Battlestar Galactica episodes "Greetings from Earth"

"Greetings from Earth--Part One" and "Greetings from Earth--Part Two"

Another Captain's Log entry from Adama reveals that they are "looking for signs that we are getting close" to Earth. I wonder how the plan for the series changed when they knew the show was getting cancelled. After this two parter, there are only four episodes left. That's just the part of me that wonders at creative changes due to ratings, and remember that writer's strike one year that supposedly changed the plot of the TV show Heroes, filming alternate endings in case of strike? I wonder if that affected Battlestar Galactica?


While out on a long range patrol, Starbuck and Apollo discover a sub-light ship with a family of humans in suspended animation. The whole Colonial fleet gets excited. Why didn't they get very excited at all those other human settlements? But they are hoping it is their "first contact with an Earth vehicle." Again, another monotheistic reference when the doctor says, "By the grace of God" when they go aboard the ship.

Athena --when was the last time we saw this character? No wonder she was considered superfluous later on--is running a school. Even her part here seems like something thrown in just to use her and Apollo's step-son character, Boxy. No daggit either.

When the crew discuss the new ship and Athena mentions the've encountered other humans, Boomer says, "Not since we've left range of our home planets...Everyone we've encountered up to now, every colony or outpost, are drifters or pioneers who set out from our home planets, terms, dress, technology all familiar to us." He goes on to mention that these settlements, if they are from the people who were to be the Thirteenth Colony, were left behind, and never made it to Earth. This ship is supposedly an alien technology to the Colonial Fleet. (In previous episodes, they mentioned leaving their "range" of their home planets long ago and then still meeting humans...They specifically mentioned back in the seventh episode, "The Lost Warrior," that they were leaving its galaxy, its star system, they say. But then that also doesn't make sense with the Gamoray outpost in "The Living Legend." But then again, like in Star Trek, maybe this is not intended to undergo all this scrutiny that I am putting it under.)

While they are all fighting about what to do with the people in suspended animation, they woke up on their own. Michael, newly awoken, stuns a Galactica police officer named Reese when he tries to come aboard. Michael is all disoriented and we discover that there is an incompatibilityv with the atmospheric pressure.

Adama decides to put the Earth-ship back on its original course to find the planet that they must be going to.


Michael asks if Apollo and company are part of the Eastern Alliance. He says his race is originally from Terra (Earth) but his family was born on Lunar 7. "That's where we were escaping from."

They take off and the end of the episode shows Adama mentioning that they have been gone for a secton (week) already. We find the Earth-ship is heading for a planet called Paradeen.

I must say, at the end of Part One here, I am quite invested in this show now. I'm extremely intrigued about them finding Earth.


Part Two begins. (Sidebar: I find it interesting that characters and their actors who didn't actually appear in part one, just part of the previews for about a second (micron!), are still given billing in the credits in part one.)


They find the planet Paradeen. It's a Terran colony. There's not much left, just farmers, and the city that they do find is abandoned.

There are two androids, Vector and Hector, that take them to Sarah's father's ranch. Her father has died. These two androids are like two C-3POs, with Ray "The Scarecrow" Bolger playing one of them. They discover that the atmospheric pressure difference will never allow the four children to go back to Earth. Then there is a really weird song and dance from the androids, reminiscent of the "best" from the Star Wars Holiday Special--remember that fiasco? (except the cool Boba Fett cartoon).


Anyway, we also discover that the Earth was made up of many nations but became the Eastern Alliance versus the Western Alliance. The war continues and the East is apparently the evil one, destroying West territories and outposts and known to kill children, all in the name of war. The Eastern Alliance is an oppressive government. Michael tells Apollo to "forget about Terra." The Eastern Alliance even look like Nazis. Here is a picture of the leader of the Eastern Alliance ship and one of its operators:

What tends to get lost a bit in this episode is that they have found proof of Earth.


Sarah has fallen for Apollo and Cassiopeia has fallen for Michael. Blah blah. Apollo and Vector meet a family of farmers, the Morlans. Someone has sabotaged the Vipers beyond repair. Starbuck winds up lost in the city archives, so they go after him. (This is a rather stupid error on Starbuck's part.) We find Sarah is the one who sabotaged the Vipers so Apollo would stay. Yeah, that's the basis for a strong, loving relationship.


The Eastern Alliance ship has landed near Sarah's farm and takes her prisoner. Apollo and the rest rescue Starbuck and then go to rescue Sarah. They do. Sarah all of a sudden falls in love with Michael--even for a woman, that's fickle. The Eastern Alliance commander says, "We are the most advance military force in the galaxy." But they don't know about the Galactica. Apollo and Starbuck take the captured Eastern Alliance ship back to the Galactica and the Alliance people are awed at the size of it.


Then it ends, but I can't wait to see what happens next. They have proof of Earth, but they have brought aboard the bad guys.