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Galactica’s entire command crew is stunned into silence at the sound of Starbuck’s voice. Even though they’re still reeling from the realization that they are among the Cylons’ fabled final five, Tigh, Tyrol, Anders and Tory are shocked by the return of Starbuck. Starbuck helps Galactica in the fight against the Cylon base ships, but after a Cylon fighter scans Anders at close range, the fight is over and the Cylons inexplicably retreat. Aboard Galactica, Starbuck’s triumphant return is met with a very muted response. She claims that she’s only been gone for six hours, and can’t explain why two months have passed for the rest of the fleet. She also can’t explain, except in the vaguest of terms, how she got to Earth and then returned to the fleet. Roslin orders Starbuck locked up and kept under guard, certain that this isn’t the real Kara Thrace, but a Cylon trick. Below decks, in the aftermath of his trial, Baltar is whisked away to the safety of a commune of people who consider him to be their messiah, and he begins to falteringly pass on the Cylons’ monotheistic belief system to his new followers, urging them to turn their backs on the pantheon of gods worshipped by the Colonials. But even among friends (and at least a few fanatics), Baltar discovers that he isn’t completely safe. Starbuck tries to convince Adama that she does know the way to Earth, but can’t give him a concrete reason to trust her. She then sets out to convince Roslin instead - with a gun in her hand.

Season 3 Regular Cast: Edward James Olmos (Admiral Adama), Mary McDonnell (President Laura Roslin), Katie Sackhoff (Lt. Starbuck), Jamie Bamber (Captain Apollo), James Callis (Dr. Gaius Baltar), Tricia Helfer (Number Six), Grace Park (Lt. Boomer)

written by David Weddle & Bradley Thompson
directed by Michael Rymer
music by Bear McCreary

Guest Cast: Michael Hogan (Colonel Tigh), Aaron Douglas (CPO Tyrol), Tahmoh Penikett (Helo), Michael Trucco (Anders), Alessandro Juliani (Lt. Gaeta), Kandyse McClure (Dualla), Rekha Sharma (Tory Foster)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

After escaping the bomb blast, Torchwood is helpless in the face of a promise of revenge from Captain John Hart. And Captain John has another ace up his sleeve: he’s found Jack’s brother Grey, alive and grown up. When Jack returns to the Torchwood hub, John kidnaps him and forces him to watch as he sets off a devastating series of huge explosions throughout Cardiff…and then John takes Jack back in time through the rift to Cardiff in 27 A.D., where Grey is waiting. Driven mad by the torment he endured after his older brother lost track of him, Grey is now seeking revenge, and buries Jack alive. Gwen mobilizes the rest of Torchwood and finds herself having to tell the city’s police what to do - as best she can. One of the explosions has cut off external power to the Turnmill nuclear power station, and Owen races to prevent a meltdown as the rest of the team returns to the hub. They find Captain John there, who explains that he was forced to do Grey’s bidding, and claims that he can locate Jack for them. But Grey isn’t finished with the rest of the team: he shoots Toshiko at point blank range and traps Gwen, Ianto and John in the underground cells normally reserved for Weevils. Without Toshiko’s technical advice, Owen finds himself trapped at the nuclear station with a radioactive disaster imminent. Whether or not Jack can be found and can save the day, his team will never be the same - nor will his relationship with his brother.

written by Chris Chibnall
directed by Ashley Way
music by Murray Gold and Ben Foster

Guest Cast: Kai Owen (Rhys Williams), James Marsters (Captain John Hart), Tom Price (PC Andy), Lachlan Nieboer (Gray), Paul Kasey (Weevil), Golda Rosheuvel (Dr. Angela Connolly), Syreeta Kumar (Nira Docherty), Cornelius Macarthy (Charles Gaskell), Amy Manson (Alice Guppy)

Notes: At last, Toshiko’s presence alongside the ninth Doctor in Aliens Of London is explained - apparently, Owen was to have been sent to investigate the “space pig,” but was hungover and didn’t answer his phone. Toshiko was sent to pose as a medic instead - not exactly her forte - which explains her jumpiness when the Doctor arrived on the scene.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

On Earth in 2008, the Doctor investigates a company called Adipose Industries, the makers of a diet pill that magically makes the fat “walk away,” suspecting that there’s something sinister to their miracle cure for obesity. Little does he know that his friend, former runaway bride Donna Noble, is also at Adipose, having just taken a job in health & safety. Also realizing that Adipose’s claims are too good to be true, Donna begins her own investigation. Donna’s family has criticized her for not sticking to any one job for any length of time since the mysterious circumstances around her not getting married, but what she can’t explain to them is that she regrets not taking the Doctor up on his offer of travel in the TARDIS - and hopes she’ll see him again someday. As she and the Doctor independently snoop around Adipose, they both learn of the more sinister agenda behind the miracle diet pill - and each other’s presence. Just as quickly, they’re both on the run, with Donna leaving no doubt that she expects to be off with the Doctor once the current crisis is over. There’s just one problem: she’s assuming that they’ll both survive the wrath of the mysterious Mrs. Foster once the secret of Adipose is out.

Series 4 Regular Cast: David Tennant (The Doctor), Catherine Tate (Donna Noble)

written by Russell T. Davies
directed by James Strong
music by Murray Gold

Guest Cast: Billie Piper (Rose Tyler), Sarah Lancashire (Miss Foster), Bernard Cribbins (Wilfred Mott), Jacqueline King (Sylvia Noble), Verona Joseph (Penny Carter), Jessica Gunning (Stacey Harris), Martin Ball (Roger Davey), Rachid Sabitri (Craig Staniland), Chandra Ruegg (Clare Pope), Sue Kelvin (Suzette Chambers), Jonathan Stratt (Taxi Driver)

Notes: The episode carries a dedication to Howard Attfield, the late actor who played the role of Donna’s father in The Runaway Bride. He originally shot some scenes for Partners In Crime, but upon his death, the bulk of his dialogue was rewritten for Donna’s grandfather, played by Bernard Cribbins. According to the show’s producers, Donna’s grandfather is indeed the spirited but perhaps slightly unhinged newsstand man encountered by the Doctor (and also played by Cribbins) in Voyage Of The Damned. The Doctor’s observation about how things can come and go through a catflap are nearly identical to a similar comment his seventh incarnation made in 1989’s Survival - a story whose working title was Catflap.

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green (click here for review and more details…)

Starbuck, after getting President Roslin’s attention by holding her at gunpoint, hands the president that gun and tells her to fire if she truly thinks that Starbuck is a Cylon. Roslin does indeed fire, but she misses; Starbuck is arrested and thrown in the brig, where Adama makes it clear that even his trust in her has now been broken. But Roslin can’t help but feel that Adama’s belief in her absolute certainty that she alone knows the way to Earth is eroding. Among the Cylons, concern is growing about the recent attack on the Colonial fleet, and the abrupt, unplanned end to it. Number Six theorizes that some of the final five Cylon models could be among the fleet, which would prompt the Cylon Raider vehicles to avoid firing on them. Dissention breaks out among the ranks of the Cylons, especially when one of the Boomer models votes against the rest of her type - a first in Cylon history. This proves to be too much for Six to bear, and she gives the signal to fire what may be the first shots in a Cylon civil war.

written by Michael Angeli
directed by Anthony Hemingway
music by Bear McCreary

Guest Cast: Michael Hogan (Colonel Tigh), Aaron Douglas (CPO Tyrol), Tahmoh Penikett (Helo), Michael Trucco (Anders), Alessandro Juliani (Lt. Gaeta), Kandyse McClure (Dualla), Callum Keith Rennie (Leoben Conoy), Rick Worthy (The Doctor), Matthew Bennett (Doral), Rekha Sharma (Tory Foster), Sebastian Spence (Narcho), Dean Stockwell (Brother Cavel), Bodie Olmos (Hotdog)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

The Doctor brings Donna to ancient Pompeii, only to discover that they’ve arrived on the eve of the eruption of Vesuvius. A woman in red robes who immediately noticed the time travelers after their arrival reports to the rest of her order - the blue box foretold by prophecy has appeared. When the Doctor and Donna race back to get in the TARDIS and leave, the blue box is exactly what they don’t find: one of the street merchants sold it as a piece of art. The Doctor finds it soon enough, but now there’s a new problem: Donna doesn’t want to leave without saving some of the people of Pompeii from their fate, something which the Doctor assures her is impossible. Trying to outdo some of the local soothsayers, Donna warns everyone she can about the volcano, but the red-robed sisterhood marks her for death for the crime of false prophecy. The Doctor discovers that one of the locals is apparently in possession of advanced computer circuitry, but doesn’t know exactly what it is. Even if he saves Donna and tracks down the alien attempting to influence history, the Doctor still can’t save the people of Pompeii.

written by James Moran
directed by Colin Teague
music by Murray Gold

Guest Cast: Phil Cornwell (Stallholder), Karen Gillan (Soothsayer), Sasha Behar (Spurrina), Lorraine Burroughs (Thalina), Peter Capaldi (Caecilius), Tracey Childs (Metella), Francesca Fowler (Evelina), Francois Pandolfo (Quintus), Victoria Wicks (High Priestess), Gerard Bell (Major Domo), Phil Davis (Lucius)

Notes: Depending on how official you consider the Big Finish audio plays to be, Pompeii in 79 A.D. was positively crawling with incarnations of the Doctor; somewhere across town, the seventh Doctor and Melanie were also trying to escape the eruption of Pompeii in the audio story The Fires Of Vulcan - though they weren’t trying to battle an alien influence.

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green (click here for review and more details…)

Having hung up his flight suit for a law career, Apollo finds himself appointed to one of Caprica’s seats on the Quorum by President Roslin. But at the press conference to announce his appointment, reporters are more interested in the sudden reassignment of the Colonial freighter Demetrius, and the rumors that Adama put Starbuck in charge of it to find the way to Earth. Aboard the Demetrius, Starbuck is struggling to remember the signposts that might lead her back to Earth, but she’s rapidly losing the patience and loyalty of her crew. Loyalty and patience also seem to be running out between Tyrol and Cally, who is convinced that Tyrol is having an affair - a theory that seems much more plausible when she spots him in a bar with Tory. Cally’s attempts to find out what’s going on only expose her to the truth: she’s married to a Cylon. That knowledge makes her a target, but even if Tyrol isn’t willing to take drastic measures to ensure that Cally can’t tell anyone else, the others are more than willing.

written by Michael Taylor
directed by Michael Nankin
music by Bear McCreary

Guest Cast: Michael Hogan (Colonel Tigh), Aaron Douglas (CPO Tyrol), Tahmoh Penikett (Helo), Michael Trucco (Anders), Nicki Clyne (Cally), Alessandro Juliani (Lt. Gaeta), Kandyse McClure (Dualla), Richard Hatch (Tom Zarek), Dean Stockwell (Brother Cavel), Donnelly Rhodes (Doc Cottle), Matthew Bennett (Doral), Rekha Sharma (Tory Foster), Jennifer Halley (Seelix), Christina Schild (Playa Palacios), Biski Gugushe (Sekou Hamilton), Finn R. Devitt (Baby Nicky), Donna Soares (Speaking Delegate #1), Andrew McIlroy (Jacob Cantrell), Judith Marie (Picon Delegate), Iris Paluly (Speaking Delegate #2), Marilyn Norry (Reza Chronides)

Notes: Given that Galactica showrunner Ronald D. Moore started his professional screenwriting career on Star Trek: The Next Generation, it’s surely just a coincidence that Tyrol, Tigh and Tory picked weapons locker 1701D for their latest clandestine meeting.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Donna’s first visit to the future brings the TARDIS to a barren, snowy planet, where she and the Doctor find a dying Ood. But before it dies, it says “the circle must be broken” and then glares at them with red eyes - the same sign of malignant external mind control that the Doctor witnessed in his last encounter with the Ood. The Doctor and Donna spot signs of civilization, though Donna becomes less convinced of that when she discovers that it’s a sales and distribution center for Ood slaves. Donna is disgusted that the advanced society that humanity has become is still relying on slave labor, but the Doctor is curious as to what is driving some Ood to calmly kill their masters, and what is causing others to fly into a deadly berserker rage. Then the time travelers discover the secret that is taken from the Ood before they are “processed” into docile servants…but that secret may die with them as the Ood revolt against all humans on the planet en masse.

written by Keith Temple
directed by Graeme Harper
music by Murray Gold

Guest Cast: Tim McInnery (Mr. Halpen), Ayesha Dharker (Salana Mercurio), Adrian Rawlins (Dr. Ryder), Roger Griffiths (Commander Kess), Paul Clayton (Mr. Bartle), Paul Kasey (Ood Sigma), Tariq Jordan (Rep), Silas Carson (voice of the Ood)

Notes: The Ood were introduced in season two of the new series in the two-part story The Impossible Planet / The Satan Pit, during which time they succumbed to “red eye” for entirely different reasons.

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green (click here for review and more details…)

The crew mourns the death of Cally, even as the investigation is ongoing. But Tyrol’s grief is subdued, and he even argues with Admiral Adama when he comes to express his condolences - picking a fight to the point that Adama is left with no choice but to relieve him of duty and bust him down in rank. Tigh and Tory both urge Tyrol not to draw any more attention to himself, but he wants nothing to do with them or with being Cylon. Tory has been exploring her options more openly, shedding any pretenses of human morality along the way. But Tigh understands grief all too well - because he’s never gotten over his wife’s death at his own hands - and his own quest to understand the nature of being a Cylon leads to a fateful and violent encounter with the Six held in captivity. Meanwhile, Baltar attracts the wrong kind of attention from President Roslin when he declares that his religious sect is being oppressed with the tacit approval of the Colonial government - and he finds an unlikely champion for his cause in Apollo.

written by Jane Espenson
directed by Edward James Olmos
music by Bear McCreary

Guest Cast: Michael Hogan (Colonel Tigh), Aaron Douglas (CPO Tyrol), Tahmoh Penikett (Helo), Michael Trucco (Anders), Nicki Clyne (Cally), Alessandro Juliani (Lt. Gaeta), Kandyse McClure (Dualla), Kate Vernon (Ellen Tigh), Rekha Sharma (Tory Foster), Leela Savasta (Tracey Anne), Leah Cairns (Racetrack), Richard Hatch (Tom Zarek), Colin Lawrence (Skulls), Don Thompson (Figurski), Heather Doerksen (Surveillance Marine), Lara Gilchrist (Paula Schaffer), Lee Jefferies (Redwing), Hector Johnson (Marine Lieutenant), Steve Lawlor (Marine), Judith Maxie (Picon Delegate), Andrew McIlroy (Jacob Cantrell), Marilyn Norry (Reza Chronides), Iris Paluly (Speaking Delegate #2), Laara Sadiq (Priestess), Donna Soares (Speaking Delegate #1), Finn R. Devitt (Baby Nicky)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

A call from Martha brings the TARDIS back to Earth, just in time for Donna and the Doctor to witness a UNIT raid on the Atmos factory. Standard-issue in more than half the automobiles in the world, Atmos cancels out all harmful pollution emissions from any car - and the Doctor recognizes it as something far ahead of current human technology. But as everyone knows, Atmos is the invention of former teen prodigy Luke Rattigan, who now heads his own academy for developing young genius. A visit to Rattigan’s academy reveals that he is in league with a Sontaran invasion force, a discovery from which the Doctor barely escapes alive. He decides to dissect an Atmos device for himself, only to accidentally trigger a weapon within it that emits toxic gas. Using a clone of Martha to keep UNIT’s attention away from the real danger, the Sontarans activate all of the gas emitters in all of the Atmos-equipped cars worldwide…

written by Helen Raynor
directed by Douglas MacKinnon
music by Murray Gold

Guest Cast: Freema Agyeman (Dr. Martha Jones), Bernard Cribbins (Wilfred Mott), Jacqueline King (Sylvia Noble), Ryan Simpson (Luke Rattigan), Rupert Holliday Evans (Colonel Mace), Christopher Ryan (General Staal), Dan Starkey (Commander Skorr), Eleanor Matsuura (Jo Nakashima), Clive Standen (Private Harris), Wesley Theobald (Private Gray), Christian Cooke (Ross Jenkins), Rad Kaim (Worker), Elizabeth Ryder (Atmos voice)

Notes: The Sontarans last appeared with The Two Doctors (namely Colin Baker and Patrick Troughton) in 1985, though fanmade productions such as Mindgame and Shakedown revisited them after the cancellation of classic Doctor Who. This is the first episode to give, in dialogue, the revised name for UNIT - the Unified Intelligence Taskforce - which was changed from the original name, United Nations Intelligence Taskforce, for completely non-fictional legal reasons. Despite the change, dialogue elsewhere in the episode still says that UNIT gets its funding from the United Nations. Speaking of UNIT, a bit of fun is poked at the long-standing debate over whether the third Doctor’s stint with UNIT took place in the 1970s or 1980s - and the issue certainly isn’t resolved. The Sontarans are apparently aware of the Time War, but for whatever reason were “not allowed to take part in it.” The reference to the human female’s “weak thorax” is a riff on the 1975 story The Sontaran Experiment, in which Field Major Styre noted differences in the thorax between the human genders.

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green (click here for review and more details…)