By Lisa Fary
Mercifully, this episode was free of any mention of Soldiers of the One or Zoe’s undead drama. Really, if I want to watch paranoia toward a given religion week after week, I’d just watch Fox News.
“There is Another Sky” focused on Tamara’s life in the V-World, the Adama’s grief, and Daniel regaining control of his company. The message was about moving forward.
- Tamara had to not only accept that she’s stuck in V-World, but also that she’s dead.
- Joseph and Willy had to accept that Sharon and Tamara are gone and let them go so all of them can move on in their respective planes of existence.
- Daniel has to accept. . . well, nothing. All he has to do is get his board of directors to accept that holobands are dead and that there’s profit in Cylon technology.
He was very persuasive, strutting into the boardroom with his Cylon in tow, parading her around the room, ordering her to rip her arm off.
His boardroom scene should have gone like this (NSFW):
Or when he was done with his presentation, he could have said this:
Daniel is totally evil, now. Not so much because he’s about to manufacture a slave race, which is pretty evil in and of itself. What bothers me is what this would do to the colonial workforce. If companies can pay once for a worker that won’t need breaks, won’t get tired or sick, and won’t to be paid, they sure as hell aren’t going to hire humans.
Congratulations, Dr. Graystone. You’ve singlehandedly ensured a wicked high unemployment rate that will result in untold human suffering. Maybe the impending Cylon war will be the best possible thing for the colonial economy.
Meanwhile, the Adamas have a memorial service, superficially similar to sitting shiva (which I only know about because of that one episode of Babylon 5) for Sharon and Tamara. Surprisingly, that tugged at my rotting, black heart and made me tear up a little.
I wasn’t sure why Sam Adama had to be topless during the ceremony, but whatever. At least he’s pretty to look at. He had me thinking this:
And Tamara? Well, she’s turning into Neo. Hopefully, it works out better for her and she’ll avoid the ignominy of an underground rave scene (not to mention a theater full of people at the end of sequel/trequel debacle, going, “Meh”).
Lisa Fary is a graduate of the creative writing program at Florida State University and holds an advanced degree in Special Education. Her earliest influences are Princess Leia, Rainbow Bright, Astronaut Barbie, and her 6th grade teacher, Ms. Palmer. She’s angry that it’s almost 2010 and she still doesn’t have a hovercraft, but will accept a jetpack as consolation. That jetpack had better be pink with a rhinestone monogram.
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Lisa Fary's earliest influences are Princess Leia, Rainbow Bright, Astronaut Barbie, and her 6th grade teacher, Ms. Palmer. She's angry that it's 2011 and she still doesn't have a hovercraft, but will accept a jetpack as consolation. That jetpack had better be pink with a rhinestone monogram. 
absolutely on-spot, as usual.
I, too, was grateful to have no more Soldiers of the One demonization/group-sex/shadowy-goings-on & whatever.
Tamara did strike me as a bit too Neo-ish.
The logic sort of escapes me, too– what is the source of her indestructibility? Does her source code originate from some more-secure place that can't be interrupted by other code? Is the next step for her to "vacuum-wand" herself and start replicating, cylon-style, into a Tamara army?
Also, as a non holo-band user, how was there enough personal information available out there to reconstruct her personality? I mean, Zoe was out there actively constructing her avatar for quite some time– so it makes sense she might be a fully-rounded persona– but Tamara would be bits and pieces of data; more of an index card of facts than a real person. How did Daniel flesh out her code so she would seem real?
Anyway, I like your commentary the best.
Thank you!
I've wondered that about how the Tamara avatar was constructed, as well. I let it go during the pilot, but it's starting to bug me. The source of her Neo abilities is going to be another problem for me – there's got to be a tech explanation because if it's revealed that she's a cybersoul or an angel in the vein of Kara Thrace, I'm going to lose it.
Is that what Starbuck was? I have to admit, I left off bothering my brain cells about that one after the finale. It was the dot I left unconnected in the big BSG connect-the-dots.
I'm enjoying the Zoe story, though the STO storyline is only so interesting because of the utter lack of morals of the police.
I was thinking about RObocop, too and was waiting for Dr Graystone to tell the board they have 10 seconds to comply. I was also wondering if we were going to see Zoe with her arm ripped off.
The ghost in the machine story was very well done and I thought the game was excellent – only half a step away from the games we have now: back to Red Dwarf and Better Than Life. The ending to that piece surprised me, too, which is always good.
The ceremony at the Adama's was moving, and if "Don't pay the Ferryman" was going around my head a little it was quickly quietened by the performances. I can go back to liking Adama and wanting Dr Graystone to grow his soul back. Things are getting interesting.
I'm liking Zoe's wardrobe. I want that shiny, plaid, one-shoulder dress of hers like now.
I've been hanging in there because the show is new, but it's been hard plodding alongside a vehicle that couldn't seem to get out of 1st gear. Another Sky kicked it up a notch, at least for me, and it looks like there might be hope at last….Enough with the sad and confused business.
I'm not sure Daniel's evil. After all he just did what he could, on the fly, to save his position in the company that he, himself, created. He'll probably be remorseful when he has had time to consider the ramifications. But if they're going to make him evil, so be it, as long as he's 'interesting evil'. Besides, Caprica and the other planets are supposed to crash, burn and take most of civilization with them, that's the premise of the show.
I realize that in our own world things are looking a little dodgy and it might be easy to over identify, but this is a TV show so PC be damned ok?
As for Tamara, she's my new favorite charactor, and now the most interesting Adama. She has transitioned from pathetic 'fragile flower' victim which we knew next to nothing about, into a force to be reconed with. She may be screwed because she's dead but it looks like she has decided to 'own' life in the V verse. I'm happily overlooking the previous whf?! and Neo talk about that bit because this new situation allows for lots of plot potential. Lol, Sam might look better with his shirt off……although I guess that would be a matter of taste.
They also need to do something with Clarice, she's boring. Having extra husbands and a wife might be interesting, sociologically, somewhere down the road but right now it just seems sort of pointless. Having her use the students to the point of terrorism, and worm her way into their lives is kind of creepy/predatory. Big ick factor there for me.
Does anyone question Zoe's sudden coopertion with her Dad? What's up with that? She's trying to get off planet, right? So why not stand there, watch her dad crash and burn and just get shoved into a storage closet so that it'll be that much easier to get herself stolen and shipped out? That's another bit of confusion best overlooked I guess because I don't see how this serves her agenda.
I guess we'll just have to put our faith in writer Jane and go along for the ride.
I am in agreement with you re Clarice. After watching last night's ep, I get the impression that she's the face of a gender battle within Soldiers of the One: women appear to be interested in creating a deeper religious experience to draw new followers, while dudes prefer blowing things up and inspiring fear. She isn't all that interesting, and being a teacher myself, I'm pretty horrified by her using her students the way she does.
Re: Zoe and the tearing off of the arm. At the end of the day, she's still a program and while she has demonstrated a sentience and a certain amount of free will, she can still be manipulated by further programming. I don't think she had a choice about following Daniel's order.
One of the oddest things about Clarice is that she was initially intended to provide some comic-relief, which seems laughable when you look at her now.
I suppose the closest analogue to what they wanted to pull off would be that maenad character in True Blood– sinister yet comical– but I'm just guessing.
Now its really just robot-Zoe and Philomon providing the comic relief– and interestingly that is also where the series is probing the boundary between program and person, the ability for sentience to manifest in new and counterintuitive ways (with sentience bounding ahead of its silicon-based and robotic limitations in some ways).