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Battlestar Galactica Resurrection Effort Described
MistGhost writes "A background story of the effort, both by Richard Hatch, and Ron Moore to resurrect Battlestar Galactica (NYT link so remember to lie on their free registration). Now that the show has started it's second season (at least here in the States) this article appears. " I sat down with the Tivo last night and really enjoyed the premiere. I think the SG-1 retooling as real potential too- that show has been stale for a long time.
Or the same viper shot peeling away to the left or right just by reversing the footage.
Or the uses of the Apollo command module seperating from the third stage as a missle launch
My Dad insisted there was some footage from an old disaster movie or two tossed in there
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
The one thing I love about BG is that the spaceships are physically accurate. They have thrusters all over the ships in different directions to subtly change course and they conserve momentum. When an enemy is behind them they just use the thrusters to flip around and shoot backwards.
I remember cringing in Stargate when they expressed a ship's top speed in miles per hour.
After being disappointed when Babylon-5 and Farscape went away I remember wondering if there was EVER going to be another Sci-fi series like those two.
The BEST scifi (and fantasy) explores the human condition in situations that cannot or do not exist today. In this way an author is able to explore aspects of emotion and dichotomy by creating situations which bring seemingly unrelated ideas into conflict. Even in sci-fi with Aliens there will always be a "human" anthromorphic undertone or the Alien will have characteristics of Terran life (mental or physical since currently humans have no real evidence of what a REAL alien would look or think like). Ron Moore Understands this.
If you take out exploring the human condition...then you get a show with lots of cool equipment and places but is easily forgettable.
This is why I think sci-fi/fantasy is a VERY interesting genre. They are limited only by imagination...but are ALWAYS about humans (US) because they come from human imagination.
On a different track....I'm particularly impressed with SG Atlantis. Usually it takes a season or two for me to become "comfortable" with the characters (case in point...Voyager took 3 seasons)..but after just one season the characters on Atlantis have "jelled" and are interesting. This is a GOOD thing! I'm conflicted about them contacting earth so soon though it might have been more interesting if they had kept them back for a couple of seasons.
Its to be seen if the addition of the stars from Farscape will breath new life into Stargate SG-1...but I'm hopeful since both actors have shown they know their craft from Farscape. Remember that Law and Order has shown that a show can go on indefinitely if you rotate actors in over time that are good. I would not be surprised if SG-1 tries for this (or Atlantis).
I loved Richard Dean Anderson in Star Gate. If anything, I think they are going to have to pull off some briliant writing to save the show now. I do like that they stole the Farscape cast for the sho and that is a plus, but without that Anderson humor, well, it won't be the same.
I also don't put an once of credit into anything that blowhard Richard Hatch has to say. What a dork he is.
I thought the last couple seasons of SG-1 were really good.
We know the characters. They've developed them all very well. So, they were able to concentrate on the story more instead of character development.
I've always liked how they continue to bring back the re-occuring characters. It really gives you a feeling that the show is "bigger" in a way.
But I like Ben Brower and I like Claudia Black, so I definately think they will bring new life into the show, keeping it going.
The show has definately changed though. Although it's always been a Science Fiction show, it has kept it's feet on the ground of viability. However, now there's spaceships, shields, and super space guns. It's fully engulfed in the SciFi space drama now.
It does make sense though; they've aquired technologies and made friends enough to build space ships and such.
It's a good progession of the show.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
How do you explain the Vulcans? They apparently had space flight for a very long time (thousands of years?) - because of the existence of the Romulans which was lost to all memory. They are physically very robust (long lived, super strong, acute senses), extremely intelligent, highly focused, yet they were only marginally advanced from humans at the time of Cochrane? It just doesn't make sense.
Enterprise grapples with this head-on and satisfyingly, I think. Vulcans are unbelievably arrogant and not particularly curious all leading up to extreme calcification.
I also liked the "Enterprising" way they dealt with the tech they had at hand. I love the grappling hook and the annoying squeek in the Captain's floor.
But... it suffered with a lot of painful extended plotlines and bad writing. I only watched the first few years and then they kept moving it's time around in my market, I lost track of when it was on and didn't care anyway...
Having lived through the 70's I can tell you with onitoligical certitude that US television at the time was a vast, vile, steaming heap of crap.
Got your back on that one. I wish my young brain had not been subjected to Charlies Angels, The Love Boat (ouch), Fantasy Island, Wonder Woman, The Bionic Woman, or The 6 Million Dollar Man. And what was with that whole 70s Bigfoot obsession? Lots of movies and TV shows about it including an episode from The 6 Million Dollar Man and The Night Stalker. Maybe it had something to do with the 70s fascination with supernatural horror (based on Christian mythology). Remember In Search Of with Leonard Nimoy? For me that symbolizes that decades fascination with stuff like that.
Doctor Who with Tom Baker, ST:TOS, and those campy Roger Corman-esque and Japanese (Toho Studios etc.) guy-in-rubber-suit Saturday afternoon monster movies (late 70s) were the high points of that TV era for me. Even cartoons like Speed Racer and Felix the Cat seem less embarrassing than 70s network TV. And the 'good' shows like Night Gallery and Night Stalker would be considered unwatcheable by modern standards. I have heard that there is one TV movie from that era, an ABC Movie of the Week about witches called Crowhaven Farm that stands out as the best television of that era. But it is impossible to find a copy. So I can't confirm it.
I can still remember coming home from school and flipping on my old telly that took more than a minute to 'warm up'. The so called remote had big rectangular buttons that seemed to use a loud clicking sound to turn it on and change the channels. I think simulating the clicking sound could shut the TV off.
Luckily I had a friend with a DEC PDP-11 by the late 70s. So that offered some degree of entertainment in the form of early computer games like Super Star Trek and Adventure (Collosal Cave).
Perhaps the biggest mind-rape of that era was the music and the hideous clothes (which ironically young girls of the current era seem to have copied). A decade that includes the Bee Gees and Barry Manilow playing on 8-track tapes, The Hardy Boys, platform shoes, bell bottoms, velour v-neck and button down shirts with those long pointy lapels, truly is (or should be) an embarrassment for everyone who had to live through it.
Even the feathered hair, skin-tight Jordache jeans, leg warmers (remember Flash Dance?) and synth-pop of the early 80s were a huge step up the evolutionary ladder for western culture. I don't know if it was a worldwide phenomenon or just in North America and Western Europe. I have to wonder what East Asian or South American culture, for instance, was like at that time.
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.