BSG - Who are the Final Five?

[Joker]

Crap, haven't seen that one yet.

I have been spoilered .

 

[Villano]

I don't think it will be anyone we know to be biologically related to anyone else, otherwise the Baby would not be so important. So it won't be Lee Adama, Bill Adama, Tyrol, Cally or Helo.

I don't think any member of the Five will have replaced someone already known for years and years, and the humaniod-Cylons are unlikely to have been around for years and years. So it won't be Saul or Zerek.

It won't be someone too ironic, too pat or too out of bounds. So it won't be Laura, Baltar or Kara.

That leaves Petty Officer Anastasia Dualla, Lt. Felix Gaeta, Samuel Anders and Dr. Cottle.

I think it will be Dualla. That way she creates a more interesting opposition to Kara and can be killed, without pity or remorse, to honorably free Lee to to go after Kara.

I agree with nearly everything you said (although I would rule out Laura on the grounds that she had a son, not necessarily for storytelling reasons). However, I'm putting my money on Felix Gaeta.

The final 5 seem to be something special and mythic (which is why I suspect that others may include Dr. Cottle, the Oracle, and Laura's spiritual advisor), and I'm not sure that they mean any harm to humanity. Gaeta was described as an "idealist" by Baltar, and always seems to act as an advisor or conscience. He helps Baltar build the Cylon detector, exposes the voter fraud, acts as President Baltar's advisor, and is the inside source of the Resistance. Plus, his willingness to be executed by the Circle without defending himself can be viewed from both a mythic point (Christ-like self-sacrifce) or knowledge that he will upload into a new body. I think Gaeta's purpose is to guide humanity to its destiny.

I'd rule out Dr. Cottle and the Oracle (for now) because I can't recall any reason why Xena-bot would feel the need to apologize to them. Also, I don't remember her ever meeting the spiritual advisor or Dualla (who was on Galactica during the occupation).

Personally, I was kind of hoping that Count Iblis or a new incarnation of Lucifer would be members of the Final 5. I still wouldn't rule out Iblis since I believe the FF are going to be portrayed in a mythological way. Having a "fallen angel" would make sense (although I'm not certain that the producers would use Iblis since he's such a well know character).

 

[The Grumpy Celt]

Personally, I was kind of hoping that Count Iblis or a new incarnation of Lucifer would be members of the Final 5...

I agree - I think there should be a Cylon malcontent who dislikes other Cylons, even more than Shannon or No. 6 ever did, a Cylon who really likes sticking it to other Cylons.

I also want to see an Iblis character. The story of Galatica is similar to that of the Aenied anyway, where the survivors of Troy flee. In that there is a section where the underworld and the dead are visited. An encounter with Iblis could be similar.

The social structure of the Cylons and their history and how they reached their current form is maddeningly vague. I wanna see Lucifer and what role he plays.

 

[Arnwyn]

I don't believe that any humans currently alive in the Fleet are any of the final five.

I agree with this, and would be quite disappointed if they go in that direction. That would be a stretch, to me.

That primer on Cylon history (given excellently by wingsandsword) is what I cling to, to make sense of - or at least provide grounding for - all the rest of the wacky mysticism.

Some cut lines from the Kobol arc were going to establish that Kobol was a paradise until one of the Lords of Kobol became jealous and wanted to be elevated above all other gods, causing strife and civil war and the eventual exodus.

Hmph. I've seen this mentioned a few times, and it irks me more each time I see it. The show seems to insist on continually indirectly referring to this little (non-existent to the general audience for all intents and purposes), so it really doesn't help things until the writers are a lot more clear.

Why would they cut something so important? Sounds like a big screw up. (It also sounds like the commentary is more interesting than the show... Zing! )

I always figured that this was a 13th Lord, who went off and later took the Cylons as his own children, thus showing how they are related (like the whole Temple of Five and Athena-Boomer's comments in Home, Part II imply) but how the Cylon god says he is the only true god.

I really, really like that. The show makes me hate the show (), but wingsandsword makes me like it again...

 

[Acid_crash]

The one thing that confuses me to this very day is that in the miniseries before the show began, at the end, Adama got a note that said there was 12 cylon models. I've always wanted to know who left that, and why him?

I think he's a cylon. Just my humble thoughts, but I haven't seen any of the show since the end of season 2.0 so I know I missed a whole lot.

 

[wingsandsword]

I agree with this, and would be quite disappointed if they go in that direction. That would be a stretch, to me.

Same, the "A member of the crew turns out to be a Cylon all along" thing has been done. They spent all first season building up to Boomer discovering what she really was. Now, making any existing character a Cylon is a cheap copy of that. A character believing they are a Cylon is one thing, heck even Tyrol feared it really badly at one point, but hard proof. . .that's bad for the show.

The thing is, who made the biological cylons? What Cylon entity engineered and programmed them? Then apparently turned control of all Cylons over to them (since apparently the biological models control of Cylon society was responsible for the war with the Colonials and for leaving Colonial space towards the end of the 2nd season). Did this entity shut down the first five models, but let the later 7 still know they existed?

I really wish they'd put that line about the "jealous god" in somewhere on screen, it sometimes seem like Battlestar Galactica is like a campaign setting where there is a lot of stuff in the GM's book, but the players only run across a small portion of it in play, and keep wanting to see the rest of the setting. It really does have that feel that there is a whole lot more backstory and setting than is shown.

 

[Shalimar]

Did I miss an ep that said the Cylons are only 50 years old as a race in this version as opposed to having been created before the 12 tribes left Kobol? 50 years before the attack was when the 10 year war started, after the 10 year war ended there was 40 years of peace.

 

[The Grumpy Celt]

I don’t know how close the writers are going to stick to real-world Greek myths, but there weren’t really any “trickster” figures (like Loki or Coyote) among them. All the gods caused havoc, even Apollo, who otherwise is thought of as being a god of rationality and order. There were minor deities of madness, chaos and fear, but they were minor and still did not fulfill this trickster/chaos-bringer role.

According to the BG novels, whatever came between the original first generation rebellious Cylons and the biological Cylons made the humanoid versions. I think this novel was titled The Cylons Secret.

Granted, the novels are non-canon, but I think this version of events is what the show’s producers intend to suggest and the one that makes the most sense.

However, this still leaves a lot of gaps and holes in terms of what we know about the Cylons, their society, their history, so forth and so on.

And I think it was always supposed to be Baltar who left the message for Adama to find – he had been told about “12 Cylon Models” by Number Sex… I mean Number Six.

As for who the final Five are, I think they are going to be:

1. Petty Officer D
2. Jay
3. Silent Bob
4. That guy at my work who keeps taking the last cup of coffee and leaving the burner on so the last spoon full of coffee fries to the bottom of the pot and smells bad.
5. Truth Seeker

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

Can safely rule out Tyrol as a Cylon...or anyone that's had a child. That is, unless they're going to name both parents as Cylons, which I'd doubt.

 

[wingsandsword]

Did I miss an ep that said the Cylons are only 50 years old as a race in this version as opposed to having been created before the 12 tribes left Kobol? 50 years before the attack was when the 10 year war started, after the 10 year war ended there was 40 years of peace.

Well, promotional materials for the Caprica spin-off series set approximately 50 years before the Fall of the Twelve Colonies say that the creation of the cylons and the early years of Cylon history will be a big theme on the show. Cylons wlll be invented when Adama and Tigh are young and starting their careers (since both were vets of the first Cylon war), which makes them being Cylons highly implausible.

"SCI FI Channel announced the development of Caprica, a spinoff prequel of its hit Battlestar Galactica, in presentations to advertisers in New York on April 26. Caprica would come from Galactica executive producers Ronald D. Moore and David Eick, writer Remi Aubuchon (24) and NBC Universal Television Studio.

Caprica would take place more than half a century before the events that play out in Battlestar Galactica. The people of the Twelve Colonies are at peace and living in a society not unlike our own, but where high-technology has changed the lives of virtually everyone for the better.

But a startling breakthrough in robotics is about to occur, one that will bring to life the age-old dream of marrying artificial intelligence with a mechanical body to create the first living robot: a Cylon. Following the lives of two families, the Graystones and the Adamas (the family of William Adama, who will one day become the commander of the Battlestar Galactica), Caprica will weave together corporate intrigue, techno-action and sexual politics into television's first science fiction family saga, the channel announced. "

In other words, the idea that Cylons are only about 50 years old is one of the key concepts of the Galactica spin-off. Saying that they are 3000+ years old, then doing a whole series about how they are only 50+ years old is a continuity gaffe on the scale of Star Trek: Enterprise (actually, that would be pretty bad even for them).