Battlestar Galactica: Why Cally Should Have Been A Cylon

I want to remind readers that this post is extremely spoiler-heavy. If you have not yet seen the show, I would advise against reading this until after you are caught up.

Ok, so I have been saying this since early Season 2, and one of my friends has been calling me crazy for this opinion (he has reasons that lie within the show as well as with his feelings for the actress who plays Cally). But I believe revealing Cally to be a cylon would have made more sense and would have had a much bigger emotional impact on Chief Tyrol than being revealed as a cylon himself, which is what really happened.

To start with, let's look at Cally's story arc. She began the show in the miniseries as little more than a named extra with a few lines. She was one of the deckhands on Galactica, serving under Chief Petty Officer Galen Tyrol, and like many other characters on Galactica, including Racetrack, Seelix, and Helo, was slowly built up and received more and more lines. Over the course of the first season, it became apparent that she had a bit of a crush on Tyrol. Unfortunately for her, Tyrol was dating Sharon "Boomer" Valerii, a raptor pilot and sleeper agent cylon (Boomer was programmed to believe she was human). My suspicion that she was a cylon arose after Boomer was activated and shot Commander Adama; Boomer was immediately arrested and interrogated, and once Tyrol returned to Galactica (he, Cally, and a few others were stranded on the surface of Kobol at the time), he was imprisoned as well, under suspicion of either being a cylon as well, or aiding and abetting one. Boomer gave up some information, but Colonial brass believed that they could probably get some more, especially since they could use Tyrol as a bargaining chip (they already threatened to kill him if she didn't cooperate). However, as they were leading her away to more permanent lodgings, Cally forced her way to the front of the mob of people yelling obscenities at her and shot her. My first thought was not, "Cally is killing her because she is angry that Boomer betrayed the Chief". It was, "Cally is killing her because Cally is a cylon and wants to make sure that Boomer doesn't reveal anything else". In my opinion, Cally played the Jack Ruby to Boomer's Oswald (fortunately, Kennedy survives this version of the story). I am not a conspiracy theorist in real life, but in the world of fiction, especially when I trust that the writers have the long-term story planned out, I am always looking for subtle hints or situations that can be read multiple ways.

It was after this that I began to think that Cally's increasing role may be due to more than just good fan reaction. By Season 3, the sweet Cally that we had met in the miniseries was nearly gone, and was being replaced by an angrier, subversive Cally. In "Dirty Hands", she goaded Tyrol, now her husband, into getting the fuel processing ship to strike, which made the fleet sitting ducks. With her swiftness to defend Tyrol's honor in Season 2 through violence against other deckhands, along with her mounting subversive nature, I had all the evidence I needed to declare her a cylon.

And to make her a cylon would have created a lot of emotional whiplash for the Chief, which would translate into great drama for the audience. I believe that I am safe in saying that Tyrol has become a fairly popular character. In the first season, he was one side of one of television's greatest love triangles ever conceived. He was in a relationship with Boomer on Galactica, while on Caprica, Helo revealed to another copy of the Sharon model that he loved her too, and was jealous of Tyrol (we almost can't call it a love triangle now, since Helo's Sharon, now given the call-sign Athena, has become a much different character than Tyrol's Boomer). The difference between these two characters was their reactions to learning the truth about the women they claimed to love. Both were shocked and disgusted upon first hearing it, but then things changed. Tyrol could never be with a cylon. It was unnatural, and the cylons are the enemy. But Helo realized that he still loved Athena, no matter what she was. This revelation haunted the Chief throughout the rest of Season 2; as much as he tried to deny his love for Boomer, he still came to Athena's aid (along with Helo) when a cylon "interrogator" was about to rape her. He also suffered intense nightmares that were the product of his fears of being a cylon himself. So when Tyrol learns that the woman he loves now, the woman he is married to, is a cylon, imagine what kind of effect that would have on his psyche.

But as we learn, the Chief turns out to be a cylon, along with Col. Tigh, Sam Anders, and Tory Foster. Of the four of these, the only one I was completely pleased with was Tory. With the other three, I wasn't so much angered as I was perplexed, especially with Tigh (how long have the cylons been able to appear human?!?), but the only person that I would change would be Tyrol. There was so much potential for incredible drama if they had made Cally a cylon, along with compelling evidence. Oh well.

Up next: Religion and philosophy in the Twelve Colonies...