Skinjob Retcon
Massive spoilage ahead.
Following two episodes of action, Battlestar Galactica's latest, "No Exit," was a talkfest of baldfaced exposition. And I loved it. While fan reviews are mixed, I thought it was compelling. After being in the dark for so long, to get a flood of answers was wonderful. For that matter, the two characters who did so much spilling (because they just received the info, too), Ellen and Anders, were among my least favorites, but, since I think we can call them new-Ellen and new-Anders, they're now a lot more interesting.
Show creator Ronald D. Moore has admitted they made up a lot of things as they went along, and this show was their attempt to tie a lot of things together. I'm sure not everything fits perfectly, but at least they gave it a shot, and, as far as I can tell, it mostly makes sense. They even threw in some Einstein to explain time gaps. (On Robot Chicken's fourth season premiere, they had Moore on explaining how the show works--he throws darts at photos of the characters and whoever they land on is a Cylon.) One part I have trouble making sense of was this: did Cavil (who's become sort of a Lucifer character) intend all the final five to survive the nuclear holocaust, to teach them a lesson? If he did, how could he ensure they'd all make it this far? If he didn't, all of them surviving the human wipeout is highly unlikely.
And one thing I don't like too much is the idea it's happened before and will happen again. I don't mind things repeating a bit, historically speaking, but I want to see progress. Or to put it another way, after having invested years in watching a show, I like to believe I'm watching something special going on. Of the many things wrong with the Matrix sequels, one of the worst was finding out what's happened has already happened before--the reason you tell a story is because it's an important moment.
There are still plenty of things to find out--certainly enough to fill out the final episodes. (Anders conveniently wasn't allowed to finish his explication.) The biggest new development is there's yet another Cylon to reveal--#7, Daniel. Here are three likely candidates:
Starbuck -- She's had visions, and found her own dead body, so it figures she's a Cylon.
Baltar -- This would explain in-head Six, since the final five had visions as well.
Lee -- They've tried everything else with him, why not this? Combining the head human and the head Cylon would marry the two races together.
Right now I'm looking for an easy-to-read, reliable chronology of what has happened in BG's past. A lot of fans have attempted this, and here's one from an AICN talkback that I guess is as good as any. It's called "Why Are People So Dumb" by Crow3711--I did't change a word.
Seriously, I don't mean to be a troll/jerk intentionally, but really people. pay attention. This episode made a TON of things make sense. Including the entire timeline, which was something I was CONVINCED they could not possibly do, and they did. Whats with you people asking for clarity and help to figure it out? Do you not listen or are you just too stupid? I'm leaning towards stupid. Not beause I'm mean, but beause I'm realistic. If can't follow two charcters having an in-depth conversation and manage to keep up, you need to quit...life basically. Because you failed. I'm so sick of shit. You people spend YEARS asking for these episodes, where chracters sit down and have logical conversations, ask the RIGHT questions, and get the answers before commercial break, and now you complain you can't understand/keep up? You all FAIL. The 13th tribe broke from the other 12, and went to Earth to start their civilization. They reached a technological peak much before the Capricans/other colonies, and created Cylons (centaurion model) who they treated like shit, and revolted, but not before making the first 5 skin jobs. When they revolted, and destroyed Earth, the five, especially Ellen, were displeased with how things went down. They tried to race back to the other colonies to warm them about treating their Centaurions with respect, but they were too late. The war had started by the time they got there. They convinced the Centaurions to leave/stop (hence the 40 year break), and during that time Ellen guided them to try and become more compassionate. She created Cavill, then the rest. Cavill hated it, boxed Ellen and the rest, and then implanted them in human race, like Boomer (with fake memories etc) to teach them a lesson about being pathetically humanoid. Cavill then holocausted Caprica etc to show them how awful being human really is. He and Ellen literally explained this entire thing and it honestly was not that hard to follow, and not only that, but it really does make perfect sense. The 13th tribe were massively more advanced, and tried to warm their brothers in the other tribes about what would happen to them. I don't care how many of you retards say you still don't understand or find retarded plot holes that ou made up. THAT IS WHAT HAPPENED ON THIS SHOW THE LAST 4 YEARS. Get over it. Learn to pay attention. Fucking children, man.
Here's one that gives years:
Is This About Right? by Cartman86
I'm making up my own years by the way. But I hope you get the idea. Year 0 - The Tribes of Kobol create Hybrids (I assume they also made toaster Cylon style models as well) Year ~0 - The Hybrids (13th Tribe) seperate from the humans (The 12 colonies) and head for Earth Year 400 - Hybrids begin to reproduce and stop using resurrection. Year 900 - The Hybrids (13th Tribe) create their own Toaster style Cylons which rebel. Year 1000 - War between Earth Hybrids and Cylons. Year 1000 - The final five (Earth Hybirds) rediscover resurrection Year 1000 - Cylons destroy Hybrids along with the planet (Earth) Year 1000 - The final 5 leave Earth (by resurrection) for the 12 colonies to warn them about creating AI. Year 2000 - Located on the 12 Colonies Daniel Graystone creates toaster style Cylons. Year 2010 - 1st Cylon War. Toasters created by Graystone rebel Year 2010 - The final 5 arrive at the 12 colonies. They are too late as war has begun. Year 2011 - The final 5 give the Cylons the ability to become hybirds and resurrection tech in exchange for the war to stop. Year 2012 - Caval is among the first of the 8 humonoid models created by the Final 5. He becomes angry and boxes the 7 line (Daniel) among other things. Year 2012 - Caval boxes the final 5 in preperation for them to witness the evils of humanity many years later. Year 2012 - Colonal Tigh is unboxed with fake memories and put within the 12 colonies along with Ellen a little while later. Year 2013 - 1st Cylon War ends. Years 2020-2035 - Tyrol, Anders and Tory (maybe other Cylons like Boomer as well) are unboxed and placed within 12 colonies. Year 2050 - 2nd Cylon War begins. Battlestar Galactica the show as we know it takes place. The toaster Cylons (along with the now 7 models) return and whipe out the 12 colonies Years 2050-2055 - The rest of the show
I guess there's also the pre-history which is our history? In other words, humanity as we know it spreads out to the stars, only to have the 13th Tribe return to Earth. Or am I getting this wrong? In any case, they must have been way more advanced, since they spotted the other tribes one or two thousand years, and were still way ahead of them.
Fans are theorizing about every aspect of the show. Here's an example.
My thought: Skinjob cylons are humans (not just humanoid) by ElPaw
the 13 tribes were all human
Earth was a human colony (not a cylon colony like is thought after the first episode this season) Kobol never created skinjobs
Resurrection was re-invented by the human FF on Earth. (More on the "re"-invented in a bit...)
The first skinjobs were the final five downloaded into skinjob bodies after the holocaust on earth. Skinjob bodies are just human clones+resurrection tech
Meanwhile, Kobol invents toasters (skinjobs were not created by kobol before toasters). These toasters rebel and cause the holocaust
FF skinjobs go out accross the galaxy to warn the other colonies for 2000 years....
Over the course of 2000 years, the genetics of the human race changes, so now there is a slight difference (hexagonal/pentagonal blood something-or-other that baltar showed) between humans now and 2000 years ago
Colonials create toasters, these toasters rebel. Also they start wanting to create humanoid cylons
FF skinjobs come across the toasters, and in exchange for toaster-human truce, they will help them create skinjobs.
The new skinjobs #1-8 are created in the image of the FF skinjobs, so have the genetic differences. But essentially they are human (not humanoid) clones. Hence baltar sees the genetic blood differences.
Now when the fleet comes across earth and tests the bodies, they think Earth was a cylon colony, but in reality it was a human colony, just a snapshot of humanity 2000 years ago, with slight genetic differences.
What will happen? What has happened? We'll find out soon enough. But at least I think they're going in the right direction.
posted by LAGuy @ 12:25 AM
8 Comments:
I totally agree: it was a great show, even though it was 100% talk. There are so many outstanding inconsistencies in the show that there's no way for their explanation to be truly consistent, but they came closer than I thought they would.
Cavil did seem to imply that the Five were kept alive as punishment, but he didn't explain it. Which is fine, because it's so utterly absurd (1 out of 10^6 humans survived, so the chance of all five surviving is 1 out of 10^30) that any explanation would have made it worse.
I thought they implied Daniel was dead. But if he's alive, then I would bet on Lee. Whatever happened to Starbuck, it seems to have involved coming back to life, but not in a Cylon resurrection ship. Maybe she has rediscovered the secret of reincarnation, which all humans apparently had once?
Of the two chronologies you posted, the first is wrong to say that Earth created the centurions. The centurions who battled the 12 colonies when Adama was young were created by the 12 colonies. The people on earth, by parallel development, created their own robot race which wiped them out too.
I think the second is wrong to equate the Earth people with the Cylon-created hybrids. I thought that she said that the 13th colony were biologically just like the other humans. Long ago on Kobol, humans resurrected. Then they gave that up and switched to sexual reproduction. Then they settled 13 colonies. Then some of the humans on Earth rediscovered resurrection.
With respect to our calendar, the only thing we know for sure is that the human race lasted on Earth for only a few thousand years (I think the figure "2000" and the figure "5000" may both have been used in the show), and when it was destroyed it looked something like our present day world, and the destruction happened after Bob Dylan wrote "All Along the Watchtower". So that means that humanity settled on this planet fairly recently. Which matches the old BSG, actually: the settlers were the "Egyptians, and the Toltecs, and the Mayans". All archaeological finds to the contrary must have been misinterpreted.
The Battlestar Wiki is one of the best sites.
Key pages:
Timeline
History of the Twelve Colonies
Cylon History
The story of the Final Five
Final Five and the Source of Resurrection
I imagine that not all the articles on the wiki have been updated to reflect last week's show!
The big remaining mysteries to me are (1) are the god[s] real? and (2) what is Head Six? If the gods are real, I still think she's a real angel.
What I don't get is when the final five made the switch from human to skinjob. Where they always Cylons? Was their whole planet Cylon? If it was Cylon, what was the nuclear war on Earth about?
My verification word is sclin.
The Final Five are really human, not "cylon", unless you use a very broad definition of cylon. The centurions, and Skinjobs numbers One to Eight are all manufactured beings. The Final Five were born to regular parents, and therefore Tigh and Adama are (extremely) distant cousins; they share a common ancestor.
Long ago, all humans lived on Kobol. Apparently they -- or some of them -- were able to resurrect, but this point is confusing. Maybe only a handful knew this secret. Or maybe everyone could resurrect, but then the whole human race abandoned resurrection and chose sexual reproduction instead. I'm unclear on that point. What is certain is that by the time humans left Kobol and settled on the thirteen colonies, they reproduced like we do.
Sometime later, Earth lost contact with the other twelve colonies. Later still, Ellen -- a human on earth -- rediscovered the technology that allows resurrection, and gave herself and four other people the ability to resurrect. Later, Earth created a species of robots that wiped out everyone on Earth, at which point the Five resurrected. Meanwhile, the Twelve Colonies separately created a species of robots (the "Cylon Centurions"). The resurrected Five travelled in a spaceship, met the Cylon Centurions, and then together the Five and the Centurions created the Eight Skinjobs.
So if you define "Cylon" to mean "Someone who can resurrect", the five became cylons when Ellen gave them this power. Or if you define "Cylon" to mean "a member of the government that includes Centurions", the Five became cylons when they joined up with the Centurions. BUT, if you define Cylons to mean an artificially created being, then the Five are not cylons at all.
Possible correction: Some of the folks on the web claim that the Thirteenth Tribe was not human, but was descended from yet another artificially created species, made by humans on Kobol. That would mean that Tigh and Adama are not cousins, but rather that Tigh's great^n-grandfather was created by Adama's great^n-grandfather. I didn't think this is what they said on the show, but now I'm unsure....
Lawrence the King wrote:
BUT, if you define Cylons to mean an artificially created being, then the Five are not cylons at all.
Although at this point (and for a long time now) the bodies and brains of the five have been artificially created...so only their minds/souls are not... :-)
Cara
I am, of course, very late with this comment, but: the Thirteenth Tribe were Cylons. This *was* stated. Not only did the tests of their remains confirm it, Cavil pointed out that Ellen's ancestors didn't crawl up out of the swamp.
Posts off the scroll are rarely looked at, But even if you're really late, we catch up to you eventually.
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