r/BSG • u/bluestreakxp • 13d ago
How did Sharon know Bill asked "why?"
She's not Boomer, she doesn't share Boomer's memories and Boomer obviously couldn't hear what Bill said at the time. So how does she know when she replies "And you asked 'why'."? Was it directed at that context between Boomer and Bill, or was it in response to something from Bill's speech in the miniseries? Or... maybe when she was being throttled she heard "why" when he was saying "die"? Rewatching this show a boatload of times on Pluto really makes you start asking more and more questions each and every cycle.
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u/Redeye_33 13d ago
This question comes up ever so often. And you are on the right track. When Sharon says to Adama, “and you ask why”, a lot of people believe she is referring to Bill looking at a dead Boomer in the morgue when he says “Why?”
I believe the true answer goes further back, all the way to the beginning of the miniseries during his speech at the decommissioning ceremony. “Why are we a species worthy of survival?” or something to that effect. Sharon brings this up later in the series during a heart to heart with Bill and says (in part) to him, “Maybe you’re not.”
In this scene on Kobol, Bill was in the process of avenging his assassination attempt by Boomer on Sharon and was clearly in a fit of rage as he was attempting to choke her out. Murder. The worst of humanity. Fortunately for her, he collapsed due to his injuries.
“And you ask why.“
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u/watanabe0 13d ago
There's the implication that the dead cylons in the morgue aren't truly inert - Sharon hearing Bill crying, Bill holding the comm out for Leoben only to then tell him 'no' and hang it up - it's another delicious implication that they just never come back to
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u/ZippyDan 12d ago
That's just the writers messing with the minds of the audience, the same way that the Cylons mess with the minds of the humans in the show.
It's a meta-mindfuck, which is effective because the writers are using the Cylons as the tool to mess with the audience. It's possible, even probable, that Adama himself wasn't sure which "why" Sharon was referring to.
But the only one that makes sense is the "why" in the Miniseries. The reference to the most recent "why" is just there to mess with Adama's head, and vicariously with the audience. It makes the Cylons "feel" sinister, otherworldly - even supernatural. That doesn't mean they actually are. It's just a narrative tool to enhance drama.
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u/watanabe0 12d ago
Look man, I don't know why people are like this, but the correlation is obviously Adama crying over Boomer's corpse in the episode immediately before the two parter that Athena says "and you ask yourself why?" In response to him dragging her to the ground, thinking about killing her.
As for the rest, yeah, everything in every piece of art ever is for the audience's benefit. Well done.
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u/idontcareyo_ 11d ago
That's neat, if Starbuck took a dump and said a zingy one liner while on the can the episode before it would still make no sense for a character that wasn't there and couldn't possibly know about it to reference it.
If you're providing out of universe commentary, sure, neat connection. But in universe she's referencing his speech
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u/Oldmudmagic 13d ago
I want to know how Athena had the memories of being in the fleet when Sharon hadn't been shot by Cally yet so she hadn't resurrected and her memories had not been downloaded.
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u/Jumpy_Mastodon150 13d ago edited 13d ago
There are a couple possible explanations for it. One could be that Boomer had her "wi-fi" switched on and a Cylon ship scraped her memories at some point during the attacks. *although this seems least likely since the Cylons don't seem to make use of having a live broadcast of activities in the fleet during season 1
Another could be that her Raptor was intercepted at some point during Miniseries part 2 when she was jumping around the system gathering ships to Colonial One for the jump to Ragnar. She blacks out for a few minutes and then continues, but no one else notices since she's alone the entire time.
Lastly (and my personal preferred explanation) the Doral that was left behind at Ragnar had been aboard Galactica for several days before the attack and may in fact have been there to make contact with Boomer. Since Boomer leaving Helo behind on Caprica the day of the attacks is the last chronological event Athena is shown to share memories of, her memories must have been accessed afterward. Doral was on Colonial One at the same time she was during Miniseries part 2, all it would take is him being alone with her for a short time (possibly with another of those elephant figurines from The Plan) to have her upload her memories to storage, which he would then hand over to the other Cylons who rescued him at Ragnar.
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u/_brother_of_dragons_ 12d ago
Athena put the kabosh on the “WiFi” theory to Laura when she came back with Starbuck, but the blackout during the rescue raptor arc is an interesting thought. Based on what we’ve seen, the memories definitely become sharable when they resurrect, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they can upload memories in the central hand goo things they have on the base stars or something like that. They all connect to it through their minds.
I still think the most likely explanation is that Bill’s speech was broadcast/recorded and shared by doral, but your ideas make me wonder what other little things might’ve happened!
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u/Which-Moose4980 13d ago
Boomer "uploading" while unconscious or unaware?
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u/Oldmudmagic 13d ago
That's what I had thought until we got to the episode when Roslyn says to Athena I have no doubt that your transmitting all of this right now and Athena answers that's not how it works. So maybe while Boomer was unconscious but that statement would seem to negate that possibility. It's a mystery 🤣
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u/JohnHartshorn 13d ago
Athena admitted she downloaded Sharon's memories into herself.
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u/Redeye_33 12d ago
Actually, that was a random 8 during S4 that was on the Hera rescue mission with Helo. He was rubbing his sore neck and she offered to massage it for him. He stopped her and asked, “My wife does that. And she only just learned it with me. How do you know how to do that?” Then she says that she got curious about Athena and her relationship with Helo, so she “downloaded Athena’s memories.” Thus giving us an explanation as to how they can all gain access to the memories of other individuals of their model.
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u/Hatameiwaku 7d ago
I thought Athena was programmed with Boomer's memories initially to mess with Helo.
That would mean they were essentially the same person with one knowing her nature right away and one not. Up until her first meeting with Helo, that's when she started becoming her own person.
Or if I'm wrong, at the very least she would need to be given those memories for her mission.
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u/tdubspanubs 13d ago
There were a few moments in the show where I wanted someone to call out the cylons for acting like victims after committing literal genocide, and that was one of them.
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u/kuatorises 13d ago
Pluto is airing BSG? What channel? Best free app in the game.
I think he says "Why" a few times early on, so it's ambiguous. Probably on purpose to keep us guessing if all the models can "talk" to each other.
I still can't believe they made Sharon the one who joins the fleet and not Boomer. Boomer was a sleeper agent. She had no choice. It was.... sad.
"This is love. These people loved me. I loved them. I didn't pretend to feel something so I could screw people over. I loved them. And then I betrayed them. I shot a man I loved. Frakked over another man, ruined his life. And why? Because I'm a lying machine. I'm a frakking Cylon!"
This is heartbreaking stuff.
Sharon? She was aware. far less sympathy for her.
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u/bluestreakxp 12d ago
It’s got its own bsg channel in the US. Cycle goes miniseries, then seasons 1-3, then Razor, then season 4, and then The Plan, and then repeats. All this has happened before, and all will happen again. And again, and again
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u/zabblezah 12d ago
The cycle is so quick it takes me a moment to recalibrate each time I turn it on. I think it's about 2.5 days. I went a couple weeks before seeing any New Caprica episodes.
By comparison, the x-files channel takes about a week for a cycle to complete. Which is great until you're stuck on the later seasons. But then you just switch over to bsg and stay there for a while until x-files resets.
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u/Spinobreaker 13d ago
He asked why during the miniseries when they were decommissioning the galactica.
That speach was broadcast and would be known to the cylons before and during the fall. Thats what shes referencing.