I am – Hercules!!

Battlestar Galactica 4.10 FAQ

What’s it called?
“Revelations.”

Who’s responsible?
Teleplay is credited to David Weddle and Bradley Thompson (“He That Believeth In Me”).

What does SciFi say?
“A band of rebel Cylons holds President Roslin hostage while attempting to lure the Final Five out of hiding inside the Galactica and the human fleet.”

Today’s not Friday! What is this review doing up Thursday?
The SciFi Channel on Wednesday night screened this episode at the Cinerama Dome in Hollywood.

The big news?
Big stuff happens. I deem this the biggest episode of “Battlestar Galactica” yet produced.

Why is it the biggest?
Series mastermind Ron Moore implored the audience to keep the big secrets. We must abide Mr. Moore’s wishes.

Others were in the audience with you, right, Herc? Will you ban those who post any kind of spoilers in talkback and shut down the talkback entirely if the spoiling persists?
I will!

Doesn’t this make Herc Ron Moore’s little bitch?
It does!

Is it true, as you intimated last week, that the focus this week shifts back on the circumstances of Starbuck’s resurrection?
It could be argued that Starbuck and her miracle viper are key components of this week’s story.

Is it true, as rumored, that Starbuck sees her own dead and mutilated body this week?
No.

Is the final Cylon revealed this week?
No.

What else is SciFi not telling us?
D’Anna has officially ascended from Boxey to Head Toaster In Charge. Despite last week’s Bill-Laura reunion, Lee Adama’s presidency continues. And we will see a side of Bill never before glimpsed!

Are you sure this is the biggest “Galactica” ever?
Yes.

Bigger than the episode that ended with Boomer putting two bullets in Bill Adama's chest?
Yes.

Bigger than the episode that leapt ahead a year?
Yes.

Bigger than the episode that revealed the Watchtower Four?
Yes.

Will this post spawn the lengthiest "Galactica" talkback ever forged?
Yes.

What’s great?
An insane amount of tension among the Watchtower Four now that D’Anna can identify them; handprints will be permanently squeezed into sofa arms across America Friday night as a deadly showdown between Lee and D’Anna escalates. Then the final act kicks the episode, the season and the series into the stratosphere. “Revelations” is one aptly titled installment. You will revel in the reveals the episode bestows and curse those you're denied.

What’s not so great?
On the way out I asked writer-producer Jane Espenson if she knew if SciFi would announce Friday when the show would return; she said she’s long assumed it won’t be back until 2009.

Anything interesting emerge in the Q&A with Ron Moore, Mary McDonnell, Katee Sackoff and Tricia Helfer?
* Helfer’s “a bit agnostic” and not as tall as you’d think.

* While cast members admit they routinely use “frak” even when away from the cameras, Sackoff prefers “fuck” in her everyday life. “Nothing works like a good f-bomb,” she insisted.

* The series finale is filming right now in Vancouver and will likely wrap just before the June 30 Screen Actors Guild deadline.

* The script for the series finale made Edward James Olmos and Aaron Douglas cry, according to Helfer. Helfer describes her own reaction to the finale script: “Like somebody punched me in the stomach.” Helfer said the ending will compel fans to revisit the series’ beginning.

* McDonnell said the series finale script filled her with “an incredible feeling of adrenaline.” “It made me understand the entire saga, and made me excited for all of you,” she told the audience. She added she was “blown away” by it.

* “The Final Five do not have numbers,” said Moore. Which I guess means there isn't a Seven???

* Moore confirmed again that the fleet will get to Earth by the series finale and that he originally had a number of ideas for what the fleet would find there. “We X’ed off a few immediately.”

* Asked if she would consider a run for U.S. president, McDonnell replied, “Only if I can have Hillary as my V.P.”

* Moore acknowledged he was behind on his episode podcasts but intended to catch up. Two of them, in fact, will be recorded June 12 (that’s today!) and another two soon after.

* Moore said he did not have the series finale in his head as he wrote the original miniseries, but figured it out midway through the first regular season. Moore seemed to hint that Leoben’s first-season line “All this has happened before and will happen again” is significant.

* As Moore wrestled with the series’ conclusion this year, he had the epiphany that the show’s not really about the plot – it’s about the characters. He then scrawled “It’s the characters, stupid!” atop his whiteboard. He said that’s when the series finale “really clicked.”

* Moore said the monotheist/polytheist business emerged out a single line in his miniseries rough draft, when Six told Baltar that “God is love.” “I didn’t really know what it meant,” said Moore, but SciFi exec Michael Jackson suggested Moore play up the religious angles. The colonists’ polytheism was holdover from the many references to the Greek and Roman gods in the 1970s series.

* Mary McDonnell volunteered that everyone was “quite happy” with Moore’s not-yet-aired directorial debut.

* How do the Cylons’ Bob Dylan tune and Baltar’s Shakespeare quotation fit into the bigger picture? “All will be revealed,” replied Moore without elaboration.

* McDonnell says she’s already snuck a peek at the now-filming “Caprica” prequel pilot’s dailies and found what she saw “absolutely thrilling.” “They all treat us like their parents,” she says of the “Caprica” cast.

* Making Starbuck female was one of the very first ideas Moore had for the series the weekend David Eick suggested Moore shepherd the series. It was a pivotal idea that helped Moore free himself from some constrictions of the original series.

* Moore said the idea of another “Razor”-like prequel TV-movie set in the “Galactica” universe was still in the “early talking stages.” He downplayed reports that three TV-movies might get produced, suggesting one movie was more likely.

How does it end, spoiler-boy?
With the survivors, stunned into silence.

Herc’s rating for “Battlestar Galactica” 4.10?

*****

Tonight’s episode will be fed in its entirety here at the top of every hour from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. ET.

10 p.m. Friday. SciFi.

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