Number Six (Battlestar Galactica)

Number Six is a family of fictional characters from the reimagined science fiction television series, Battlestar Galactica. She is portrayed by Canadian actress and model Tricia Helfer. She is the sixth of the twelve known Cylon models, and like the other significant seven, there are several versions of her, including Caprica Six, Baltar's "Head Six", Shelly Godfrey, Gina Inviere and Natalie.

Number Six is a seductive, statuesque Cylon infiltrator. She was the first example shown of a new generation of Cylons capable of adapting to human form and emotions. Little else is known of her earlier years. She can, like other Cylons, retain memories which can be downloaded into another body if the original body is killed. Like her counterparts, her body was designed to mimic the human body at the cellular level, making her almost undetectable to testing procedures, and there are many copies of her in existence. Most versions of Six have platinum-blonde hair, including Caprica Six, Shelley Godfrey, and Sonja. Others such as Gina Inviere, Natalie, and Lida have honey-blonde hair, and one Six with black hair has been observed.

Since her debut in the mini-series, a leitmotif has been used in scenes featuring Tricia Helfer as Number Six. This simple 9-note motif was composed by Richard Gibbs. The 9/8 figure is divided unevenly into a group of 3 notes, followed by 3 groups of 2. It is almost always performed on a gamelan, and also plays over the introduction to each episode of the series. On the published series soundtrack, the melody is listed as The Sense of Six. For her role as Six, Tricia Helfer received a Leo Award for "Best Lead Performance by a Female in a Dramatic Series".

Versions

Copies of Number Six appear regularly, mostly within Cylon society. Several notable versions have had more prominent roles:

Caprica Six

At the beginning of the miniseries, a Six copy is involved in an intense sexual affair with Dr. Gaius Baltar. Pretending to be an employee of a rival computer corporation, Six seduces Baltar while helping him with his work on the Colonial defense system. Six then reveals her true nature to Baltar, and informs him that the Cylons will use the computer secrets that he has given her to infiltrate the Colonial defense systems, disable the Colonial military and attack the Twelve Colonies. That day, the Cylons launch their attack and destroy most of humanity. Six uses her body to shield Baltar from a blast during the attack, saving his life and sacrificing hers.

In the episode "Downloaded", this copy is downloaded into a new body. This Six, nicknamed "Caprica Six" by fellow Cylons, is viewed as a hero amongst the Cylon civilization for her complete success in her mission to compromise the colonies' defenses. She retains her sentimentality and expresses some regret at her actions, as evidenced by her constant visions of Baltar. This "Head Baltar" plays a similar role to her that the Head Six plays towards the real Baltar, as a critical counselor and manipulator. Caprica Six is enlisted to motivate the resurrected Galactica copy of Sharon "Boomer" Valerii to move out of her apartment and reintegrate into Cylon society. However, in defiance of their superiors, both Caprica Six and Sharon opt instead to aid Samuel Anders, to the extent that Caprica Six murders a Three to save him. Caprica Six and Sharon then begin preaching peace with the humans as the way of God. This leads them to take over Cylon culture and to resume the hunt for humanity, leading them to the colony of New Caprica, which they take over in a bloodless coup facilitated by Baltar, who surrenders to Caprica Six as soon as the Cylons arrive.

After the Cylon occupation of New Caprica, Caprica Six alienates the other Cylons with her desire for peaceful coexistence with humans. Her reunion with the real Gaius Baltar, however, shatters her illusions about her former pawn, as Baltar impotently allows the Cylons to bully him into enacting their oppressive tyranny upon New Caprica.

The other Cylons insist Baltar must sign an execution order for 200 insurgents in response to two suicide bombings by the human resistance movement. Baltar initially refuses and Caprica Six alone objects strongly to her fellow Cylons' desire for mortal retribution. These objections result in her being shot in the head by fellow Cylon, Aaron Doral. Her death and an immediate threat to shoot Baltar force him to sign the order. Caprica Six is reborn and helps Baltar escape onto a Cylon Basestar when New Caprica is ultimately abandoned by its population.

After settling on the basestar, she becomes involved in a ménage à trois with Baltar and Biers and explicitly states that she loves both of them. She was also instrumental in rescuing an inexplicably sick Hera from the Basestar. She assists in Athena's download and witnesses the obvious bond between Athena and Hera. Caprica subsequently disables and then kills Boomer who threatens to throttle Hera despite Athena's anguished pleas. She leads Athena and her child to a captured Raptor and returns with them to Galactica, where she is promptly imprisoned. In this situation she is frequently used as a source of information about and means of understanding the Cylon's motivations.

Colonel Tigh begins to make more frequent stops to her cell, questioning her about what it's like to exist as a Cylon. He confronts her about being responsible for the deaths of billions and whether she feels any remorse or if she can just 'flip a switch' and shut out the pain. Caprica Six questions Tigh's reasons for the line of questioning, unaware that Tigh is one of the Five Unrevealed Cylon Models. When she goads him about needing to feel pain, he turns to leave but she assaults him and bludgeons him. To her surprise he cries and begs for more pain, but in response she abruptly aborts her assault, shakes her head and replies that he doesn't need any more pain. She then kisses him passionately.

Dr. Cottle later reveals that Caprica Six is pregnant. It is revealed that Tigh is the father of the baby. After it is revealed that Tigh is one of the 'Final Five' Cylons, Caprica Six's relationship with Tigh changes. The significance of her pregnancy increases as the child will not be a human-cylon hybrid, but will be a pure Cylon offspring. Caprica Six begins to live with Tigh in his quarters on Galactica and the two now share a very intimate and caring relationship. However when Ellen Tigh returns, she, Tigh and Caprica Six fight about who Tigh really loves, and Caprica Six loses the baby.

She joins the rescue mission for Hera and is finally proud of Baltar, something that she had always wanted and feels was the one thing missing between the two of them. They both see Head Six and Head Baltar and are shocked that the other sees them. The two defend Galactica against Cylon boarders and take Hera when they find her wandering alone. Caprica Six holds a gun on Cavil during the standoff over Hera and hands him the phone when the deal is made. Later, on Earth, she and Baltar are visited one last time by Head Six and Head Baltar, who explain that their destiny was to protect Hera and while God's plan is never over, their lives will be much less eventful. Caprica Six and Baltar then go off to start new lives as farmers together.

The non-canon novelization of the miniseries by Jeffrey A. Carver suggests that Caprica Six went by the name Natasi.

Head Six

A distinct copy derived from Caprica Six residing in Baltar's head since the destruction of the colonies, "Head Six" appears as a figment of his imagination, invisible to everyone else. She suggests that this phenomenon might be caused by either a computer chip implant or insanity over his guilt. When Baltar undergoes an MRI-like "brain scan", it reveals no sign of a computer chip or any other foreign object in his brain. While this briefly leads Baltar to think that he has truly gone insane, he concludes this is impossible, given Six's knowledge of events unknown to him (for example, the prediction of the birth of the Human/Cylon Hybrid to Sharon Agathon while a prisoner aboard Galactica). Confronted with this, Six declares that she is neither a computer chip nor a hallucination produced by mental instability. When Baltar then asks just who or what she was, she simply replies that she is "an angel of God sent here to protect you." Her look may be reminiscent of Cassiopeia in the 1978 BSG canon: a sexy blonde in a sensuous, bright red dress.

This Six often appears suddenly, without warning. She often advises and gives instructions to Baltar. While she usually appears to him as part of the real world, occasionally he interacts with her in an imagined but persistent dream-like setting within his mind. In this, Number Six resembles the character of Harvey from Farscape (who in turn was named after the "imaginary" character from the James Stewart film Harvey).

While Six can physically interact with Baltar in his imagination, she also appears able to physically affect him in the real world — for example, in one episode Number Six throws Baltar into a bulkhead and grabs him by the throat, and passersby see his physical reaction to this. On another occasion, she can be seen while she ties the knot on Baltar's improvised noose. In the episode "Escape Velocity" (aired April 25, 2008), Head Six is shown lifting Baltar from the floor to a standing position after he endured repeated blows from a Galactica Marine.

This manifestation of Six in particular is extremely religious. In contrast to the colonists, and like the other Cylons, she believes in a singular God, whom she identifies as Love. She constantly attempts to convince Baltar to believe in the Cylon God, and to accept his part in God's plan or will.

Her motivations are unclear. While some of her advice appears to benefit humanity, for example, pointing out a Cylon device to Baltar on Galactica and helping him build a Cylon detector, it more often serves only Baltar's needs, and she expresses enjoyment over what she considers the inevitable extinction of the human race, constantly saying that humanity is naturally violent and would have destroyed itself without the Cylons' intervention.

Head Six appears to be somehow related to Caprica Six, which is the Six model who seduced Baltar on the planet Caprica and encouraged him to give her access to the Colonial Defense Mainframe. This belief is encouraged by the fact that Caprica Six has her own Head Baltar, implying some sort of transcendental connection between those two specific characters. The precise identity or nature of Head Six is unknown, however she is called Sara by Baltar on at least one occasion. Ron D. Moore has stated that Baltar never bothered on learning her name. In the season finale, there's a flashback scene in Caprica in which Gaius tells her "he has forgotten her name"-

Head Six has been seen only very infrequently since the Events on New Caprica, she has made brief appearances in season 4, where Baltar begins to refer to her as an Angel.

In the final episode of season 4, it is revealed that Head Six is indeed an agent of a higher power, not a chip inside Baltar's head. She and (an angelic version of) Head Baltar are the last seen characters in the final moment of the episode, which takes place many millenia after the rest of the series. Their role was to guide Baltar and Caprica Six in protecting Hera, and now that that's done, they leave them alone. She and Head Baltar speculate on whether the cycle will continue (all of this has happened before and all of this will happen again), and Head Six believes that it will not and that the cycle has finally been broken.

Although the name is not used by characters in the context of the story, showrunner Ronald D Moore revealed in his official SciFi BSG podcasts "Head Six" is the designation given to the character in scripts and production documents. Fans also refer to the character as "Virtual Six" or "Inner Six".

Shelly Godfrey

In the episode "Six Degrees of Separation", the name of which is derived from the theory of the "Six Degrees of Separation", a copy of Number Six in the fleet using the name "Shelly Godfrey" appears. Godfrey attempts to frame Baltar for betraying the human race with supposed photographic evidence. In addition, she attempts to seduce Commander Adama. She disappears abruptly after her "photographic evidence" is proven to be fake. This leads the people of the fleet to conclude that she was a Cylon agent trying to discredit Dr. Baltar because of his Cylon detector research. Baltar's popularity increases as a result. As her appearance coincided with the temporary disappearance of Head Six, it is often wondered (and indeed voiced by Baltar himself) whether she was a physical manifestation of Head Six posing in a dual identity.

The episode does cause the audience (and Baltar) to think Shelly Godfrey is related to Head Six, however this is demonstrated to be a deliberate red herring by subsequent episodes of Battlestar Galactica. In Season 3, both when Baltar is on Cylon-occupied New Caprica and held as a prisoner on a Basestar, it is revealed that every humanoid Cylon is an individual - even amongst the same model type although mostly only the Sixes display this. Furthermore it is revealed that only the individual Cylon known as Caprica Six has any romantic feelings for Baltar - most other Number Six copies are indifferent to Baltar and his plight.

Gina Inviere

Gina, as she appears in Razor

In the episode "Pegasus" and the telemovie Battlestar Galactica: Razor, it is revealed that a copy of Number Six had hidden aboard the Pegasus, posing as a civilian network administrator and using the name Gina Inviere (supposedly Old Gemenese for "resurrection"; in reality, înviere is Romanian for "resurrection".) This Number Six gains the confidence of Rear Admiral Cain with whom she has a romantic relationship, and then-Lieutenant Kendra Shaw, who gives Gina the administrator codes for the Pegasus mainframe. Gina uses Shaw's password in order to disable the Pegasus during a Cylon attack, enabling the ship to be boarded by centurions. Shaw sees another Six with the centurions thereby exposing Gina as a Cylon. Cain orders her former lover's imprisonment, condemning her as a thing, and allows Gina to be subjected to torture and gang rape by members of the Pegasus crew. By the time of the events of "Pegasus", Gina appears to be catatonic from the severe trauma of her abuse. With the assistance of Baltar (who instantly transferred his love for Caprica Six onto Gina, vastly complicating his relationship with Head Six), Gina escapes and flees into the civilian fleet after killing Rear Admiral Cain. She then joins a group of Cylon sympathizers, who want humanity to make peace with the Cylons. The extensive sexual abuse she has suffered renders Gina psychologically unable to be intimate with Baltar until shortly before her death. In the finale of the second season, Gina detonates a nuclear weapon she had received from Dr. Baltar, killing herself, signaling the location of the human settlement to the Cylons, and destroying the Cloud 9 and several other ships in the human fleet.

Gina has honey-blonde hair, actress Tricia Helfer's natural hair color, instead of the platinum-blonde of most Sixes. Like Shelly Godfrey, she sometimes wears glasses.

Series creator Ron Moore says in the DVD commentary for "Pegasus" that the name "Gina" is directly meant as a jab against critics of the reimagined series who use the derogatory term "GINO" (Galactica In Name Only) to describe it.

Natalie

Natalie

An assertive and authoritative version of Number Six named Natalie appears in the episode "Six of One" . Following a vote to lobotomize Cylon raiders in which a single copy of Number Eight (Boomer) voted against the rest of her model, Natalie, along with the remaining Number Eights and Twos, leads a coup against the other models. They decide to give sentience to the Cylon centurions, making them self-aware and capable of feeling for the first time. The other models, led by Cavil, are dumbstruck by this decision and attempt to destroy Natalie and her followers permanently in the episode titled "The Ties that Bind" . Natalie makes a deal with Rear Admiral Adama on the Galactica to reveal the location of the main Cylon Resurrection hub as long as she can bring the "final five" with her off the Galactica after Earth is located. Natalie is on her way to speak to Adama again when she is confronted and shot by Athena because of a dream Athena had in which a Number Six took her daughter Hera. Somehow the rebel Basestar's hybrid detects her shooting and panics, causing the ship to jump away. Natalie dies of her injuries in the infirmary, seeing a forest as she dies. With no Resurrection Ship in range, her death is permanent.

Other versions

Number Sixes have been shown in a variety of roles, including repairing the Galactica ("Deadlock" and "Someone to Watch Over Me"), hospital administration ("The Farm"), serving as Heavy Raider pilots, and as rebel Cylon leaders (Natalie and Sonja). Other versions include:

• A copy in a red tunic, who arrives aboard the Armistice Station and seduces the Colonial representative (otherwise known as Boxey's father) shortly before the station is destroyed. Similar copies are part of the group that board Ragnar Anchorage to rescue and debrief Aaron Doral.
• A copy, wearing a white lab coat, who captures and kisses Helo before being shot by Sharon Agathon. Another lab coat-wearing Six observes their escape, and another (possibly one of these two) later leads Centurion troops in pursuit of them. In "Razor", a copy in a white lab coat is the one seen and shot by Kendra Shaw during a Cylon boarding raid on the Pegasus.
• A copy of Six in a black suit, who acts as "overseer" to the breeding experiment concerning Helo and Sharon Agathon. This copy (or a similar one) is killed by Starbuck when she escapes the farm.
• Copies, clad in gold tunics, who act as "nurses" or "midwives", helping Caprica Six and Boomer through their respective resurrections.
• Two copies that take part in a meeting aboard Colonial One on New Caprica, and agree with the proposal to execute over 200 human detainees. They vote on behalf of the majority of the Number Six model (Caprica Six dissents).
• A raven-haired copy, dying from a disease aboard a basestar, whom Baltar strangles after she hysterically accuses him of deliberately leading them to the disease-carrying beacon.
• A copy from "Faith" aboard the damaged Basestar. She recognizes crew-member Jean Barolay as a resistance fighter from New Caprica who gagged her, threw her into a septic tank and watched her drown. After Barolay tells her she'd be happy to do it again, the copy attacks and kills her. Shortly afterwards she is shot and killed by another Six copy, Natalie.
• A copy named Lida who comforts Gaius Baltar in Blood on the Scales.
• A copy named Sonja who has been elected to represent the Cylons in the Quorum. She requests that Roslin and Adama hand over Boomer in order to try her for treason against the Cylons.
• Multiple Sixes are seen as pilots of Cylon Heavy Raiders working alongside Galactica pilots in Faith and Someone to Watch Over Me.

Casting

Tricia Helfer was cast after a strong audition, despite some initial concerns over her lack of acting experience. Director Michael Rymer explains:

"It wasn't just the way she looked; she just has this vibe about her. Nobody gets how hard that role is, to bring the depth, the vulnerability and the mystery to essentially a robot chick."

Reception

In 2006, Tricia Helfer was awarded the Leo Award for "Best Lead Performance by a Female in a Dramatic Series" for her role as Number Six in the episode "Pegasus".

See also

• List of women warriors in folklore, literature, and popular culture

External links

• Number Six at Battlestar Wiki
• Gina Inviere at Battlestar Wiki
• Caprica-Six at Battlestar Wiki
• Natalie at Battlestar Wiki
• Gateworld biography
• Tricia Helfer interviewed on spacecast.com ::On acting like a machine|::On watching the show

• Caprica.ie - BSG, Caprica & Sci-fi fan site