Exercise in balance

4.06 "Faith"

Welcome back, Awesome! I fell a couple of episodes behind, so I'm in catch up again. And this episode was just in time to keep me from completely loosing the thread of this season. There was action, there was emotion, there was drama, there were questions and answers, there were pilots! And I had really missed pilots and the "original seven" Cylons.

Helo is a frakking dynamo! I love him to no end and I will not be even remotely surprised if he ends up as the head of the military once they've made it to Earth. He has very Adama-like qualities. Also, thank the gods for the semi-return of an ass kicking Starbuck. Just having her in a state other than her twitchy, vision-induced haze was a huge relief. She's the best when she's angry. Like fire. Now's not the time for me to rant again about how in love with her I am.

It's probably due to the fact that I've only watched three episodes of DS9, but I didn't even recognize Nana Visitor until practically half way through the episode. I'm not sure how I felt about her character, as I'm still not sure how I feel about "The Church of Baltar and the Cylon God", but she was instrumental in getting Roslin into Adama's quarters so they could sit around in their bathrobes and be the adorable married couple we've always known them to be, so she can't be all bad. (It's very disappointing to think that she won't make it to Earth alive so they'll never have a chance to be peacefully happy together.)

It's just amazing to me how much I enjoyed the fact that I didn't have to see Chief or Baltar (even though I had to hear him) and barely had to see Tory. More importantly, I think, is the fact that I did get to see Starbuck, Helo, Athena, Sam, Natalie and Leoben. There were a ton of interesting interactions going on there. The Starbuck/Natalie alliance is definitely going to be an interesting one. Athena and the room full of Eights was brilliant. The whole scene leading up to Natalie killing the PTSD Six was awesome.

And Sam! I think Sam is "The Great Cylon Hope" and I really like the fact that he's incredibly curious about his Cylon nature, but still remains completely loyal to the fleet. He's not Chief and Tigh, who are pretty much flat out rejecting their Cylon nature. He's not Tory who seems to have just gone some kind of mad with power without actually thinking what it means to be a Cylon or a human, for that matter. He's not Athena who is kind of living in denial of being a Cylon. He's doing his own thing, he's completely fumbling around but still making a go of figuring stuff out, and I very much appreciate him for it. Actually, I think I'll make it an even stronger statement. I respect him for it. And I'm continually amazed at how much Sam Anders has grown on me since his introduction.

Wow. I may have just jumped shipper alliances from Kara/Lee to Kara/Sam. Wait...no...I may have actually become a shipper of Sam/Random Eight. Wonder if anyone's writing that yet.