Review

Crossroads, Part 2 is difficult episode to assign a rating to, because while parts of this episode are worth a great deal of praise, by and large the episode walks the suspension of disbelief line pretty hard. That said, this episode never did quite cross that line. As such its other merits make up the rating I gave it. The numerous fantastic smaller details of the episode not only keep the episode's rating out of the gutter, but also manage to raise the episode slightly above its predecessor in overall quality.

So what provokes me to rate this rather obvious milestone in the course of the show so low? Well, lots of reasons that all add up to a big stinker. First thing's first, like the episode's predecessor, the handling of Baltar's trial was particularly weak. Thankfully, this time around my overall feeling of boredom regarding the proceedings vanished, but instead it's been replaced by a feeling of incompetency and a distinct lack of realism.

Three things stand out as being wrong with the trial. 1. Caprica Six was never put on the stand despite hints in The Son Also Rises that at least one of the two sides had an interest in doing so, 2. the move for a mistrial was completely forgotten, and 3. the prosecution never got a chance to make their closing statements. Neither did the defense, but Lee's monologue definitely counts as a de facto closing statement. In addition to this, Baltar acted like a bumbling buffoon throughout the whole episode with his rampant disrespect for his allies, his inability to comprehend legal strategy, and his overwhelming arrogance (even for him) during and after the trial. It seemed out of character.

Moving beyond the trial, the dream sequence scene which we now know is communally shared by Roslin, Six, Athena, and presumably Hera still felt rather pointless. It serves more of a purpose this time around than it did in the last episode, but like much of the rest of the episode, it gave us more questions than answers. The vision seems to be a manifestation of Cylon projection, but why is Roslin affected? Is it because she has some of Hera's blood in her? What is the meaning behind the vision? Why wasn't more time in the episode spent on exploring the ramifications of this?

For that matter, frankly, I don't feel emotionally invested in Roslin's character at all anymore. When we first found out she had cancer again, it was done so casually I thought she was lying. It should have been the big cliffhanger during the last episode! In this episode, only a tiny amount of time is spent dealing with Roslin's cancer; once again it's on the back burner. And once again I feel emotionally detached from it. Just like my criticism of the last episode, Roslin's cancer should have been the front and center issue of this episode. For gods' sakes, the president is dying! And they're focusing half the episode's plot on four random characters going crazy hearing a Bob Dylan song?

And that of course brings us to our wonky cliffhanger. Regardless of whether or not Tigh, Anders, Tory, and Tyrol really are Cylons, the reason they're all communally hearing a mysterious song no one else can hear is not made clear. I suppose it's possible that it too is a manifestation of Cylon projection (like the opera house dreams), but frankly I'm having a hard time buying the idea that all these characters are all Cylons to begin with. With Tory and Anders I'm able to see it as a viable possibility. But with Tyrol and especially Tigh it's a tough pill to swallow. In Tyrol's case, Cavil told him directly that he's not a Cylon. Granted, there's no reason to take Cavil's word for it, but the aesthetic of the scene in its broader context leads me to believe Cavil knows this to be true. Especially seeing as how Cavil seems to know things about the final five none of the other Cylons know. As for Tigh, he fought in the original Cylon war against the Centurions! His existence in the Twelve Colonies predates the presumed invention of the humanoid Cylons!

Granted for all we know this episode is just misdirection; maybe none of these characters are Cylons and the point of the plot is to get the characters to believe that they are. But like all the overarching thematic mysticism this show has had to offer this season, the implications are left vague. Similarly, the return of Starbuck was equally confusing. How did she survive the explosion of her viper? Where did she get another one? How did she get all the way to the nebula? For that matter, how did she reach Earth? Is she a Cylon? Did Apollo just imagine the whole experience? What caused the fleet-wide power surge in the first place thus making time for the whole rendezvous with Starbuck thing? And why was power restored shortly afterward? The implications are, once again, left overly vague.

All of this scored to a cover of a 1960s psychedelic classic rock song by Bob Dylan for no apparent reason. Bear McCreary's rendition of it is absolutely fantastic, but I don't think that a classic rock song, even a well reinterpreted one quite belongs in the Battlestar Galactica universe. The whole ending just leaves me with bad flashbacks of Galactica 1980. If that's happening, there's obviously something aesthetically wrong with the episode.

The basic problem here is that a good story leaves its audience with most strongly an emotional impact rather than lingering questions. The best impression to leave your audience with after the emotional impact is "wow, that was incredible, I can't wait to see what happens next!" Kobol's Last Gleaming and Pegasus did this masterfully. I didn't quite get that feeling in Lay Down Your Burdens, and even less so during The Eye of Jupiter. Crossroads, Part 2 takes the issues that Lay Down Your Burdens and The Eye of Jupiter had and multiplies them. Even more so than those two episodes, the audience is primarily left emotionally detached from the story, confusedly wondering why things happened the way they did rather than enthusiastically wondering what happens next. Battlestar Galactica has been slipping into this inferior style of storytelling slowly and consistently over the last season and a half causing overall episode quality to diminish significantly.

In the end though while the storytelling and the aesthetic of this episode is irritating, nothing that happens in this episode can't ultimately be rationalized later even if making four or five main "good guy" characters Cylons is what the writers really intend on doing despite the issues it brings up and the overall lack of taste. Indeed, beyond that this episode features tidbits of masterful writing. In particular, Apollo's monologue in court about the purpose of Baltar's trial was brilliant, along with Romo Lampkin's final scene. The symbolism of abandoning the apparently unnecessary cane and restoring the sunglasses is a fantastic detail and the acting in this episode was its usual high quality, especially Tigh and Apollo.

This may be the worst executed of the major cliffhangers Battlestar Galactica has had to offer so far, but despite the radical departure and downgrade in storytelling style, this episode does manage to succeed in remaining true to what kind of show BSG is: an innovative science fiction drama willing to go in crazy, risky directions to keep things interesting. And while the stories may not be as finely crafted and as emotionally powerful as they used to be, they remain at the very least still quite interesting. At least we still have that.