a masterpiece of tone 
wonderfully directed by Michael Rymer, who also superbly directed the pilot. 
It balances action/suspense, functional dialog, strong images, and 
intriguing levels of wakefulness. The Galactica crew has gone 130 straight 
hours without sleep, and it shows. The Viper pilots, on patrol for Cylon 
Raiders, struggle to keep their eyes open. Baltar sits in a passenger seat 
on Colonial One, drifting between half-asleep and half-awake. Analog clocks 
tick toward the deadline of 33 minutes: tick, tick, tick. The sound echoes 
through Baltar's dreamscape. Sometimes he's awake in the midst of that 
dream, talking to Number Six as if she were sitting next to him. Sometimes 
he's in fantasy mode, back at his house on Caprica. Dreaming, awake -- is 
there even a difference for him? "There are limits to the human body, the 
human mind," he says. One could say he's already passed his, talking out 
loud to an imaginary woman.

A Cylon base star appears. It's a frightening sight, with a foreboding 
shape, like some sort of sea predator. The fleet jumps away, safe for 
another 33 minutes. The clock is restarted: tick, tick, tick. Between jump 
cycles, the crew has 33 minutes to make preparations for the next jump --  
and to think about whether the Cylons will find them again.

In the pilots' ready room, strategic plans are discussed for the next 
jump -- but hell, Apollo says, you don't need to hear these plans again, 
because you've already been through this 237 straight times. As the pilots 
exit the room, they affectionately touch a photo on the wall. It has a 
soldier in the foreground, his back to the camera, and destruction in front 
of him. The exact context of the photo is never explained, for which I'm 
glad, because it doesn't need to be. We understand the emotions completely. 
These people are still grieving for the fallen colonies of Kobol. It's a 
poignant moment, and exposition could probably only have lessened its 
impact.

Even more poignant is a scene in the corridors: hundreds, maybe thousands, 
of makeshift memorials. It reminded me of 9/11, when people posted photos of 
their missing loved ones along the streets in New York, hoping they would 
come home.

This episode is somber but not sentimental, serious but not funereal. It has 
a plot, and it has moments of real suspense. But it does not cheat its 
premise, and it does not let anyone off the hook.

In the Viper hangar, Kara blows up at Lee because he doesn't reprimand her 
for insubordination ("We're not friends; you're the CAG"). She starts to 
laugh and cry simultaneously, which can't be a good sign of mental health. 
Usually when that happens, you're probably under more stress than you know 
what to do with.

The plot is simply: How do we escape the Cylons, who are somehow tracking us 
to our new position with each jump? But the plot is also about a man named 
Dr. Amarak, a passenger on the luxury liner Olympic Carrier, who knows 
Baltar from the Colonial Ministry of Defense, and tells President Roslin 
that he has an urgent message about a "traitor in our midst." Just hearing 
the name Amarak throws Baltar into a state of internal panic: Did Amarak 
find out that I gave Six access to the defense mainframe? Baltar, ever the 
self-preservationist, instantly begins thinking of ways to get out of this 
jam.

A minor mix-up in CIC causes the Olympic Carrier to be left behind when the 
fleet makes the jump. Dualla (Kandyse McClure) can't account for it, and it 
may have been her mistake. Under the circumstances, where pilots are popping 
stimulants like candy and most people are walking zombies, the error seems 
understandable. But, on the other hand, there were 1,345 people aboard the 
Olympic Carrier, now presumably dead or captured by the Cylons. Colonel Tigh 
has a brief speech about the need for performance under these pressures, but 
I like even better the understated simplicity of Adama's speech: "We make 
mistakes, people die. There aren't many of us left." No wasted words or 
raised voice, because the facts of that statement carry all the weight, and 
additional emphasis is unnecessary.

The plot thickens: After 33 minutes, there is no Cylon assault. Adama 
suspects that perhaps the Cylons were tracking the Olympic Carrier -- or 
perhaps a Cylon agent on board the Olympic was giving away their position. A 
while later, the Olympic reappears, which proves to be a test of Adama's 
theory on the Cylons' all-too-adept pursuit skills. Did the Cylons let them 
escape deliberately? What other explanation can there be?

Baltar's stake in this is amusingly self-serving. When the Olympic vanishes, 
Six calls it a miracle that God has granted him. When the Olympic 
resurfaces, Six tells him that it's God's punishment for his lack of faith. 
Baltar, a staunch atheist, begins rethinking that stance. The religious 
debate between Baltar and Six (or perhaps we should say the imagined debate 
inside Baltar's head) is interesting, but what's even more interesting is 
how Baltar ultimately decides to find religion for purely self-serving 
reasons. He repents his sins in the hope that the Olympic Carrier will be 
destroyed such that he can be saved.

The fate of the Olympic, by the way, makes for a riveting sequence of its 
own. With the suspicion that the ship has been compromised, and the 
realization that the Cylons are again just minutes from another assault, 
*and* the detection of nuclear weapons on board the Olympic, the Galactica 
attempts to stop the Olympic from approaching the fleet. The Olympic runs 
the blockade and doesn't acknowledge orders to stop, leading to an 
unthinkable decision on which Adama and Roslin both concur and Apollo must 
carry out: Destroy the Olympic Carrier.

Visually, this plays out with a compelling you-are-there believability, as 
the camera peers into the windows of the ship (seeing no people, Apollo and 
Starbuck speculate the ship is empty) and then shows final shots from 
Apollo's point of view before he pulls the trigger and destroys the ship. I 
really hate to bring up 9/11 again, but on that day there was talk that 
shooting down commercial airliners might've been necessary if they'd been 
known to have been hijacked, and this scene plays out how we imagine such a 
scenario might've felt for a military pilot.

The subplot of "33" takes place on Cylon-occupied Caprica, where Helo is on 
the run from the Cylons, after having volunteered to be left behind several 
days earlier when Sharon returned to Galactica with their Raptor. This left 
me wondering how he survived, and what happened to all the other civilian 
survivors who were present at that scene. I guess I'll save those questions 
for another day, since that's what "33" does. A copy of Sharon shows up and 
rescues Helo, claiming that she returned to Caprica for him. The opening 
prelude to "Battlestar Galactica" says the Cylons "have a plan," and it 
would seem Helo is a part of this plan.

The episode ends on a necessary note of hope (a baby is born, leading the 
"head count" to increase by one), signaling that perhaps after this grueling 
test of survival, a corner has been turned and things will get better. "33" 
is excellent television drama. If the series can stay this good, it will be 
TV viewing time well spent.

--
Irrelevant footnote: The way Edward James Olmos says "previously on 
Battlestar Galactica" at the beginning kicks ass. He should say it every 
week.

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Copyright 2005, Jamahl Epsicokhan. All rights reserved.
Unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this article is prohibited.

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