Battlestar Galactica Interview: Mark Verheiden on Cylon Humanity and Boomer’s Motives

Chris Ullrich

Chris Ullrich is a freelance writer living in Los Angeles. In addition to ComicMix, he is a contributor to some of the most popular entertainment sites on the net, including The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW), Download Squad, Cinematical, Comic Book Resources and LAist, where he has served as Technology Editor.

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3 Responses

  1. Anonymous says:

    The writers of BSG seem to love imploding then rebuilding the universe in which the story takes place (the addition of pegasus, the jump one year forward, and now this season) As a writer, how do you approach these situations? It seems like there is a lot of freedom in essentially starting from scratch, but I could also imagine there's a lot of pressure to make sure the show continues to live up to such a high standard.

  2. Anonymous says:

    I would like to comment on the answer that Mr. Verheiden gave about Boomer:"I would look at Boomer's life experience. After shooting Adama back in Season One, she not only discovered her entire life had been a lie, but she experienced wholesale rejection by everyone she ever cared about, including Tyrol. And then Cally shot Boomer in the gut. After all that, is it any surprise that she might reject her old life and retreat to the less emotional, anti-human Cylon faction? "I would say, yes it is a major surprise, considering that she was shot by Cally, and rejected by everyone she cared about, in early season2. Yet even as she died, she said she loved chief Tyrol, and by the very end of season2, in the excellent episode "Downloaded", we learn that she is still definitely pro-human, months after resurrecting. She saves a humans live in that episode, chooses the love of her human friends over the questionable love of the "one true god", she says she shot a man she loved and frakked over another's life because she is a lying machine. And that she has a conscience, that she knows the butchey of humans was wrong. She still sounds and acts like a human here. A few episodes later, at New Caprica, I would guess the hostile occupation plan wasn't her idea. We were given so little insight into what she thought of the whole New Caprica situation, but surely the Sharon from "Downloaded" realised it wasn't all the humans fault that things went wrong? However, she at least still tries to save human lives there, and we are not shown her trying to reconnect to her old friends or being rejected (except by Cally, in extremely bad circumstances). And after that, she suddenly turns (seemingly) 100% Cylon, by the time she threatens to snap Hera's neck. It seems like another person alltogether, the Boomer from the miniseries, season1 and "Downloaded" long forgotten?So why did she become this way? Certainly not because Cally shot her and the crew rejected her, because this has not turned her pro-Cylon or anti-human before New Caprica. And New Caprica could make her bitter, but then at least as bitter with the Cylons (especially Cavil) as with the humans. Moreover, she should be very bitter about being programmed as a sleeper agent to start with, as that is the root cause for all her problems. Some Cylons did it, shouldn't she be bad at those first and foremost? I hope Mr.Verheiden hints at this when he says that she "might" reject her old life (might or might not after all?) and that anything can happen as we careen ahead. Because it would be a waste to turn this character into a villain, especially because I feel the writers have not made this switch from hero (in "Downloaded") to zero and villain (by "Rapture" and now "Six of one") believable, and Mr. Verheiden's suggestion does not sound convincing to me at all.

  3. Anonymous says:

    I totally agree with the post above. I never followed how all of the sudden after the time-skip, Boomer is pro-Cylon. Did something happen on New Caprica that we didn't see to make this change in her personality? I keep waiting, hoping, that the Boomer I loved from Seasons 1 and 2 will reappear, probably in vain I know. And I certainly don't understand the romantic relationship she is having with Cavil…. yuck!