Now Playing Magazine Review: Episode 109

The Reviewers of Now Playing Magazine have posted their review of Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down on the Now Playing Magazine webpage:


Battlestar Galactica - “Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down”

Written by Scott Collura
Monday, 07 March 2005

President Roslin’s suspicions about Commander Adama are intensified when she learns that he’s been making irregular calls to another ship. And the paranoia about who is or isn’t a Cylon continues to spread when Colonel Tigh’s wife, who was believed to be killed in the holocaust, reappears in his life.
“Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down” is a bit of a strange one for Galactica in that it attempts to take the usually heavy tone of the show and cram it into a situation comedy scenario, particularly in its last act when a series of misunderstandings leads to a scene of “huh?!”s and “whozzat?!”s among Adama, Tigh, Roslin, and Baltar that would fit much more easily into an episode of Three’s Company.
Which isn’t to say that comedy can’t work on this show. Take the moment early on – one racy enough that Sci Fi Channel felt compelled to include a “mature warning” interstitial – where Baltar takes a break from his Cylon detector workload to get it on with Number Six right in the middle of his lab. Of course, Number Six isn’t really there, so when Starbuck happens to walk in on Baltar in the middle of his “break,” what she sees is a distinctly one-man operation, if you take my meaning. It’s a pretty funny moment, and still works within the larger confines of the Galactica universe.
But when President Roslin’s misgivings about Adama are mixed into a slapstick denouement here, it seems to be a bit of a cop-out on the part of the writers. It’s admirable that they want to stretch the horizons of the show, but in this particular case it’s an uneasy fit, and one hopes that the subplot hasn’t been resolved entirely here.
That said, there’s still a lot going on in this episode that doesn’t wander into Jack Tripper territory. A Cylon scout ship shows up, and when it’s damaged by Apollo in a dogfight, it provides the perfect opportunity for the Galactica to study it – or does it? And back on Caprica, things have grown even more desperate for the stranded Helo now that, unbeknownst to him, his Cylon companion Sharon has turned her back on her fellows because of her intense feelings for the man. The hunt is now on, with Cylon Centurions scouring the city looking for them. This “B” story also raises the question of what the version of Number Six on Caprica is really feeling about the situation…
As usual, the show doesn’t end in the way that you expect it might. In this case, a new supporting character seemingly has joined the cast, one that is particularly annoying in this episode. But somehow I know that the Galactica writing staff won’t be content to let any of these characters simply stew in the limitations of their broad sketches. That means that any new character is ultimately a welcome one on Battlestar Galactica. B