Season 4, Episode 1:
He That Believeth In Me
In the confusion during the Cylon attack in the Ionian Nebula, Kara has reappeared in her Viper. She tells Lee that she has been to Earth and describes it to the emotional and incredulous staff in the CIC. Although Roslin thinks it's a trick, they realize there's no time to debate because Cylon forces are inbound, and Bill orders all Vipers and Raptors to be deployed.
Kara tells Lee not to lose track of her, and together with the other Vipers, they begin to engage waves of Raiders. The fleet appears to be losing ground as more and more Raiders keep appearing, and Tigh envisions that he shoots Bill in front of the CIC staff before snapping back to reality and being ordered to draft all recruits to take part in the fight.
Anders runs to his Viper and questions whether he'll turn and kill everyone, but Tyrol silences him and tells him just to do his job. Anders launches as the Pyxis is destroyed by a damaged Raider, and the rest of the Raiders begin to shoot missiles at the civilian ships.
The Vipers take out the missiles while Anders follows a Raider trying to shoot down Seelix, and is scanned by it. His eye glows red in response. Not only does the Raider break off its attack and retreat, the rest of the Cylon fleet jumps away.
After being accosted by the mysterious women, Baltar is led to an unused compartment on Galactica and realizes that they are a commune that worships him. He is trailed by former resistance fighter Charlie Connor, who spies on him as he is introduced to its members.
The fleet licks its wounds from the battle. Kara returns to Galactica and is met by the confused command staff. Tyrol examines her Viper and finds that it looks factory-new, and is told by Kara that she has gun camera footage of Earth to show everyone. Anders also arrives and hugs her in happiness, while is surprised that he has enrolled in the pilot training program. Bill orders her to be escorted to sickbay for an assessment, while she claims that she's only been gone for six hours.
Baltar meets several young female commune members, including a woman named Jeanne who asks him to pray for her son, and another woman named Paula is assigned to him as an escort. Baltar seduces another cultist named Tracey at the commune's temple, and wakes up later to the rest of the group asking him to pray for Jeanne's son. He is understandably confused by the situation.
Kara is cleared by Cottle for active duty. Although Bill and Roslin remain wary, Kara explains how she was transported by the gas storm to Earth, and matched it with the constellations she saw in the Tomb of Athena. She says that she doesn't remember how she got back to the fleet.
Later, Tyrol shows the command crew the pristine Viper. He tells them that it's not the same as Kara's Viper she used before. Roslin fears that Kara might be a Cylon, but Lee suggests that since they didn't find any information in the nebula, Kara's reappearance may be a sign.
Tigh, Tyrol, Tory and Anders meet again in the former's quarters. The group can't hear the music anymore, and wonder about what caused the Cylons to retreat. Anders relates his experience of the Raider scanning him, and they wonder if they could unconsciously harm the fleet. At the same time, Roslin visits Caprica-Six and asks her to assist with finding out more information from her dream about the Final Five.
As the fleet continues making its way farther from the nebula, Kara begins experiencing severe headaches and complains that they're going the wrong way. Bill replies that he can't trust her yet, and they continue on their way.
Bill and Lee meet and patch their differences up from the encounter during the trial, and the former confirms that Roslin is staying in his quarters because of her frail condition. Bill offers his son his flight status back, but Lee reuses it, citing that he's more interested in helping out with government matters.
After praying for Jeanne's son, Paula escorts Baltar to the washroom, but they are both confronted by Charlie and another man, who blame Baltar for what happened on New Caprica and escaping justice. He tries to slice Baltar's throat, but Paula beats her assailant with a door handle and mercilessly hits Charlie until Baltar tells her to stop. They go back to the commune and discover that Jeanne's son has seemingly been healed. Baltar looks on in shock as HeadSix smiles at him.
Anders meets with Kara and tries to reassess their relationship. She takes her photo down from the memorial wall and tells him that he still loves her, and doesn't care if she's a Cylon. She asks him to help her prove that the Fleet is going the wrong way. When she incapacitates her Marine escorts, Anders asks what she's doing, and is knocked out in response.
Kara goes to Bill's quarters and subdues the guards with a stun grenade. She walks in and, as Roslin stands up staring at her, raises her gun…
Tropes:
- Ambiguous Situation: Anders fears that his encounter with the Raider involved some sinister hidden programming, and the audience doesn't learn for sure until the next episode that this is not the case.
- Armor-Piercing Question: Lee asking his father, "What if Zak had come back in that Viper?"
- Best Served Cold: Connor's attempted revenge against Baltar.
- The Chosen One: Baltar, who can seemingly heal the sick and ailing to the amazement of the cult.
- Cliffhanger: Kara pointing her gun at Roslin.
- Continuity Nod:
- When the fleet jumps out near the end of the episode, it shows the vertigo effect on Galactica, similar to how it was shown in the miniseries.
- A Cylon Raider scanning an object before it jumps away to report its findings, which was originally used against Boomer's Raptor (and to deliver the Cylon virus) in the miniseries.
- Conveniently Unverifiable Cover Story: Kara's explanation of her whereabouts has so many holes that it's Swiss cheese, which causes Bill to keep her under a Marine escort at all times.
- Cut Himself Shaving: Gaius's quip to the cult after Connor and Shaunt assault him with his own shaving razor.
- Daydream Surprise: Shortly after finding out he's a Cylon, Tigh shoots Admiral Adama in the CIC ala Boomer. Everyone panics. Then he looks up and it turns out that it was all in his head.
- Death Seeker: Gaius literally begs to be killed on two separate occasions over the course of the episode. The second time, it distracts and confuses Connor long enough for Paula to whack him on the head and save Gaius' life.
- Dramatic Gun Cock: A loud click sound precedes Kara pointing a gun at Roslin, to punctuate the drama of the cliffhanger.
- Dramatic Irony: Tigh says that they wouldn't be able to use Baltar's Cylon detector to test if Starbuck is a Cylon because it failed to identify Boomer. The audience knows that the detector actually does work, but Baltar lied about Boomer's test results.
- Glowing Mechanical Eyes: As per usual, the Raider's eyeslit glows red back and forth while it's scanning Anders. Anders's iris flashes red, too, in response.
- Healing Hands: Baltar apparently has this ability, much to the cult's surprise and amazement.
- Heel Realization: After three seasons of bluster and rationalization, Gaius finally seems to have accepted responsibility for how much horror and suffering he's caused (possibly due to the kindess of the cultists that have taken him in), and the resulting guilt and shame is overwhelming to him. Thus when Connor has him at razorpoint, Gaius at Head-Six's prompting sincerely prays for God to take his life in exchange for that of Jeanne's son. Fortunately for Gaius, Paula saves him from Connor and the boy miraculously recovers anyway.
- Improbable Infant Survival: Played straight and averted. Jeanne's son, Derrick, is miraculously healed of his encephalitis, while it's again mentioned that Connor's son died during the New Caprica arc.
- Innocently Insensitive: When Sam assures Kara that he'd still love her even if she turned out to be a Cylon, she jokes that he's a better person than she is, 'cause if he turned out to be a Cylon, she'd shoot him. Not knowing that he recently found out he is one.
- It's Personal: Connor blames Baltar for the death of his son on New Caprica, and uses the opportunity to try and kill Baltar.
- Macross Missile Massacre: Galactica's Raptors use these during the battle in the nebula, as do the Cylon basestars.
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Paula beating Shaunt and Connor after they try to kill her and Baltar. Baltar tells her that she might want to tone down the "smiting" in the future if she doesn't want to find herself up on charges.
- Pin-Pulling Teeth: Kara does this to prime a grenade to deal with a guard, so she can get to Roslin.
- Prolonged Prologue: The opening sequence runs nearly ten minutes, similar to the third-season premiere.
- Promoted to Opening Credits: Katee Sackhoff (Kara) is re-added to the opening credits after being absent for the last three episodes of the third season.
- Real Life Writes the Plot: Kara now permanently has longer hair, subtly indicating that she's not quite the same as the person who died back in "Maelstrom". In real-life, Katee Sackhoff had simply gotten tired of cutting her hair multiple times per season, and refused point-blank to do it again.
- Series Continuity Error: Anders's leg cast (from when he fell off the Viper in "The Son Also Rises") mysteriously disappears, although a deleted scene would have shown it being cut off and him being cleared for duty.
- Slashed Throat: Baltar almost becomes a victim of this, but Paula beats Connor's head in before can get any further.
- Snap Back: Averted. Galactica appears to have lost one of her gun batteries as a result of the battle, and there is a hole on one side of the hull.
- Stalker Shrine: The cultists have set up a shrine in honor of Baltar, which unnerves him.
- Take Me Instead: Baltar says this, nearly verbatim, while praying to God to save Jeanne's son.
- This Is Gonna Suck: When Baltar is introduced to the cult, he's very clearly alarmed and bewildered, but he only sports worried facial expressions and otherwise says nothing.
- Trial Balloon Question: Not unlike a scene between Athena and Helo on Caprica in Season 1. Anders, who's recently discovered that he's a Cylon, tells Starbuck that he'd love her even if she were a Cylon like everyone suspects. Unfortunately, her response is to joke that she wouldn't do likewise.
