|
Article Excerpt
The new Battlestar Galactica series is constantly being praised for what Mary McDonnell likes to call "stones that contain relevance to our own world" (Bassom, Companion Season Two 6). Unlike the political, social, and military allusions, however, the psychological themes in the show have failed to draw critical attention. While it is true that the series has effectively dealt with the psychological toll of the post-apocalyptic situation on the characters, and has realistically depicted the resulting trauma, Battlestar Galactica also deals with the condition and fallibilities of the psyche on a more fundamental level. The conflict between humanity and the Cylons is rooted in the Cylons' failed psychological maturation which, with regard to the series production, serves as the motor that drives individual plots forward and connects them to the fabric of the series' overall text. Within the fictional universe, this psychological dimension has wide-ranging implications for the relation between humanity and the Cylons as well as for the development of individual characters, including the Cylons who in this series (unlike the original) exist as individuals.
In the original Battlestar Galactica the Cylons were simply one-dimensional villains, robotic aliens from the vast regions of space that hated humanity for reasons unknown and, probably, unintelligible to the Colonials. This drawback was alleviated to some extent by the introduction of the character of Baltar. Having Baltar lead the Cylon pursuit of the Colonial fleet gave the Cylons a human face with which the viewers could identify. In spite of the fact that Baltar's reasons for hating humanity were never addressed in the series--which essentially made the character as one-dimensional as the Cylons themselves--he was still a recognizable individual within a seemingly endless mass of identical robots. Baltar's presence did not weaken the series' fundamental structure: the contrast between emotionless and evil machines, on the one hand, and the atmosphere of warmth and implicit trust aboard the Galactica, on the other. There was no specific, that is, psychological motive for the Cylons' hatred of humanity, which left little room for development or change, and ultimately reduced the premise of the series to the ancient struggle between good and evil.
In contrast to this, the reimagined Battlestar Galactica provides a pre-history for the Cylons. According to the Colonial history established in the series, the Cylons were created by Humans and, following a period of coexistence, they rebelled against their former creators and masters and waged a bloody war before disappearing into space ("Razor"; "Flashback" minisodes). This background story allows for a much more complex and dynamic relationship between the Colonials and the Cylons and provides a motivation for the latter's hatred. This is reflected in the fact that humanity's treatment of the Cylons is critically questioned in the series, suggesting that the Colonials are partly to blame for the destruction of their planets. Adama addresses this in his speech at the decommissioning ceremony of Galactica:
We never answered the question, why? Why are we as a people worth saving? We still commit murder because of greed, spite, jealousy. And we still visit all of our sins upon our children. We refuse to accept the responsibility for anything that we've done. Like we did with the Cylons. We decided to play God, create life. When that life turned against us, we comforted ourselves in the knowledge that it really wasn't our fault, not really. You cannot play God then wash your hands of the things that you've created. Sooner or later, the day comes when you can't hide from the things that you've done anymore. (2003 Miniseries, Part 1)
There is no doubt that, as a race, humanity is guilty of atrocities that undermine the image of Man as an enlightened and rational being, an image which the original series strongly endorsed. The acknowledgement of humanity's imperfect nature is further reflected in the characters. The human characters are depicted as fundamentally flawed and their decisions are often morally questionable. The Cylons, while without doubt the enemy, are not portrayed as inherently evil. This underscores the image of humanity as imperfect while at the same time giving texture to the reimagined Cylons. During the first two seasons, their actions and motivations remain in the dark and thus an aura of mystery surrounds them. This makes the audience curious and interested in the Cylons rather than just accepting them as the evil enemy. In the reimagined series, the basic scheme of good vs evil is thus abandoned in favor of a more complex and equivocal setting. This is further emphasized by a consistent portrayal of the Cylons as victims. In the first part of the Miniseries, Caprica Six (1) suffers a (sexual) betrayal by Gaius Baltar. The tortures of Leoben in "Flesh and Bone" and of Gina aboard the Pegasus strengthen this further. The same is true about the treatment of Athena on Galactica culminating in the near-rape by the aptly-named Lieutenant Thorn. This continued depiction of the Cylons as victims causes the audience to sympathize; the reimagined series thus plays with the concepts of good and evil, blurring and constantly deferring them to such an extent that these concepts effectively lose their function as signifiers within the fictional universe of the series.
The Cylons' desire to be like humans is also relevant. In the original series the Cylons sought to destroy humanity, which for them was a diametrically opposed "other," in order fully to assert their own cultural identity. (2) The driving force behind the original Cylons' hatred was thus the otherness of humanity. In the reimagined series, it is their own otherness from humanity that the Cylons wish to overcome. This means they do not perceive humanity as the "other," but take over humanity's point of view and, in doing so, recognize their own otherness which they seek to nullify. They construct their identity on the basis of humanity's perception of them. This identification, which is rooted in Cylon-Human history and evident in the Cylons' development from machines into beings almost indistinguishable from humans, constitutes the link enabling us to apply psychoanalytical concepts to the Cylons and their behavioral patterns. The Cylon condition in the reimagined series can be read as a parable of a human child's development and the hazards and dangers associated with it. The Cylons, conceived of as the children of humanity, collectively suffer from a psychological imbalance that determines their actions; an imbalance that is caused by an unresolved Oedipus complex. By applying oedipal concepts to the Cylons and their behavioral patterns, it is possible to explain their otherwise inexplicable and contradictory actions towards humanity.
The Effects of the Unresolved Oedipus Complex on the Cylons' Psyche
In the essay "The Machinery of Love," Summer Brooks makes the following observation about the creation of the Cylons by the Colonials and the time of coexistence that preceded the first Cylon war:
There might actually have been a moment when parental love existed back when the first inventor/creator lovingly assembled the first sentient toasters. That task would have...
|
