Justin Posted March 6, 2019 Report Share Posted March 6, 2019 Any Battlestar Galactica fans here? I always loved the original.To me this was the first time a Sci-Fi television show was put on the air with the production value of a feature film. I always thought it was tragic that the series was canceled after the first season. The Battlestar Galactica reboot of course was tremendously successful during the 2000s. I was more a fan of the original series but would love to hear from all Battlestar fans! Sabertooth 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrekMD Posted March 7, 2019 Report Share Posted March 7, 2019 (edited) Oh I loved Galactica, both original and new. The original has a special magic to it, though. Apparently Galactica is getting another reboot as a movie. Battlestar Galactica Movie Reboot Taps Jay Basu As Writer I just ordered a model of the original Galactica from Eaglemoss that is being released: Galactica (TOS) Edited March 7, 2019 by TrekMD Justin, Sabertooth and RickR 3 Quote 🖖 Going to the final frontier, gaming... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RickR Posted March 7, 2019 Report Share Posted March 7, 2019 It was a great show for sure. I'm one of those that really loved the "new" version a lot more than the old. Removing all the "kiddie" elements really took it to a new level IMO. Plus, it was great that they were able to take their time and actually finish the story this time. Justin and Sabertooth 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justin Posted March 7, 2019 Author Report Share Posted March 7, 2019 49 minutes ago, RickR said: It was a great show for sure. I'm one of those that really loved the "new" version a lot more than the old. Removing all the "kiddie" elements really took it to a new level IMO. Plus, it was great that they were able to take their time and actually finish the story this time. I don't doubt that. Especially regarding the "kiddie" elements. I've never seen much of the "new" version. I've said over in our Star Trek thread that the "kiddie" elements were some of my biggest complaints about Voyager. I loved DS9 and knowing Ronald D. Moore and some of the DS9 guys were behind the reboot of Battlestar Galactica made me think they probably took things to a new level and did a good job with really involved storytelling and long arcs. I'm glad to hear that you liked it, I'll have to check it out. I'm always hesitant with reboots but this sounds good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrekMD Posted March 7, 2019 Report Share Posted March 7, 2019 Oh, the reboot is definitely worth watching. I'm curious about yet another reboot as a movie franchise now. I hope they do it well. Justin 1 Quote 🖖 Going to the final frontier, gaming... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RickR Posted March 7, 2019 Report Share Posted March 7, 2019 It has been a few years since I watched the reboot, but I loved it at the time. I'd highly recommend it. The big problem, though, is that re-watchability is zero. You are correct in predicting the long story arcs, and there are also a lot of surprise twists. Once you know what's coming, it kind of loses the appeal. But maybe that's just me. Justin 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sabertooth Posted March 7, 2019 Report Share Posted March 7, 2019 (edited) I am a fan of both the original and reboot. The original is just good campy fun. The reboot is much more serious with a deep story and top notch performances. I've watched the reboot series twice over the years. I also enjoyed the spinoff prequel series Caprica. It's too bad they didn't give Caprica a shot at a second season. Sci-Fi (SyFY) cancels so many good shows! Edited March 7, 2019 by atarilbc Justin and RickR 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Stilphen Posted March 19, 2019 Report Share Posted March 19, 2019 (edited) There's a great documentary about it that was done in 2003: As well as a couple retrospect videos about the original and the BG 1980 'sequel': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Af6wuq0h6Fc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RWpZlin6so Personally I loved the show when it first came out. Here was a show that boasted the same special effects that were in Star Wars, with ships flying around in space having laser battles. The sequence showing a Viper ship launching and hitting Turbo was also cool to see (at first..). The main characters Apollo (perfect scifi name, given the Apollo moon missions were still recent enough) and Starbuck (basically Han Solo, complete with laser pistol) were interesting enough, not to mention the bevy of beauties that were always around them. There was even a robotic dog (which was actually a monkey in a costume!). The effects were done by John Dykstra - the same person who headed Lucas' Industrial Light and Magic division which created the special effects for Star Wars. Dykstra left ILM before SW was released, and set up his own special effects company, Apogee, with a few ex-ILM folks, and the first project they worked on was BG. Seeing screens showing squadrons of Cylons and Vipers in vector graphics was also very reminiscent of Star Wars. The show borrowed from Fred Saberhagen's Berzerker series of stories, which tell about an ongoing war between humanity and the Berserkers - self-replicating war machines programmed with one main objective: destroy all life. They were created by the Builders, who were humanoids with a single, 'sliding' eye. Both found their way into Battlestar Galactica in the form of the Cylons and their Base Stars. The Cylon's sliding red eye and monotone voice was the stuff of nightmares to a kid back then It was a great audio and visual effect, which were used in Stern's Berzerk (the sliding red eye also appeared again in another show, Knight Rider). It's a shame the series was cancelled after 1 season, but watching the show years later, it's not hard to see why it was cancelled. After seeing the same handful of special effects footage shown repeatedly, and the same Viper ship launching and "turbo-ing", you realize where most of the budget went (ironically, Dykstra left ILM over Lucas being upset with the effects being over budget and over time. Have to wonder if the same issues doomed BG). Plus the stories run the gambit from very entertaining to very poor. The followup (BG 1980) was just awful, save for maybe the last episode (featuring Starbuck and the Cylons), which was certainly "too little, too late", though there was one special effect from the show that was noteworthy - the time travel visual effect. You've seen the same effect before, in Atari's Star Wars arcade game, when you destroy the Death Star. Atari had plans to create a laserdisc game based on the show, but the project only went as far as this test footage that was assembled: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoUwU6dqSsQ Notice the intro shows a similar "flying through rings" effect Mattel nearly had the first BG video game. Space Battle for the Intellivision (and Space Attack for the VCS) was to be that game, but someone failed to realize they only had the license for electronic games, not video games. The graphics were left unchanged, which is why the enemy ships look like Cylon Raiders. But BG actually influenced another game the year before - Atari's seminal Star Raiders. The game has the player battling the Zylons, with the fighters using Star Wars' Tie-Fighters and the same BG Base Stars: Edited March 21, 2019 by Scott Stilphen RickR, Justin and MaximumRD 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MaximumRD Posted March 21, 2019 Report Share Posted March 21, 2019 Loved everything about the original, was not much a fan of the newer series. Justin 1 Quote I am Rob aka MaximumRD aka OldSchoolRetroGamer and THIS is my world http://about.me/maximumrd "For you, the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me, it was Tuesday." - M. Bison Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MaximumRD Posted March 22, 2019 Report Share Posted March 22, 2019 Another take : Justin 1 Quote I am Rob aka MaximumRD aka OldSchoolRetroGamer and THIS is my world http://about.me/maximumrd "For you, the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me, it was Tuesday." - M. Bison Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justin Posted March 25, 2019 Author Report Share Posted March 25, 2019 Here's a nice video of Battlestar Galactica creator Glen A. Larson discussing the production of the show, and drawing on different religions and Earth's cultures to create the series' mythology. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justin Posted March 26, 2019 Author Report Share Posted March 26, 2019 A little more from Glen Larson about the inception of the original Battlestar Galactica: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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