Review: Kobol's Last Gleaming

Man- Have I ever said that this series frakin' rocks? Well, I'll say it again. It's amazing. I must say that it's too bad that this episode is the second to last in the first season. At least we know that we're getting a second season.
In this episode, we see a series of shots with Lee and Adama, Kara sleeping with Baltar and Boomer sticking a gun in her mouth. From there, the storyline is tight, to the point and quite simply, amazing. During a routine Raptor mission, Boomer and Crashdown find a planet- Kobol. They report back and plans are being created to investigate what's going on. Roslin looks at the images taken and sees a city instead of ruins. She and the priest are convinced that this will lead them to Earth. Meanwhile, Kara, Baltar and Lee have problems, coming to punches at one point in time. Lee's clearly not happy. Roslin tries to convince people to go back to Caprica to get the Arrow of Apollo, which will lead them back to Earth. Three Raptors are prepped and sent out to Kobol, where they run into a full compliment of Raiders and a Basestar. One Raptor is destroyed, another is shot down and the third escapes. A rescue mission is planned, with the captured Cylon Raider being preped to destroy the Basestar. However, Kara, learning that Adama has no clue where Earth is, takes off for Caprica.
This episode is probably one of the strongest of the series thus far. From the opening credits, with a montage of scenes bringing us up to date on the episode, it's clear that this episode is special. Where the cylons are looking for emotions, it's clear that they've found the right race- Humanity. The series of shots show us almost everything. Anger, Love and Fear/Sorrow. From then on, it's a rollercoaster. We find Kobol, something that's sort of on the way towards Earth, and a major event thus far. I'd bet that it's going to be a major location next season, at least for the first half. The character dynamics come to a climax here (Literally for some). We see tensions that have been brewing between Lee, Baltar and Starbuck for a good portion of the series, which is quite interesting, and we finally see Lee get really pissed off at Starbuck, which was quite cool to see. We see Starbuck apoligize for the first time, another interesting thing. Finally, we see Baltar in some interesting roles, paticularly with him and Boomber.Boomer, we see twice, where on Galactica, she's about to put a gun into her mouth, to kill herself. She fails to do this, which is probably why she's a Raptor pilot. On Caprica, Helo shoots her, and he's really pissed off with her.Then comes the driving part of the episode, where some of the crew is stranded on Kobol (If they survive the crash) when they're downed by Raiders. Zoic really knows their stuff, and it's a great scene on the way down, with Baltar screaming his lungs out, the crew trying to get control and telling the remaining Raptor to bug out.
Something that really stuck with me was the visual sense of this episode. Lots of rich yellows and other colors throughout several parts, which really enhanced the scenes where it was used, as well as departed a little from greys of the ship. It looked very, very good.
Roslin's religion and visions are also coming to fruition, where everything is laid on the table. She believes that she's the leader who'll lead them to the new home, even though she's to die while doing so. Her visions of the city in the ruins and her faith have been hinted at throughout the series, and it's now paying off.
The only problem: Seven more days until the last one.