Battlestar Galactica

Episode #302 - "Precipice"

This document is ©2006, John Larocque. All rights reserved.

The Cylons were created by man. They rebelled. They evolved. There are many copies. And they have a plan.

The human race. Far from home. Fighting for survival.

Synopsis

Ron Moore's Commentary

4/18/2006 -- The issue of the cage, what [Sharon's] been doing in it, and what her future is will be dealt with in the first couple of episodes.

10/2/2006 -- My favorite scene in the opening two hours is when Baltar goes to see Laura. Going into that scene, I think there's an assumption of whose side you're on. Laura's in detention, and Baltar's working with the Cylons. It should be pretty clear who you're rooting for in the scene. But when he starts challenging her on the morality of the suicide bombing, and that's why he's there and that's what he's angry about, it throws her off stride and I think it throws the audience off stride too. For a moment, you're really not sure where you're supposed to go emotionally in that scene and I think that's a great place to take an audience. (source: Chicago Tribune)

10/6/2006 -- I'm with Laura. She's the good guy. I hate Baltar. He's the bad guy. And this scene, when he starts talking to her, when you get to the point where Baltar is challenging the fact that there are suicide bombings and can Laura support that? Can she really support the idea of young men and young women strapping bombs to themselves and walking into crowded places.. I love that moment, dramatically, because that's the place where you as the audience are not quite sure who you're rooting for anymore... Baltar in particular, what do you feel about this? Here's the greatest collaborater of them all. Here's the man who is the titular head of the government during the occupation, under whose reign all these things are happening. And yet, what's he in here to do? He's in here to protest the fact that human beings are becoming suicide bombers. Look at Laura's face here. The way she can't quite meet his eyes. She can't look at him when he says that. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- These two hours are not a polemic about how things should be and what's the answer to Iraq in ninety minutes or less. It was really looking at the situation as a whole... That's one of the textures that we kept losing that I never quite was able to work back into the story was that Jammer was there [in that building] during the suicide bombing. He was standing in one of those ranks, and suddenly the world exploded and there were dead bodies piled on top of him that he had to push off to stand up. And that that was part of what was torturing him through the episode. I really thought it was important that we go that side of the story. Some of these guys that got into the New Caprica Police were doing it because they genuinely want to help their people. It's better that we police our own than have the Cylons policing us. And that honorable men could disagree on that idea. And that someone like Jammer could get sucked into that and suddenly find himself on the wrong end of the insurgency. To the point where he can't even reveal who he is. He has to hide his identity. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- Tigh is being very open about the fact that what they're doing is wrong. Tigh makes no bones about the fact that he's doing something that's evil. He knows he's doing that. But he's justifying it to himself. He's going to do it. An eye for an eye. And the fact that he'll do whatever he has to do to win. Why is Colonel Tigh on Galactica? Why does Adama keep him around? Because when the chips are down, and they are way down, baby, in this situation, when you are in a foxhole, who do you want next to you? You want Colonel Tigh 'cause he is gonna get your ass out of there. And he's gonna win. And he's gonna find a way to win. And he'll do whatever he has to. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- They really used night scopes to shoot this. This was Sergio's idea. It wasn't in the script and Sergio called and wanted to do it. He had this vision of doing this sequence in the green light, in the night vision lens... I was asked about this by a reviewer the other day, "Is that a deliberate attempt to evoke Iraq and say that this is Iraq?" And I said, "Well, no. The reason was it's how you're used to looking at it." It's the same philosophy behind why I do the handheld camera in space, when you're watching Vipers flyby. The fact that it seems to be handheld and there's a person standing out there filming these Vipers whipping by camera and having trouble in focus and keeping it in frame, intuitively tells you that it's a real object. This is really happening. The night vision, to me, serves the same function. Because you're used to seeing scenes shot at night in that palette, in that green and black, and that you know that that's a night vision thing and you're used to watching either on COPS or footage from Iraq or around the world, where troops are kicking in doors and going into places, grabbing people. And you're used to seeing those images. By doing it in the show it immediately evokes a sense of verisimillitude. It's a sense of truth... You want it to look real. Again it wasn't the politics. It's about what is effective dramatically. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- I love this idea. That Tyrol does not know that Gaeta is the source, and Gaeta doesn't know that Tyrol is the recipient. This was also again part of the things I liked playing. What happens if Tyrol and Gaeta are both working towards the same objective, but they don't realize it, and they're about to kill each other. These guys are on a collision course, and you'll see where that collision course ultimately takes you, much later. I thought Gaeta was a really interesting character in this whole saga. That Gaeta, who had idolized Baltar and thought he was a great man, and ultimately become his chief of staff, or whatever he was, to President Baltar, then sticks by him and tries to work within the system after the Cylons come. And yet wants to help the insurgency and starts to believe that his boss is everything that is evil. What happens to him and how does he try to help and what are the constraints of that? I was very interested in Gaeta and his role. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- In early drafts] Pegasus was actually going to go and do the rescue mission, and not Galactica. And that that explains certain things that will happen in later episodes. But the whole idea that Adama sends Pegasus off with the civilian Fleet to safeguard the remnants of humanity in case they fail then goes back and fights the Cylons on his own, is not what initially happened. We were always talking about having Pegasus back there, originally, then it would be they were transferring people onto Pegasus because Pegasus was the most powerful battlestar and it was the strongest battlestar and you would send the strongest ship into the fight and that'd explain why Pegasus was there, when it needs to be there in "Exodus" and not Galactica. But that didn't really play. It didn't play as strongly and it was confusing and the idea that Lee lays down the law to Adama, and he listens to him, is more provocative. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- This is where Laura confronts Tigh. I like the fact that Laura walks out of that Baltar scene and actually is agreeing with Baltar, if you think about it. She walks out of that scene and she goes and confronts the insurgents and says, "This has to stop." And then when he says something about her being on the side of the Cylons and she slaps him, I mean, we've never seen Laura ever hit anybody. She wouldn't touch a gun. She's not that kind of person. But that idea that she was on the Cylon side, that she would hit Tigh. And then this, I love this. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- I cut the moment of Doral shooting Caprica-Six and James Callis was very upset and because shooting Caprica-Six in many ways moves him. It's the fear of it. It's the visceral shock of the blood and the murder. And then having the experience with Head-Six, as they call her in the writer's room, or Number Six is how I refer to her, the fantasy Six. It's the combination of those two events that really makes him sign the document. James was very concerned all the way through that Baltar never become a complete villain. And I think he is right... James was very upset by the fact that we had lost that moment of Doral shooting Caprica. And I was like, "Well, you know what? I lost it for time, but I also think that it doesn't matter. It's important to cut it anyway because nobody responds to the fact that she gets shot and that's a big deal in the Cylon world, blah, blah, blah." But he pressed the point, and I started to realize, you know what? No, it's more important to protect the character, Baltar. It's more important that we understand why Baltar does these things, so it was very late in the game when I restored that edit back into the show. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- I didn't want to keep having Sharon be the woman that sits in the cell all day. There was nothing interesting about that. We had done as much as we could with that. And that there was something more interesting about, again, the idealism of the fact that if there's a point where Adama wants to believe in her. Adama wants her to be in that uniform again. And it's important to me as a storyteller that Sharon now be worthy of that. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- This is a complete homage to Seinfeld, because I am a complete Seinfeld nut. I watch Seinfeld a couple of times a night. As my wife will testify. So "the twist" and "the swirl" is a complete homage to Seinfeld, I just totally cop to it, and am proud to do it. (source: Precipice podcast)

10/6/2006 -- Why are there trucks on New Caprica? You know what? Because we need trucks on New Caprica. (laughs) Because I didn't want to do landspeeders and hovercrafts and all that kind of crap. If suddenly these were shots of hovercraft and air vehicles moving around the scene, you would be taken emotionally out of the moment... This sequence, this leading up to the Cylons shooting them is a deliberate homage to The Great Escape. This is the end of the movie when Richard Attenborough and the other guy are captured and they're taken out in trucks and the Nazis say, "Get out and have a five minute break." And they all just walk out, and it's like, "It was a great moment. We really tried." And they're looking at the mountains and then suddenly they turn around and machine gun. It's a different context and we play it a little differently, but this little interlude with Laura and Zarek, it takes you in a different place. It's the same trick. It's the same sort of structural idea. You take the audience over here a little bit. You get 'em involved in this little lighter moment. It's a little bit more of a joke. And you're intercutting with the river. And then... all hell breaks loose. (source: Precipice podcast)

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