[goMac]

Originally Posted by jokell82 

Because we saw her ship blow up?

Stranger things have happened in the show...

[Buckaroo]

Originally Posted by jokell82 

Because we saw her ship blow up?

Hmmmm. Something just occured to me. We saw something blow up. Could it have been the cylons ship blowing up?

I can't believe they killed off one of the main characters. It's a twist.

[jokell82]

But have they ever reversed something we *saw* happen? Plus it was revealed earlier this year that Starbuck wouldn't be in the next season, which leads to the conclusion that she really is dead.

Originally Posted by Buckaroo 

Hmmmm. Something just occured to me. We saw something blow up. Could it have been the cylons ship blowing up?

I can't believe they killed off one of the main characters. It's a twist.

No, we really saw her Viper blow up.

[Eriamjh]

I like Starbuck. I hate Starbuck.

Exactly how does dying fulfill one's destiny (lame plot twist in future episodes aside)?

[goMac]

Originally Posted by Eriamjh 

Exactly how does dying fulfill one's destiny (lame plot twist in future episodes aside)?

Her destiny is just starting. Out of all the theories, none of them are that she is dead, or dead for good.

In the episode it was made clear that she had to die to get to her destiny. Something lies between life and death and she has to get to. Going by that, while she may not be alive, she's not dead.

[zerock]

she is one of the final 5 ?

anyways she could still be alive, is bsg, is expected.. and i really dont expect her to die like that for real.

[RAILhead]

I'm in the camp that thinks it sure looked like she died, but can't believe it -- if for no other reason than to think the new BSG wouldn't totally throw away the whole Starbuck/Apollo duo.

At least this episode didn't clear the shark when it jumped.

[analogue SPRINKLES]

You guys notice the nice symbolism when starbuck met Adama and the prez in the hallway and the lights went out?

Oh and if you didn't hear the podcast the ending with Adama smashing the ship was IMPROVISED. The bad thing was it was a REAL historical model ship worth hundreds of thousands so the props people off camera nearly had a heart attack.

[powerbook867]

wow, that end scene was improvised? That is some impressive acting.

I am sure the prop people were less than pleased....

[Millennium]

Starbuck is not a Cylon as we know them, nor is she a hybrid: her age doesn't work out right for either of those things to be possible. She's too old to be the child of the Agents we know, and too young to be some kind of "child" of the robotic Cylons from the wars of 40 years ago.

However, is it perhaps possible that the "Final Five" are something quite different from the Cylons we know? In the original BSG, the robotic Cylons were not the first people to hold that name, so perhaps the new series is doing something similar. What if the robotic Cylons encountered a new race, stole their biotechnology, and eliminated their benefactors?

[analogue SPRINKLES]

Something I have always wondered is how old are the current skinjobs? We all assume they are only 3 years old as that is when they first started to sneak around on the colonies.

Nobody has seen them for 40 YEARS so they could have been around doing all sorts of things among themselves or the colonies in that time without anyone knowing.

Perhaps they were created right after the war ended and have had a very interesting history among themselves for 40 years. The current skinjobs could actually be version 2.0 with the version 1.0's being the final five that were considered defective or developed radical ideas that the 2.0's considered wrong and therefor destroyed them and purged their memories of them so they also do not begin to follow their ideals.

The final five which were 1.0 models could have not had resurrection abilities, wanted to die in order to find god or thought of themselves as humans and wanted to live with them. With that in mind one of the final 5 could have been the father to Starbuck and her mother could have found he was a Cylon at a later date which would explain why she was so convinced of her destiny.

Another thing that I wonder how the Cylons "Evolved". You don't go from mindless tin cans to 99.99% human in one small step. Something must have drove the Cylons to make this large step and D'Anna clearly hinted at such by speaking of "The one who programmed us, who made us who we are, how we think". This "Someone" could have easily been a mortal person CLAIMING to be a the true "God" and promised to give the cylons a soul by making them human. For all we know it could have been the original cylon creator who was tying to fix the mistake he first made that lead to the war.

[Wiskedjak]

Originally Posted by Millennium 

However, is it perhaps possible that the "Final Five" are something quite different from the Cylons we know?

That's certainly what I've been thinking.

[analogue SPRINKLES]

I think I know what is going on to a point.

Starbuck is the Goddess Arora "Goddess of the dawn" (Also known as EOS to the greeks)
Eos - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Long story short:
Starbuck is Arora (the female god with Wings) and her destiny was to fly into the eye of the storm and somehow as a result opens up a path to earth. Her mother (who fought in the first Cylon war) knew this somehow and pushed her to be the best she could be but with her drive she caused a bit of unintentional damage.

In the paintings Starbuck made of the Eye of Jupiter there is always a figure in the middle of it which looks like this:



That symbol looks roughly like the figuring of Arora as it has two circles or wings.



An important note is that in any images of the eye created by someone else does NOT have the figure in the middle. Only the images that Starbuck made. Starbuck says she has always been "drawn" to the symbol and since it is in the middle of the eye in her paintings it explains why she was drawn to the centre and why she flew into it in the end.

Starbuck says "Arora brings the morning star into fair wind. A fresh start." to Adama when she gives him the figurine
.
In other words "she" being Starbuck/Arora brings the MorningStar/Battlestar into fairwind/path to earth.
The fresh star could also mean that since Starbuck has had such a troubled past she will return with a new biginning somehow as she has closed her issues with her mother and destiny.

Adama also attaches the Arora figure to the front of his model ship as the mast head which is the same role Starbuck will be taking because of her death.
\
"As the dawn goddess, she opened the gates of heaven (with "rosy fingers") so that Helios could ride his chariot across the sky every day. As the dawn goddess, she opened the gates of heaven (with "rosy fingers") so that Helios could ride his chariot across the sky every day."

That means that Starbuck needed to fly into the eye of the storm and the result is it somehow opens up a path to earth for the Battlestar to follow. The "Rosy Fingers" could also relate to what her mother did to Starbucks fingers.



In Homer (Iliad viii.1; xxiv.695), her yellow robe is embroidered or woven with flowers (Odyssey vi:48 etc); rosy-fingered and with golden arms, she is pictured on Attic vases as a supernaturally beautiful woman, crowned with a tiara or diadem and with the large white-feathered wings of a bird.

OK so the description of Eos is "Yellow robe embroidered with flowers."



Now look at the pic starbuck drew as a child.



The dress with yellow flowers behind her. The wings of Eos ties to fact the starbuck has her pilot wings and flies. You can also see the storm circle at the top right and that symbol on the left which is in the centre of all the pictures Starbuck drew of the eye.

So in the end Starbuck flying into the eye opened up a path somehow to earth and she will probably be reborn somehow as "all of this has happened before and all of it will happen again".

The whole Loben connection might be because he knew of this somehow by listening to the hybrid ramble and somehow feels he should be involved or just wants to be.

[SirCastor]

okay, Theories aside, it's pretty safe to say that Starbuck actually died here. For those of you with less than perfect memories (like me):

ship during explosion

after explosion

and someone mentioned the raider being visible from Lee's Perspective, I took that one too, just to check. At first I thought that the Raider disappeared before Starbuck showed, but here's a shot with all three...

[Visnaut]

Excellent post, sprinkles. That's some excellent research.

[analogue SPRINKLES]

Originally Posted by SirCastor 

and someone mentioned the raider being visible from Lee's Perspective, I took that one too, just to check. At first I thought that the Raider disappeared before Starbuck showed, but here's a shot with all three...

Keep in mind that is not a view from Lee's eyes and he made no mention of seeing the raider.

[SirCastor]

Originally Posted by analogue SPRINKLES 

Keep in mind that is not a view from Lee's eyes and he made no mention of seeing the raider.

right. Thus the purpose of the picture.

That said though, I wonder why that shot is in there. The Raider is only visible for Kara, right? And at this point in the episode, Kara's already gone, she's already at the point of giving up, right?
Why was this included?

[Visnaut]

Originally Posted by SirCastor 

That said though, I wonder why that shot is in there. The Raider is only visible for Kara, right? And at this point in the episode, Kara's already gone, she's already at the point of giving up, right?
Why was this included?

Quite possibly there is no special reason. Probably just a result of the shots available to the editors.

[jokell82]

BSG just started here, and I still can't believe there's no more Starbuck.

[Spliff]