Meaning it's not technically Olmos's fault -- he's a good director -- or the editor's fault -- also great -- but the fault of the screenwriter, Michael Taylor. Last seen employing the exact same technique in "Unfinished Business," which of course was awesome in the exact same way, or horrible in the exact same way, depending on where you're standing. The other one that managed to convince people it was "all about the quadrangle" when the quadrangle was just the lens it was looking through. Or focusing the light with, to light everybody on fire once and for all, maybe. I think I'm pretty much lying when I say I've tried desperately to avoid tipping my hand as far as how I feel about his scripts. He also wrote (on DS9) "The Visitor," "Things Past," "In The Pale Moonlight," and in a show called Star Trek: Voyager, of which I vaguely remember hearing, the episode "Fury." He was in the room for the DS9 story "Statistical Probabilities," and for Voyager on "Blink Of An Eye," "Ashes to Ashes," "Author, Author," and "Dragon's Teeth." (Sadly, none of these has been recapped by the redoubtable and lovely Keckler, because none of them involve creepy/hilarious space sex with Scottish ghosts or salamanders from the future, or I'd link to them.) But which does all add up to something and that something is a hunch, so because I love you, I did some research on this hunch of mine, and yeah: what Taylor writes about is writers, writing, meta-narrative, and most especially, time-space anomalies such that two contrasting narratives are brought into, like, violent conflict and then play out in parallel, each commenting on the other. Like this one, which mainly seems to have pissed people off.

So Galactica and the Fleet are anchored near a strange moon. As the camera pans across lots of pilots and crewmen lying in bed, peacefully, two voices sing. Two voices: Chip Six and Gaius, over the images of sleepy little crewmen. "Close your eyes, go to sleep / Baby's in the cradle counting sheep / Climb up to your house of dreams / Baby's in the cradle fast asleep..." In the brig, Gaius is robotically ripping fabric into strips. Not like he's a Cylon, but in fact like he has lost his marbles. "...Should I die before I wake," he sings in the same melody, and Chip Six appears, concerned, looking at him as he continues to OCD all over these ripped clothes. "Sorry," he says, even though he's totally not, "improvising." She assures him he's doing the right thing, and he can barely hear her. He's on autopilot. She says his name tenderly, again, and he notices her only barely, then drifts toward sleep on her shoulder. The Marine standing guard bashes the bars, jerking him awake and screaming. Cruel and unusual, no? He wakes up and they begin knotting the strips of fabric into a...rope. Yeah. (In addition to admiring the structure, I think I cried the entire way through this episode both times I've watched it so far. This has got to be the darkest episode of the series, or at least tied with "Pegasus." Tell me the difference between the two stories. I'm serious.) They begin to sing again, in two voices. "Close your eyes go to sleep / Baby's in the cradle counting sheep..." As they sing about the house of dreams, Gaeta tosses and turns; he finally sits up as Chip Six adjusts the noose around Gaius's neck. He wakes up from his sleep-deprivation delirium long enough to balk, to ask for more time to think. With the noose around his neck, Six nuzzles his cheek. "Too late, Gaius. It's time to learn the truth." She kicks the bunk out from under him. He drops. Nowhere to stand.