"You're the 5th"

photo by Randee St. Nicholas for the L.A. Times.

In The Los Angeles Times Geoff Boucher has an exciting and interesting interview with Kate Vernon.

Kate reveals that she's held the secret Ron Moore told her for quite some time:

All of this was a tremendous surprise considering Ellen was poisoned to death in Season 3, but with the Cylons, the usual rules of mortality don't apply. Vernon is thrilled to be back. Her character was originally written for a four-episode arc, but she endured and became a key character -- until she was murdered by her on-screen husband.

"I wasn't done with the character," Vernon moaned. "They killed me off. I was devastated. Why me? What did I do wrong?"

A small reprieve came when executive producer Ron Moore told her she would return as a dark vision of her husband's tortured mind, but Vernon resigned herself to the fact that her role in "one of the greatest shows ever made" was over. Then, on an especially wrenching afternoon many months ago, she got a phone call.

"I was crawling down Sepulveda and I had just come from a therapy session and I was crying, my eyes were swollen like clam eyes, and I was hanging on my steering wheel wondering what was going on in my life and my career. The phone rang. It was Ron's assistant."

For the next 45 minutes (traffic was bad) Moore explained that Ellen would return as a centerpiece presence. "Now I'm in seven of the last nine, and they are just absolutely brilliant. I can't tell you how good they are," she said.

Kate and Ron also talked to The Deadbolt about how trilled she was to return to BSG for the last episodes.

The L.A. Times also responded to reader complaints about their article, which ran a front page photo of Vernon in the Calendar section, with a large headline and with no spoiler warning. The L.A. Times responded:

"We really did think about it, but the story was too good to pass up for the few people who would inevitably be mad at us," says TV editor Kate Aurthur. She explained: "Entertainment journalism is a competitive medium, and this was a huge exclusive scoop for us. We took great pains to make sure it didn't export to the Web early by accident, and even held the Web version up so it published after the episode aired Pacific Time (letting our East Coast competitors perhaps get the jump on us, but out of consideration for Sci Fi's wishes and our core readers in California)." As for a reader who sarcastically asked if editors were aware that some readers record shows to watch later, Aurthur responds, "Though we certainly know that many readers have DVRs, we can't hold back on our coverage when something very important happens on a show people love. We must assume that people who care the most watch in real time, or close to it."

I have to agree with the Times on this one. This was a major event in the history of the show, so it's logical that it would make big news. My view has always been that once the show airs in the U.S. it's no longer a spoiler, and any embargo on the information can be lifted. At least that's our policy here. There are other sites on the web that specialize in spoilers, and they do a fine job at it. But on Sitrep, after an ep airs, the information is fair game to report and discuss.