'Battlestar Galactica' Retro Recap: 'Dirty Hands'

Written by John Edward Betancourt

​Routine is a word that means a lot to people and with good reason; it symbolizes stability and security in our lives and it’s something that we all seek out. We all love the notion of having a comfortable routine day in and day out to keep us free of drama and strife, and while there’s nothing wrong with desiring peace in our life, there is an inherent danger that comes with routine. Because once you achieve it, you have to work to keep it interesting, otherwise it becomes monotonous to the point where people want to be free of it and it is the darker side to routine that was explored in depth in the next episode of Battlestar Galactica, ‘Dirty Hands’.
 
Because in this particular tale, routine was causing trouble in the fleet, to the point where lives were being put into danger when some bad Tylium caused a collision between a Raptor and Colonial One and that ugly mistake brought forth the painful truth about routine in that…people doing some of the dirtier jobs in the fleet, in this case the men and women and children working aboard the Refinery vessel…were starting to break down and with good reason. After all, these poor folks have in essence been working consecutive and excessively long days doing the same thing over and over since the attack on the Colonies and the Battle of New Caprica and no mind can handle that kind of workload forever.
 
Yet, while that alone could have carried the episode, leave it to this series to add something more into the mix by giving these poor people a little more depth when it comes to their situation. Because a pamphlet/manifesto about class warfare in the fleet was being circulated about by Gaius Baltar and his words inspired the folks aboard the Refinery vessel to take part in peaceful protests to bring attention to their plight and flat out demand a better life and the reasons those words inspired them, is because Baltar is right. There were young kids working in this Refinery, ones that knew how to run any machine in the place and that gave Chief Tyrol pause when he went to inspect the ship because it meant that mankind was now settling into a dangerous new routine, one where people were indeed being shuffled into classes and roles, rather than being given the chance to be more in life.
 
It's a truth that prompted the Chief to go above and beyond merely rotating out skilled workers to provide relief, it flat out motivated him to bring any hands-on job on the fleet to a crawl by way of a strike because enough was enough. People needed to have the opportunity to explore whatever career or trade they saw fit and well…his gambit worked. President Roslin listened closely to his demands and his ideas and believe it or not, the genesis of change came about in the fleet thanks to the Chief’s actions since Seelix, who was passed over for flight school because she was needed on the deck, was finally given a promotion to Ensign and her wings as well, and really, this ended up being just a beautiful and thoughtful and oddly enough, relevant episode.
 
In fact, I continue to be impressed with the fact that this series was ahead of its time because class warfare in America is a topic that is heating up and who knew that this series spotted something such as that eleven years ago? But it did, and it made this story incredibly poignant and uplifting with its happy ending and well, I loved it. I loved watching the Chief become the champion for those who don’t have a voice in the fleet and I love that the President was open to seeing the people become more in the midst of a tough situation. But alas, the good times are truly about to come to an end. For the next episode in this storied saga, features nothing but heartbreak and I’m bracing myself before I hit play…until next time.   

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