Scar (Battlestar Galactica)
Encyclopedia
"Scar" is the fifteenth episode of the second season
of the reimagined Battlestar Galactica
television series. It aired originally on the Sci Fi Channel
on February 3, 2006.
In the episode, Viper
pilots Starbuck
and Kat
form a rivalry over which of them will destroy Scar, a feared Cylon Raider
. Tormented by her feelings for Sam Anders, Starbuck nearly allows Scar to kill her in a game of chicken
. In the end, she swerves and lures Scar to Kat, who destroys Scar.
Executive producer Ronald D. Moore
insisted that the episode include only one dogfight
. As a result, the episode focuses on the differences between Starbuck and Kat and how their personalities come into conflict rather than on space combat. Their mutual animosity has been identified as an inversion of typical gender roles, especially in comparison with the male pilot Apollo
. According to one analysis, Scar represents more than just a professional rivalry, but both characters' personal demons.
Critical reception to "Scar" was mostly positive. The episode appeared on several retrospective "best of" lists.
, Starbuck vows to destroy Scar, a Raider known as the Cylons' ace of aces and dreaded for his sneak attacks. Kat challenges Starbuck, getting her to bet her beer stein
labeled "Galactica
Top Gun". Later, Kat interrupts Starbuck during a briefing, breaks her record in a test of shooting a side arm
accurately while dizzy, and chastises her after her advice gets a rookie pilot killed by Scar.
Sharon warns Starbuck that Scar is likely so competent and bloodthirsty because "he" has died and been resurrected many times. With the Cylon Resurrection ship gone, destroying him would make his death permanent.
Starbuck is troubled by memories of Anders, whom she promised to rescue from Caprica; Admiral William Adama
and President Laura Roslin
have refused to order a rescue mission. After the rookie's death, she drunkenly comes on to Apollo but rejects him during foreplay
. They fight over her feelings for Anders. She leaves and continues drinking while watching archival footage of Scar.
Later, Starbuck is hung over
and assigns another pilot to take her place on patrol. When Scar kills his inexperienced wingman
, Kat blames Starbuck. They trade insults. Starbuck taunts Kat for her fear of Scar, and Kat punches Starbuck. Apollo arrives, cutting the altercation short. He orders the two pilots to fly together to protect a mining operation in an asteroid field.
As Starbuck and Kat patrol in their Vipers, Kat pursues a Raider she believes to be Scar. As Starbuck checks behind them, the real Scar appears and damages Starbuck's Viper. Starbuck plays chicken with Scar, to Kat's horror. Remembering her promise to Anders, Starbuck swerves at the last moment. She lures Scar into Kat's line of fire, and Kat shoots him down. Back in the mess, Starbuck yields her stein to Kat and toasts a succession of pilots who have perished since the war began. She claimed previously that she could not remember their names.
and Bradley Thompson
based Starbuck's portrayal in "Scar" in part on their fathers, whom Weddle described as "war veterans who were very conflicted and self-destructive". Jacob Clifton of Television Without Pity sees the episode in part as a deconstruction of the myth of Starbuck as a perfect pilot, a myth embraced by the characters, particularly Kat, and the audience alike. Kieran Tranter echoes this analysis, noting that her competence as a pilot was unquestioned in the series before "Scar".
Thompson contrasts Starbuck's attitude toward the new pilots with Kat's. Where Starbuck has become jaded by seeing so many rookies killed in battle, Kat reaches out to them with advice and genuine concern. Moore contrasts Apollo's calm in "Scar" with Starbuck and Kat's mutual animosity and suggests that this amounts to a reversal of gender roles. Clifton also notes that the episode plays a "Flip the Genders game." Moore observes that Starbuck opens up to Helo
in "Scar" more than she opens up to Apollo; the series established previously that she and Helo are old friends. Clifton contends that Helo, as a pilot of Raptors
rather than Vipers, does not fully understand Starbuck's loss, but he makes up for it by being instinctively supportive.
Clifton sees Starbuck's anguish over leaving Anders as a manifestation of a recurring tension in the series between the impulses to "'Stay and fight' or 'Run and rebuild'" when fighting would mean certain death. Anders represents what Starbuck could have had if the Cylons had not destroyed the Twelve Colonies
. His absence also allows Starbuck to project away her feelings instead of confronting them. Clifton notes further that Starbuck's status as an adult survivor of child abuse
complicates her feelings on these issues.
Clifton reflects on what Scar represents to Starbuck and Kat. Overall, he writes, "the real truth is not that nailing Scar is a competition for them; the real truth is that Scar has become each other, and everything that takes things away from them." For both of them, this goes beyond fear of the Cylons in general. For Starbuck, Scar embodies her anxiety over the mysterious operation the Cylons performed on her on Caprica and the abuse in her past; Clifton notes both these experiences left literal scars on Starbuck. For Kat, Scar embodies her fear of not being as good as Starbuck and her fear of letting the fleet down, which in the past caused her to turn to abuse
stimulants.
Kat and some other pilots try to remember the name of a fallen comrade's girlfriend who died in the attack on the Colonies, but Starbuck considers it pointless. Clifton suggests Kat identifies with the dead woman more than Starbuck because Kat was a civilian until she signed up as a pilot during the series. He also notes a similarity between the names that are guessed (Kathy, Katherine, Kassie, Karen), Kat's call sign
, and Starbuck's first name, Kara.
". In particular, he wanted to explore their daily lives aboard Galactica and their tactics in battle. Writers David Weddle
and Bradley Thompson
kept the episode from becoming too "industrial" by incorporating executive producer David Eick
's desire for a confrontation between Starbuck and Kat. Weddle compared "Scar" to the film Battleground
for its focus on the individual pilots.
Moore restricted the writers to one dogfight in this episode. To increase the dramatic tension, Weddle and Thompson began the episode at the start of Starbuck and Kat's patrol and told the bulk of the story in flashbacks
; inserted more opportunities for Starbuck and Kat to clash on Galactica; and wrote another dogfight to be narrated over radio
.
The writers went over the script in detail with Moore in a July 2005 writers' meeting that was recorded and published by podcast
. one key plot point they discussed at length was a motive for Galactica staying in one place while Scar shoots down its fighters one at a time. Slate
summarized the ensuing discussion:
A scene of auctioning off a recently killed rookie pilot's belongings was written and filmed, but it was cut from the episode. Moore felt it was too jarring a scene to include in the episode. He compared the practice of new pilots taking dead pilots' bunks to a scene from Full Metal Jacket
.
The chair in which the pilots spin to get dizzy before their accuracy test was based on a similar device Moore saw at Edwards Air Force Base
; the test there was to point one's finger accurately rather than to fire a weapon. Thompson based Scar's technique of flying at Starbuck with the sun behind him obscure her vision on a technique described in World War II
pilot Pappy Boyington
's autobiography, Baa Baa Black Sheep. A diagram shown on a whiteboard
in the ready room during Starbuck's briefing was taken from a textbook on fighter
tactics.
The visual effects in "Scar" were particularly difficult and time-consuming to produce. The last visual effects shots were finished in the week before the episode aired.
In a rare break from the series's cinéma vérité
style, director Michael Nankin
slows down time as Starbuck remembers Anders in the moments before she swerves from Scar. The episode closes with Stanley Myers
's classical guitar
piece "Cavatina
", the theme
from the 1978 film The Deer Hunter
.
gave "Scar" a B+, praising the "great action scenes and for some gut-wrenching emotional ones" but criticizing the narrative device of cutting back and forth between the final encounter with Scar and earlier action. Keith McDuffee of TV Squad also lamented the "time shifting" but liked the episode overall. Clifton gave "Scar" an A-, praising actress Luciana Carro
performance as Kat and the editing
. He later elaborated, "I liked 'Scar' as a well-done story, but in the middle of a lackluster and unrepentantly heterogeneous season, I could have done without." Amanda Keith of the Los Angeles Newspaper Group
noted that Katee Sackhoff
's portrayal of Starbuck had evolved from a "larger-than life character" to one that is "one hundred different kinds of frakked
up". Keith called it "a remarkable transformation, and another sign that the [Battlestar Galactica] actors really was robbed of Emmy glory." Simon Brew of Den of Geek called "Scar" "not one of the best episodes to date, I thought, but an improvement on 'Black Market
' [the previous episode]".
Right before the series finale
, as part of a retrospective look at the series, Alan Sepinwall of The Star-Ledger
included "Scar" on his list of favorite episodes, calling it a "great self-contained show, and one of the best showcases Katee Sackhoff ever got, as we spend an entire hour just living with the Viper pilots and getting a better sense of the emotional toll of war without end for the toughest warrior of them all." Michael Hickerson of Slice of SciFi
ranked it as the series's fifth best episode. John Kubicek also ranked it fifth best, calling the scene in which Starbuck toasts the dead pilots "pure magic, and easily my favorite single scene in the history of the show." Kelly Woo of TV Squad ranked "Scar" as the series's eighth best episode. Eric Goldman of IGN
ranked Starbuck's showdown with Scar at #19 on his list of the series's top "storylines and moments", calling it a "visually strong battle sequence".
Battlestar Galactica (season 2)
The second season of the reimagined science fiction television series Battlestar Galactica premiered on the Sci-Fi Channel in the United States on July 25, 2005, and concluded on March 10, 2006. The season was split into two parts, each containing 10 episodes...
of the reimagined Battlestar Galactica
Battlestar Galactica (2004 TV series)
Battlestar Galactica is an American military science fiction television series, and part of the Battlestar Galactica franchise. The show was developed by Ronald D. Moore as a re-imagining of the 1978 Battlestar Galactica television series created by Glen A. Larson...
television series. It aired originally on the Sci Fi Channel
Syfy
Syfy , formerly known as the Sci-Fi Channel and SCI FI, is an American cable television channel featuring science fiction, supernatural, fantasy, reality, paranormal, wrestling, and horror programming. Launched on September 24, 1992, it is part of the entertainment conglomerate NBCUniversal, a...
on February 3, 2006.
In the episode, Viper
Colonial Viper
The Colonial Viper is the primary fighter spacecraft type used by the human protagonists in the Battlestar Galactica fictional universe. Appearing in both the 1978 original series and the 2003 reimagined series, as well as various derivative works, the single-pilot spacecraft are carried aboard...
pilots Starbuck
Kara Thrace
Kara Thrace is a fictional character in the reimagined Battlestar Galactica franchise. Played by Katee Sackhoff, she is a revised version of Lieutenant Starbuck from the 1978 Battlestar Galactica series...
and Kat
Louanne Katraine
Louanne Katraine is a fictional character from the reimagined Battlestar Galactica television series, portrayed by Luciana Carro.- Character biography :...
form a rivalry over which of them will destroy Scar, a feared Cylon Raider
Cylon Raider
The Cylon Raider is the standard starfighter used by the Cylons, in the various Battlestar Galactica movies and television series. Cylon raiders are used as the main line of defense for Cylon Basestars.- Original series :...
. Tormented by her feelings for Sam Anders, Starbuck nearly allows Scar to kill her in a game of chicken
Chicken (game)
The game of chicken, also known as the hawk-dove or snowdrift game, is an influential model of conflict for two players in game theory...
. In the end, she swerves and lures Scar to Kat, who destroys Scar.
Executive producer Ronald D. Moore
Ronald D. Moore
Ronald Dowl Moore is an American screenwriter and television producer best known for his work on Star Trek and the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica miniseries and television series, for which he won a Peabody Award for creative excellence in 2005 and an Emmy Award in 2008.-Early life and...
insisted that the episode include only one dogfight
Dogfight
A dogfight, or dog fight, is a form of aerial combat between fighter aircraft; in particular, combat of maneuver at short range, where each side is aware of the other's presence. Dogfighting first appeared during World War I, shortly after the invention of the airplane...
. As a result, the episode focuses on the differences between Starbuck and Kat and how their personalities come into conflict rather than on space combat. Their mutual animosity has been identified as an inversion of typical gender roles, especially in comparison with the male pilot Apollo
Lee Adama
Leland Joseph "Lee" Adama is a fictional character in the television series Battlestar Galactica. He is portrayed by actor Jamie Bamber. He is one of the main characters in the series.-Early life:...
. According to one analysis, Scar represents more than just a professional rivalry, but both characters' personal demons.
Critical reception to "Scar" was mostly positive. The episode appeared on several retrospective "best of" lists.
Plot
Drunk in the pilots' messMess
A mess is the place where military personnel socialise, eat, and live. In some societies this military usage has extended to other disciplined services eateries such as civilian fire fighting and police forces. The root of mess is the Old French mes, "portion of food" A mess (also called a...
, Starbuck vows to destroy Scar, a Raider known as the Cylons' ace of aces and dreaded for his sneak attacks. Kat challenges Starbuck, getting her to bet her beer stein
Beer stein
Beer stein , or simply stein, is an English neologism for either traditional beer mugs made out of stoneware, or specifically ornamental beer mugs that are usually sold as souvenirs or collectibles...
labeled "Galactica
Battlestar Galactica (ship)
The Battlestar Galactica is a space battleship in the original and re-imagined science fiction television series Battlestar Galactica.The Twelve Colonies of Man in the original television series built a number of Battlestars during their thousand-year war with the Cylons, whose battleships are...
Top Gun". Later, Kat interrupts Starbuck during a briefing, breaks her record in a test of shooting a side arm
Side arm
A side arm is a weapon, usually a pistol but can be a dagger, as used in pre-modern times, which is worn on the body in a holster to permit immediate access and use. A side arm is typically required equipment for military personnel and sometimes carried by law enforcement personnel...
accurately while dizzy, and chastises her after her advice gets a rookie pilot killed by Scar.
Sharon warns Starbuck that Scar is likely so competent and bloodthirsty because "he" has died and been resurrected many times. With the Cylon Resurrection ship gone, destroying him would make his death permanent.
Starbuck is troubled by memories of Anders, whom she promised to rescue from Caprica; Admiral William Adama
William Adama
William "Bill" Adama is a fictional character portrayed by Edward James Olmos in the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica television series...
and President Laura Roslin
Laura Roslin
Her first actions include organizing all FTL-capable ships together and convincing Commander William Adama to abandon a retaliatory attack on the Cylons. President Roslin and Billy Keikeya, her aide/press secretary/chief of staff, establish a working office space aboard her transport, renamed...
have refused to order a rescue mission. After the rookie's death, she drunkenly comes on to Apollo but rejects him during foreplay
Foreplay
In human sexual behavior, foreplay is a set of intimate psychological and physically intimate acts between two or more people meant to create desire for sexual activity and sexual arousal. Either or any of the sexual partners may initiate the foreplay, and they may not be the active partner during...
. They fight over her feelings for Anders. She leaves and continues drinking while watching archival footage of Scar.
Later, Starbuck is hung over
Hangover
A hangover describes the sum of unpleasant physiological effects following heavy consumption of alcoholic beverages. The most commonly reported characteristics of a hangover include headache, nausea, sensitivity to light and noise, lethargy, dysphoria, diarrhea and thirst, typically after the...
and assigns another pilot to take her place on patrol. When Scar kills his inexperienced wingman
Wingman
A wingman is a pilot who supports another in a potentially dangerous flying environment. Wingman was originally a term referring to the plane flying beside and slightly behind the lead plane in an aircraft formation....
, Kat blames Starbuck. They trade insults. Starbuck taunts Kat for her fear of Scar, and Kat punches Starbuck. Apollo arrives, cutting the altercation short. He orders the two pilots to fly together to protect a mining operation in an asteroid field.
As Starbuck and Kat patrol in their Vipers, Kat pursues a Raider she believes to be Scar. As Starbuck checks behind them, the real Scar appears and damages Starbuck's Viper. Starbuck plays chicken with Scar, to Kat's horror. Remembering her promise to Anders, Starbuck swerves at the last moment. She lures Scar into Kat's line of fire, and Kat shoots him down. Back in the mess, Starbuck yields her stein to Kat and toasts a succession of pilots who have perished since the war began. She claimed previously that she could not remember their names.
Characterization
Moore notes that, despite Starbuck's reputation as a superior fighter pilot, "Scar" demonstrates a number of her character flaws and poor choices. He cites her obsessive competition with Kat, her drinking, and her ill conceived attempt to sleep with Apollo. Writers David WeddleDavid Weddle
David Weddle is an American television producer and writer, best known for episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine , The Twilight Zone , Battlestar Galactica , and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation with writing partner Bradley Thompson...
and Bradley Thompson
Bradley Thompson
Bradley Thompson is an American television producer and writer, best known for episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine , The Twilight Zone , Battlestar Galactica , and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation with writing partner David Weddle...
based Starbuck's portrayal in "Scar" in part on their fathers, whom Weddle described as "war veterans who were very conflicted and self-destructive". Jacob Clifton of Television Without Pity sees the episode in part as a deconstruction of the myth of Starbuck as a perfect pilot, a myth embraced by the characters, particularly Kat, and the audience alike. Kieran Tranter echoes this analysis, noting that her competence as a pilot was unquestioned in the series before "Scar".
Thompson contrasts Starbuck's attitude toward the new pilots with Kat's. Where Starbuck has become jaded by seeing so many rookies killed in battle, Kat reaches out to them with advice and genuine concern. Moore contrasts Apollo's calm in "Scar" with Starbuck and Kat's mutual animosity and suggests that this amounts to a reversal of gender roles. Clifton also notes that the episode plays a "Flip the Genders game." Moore observes that Starbuck opens up to Helo
Karl Agathon
Karl C. Agathon is a fictional character on the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica TV series, portrayed by Tahmoh Penikett.-Background:...
in "Scar" more than she opens up to Apollo; the series established previously that she and Helo are old friends. Clifton contends that Helo, as a pilot of Raptors
Colonial Raptor
The Raptor is a multipurpose military spacecraft featured in the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica. According to producer Ronald D. Moore, the Raptor is analogous to the U.S. Navy's EA-6B Prowler.-Description:...
rather than Vipers, does not fully understand Starbuck's loss, but he makes up for it by being instinctively supportive.
Clifton sees Starbuck's anguish over leaving Anders as a manifestation of a recurring tension in the series between the impulses to "'Stay and fight' or 'Run and rebuild'" when fighting would mean certain death. Anders represents what Starbuck could have had if the Cylons had not destroyed the Twelve Colonies
Twelve Colonies
The Twelve Colonies of Man are fictional locations that constitute the principal human civilization in the original Battlestar Galactica television series, the "reimagined" series of the same name in 2004, and in the prequel series, Caprica...
. His absence also allows Starbuck to project away her feelings instead of confronting them. Clifton notes further that Starbuck's status as an adult survivor of child abuse
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...
complicates her feelings on these issues.
Clifton reflects on what Scar represents to Starbuck and Kat. Overall, he writes, "the real truth is not that nailing Scar is a competition for them; the real truth is that Scar has become each other, and everything that takes things away from them." For both of them, this goes beyond fear of the Cylons in general. For Starbuck, Scar embodies her anxiety over the mysterious operation the Cylons performed on her on Caprica and the abuse in her past; Clifton notes both these experiences left literal scars on Starbuck. For Kat, Scar embodies her fear of not being as good as Starbuck and her fear of letting the fleet down, which in the past caused her to turn to abuse
Substance abuse
A substance-related disorder is an umbrella term used to describe several different conditions associated with several different substances .A substance related disorder is a condition in which an individual uses or abuses a...
stimulants.
Kat and some other pilots try to remember the name of a fallen comrade's girlfriend who died in the attack on the Colonies, but Starbuck considers it pointless. Clifton suggests Kat identifies with the dead woman more than Starbuck because Kat was a civilian until she signed up as a pilot during the series. He also notes a similarity between the names that are guessed (Kathy, Katherine, Kassie, Karen), Kat's call sign
Call sign
In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign is a unique designation for a transmitting station. In North America they are used as names for broadcasting stations...
, and Starbuck's first name, Kara.
Production
Moore wanted an episode focused on Viper pilots like the first-season episode "Act of ContritionAct of Contrition (Battlestar Galactica)
"Act of Contrition" is the fourth episode of the reimagined Battlestar Galactica television series.-Plot:After a fatal accident on the hangar deck in which thirteen pilots are killed by an accidentally launched recon drone, Starbuck is assigned to quickly train replacements...
". In particular, he wanted to explore their daily lives aboard Galactica and their tactics in battle. Writers David Weddle
David Weddle
David Weddle is an American television producer and writer, best known for episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine , The Twilight Zone , Battlestar Galactica , and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation with writing partner Bradley Thompson...
and Bradley Thompson
Bradley Thompson
Bradley Thompson is an American television producer and writer, best known for episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine , The Twilight Zone , Battlestar Galactica , and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation with writing partner David Weddle...
kept the episode from becoming too "industrial" by incorporating executive producer David Eick
David Eick
David Eick is an American producer and writer, best known as the Executive Producer of Battlestar Galactica, of which he also wrote several episodes with Ronald D. Moore, as well as the re-imagined version of Bionic Woman...
's desire for a confrontation between Starbuck and Kat. Weddle compared "Scar" to the film Battleground
Battleground (1949 film)
Battleground is a 1949 American war film that tells the story of the 2nd Squad, 3rd Platoon of Item Company, 327th Glider Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, trying to cope with the Siege of Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. It stars Van Johnson, John Hodiak, Ricardo...
for its focus on the individual pilots.
Moore restricted the writers to one dogfight in this episode. To increase the dramatic tension, Weddle and Thompson began the episode at the start of Starbuck and Kat's patrol and told the bulk of the story in flashbacks
Flashback (narrative)
Flashback is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened before the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial backstory...
; inserted more opportunities for Starbuck and Kat to clash on Galactica; and wrote another dogfight to be narrated over radio
Radio
Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
.
The writers went over the script in detail with Moore in a July 2005 writers' meeting that was recorded and published by podcast
Podcast
A podcast is a series of digital media files that are released episodically and often downloaded through web syndication...
. one key plot point they discussed at length was a motive for Galactica staying in one place while Scar shoots down its fighters one at a time. Slate
Slate (magazine)
Slate is a US-based English language online current affairs and culture magazine created in 1996 by former New Republic editor Michael Kinsley, initially under the ownership of Microsoft as part of MSN. On 21 December 2004 it was purchased by the Washington Post Company...
summarized the ensuing discussion:
One writer suggests that they're fixing the engines (a true standby of science fiction, one that served Star TrekStar TrekStar Trek is an American science fiction entertainment franchise created by Gene Roddenberry. The core of Star Trek is its six television series: The Original Series, The Animated Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise...
for decades). Another writer proposes that ...Vipers are vulnerable because they're flying attenuated, long-distance patrols. Moore eventually decides that the fleet must have manufacturing facilities, but needs raw material, some magic metal for building Vipers found only where the ship is stuck. 'Then it can influence the conversations in the ready roomReady roomA ready room is a room on an aircraft carrier where on-duty pilots "stand by" their aeroplanes. Each flight squadron has its own individual ready room. Large squadrons, such as torpedo and dive-bomber squadrons, can have more than one ready room...
,' Moore says, 'because of the psychological toll on the pilots. Now their machines are more valuable than they are.'
A scene of auctioning off a recently killed rookie pilot's belongings was written and filmed, but it was cut from the episode. Moore felt it was too jarring a scene to include in the episode. He compared the practice of new pilots taking dead pilots' bunks to a scene from Full Metal Jacket
Full Metal Jacket
Full Metal Jacket is a 1987 war film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick. It is an adaptation of the 1979 novel The Short-Timers by Gustav Hasford and stars Matthew Modine, Vincent D'Onofrio, R. Lee Ermey, Arliss Howard and Adam Baldwin. The film follows a platoon of U.S...
.
The chair in which the pilots spin to get dizzy before their accuracy test was based on a similar device Moore saw at Edwards Air Force Base
Edwards Air Force Base
Edwards Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base located on the border of Kern County, Los Angeles County, and San Bernardino County, California, in the Antelope Valley. It is southwest of the central business district of North Edwards, California and due east of Rosamond.It is named in...
; the test there was to point one's finger accurately rather than to fire a weapon. Thompson based Scar's technique of flying at Starbuck with the sun behind him obscure her vision on a technique described in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
pilot Pappy Boyington
Pappy Boyington
Gregory "Pappy" Boyington was a United States Marine Corps officer who was an American fighter ace during World War II. For his heroic actions, he was awarded both the Medal of Honor and the Navy Cross. Boyington flew initially with the American Volunteer Group in the Republic of China Air Force...
's autobiography, Baa Baa Black Sheep. A diagram shown on a whiteboard
Whiteboard
A whiteboard is a name for any glossy, usually white surface for nonpermanent markings. Whiteboards are analogous to chalkboards, allowing rapid marking and erasing of markings on their surface...
in the ready room during Starbuck's briefing was taken from a textbook on fighter
Fighter aircraft
A fighter aircraft is a military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat with other aircraft, as opposed to a bomber, which is designed primarily to attack ground targets...
tactics.
The visual effects in "Scar" were particularly difficult and time-consuming to produce. The last visual effects shots were finished in the week before the episode aired.
In a rare break from the series's cinéma vérité
Cinéma vérité
Cinéma vérité is a style of documentary filmmaking, combining naturalistic techniques with stylized cinematic devices of editing and camerawork, staged set-ups, and the use of the camera to provoke subjects. It is also known for taking a provocative stance toward its topics.There are subtle yet...
style, director Michael Nankin
Michael Nankin
Michael Nankin is an American film and television writer, director and producer. He has been nominated for the Humanitas Prize for his writing.-Career:...
slows down time as Starbuck remembers Anders in the moments before she swerves from Scar. The episode closes with Stanley Myers
Stanley Myers
Stanley Myers , was a prolific British film composer who scored over sixty films. Born in Birmingham, as a teenager Myers went to King Edward's School in Edgbaston, a suburb of Birmingham...
's classical guitar
Classical guitar
The classical guitar is a 6-stringed plucked string instrument from the family of instruments called chordophones...
piece "Cavatina
Cavatina (song)
"Cavatina" is a classical guitar piece by Stanley Myers and the theme from The Deer Hunter.The piece had been recorded by classical guitarist John Williams, long before the film that made it famous. It had originally been written for piano but at Williams' invitation, Myers re-wrote it for guitar...
", the theme
Theme music
Theme music is a piece that is often written specifically for a radio program, television program, video game or movie, and usually played during the title sequence and/or end credits...
from the 1978 film The Deer Hunter
The Deer Hunter
The Deer Hunter is a 1978 drama film co-written and directed by Michael Cimino about a trio of Russian American steel worker friends and their infantry service in the Vietnam War. The film stars Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, Meryl Streep, John Savage, John Cazale, and George Dzundza...
.
Reception
Critical reaction to "Scar" was mostly positive. Rose Wojnar of The San Diego Union-TribuneThe San Diego Union-Tribune
-Predecessors:The predecessor newspapers of the Union-Tribune were:* San Diego Sun, founded 1861 and merged with the Evening Tribune in 1939.* San Diego Union, founded October 10, 1868.* Evening Tribune, founded December 2, 1895.-Ownership:...
gave "Scar" a B+, praising the "great action scenes and for some gut-wrenching emotional ones" but criticizing the narrative device of cutting back and forth between the final encounter with Scar and earlier action. Keith McDuffee of TV Squad also lamented the "time shifting" but liked the episode overall. Clifton gave "Scar" an A-, praising actress Luciana Carro
Luciana Carro
Luciana Carro is a Canadian actress best known for her appearance on the television series Battlestar Galactica and in movies such as Two for the Money and Dr. Dolittle 3.-Career:...
performance as Kat and the editing
Film editing
Film editing is part of the creative post-production process of filmmaking. It involves the selection and combining of shots into sequences, and ultimately creating a finished motion picture. It is an art of storytelling...
. He later elaborated, "I liked 'Scar' as a well-done story, but in the middle of a lackluster and unrepentantly heterogeneous season, I could have done without." Amanda Keith of the Los Angeles Newspaper Group
Los Angeles Newspaper Group
The Los Angeles Newspaper Group is an umbrella group of local daily newspapers published in the greater Los Angeles area by MediaNews Group. The news coverage of the newspapers are mainly local stories. The newspapers contain some national and international news, often from the Associated Press...
noted that Katee Sackhoff
Katee Sackhoff
Kathryn Ann "Katee" Sackhoff is an American actress known mainly for playing Captain Kara "Starbuck" Thrace on the Sci Fi Channel's television program Battlestar Galactica. In 2004 she was nominated for a Saturn Award in the "Best Supporting Actress in a Television Series" category for her work in...
's portrayal of Starbuck had evolved from a "larger-than life character" to one that is "one hundred different kinds of frakked
Frak (expletive)
Frak is a fictional version of "fuck," "shit" or "damn" first used in the original Battlestar Galactica series. It continues to be used throughout different versions of the franchise as an expletive....
up". Keith called it "a remarkable transformation, and another sign that the [Battlestar Galactica] actors really was robbed of Emmy glory." Simon Brew of Den of Geek called "Scar" "not one of the best episodes to date, I thought, but an improvement on 'Black Market
Black Market (Battlestar Galactica)
"Black Market" is the fourteenth episode of the second season of the reimagined Battlestar Galactica television series. It aired originally on the Sci Fi Channel on January 27, 2006. In the episode, Apollo's investigation of the fleet's black market becomes intertwined with his involvement with a...
' [the previous episode]".
Right before the series finale
Daybreak (Battlestar Galactica)
"Daybreak" is the two-part series finale of the reimagined science fiction television series Battlestar Galactica, and are the 74th and 75th episodes overall. The episodes aired on the U.S. Sci Fi Channel and SPACE in Canada respectively on March 13 and March 20, 2009. The second part is...
, as part of a retrospective look at the series, Alan Sepinwall of The Star-Ledger
The Star-Ledger
The Star-Ledger is the largest circulated newspaper in the U.S. state of New Jersey and is based in Newark. It is a sister paper to The Jersey Journal of Jersey City, The Times of Trenton and the Staten Island Advance, all of which are owned by Advance Publications.The Newark Star-Ledgers daily...
included "Scar" on his list of favorite episodes, calling it a "great self-contained show, and one of the best showcases Katee Sackhoff ever got, as we spend an entire hour just living with the Viper pilots and getting a better sense of the emotional toll of war without end for the toughest warrior of them all." Michael Hickerson of Slice of SciFi
Slice of SciFi
Slice of SciFi is a podcast and website and part of the FarPoint Media Network that looks into the world of science fiction, fantasy and horror...
ranked it as the series's fifth best episode. John Kubicek also ranked it fifth best, calling the scene in which Starbuck toasts the dead pilots "pure magic, and easily my favorite single scene in the history of the show." Kelly Woo of TV Squad ranked "Scar" as the series's eighth best episode. Eric Goldman of IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
ranked Starbuck's showdown with Scar at #19 on his list of the series's top "storylines and moments", calling it a "visually strong battle sequence".
External links
- "Scar" at the Battlestar Wiki
- "Scar" at SyfySyfySyfy , formerly known as the Sci-Fi Channel and SCI FI, is an American cable television channel featuring science fiction, supernatural, fantasy, reality, paranormal, wrestling, and horror programming. Launched on September 24, 1992, it is part of the entertainment conglomerate NBCUniversal, a...
(Podcast commentary)