The Long Patrol

"The Long Patrol" is one of those where the title gives you no clue about the episode. The "long patrol" is a mission that Starbuck signed on for so he could have access to certain luxury dining suites. The first part of the episode comes dangerously close to sitcom territory. Starbuck tries to dine with both Athena and Cassiopeia without the other one knowing. This is straight out of sitcom 101 where the lead character tries to be in two places at once (usually parties). I started to roll my eyes and say to myself, "not this again", but surprisingly (and wisely), the gag ends after one trip back and forth. Starbuck is called away for the mission and the girls realize what he was doing. I was so glad to see it done this way. Too often I've seen television shows try to sustain this situation for fifteen minutes straight and it doesn't work. Here, it does work the way it really would. Starbuck thinks he's getting away with it at first, then quickly realizes that he's in trouble and the gag is over. I also like that it springs from Athena's unexpected arrival, rather than from the usual "I accidentally said yes to both" thing. Cassiopeia and Athena are Starbuck's Betty and Veronica. I wonder how long they can milk this back and forth sort of relationship. 

Starbuck gets a fancy Viper with no guns but a talking computer called CORA. Certainly CORA is reminiscent of other female computer voices (notably Star Trek), but she also very much prefigures KITT from Knight Rider. Trek's computer was sterile and utilitarian (except in "Tomorrow is Yesterday"), but CORA has personality and cares about Starbuck.

When Starbuck meets Robber and he starts talking Irish, I though "oh no" again. We just had the lame western episode. Now we're gonna have the lame Irish episode. Well, thankfully, this is all handled much better than in the previous episode. Why do they speak with Irish accents? No idea. Maybe because it makes them sound more piratey, or more likely I suspect, because they spend all their time making and drinking liquor. But aside from the stereotyping there, I found the story to be interesting and cleared up some things for me. They explain why these humans are here (it's a prison colony from the war). The guards were apparently Cylon collaborators. The rest are from Aries. While in the last episode I had no idea what humans were doing on that settlement, here all my questions were answered. It's always interesting to tell stories about pockets of people who don't know the war is over. 

I really liked the thematic element of the prisoners being descended from prisoners. The term "original sinners" is thrown around, obviously tying to Christian ideas of "original sin". Here the sins of the fathers are literally visited on the seventh generation! I like the touch too that the cells are all unlocked. In a way, Starbuck becomes a Christ figure here. He is punished for a crime he didn't commit, and shows those wallowing in their sins the simple means of salvation. He even "lead captivity captive" (Ephesians 4:8) when they took the guards in custody. His maximum-G flight from the Cylons might also be seen as "ascending on high". 

I like the charts on the wall, and learning that there was a man who returned from Earth who made them. This information is much more useful than anything in "Lost Planet of the Gods". I question how Adama knows so much about Earth's solar system, but if one returned from Earth, perhaps others did. These legends have to start somewhere after all. This is the first time we've been told someone did indeed come back from Earth.

The cute comm officer returns after her absence last episode (and who can blame her).

Overall, despite some troubling early elements, I found I actually really like this episode. Certainly it's better than the previous one, but I think it's my favorite since the pilot.

Favorite line: "Your two women; very pre-war."