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Battlestar Galactica (New Series) Season 4

The Oath

Battlestar GalacticaHaving thrown his lot in with Tom Zarek, Gaeta assembles a team of Galactica crew members whose discontent with what Zarek calls the “Roslin/Adama administration” has reached a boiling point; they smuggle Zarek out of Galactica’s brig and off the ship. Gaeta’s position in CIC allows him to cover for Zarek’s departure until the vice president is once again safely ensconced aboard Colonial One. But as the hub of communications between CIC and the rest of the fleet, Gaeta is also able to squash Lee’s demands to know how Zarek returned to power, and Starbuck’s warning that the armory has been broken into. Marines loyal to Zarek and Gaeta take over CIC, escorting Adama and Tigh away and putting Gaeta in command of Galactica. Lee returns to Galactica and is promptly abducted by Gaeta’s forces, but only Starbuck – and her utter lack of remorse on the issue of putting rounds through people she has served with for years – saves him. Their first task after that is to find Roslin and rush her to safety – namely, Baltar’s religious enclave, where she hopes to use his radio in the absence of Galactica’s own communications systems. Tigh and Adama prove to be quite adept at getting themselves out of trouble, and they’re already armed and free by the time Lee and Starbuck find them. Roslin’s message to the fleet is enough to confuse the issue of who’s in charge and buy time for her escape. But a few other members of the crew stay behind to cover Roslin’s (and Baltar’s) escape, and retake the ship – and Adama and Tigh are among those who refuse to give up without a fight.

written by Mark Verheiden
directed by John Dahl
music by Bear McCreary

Guest Cast: Michael Hogan (Colonel Tigh), Aaron Douglas (Tyrol), Tahmoh Penikett (Helo), Michael Trucco (Anders), Alessandro Juliani (Gaeta), Richard Hatch (Tom Zarek), Sebastian Spence (Narcho), Brad Drybrough (Hoshi), Jennifer Halley (Seelix)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
7th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

A Thousand Tiny Wings

Doctor WhoThe TARDIS lands in Kenya, during the native Mau Mau uprising against British colonialists, where the Doctor finds an isolated community of women awaiting either an end to the fighting or a rescue party. But among them is Elizabeth Klein, the Nazi scientist from an alternate future that the Doctor first met during his internment at Colditz Castle. Now trapped in a timeline where the Third Reich fell, Klein is living in exile among fascist sympathizers, making her own plans. When an alien influence is found to be waiting for its chance to invade, the Doctor and Klein are forced into an uneasy alliance.

Order this CDwritten by Andy Lane
directed by Lisa Bowerman
music by Richard Fox & Lauren Yason

Cast: Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor), Tracey Childs (Elizabeth Klein), Ann Bell (Mrs. Sylvia O’Donnell), Abigail McKern (Mrs. Denise Waterford), Joannah Tincey (Miss Lucy Watts), Chuk Iwuji (Joshua Sembeke), Alex Mallinson (Abraham)

Notes: Klein, played by Tracey Childs, first appeared in the 2001 audio drama Colditz, which revealed only that she was from an alternate, Nazi-dominated future Earth, and had the capability of piloting the TARDIS. Between her first and second appearances as Klein, actress Tracey Childs made an appearance in the Doctor Who TV episode The Fires Of Pompeii, as the matriarch of the only family to survive the eruption of Vesuvius. Chuk Iwuji also made an appearance on TV Doctor Who, as a Secret Service agent in The Impossible Astronaut (2011). Klein is apparently acquainted with exiled Nazi de Flores (Silver Nemesis, 1988).

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
Picard Season 1 Star Trek

Maps And Legends

Star Trek: Picard2385: As a fleet of passenger vessels commanded by Admiral Jean-Luc Picard gathers in orbit of the planet Mars to continue the ongoing emergency evacuation of the entire population of Romulus, whose star is about to go supernova, synthetic life forms performing labor at Utopia Planitia receive a signal from an outside source, overriding their programming and causing them to turn Mars’ own defenses against it in an unexpected attack. The resulting catastrophic loss of life causes Starfleet to reconsider the Romulan evacuation plot.

2399: Picard, now retired, enlists the help of his Romulan housekeepers, Laris and Zhaban, in piecing together the level of Romulan involvement in the recent murder of Dahj, a young woman who may well have been a synthetic life form and the closest anyone has come to replicating an android like Data. Picard suspects the Tal Shiar, a Romulan secret police organization may be involved, but Laris believes it may be an even older Romulan organization, the Zhat Vash, of which the Tal Shiar has always been a very small part. When they beam into Dahj’s apartment in Boston to look for signs of Romulan involvement, they discover that the would-be assassins covered their tracks very carefully. Picard decides to go to Starfleet Headquarters with his concerns, and requests a ship and crew to be assigned to him so he can find Dahj’s twin sister before she too is killed. This request is met with the fury of Starfleet’s commander in chief, still outraged over Picard’s comments in a recent interview that Starfleet abdicated its duty when the Romulan evacuation was abandoned. Turned away, Picard decides to enlist the help of his second-in-command in the evacuation effort, Rafi Musiker, to find and hire a private ship to undertake his mission.

Order DVDswritten by Michael Chabon & Akiva Goldsman
directed by Hanelle L. Culpepper
music by Jeff Russo

Star Trek: PicardCast: Patrick Stewart (Jean-Luc Picard), Alison Pill (Dr. Agnes Jurati), Isa Briones (Dr. Soji Asha), Michelle Hurd (Rafi Musiker), Harry Treadaway (Narek), David Paymer (Dr. Moritz Benayoun), Jamie McShane (Zhaban), Tamlyn Tomita (Commodore Oh), Orla Brady (Laris), David Carzell (Dahj’s Boyfriend), Wendy Davis (Dr. Kabath), Chelsea Harris (Dr. Naáshala Kunamadéstifee), Peyton List (Lt. Rizzo), Ann Magnuson (Admiral Kirsten Clancy), Marti Matulis (Checkpoint Supervisor), Chaka DeSilva (Burley Fuelie), Alex Diehl (F8), Kate Fugeli (Kvetchy Fuelie), Harrison Grant (Ensign), Anthony R. Jones (Pincus), Paul Keeley (Philosophical Fuelie), Jason Liles (Noiro), Meghan Lewis (Picard Computer / Utopia Planitia Computer Voice), Brit Manor (Tough Fuelie), Zachary James Rukavina (XB/Nameless), Douglas Tait (Tellarite)

LogBook entry by Earl Green