On this Day,Thirty-Five Years Ago, A Little Sci-fi Show About Some Humans being Chased By Killer Robots Made It's Debut On ABC; This Was The Creation Of a TV Producer Named Glen Larson; He Began Developing This Idea In the 1960's; At The time, There was really No Market For Space Drama On TV,Because,After All, A Show called 'Star Trek' Only lasted Three Seasons; However, That Show Appealed To The Intellectuals, And Gained A Following That grew Bigger And Stronger as The Years Went by; Then, People saw A Film Called 'Star Wars', Written And Directed by a Upstart Named George Lucas, Which In Many Ways,opened the Flood Gates For Adventures in The Stars.
Glen Larson took His Concept,refined it, And Pitched it To ABC; With The Success Of Star Wars Still Fresh in their Minds, They Jumped At The opportunity, And Greenlit a full season.
At First, The Ratings Were Great; Later,however,They Began To Slip; And, The Network Rethought About This Space series,Which Was Costing them an Astounding One Million Dollars An Episode To Produce; There Were Plans For A Second Season, which Included Legendary Writer Issac Asimov as Science Consultant; Unfortunately,It was Not To Be; Due To The rising Cost of FX ,And A Court Battle Between Universal And 20th Century Fox Over Alleged Plagiarism, The Series Was Cancelled.
A Year Later,STAR TREK,The Show It's Fans Would Not let Die,Hit The Big Screen,And Confirmed It's Becoming A Franchise. In The Meantime,The Loyal Following The Glen Larson series Had cultivated,was Beginning To Grow,And Mature;Biding It's Time in wait For The Day That Their Saga Would return.
Fast Forward 14 years Later: The First Three chapters Of the Star Wars saga Are rolling out; The Trek Franchise,After 10 Films,And Four more TV Series,Was For the Moment,Running out of steam. A Writer Named Ronald D. Moore,Who Had Written For The Trek Franchise, Took The Larson saga,And Updated It For The Next Generation Of Fans; He Radically changed Many of the details,Including Genders of Some of The Main Characters; He Made The New version Of The saga Much more Darker,And Grittier, In keeping With the New Realities Of Life Today. Many Who remember the old,did Not Accept The New,Until They Took a Second look; The Story Was Still the Same: A Race Of Humans,Engaged In A War With Human-like Machines,having lost the war,Are now on The run To Find A Haven - A Planet Called EARTH.
Looking Back on this wonderful Thing we Call BATTLESTAR GALACTICA, There is No Doubt,It Has Gained A Following Equal To Star Wars,And Star Trek; And, even though There Are Many More Sci-Fi sagas, Such as Stargate,And Walking Dead, No One Will Doubt That 'BSG' Will Continue To thrive,As long as All generations Will Have access To These Stories,And Make their own.
With that Being said,Who Else is going To Watch The Original Pilot On DVD Tonight?
Leonidas,CAG,BFC-002
Comments
If you ever decide to purchase Caprica, don't buy the miniseries; it's in the box. I got stuck on that one as well.
I Actually Did That,Bought The Miniseries; Ah,What The Hell! When It First Premiered In Dec.'03,I Actually recorded it On VHS! That was Before I began Converting To DVD!
I don't have the original BSG series on DVD although I plan to get it one of these days. I made the mistake of buying the re-imagined mini series separately. The mini series is included if you buy one of the complete series box sets. I think it's a trick they played to increase sales. I also have The Plan and Blood and Chrome. The Re-imagined BSG box set I have is the one with the Centurion figure in the top of the box. Razor started off season 4 and I was happy that it was in the season 4 box so I didn't have to purchase it separately.
I liked Caprica because it tells the story behind how the Cylons came into existence. What I liked most about Caprica was and being able to see the Adama family before William Adama as we know him was born.
I have the Entire original series,Including Galactica '80,On DVD; I also have the RDM series,Including Razor,The Plan,and Blood And Chrome; For Me, The Jury's Still out on Caprica.
I was 18 at the time and I never missed an episode. It's amazing that while the new BSG was on the air, I only got to see one night of the mini series; totally opposite from the original BSG. I was a full time college student and I didn't have any time for TV. The years went by and I was given a free month of Netflix from my sister in law. I found the re-imagined BSG series and quickly fell in Love with it. Since them I have purchased it on DVD and I also have Caprica on DVD.
NetFlix has all three BSG series and Caprica as well. If you do NetFlix streaming like I do, it only costs $7.99 a month. Give it a try, you'll be glad you did!!!!!
SO SAY WE ALL! ! ! ! !
I Was About 11 yrs. old At the Time It was On primetime; when I heard It got cancelled,I was like " They Can't do that!"; Then, when Galactica 1980 Came out, I Got excited again; Unfortunately,It Went into An Entirely New direction.
Thank you; Thought I would Commemorate The Beginning Of What We All Enjoy Here.
great article.