Sunday, January 30, 2005
Act of Contrition
"Starbuck" has to train new Viper pilots.
This episode is similar to the classic episode "Lost Planet of the Gods." In "Lost Planet of the Gods" the Viper pilots get sick because Boomer and Jolly were careless and didn't go into decontamination like they were supposed to. The went to Apollo's bachelor's party and infected everyone. Starbuck and Apollo had to train the fleet's non-combat pilots to fly Vipers. All of the new trainees were women. The new trainees had to fight in battle against the Cylons even though they weren't fully trained.
In "Act of Contrition," we have a similar setup. There is a party celebarting a pilot's 1000th landing, but there is an accident (because of carelessness) and a piece of ordinance goes off in the landing bay killing 14 Viper pilots and wounding several others. Starbuck is tasked with training the new pilots. One of the new pilots, "Hotdog," engages enemy Cylons even though he isn't prepared. But somehow it's Starbuck who gets hit and ejects from her Viper while tumbling towards a planet.
Perhaps in part II, we will see another theme from the old classic series. The theme where Starbuck or some other Viper pilot gets stranded on a planet.