With no choice but to flee, humanity's survivors set out in search of the mythic 13th Colony of Kobol ... a legendary planet known as Earth.
They've arrived.
Previously on Battlestar Galactica: The four humanoid Cylons led Starbuck to a Colonial signal on her Viper that led the fleet to Earth. The humans and Cylons joined forces for the journey, but the celebration was short-lived when they discovered Earth is a desolate wasteland.
This episode picks up right where we left off, with the crew wandering aimlessly around Earth, staring at the ocean. Get used to it, because this whole episode is about despair. President Roslin (Mary McDonnell) picks up a flower from the ground while reports come in that there's no human life on the planet.
Baltar (James Callis) reports that the water is full of low-level radiation, proving Earth was nuked about 2,000 years ago. Dualla (Kandyse McClure) is busy digging some jacks out of the sand. She starts crying and becomes incredibly depressed for the trip back to Galactica, muttering to herself to keep it together.
Back on Galactica, Roslin is bombarded by the crew wanting to know about Earth, but she's too sad to talk. Lee (Jamie Bamber) takes on crowd control duties. Back on Earth, D'Anna (Lucy Lawless) and Number Six (Tricia Helfer) are digging in a pit of human bones and they find...a Centurion head! They bring it back to Galactica, but it's not one of theirs, it's a different model.
Roslin surmises that the 13th tribe created their own Cylons and the robots rose up and destroyed them. Baltar disagrees, because the bones they found weren't human, they were all Cylon. The 13th was all Cylon! Roslin's face drops even more and she leaves Lee to handle the Quorum.
To calm herself, Roslin hides in her room and burns the Pythian prophecy. She's in a very bad place, not showing up for her cancer treatment, and even Admiral Adama (Edward James Olmos) can't cheer her up
To pick up her spirits, Dee offers to babysit Hera. Then she talks to Lee and cheers him up about taking over for Roslin and leading the fleet by telling them the truth. They have a sweet moment followed by Lee asking her out on a date, which she accepts. After their date, Dee is giddy over how strong and funny her man is. She kisses him good night after having the most fun she’s had in a long, long time.
Dee goes into the lockers to chat with Gaeta. She’s on cloud nine, humming a little tune and looking back on a photo of herself from childhood she can barely remember. Felix is still depressed about Earth, but Dualla wants to hold on to the great memory of her date with Lee.
Then she takes off her wedding ring, picks up her gun, and shoots herself in the head. Dead. I’ve now seen this scene three times, and it still sends shivers down my spine.
Gaeta rushes back in calling for a medic, but she’s already dead. Lee mourns Dualla in the morgue while his father stumbles in, drunk, offering little consolation. Lee moves on to Colonial One and changes the survivor tally from 39, 651 to 39,650.
Admiral Adama takes another approach, picking up a gun and barging in on Tigh, agreeing to have that long overdue conversation about him being a Cylon. Adama is drunk and trying to provoke a fight, talking about how Ellen was a whore who used to flirt with him. Still, Tigh refuses to fight back because he knows it’s what Adama wants and that Adama won’t actually kill himself.
After their confrontation, Adama returns to the CIC, asks Hoshi to take over for Dualla, then plots a trip to leave Earth. Admiral gets on the horn and tells the truth: they can’t stay on Earth so, like the 13th tribe, he vows to leave and find a new home. He fails to inform the fleet that the 13th tribe wasn’t human but Cylon
For the rest...WATCH IT
