Entertainment
How Battlestar Galactica Turned A Sci-Fi Plothole Into Its Most Depressing Episode
By Jonathan Klotz
| Published
The Battlestar Galactica reboot turned a cheesy, fun sci-fi guilty pleasure into a dramatic, dark, and shockingly emotional series that redefined the entire medium. Keeping the focus small turned every update of the colony fleet’s survivors into a dramatic moment, and it let the writers mine the humans’ need for food and water for entire episodes.
While “Water” was a disappointing episode early in the show’s run, the Season 3 episode “The Passage” began with the need for fresh food and then told a tragic story of everyday heroism, guilt, and the ultimate sacrifice.
The Passage Is A Slow Motion Emotional Doom Spiral
There’s nothing sexy or fun about logistics. It’s the act of moving things from point A to point B, and yet “The Passage” is all about the work and planning that goes into keeping a fleet of ships moving through space.
It also put one of Battlestar Galactica’s one-time background characters, intended for only a single appearance, Louanne “Kat” Katraine (Luciana Carro, who later appeared in Caprica and Ronald D. Moore’s Helix), in the spotlight. Kat had butted heads with Starbuck (Katee Sackhoff) a few times previously, which is why the hotshot Viper pilot was so horrified to learn that “Kat” was a smuggler back on Caprica, blaming her for sneaking Cylons onto the planet.
Kat’s smuggling skills turn out to be invaluable when the colonial fleet has to navigate a radioactive star cluster in order to find fresh food. One of many Viper pilots tasked to guide the ships through the cluster, Kat ends up losing one, furthering her downward guilt spiral. She replaces her radiation badge, which has gone pure black from exposure to the deadly rays, with Helo’s fresh one, and on the final jump, stays behind to find a missing civilian ship. Triumphant, but sick from lethal doses of radiation, Kat comes back to Galactica as a hero.
From the moment Starbuck attacks her for being a smuggler, it’s clear that Kat is on a path of self-destruction. Her desperation to prove herself was watched with horror by Battlestar Galactica fans who knew how this story would end even before she swapped her radiation badge. Kat’s story comes to an end with heartbreaking back-to-back scenes showing her promotion to the lead of the flight group, followed by Starbuck hanging her photo on the memorial wall for those they’ve lost.
Battlestar Galactica Rewrote The Rules Of Sci-Fi
On its own, “The Passage” is a fantastic episode of Battlestar Galactica, and it all started with addressing a reality of living in space that most sci-fi ignores: food. Other shows wave away how food gets onboard, from Star Trek’s replicators to Star Wars pretending no one ever eats, and really, most series don’t want fans thinking of the practicalities of the setting. That Galactica would devote multiple episodes to managing resources and the mundane day-to-day running of the colonial fleet is a testament to the writing that, though a little uneven in the back half of the show’s run, is among the top tier of sci-fi shows in history.
“The Passage” also addressed what some fans might have considered a plot hole by bringing up how the Cylons snuck into Caprica in the first place. Kat explained she had no idea at the time that Cylons could look like humans. It’s a simple way to explain that humans like Kat may have accidentally assisted the Cylons to put them in position for the devastating attack on the colonies. It’s so simple that there was never a need for the show to even address the practical logistics of Cylons moving around Caprica, but it happened, and it was handled in a way that makes sense given the way the two pilots had been butting heads.
Battlestar Galactica ended up killing a lot of characters by the time humanity found its way to Earth, and in truth, Kat’s death shouldn’t have been as emotional as it was. “The Passage” didn’t focus on any of the main cast, and the result was a beautiful, contained story that made the world of the colonial fleet feel so much larger. A life on the run is going to be harsh, brutish, and short, but thanks to the slow-motion trainwreck of watching Kat pay the ultimate price to save the colonial fleet, it was also hopeful, beautiful, and a story that few sci-fi franchises would have ever the guts to tell.
Entertainment
AI stocks are cooling — this ChatGPT trading tool keeps delivering
TL;DR: A ChatGPT-powered investing platform that helps you find and manage stocks with clearer signals—lifetime access for a one-time $54.97.
Credit: Sterling Stock Picker
The AI trade has seemingly had its moment — big runs, big headlines, big expectations. The AI fun is not over by any means. But now that things are settling, the real question is what comes next?
Instead of chasing whatever’s trending, Sterling Stock Picker leans into a more grounded approach: using a ChatGPT-powered assistant (Finley) to help you understand what’s actually happening inside a stock. You can ask questions about companies, sectors, or your own portfolio and get explanations that are tied to real data — not just surface-level summaries.
Mashable Deals
It also handles the heavy lifting most people avoid. The platform analyzes financials, growth metrics, and risk, then surfaces signals like whether a stock is worth buying, holding, or avoiding. There’s even a “North Star” system that simplifies that call into something actionable.
Mashable Trend Report
If you’re building from scratch, there’s a done-for-you portfolio builder that aligns with your risk tolerance. If you already have positions, it can suggest adjustments based on your portfolio’s performance.
One thing that stands out is how it balances guidance with transparency. You’re not just handed picks — you can see the reasoning behind them, which matters if you’re trying to build a repeatable process.
Have a lifetime way to pressure-test your judgment — especially in a market that’s moving past hype and into something more selective.
Get lifetime access to the ChatGPT-driven Sterling Stock Picker while it’s on sale for a one-time $54.97 payment (reg. $486) through May 10.
StackSocial prices subject to change.
Entertainment
Get 2TB encrypted cloud storage and collaboration tools for just $112.49
TL;DR: Lifetime access to 2TB of secure Drime cloud storage is on sale for a one-time $112.49 (reg. $299.99) through May 10.
$112.49
$299
Save $186.51
Cloud storage is one of those things that quickly turns into a monthly bill you forget about. That’s what makes a lifetime option like Drime worth a closer look.
You can currently get 2TB of storage for a one-time $112.49 (reg. $299.99), which means no ongoing fees just to keep your files accessible.
Mashable Deals
But this isn’t just a place to dump files and forget about them. Drime leans more toward being a full workspace. You can upload, sync, and access files across devices, but also edit documents, leave comments, and collaborate with others without switching tools. It’s useful if you’re juggling projects, clients, or even just shared folders with family.
Security is a big part of the pitch. Files stored in the encrypted Vault are protected by end-to-end encryption, and everything is hosted in Europe in compliance with GDPR standards. This means your data isn’t floating around unsecured, and you have more control over who sees what.
There are also a lot of small quality-of-life features that make a difference over time — like version history for restoring older files, advanced link sharing with passwords and expiration dates, and even built-in e-signature tools.
It’s a simple way to get more control over your files without adding another monthly expense.
Mashable Deals
Get lifetime access to 2TB of Drime Cloud Storage for a one-time $112.49 (reg. $299.99) through May 10.
StackSocial prices subject to change.
Entertainment
The Bear still doesnt know how to write romance
Whenever The Bear introduces a new female character, I pray she doesn’t become a love interest for one of the male leads. Not because I hate romance, but because I specifically hate the way The Bear does romance.
The clearest offender is Carmy’s (Jeremy Allen White) relationship with Claire (Molly Gordon). A childhood friend who re-enters Carmy’s life, Claire is less a real human character than she is a walking self-help book for Carmy. She spends almost every moment she’s on screen talking about him: her memories of him, his mental health struggles, his relationship with his family. In theory, she has a life apart from Carmy — her defining character trait outside of being his girlfriend is vaguely “nurse” — but in watching The Bear, you wouldn’t know it.
Usually a great performer (see: Shiva Baby, Oh, Hi!, and more), Gordon is reduced to two modes here: luminous love interest hanging onto Carmy’s every word, or calming therapist. She’s not the only Bear character to meet this fate. As The Bear builds Ever staffer Jessica (Sarah Ramos) into a possible match for Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), it replaces her level-headed expertise with empty platitudes designed to ground him. (Season 4 line “honesty is sanity” made me want to drive my head through a wall.) Elsewhere, Richie’s ex-wife, Tiffany (Gillian Jacobs), acts as a similar pillar of support.
Their heads constantly askew, their eyes lit up in adoration, their mouths always ready to offer up an eager laugh or some cornball advice, these characters morph into The Bear‘s single idea of a Woman In Love. Now, The Bear‘s standalone episode “Gary” offers a new addition to this pantheon: Sherri (Marin Ireland) from Gary, Indiana.
Mashable Top Stories
Sherri is a woman whom Richie and Mikey (Jon Bernthal) meet at a bar while on a work trip to Gary. She immediately strikes up a rapport with Mikey, playing a private game of “Fact or Fiction” with him, listening to his complicated woes while nestled together in a bathroom stall, and stealing his beanie and wearing it like a middle schooler trying to get a rise out of a crush. It’s a level of blindly supportive compassion we haven’t seen since Claire Bear, and Ireland, typically a huge asset to any project, soon becomes trapped in The Bear‘s love interest archetype. (Someone please ban affectionate head tilts from the set of The Bear, effective immediately.)
While Sherri feels like she was meant to be a moment of bright connection in Mikey’s life, maybe even “the one that got away,” she really just comes across as an empty vessel for him to pour his trauma into. “What are you looking for, Michael?” she wonders. Later, when he asks permission to do a bump of cocaine, she simply responds, “I want you to be you.” It’s a series of faux-deep exchanges that even two great performers can’t sell. (It doesn’t help that Bernthal and Moss-Bachrach wrote the episode.)
That faux-deepness is what sinks The Bear‘s other romances, too. The show tries to force these deep, cosmic connections, but it forgets that these relationships should be a two-way street. Perhaps that’s why many viewers are drawn to shipping Carmy and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri). While the showrunners have affirmed that their relationship is platonic — and I personally agree with that choice — what sets this hypothetical pairing apart is that they each have such rich lives, both in their work together and their time apart. That’s because The Bear is invested in both of them as characters, rather than just using one as a device to unlock the other. You simply can’t say the same of The Bear‘s other romantic pairings, and the release of “Gary” further proves that romance is the recipe The Bear has yet to master.
“Gary” is now streaming on Hulu. The Bear Season 5 premieres this June on Hulu.
Manchester City look to extend win streak, take on Everton
Yankees tee off on Orioles to win third straight in 4-game series
