BSG: The Farm

This was the darkest episode of the show for all of five episodes, and then "Pegasus" came along. (And then "Pegasus" was knocked off that perch by its own extended version.)

For the first and only time in the show, the A-storyline takes place on Cylon-occupied Caprica. Starbuck has met the resistance movement, led by former Pyramid star (and onetime musician, cf. 4.11, "Sometimes a Great Notion") Samuel T. Anders, whom she promptly starts fawning over, and then frakking.

Then they go on a scouting mission and she gets shot and wakes up in a hospital with a doctor played by Rick Worthy. I mention him specifically because shortly after I saw "Pegasus," I went back to Voyager and watched the two-parter "Equinox" for fun and recognized him. I believe that makes him the second of five Star Trek actors to turn up on this show (Kate Vernon, Michelle Forbes, Dean Stockwell and Nana Visitor being the others, but I'm probably missing a few other people anyway). Anyway, his character's name is Simon, and he's a doctor. (I'm tempted to say it's a Firefly reference.) Simon completely fails to put Starbuck at ease. (Moore says in the podcast that the viewers are smart, that we don't really need to suffer these "gotcha" moments, that we can figure things out along with Starbuck. I wish he'd kept that mindset when he was writing the denoument to "Daybreak," but that's another story for a different day.)

Anyway, it turns out that he is a Cylon, and it's strongly implied that he harvested one of Starbuck's ovaries (but the writers of this and 3.2, "Precipice," aren't exactly clear on the difference between ovaries and eggs, so who knows exactly what he took). Starbuck escapes by stabbing Simon in the throat and clocking a Six with a fire extinguisher. She finds a room where a bunch of women are wired up to machines, and mercy-kills them all. Then she runs into another Simon copy, but he's gunned down by the resistance, who have come to rescue her. Amid all this, Sharon has stolen a heavy raider, and uses it to take Starbuck and Helo back to the fleet, while Anders remains behind to keep fighting. He does seem to suggest that he'll leave if Starbuck can get all the resistance fighters off with him, which they can't do in one tiny Raider... which begs the question of why they don't just steal more Raiders then and there? (Because Starbuck is the only human who can fly Raiders? Sure, if you pretend 3.8, "Hero" doesn't exist. On the other hand, at least Novacek's a pilot, whose Raider was probably modified, etc, etc. Also, Novacek's first name is "Daniel," but sadly that doesn't go anywhere... cf. 4.15, "No Exit.")

Sharon points out that they would have set Starbuck up with a Cylon she'd like if she agreed to take part voluntarily in the breeding program. I don't mean to spoil anything, but this scene is hilarious in light of later revelations (3.17, "Maelstrom," 3.20, "Crossroads, Part 2"). Hell, it's pretty funny as it is, since you can't quite see Starbuck falling for any of the male members of the Significant Seven.

But in between that and Anders's morning-after pillow-talk at the beginning of the episode, this one is pretty dark. Not content to nuke us into oblivion, the Cylons are now down with raping human women in order to propogate their race. Thank goodness there are some levels we won't stoop to... oh. Right. "Pegasus."