I swear to the gods the writers of Battlestar are trying to lose me as a fan. Maybe it’s my bloodthirsty, masculine warrior side that is crying out for stuff blowing up or maybe it’s my dainty, feminine side wishing beautiful, stylish things would explode. Either way I settled in for this week knowing full well there wouldn’t be a ton of action but little did I know I was being set up to watch As The Galaxy Turns starring the Adamas and some random womens.

So tonight’s episode lasted an hour while the actual events occurring in the episode, real time, lasted 15 minutes. So we’re starting with a 4:1 ratio of nonsense to reality already. Coupled with the fact that there were about eight million flashbacks we do the appropriate math and end up with a 14.3:9:1 quotient which translates into a trip down memory lane for very little real effect. Emotional styrofoam, as it were.We enter to see Lee and Helo boxing in present day on Galactica. Colonel Tigh, our favorite cycloptic alcoholic referees. While they fight we fade in and out of Lee flashing back to the early days on New Caprica, hereout referred to as NewCap as I’m already tired of typing the full name and after this episode, hopefully, we won’t hear about it much. Lee’s reminiscing about Kara who in present day wakes up next to on-again off-again husband Anders, gets dressed and tells him she’s still not sure what she wants but isn’t ready to do married life yet. She heads down to ringside to watch Lee fight but ends up in Helo’s corner, an obvious statement that she and Lee are still at odds.

Flashback to NewCap by Lee as he sees Kara and Anders walking toward him. What does it mean? We won’t find out until the very end so back to present day we go as Helo gets a clean shot on Lee, sending him sprawling to the floor. He’s just about to stay down for the count when Kara slides his way and tells him to get up, so of course he does but the chain-smoking Doc calls the fight, saying Lee can’t continue. Poor Lee.

Lee is going to leave when Kara comes up to him from behind and challenges him to a fight, we go to the opening credits from there. OMG, they are going to fight! Maybe something will explode! But then again, maybe not.

We return to NewCap and more backstory about how Lee and Kara are all looking at each other. Back and forth. Looking looking looking. I already start tiring of what I know is just leadup to something inevitably happening between the two of them but the show hasn’t the decency to just let it happen and move on to blowing things up. Nope, we get an hour of film school project fodder, boy and girl looking back and forth ad nauseum.

Back in present day Adama gets to explain to Roslin what the fights are all about, basically giving the crew an outlet for their aggression and unresolved feuds. You leave your tags at ringside so rank doesn’t exist in the ring. Roslin blabs about how her dad loved the fights so she does too. Yay giving a character other than an Adama or Starbuck something to say in the episode. Too bad it was a throwaway addition.

Hotdog challenges Starbuck while Lee smolders. More flashes back to more wistful glances on what we next learn is the groundbreaking and our only glance at Balter this episode. It was a simpler time, a time of new beginnings and a lot of glances between Starbuck and Lee. We also get our senior citizen audience interest piece in Adama and Roslin flirting. As if I could lose more interest in this episode, there they go.

Finally a bit of substance arises and we find out Adama initially refused to let the Chief and Cally go have their kid on NewCap, keeping them stationed aboard Galactica. In the end it was a mistake as Chief was stuck planetside while Adama fled after the Cylons reappeared. But at the time Chief was upset as he hadn’t read the spoilers yet so he had no idea what was to come. With Roslin’s help, Adama eventually comes around and lets the Chief settle. A mistake in hindsight, which leads Adama to challenge the Chief to a match back in present day. “Chief,” he begins, “get your fat lazy ass in here.” The bell is just ringing and Chief turning around when Adama blindsides him and drops him to the ground with a hook. It’s not an explosion but it will do, for now. “Get up,” Adama quips, “we’re just getting started.”

Huzzah!

Back on NewCap we continue with the Lee/Starbuck almost doing something inexplicable but mercifully get back to present day as Adama and Chief pummel each other. Adama taunts Chief and then fakes him out, drawing the Chief toward him pretending to be winded and then 1-2s him to the mat. Kara uses it as an excuse, saying the old man still has his chops and knows when to make a move, unlike his son. Ooooh, burn!

We return to NewCap and finally get somewhere with the Lee/Starbuck flashbacks as they’re both drunk and their respective dates are out for the night. Will something finally happen? In short, yes. But not before Adama gets his ass handed to him by a second-winded Chief who beats him without mercy. Adama falls, then is helped back up by Chief and Tigh and gives a fancypants speech about how he gave people too many breaks back in the day and let them go before the fight was really over. He “let this family disband and paid the price in lives, something that can’t happen again.” Then he wanders off to stuff his liver back into his abdomen.

The crowd starts to dissapate when Starbuck realizes she hasn’t had her fight with Lee yet, so she calls him out and the crowd gets back together to watch, Anders and Dualla coming to ringside to watch their lovers go at it. I lean back and take a long sip of Pepsi as I know we’re in for flashback overload at this point. I’ll be kind and only highlight the twelve hours of flashbacks I had to endure.

Starbuck and Lee are alone and drunk after the groundbreaking party. Lee asks if life with Anders on NewCap is what she really wanted for the rest of her life. They kiss, they frak and then realize what they’ve done. “What are we gonna do?” Starbucks asks. Lee responds that they’ll tell their mates what happened and live happily ever after together. Uh-huh. And maybe Tigh will grow back his eye and monkeys will fly out of his manic depressive ass.

Lee rises, no pun intended, and screams out to the desert night that he loves Kara and doesn’t care who frakking knows. He won’t stop til Kara does the same so she reciprocates, saying she loves Lee. This was truly the gayest moment shared by two straight actors in the history of television and my vote for the precise moment this show jumped the shark.

Next morning Lee wakes up alone, heads into town and finds his father who tells him Kara got married to Anders. Lee gets all salty, runs into the couple and congratulates Sam saying “Good luck, you’ll need it” while giving Kara the stinkeye the whole time. C’mon, Lee, you knew what this was going in - mediocre writing on an otherwise outstanding show. Too bad you didn’t get the memo.

The two fighters fall together in the middle of the ring and everyone falls out, seeing the fighting is over. “I missed you,” Kara says. “I missed you too,” says Lee.Captain Obvious? I missed the Cylons. And explosions.

End credits.