Jane Espenson

"Battlestar Galactica" rumor confirmed: Yep, someone is gay!

The blogosphere has been abuzz for several weeks now with news the Battlestar Galactica was going to finally add a gay male character (or two) when the show debuts their new "The Face of the Enemy" webisodes starting this Friday.

Well, I just watched the first two webisodes and I can confirm the speculation is true. Find out who is gay and what happens with them after the jump. But only click through if you don’t want to be spoiled about the reveal or the two webisodes!

I’m sure it won’t come as much of a surprise that the two gay characters are Lt. Felix Gaeta (Alessandro Juliani) and Lt. Hoshi (Brad Dryborough). So how does the big gay reveal occur? Do Felix and Hoshi host a Mama Mia! sing-along? Do the Twelve Colonies try to pass their own Proposition 8?

Fortunately, the answer is neither.

We actually learn Felix and Hoshi are a couple in the very first webisode when Colonel Tigh sends Gaeta away for some rest and relaxation. As Felix is leaving the deck, he runs into Hoshi. Felix apologizes for leaving on such short notice but Hoshi only says "Go. Feel better. I’ll be waiting." The two then share a brief but sweet kiss indicating they have been a couple for quite some time.

Felix then departs in a shuttlecraft along with a number of other folks, but something goes wrong during the jump and the group finds themselves lost.

In the second webisode, Hoshi — frantic after Felix has been missing for two days — goes to Colonel Tigh and asks for a shuttlecraft to go hunting for Felix. Colonel Tigh says no, but Hoshi is insistent, saying "I know, I know I can find Felix. Me and Felix ... there has been too much loss already." Tigh then says he’ll see what he can do.

During that long pause it seemed quite clear Hoshi was struggling with how much to reveal about his relationship with Felix and that Tigh was unaware they were a couple. Hoshi’s hesitancy to tell him raises all sorts of interesting questions including how long the two men have been together, how they met and so forth.

Based on the first two webisodes, I’m pleased with what the show is doing and where it might going with this storyline. It was nice to see the characters kiss right away rather than making us wait and it was even nicer to see Hoshi taking an active part in finding Felix in the second webisode. Frankly, after they kissed and Felix left, I was annoyed that the two characters were immediately separated and that it seemed like Hoshi would vanish. Instead, it appears that he is going to play a part in the webisodes and that will be something refreshing to see.

There are a couple of other items that occur in the webisodes that I’m not mentioning here so as not to spoil all the surprises. But two in particular could play out in interesting ways in regards to Felix and Hoshi’s relationship — or not at all.

While I am very glad the show has taken this step, I still have to ask why it took so long and why it had to happen on the webisodes rather than on the show itself. With any luck perhaps we’ll see the two when the show returns in January.

"The Face of the Enemy" webisodes premiere this Friday at noon on the show’s website and two new webisodes air each Friday until the show returns on January 16th for the final ten regular episodes.