The Ghost in the Machine

[chani]

Great writing and great acting. Terrific Zoe/Daniel bras de fer! "The Ghost in the machine" was again a fabulous episode.

There is nothing better than Caprica on tv these days. Of course it requires more effort than the usual action-packed sci-fi and rushing plot entertainment tv, but it's worth it. I don't know what some people expect, in terms of plot, for a prequel about a civilization  that is about to fall. Years are counted on Caprica, no need to rush and follow a twist-filled plot. The characters, unlike us, don't know what is coming, and they aren't in the run either. It was very different on BSG where everything was about survival and flight. Actions and behaviours were more extreme, the drama was more spectacular, the red line was crossed many time. Our characters are heading towards this primal place BSG characters lived in, but, as grey as they are, they aren't there yet. And it's fascinating.

The pace is perfect and the show deals with important matters. Good drama isn't always about action and events, it's about characters and tension. Sadly, advertisement, video clips and video games have raised generations of hurried viewers who can't recognize, even less enjoy, the good stuff. Sorry for the rant, but I'm fed up with whiny comments about the fact that "nothing happens!" on the show and that characters on BSG were "more real".

Now about the good stuff in this episode, well, there was lots of it...

There's so much to read in the episode!

Firstly there is the title and Zoe's situation in the U-87. She is a ghost in the machine indeed; second layer, the episode explored the philosphical meaning of the phrase, the matter of mind-body dualism and Ryle's theory against Descartes', through Daniel's tests to trick Zoe into revealing herself and Zoe's strategy to turn herself off and let the robot respond "(the cylon treatment" as Daniel put it); third layer, there's Arthur Koestler's book, The Ghost in the Machine, which takes Ryle's phrase as its title. The book's main focus is mankind's movement towards self-destruction, particularly in the nuclear arms arena. It's perfect for Caprica since we know we are going towards the fall, the genocide that the Cylons are going to make by nuking the colonies.

One of the book's central concepts is that as the human brain has grown, it has built upon earlier, more primitive brain structures, and that these are the "ghost in the machine" of the title. Koestler's theory is that at times these structures can overpower higher logical functions, and are responsible for destructive impulses. We can see it through the characters on screen.

I must say that I never liked Zoe much and I liked her even less after this episode, even though I felt sorry for her in the first scenes as Daniel taunted her to get a physical reaction. Alessandra was really good, and Eric's acting was stellar once more.

But I don't buy what Zoe said to Lacy in the ending scene, although it was a typical teenager scene and I like how the show keeps reminding us that the first Cylon is still a teenage girl sharing with her best friend how much her father pissed her off and that she wants to run away before she'd make something she'd regret; and that she could have shot him had the bullets been real. So, in spite of her confession to Lacy, I think that she didn't know that they were blanks. Daniel is merciless in the episode, playing with fire for sure, mentally torturing his daughter to re-establish a lost connection(when this man wants something he has to get it! Hubris anyone?), but he would have never put anyone he loves in "real" danger, Ceasar included, so the blanks fits in his character; but Zoe shot the dog because she refused to give in to her father. She didn't shoot because the robot knew they were blanks, she wanted to win the battle of will, and have the last word no matter the cost. 

 But eventually she's convincing herself that she knew from the beginning that the shooting wasn't real, which was typical of a teenager but, above all, a wonderful echo to Joseph's storyline and what Sam told him: you can kill anyone if you make yourself believe that "it isn't real", that it is just a game.

That little Sam/Joseph scene, my friends was a key scene, an inside-meta for the whole episode.

Speaking of echoes, there was a leitmotiv about fire: Zoe's big fear since she was 5, Daniel playing with it (literally and figuratively...and I can't help thinking that he's been waiting for the U-87 to attack him and punish him for the murders of Vergis' assistants, the game with the U-87 could be his own version of the Russian roulette), Joseph being asked to be Prometheus in the club...

The episode was very very Greek again. I loved the Mysteries club. It was a virtual adaptation of initiation rites that Greeks used to undergo(in Eleusis for instance, near Athens). Tamara represents Persephone in the V-world. That's why I mention the Eleusian Mysteries that probably inspired the cabaret club in New Cap City. 

In Greek mythology Demeter's daughter, Persephone (also referred to as Kore, "maiden"), was gathering flowers with friends, when she was seized by her uncle, Hades, the god of death and the underworld, with the consent of her father Zeus. He took her to his underworld kingdom. Distraught, Demeter searched high and low for her daughter. Because of her distress, and in an effort to coerce Zeus to allow the return of her daughter, she caused a terrible drought in which the people suffered and starved. This would have deprived the gods of sacrifice and worship. As a result, Zeus relented and allowed Persephone to return to her mother.
Tamara draws flowers as a signature which recalls the flowers Persephone was gathering with friends when she was seized. Joseph is  a new Demeter, and he is a Tauron, a "dirt eater" according to racists. The Caprican blogged about the wars that caused Taurons de desperate for food and are the origins of the 'dirt eater" phrase, not so long ago...Sam, Tamara's uncle, who is the bringer of death, could be seen as Hades. Daniel used Sam's skills and connections to get the MCP. On Caprica, according to Persephone's myth I think that both Daniel and Jospeh could be seen as Zeus for they embody fatherhood. In the myth, Persephone ended up spending six month with Hades and six month with Demeter. The Eleusinian Mysteries aren't well known but probably included a celebration of Persephone's return, for it was also the return of plants and of life to the earth. Persephone had gone into then underworld (underground, like seeds in the winter), then returned to the land of the living: her rebirth is symbolic of the rebirth of all plant life during Spring and, by extension, all life on earth. Good timing for this post!!! 

One last thing about Eleusian Mysteries: Men and women were allowed, even slaves, the only requirements for membership were a lack of "blood guilt", meaning having never committed murder, and not being a "barbarian"  that is unable to speak Greek. Joseph was a good candidate when he entered the club the first time! No wonder the host picked him!


And of course the riddle Joseph had to answer recalled riddles that the Sphinx asked to travellers to allow them passage (and of course it calls to the mind Oedipus' trial). the sphinx was a monster like a chimera, with the head of a woman, the body of a lion, the wings of an eagle, and a serpent-headed tail. Here we've got a drag queen named Cerberus as host! I liked it.
 
Who is the mysterious Emmanuelle? She hinted at the fact that she might not look the same in the real world. Is she someone Joseph already knows. Could be Evelyn since she helped him to find Heracles...

The enhancing drug that Joseph took reminded me of the eye drop Daniel used before getting to the set of Sarno's show...and it looked a lot like my inhaler for asthma!
 
I wonder if the stuff was a sort of commentary on the pace of the show, and how things get faster in the V-world. I complained above about the viewers who want more action and who probably enjoy "There Is Another Sky" more than any other episodes, and in a way they are like game players in the V-world. They are addicted to artificially-quickened plot. 

The drug was also another way to recall the theory of "the ghost in the machine" that I mentioned above, about primitive brain structures allowing destructive impulses. Joseph found the killer inside of him, slaughtered the people in the club thanks to it and thanks to Sam's advice. After all, it isn't real, just an illusion. 

So fire was a recurring leitmotiv, and fire is the metaphor of knowledge in both Greek mythology and this episode: Joseph only wants to know where Tamara is; others want to know about the afterlife (Clarice, the people in the Mysteries club); Daniel wants to be sure that his daughter/avatar is in the machine. The fire that destroyed their previous house started from his office, the temple of scientist knowledge!

This reminds me of an interview with Eric Stoltz in which he said about Daniel: "He’s so hungry for knowledge that, like Prometheus, he steals fire from the gods, gives it to man, thinking he’s doing a good thing and is eternally punished for it." Daniel always thinks he is doing a good thing, even in this episode, after he got that Zoe was defiant and he would have to force her into talking to him,  he warned her that it would be hard but it would be for the best of all. 

Will he end up trapped and chained up to a rock with his liver being eaten over and over again? There has been speculations about Daniel becoming the first hybrid, so I guess it would fit in the myth, but to my understanding the first hybrid was the Centurions's failed attempt at making a skinjob so I guessed they started up from a machine not from a human being...

And I don't think that hunger for knowledge is the only thing that drives Daniel. He is also motivated by love. Vergis got it too well.

Anyway Daniel indeed stole the fire, twice: firstly he captured the code of the avatar that Zoe made ––as the summary recalled at the beginning of the episode and as Zoe pointed out again when meeting Lacy––secondly he had the Vergis' MCP stolen, something that Tomas recalled himself when talking to Amanda by the end of the episode.


Looks like Tomas Vergis has decided to destroy Daniel's marriage. He is planting the seeds that will cause problems between the Graystones, especially since they already keep things from each others. From the scene we saw, it's obvious that the Amanda/Tomas affair never happened; they had dropped the idea after deleting the scenes from the pilot. She might still become unfaithful though, this time with Clarice. I love the last shot of Amanda being outside looking at the windows where Daniel, alone inside, watched films of Zoe. Loss, even a common one, can cause a rift between people. 

Poor Amanda, she was already Clarice's tool, now she's Vergis'!

The A.V club 's review gives another take on the episode, focusing more on the father/children side and it's quite interesting an insight.

ETA 1: I've just read a tweet by Serge Graystone saying:

"I think I should've told Daniel that Zoe was in the robot. I don't like where this is going."

It sorta cute of course, but my main concern when I watched the episode earlier today was: why did Serge allow entrance to Tomas Vergis? Didn't Daniel cancel Vergis' access to the house after being threatened by his rival?

ETA 2: Todd VanDerWerff wrote something that I find really insightful:

"Obviously, there have been plenty of stories about how daddy's little girl has all grown up and now he's sad to see her leave home (or get married or what have you), but there's always a creepy undertone to these. Too many of these sorts of stories twist what's a time-honored storytelling theme - parents realizing their children are becoming their own people - and turn it into a weird desire to keep daddy's little girl as daddy's little girl forever, shrink wrapped and never moving past childhood innocence. (...) 

In a way, Daniel's desire to have his daughter back has always been a desire to return her to a person he understood, someone who wouldn't join a terrorist group or create an incredibly advanced avatar of herself and stick it in a virtual world. But even when he confines her to a robotic body, he can't completely pin her down. She's a person of her own, now, and while he'll always understand her better than most, he'll also always be cut off from certain parts of her. Daniel's battle to get Zoe to unwittingly reveal that she's in the Cylon tonight was practically about the story need to show this battle of wills. But metaphorically, it was about parents needing to learn when to let go. (The other storyline commented on this as well, in a lovely image where Joseph confronted the mark his daughter was leaving on the world - literally! - a mark he couldn't quite understand but could appreciate and a mark that was always going to keep him outside of her life.)"