04: The Long Patrol

[Eric Paddon]

This thread is for discussion on changes in adapting episode #4, "The Long Patrol" and conforming the story to an overall season story arc storyline.

[Senmut]

Putting the asteroid dust cloud at this point in the show was a mistake, given that there are still places known to the Colonies yet to be reached. After TLL perhaps would have been better, but then we don't know to what degree the Fleet has been zig-zagging in their evasion of the Cylons. I would also like to have seen more about how the people on Proteus support themselves. It seems so desolate, yet they obviously grow whatever ambrosia is made from, not to mention food. Where do they get the fuel for Croad's fighter or Robber's freighter? True, it's been seven hundred yahren since the penal colony was established, but some reference should have been in the Galactica's navigational database.

[Eric Paddon]

Senmut, I agree with you that the placement of the dust cloud and the "we're leaving our star system" dialogue does muddy things up considerably. So this was how I chose to rectify that problem, for which the answer IMO means going back to LPOTG.

In the wake of LPOTG and this failed attempt to find the precise coordinates for Earth, what accounts for the direction the Fleet takes up to the time of "War Of The Gods" when the SOL beings ultimately give them the coordinates? I take the view that Adama came away with one tangible piece of something from the Kobol tomb before the Cylon attack destroyed it. That Adama found time to read the first piece of information that let's say correlates to the first part of the information that the SOL give in WOTG. And that in fact if Adama had been able to read the whole thing he would have gotten the same information and no more than what Apollo, Starbuck and Sheba recite at the end of WOTG (thus the SOL were merely rectifying the injustice of LPOTG in that respect).

First part of the coordinates-"Quadrant Alpha". To me, this suggests that the known galaxy in Colonial civilization has been segmented into several components (I take the view that all of Galactica takes place in one galaxy only). The region surrounding the Colonies and most of known space would be the "Home Quadrant". Then in one "direction" of space if you will, you would have the Alpha Quadrant, Beta Quadrant, Delta Quadrant etc.

So let's say that Adama saw the "Quadrant Alpha" part of the coordinates in LPOTG and that at least told him which general section of the galaxy to go looking for Earth in. I can not imagine that he could have sustained support for the journey to Earth in the wake of LPOTG without having at least one tiny thread to build on to at least point them in a general direction.

Upon leaving the "Home Quadrant" and entry into the "Alpha Quadrant" the Fleet exits what might have been called as the "Colonial Frontier" indicating those outposts of humanity that were commonly travelled to as late as the Destruction. What lies beyond are older settlements that would have become forgotten as the demands of the war with the Cylons became greater. This could explain why some settlements like Proteus know of the war before contact was lost but other settlements like Equellas (The Lost Warrior) never knew about it. These would still consist of planet names and stars still known to Colonial astronomy but part of a more distant environment in the way the Rocky Mountains would have seen to America at the time of the Lewis and Clark expedition.

So as a result, in TLP, they are now entering the Alpha Quadrant and know that any human outposts they come across will be remnants or descendants of more distant settlements so it doesn't surprise them that they run into them. They also are aware of the Delphian Empire based in Gomorrah/Gamorray which as we see in LL is the last named planetary system suggesting that from the Colonial standpoint, the Delphian Empire represents the edge of "known" space to them and that beyond would lie any hope of finding keys to where the 13th Tribe went.

Just my take on things. Any parts of this theorizing of mine that fall apart?

[luicfer7thfleet]

croad was played by the same actor that played the sheriff in the super scouts. this was also the only nonfleet human fighter seen in series untill the greetings from earth like your post!. very good ideas! they did talk about the planet croedon bring a farmer world so maybe their was some level of trade [a couple of old small cruisers ?] how else did croad have his sqd with him when they met starbuck, did they all ride in his fighter??. in the novel robber was a woman who was going to be starbucks new girl freind but the whole cassie thing heated up so their went that. see ya [AH]

[SpyOne]

I agree that Adama got at least a vague clue to Earth's location in LPotG, but as I said there, I think it makes most sense to rearrange the order so Long Patrol takes place before LPotG.

The really relevant stuff here is that the Galactica seems to know this area will contain Colonial settlements that have had no recent contact with the Colonies; thus the removal of all Colonial insignia from Starbuck and his ship.
They expect Colonial insignia will be recognized, but that a modern Viper will not.

Except for placement within the overall story, this episode is probably the very best for standing on it's own without changes.

[n-121973]

I'm just curious Eric after looking at the story is what your take on who 'The Silent One' was. Clearly from your description he was a US Astronaut, but beyond that, did you in your head come up with a backstory for his mission? Was he from our future for instance and his (crippled?) ship was discovered near the penal colony? Or was it a Farscape type thing where through some (insert techno-babble) a contempory space vessel got swept clear across the galaxy?

[Eric Paddon]

Glad you picked up on the American flag clue in the adaptation. I really haven't developed too much of an idea on his backstory because I feel there are so many fascinating angles to approach his story that to come up with a "definitive" telling makes one lose the mystique of him just a little. I do think though that he likely was part of an expedition that perhaps got sucked into some kind of black hole or through some phenomenon that hurled him many thousands of light years to a region of space that would have been totally unknown to him, and with all his fellow astronauts killed, he suddenly finds himself in the very terrifying situation of being all alone in this distant environment. In a way, the sight of other human beings so far from his own world, but speaking in what has to be an alien tongue that he can't understand a word of, likely compounds his inner misery and in a sense makes it easy to understand why he becomes a "Silent One" who would take to sketching on his prison wall as his only way of keeping his sanity. In all likelihood, he probably scribbled his name on the wall but the characters would not have been recognizable to Starbuck.

That's my general theory, but expanding it into something more detailed I'm not quite ready to do yet. Thanks again!

[n-121973]

Then of course there's the question of time. Did this black hole catapult him through space or time as well? If the black hole simply propelled them to the other side of the galaxy, the reference at the end of the episode to the fact that the silent one is long dead could suggest at the very least that your Battlestar Galactica adaptations take place in the near future. I've just gone back over the prison scenes in your adaptation and I just noticed Starbuck's observation about Saturn was that it had 'a strange set of rings to it'. Was that just his opinion of the drawing or hadn't he seen rings around a planet before? In the pilot at least one of the Colonies had a ring system on a par with Saturn's as I recall. Hope you don't mind the nitpicking.

[Eric Paddon]

I prefer to say that either explanation you put forth is plausible since at this point I am not prepared to say that Galactica is in the near future or distant future.

As to the rings, I recall seeing a Saturn type planet in the sky in "Magnificent Warriors" and not in Saga, so it's possible that for someone like Starbuck who would not have traveled this far into space before, it would not be a common sight.

[n-121973]

Hi Eric
I think the planet with the rings features during Adama's "Captain's Log" recitation in Saga of a Star World when there are the scenes of ships rising from the surface of the various colonies and rendezvousing in space and in one of those scenes several ships are seen pasing over a world with rings. Not that it matters of course its just one line in the adaptation.

[Ethan]

Hello?

C.O.R.A. soooooo did not get enough screen time . . . . . Talk about an oportunity to take the traditional Viper and modify it . . . .

Can we get someone with an even sexier voice to do C.O.R.A.? Who? A whispering Heather Locklear would give me the shivers . . . . (its a good thing)


From that Burgerking Radio commercial . . .

". . . mayby you want your commercial announcers to be a little bit more . . .
. . . female . . .
and maybe a little bit more . . .
. . . brahzeellian . . . "

[Eric Paddon]

Of course there was just one flaw with this sophisticated CORA that they never addressed, but what I think explains why we never saw that viper or heard her voice again. You would think that if an unfamiliar pilot is suddenly commandeering the viper for his own purpose that a SMART computer would then go into an automatic lockdown, so therefore if CORA were really all she were cracked up to be, she wouldn't have allowed Robber to take off or do anything with the Viper.

As for who has a sexy female voice for the computer, I'd vote for Candice Bergen. (she after all did voice the SAL 9000 computer in "2010"!)

[Senmut]

I think that the failure of C.O.R.A. to lock Robber out shows a flaw in Colonial Military thinking. Cylons blast Vipers, they generally don't capture them. Since it takes a minimum of two Cylons to fly a Raider, it would be unlikely that a single Cylon could handle a Viper. Since Vipers work in groups, the idea that a non-Warrior might actually commandeer one was obviously never seriously considered. Thus, since Robber is Human, C.O.R.A. has no instructions on how to deal with his taking over. He knows about the Colonies, and speaks Colonial, so it is assumed he is a Warrior also. "Her" thinking reflects that of the Colonial Military, which as we see had a hole big enough to fly a BaseShip through.

[Pegasus4]

I was wondering why you had Apollo and Boomer pretend to take Robber's family hostage after picking them up on the scanner. I understand taht they should scan the area to see who and how many are around but in the episode Boomer sees someone run by and is about to fire when a woman shoves him while screaming NO. He then sees that he almost shot a little girl and feels bad. His shout to Apollo saves the captain from being shot in the back.

That still works for me because it's a nice dramatic moment and makes Boomer realize that after that and the virus in LPotG he shouldn't be in such a rush all the time and plan ahead abit more. Which he does.

[Eric Paddon]

That was one of those changes I made where I felt that what played out on screen didn't work as well when trying to recreate it from a narrative standpoint, but more importantly I wanted to have Apollo and Boomer showing some serious concern bordering on anger for Starbuck's well-being. They're in pursuit of someone who at this point they have good reason to think could even have killed Starbuck, and that means their first instinct is not going to be to go soft on him. Plus, I wanted to have Apollo give an angry speech threatening Robber if he doesn't level right away about what happened to Starbuck. There was to me at least, too much of a nonchalant to indifferent attitude on their part about where Starbuck might be in the scenes leading up to this.

[Senmut]

Your take on my above post, EP?

[Eric Paddon]

You mean your "below" post? It indeed is a failure that Adama takes into account, as well as Wilker, so that's why I decided to have Adama abandon the program for now (which can at least take care of why we don't see CORA again the rest of the series).

[Senmut]

Kinda sad. I wish CORA had been exploited/used more often.

[Eric Paddon]

Well, we can always revisit CORA in our own project!

[Athene]

That's my second favourite episode of the entire series. I watch that almost as much as I watch Saga of a Starworld.

[Eric Paddon]

If Jane Seymour hadn't been lured back to do LPOTG I think this would have opened as the first post-Saga episode since I think it's clear production wise this was done before LPOTG.

[Senmut]

Originally Posted by Eric Paddon

Well, we can always revisit CORA in our own project!

Any further burblings on that score, EP?