Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series)

Battlestar Galactica
Battlestar Galactica intro
Created by	Glen A. Larson
Starring	Richard Hatch Dirk Benedict Lorne Greene John Colicos Maren Jensen Noah Hathaway Herbert Jefferson Jr. Tony Swartz Laurette Spang Terry Carter Anne Lockhart Jonathan Harris (voice, uncredited)
Composer(s)	Stu Phillips
Country of origin	United States
Original language(s)	English
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	24 (list of episodes)
Production
Running time	45 minutes per episode
Production company(s)	Glen A. Larson Productions Universal Television
Release
Original network	ABC
Original release	September 17, 1978 (1978-09-17) – April 29, 1979 (1979-04-29)
Chronology
Related shows	Galactica 1980 Battlestar Galactica (reimagined series)
External links
[{{#property:P856}} Website]

Battlestar Galactica is an American science fiction television series created by Glen A. Larson that aired on the ABC network from September 17, 1978, to April 29, 1979. It stars an ensemble cast led by Lorne Greene, Richard Hatch, and Dirk Benedict. The series follows a group of humans fleeing the destruction of their homeworlds aboard the titular spacecraft, searching for a new home as they are pursued by the Cylons.

Beginning production as a miniseries, ABC subsequently ordered a full season and the show was reworked as an episodic serial. However, high production costs and declining ratings led to the series' cancellation after 24 episodes. ABC attempted to revive the series as a lower-budget spinoff, Galactica 1980, but it performed poorly and was cancelled after airing ten episodes. Despite initially failing to find a wide audience, Battlestar Galactica developed a 1970s American cult and pop culture following. The show also spawned a media franchise which includes comics, theme park attractions, games, and a reboot series which ran from 2004 to 2009.

Series overview

Battlestar Galactica is an American science fiction television series, produced in 1978 by Glen A. Larson and starring Lorne Greene, Richard Hatch and Dirk Benedict. It lasted one season in 1978–1979, but books were written continuing stories. After cancellation, its story was continued in 1980 as Galactica 1980 with Adama, Lieutenant Boomer (now a colonel in the Colonial Service) and Boxey (now called Troy) being the only continuing characters.

Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series)

The following table lists the episodes of the original Battlestar Galactica.

#	Title	Original airdate	Code
1–3	"Saga of a Star World"	September 17, 1978 (1978-09-17)	50280–2
In a distant part of the cosmos, the human race is embroiled in a thousand-year-long war with the robotic Cylons. Aided by the human traitor Baltar, an armistice turns out to be a ruse by the Cylons who launch a massive surprise attack against the Twelve Colonies of humanity, almost wiping them out. Only the Galactica, led by Commander Adama, and a ragtag fleet of 220 civilian ships survive, beginning a journey across the galaxy in search of long-lost sister civilization Earth. But the Cylons will not rest until every last human has been eliminated, and pursue them across the galaxy.
4	"Lost Planet of the Gods, Part I"	September 24, 1978 (1978-09-24)	50204
With many warriors suffering from an unknown ailment, the Galactica recruits new viper pilots—mostly young women, including Apollo's new bride, Serina. Led by Adama's spiritual interpretations, the fleet enters a vast magnetic void, emerging at the planet Kobol, the legendary world from which humanity originated.
5	"Lost Planet of the Gods, Part II"	October 1, 1978 (1978-10-01)	50205
Before Adama can discover Earth's location from the inscribed hieroglyphs, a Cylon attack destroys the sacred city on Kobol—and claims the life of Serina.
6	"The Lost Warrior"	October 8, 1978 (1978-10-08)	50908
Marooned on a frontier planet, Apollo befriends a young widow and her son, rallying a town against "Red Eye"— a likewise marooned, yet memory-damaged, Cylon centurion gunslinger. The storyline is very much reminiscent of the classic western Shane.
7	"The Long Patrol"	October 15, 1978 (1978-10-15)	50902
After losing an experimental Viper to a smuggler, Starbuck is imprisoned on a penal colony, but this new environment holds a possible clue to the location of Earth.
8	"Gun on Ice Planet Zero, Part I"	October 22, 1978 (1978-10-22)	50206
Herded into a confined area of space by the Cylons, the fleet must pass within close range of a lethal Cylon pulsar cannon—unless an expedition of officers from the Galactica and a team of convicts can penetrate the ice-bound fortress housing the weapon and destroy it.
9	"Gun on Ice Planet Zero, Part II"	October 29, 1978 (1978-10-29)	50207
Apollo, Starbuck, and Boomer lead a team of cut-throat demolitions and cold-weather experts (and the stowaway Boxey). Along the way, they encounter the misguided human scientist who originally built the weapon, as well as his legions of clones.
10	"The Magnificent Warriors"	November 12, 1978 (1978-11-12)	50912
When a Cylon attack destroys the fleet's food supply, Adama and the others must agree to certain compromises with old acquaintances and with the inhabitants of a grain-rich, yet politically turbulent planet.
11	"The Young Lords"	November 19, 1978 (1978-11-19)	50905
Crash-landing on the planet Atilla, Starbuck befriends a group of young siblings trying to free their castle, their planet, and their father from the Cylons.
12	"The Living Legend, Part I"	November 26, 1978 (1978-11-26)	50919
The Galactica is reunited with the Battlestar Pegasus, previously thought destroyed. Led by the brilliant but arrogant Commander Cain, the fleet is torn in its loyalty between Adama and Cain until the human traitor Baltar launches a devastating attack.
13	"The Living Legend, Part II"	December 3, 1978 (1978-12-03)	50920
In order to obtain much-needed fuel, the Galactica and Pegasus join forces in a daring attack on the Cylons. The Pegasus plunges into the teeth of Cylon forces and is either destroyed or "missing in action" after the attack.
14	"Fire in Space"	December 17, 1978 (1978-12-17)	50917
The Galactica is rammed by Cylon Raiders making suicide runs on the main bridge and a landing bay. With Adama lying critically injured and the ship in flames, Boomer and Athena lead a group of survivors in the rejuvenation center, relying on Boxey's robot daggit Muffit to help them.
15	"War of the Gods, Part I"	January 14, 1979 (1979-01-14)	50921
Vipers are disappearing from regular patrols, and mysterious bright lights are flying around the Galactica at immeasurable speed. On an eerie, red-glowing planet, the enigmatic Count Iblis is found, apparently the sole survivor of a major catastrophe.
16	"War of the Gods, Part II"	January 21, 1979 (1979-01-21)	50922
Always shunning the mysterious bright lights, Iblis uses his charm and his supernatural powers to wrest control of the fleet from Adama, but the wiley Commander knows Iblis' key is on the red planet, where Apollo and Starbuck go only to face tragedy and find the answer to the mysterious lights.
17	"The Man with Nine Lives"	January 28, 1979 (1979-01-28)	50916
An old con man, Chameleon, meets Starbuck and cons him into believing he may be his father in order to gain his help in evading a trio of blood-thirsty Borellians who are after him seeking revenge for a previous con. In the process, Starbuck's girlfriend Cassiopeia learns that Chameleon's con may not actually be a con after all.
18	"Murder on the Rising Star"	February 18, 1979 (1979-02-18)	50924
When Starbuck is implicated in a rival triad-player's murder, Apollo and Boomer come to his defense as Protectors. They eventually uncover a plot involving Karibdis, a traitor alongside Count Baltar in the Destruction of the Twelve Colonies.
19, 20	"Greetings from Earth"	February 25, 1979 (1979-02-25)	50926/50947
A ship of humans in suspended animation is found drifting in space. When brought aboard the Galactica, the Colonial leaders debate whether to awaken its occupants. Their ship is eventually escorted by Apollo, Starbuck, and Cassiopeia to the planet Paradeen which is embroiled in a bitter war with the Eastern Alliance.
21	"Baltar's Escape"	March 11, 1979 (1979-03-11)	50927
Baltar escapes from the prison barge by hijacking a shuttle piloted by Boomer and Sheba. Taking advantage of lax security imposed by the new governing council, Baltar kidnaps the council members from a Galactica landing bay and demands to be released.
22	"Experiment in Terra"	March 18, 1979 (1979-03-18)	50928
The mysterious bright lights return again, transporting the bewildered Apollo to the planet Terra to avert war with the Eastern Alliance. Exposing a plan by the devious president, Apollo has Starbuck warn the Galactica, which uses its laser cannon to destroy all the ballistic missiles avoiding planetary holocaust.
23	"Take the Celestra"	April 1, 1979 (1979-04-01)	50929
When Starbuck encounters his long-lost love Aurora, she complicates matters by taking part in a mutinous rebellion aboard the Celestra. Her rebellion, undertaken for a noble cause, is soon overshadowed by a sinister mutiny by Charka, the Celestra's power-hungry second-in-command.
24	"The Hand of God"	April 29, 1979 (1979-04-29)	50930
Receiving a mysterious radio signal possibly from Earth, Adama and the crew are wary of a Cylon trap, and decide to turn the tables by attacking the Cylons with a stolen Cylon Raider. Apollo and Starbuck, in the series finale's last scene, narrowly miss receiving Apollo-11 moon-landing transmissions from Earth.

Feature length films

Between 1978 and 1981, episodes were edited into three feature-length films. The first film, Battlestar Galactica, was an edited version of the pilot "Saga of a Star World", featuring some differences from the original televised episodes, including the death of Baltar. It was released in cinemas in Canada, Australia and continental Europe before its American TV premiere and, in 1979, it was released theatrically in the UK and US. The second film, Mission Galactica: The Cylon Attack, was a re-edited version of the episodes "The Living Legend" and "Fire in Space", which also differed from the broadcast versions, omitting several scenes from both episodes. In 1979, it was released theatrically in continental Europe and Japan, and in the UK and Australia in 1980. The third film, Conquest of the Earth (also called "Galactica III" on the German poster), was a similar edit, though this time its source episodes were from Galactica 1980. It was also released theatrically, in 1981, in Europe and Australia.

Title	Release	Notes
Battlestar Galactica	1978	Edited version of "Saga of a Star World"
Mission Galactica: The Cylon Attack	1979	Merger of "The Living Legend" and "Fire in Space"
Conquest of the Earth	1981	Merger of "Galactica Discovers Earth" and "The Night the Cylons Landed"

Telemovies

Following the cancellation of the series, all of the episodes from the original series were re-edited into telemovies for syndication, including a third edit of the pilot. The four two-part episodes ("Lost Planet of the Gods", "Gun on Ice Planet Zero", "The Living Legend" and "War of the Gods") were all combined and expanded with about five minutes of scenes deleted from the original broadcasts. The remaining single episodes were edited into two hour blocks, combining two episodes into a single narrative, occasionally including over-dubbed dialogue. The final telemovie, an expanded version of "Experiment in Terra" with some scenes from the Galactica 1980 episode "The Return of Starbuck", featured new footage of an astronaut finding Commander Adama's logbook, which retold the premise of the show. It is believed that this version of the episode was to be released as another theatrical film in other countries, but never materialized.

#	Telemovie title	Original Episodes
1	Battlestar Galactica	"Saga of a Star World"
2	Lost Planet of Gods	"Lost Planet of the Gods" (expanded)
3	Gun on Ice Planet Zero	"Gun on Ice Planet Zero" (expanded)
4	The Phantom in Space	"The Hand of God"
5	Space Prison	"The Man with Nine Lives" and "Baltar's Escape"
6	Space Casanova	"The Long Patrol"
7	Curse of the Cylons	"Fire in Space" and "The Magnificent Warriors"
8	The Living Legend	"The Living Legend" (expanded)
9	War of the Gods	"War of the Gods" (expanded)
10	Greetings from Earth	"Greetings from Earth"
11	Murder in Space	"Murder on the Rising Star" and "The Young Lords"
12	Experiment in Terra	"The Return of Starbuck" (edited) and "Experiment in Terra" (expanded)

Galactica 1980

The following table lists the episodes of Galactica 1980. The episodes were later sold as part of the Battlestar Galactica syndication package, with a new introduction sequence.

#	Title	Original airdate	Code
1	"Galactica Discovers Earth (aka Galactica: 1980), Part I"	January 27, 1980 (1980-01-27)	1.1
After 30 years of searching, the Battlestar Galactica and its ragtag fleet locate Earth. However, it soon becomes clear that Earth is not advanced enough to help combat the Cylon fleet that tailed Galactica to Earth. Captain Troy – a grown up version of Boxey – and Lieutenant Dillon end up teaming up with a feisty female reporter from Earth named Jamie Hamilton.
2	"Galactica Discovers Earth (aka Galactica: 1980), Part II"	February 3, 1980 (1980-02-03)	1.2
Commander Xavier steals an experimental Viper capable of time travel and goes back to the 1940s in an attempt to speed up Earth's technological development by giving Colonial technology to the Nazis.
3	"Galactica Discovers Earth (aka Galactica: 1980), Part III"	February 10, 1980 (1980-02-10)	1.3
Jamie, Troy and Dillon travel back in time in pursuit of Xavier, and manage to prevent the Nazis from prematurely developing the V-2 rocket. Xavier escapes, and the others return to 1980, where all three Vipers are discovered by the military.
4	"The Super Scouts, Part I"	March 16, 1980 (1980-03-16)	1.4
The fleet is attacked by Cylons, who destroy the school barge. Troy, Dillon and a shuttle-load of Galactican school children make an emergency landing on Earth.
5	"The Super Scouts, Part II"	March 23, 1980 (1980-03-23)	1.5
The Galactican children attempt to fit in on Earth, and uncover an illegal toxic-waste dumping conspiracy.
6	"Spaceball"	March 30, 1980 (1980-03-30)	1.6
The "Super Scouts" use their superhuman strengths as ringers in a baseball game while Xavier plots their abduction.
7	"The Night the Cylons Landed, Part I"	April 13, 1980 (1980-04-13)	1.7
A new advanced Cylon Raider is shot down over Earth. Two of its five crew survive – a Centurion, and a new, advanced humanoid Cylon – and are loose on Earth during Halloween.
8	"The Night the Cylons Landed, Part II"	April 20, 1980 (1980-04-20)	1.8
Troy and Dillon attempt to kill the Cylons on Earth before they can contact their empire.
9	"Space Croppers"	April 27, 1980 (1980-04-27)	1.9
The Galactican children help a farmer in financial trouble. This is the last episode set on Earth and the final appearance of most of the cast.
10	"The Return of Starbuck"	May 4, 1980 (1980-05-04)	1.10
Told in a series of flashbacks, this episode explains the fate of Lieutenant Starbuck, who crash-landed on a planet with a Cylon Centurion, whom he befriends believing the Centurion to be the only other inhabitant – an assumption that proves false when the Centurion discovers a woman who is on the verge of giving birth to a child and who proves to be a renegade member of the same race as the Seraphs and Count Iblis.

See also

• List of Battlestar Galactica (2004 TV series) episodes

References

In a distant star system, the Twelve Colonies of Mankind were reaching the end of a thousand-year war with the Cylons, warrior robots created by a reptilian race that expired long ago, presumably destroyed by their own creations. Humanity was ultimately defeated in a sneak attack on the colonies by the Cylons, carried out with the help of a human traitor, Baltar. Protected by the last surviving capital warship, a battlestar named Galactica, the survivors fled in available ships. The Commander of the Galactica, Adama, led this "rag-tag fugitive fleet" of 220 ships in search of a new home. They begin a quest to find the longlost thirteenth tribe of humanity that had settled on a legendary planet called Earth. However, the Cylons continue to pursue them relentlessly across the galaxy. The main characters include Captain Apollo, a Colonial fighter pilot who is Adama's son. His best friend is Lieutenant Starbuck, a highly regarded fighter pilot, and also a gambler and womanizer.

The era in which this exodus took place is never clearly stated in the series itself. At the start of the series, it is mentioned as being "the seventh millennium of time", although it is unknown when this is in relation to Earth's history. The final aired episode, "The Hand of God", indicates that the original series took place after the Apollo 11 Moon landing in 1969 as the Galactica receives a television transmission from Earth showing the landing. The later Galactica 1980 series is expressly set in the year 1980 after a 30-year voyage to Earth.

A member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Larson incorporated many themes from Mormon theology into the shows.

Cast and characters

Main article: List of Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series) and Galactica 1980 characters

• Richard Hatch as Captain Apollo
• Dirk Benedict as Lieutenant Starbuck
• Lorne Greene as Commander Adama
• John Colicos as Baltar
• Maren Jensen as Lieutenant Athena
• Noah Hathaway as Boxey
• Herbert Jefferson Jr. as Lieutenant Boomer
• Tony Swartz as Flight Sergeant Jolly
• Laurette Spang as Cassiopeia
• Terry Carter as Colonel Tigh
• Anne Lockhart as Lieutenant Sheba

Pilot and subsequent changes

Main article: Saga of a Star World

The pilot, budgeted at $8 million (one of the most expensive at that time), was theatrically released in Sensurround. An edited version was released on July 8, 1978, in several regions including Canada, Japan, and select Western European countries.

On September 17, 1978, the full 148-minute pilot premiered on ABC to high Nielsen ratings. Two–thirds of the way through the broadcast, ABC interrupted with a special report of the signing of the Camp David Accords at the White House by Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, witnessed by U.S. President Jimmy Carter. Following the ceremony, ABC resumed the broadcast at the point where it was interrupted. This interruption did not occur on the West Coast. After the pilot aired, the 125-minute theatrical version received a nationwide theatrical release in May 1979.

The pilot had originally been announced as the first of three television films. After broadcast of the second episode, "Lost Planet of the Gods", however, Larson announced the format change to a weekly series, catching his writing and production staff off guard. This resulted in several 'crash of the week' episodes until other scripts could resume. "Lost Planet" also introduced a costume change from the original, in that the warriors' dress uniform featured a gold-trimmed cape falling to upper thigh. Because of the costume change, a portion of the pilot was reshot; this refilmed version was released in cinemas in 1979. The original version of the warriors' dress uniform, a plain, mid-thigh-length cape, is documented in The Official Battlestar Galactica Scrapbook by James Neyland, 1978.

Legal troubles

In 1978, 20th Century Fox (producers of Star Wars) sued Universal Studios (producers of Battlestar Galactica) for plagiarism, copyright infringement, unfair competition, and Lanham Act claims, alleging Galactica had stolen 34 distinct ideas from Star Wars. Universal promptly countersued, claiming Star Wars had stolen ideas from their 1972 film Silent Running, notably the robot "drones", and the 1930s Buck Rogers serials. Fox's copyright claims were initially dismissed by the trial court in 1980, then the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit remanded the case for trial in 1983. It was later "resolved without trial".

Star Wars director George Lucas additionally threatened legal action against Apogee, Inc., the visual effects studio formed by John Dykstra and several other former artists from Lucas' Industrial Light and Magic who decided to remain in Van Nuys rather than relocate to San Rafael, California with the rest of the company. Lucas claimed that Apogee's work on Galactica was being done with equipment that he had left behind, for a project that would be in direct competition against Star Wars. Eventually, Apogee agreed to surrender the equipment to ILM, and several members of Dykstra's team returned to ILM. Afterwards, Universal's newly formed visual effects division, Universal Hartland Visual Effects, took over the show's visual effects for the remainder of its run. Lucas also went after Galactica merchandise, claiming that the Cylon Raider and Colonial Viper toys could be confused with his own Star Wars toys. His major contention was that the Galactica toys featured plastic pellets that could be fired to simulate lasers, and these constituted a choking hazard for children, and he did not want to be blamed for any such accidents, despite none of the Star Wars toys offered by Kenner having anything similar.

Such an accident came to pass on Christmas Day 1978, when a four-year-old child accidentally shot a pellet from a Cylon Raider toy into his mouth, where it lodged in his larynx and caused his brain to be deprived of oxygen. He was declared dead six days later on New Year's Eve 1978. The following year, Mattel issued an immediate recall of all Galactica toys, and the boy's parents sued Mattel. A second incident involved the Colonial Viper toy which ended in emergency surgery to remove an inhaled pellet from a young boy's lungs. The second incident was not fatal, but Mattel subsequently redesigned all of its Galactica toys so that the pellets no longer left the toy when fired.

Ratings

Battlestar Galactica initially was a ratings success. CBS counter programmed by moving its Sunday block of All in the Family and Alice an hour earlier, to compete with Galactica in the 8:00 timeslot. From October 1978 to March 1979, All in the Family averaged more than 40 percent of the 8:00 audience, against Galactica's 28 percent.

In mid-April 1979, ABC executives canceled the show. An AP article reported "The decision to bump the expensive Battlestar Galactica was not surprising. The series ... had been broadcast irregularly in recent weeks, attracting slightly over a quarter of the audience in its Sunday night time slot." Larson claimed that it was a failed attempt by ABC to reposition its number one program Mork & Mindy into a more lucrative timeslot. The cancellation led to viewer outrage and protests outside ABC studios, and it even contributed to the suicide of Edward Seidel, a 15-year-old boy in Saint Paul, Minnesota who was obsessed with the program.

For the 1978–79 season as a whole, Battlestar Galactica ranked 34th out of 114 shows airing that season, averaging a 19.6 rating and a 30 share.

Language

While primarily English, the Colonial language was written to include several fictional words that differentiated its culture from those of Earth, most notably time units and expletives. The words were roughly equivalent to their English counterparts, and the minor technical differences in meaning were suggestive to the viewer. Colonial distance and time units were incompletely explained and inconsistent in their usage, but appear to have been primarily in a decimal format.

Time units included micron (less than one second), centon (minute), centar (hour), cycle (day), secton (week), sectar (month), quatron (unknown, perhaps a 25 centar day or maybe 1/4 yahren), yahren (Colonial year), and centuron (Colonial century).

Deprecated time units A millicenton was about 10 minutes long and only used in the first few episodes. The microcenton was replaced with the micron after the 2nd episode "Lost Planet of the Gods".

Distance units were metron (meter), maxim, hectar, and a few other rarely used words.

Expletives included "frack", also spelled "frak" (interjection), "feldergarb" (noun), "snitrag" (noun), and "golmogging", also spelled "gall-mogging" and "galmonging" (adjective). These words avoided US FCC guidelines on the use of profanities and the associated fines.

Other terms included daggit (a canine–like animal indigenous to one of the colonies), ducat (ticket), pyramid (card game), cubit (unit of currency represented by rectangular coins), triad (a full contact ball and goal game similar to basketball), lupus (a wolf-like animal indigenous to another of the colonies), travelator (travel agent), officiator (referee for triad game) and sociolator (prostitute/escort).

Figures of speech There were a number of these used in the series, such as "daggit dribble", a term used to condemn falsehood, and "daggit-meat", used as an expression of contempt.

Music

The show's original music was composed and conducted by Stu Phillips, with the pilot score performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. It was recorded at 20th Century Fox, which later sued Universal over the series. MCA Records released a soundtrack album on LP and cassette with Phillips as the music producer; the album was later reissued on compact disc by Edel in 1993, and Geffen Records in 2003. For the series, Phillips used a studio orchestra at Universal, although the theme and end credits music as recorded by the LAPO were retained.

In 2011–2012 Intrada Records released four albums featuring Phillips's music for the series, representing the first commercial release of music other than that of the pilot. (Phillips previously produced a four-CD promotional set.) Except the first, all are two-disc sets.

• 2011: Battlestar Galactica Volume 1: "Saga of a Star World".
• 2011: Battlestar Galactica Volume 2: "Lost Planet of the Gods" parts 1 and 2, and "Gun on Ice Planet Zero" parts 1 and 2.
• 2012: Battlestar Galactica Volume 3: "The Long Patrol", "The Lost Warrior", "The Magnificent Warriors", "The Young Lords", "Murder on the Rising Star", "Take the Celestra", "The Hand of God", and Galactica 1980's "The Return of Starbuck".
• 2012: Battlestar Galactica Volume 4: "The Living Legend" parts 1 and 2, and "War of the Gods" parts 1 and 2, plus music recorded for Mission Galactica: The Cylon Attack and Galactica 1980.

"Fire in Space", "The Man with Nine Lives", "Greetings from Earth", "Baltar's Escape", and "Experiment in Terra" were entirely tracked with preexisting material.

Criticism

Battlestar Galactica was criticized by Melor Sturua in the Soviet newspaper Izvestia. He saw an analogy between the fictional Colonial/Cylon negotiations and the US/Soviet SALT talks and accused the series of being inspired by anti-Soviet hysteria.

Follow-on projects

In 1999, Richard Hatch (who had played Apollo) released a trailer for a proposed sequel, Battlestar Galactica: The Second Coming.

The series was remade with a reimagined three-hour miniseries in 2003 and followed by a weekly series that ran from 2004 to 2009.

Caprica was a prequel series to the 2004 reimagined series that ran for 19 episodes in 2010. It is set 58 years before the main series on the Colonial capital world of Caprica, showing how humanity first created the Cylons, who would later turn against their human masters. One last installment, Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome, a sequel set during the First Cylon War after the events of Caprica, was released on Machinima, Inc. before being released to home video in 2012.

In 2009, Bryan Singer was tapped to direct a feature film remake with production input from original series creator Glen A. Larson. Larson's death in 2014 caused a delay, but in 2016 Lisa Joy was assigned to be the screenwriter and the studio was considering Francis Lawrence to replace Singer as director. As of 2024, no film project has materialized.

A Battlestar Galactica project was announced in 2020 as a future addition to NBCUniversal's Peacock streaming service. Mr. Robot creator Sam Esmail is to serve as the new Galactica's executive producer. It has yet to be produced as of 2024, outside of scant updates and vagueries from Esmail.

Further reading

• Criswell, David and Richie Levine (2006). Somewhere Beyond the Heavens: Battlestar Galactica Unofficial Companion. Imprint Books. ISBN 1591099935.

External links

• Battlestar Galactica at AllMovie
• Battlestar Galactica at IMDb
• Battlestar Galactica - The Complete Epic Series at Rotten Tomatoes
• Battlestar Galactica on NBC.com
• Battlestar Galactica at Battlestar Wiki