Written by Bradley Thompson & David Weddle
Directed by Michael Nankin
“I don’t know why I’m here.”
After two frustrating weeks, Someone To Watch Over Me is a return to solid Battlestar Galactica. It also has two overriding, powerful characteristics:
(1) GORGEOUS BEAUTY
The Tyrol/Boomer Cylon projection scenes are warm and sensual, much like the early Baltar/Head Six trips…the house, the weather outside, the golden sunshine…it all makes for an powerful-yet-unearthly watercolour setting.
They’re topped by the Kara/Slick piano scenes. Smokey, moody, sultry…two people alone, in what amounts to a single pool of light, acting their socks off. If there is a scene in the annals of television that sums up “elegiac”, then this is it. Katee Sackhoff & Roark Critchlow nearly steal the show with their soft-shoed power.
(2) SHOCK & AWE
Where shall we begin? The Hera-Starbuck-All Along the Watchtower link? The fact that Slick might not even be real…or that he may be (a) Kara’s father, and (b) the missing, sensitive, artistic Cylon Daniel? Mind blown yet?
Well, let’s switch to Boomer going bananas! Forcing Athena to watch as she takes her sick, sexual revenge with the unknowing Helo…snatching Hera off the ship without anyone noticing…and delivering what could be the death blow to Galactica and her structural integrity.
I’m with the Chief on this one: his “what have I done” expression says more than anything I can write to describe the series of shocks that rock this episode in its second half…the quiet, reflective first half lullling everyone into a false sense of security.
Anchored by two stunning performances from Katee Sackhoff and Aaron Douglas (could the Chief’s life be ANY more frakked?), Someone To Watch Over Me is bowl-you-over, breathless, choke-you-up Battlestar Galactica at its finest. I was beginning to think the series had forgotten how to do such episodes. Thank the Lords of Kobol that I was wrong.
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