They keep promising answers, yet they just keep asking more questions …

–Did I mention spoilers? Because: yes.

A week or two ago, a poster on a UBB I frequent put forward the notion that not all of the Daniel models had been eliminated by Cavil, and that one had found his way to Caprica, knocked up a Colonial Marine, and had a kid named Kara.

Last night’s episode seems to support this theory.

Kara is slowly going crazy: she is having flashes of her decayed corpse everywhere she looks, and she wants to know: if that is her, what is she? Kara, who now spends her time either in sickbay or in the bar, begins having run ins with a piano player. She critiques his music, but comes to enjoy their time together. She opens up about her past, and her musician father, and when they begin composing a song together — with an assist from Hera — Tigh reacts violently when he overhears: it’s Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower”, the haunting tones of which revealed the true identity of four of the Final Five Cylons at the end of the 3rd season.

Meanwhile, Boomer is under threat of extradition to the Rebel Cylon baseship on charges of treason. Tyrol is certain she’ll be executed, but Roslin signs the hand-off order. Tyrol still loves Boomer, and they’ve been using Cylon projection to see what their lives on the Colonies would have been like if the war hadn’t happened, and they’d been able to muster out together (they have a child). Roslin warns Tyrol that Boomer can’t be trusted, and the most unintentionally hilarious episode of the season might be Adama reminding everyone, “She put two holes in me.”

I, again, am a sucker for redemption stories. I wanted the angsty Boomer we saw in season two’s “Downloaded”, the one who hated herself for being a Cylon and betraying Adama and the Galactica. There might still be some hidden motivation deep inside Boomer, but it wasn’t on display here. Tyrol causes a power-outage throughout the ship, assaults a Number Eight, and switches Boomer out of the Brig while the Marines try to get their systems working again.

Boomer promptly takes Athena out of commission, has sex with Helo, and takes Hera out of the Galactica’s day care on a pretext, and with Tyrol’s unknowing help, smuggles her onto a Raptor (the child is presumably inside a storage container). Athena is able to free herself and warn Helo, who promptly calls up to CIC. On the flight deck, Boomer realizes they’ve seen through the ruse and heads for space as Adama orders the flight pods retracted.

This is a dangerous order: Galactica is in bad shape, and an FTL jump at too close a distance could technobabble the technobabble and make some bad voodoo happen. Boomer almost manages to make it out of the pod, but clips her wing and starts to wobble. She hits the FTL — as Hot Dog, on a CBDR whispers to himself “don’t do it don’t do it!” in his Viper — and a big chunk of Galactica’s “alligator head” crumbles and explodes.

It’s heartbreaking to watch Tyrol rush across the hanger deck as Athena and Helo berate a deck hand: “How did you not notice a child being led onto a Raptor?” Because the child was in a storage crate, and Tyrol can’t exactly admit his role. Escaping into the Cylon projection of their home, Tyrol finds it completely empty: even their daughter is gone.

This episode, especially in terms of pacing, has far and away blown the last two out of the water. Things are certainly picking up, and I can’t wait for next Friday.