The fourth and final season of the reimagined science fiction television series ''

Battlestar Galactica ''Battlestar Galactica'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Glen A. Larson. The franchise began with the original television series in 1978, and was followed by a short-run sequel series (''Galactica 1980''), a line of ...

'' premiered on the

Sci-Fi Channel Syfy (formerly Sci-Fi Channel, later shortened to Sci Fi; stylized as SYFY) is an American basic cable channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. ...

in the United States on April 4, 2008, and concluded on March 20, 2009. Similar to the second season, it was

split Split(s) or The Split may refer to: Places * Split, Croatia, the largest coastal city in Croatia * Split Island, Canada, an island in the Hudson Bay * Split Island, Falkland Islands * Split Island, Fiji, better known as Hạfliua Arts, entertai ...

into two parts, each containing 10 episodes. "Season 4.0" aired from April to June 2008 and "Season 4.5" aired from January to March 2009. The fourth season contained 20 episodes, plus the television film ''

Razor A razor is a bladed tool primarily used in the removal of body hair through the act of shaving. Kinds of razors include straight razors, safety razors, disposable razors, and electric razors. While the razor has been in existence since bef ...

''.

Cast and characters

Main cast

Edward James Olmos Edward James Olmos (born February 24, 1947) is an American actor, director, producer, and activist. He is best known for his roles as Lieutenant Martin "Marty" Castillo in ''Miami Vice'' (1984–1989), ''American Me'' (1992) (which he also dir ...

William Adama William "Bill" Adama (callsign "Husker") is a fictional character in the re-imagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' television series produced and aired by the SyFy cable network. He is one of the main characters in the series, and is portrayed by E ...

Mary McDonnell Mary Eileen McDonnell (born April 28, 1952) is an American film, stage, and television actress. She received Academy Award nominations for her roles as Stands With A Fist in '' Dances with Wolves'' and May-Alice Culhane in ''Passion Fish''. Mc ...

Laura Roslin Laura Roslin is a fictional character in the re-imagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' series, portrayed by Mary McDonnell. She is the President of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol and is one of the primary characters in the show. Character biography ...

* Katee Sackhoff as Kara "Starbuck" Thrace * Jamie Bamber as Lee "Apollo" Adama *

James Callis James Nicholas Callis (born 4 June 1971) is a British actor. He is known for playing Dr. Gaius Baltar in the re-imagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' miniseries and television series, and Bridget Jones's best friend Tom in ''Bridget Jones's Diar ...

Gaius Baltar Dr. Gaius Baltar is a fictional character in the TV series ''Battlestar Galactica'' played by James Callis, a reimagining of Count Baltar from the 1978 ''Battlestar Galactica'' series. He is one of the show's primary characters. Personality Ga ...

* Tricia Helfer as Number Six * Grace Park as Sharon "Boomer" Valerii/Sharon "Athena" Agathon (Number Eight) * Michael Hogan as

Saul Tigh Saul Tigh is a fictional character on ''Battlestar Galactica'' played by Michael Hogan. He is one of the main characters of the show. Biography Overview and personality Saul Tigh is a line officer assigned as executive officer on the Galac ...

* Aaron Douglas as

Galen Tyrol Galen Tyrol (commonly referred to as The Chief) is a character on the television series ''Battlestar Galactica''. Tyrol is responsible for the maintenance of the Vipers and Raptors aboard. Battlestar ''Galactica''. After the events of the mi ...

Tahmoh Penikett Tahmoh Penikett (; ; born May 20, 1975) is a Canadian actor. He is known for playing Karl "Helo" Agathon on SyFy's 2004 television series ''Battlestar Galactica''. He has appeared in TV series ''Supernatural'', '' Dollhouse'', the Showcase time ...

as Karl "Helo" Agathon *

Michael Trucco Edward Michael Trucco (born June 22, 1970) is an American actor known for his role as Samuel Anders on the reimagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' and his recurring role as Nick Petteruti in ''How I Met Your Mother''. He also appeared on the 2017– ...

Samuel Anders These are lists of characters from the various ''Battlestar Galactica'' incarnations. Original 1978 movie and series People from the ''Galactica'': * Commander Adama - played by Lorne Greene * Commander Cain - played by Lloyd Bridges * Capta ...

* Nicki Clyne as Cally Henderson Tyrol *

Kandyse McClure Candice McClure (born 22 March 1980), known professionally as Kandyse McClure, is a Canadian actress. She is known for her roles as Anastasia Dualla in the SyFy series ''Battlestar Galactica'' and as Dr. Clementine Chasseur in the Netflix series ...

Anastasia Dualla Anastasia "Dee" Dualla, portrayed by Kandyse McClure, is a fictional character in the reimagined ''Battlestar Galactica.'' Character history A native of Sagittaron, Anastasia Dualla joined the Colonial Fleet against the wishes of her father; ...

Alessandro Juliani Alessandro Juliani (born July 6) is a Canadian actor and singer. He is notable for playing the roles of Tactical Officer Lieutenant Felix Gaeta on the Sci-Fi Channel television program ''Battlestar Galactica'', Emil Hamilton in ''Smallville'', Jac ...

Felix Gaeta Lieutenant Junior Grade Felix Gaeta is a fictional character on ''Battlestar Galactica'' played by Alessandro Juliani. Arc Character overview in his early career Felix Gaeta is known for his friendly, encouraging, trusting, and idealistic na ...

Recurring cast

Donnelly Rhodes Henry Donnelly Rhodes (December 4, 1937 – January 8, 2018) was a Canadian actor, known professionally as Donnelly Rhodes. He had many American television and film credits, probably best known to American audiences as the hapless escaped convic ...

Sherman Cottle Major Sherman Cottle is a fictional character in the reimagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' series. The battlestar ''Galacticas Chief Medical Officer, Cottle is played by Donnelly Rhodes. Character biography Cottle is gruff, sarcastic, and por ...

Rekha Sharma Rekha Shanti Sharma is a Canadian actress of Indo-Fijian descent, best known for her role as Tory Foster on ''Battlestar Galactica,'' and Ellen Landry on '' Star Trek: Discovery''. Career Sharma began acting career in her 20s. She has stage ex ...

as Tory Foster *

Callum Keith Rennie Callum Keith Rennie (born 14 September 1960) is a British-born Canadian actor who started his career in Canadian film and television projects, where his portrayal of Stanley Raymond Kowalski on the television series '' Due South'' was his firs ...

Leoben Conoy Leoben Conoy (Number Two) is a fictional character portrayed by Callum Keith Rennie appearing in the reimagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' series. Leoben is a humanoid Cylon agent who portrays himself as possessing philosophical and religious en ...

(Number Two) *

Lucy Lawless Lucille Frances Lawless (; born 29 March 1968) is a New Zealand actress and singer. She is best known for her roles as Xena in the television series '' Xena: Warrior Princess'', as D'Anna Biers on the re-imagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' seri ...

D'Anna Biers D'Anna Biers (Number Three) is a fictional character from the re-imagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' television series, played by Lucy Lawless. Within the fictional universe of Battlestar Galactica, Number Three is a Humanoid Cylon Model. Chara ...

(Number Three) *

Dean Stockwell Robert Dean Stockwell (March 5, 1936 – November 7, 2021) was an American actor with a career spanning seven decades. As a child actor under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he first came to the public's attention in films including ''Anchors A ...

as John Cavil (Number One) *

Matthew Bennett Matthew Ray Bennett (born April 9, 1968) is a Canadian actor, writer and director. He is best known for portraying Detective Len Harper on ''Cold Squad'' and his recurring roles as Aaron Doral cylon model number five in the reimagined ''Battles ...

Aaron Doral The Cylons are the main antagonists of the human race in the ''Battlestar Galactica'' science fiction franchise, making appearances in the original 1978 series, the 1980 series, the 2004 re-imagining, and the spin-off prequel series ''Cap ...

(Number Five) *

Rick Worthy Richard "Rick" Worthy (born March 12, 1967) is an American actor. He is best known for appearing in a variety of science fiction and fantasy television shows. He is perhaps best known for his recurring role as Simon O'Neill cylon model number f ...

as Simon (Number Four) * Richard Hatch as Tom Zarek *

Kate Vernon Katherine Elizabeth Vernon (born April 21, 1961) is a Canadian-born American actress. She is known for her roles as Lorraine Prescott on the CBS primetime soap opera ''Falcon Crest'' (from 1984–1985), the stuck-up and popular Benny Hanson in ...

Ellen Tigh Ellen Tigh is a fictional character from the re-imagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' series. She is played by the actress Kate Vernon. Overview Ellen Tigh is the wife of Colonel Saul Tigh. At the beginning of the series, he believes she has been ...

Mark Sheppard Mark Andreas Sheppard (born 30 May 1964) is an English actor and musician. He is often credited as Mark A. Sheppard. Sheppard is known for playing the demon/King of Hell Crowley on ''Supernatural'' and for his recurring roles as lawyer Romo La ...

Romo Lampkin These are lists of characters from the various ''Battlestar Galactica'' incarnations. Original 1978 movie and series People from the ''Galactica'': * Commander Adama - played by Lorne Greene * Commander Cain - played by Lloyd Bridges * Captai ...

* Leah Cairns as Margaret "Racetrack" Edmondson *

Bodie Olmos Bodie James Olmos (born August 27, 1975) is an American actor. He is the son of Edward James Olmos and Kaija Keel, and grandson of Howard Keel. His older brother is actor Mico Olmos, and his younger sister is Daniela Olmos. His first on screen ...

as Brendan "Hot Dog" Costanza * Jennifer Halley as Diana "Hardball" Seelix

Episodes

Production

During the hiatus after season 3, the writers had a retreat in

Lake Tahoe Lake Tahoe (; was, Dáʔaw, meaning "the lake") is a freshwater lake in the Sierra Nevada of the United States. Lying at , it straddles the state line between California and Nevada, west of Carson City. Lake Tahoe is the largest alpine lake i ...

where they planned much of the story arc for the fourth season, mainly mapping out the storylines of the first 10 episodes. In June 2007, the Sci-Fi Channel confirmed the fourth season would be its final season, with an order of 22 episodes, an increase from 13 as originally announced. Production of the final season began in May 2007. A special TV movie, titled '' Battlestar Galactica: Razor'', aired on November 24, 2007. The regular season began airing on April 4, 2008. Only the first 12 episodes of season four (including ''Razor'', which is technically the first two episodes of the 22 ordered for season 4) were filmed before the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike halted production of all scripted TV shows. After the strike ended, the final 10 episodes began airing on January 16, 2009.

Reception

The season received universal acclaim from critics, scoring 85 out of 100 based on 16 reviews from

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

. On

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...

, the season has an approval rating of 92% with an average score of 8.1 out of 10 based on 38 reviews. The website's critical consensus reads, "''Battlestar Galactica''s final season proves a satisfying conclusion to TV's best science fiction offering." The series also placed on numerous critics top ten lists of both 2008 and 2009 by publications such as the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...

'', ''

San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and Michael H. de Young. The pa ...

'', ''

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 ...

'', ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...

'' and ''

TV Guide TV Guide is an American digital media company that provides television program listings information as well as entertainment and television-related news. The company sold its print magazine division, TV Guide Magazine LLC, in 2008. Corporat ...

''. The fourth season received a total of eleven

Emmy Award The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...

nominations. "Season 4.0" received six nominations at the

60th Primetime Emmy Awards The 60th Primetime Emmy Awards were held on Sunday, September 21, 2008, at the newly opened Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles, California to honor the best in U.S. prime time television. The ceremony was hosted by Tom Bergeron, Heidi Klum, Howie Ma ...

, for Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series (

Michael Angeli Michael Angeli (born 1970/1971) is an American writer and television producer, best known for his award-nominated work on television series including ''Monk'' and the remake of ''Battlestar Galactica'', a show for which he was also a co-executiv ...

for "Six of One"), Outstanding Cinematography for a One-Hour Series (Stephen McNutt for ''Razor''), Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing for a Drama Series ("He That Believeth in Me"), and Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy or Drama Series (One-Hour) (''Razor''); and won for Outstanding Special Visual Effects for a Series ("He That Believeth in Me") and Outstanding Special Class – Short-Format Live-Action Entertainment Programs (''Razor Flashbacks''). "Season 4.5" received five nominations at the

61st Primetime Emmy Awards The 61st Primetime Emmy Awards were held on Sunday, September 20, 2009. CBS broadcast the Primetime event and E! broadcast the Creative Arts event; both took place at Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles, California. The nominations were announced on ...

, with the episode "Daybreak, Part 2" receiving all the series' nominations, for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series (

Michael Rymer Michael Rymer (born 1 March 1963 in Melbourne) is an Australian television and film director, best known for his work on the re-imagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' TV series, for which he directed the pilot miniseries and several episodes of the ...

), Outstanding Single Camera Picture Editing for a Drama Series, Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy or Drama Series (One Hour), and Outstanding Special Visual Effects for a Series; and won for Outstanding Sound Editing for a Series. For the 10 regular episodes, ''Battlestar Galactica'' averaged a 1.7 Nielsen household rating and 2.2 million total viewers. This represented an increase of 13% in household rating and 11% in total viewers. The series finale received 2.4 million viewers and became the most-watched episode of the series in over three years.

Home video releases

Similar to the second season, the fourth season was split into two parts, as well the DVD and Blu-ray sets. Season 4.0 was released on DVD in region 1 on January 6, 2009, in region 2 (although simply titled "Season 4") on October 6, 2008 and in region 4 (titled "Season 4: Part 1") on December 3, 2008. Season 4.5 was released on DVD in region 1 on July 28, 2009, in region 2 (titled "The Final Season") on June 1, 2009 and in region 4 (titled "Season 4: Part 2 – The Final Chapter") on July 28, 2009. The complete fourth season was released on

Blu-ray Disc The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of sto ...

in region 1 on January 4, 2011. The Season 4.0 DVD set includes the first 10 episodes of season four and the television film ''Razor''. The ''Razor'' disc includes the broadcast version as well as the unrated extended version. Executive producer Ronald D. Moore and writer Michael Taylor provide commentary for the extended version. Also included on the ''Razor'' disc are deleted scenes, two featurettes—"The Look of ''Battlestar Galactica''" and "My Favorite Episode So Far", as well as a sneak peek at season 4. For the other discs, special features include creator Ronald D. Moore's podcast commentaries on 7 of the 10 episodes; podcasts for "Guess What's Coming to Dinner?" and "Sine Qua Non" were not recorded, while a podcast for "Faith" was recorded and is available on the official website but is not included on the sets due to the recording quality. With that, new commentaries were recorded for the DVD. Moore, along with writers

Bradley Thompson Bradley Thompson is an American television writer and producer known for episodes of ''Star Trek: Deep Space Nine'' (1996–1999), '' The Twilight Zone'' (2002–2003), ''Battlestar Galactica'' (2004–2009), ''CSI: Crime Scene Investigation'' ...

and

David Weddle David Weddle is an American television writer and producer known for episodes of ''Star Trek: Deep Space Nine'' (1996–1999), '' The Twilight Zone'' (2002–2003), ''Battlestar Galactica'' (2004–2009), ''CSI: Crime Scene Investigation'' (200 ...

provide commentary for "Faith"; Moore and writer

provide commentary for "Guess What's Coming to Dinner?"; and Moore and writer Michael Taylor prove commentary for "Sine Qua Non". Moore is joined by writer

Jane Espenson Jane Espenson (born July 14, 1964) is an American television writer and producer. Espenson has worked on both situation comedies and serial dramas. She had a five-year stint as a writer and producer on ''Buffy the Vampire Slayer'' and shared a ...

, editor Michael O'Halloran and supervising editor Andrew Seklir on his podcast commentary for "The Hub"; and is joined by writers Bradley Thompson and David Weddle, and editor Julius Ramsay on his podcast commentary for "Revelations". Also included are deleted scenes for every episode, ten

David Eick David Eick () (born 1968) is an American writer and producer, best known as the executive producer of ''Battlestar Galactica'', for which he also wrote several episodes. Eick executive produced ''Caprica'' and '' Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Ch ...

videoblogs, three featurettes—"The Journey", "Cylons: The Twelve", and "The Music of ''Battlestar Galactica''", as well as a sneak peek of season 4.5 and a trailer for ''

Caprica ''Caprica'' is an American science fiction drama television series. A spin-off prequel of the re-imagined ''Battlestar Galactica'' (2004), Caprica is set 58 years before the main series. ''Caprica'' shows how humanity first created the Cylon a ...

''. The Season 4.5 DVD set includes the last 10 episodes of season four. Special features include creator Ronald D. Moore's podcast commentaries on all 10 episodes. There are also three unaired extended episodes, for "A Disquiet Follows My Soul", "Islanded in a Stream of Stars", and "Daybreak". The extended episodes feature commentary tracks; writer and director Ronald D. Moore on "A Disquiet Follows My Soul"; series star and episode director

on "Islanded in a Stream of Stars"; and executive producers Ronald D. Moore and David Eick and director

on "Daybreak". Also included are deleted scenes for various episodes, 11 David Eick videoblogs, and five featurettes—"Evolution of a Cue", "And They Have a Plan", "The Journey Ends: The Arrival", "What the Frak is Going on With ''Battlestar Galactica''?", and "A Look Back".

References

External links

* * {{Battlestar Galactica (2004 TV series) episodes *4 2008 American television seasons 2009 American television seasons Split television seasons