Is Gaeta Gay? And What Is In Store for the Character in Season Four?
I was perusing After Elton’s recent list of Top Ten Gay and Bisexual SciFi Characters this evening and realized I had always assumed that Gaeta was gay.
I know, this is not a revolutionary thought as Gaeta’s devotion to Gaius Baltar inspired similar speculation from legions on fans during the first two seasons. His nicknames among fans include "Gay-ta" as well as "Lt. Gaydar" and many others.
And yet, we have never learned for sure whether Gaeta is a gay man … an odd omission from a series that is otherwise very comfortable with the ambiguities of sexuality and the soul.
If you are interested in some spoilers/speculation on Gaeta on Season Four, click the link to send you to the rest of this post.
One of the few things we know for sure (or at least we know that Ron Moore wants us to think we know for sure) is that the person who plays the Last Cylon is not featured in the Last Supper photo that recently appeared in Entertainment Weekly. Gaeta is one of the characters who is missing, and when you think about it there is a better than average chance he is the Cylon God:
1) He is close to Baltar, who was President of the Colonies during a pivotal time in the recent human history. Every Cylon discovered so far has been close to a human in command and had an important role in the human administration … why should the Last Cylon be any different?
2) He is very good at science, and even better with machines. More importantly, he was placed as the assistant to the one man in the entire human fleet who could detect Cylon technology or even craft a credible Cylon detector: Giaus Baltar.
3) He has a fascination with Giaus, perhaps even a sexual crush … or at least he did, for most of the series. Is it a coincidence that Baltar’s "Head Six" started to loose interest in him around the same time that Gaeta began to question his loyalty to Baltar? Was the "Head Six" a subconscious projection of the desires of Gaeta, as the First Cylon? A wild thought, but a very intriguing one.
The more you think about it, the more it makes sense. Gaeta was a leader in the resistance on New Caprica, and if the Cylons somehow, subconsciously, knew the resistance had to succeed then it would explain why the Cylons did not just nuke New Caprica the way they nuked the original Caprica.
What do you think? Am I a crazy fool, or does this have a possibility of making sense?
January 28th, 2008 at 11:48 am
“Is it a coincidence that Baltar’s “Head Six” started to loose interest in him around the same time that Gaeta began to question his loyalty to Baltar? Was the “Head Six” a subconscious projection of the desires of Gaeta, as the First Cylon?”
Um…what?! Head Six losing interest in Baltar?! What are you talking about? She’s been there for the entire season 3, and I’m sorry, but Head Six is nothing like Gaeta in personality or agenda.
Gaeta is at the moment my primary suspect for the last Cylon. I think he also may have been the one that D’Anna said: “YOU?! Forgive me, I had no idea”, because it was clearly a person she knew very well, better than the others, and she expressed her surprise because it was someone she never would have expected to be a FF Cylon; that could be Gaeta, she saw him every day when he worked in Baltar’s administration on New Caprica, and she probably never thought much of him or expected him to be anybody special. When know that he has a secret, maybe about something that happened on New Caprica (yes, I know that the scene in TABFAYW was a remnant of the abandoned storyline, but the scene remained in the show, and it needs to be explained…they could nicely retcon this), so he might very well have something that he feels he needs redemption for. (The old Hybrid’s words about the fifth Cylon, “hungering for redemption that will come only in the howl of terrible suffering”. Many people assumed it was Baltar, but to me it seems like a red herring.)
But I don’t think Gaeta has anything to do with Head Six. Sorry, but that theory is a bit too ‘out there’. I also don’t think anyone is “Cylon God’, and certainly not any of the Cylon models.
I believe that Head Six is a manifestation of Baltar’s subconscious desires, fears, his troubled consience and his obsession with Six; her look and personality are to an extent like an exaggerated, powerful version of Caprica Six before the attack, mixed with Baltar’s idea of her as a fanatically religious Cylon who seduced him and manipulated him - basically, it’s the way he came to see Caprica Six in his mind, after the destruction of the Colonies - but she also has many character traits of Baltar himself, and she tends to change her attitude and behaviour depending on Battar’s mood at the time. For instance, she made him feel good about himself and helps him aleviate his conscience or find an excuse for what he does (e.g. in Precipice, when he recluctantly signs she death list at gunpoint), punished him when he felt guilty (in Kobol’s Last Gleaming I, for ‘cheating’ on her with Starbuck, in Downloaded, for failing to protect the baby…)… Notice that, in season 3, she never was stern, angry and punishing as she was quite a few times in seasons 1 and 2? Since Baltar’s luck changed and he started suffering punishment from other people, he doesn’t need her to do it, he only needs her to comfort him and help him through, and that’s exactly what she’s been doing throughout season 3. She also always tries to help him stay alive, but in TABFAYW she was helping him hang himself - why? Maybe because that time he decided to commit suicide and either die or find out that he was a Cylon, but he needed someone/something to help him stay determined and go through with it. I see Head Six as Baltar’s ‘anima’, just as I see Head Baltar as Caprica’s ‘animus’. I also think that through his Head Six Baltar has tapped into the ’stream’, the collective unconscious, which maybe where various the virtual beings (Head 6, Head Baltar, Starbuck’s virtual Leoben), visions, premonitions and shared dreams come from. This could be the reason why Head Six, while acting like a woman who is in a relationship with him, is also acting like a guide to Baltar on a spiritual journey, why she has premonitions and vague prophecies, such as the one about the baby (which was so vague that it can’t definitely be attributed to an outside source of information), but doesn’t really seem to know much more than Baltar knows (for instance, she believed Hera was dead). Basically, most of the time she has only been voicing his hidden thoughts, or helping him figure out some things that he really could have figured out himself (the Cylon transponder in the Miniseries, warning that Galactica is an unsafe place in Kobol’s Last Gleaming…), and through her he has come in touch with the part of his mind that he was not aware of previously. This is, at least, what makes most sense to me. I suspect that Ron Moore and co. will never ‘explain’ what virtual beings are, and will leave it as ambiguous as it was from the beginning.
February 25th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
Whew! Hey you Ivana! Get a life already. That was not a comment it was a frackin’ essay!
February 29th, 2008 at 12:21 am
It wasn’t that long… It’s just big text!
Honestly, I don’t think we’re going to see a gay man on BSG. They did it with Cain and I don’t think there will be enough time for a gay relationship that is at all meaningful in S4. Would you prefer a deeper, juicier plot line that is gratifying to our years of devotion or time wasted on developing a gay relationship for the sake of Earth’s modern day politics? That’s BS. And I think I speak for everyone when I say that no one wants another superificial gay relationship on the show. That would not be good for the BSG or for anyone around right now.
Also, I really don’t think Gaeta is the last Cylon. I believe it’s Bill Adama. Leoban, the seer of patterns, said so. Sure, he lied about Cara’s child, but otherwise, he’s only spoken the truth… And he sees patterns! What more proof do you need?
May 23rd, 2008 at 4:40 pm
First of all, I think it would be great if they made one of the primary characters gay. It doesn’t have to be a big announcement or an entire episode devoted to it and certainly no need to develop a whole gay relationship on the show. For example, if Gaeta were to bite the big one, maybe they can show his boyfriend come and give the eulogy. It could be totally matter of fact and barely take up any time, but it’ll make a nice little statement about how the BSG human society deals with sexual orientation - that it no one gives a frack.
As for the Gaeta being the Final Cylon, it’s certainly possible. It’s gotta be someone who’s been there from the beginning, but not one of the “big” characters. Gaeta and Dualla certainly fit that mold. However, my money is on Tom Zarek. He’s been a controversial figure since the beginning, a thorn on Roslyn’s side, instrumental in putting Baltar into office and now he pretty much controls the Quaram though Lee. And it certainly would be fitting to make the Final Cylon played by an original BSG alum.