The War of the Gods (Part 2) Analysis
By Walt Atwood

STORY SYNOPSIS

"This is an event unlike any we've experienced since the destruction of our civilization. Baltar's ship is reaching our quadrant, and will be escorted by an elite squadron that will deliver the treasonous instrument of our holocaust directly into our hands. Word is spreading like sunbursts through every corner of the Fleet. There is a a jubilation unprecedented, as Baltar is brought before the Council of Twelve. It is just as Count Iblis promised. Our enemy has been delivered." --Adama's memoirs

As Baltar (portrayed by the late John Colicos) faces the Council, the president renounces the Cylon double-agent. Baltar, apparently tried in absentia, is sentenced to life aboard the prison barge. Naturally, the traitor protests, insisting that the Colonists and the Cylons need each other in the face of a new threat. But then Count Iblis (Patrick Macnee) steps forward and rebukes Baltar, using his powers to force the prisoner to his knees. Adama has Baltar removed. Iblis then insists that the Council decide on his third test quickly. The Council recesses.

In a holding cell, a fuming Baltar paces until he hears a voice. "Sit, Baltar! Sit, old friend!" It is Iblis. Baltar refuses. "I know you! I remember that voice! It is the voice of the Cylon Imperious leader!" Iblis simply smiles an evil smile. Cylons are machines, he points out. But Baltar recalls they were living beings who were overcome by their own technology 1,000 yahrens ago when their war with the humans began. But Iblis' smile broadens: he responds that in order for his voice to have been transcribed into a machine leader, it would have to have been done 1,000 yahrens ago. Iblis "would have to be over a thousand yahrens old." Iblis then walks through the cell door and consoles Batlar: "Do not fear, my friend. All is not lost." Iblis then disappears, leaving Baltar alone.

Just before a game of triad, Iblis and Sheba visit Boomer, who is getting ready to play against Apollo. Boomer tells them "I'd give anything to beat them, just once." Iblis offers to play the game through Boomer. With Iblis' mysterious unseen help, Boomer's blue team defeats Starbuck and Apollo's gold team. After the game, everyone heads over to the cruise liner Rising Star for a huge celebration in a Studio 54-style dance hall. A jubilant Sheba is with Iblis. She wants to cheer up Apollo. When she and Apollo go off on their own, Starbuck talks to Iblis about Iblis' relationship with Sheba. Iblis doesn't mind Apollo's closeness to her. After all, why should she be limited to one man? Starbuck is pleased to hear that a man should be able to enjoy as many women as he wishes.

Later on, the Galactica is buzzed again by the mysterious lights. But the battlestar's crew and fighters are unresponsive. Adama is outraged to learn from Tigh that many warriors are on Life Station relief after "excessive pleasure." With the defense alert fully twelve centons along, Apollo finds himself trying to wake his hung-over warriors out of their bunks. Iblis storms in and admonishes all of them, provoking a resentful Apollo. Adama rushes in a breaks up the confrontation, but not before Iblis starts dishing out threats.

The Galactica's remaining vipers launch and try in vain to pursue the mysterious lights. Boomer tries to attack one, but his own ship disappears, having been captured by the brilliant alien colossus. Starbuck wants to see if they can find Boomer, but Apollo knows it is too late. Boomer is gone with the other ships. Back on the Galactica, a conference on the bridge makes it clear that Iblis is not helping them stop the disappearances, let alone find the missing pilots. Apollo and Starbuck visit Dr. Wilker (John Dullagham) again, and discover that an analysis on the fruits which resulted from the recent "miracle" growth aboard the agro-ships seems to have coincided with an energy release at the time of the appearance of the mysterious lights.

In Adama's office, the commander sits at his desk, almost perfectly still. He concentrates on the figurine of a bird that he slowly moves with only the power of his will. Apollo enters and in astonished by the display. Adama explains that before his children were born, he used to irritate his wife with telekinetic tricks he learned in a pliot program on psionics at the Military Institute. It seems that in the history of ancient Kobol there were legends of advanced beings who visited that world like "angels", using great powers as "custodians of the Universe." Perhaps Iblis is linked to such a past. Apollo must tell no one that he is going on a mission back to the red planet to find whatever clues exist in the remains of the ship which crashed there. As Apollo readies to leave in a shuttle, Starbuck appears in the launch bay and insists on accompanying his friend. As the two leave under the premise of an unscheduled mission to a passenger ship, Iblis, with Sheba (Anne Lockhart) on agro-ship 9, can sense that something has happened. Iblis returns to the Galactica immediately. Confronting Adama, Iblis threatens to kill Apollo for trying to reveal the Count's true identity. Adama says outright that he doesn't believe in Iblis. With that, a fuming Iblis departs. Later on the bridge, Adama learns that Iblis has disappeared. A viper is also missing; Sheba took off after Apollo's shuttle.

On the surface of the red planet, Apollo and Starbuck descend into the crater and begin probing the wreckage. Apollo finds something shocking in the debris and calls out to Starbuck. Sheba arrives, and climbs down the cliff to the debris. Apollo and Starbuck are about to show Sheba what they found when Iblis appears on top of the cliff, arcing lightning bolts across the sky, and thundering "No! I forbid it!"

Iblis makes his way to the group, and orders Sheba away from the wreckage. Apollo tries to reason with her; he has put the pieces of the puzzle together. "Remember the ancient records... the name Diabolis, Mephistopholes... the Prince of Darkness." Iblis warns Sheba to come to him, or he will kill her. This is enough for Apollo to draw his blaster and shoot Iblis. What happens next stuns the warriors more than Iblis. The energy from Apollo's weapon is harmlessly absorbed into Iblis' body, but not before Iblis undergoes a split-second transformation into some lurid, dark creature. Iblis waves his hand to throw a thunderbolt at Sheba, but strikes Apollo instead. Starbuck is outraged to find Apollo has been killed. In his greif, he draws his own weapon on a chuckling Iblis and fires twice again. Each time, Iblis' appearance briefly changes back to that of the creature, wearing an almost identical robe to that of Iblis yet having some eerie appearance of a devil.

Sheba and Starbuck refuse to obey Iblis, choosing to grieve over Apollo. The mysterious dancing lights appear in the clouds. Iblis is taken aback by their return. Starbuck taunts the Count, asking if he has broken some rule by striking down someone not under his command. Iblis promises he will return. With that, the count resumes his alien appearance and seems to teleport away. Starbuck and Sheba, still weeping, load Apollo's body into the shuttle and launch into space after the Galactica. Once in space, they are captured by the brilliant alien colossus.

On board the brilliant alien colossus, we see Starbuck, Sheba and Starbuck revived by beings wearing shimmering veils. "What you are, we once were. What we are, you may become," the aliens tell the Galactica's warriors. Iblis overstepped his bounds by killing Apollo, who was only dead "by primitive measures." The aliens applaud Apollo's "courage to grow beyond limitations of the flesh," and express hope for the human race's potential. They foresee a time when the Colonists seed the Universe with new civilizations that will ascend to become Great Powers. All of the warriors will now be returned to the Galactica, with reasonable explanations.

In Adama's dining hall, Apollo, Sheba and Starbuck try to reconcile gaps in their memories. It seems they remember Apollo loosing a fight with Iblis, and they brought his body back in the shuttle. After that, nothing. Boomer reasons that Apollo was merely stunned and Iblis was scared off. But Apollo, Sheba and Starbuck remember something else. Light, sound, something good and pure. Adama muses that few see the Light of Good and Truth first-hand. Human beings will always struggle with the conflict between good and evil, even after they find Earth. This brings a stir of facts, streaming from the lips of Apollo, Sheba and Starbuck:

"Earth, quadrant alpha, nineteen million sectares by epsilon vector twenty-two, on a circular reckoning course of zero-zero-zero-point-nine... in a star system of nine planets and one sun."

A Second Look

While there are some similarities in this show to Arthur C. Clarke's anthology which started with 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (MGM-UA, 1968), this episode, like "Saga of a Star World" and "Lost Planet of the Gods", can be said to be truly original and uniquely BATTLESTAR GALACTICA. Unfortunately, there were too many episodes in between which were derived from war movies and westerns. It's a shame, because Count Iblis and the "custodians of the universe" were a far better execution of STAR TREK's Q (portrayed by John DeLancie, who made a cameo in BATTLESTAR's "Terra" anthology as a prison guard) years before TREK ever introduced the notion.

To be fair, some would say Q came from the character Trelane from "Squire of Gothos", more than a decade before BATTLESTAR was made.

There does appear to be a tasty treat of decent science fiction tucked away in this story, dealing with something TREK never bothered to explore in depth: the notion of a race of beings who make what they want by the sheer power of will. There is just a hint of "the Force" from STAR WARS evident in Iblis forcing Baltar to kneel. This can be forgiven thanks to subsequent performances by Patrick Macnee and the other regular characters, especially the unusually eloquent scenes feature Richard Hatch's Apollo and Dirk Benedict's Starbuck. Why didn't this kind of dialogue and drama happen earlier in the series?

Anne Lockhart and Dirk Benedict render surprisingly good performances in this outing. Their acting is made better, in no small part, by smarter characterization and dialogue. They have something interesting to say because the story gives them something interesting to talk about.

In the first part of this story, Apollo expresses dismay over the notion that, if Iblis represented a parent civilization, "from this point forward, we'd be powerless to control our own destiny." Indeed, if the Galactica does find living offshoots of its ancient roots who proove to be formidable, that would threaten the stability of BATTLESTAR's premise without some fancy footwork. Unfortunately, BATTLESTAR simply side-steps the issue by showing us glimpses of these advanced beings, followed by their disappearance.

This episode establishes some contradictory issues about the fleet and its facilities. While "The Magnificent Warriors" left the impression that the fleet had been reduced to one agro-ship, "War of the Gods, Part II" makes it clear there are least nine such ships in the fleet. And while residents of the Freighter Gemini complain of their living conditions, Baltar seems to enjoy much nicer accommodations in the Jailbird Hilton. People of the fleet are ready to dump Adama's leadership, but it seems the Council of Twelve is chaired by a civilian, with Adama simply being a member. And how down-trodden can their condition be when they later celebrate in great parties after Baltar is captured? There seems to be a regular shuttle service set up so people have mobility throughout the fleet. They can visit the Rising Star or agro-ships, or other vessels. If there's a problem with the quality of life, why do the people on the Gemini wait to complain? If anything, the ones who need better quarters could camp out under a tree on board an agro-ship. Why whine when action can be taken?

Upon returning to the red planet, the redness appears to have faded. Apollo and Starbuck don't appear to be worried about toxic "radion levels" anymore, and the warriors' sensitivity to the sounds of the dancing lights seems to have waned. And just how did Sheba know where Apollo and Starbuck took that shuttle? And how did she manage to get a viper without clearance? Again, BATTLESTAR seems to treat this as if Junior simply snatches the keys to the station wagon and takes off on a date with Suzie.

What did Iblis think he was doing, when he tried to kill Sheba? What good would that do him? Was he going to kill her to make an example of her to the other two?

Never mentioned, but loosely understood, was the fate of Sheba's viper which she took to the red planet. Did she leave it behind when she accompanied Starbuck back to the Galactica? Or did they stow it aboard the shuttle?

Spectacle Value

The fandom focus appears to be on the brilliant alien colossus, or "ship of lights", as an outstanding special effect. While it was, attention should also be paid to the "real" Count Iblis effect. Patrick Macnee, on his own, managed to make the character more alien in "Part II" with the right acting and that evil smile. But things really kicked into overdrive when Apollo shot Iblis.

One nice little bit of acting goes to Dirk Benedict, who made his own home-made special effect by rising awkwardly when the aliens revived Starbuck on the brilliant alien colossus. He makes it look like they were handling him like a flimsy rag doll.

Not enough recognition goes to the simple effects of the wreckage on the red planet. Again, simple but effective.

The aliens aboard the brilliant alien colossus were also effective. Showing veiled people, who seem slender enough to be feminine and yet have a masculine voice, gave them a more alien, androgynous feel. This technique was also effectively used in the form of the telepathic inhabitants of the forbidden world of Talos IV in the aborted STAR TREK pilot "The Cage" (Paramount, 1964).

Another overlooked special effect: the geodesic domes of the agro-ships. Derived from the 1972 sci fi movie SILENT RUNNING, these ships made a credible component of the fleet. The interior shots were extremely creative illusion-builders.

IF BATTLESTAR GALACTICA WERE NEW TODAY

The Council of Twelve should not be shown as so gullible. A sudden fruit harvest, Baltar shows up on their doorstep, and they're ready to turn over the keys to a complete stranger? Without anyone asking where the Cylon baseship is that Baltar had to originate from? Gimme a break!

Count Iblis' notion of multiple sex partners would raise some eyebrows, no doubt.

This show should bring back Patrick Macnee, no matter what his age.

The show's makers may want to revisit these Great Powers, but it would be best not to allow the contents of BATTLESTAR to be too heavily influenced by them.

If they are going to show other ships in the fleet, how about using metaphors other than the slum-in-a-metal-box? People can still feel confined in a clean, high tech, cush freighter converted for long-term passenger use. Human beings know how to adapt to harsh conditions. Why not show people finding innovative ways to make their homes more livable?

Tidbits & Nit picks

There are a couple of fandom theories about Iblis' relationship to the Cylon Leader:

1: Iblis is the Cylon Leader, in the flesh.

2: Iblis is responsible for the downfall of the original organic Cylon reptiles, who were overcome by the machines he programmed.

Speculation goes that if Iblis were a Cylon, they would know exactly where the fleet was and be able to pursue them in greater numbers. If Iblis simply instigated the rise of the Cylon machines over the living beings, there does arise the question of free will again. How much sense does it make for a race of beings to consciously choose to destroy themselves by creating killer machines? That doesn't sound like a choice made freely. That leads to a third (my own) possibility:

3: Iblis is a being of many false identities, who pursues a life creating alter-ego cults-of-personality by infiltrating the leadership of civilizations he encounters. Perhaps the Cylon machines were created by the Cylons for service or defense, but were tampered with after Iblis (in another form/identity) gained prominence in ancient Cylon society. Maybe Iblis didn't even do the tampering; he was part of a movement that became corrupt as a result of his politicking. He connived his way into becoming leader of the Cylons, only to find his civilization collapsing around him as the machines took over. Perhaps Iblis could inhabit the body of another being, such as the Cylon machine leader. Or perhaps the Cylon machine leader, an alter-ego of his, is a puppet which can either act independently or at his whim.

Still, the first theory should not be dismissed. Iblis is a master of illusion, and could take on the form of the Cylon leader quite easily. Baltar pursued the Galactica on the Cylon leader's wishes, with the intent to storm the fleet and capture the humans to be taken under Cylon rule. When the Cylon baseship was destroyed at Carillon, the Leader's indentity was mysteriously restored to a successor. It should be remembered that Iblis apparently is endowed with two other powers: immortality (he can't be killed) and the ability to teleport to another distant place at will. The Cylon Empire is brimming with IL-series machines who are constantly trying to step on each other to gain power and prominence. How does a leader keep things stable at the top with this going on? Iblis could be using his powers of influence.

Adama's dining room aboard the Galactica seems mighty plush considering the emergency conditions the Colonists are constantly living and working under.

One would think that a few more lines could've been given to Athena throughout this story.

You have to love that line Starbuck gave while in the custody of the aliens: "Sweet lady, there aren't many places I've been in my life where I didn't feel like I was in complete control, but, uh, this is an exception."