See the war that started it all.

Genre: Action, Drama, Sci-Fi
Director: Félix Enríquez Alcalá
Role: Number Six / Gina Inviere
Other Cast: Edward James Olmos, Jamie Bamber, Mary McDonnell, Michelle Forbes, Grace Park, James Callis, Stephanie Jacobsen, Katee Sackhoff, Michael Hogan, Aaron Douglas
Release Date: U.S., November 24 2007 (TV)
MPAA Motion Picture Rating: This movie is not yet rated.

• Overview
• Memorable Number Six Quotations
• Said of Battlestar Galactica: Razor
• Battlestar Galactica: Razor Movie Trivia
• Critical Reception
• Battlestar Galactica: Razor Online

More Razor images of Tricia in our Battlestar Galactica: Razor Photo Gallery!

Battlestar Galactica: Razor tells the story of the first mission of Lee ‘Apollo’ Adama (Bamber) as commander of the battlestar Pegasus. Flashbacks interleaved with the main story show what happened to Pegasus during and after the Cylon attack on the Twelve Colonies, as well as some events at the end of the First Cylon War. The main story and most of the flashbacks focus on Lt. Kendra Shaw (Jacobsen), who joins Pegasus as aide to Admiral Helena Cain (Forbes) just before the Cylons strike.

* * * *

Tricia Helfer portrays Gina Inviere, a copy of the humanoid Cylon Number Six and a Cylon infiltrator in the Pegasus crew. Tricia also appears briefly in the film as an unnamed blonde copy of Number Six.

Gina first appears in the Battlestar Galactica series in its second season imprisoned, abused and evidently gang-raped by Pegasus’ interrogation officers after having been somehow implicated as a Cylon and caught. For more information on these events, please see our page on Battlestar Galactica.

In Battlestar Galactica: Razor, Gina is revealed to have been a systems analyst on the Pegasus as well as Admiral Cain’s secret lesbian love interest. Gina’s cover is compromised, however, when Lt. Shaw accidentally happens upon a blonde copy of Six boarding the Pegasus with a troop of Cylon Centurions. From the identical physical appearances of Gina and the Six, Shaw quickly realizes the connection and immediately moves to out Gina in front of Admiral Cain and everyone in the Pegasus CIC. Realizing her cover has been blown, Gina quickly seizes a gun and manages to kill two Marines, but then hesitates to shoot Cain, giving Shaw an opportunity to knock her out. When she is again next seen, Gina is chained to the floor of a prison cell while a resentful Admiral Cain orders Lieutenant Thorne to interrogate her and employ “degradation, fear, [and] shame” as he best sees fit.

“Looking for the CIC?… You got that ‘new-officer-meaning-to-report-to her-CO’ look down cold.”

“You certainly set a beautiful table.”

“As they say, the best defense is a good offense.”

“Here I thought we were being so discreet. Guess that’s hard when you truly care for someone.”

“To satisfy your curiosity, we met a few months ago when I presented the plans for the retrofit. We spent a lot of time together working out the details and I guess one thing led to the other.”

“She has needs, just like the rest of us. No one can survive entirely on their own. Trust me, Lieutenant. In the end, we’re all just human.”

Select quotations regarding the film from Tricia Helfer and her co-workers: Coming soon/not available.

• One early script idea featured a flashback revealing the character Samuel T. Anders (portrayed by Michael Trucco) as a professional Pyramid player. This was later omitted due to budget and time constraints, and Anders does not make an appearance in Razor.

• Prior to airing on TV, Razor was shown in theaters in select cities to pre-registered fans.

• Ronald D. Moore and David Eick initially hesitated to reveal the lesbian affair between Gina and Admiral Cain, feeling that portraying the first high-profile gay relationship in the Galactica universe between two villainous characters might be taken as a homophobic statement. They decided to proceed when they ultimately felt that the relationship would be portrayed in a positive light, with Gina unable to kill Cain at an opportune moment, and Cain’s heartbreak leading to her descent into madness.

Battlestar Galactica: Razor got only a very limited theatrical “fan” release in the U.S. in mid-November 2007 before premiering on television on November 24, and has therefore scarcely at all been reviewed by professionals. The film was nevertheless generally favorably received by fans of the reimagined series.

• Rating > Internet Movie Database: 7.7/10 (5,700 user votes counted)
• Rating > MetaCritic: No rating (professional)
• Rating > Rotten Tomatoes: No rating (professional)

Extracts from professional reviews:

“Razor begins slowly, but soon builds up and pounds you with nearly non-stop action and excitement for a solid hour. Aside from last season’s premiere, this is the largest cavalcade of battles we’ve seen in BSG for a long while. It’s a welcome change for those who felt the mid-end of season 3 plodded along just a bit too much. Have no fear, there is a lot of action in Razor, and it will hold you until the very end. Ronald Moore and the crew working on the show have not lost their touch with brilliant storytelling weaved into a battle heavy showpiece. In fact, you could say that the writer and director of Razor found the magic that still leaves season one as the best in the shows history.”
- Steve West, Cinema Blend

“Galactica has been a pleasant surprise from the get-go, reimagining the fluffy ’70s incarnation into a probing examination of ethics, mistrust and values that cleverly parallels a post-Sept. 11 age. With its innovative web components, minisodes and now Razor‘s theatrical play, the efforts to capitalize on the zealous sci-fi fan base have been equally impressive — the ultimate corporate good soldier, quietly helping NBC Universal in the quest to navigate toward its own brave new world.”
- Brian Lowry, Variety

“The ‘razors’ referred to here aren’t ships or weapons but warriors stripped of fear and all ethical qualms. These “heroes” are asked to commit inhuman atrocities if necessary, in order to vanquish the apocalyptic threat posed by the robotic Cylon menace. [...] Razor is as thrilling as it is sobering and disturbing, a potent combination that leaves us eagerly awaiting Galactica‘s fourth and regrettably final season next year.”
- Matt Roush, TV Guide

Awards & Nominations

Battlestar Galactica: Razor has received a total of 1 award and 2 award nominations.

Awards:
• Visual Effects Society Award (2008) — Outstanding Visual Effects in a Broadcast Miniseries, Movie or Special

Nominations:
• Hugo Award (2008) — Best Dramatic Presentation, Televised
• Saturn Award (2008) — Best Presentation on Television

Personal Thoughts

Sandra: Season 3 of Battlestar Galactica was a bit of a disappointment for me personally, so I was really pleased to see the screenwriters return to the less religious and more dramatic themes of the earlier seasons in Battlestar Galactica: Razor. Admiral Cain’s Pegasus was definitely one of the most interesting stories in the series (S2), so this was a most welcome chapter in the BSG saga all around.

As always on BSG, Tricia is great as Razor‘s Gina, even though she neither gets a lot to say nor a lot of screen time; much like 2009′s The Plan, Razor is first and foremost a backstory to previously unexplained events, and the focus is throughout on the one-off character Lt. Shaw. Gina does get a couple of delicious punchlines, though, and her history was also something I for one was happy to see revealed. For anyone not familiar with the BSG series, though, Razor is not the right place to start, as it simply requires too much knowledge regarding the series up to that point to be fully understood.

Below are some Battlestar Galactica: Razor related links that may be of interest to you.

• Battlestar Galactica: Razor official site
• Battlestar Galactica: Razor TFL-approved fanlisting
• Battlestar Galactica: Razor TFL-approved Gina character fanlisting
• Battlestar Galactica: Razor TFL-approved Number Six character fanlisting
• Battlestar Galactica: Razor on IMDb.com
• Battlestar Galactica: Razor on RottenTomatoes.com
• Battlestar Galactica: Razor on Wikipedia.org

• Félix Enríquez Alcalá on IMDb.com
• Félix Enríquez Alcalá on Wikipedia.org

• Edward James Olmos on EdwardJamesOlmos.com
• Grace Park on Grace Park Fan
• Grace Park on Grace Park Online
• James Callis on The James Callis Website
• Jamie Bamber on Jamie Bamber Web
• Katee Sackhoff on KateeSackhoff.com
• Katee Sackhoff on Katee Fan
• Michelle Forbes on MichelleForbes.net
• Stephanie Jacobsen on Stephanie Jacobsen Fan