Battlestar Galactica DVD Movie In the Works?

Philias writes "Although Battlestar Galactica has been going down in ratings and has yet to get picked up for another season, the sales of its DVDs has got Universal thinking of a Direct-To-Video Movie. GeekMonthly.com is reporting that plans are afoot for a film that will bridge the gap between Galactica and the new spinoff 'Caprica.' The film would be shot in March during the usual hiatus between seasons. The big difference between this and the mini-series and other seasons would be that this would be sold on DVD before being aired on the SciFi channel."

Comments

Interesting

[agent dero]

"plans are afoot for a film that will bridge the gap between Galactica and the new spinoff 'Caprica.' The film would be shot in March during the usual hiatus between seasons."

"Unfortunately, nobody will be paid for any part of it."

No surprise ratings are falling.

[guidryp]

I am a huge fan of BSG, and have watched every episode since the mini series, but I am not surprised the ratings are in decline. This season has lost it's way. Baltar was great when he was among the humans with the cylon in his head frakking with his brain. Now among the cylons he is quite uninteresting.

Other than that they really seem to be pushing the preachy morality play of the week. I think the listened too much to the critics who liked them touching "real issues" and now they have gone overboard on the "real issues" and the story and characters seem to be suffering, so much so that I have a hard time buying their actions. It is just not as good this season. I hope they get back to form soon.

They shouldn't try to drag this on endlessly, when the story is over they should stop and not inject filler seasons that increasingly make it unrealistic. I would rather have 3 or 4 good season ended properly rather than dragged out mediocre 5 or 6 seasons.

I expect modding down from fans who will claim it is better than ever.

Re:No surprise ratings are falling.

[TheRaven64]

Baltar was great when he was among the humans with the cylon in his head frakking with his brain. Now among the cylons he is quite uninteresting I find with season 3 that the episodes which spend more time on the Cylon base ship are more interesting. It seems that without Baltar, the human survivors are just much less interesting than the Cylons...

Re:No surprise ratings are falling.

[Altima(BoB)]

I find with season 3 that the episodes which spend more time on the Cylon base ship are more interesting. It seems that without Baltar, the human survivors are just much less interesting than the Cylons... I dunno, I feel the opposite way on this. The cylons were most imposing and effective as antagonists around the begining of the series, when they were mostly faceless (Just the imposing base stars and fighters seen) and were making small, insidious encroachments on organic humanity, like Sharon. "33" was especially effective because even their tactics seemed like brute force mechanical thinking with infinite patience.

Now they seem too human, too emotionally vulnerable and the base star's interior just seems like a space that's too large and relaxing. And seeing base stars filled with Xena's and Tricia Helfer's is somewhat detracting. Though the cylons I really really like are the Dean Stockwell ones and the Grace Park ones. Whereas Lucy Lawless' and Tricia Helfer's cylon characters have grown somewhat flat to me, the other two mentioned represent a lot more of the sadistic cylon determination (Stockwell) and the schitzophrenic identity crisis that organic cylons are bound to have (All those Sharons)

I listen to the podcast commentaries a lot and Ronald D Moore, the producer, openly acknowledges a lot of these issues, that whatever cylon sets they built wouldnt never live up to peoples' imaginations and that revealing more and more about the cylons was always simply too tempting for them as authors. I can appreciate that, but I still think they were perhaps incorrect choices.

What I think they should do with this current arc they are doing is to give Baltar back to the Galactica. The only problem with that is considering how enthusiastically they've ejected people out of airlocks for less, keeping him alive on Galactica would be difficult to do believably. Maybe strand him on the algea planet with someone like the Chief... Also, while another election episode would be rather dull, Laura has stayed in powr through so many unlikely twists that to remove her from power within the fleet would put her character in an interesting position.

For the record, I still think it's the best drama on television, and easily soars above the 99% of TV that's just utter cultural garbage.

Re:No surprise ratings are falling.

[PsychoSlashDot]

That's one opinion, and it's not a horrible one, but there is another way to look at things.

Every episode the writers add new canon. They reveal new aspects of characters, back-story, colonial religion, Cylon goals, and secrets about Earth. The problem is that this show started off with a huge bang, and due to its uniqueness and high quality, a lot of viewers "fell in love" with various aspects of the characters or plot or even style of presentation. Today, it's virtually inevitable that every episode will introduce some element to "taint" the adoration and respect viewers have. Starbuck's recent behaviour? Helo's? Discovering the Cylons want Earth as well?

I guarantee that when the "Final Five" have their faces revealed, for every fan who says "that's neat!", there'll be some disgruntled soon-to-be-ex-fan who throws his hands up in the air and says "that's not what I would have done".

The show continues to be a very high-quality, well-written and well-acted one. I expect the ratings problem is due much more to unrealistic expectations of many, many fans that BSG will contain nothing but plot elements THEY adore.

Try caring more about what BSG IS instead of what it ISN'T, each episode. What it certainly is, is the best show on television.

Re:No surprise ratings are falling.

[JFMulder]

Actually, I love the fact that the Cylons are getting more human. It's so great because as the series evolve you realise that the humans are being colder and colder and acting more like.... machines.

It's a great reversal of the roles and I'm sure it will even out at some point because

*** SPOILER ALERT DON'T READ IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN LAST EPISODE BEFORE HIATUS ***
William Adama is pretty much willing to nuke the whole fracking planet at this point. It's pretty much a cold decision, considering Earth is in the balance. Maybe now will be a time for the humans to realize what they are turning into and shift their course. The executions "if were not with us on New Caprica you are against us" mentality also was pretty cold. Reminds me of a certain... nah... I won't go into that. :)
**** END SPOILER ***

It's interesting that the heart of the Galactica crew right now is pretty much Shannon (a machine) and her husband. It's also interesting that there is also one Cylon who distinctively thinks like a cold-hearted machine, the preacher, who coldly said last episode "Let's kill them, rid the universe of the human pestilence. We are machines, it doesn't matter if it takes us a 1000 years to find Earth", which, you got to admit, he had a really good point. The only thing preventing this is the other Cylons who are slowly evolving with more human feelings.

I just love how the show plays this, consciously or not. (but I bet the writers knew it all along)

The one thing I miss tough is the deliciously crazy Baltar being tormented by Number Six while he is going around on Galactica and having people look at him funny. And the shocker was realizing the Number Six on her own also had her own suggestive-manipulative-Baltar in her head. That was a great revelation. Too bad they didn't get to play more with this since Baltar is now on the base ship.

Re:No surprise ratings are falling.

[JFMulder]

I think Baltar's Number Six and the reborn Number Six is not the same character at all. The Number Six inside Baltar's head is far more manipulative and dangerous than the flesh and bolts one. To me, the reborn Number Six takes her decisions based on her feelings towars Baltar and the human race, while Baltar's (whose is trying to please Baltar, I mean, it's still his fantasy after all) is there to provoke him and has less emotions than the flesh and bolts one.

As for Batlar being a Cylon himself, while an interesting idea (Baltar is even pondering the notion now), it would be anti-climatic, because it's such an interesting burden (for the viewer) to be responsible for the genocide of your race. It's a great burden to carry. It was great to have a delusional Baltar and it would have been for nothing if he is indeed a Cylon. One interresting plot twist tough would be if he turned to believe he is one and commited suicide to prove his point and we then realize he wasn't. That would be the perfect ending for this character I think. Or if the show ends with the destruction of the Cylons and he last ressurection ship, you end up with a lone Baltar without any ressurection ship to revive him if he is indeed one and you have him on the fringe of death and he will never know if was a Cylon indeed. Cue credits. :)

How to be stupid

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

I stopped watching BSG this season after the first episode. Not because the story sucks - in fact I really liked that first episode, it was brilliant - but because the picture sucks.

I learned last year that UniversalHD runs the BSG reruns after 6 months or so, in high def. So, now I am just going to wait it out until the show is available in HD.

I think Universal is just frackin stupid to run the premier episodes in crap-def on the sci-fi channel. If there is a single demographic most likely to own HDTVs and actively seek out HD shows, it is the one that watches BSG. They need to get their shit together and simulcast the show in HD, not make us wait 6+ months for it.

What did they expect?

[dgatwood]

I'm not sure what Sci-Fi expects ratings to do when they run what amounts to half a season of episodes, call it a season, and run them the better part of a year apart. TV audiences of the TiVo generation have shown that they're not content to just watch reruns for long periods of time. With decreasing new episode counts, the problem of ratings getting harder and harder to come by shouldn't be a surprise to anyone.

If Sci-Fi wants a show to succeed, they should try a novel approach: go back to a 30+ episode season. These silly little 10- and 13-episode runs are barely long enough to start getting into the action, then bam: 3 month hiatus....

Well I'd Watch It...

[nbannerman]

I'll be honest; the ratings in the UK would be a lot higher if we didn't have such a huge wait. Whilst you in the US are enjoying Series 3, we haven't even started yet.

I watch the US versions, a day after they air. You can work out the rest for yourself. But there is no point viewing on Sci-Fi UK when I've already seen it. If we had parity with the US, or at least something more sensible like a week, the viewing figures would be much higher!

Loss of stargate as a lead-in

[Joe The Dragon]

Loss of stargate as a lead-in is pulling the ratings down.

Lose the shakeycam

[PhotoGuy]

I loved the original series, but can't watch the new stuff because of the excess use of shakey cam. We *get* it, yes, it seems more "real" with shakey cam. But it's also very annoying and overused. If I want to turn my head in a jerky fashion, I will, do it by making something else on the screen interesting; don't make the camera do it for me. I find it very patronizing, pretentious, and faddish and I wish producers would stop using it. Let the material show its strength, unobscured by a shaky camera.