Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome, the young Adama prequel explained

Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome is a prequel about William Adama as a newly graduated pilot in the tenth year of the first Cylon War. It came out as ten web episodes on Machinima between 9 November and 7 December 2012, then aired on Syfy as a single TV film on 10 February 2013. Adama, stuck flying a Raptor instead of the Viper he wanted, is sent on a secret mission into Cylon space with a cynical navigator and a civilian engineer who isn't what she seems. It's set roughly 42 years before the Fall, which puts it near the start of the timeline. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

Plot#

The milk run. Ensign William Adama arrived on Galactica fresh from the Academy, wanting to fly Vipers. Commander Silas Nash put him in a Raptor instead, the Wild Weasel, with Lt. Coker Fasjovik as his ECO. Coker had only weeks left on his second tour and wanted nothing more than to get home. Their first job was meant to be a quiet supply run to the shipyards. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

The cargo turned out to be a person: Dr. Becca Kelly, a software engineer who'd worked for Graystone Industries. Once they were out of Galactica's range she gave them new orders. They were to meet the Archeron in Cylon territory. When they got there the ship was already wreckage, and Cylon Raiders came at them. Adama's flying got them clear. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

The ghost fleet. Kelly got new coordinates. They led to a fleet of Colonial ships that had been reported destroyed but were in fact hiding deep in Cylon space. Kelly told Adama she had been married to Ezra Barzel, a famous Marine whose legend had inspired a generation of recruits. The commander of the Osiris put together a strike to get Kelly to Djerba, a former winter resort world now held by the Cylons. Coker learned it was a volunteers-only job, close to suicide. He also met an old friend, Jim Kirby, who'd been listed as dead. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

Djerba. A basestar was waiting when they jumped in. Kirby, flying escort, broke off and went home to his family. The Osiris couldn't use its nukes against the basestar, so its commander rammed it and set off the warheads by hand, and both ships were destroyed. The Wild Weasel crashed in the snow on Djerba. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

The three of them trekked through a blizzard and found Kelly's escort team dead in a cave. The floor gave way. A snake-like creature bit Coker before a survivor, Tech Sergeant Xander Toth, killed it. Toth had been alone too long and was barely holding together. He told them the creatures came out of Cylon experiments mixing animals and machines, and led them to an abandoned resort he'd mined. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

At the resort, Kelly told Adama her husband's hero story was a lie. He'd been killed by friendly fire. She said the war had to end. They slept together. Coker started to warn Adama that her mission wasn't what she said, but a mine went off and Centurions attacked. Toth was shot. Kelly found a cold store full of human remains, and a Centurion that cornered her scanned her dog tag instead of killing her. Coker shot it, and saw that it had spared her. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

The betrayal. At the communications array, Kelly said she was there to upload a virus. Coker saw a battlestar on the screen and realised she was sending the ghost fleet's position to the Cylons. He shot her, and she shot him several times. She told them the war would only end if humans and Cylons talked, and that the Cylons valued life more than humans did. Adama smashed the array and dragged Coker out, leaving Kelly behind. An experimental Cylon with an almost human face found her, told her she was more enlightened than the rest of her kind, then broke her neck. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

Husker. Back on Galactica, Nash told Adama that command had known Kelly would betray them. While the Cylons chased her false lead, the ghost fleet got away and hit undefended Cylon bases. The Osiris's dead were the price, and the story would keep the public behind the war. Adama got his Viper. His call sign, Husker, came from Coker, who'd sneered at him as a farm boy when they first met. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

What it reveals#

Blood & Chrome is about how Adama learned to distrust the people running the war. He starts as an eager kid who believes the recruiting posters, finds out the Barzel legend was invented, and then learns his own mission was a set-up that cost a ship full of lives. The cynical, careful commander of the main series starts here. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

It also shows what the Cylons were doing during the war. They were experimenting on captured humans and on animals, a Centurion spared a human who was working for them, and one of them already had a nearly human face. That points straight at the humanoid models the Colonies would meet 40 years later. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

Kelly is an early version of a question the whole franchise keeps asking: should humans and Cylons make peace? She thinks so and is willing to betray her own side for it. The story treats her as a traitor but doesn't make her a fool. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

Where it fits#

The reimagined continuity runs in a clear line. Caprica, set about 58 years before the Fall, shows how the Cylons were built at Graystone Industries. Blood & Chrome sits in the tenth year of the war that followed, around 42 years before the Fall. The war ended with an armistice 40 years before the Cylons came back, which is where the miniseries opens. (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome; Caprica, "Pilot"; Battlestar Galactica (miniseries))

Razor also has a young Adama in the Cylon War, flying a Viper on the war's last day and landing on a base where the Cylons experimented on people. Blood & Chrome comes before that, at the moment he first gets his Viper. (Battlestar Galactica: Razor; Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

The episode guide puts Blood & Chrome with Caprica as an optional extra, best watched once you've finished the main show and seen "Daybreak". (Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

Characters#

• William Adama: rookie Raptor pilot who earns his Viper and his call sign.
• Coker Fasjovik: Adama's weary ECO, counting down his last weeks of service.
• Dr. Becca Kelly: former Graystone Industries engineer who betrays the ghost fleet.
• Silas Nash: Galactica's commander, who knew the plan from the start.
• Xander Toth: the last survivor of Kelly's escort team on Djerba.
• Jim Kirby: Coker's old friend in the ghost fleet, who deserts.

(Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome)

Continuity#

• Graystone Industries, Kelly's old employer, is the company that built the first Cylons. (Caprica, "Pilot")
• The Cylon experiments on Djerba fit with what young Adama finds at the end of the war, the lab that produced the first Hybrid. (Battlestar Galactica: Razor)
• Galactica is the same ship Adama commands in the main series, about to be retired when the Fall comes. (Battlestar Galactica (miniseries))