Battlestar Galactica (2003)/Hero

Hero
Season 3, Episode 8
Airdate	November 17, 2006
Written by	David Eick
Directed by	Michael Rymer
Fleet Survivors	41,421
← 3x07 A Measure of Salvation (2)	3x09 → Unfinished Business
Battlestar Galactica (2003) — Season Three

Hero is the eighth episode of the third season of Battlestar Galactica, and the forty-first episode overall.

Edward James Olmos (Admiral William Adama), Mary McDonnell (Laura Roslin), Katee Sackhoff (Kara "Starbuck" Thrace), Jamie Bamber (Major Lee "Apollo" Adama), James Callis (Dr. Gaius Baltar), Tricia Helfer (Number Six), Grace Park (Lieutenant Sharon "Athena" Agathon)

Michael Hogan (Colonel Saul Tigh), Aaron Douglas (Chief Galen Tyrol), Tahmoh Penikett (Captain Karl "Helo" Agathon), Alessandro Juliani (Lt. Felix Gaeta), Kandyse McClure (Lieutenant Anastasia "Dee" Dualla)

Special Guest Star: Lucy Lawless (D'Anna Biers)

Guest Star: Carl Lumbly (Lieutenant Daniel "Bulldog" Novacek)

Guest Stars: Donnelly Rhodes (Dr. Cottle), Matthew Bennett (Aaron Doral), Rekha Sharma (Tory Foster)

Cast: Lucianna Carro (Kat), Barry Kennedy (Admiral Corman), Tiffany Lyndall-Knight (Hybrid) (credit only)

Plot Overview

A man is discovered by the fleet after being imprisoned by the Cylons since before their attack on the Colonies. Unfortunately, his return brings with it a dark secret from Adama's past.

Amidst the Cylons, a copy of Number Three has dreams that pushes her to seek out what lies between life and death.

Arc Advancement

Happenings

• Three begins having nightmares. This compels her to have herself killed where in the time before she's downloaded, she has visions of five figures in the opera house, but whose identities are obscured. When she resurrects, she tells the others that there's something beautiful between life and death.

Characters

• The Admiralty sent Adama on a secret mission to send a stealth craft over the armistice line to find if the Cylons were up to something. It was ultimately the failure of this that put Adama and Tigh on Galactica.

• Adama feels guilt for not only shooting down Bulldog, but also fears the mission might have provoked the Cylons into attacking.

• Baltar is an intimate relationship with Three and Caprica-Six.

• Tigh, now wearing a patch instead of medical gauze, comes out of his quarters and begins to reconcile his relationship with Adama.

Trivia

The Show

• In the American airing on the Sci-Fi Channel, Adama's line about Bulldog's "bullshit attitude" was censored. It appears to be the only known instance, as other countries and DVDs leave the line intact.

• A close examination of the dossier reveals that the name of Adama's mother is Evelyn.

• The "Previously on..." bit opens with "In the beginning..." and begins the recap with events from the miniseries before playing clips from recent episodes.

Goofs

• Yet again, Luciana Carro's first name is misspelled with an additional 'n'.

• Throughout the episode, it's said that the stealth mission took place a year before the events of the miniseries while Adama was commander of Valkyrie. However, dialogue in many previous episodes imply that Adama has been in command of Galactica for at least two years prior to the Cylon attack. In fact, a close examination of the dossier seen in the episode provides a time of six years, which seems most likely as in "Litmus" Adama says that Tyrol has been under his command for five years, the longest time given prior to this episode.

• The final scene with Tigh has Adama still wearing the same uniform from the celebration. Yet, between these two scene is Adama seeing Bulldog off and is wearing a different uniform.

Quotes

• Tory Foster: (regarding a portrait of Baltar) Is there really any place left in the universe deserving of such a rare and distinguished item?

Roslin: I was thinking put it in the bathroom right over the toilet.

• Adama: How the hell did you escape a Cylon baseship?

Bulldog: Well, sir, it's like this. The enemy had me locked in a cell for three years. The accommodations were lousy, the service was slow, and after a while I felt the institution no longer had anything left to offer me. So I left. (cracks a smile)

Adama: You had me worried there for a moment. I thought maybe the Cylons had beaten the bullshit attitude out of you.

• Tigh: A drink?

Bulldog: You have no idea.

Tigh: (under his breath) Yes, I do.

• Tigh: Sometimes surviving can be its own death sentence. I know that.

• Adama: I started it. Initiated it.

Lee: Wait a minute. You started what? Started what?

Adama: The attacks on the Colonies. By crossing the line, I showed them that we were the warmongers they figured us to be. And I... I left them but one choice: to attack us before we attacked them.

Lee: No. No. Because it wasn't just you. They put you there. They put you there, across the line. You had no choice. That was the Admiralty. That was the - That was the military. You were one mission. You were one man. One man.

Adama: It only takes one.

• (Tigh has just saved Adama from Novacek)

Tigh: The toughest part of getting played is losing your dignity. Feeling like you are not worth the oxygen you are sucking down. You get used to it. You start to believe it. You start to love it. It's like a bottle that never runs dry, you can keep reaching for it over and over and over again.

Adama: So how do you put that bottle away, Saul?

Tigh: (thoughtful) I don't know. One day, you just decide to... get up and walk out of your room.

• Roslin: What is this? (opens the folder, reads) Your resignation. You've gotta be kidding me.

Adama: I've said before. We can't hide from the things that we've done. I see no other way around this situation. Maybe it's time, Laura.

Roslin: Sit down, Bill. I think you're being naive.

Adama: Naive?

Roslin: Did it ever occur to you that the Admiralty may have set you up to provoke a war they wanted? It's naive to think that horrible things that we can't understand have simple explanations, because simple explanations make us feel like we have control, and we don't. We know why the Cylons attacked us, and it wasn't any one thing, oh my Gods. We did a thousand things, good and bad, every day, for forty years to pave the way for those attacks.

Adama: Something has to be done.

Roslin: (picks up a folded piece of paper, hands it to Adama) Do you know what that is?

Adama: (opens it) Medal of Distinction.

Roslin: This is before I heard about this resignation of yours, so, hmm. I'd like to propose this: you seem hellbent on paying some kind of penance for whatever is you think you've done. So instead of resigning, why don't you get up and walk out of here, meet me on the port hangar deck tomorrow evening for the ceremony, and let me pin a frakking medal to your chest?

Adama: I can't.

Roslin: It's not for you. It's for them. Stand up there, acknowledge your fleet, and give them what they need: a hero. That'll be your penance, even if it kills you.