The surviving human civilians from Battlestar Galactica (2003).
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Civilian Fleet
Tory Foster
Tory Foster
Played By: Rekha Sharma
Special Aide to the President, replacing the deceased Billy Keikaya. Snarky and gorgeous, Foster is primarily used as a Bit Character for the first two seasons so that the audience can get someone to bounce off of Roslin. However, in a massive twist, she turns out to be a Cylon and one of the Final Five. Amusingly, Word of God has outright admitted that this decision was precisely because she hadn't yet had much Character Development up until that point. It also created the interesting situation that all three Number Twos in the show are (arguably) Double Agents.
- A God Am I: Her reaction to finding out her true nature is roughly along these lines.
- Ascended Extra: Started out just as an aide, wound up being one of the Final Five.
- Crying After Sex: After she and the other Final Five (minus Ellen) become aware of each other, Tigh sends her on a mission to seduce Baltar, hoping he will know something about them being Cylons and divulge it. She does so, but is not happy about it, and gently cries afterwards. When a concerned Baltar asks her if she's okay, she claims she always cries after sex. It's left ambiguous if this is true, or if it's a symptom of her disgust with herself. Notable, she does not seem to have this problem after sex with Anders.
- Establishing Character Moment: Her attempt to rig the presidential vote in favor of Roslin proves her to be a much more Machiavellian character than her predecessor.
- Face–Heel Turn: Pulls one when she murders Cally in cold blood, and begins to act increasingly contemptuous of the humans around her, most notably by taking D'Anna's side when she's trying to extort the Galactica crew. She's the only one of the Final Five to do so, and the only one who is killed by another character (Anders also dies, but of flying himself and the derelict Fleet into the sun after Earth is found).
- Go Mad from the Revelation: It's all but stated that she slowly lost her mind after realizing that her entire life was a lie due to being a Cylon.
- Hates Being Alone: According to Ellen in the extended version of Daybreak.
- Ms. Fanservice: Serves as one by virtue of being played by Rekha Sharma.
- Neck Snap: Dies this way in the finale after Tyrol finds out that she murdered Cally and lied about it.
- Number Two: For President Roslin after the death of Billy Keikeya prior to her Face–Heel Turn.
- Really 700 Years Old: Like the other members of the Final Five, she is technically well over two millennia old.
- Reincarnation Romance: Inverted. The original Tory and Galen were madly in love, but their Colonial versions are both too distracted by other people and concerns to even notice each other. When they find out, they just snicker, and it's further inverted in the hardest way possible. In "Crossroads", just before they find out they're Cylons, Tory has been having sex with Sam, whom she's not noted to have been in a relationship with before, rather than Galen.
- Sexy Secretary: Tory is Roslin's personal assistant and quite attractive. When she sets out to get information out of Baltar, he says to Head-Baltar that she's a "sexy lady".
- The Snark Knight: Her demeanor is professional, eye-rolling and unimpressed, at least before learning she's a Cylon.
- Token Evil Teammate: Of the "modern" iterations of the Final Five, she is the only one to betray humanity to the Cylons.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Her murdering Cally indirectly ends up dooming the entire Cylon race to extinction, as Tyrol finds out at the worst possible moment and kills her in revenge, causing knowledge of resurrection technology to be irrevocably lost.
- Walking Spoiler: She's one of the Final Five and a Cylon.
Billy Keikeya
Billy Keikeya
Played By: Paul Campbell
Personal aide to Secretary of Education Laura Roslin, he spends one and a half seasons flirting with Dualla before being killed in a stand-off and, eventually, replaced by Tory Foster.
- Death of the Hypotenuse: Dies just as Dee and Apollo are starting to grow closer.
- Dogged Nice Guy: To Dee.
- Fake Guest Star: He's practically a main character in the first half of the series, yet is always credited as guest star.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Gets shot dead pushing people out of the way of gunfire when a hostage situation turns into a Blast Out. Possibly crosses over into Suicide by Cop, as he was despondent over Dee rejecting him.
- Kill the Cutie: One of the most unambiguously nice characters around, and gets killed quickly off.
- Reckless Gun Usage: The man doesn't know how to handle a gun, and it shows. Dee has to tell him not to rely on Pants-Positive Safety.
- Sacrificial Lion: He's the first main character in the series to die, during a Blast Out in what seemed to be a filler episode, re-establishing that Anyone Can Die. He was actually written out because his actor had scored the lead role in a pilot, which ironically wasn't picked up.
Ellen Tigh
Ellen Tigh
"You don't wanna frak with me, Bill. Try to remember that."
Played By: Kate Vernon
Tigh's wife, who miraculously survived the Fall of the Twelve Colonies. She's manipulative, vain and kind of a bitch, a Lady Macbeth with her husband as object-of-control, and Adama notes that she and Saul just tend to make each other worse. During the New Caprica occupation, she seduces a One to free her husband from imprisonment, and then is forced to betray a crucial meeting. In response, Saul poisons her. This makes it even freakier that she turns out to be one of the Final Five and a Cylon.
- Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Ellen and Saul very much have this dynamic.
- Character Development: After remembering she's a Cylon, Ellen becomes far smarter, calmer and more collected along with developing a much deeper level of empathy for other people.
- Dirty Old Woman: The point of pretty much all of her introductory episode, "Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down". Lee's face when she pinches his ass is priceless. Even after she returns with her full Cylon memories in "Deadlock", she jokes that "Experience is the best teacher - apart from me."
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Evolves into one post-Character Development.
- Lady Drunk: She's rarely seen without a drink in hand, which doesn't exactly help her already grating personality.
- Lady Macbeth: She brings out the absolute worst in Saul, encouraging him to indulge in vices and make all manner of terrible decisions. There's a reason the fandom calls her "Lady McTigh".
- Meaningful Name: "Ellen" is an Old English name descended from the Greek name "Helen", which means "light" or "torch." She was the first member of the Final Five to come up with their Fling a Light into the Future plan. Additionally, it also comes across as an allusion to Helen of Troy from Classical Mythology, the World's Most Beautiful Woman whose capture by Paris sparked the Trojan War and the ultimate fall of Troy. Not only is Ellen herself quite the Silver Vixen, but her "death" at the hands of her husband Saul results in her (temporary) imprisonment by the Cylons, and she eventually proves essential in the ultimate downfall of the Cylons.
- The Millstone: She's very, very good at making bad situations worse.
- Really 700 Years Old: Like the other members of the Final Five, she is technically well over two millennia old.
- Really Gets Around: To the point of groping Lee when she's at dinner with Tigh.
- Reincarnation Romance: She and Saul were married originally too, and somehow found each other again after Cavil wiped their memories.
- Shut Up, Hannibal!: While she is being held prisoner, at one point her "son"/creation John Cavill/Number One gives a furious Motive Rant to her, calling out her and the rest of the Final Five for having practiced No Transhumanism Allowed when designing him and the rest of the humanoid Cylons. Ellen's response is to literally roll her eyes and curtly undercut his Psychopathic Manchild rambling by pointing out that none of his angst justifies him committing genocide against humanity, and if he really did supposedly care so much about actually being a "perfect machine", he could have invested genuine effort into figuring out how to transcend his limitation instead of deciding to Put Them All Out of My Misery.
- Silver Fox: Gender-inverted. While she is clearly getting up there in years, she is still immensely attractive, to the point where it is more than understandable why she has a status as Really Gets Around.
- Thicker Than Water: Amazingly, she still loves John even after every horrible thing he did because he's her son and actually offers him a chance at redemption, which he refuses out of spite.
- Took a Level in Kindness: Downplayed. After regaining her memories, she becomes far kinder, more mature, and wiser... but she quickly starts to regress back to her old ways almost the exact second she gets back on Galactica.
- Toxic Friend Influence:
- As Adama commented once, she tends to bring out Saul's worst and most self-destructive instincts. It's most noticeable when Saul takes command of the fleet early in Season 2 and makes a string of bad decisions, several of which were inspired by her.
- Interestingly, it seems to work both ways: Ellen seems to be a lot more ambitious and manipulative around Saul, even after becoming a pseudo-Team Mom.
- Walking Spoiler: Like her husband, she's one of the Final Five and a Cylon.
Tom Zarek
Tom Zarek
Played By: Richard Hatch
Introduced as an inmate on the prison ship Astral Queen, Zarek was jailed for acts of terrorism. He sees himself as a Well-Intentioned Extremist working for the common man; whether that's true or not, he's definitely good at politics. After inhabiting the Heel–Face Revolving Door for several seasons, he settles on the bad-guy side, leading a mutiny against Roslin and Adama.
- Ambiguously Evil: For all the bad things he's done, he's often not... necessarily wrong in what he says or wants.
- The Charmer: He's undeniably charming and charismatic. He has no need to rule his men with fear, as they genuinely adore him.
- Death Seeker: It's suggested by Lee in his first appearance that Zarek is one since he thinks that this would make him an Inspirational Martyr.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Though the 'evil' part is kind of tenuous, especially in this series. Zarek immediately cuts off all contact with Phelan after he learns of the latter's child prostitution ring. He was also willing to face execution rather than participate in Baltar's collaborationist government on New Caprica.
- Face Death with Dignity: He goes to his execution with quiet stoicism.
- Fatal Flaw: Pride. Zarek is incredibly arrogant and often thinks of himself and his goals as being above the scrutiny of others, even if those goals endanger the survival and destiny of humanity.
- Heel–Face Revolving Door: His goals and motivations, always left a bit ambiguous, slide in and out of alignment with Adama/Roslin several times over the course of the series. He claims to be a Well-Intentioned Extremist who follows his conscience, and that might even be true to a degree, but he ultimately dies a heel after Jumping Off the Slippery Slope during his and Gaeta's attempted coup.
- Hypocrite:
- Gives Roslin and Adama shit for circumventing democracy. What does he do when the Quorum refuses to support Zarek and Gaeta's mutiny? Have them all executed.
- Generally speaking, Zarek often argues for the protection of democracy... and most of these methods he proposes for doing so are coincidentally actions that would support tyranny if he ever got in charge.
- He justifies the actions of The Circle by arguing that giving the collaborators public trials would lead to them building sympathy as martyrs, which is exactly how he built up his own "freedom fighter" public image. The implication is that he was trying to prevent anyone from following in his footsteps.
- Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: He may have his sympathetic moments and constantly champion for the preservation of democracy among the surviving Colonials, but at the end of the day, he's ultimately only in this for the power and desires to be a tyrant over the remnants of humanity so as to sate his own ego.
- Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: After spending most of the series gradually slipping from a Well-Intentioned Extremist no different morally from Roslin, he crosses the line into power-mad tyranny during his and Gaeta's mutiny when he kills the Quorum of Twelve for refusing to support the coup.
- Karmic Death: Considering the above, and what he planned to do to Bill if he caught him, he gets his just desserts when his mutiny is defeated and Bill has him executed by firing squad.
- Kick the Dog: Has the Quorum of Twelve executed by firing squad when they refuse to support his mutiny.
- Know When to Fold 'Em:
- During the search for the Tomb of Athena. His right-hand wants to keep pressing on with their plan to arrange an "accident" for Apollo, but he's smart enough to realise his window of opportunity has closed and abandons that plan. For now.
- Doesn't run for reelection because he knows he can't rule without the support of the military. However when elements of the military become disillusioned with the Adama/Roslin administration, he takes the opportunity to launch a Military Coup.
- Meaningful Name: "Zarek" is a Polish derivation of Belshazzar, the last king of Babylon. Belshazzar is perhaps best remembered for the Biblical story of the feast in which God's hand wrote a warning on the wall that the monarchy would soon be overturned; Zarek seeks to overturn the Colonial government.
- Motive Decay: In part from the natural stress of the surviving Colonials' flight from the Cylons' genocide, he gradually becomes less and less of a Well-Intentioned Extremist until he becomes a ruthless wannabe tyrant in the final season.
- Mythology Gag: Zarek is played by Richard Hatch, who played Apollo in the original series. Zarek spends much of his time antagonizing the present Apollo, and in his first episode, he lectured Apollo on the meaning of his callsign.
- Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: On the surface, Zarek may call himself a "freedom fighter" and paint himself as a patriotic rebel fighting for the rights of democracy against Adama and Roslin's dual dictatorship, but at the end of the day, he still shoved the Quorum of Twelve in front of a firing squad when they refused to rubber-stamp his unlawful mutiny. In fact, it's after him killing the Quorum of Twelve that Gaeta realizes that Zarek is really in his mutiny only for the power and isn't a genuinely Well-Intentioned Extremist like he is.
- Off Screen Villainy: When the series starts he's imprisoned for terrorism, and he's suspected of involvement in abuse of office, political manipulation, and conspiracy to commit murder. As Roslin herself ends up committing most of these crimes, the writers had to give Zarek some ruthless acts during his grab for power just to restore the balance (and even these are entirely Pragmatic Villainy).
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: When President Roslin tells him she is going to give Baltar a fair and public trial, Zarek's initial reaction is to completely freak out and advise that, against all precedent and his own personal convictions, martial law be declared for the duration. Roslin seems genuinely perturbed by just how out of character this is for him.
- Principles Zealot: Truly believes that he is working to improve the lot of the common man, and genuinely believes in the principles of freedom and democracy...and is willing to do absolutely, positively anything in pursuit of those beliefs, no matter how underhanded, morally questionable, dishonest, or actively detrimental to the survival of humanity it might be.
- Slowly Slipping Into Evil: Zarek gets gradually more ruthless over the course of the series, all the while slowly abandoning his principles in the pursuit of power. By the time of the mutiny, all Zarek cares about is ruling over humanity to sate his own ego.
- The Starscream: When he was Vice-President.
- Villain Has a Point:
- In his first episode, Zarek makes the more or less valid argument that the fleet is treating him and the other prisoners aboard The Astral Queen as an expendable labor force, and that even though they are coming to them for help, the prisoners are still not allowed to chart their own course and everyone is acting like absolutely nothing has changed. Apollo ultimately decides Zarek has a point and ends up meeting him halfway.
- Later on in the series, he repeatedly draws attention to the fact that Roslin and Adama (who later become romantically involved) tend to make unilateral decisions for the fleet between them and that they adamantly resist just about any oversight or checks on their authority. Adama dissolves a board of inquiry he himself created when it begins to question his own decisions and loyalties, and Roslin tries to rig her reelection campaign against Baltar when she's afraid it won't go her way.
- Villainous Friendship: He and Meier are legitimately friends, and rather close ones at that.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: At first, anyway.
- Your Terrorists Are Our Freedom Fighters: His supporters view him as a hero fighting for Sagittaron liberation. His critics view him as a destructive terrorist. Debates and the occasional fistfight have broken out over this issue. Dee, who's also from Sagittaron, is one of his biggest critics as she believes that freedom doesn't justify his violent actions.Billy: He's a freedom fighter. He's a prisoner of conscience.
Dee: He's a butcher.
Romo Lampkin
Romo Lampkin
"Everybody has demons. Them, Baltar, you, me. Even the machines. The law is just a way of exorcising them."
Played By: Mark Sheppard
An eccentric, self-absorbed and attention-hungry lawyer who takes up the unwanted job of being Gaius Baltar's attorney during his (Baltar's) farcial trial. Claims to have learned everything about his trade from Joseph Adama, William Adama's father (and Lee's grandfather).
- Amoral Attorney: Downplayed - he's ethically questionable and has penchants for deception and psychological manipulation, but he's not a horrible man, and is dedicated to the preservation of the Colonies above all else.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Literally a lawyer, and tremendously skilled. The man got Gaius off in what was supposed to be a show trial. He's also very quirky.
- Deadpan Snarker: He's played by Mark Sheppard, of course he's snarky.
- Honor Before Reason: He'll do his job to the best of his ability regardless of who he's representing.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He's a pretty sleazy guy, but his heart is in the right place. During Gaeta and Zarek's coup, he proves helpful to the heroes and aids Kara in getting an injured Sam to the medical bay.
- Manipulative Bastard: He is excellent at manipulating people, which is one of the reasons he's so good at his job.
- Sticky Fingers: He's a kelptomaniac who lifts items off the other characters to sate his impulse. This ends up being plot relevant in his first episode as he lifts an item that tips Lee off as to who planted the bombs on the Raptors.
- Sunglasses at Night: A character quirk is that he wears sunglasses everywhere all the time, no exceptions unless it plays into one of his gambits.
Meier
Meier
Played By: James Remar
Tom Zarek's righthand man during the fleet schism.
- Alas, Poor Villain: For as ruthless as he is, it's legitimately sad to watch him bleed out in Zarek's arms while apologizing for failing him.
- Beard of Evil: Sports a goatee and is much more ruthless than Zarek.
- The Dragon: To Zarek.
- Toxic Friend Influence: He tends to bring out the worst side of Zarek (which really says quite a lot), and convinces him to assassinate Apollo.
- Villainous Friendship: He and Zarek are genuinely friends, and rather close ones at that.
Elosha
Elosha
Played By: Lorena Gale
A priest who serves as a spiritual advisor for Roslin.
- Good Shepherd: She is a priest who does her best to advise Roslin on matters related to the prophecies of the Sacred Scrolls.
- Killed Off for Real: Blown up by a land mine in "Home".
- Magical Negro: Falls into this trope, with it being especially glaring when she appears later on in Roslin's vision and advises her to love again. Interestingly, Word of God via the podcasts reveal the initial person giving the message in the visions was going to be Billy, but the actor was unavailable at the time and the role was altered with much of the dialog remaining the same, with the producer stating it actually fits Elosha better as she was a priest and her skin color being black was just a coincidence in terms of how her character was written.
- Sacrificial Lion: She's a major recurring character killed during "Home" to show how high the stakes are.
President Adar
President Richard Adar
Played By: Colm Feore
The President of the Colonies prior to Roslin who was killed during the Cylon attack at the beginning of the series.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: The first few episodes imply that he was actually a Reasonable Authority Figure, and it's only in later episodes that him being a Corrupt Politician is made more obvious.
- Jerkass: Flashbacks show that he was an incompetent president who would rather kill innocent people than make a compromise and look "weak".
- Know When to Fold 'Em: He desperately offered an unconditional surrender to the Cylons after their first strike during the Fall. They ignored his offer.
- President Evil: He was willing to use military force to stop a peaceful protest by teachers, which would no doubt cause casualties, and got angry with Roslin for compromising with them because he thought it makes him look weak.
Boxey
Boxey
Played By: Connor Widdows
A young boy who survives the Cylons' initial attack and is evacuated to Galactica by Boomer.
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: He's a minor presence throughout the Miniseries, makes a single appearance in the first season, and then disappears completely. Several other scenes with him were shot during the first season but all were cut except for his brief appearance assisting Starbuck with a light-hearted air group briefing in "Bastille Day".
- Demoted to Extra: Compared to his original series counterpart, this version of Boxey has a significantly smaller role. The original plan for him to form a family unit with Boomer and Tyrol was dropped after the decision to make Boomer a Cylon sleeper agent. The writers then tried to reposition him as The Artful Dodger but ultimately decided there wasn't enough time to develop the idea.
- Orphan's Ordeal: His father is implied to be the Armistice officer killed in the opening scene of the Miniseries and his mother died during the attack on Caprica. He seems to get over it pretty quickly as he replies to Tigh asking where his mother is with a sarcastic "Dead".
Sesha Abinell
Sesha Abinell
Played By: Dana Delany
A terrorist and conspiracy theorist convinced that Cylons are controlling the Colonial Military.
- Conspiracy Theorist: She's convinced the Cylons are still manipulating the military, which is not helped at all by her knowledge of Athena's existence.
- Freudian Excuse: Her descent into radicalism was caused by the death of her husband during a Cylon attack.
- Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: That said, it's literally everyone has lost someone to the Cylons, so it's really no excuse.
Phelan
Phelan
Played By: Bill Duke
"It's hard to find the moral high ground when we're all standing in the mud."
The head of the fleet's black market.
- Faux Affably Evil: He acts polite and civil to Lee, even when admitting that he runs a child prostitution ring.
- Soft-Spoken Sadist: He rarely raises his voice, which does nothing to contrast from what a monster he is.
Emily Kowalski
Emily Kowalski
Played By: Nana Visitor
A terminal cancer patient who Roslin befriends.
- Deadpan Snarker: She's very sardonic and witty, even making snarky remarks to Roslin, the President.
- Freak Out: She has a full-blown meltdown when Roslin turns off her radio, which was playing Baltar's religious speeches. She later apologizes, saying that it's the only thing giving her hope.
- We Hardly Knew Ye: Though to be fair, she gets a ton of characterization in her one episode.
Gerard
