A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away
"There are those who believe that life here began out there, far across the universe, with tribes of humans who may have been the forefathers of the Egyptians, or the Toltecs, or the Mayans. Some believe that there may yet be brothers of man who even now fight to survive somewhere beyond the heavens..." - Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series)
What a complete mind frack! I had to re-watch the ending twice to make sure I wasn't hallucinating. It's hard to believe that this series was actually on television - an invention of which I have so much contempt. How could something so sublime come from something so vulgar? I was blown away. The writers allowed something so intense, non-linear, and incomplete into the finale that your imagination is allowed to run wild. A book could be written just to explain the last 15 minutes of the show.
One of Battlestar's themes throughout the series has been the concept of a collective unconscious - a collective mythology. This collective is shared not just by humans but by Cylons as well. Shared visions, dreams, hopes, and fears bind the two races together. Which race gave rise to the other is posed as an infinite regress, a möbius strip of which the answer becomes, in the end, irrelevant. In fact, so many questions raised during the 5 year run become irrelevant when compared to the real unknown that runs throughout the entire story ... the question of God.
Is there a bigger question? Do angels walk among us? Are we merely pawns in a game that belongs to beings born billions of years before us? Now, I will have to re-watch the series with the end in mind to figure out exactly what happened. I'll write more once my brain stops spinning.