Talk:Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series)/Archive 1

Archive 1

Way More Information Required

This article is sorely lacking. For a show as popular as this one was, there should at least be *some* mention of what it is about, what the overall plot is, who the characters are, etc. Sadly, I am not the person to write this information, since I have never seen the show. I hear it had robots called "Cylons" in it. Surely a fan knows more.

You can find just about everything you wanted to know - or not - here: http://www.kobol.com/archives/BG-FAQ.html

I would like to see some definitive proof that the pilot episode netted 65 million viewers.

I agree: surely a basic plotline can be written by someone familiar with the show. DJ Clayworth 20:10, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I deleted the reference to the actor who portrays adama in the new series because it was not relivant to the subject of this article.

Plot summary

The plot synopsis in this article disagrees significantly with the version in The Destruction of the Twelve Colonies (which is from the same show, not the 2003 re-imagining). For now, I'm deleting the overlapping text and putting in a reference to the "Destruction" article, and restoring the briefer, less-contradictory/ambiguous summary from an earlier revision. The "Destruction" article is fairly comprehensive, so linking to it should be sufficient. If the synopsis here needs to expanded, though, I think it needs to agree with the other available material on the subject. -- Fru1tbat 15:57, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Huge cult following?

Please some references? ---- Fernando Estel · ^{(Talk: here- commons- es)} 13:23, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

1978 timing of pilot

I'm glad reference was made to the fact that the 1978 pilot was interrupted by the announcement of the Egypt-Israel peace accord. I always found the parallel between real life and the pilot to be disturbing and ominous, even though I don't subscribe to any supernatural powers. Frankly, the fact that the peace accords were announced just when the Cylon-Human accord was about to be broken in the pilot is just too weird to go without comment. What's surprising was that nobody ever made reference to it. I bet if Wolf Blitzer had been around then, he'd have used it as a basis for a show.... —Preceding unsigned comment added by HamTech87 (talk • contribs) 05:04, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

suicide?

The article states "The cancellation led to viewer outrage, protests outside ABC studios, and even contributed to the suicide of Edward Seidel, a 15-year-old boy in Saint Paul, Minnesota who had become obsessed with the program".

The reference that it is linked to reads like a joke article. I find it very hard to believe its true. Is there a link to a legitimate article available? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.43.174.63 (talk) 13:07, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Here's another page that seems to independently reference it. I found other references to the AP article as well, but it could all be stemming from a single prank... [1]. 82.100.250.197 (talk) 20:45, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Ratings

I happened to run across some articles on this from the Spring of 1979, and they make it clear that Galactica was not a ratings success after October, when CBS moved All in the Family against it. There were many, many articles on this and I assume anyone who was around in 1979 must have been aware of the show's struggle. I don't know why someone made the claim that it was a highly-rated show when it was cancelled.76.216.88.99 (talk) 03:22, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Celebrity fans

Like celebrity fans of Doctor Who and Star Trek, who could we include for the original Battlestar Galactica? I remember Isaac Asimov was going to be the consultant on the never produced second season.--DrWho42 (talk) 09:24, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Video Release Section

Moved here due to lack of sourcing for several months. Please feel free to reincorporate with proper citations. Doniago (talk) 16:20, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Unsourced Material

The series first saw selective release on VHS videotape from Universal Studios Home Entertainment in the 1980s and 1990s. The full series was available in PAL format on VHS in the European and Australasian markets. In the North American (NTSC) market, selected episodes were released - the theatrical edit of the series pilot episode, "Saga of a Star World," plus all one-hour episodes except for "Take The Celestra." Universal later added two of the two-part episodes, "Lost Planet of the Gods" and "The Gun on Ice Planet Zero", as well as the feature film "Mission Galactica: The Cylon Attack" (a theatrical edit of "The Living Legend" and "Fire In Space"), the Galactica 1980 feature film "Conquest of the Earth" (composited from "Galactica Discovers Earth" and "The Night The Cylons Landed") and the Galactica 1980 episode "The Return of Starbuck". Universal never released the remaining two-part episodes - "War of the Gods" and "Greetings from Earth" - for North America in any form. Series fans in America had to wait until the 2003 DVD release in order to purchase the complete series. Universal test-marketed a VHS release of the uncut series pilot movie, "Saga of a Star World", in parts of North America. The only major differences between the regular and extended versions are the background color of the box and the listed running time of the movie. Three of the feature film edits had a limited release on Pioneer's laserdisc format. These were "Battlestar Galactica", the theatrical edit of the series pilot; "Mission Galactica: The Cylon Attack", and "Conquest of the Earth". In the case of the pilot movie, time compression techniques were used to squeeze the movie onto a single laserdisc. In 2000, Universal Playback Video of Great Britain released a limited edition VHS box set titled "Battlestar Galactica: The Collection." Pre-release marketing for this set proclaimed it was the 'complete MOVIE collection', and included the titles of all of the syndicated TV movies in the press info, implying to many fans that it was the complete collection of the TV movie syndication package. Fans who bought the set, however, found that several of the two-part storylines were simply presented in their original episodic versions rather than in the expanded telemovie form. With one exception, the only syndicated TV movies included in this set were the ones that combined one-hour installments: "Experiment in Terra", "Murder in Space", "Space Prison", "Space Casanova", "Phantom in Space" and "Curse of the Cylons". The only telemovie that came from a 2-hour story that was included is "War of the Gods," with extra footage. This marked the first time that a series episode had been released on video with additional footage that was not part of its original broadcast format. The Pilot movie was presented in its theatrical form, while "Lost Planet of the Gods," "Gun on Ice Planet Zero," "Living Legend", and "Greetings from Earth" were all presented as two-part episodic versions. At present, it marks the only release of any of the syndicated telemovies in any form. The full series was released on Region 1 DVD in 2003 as Battlestar Galactica: The Complete Epic Series which was packaged in a limited edition "Cylon head" box set with six double-sided discs. For the first time ever, the original, uncut ABC broadcast version of every single episode was released in a retail format. Extras for the Region 1 release included an episode guide and collector's book, more than three hours of deleted and alternate scenes, new interviews with television series creator Glen A. Larson, a 45-minute documentary on the making of Battlestar Galactica, a featurette on scoring the television series, a featurette on the creation of the Cylons, an audio commentary for the television pilot episode with Richard Hatch, Dirk Benedict, and Herbert Jefferson Jr., and previously unreleased photos and concept drawings. It also featured the original television movie edit of "Greetings from Earth." This set was originally released in Region 1 with an oversized "Cylon head" box, where the "face" was 3D and had a red lenticular "eye". Several months later, a smaller, bas-relief "Cylon head"-embossed box replaced the oversized version. The series was also released on Region 2 DVD in 2004 on seven single-sided discs. This set included all of the episodes but omitted some of the extra features. "Mission Galactica" made its DVD debut in 2008, in a plain-vanilla format without extras but digitally restored to the same level as the series. As of 2009, "Mission Galactica" is only available in PAL Region 4 (R4) format.

Link to Mormonism

What exactly is the link between Battlestar Galactica and Mormonism? The article doesn't explain it at all. Patiwat 20:07, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Try my blog post here: http://www.millennialstar.org/index.php/2006/02/12/ligbattlestar_galactical_ig_and_mormonis

That should explain it.Rabidwolfe 15:55, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Explain what - the link goes to a page that says there's nothing to display jmdeur 22:02, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

That's because the URL has changed due to change in servers since then. Here it is now:

http://www.millennialstar.org/2006/02/12/battlestar-galactica-and-mormonism/ Rabidwolfe (talk) 02:05, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

The Mormon angle is interesting and ought to be discussed further in the article. Danceswithzerglings (talk) 02:23, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

The thing I find interesting about the above is that some people see "links to religion" everywhere they look. If I find 5 bread-rolls and 3 fish fingers in my freezer, that I did not know I had, that does not mean I am pretending to be jesus, just that I do not know what is in my freezer. Do the same in a major TV show, and it becomes a "link to christianity." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bat Flattery (talk • contribs) 19:45, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

There is more here: http://www.ldsliving.com/7-Mormons-with-Stars-on-the-Hollywood-Walk-of-Fame/s/79203?page=3#story-content. Unlikely this site would be encyclopedic, but I find it interesting and others apparently do, too, based on this conversation. 155.213.224.59 (talk) 17:16, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

In Other Media

I don't have any specifics accessible at the moment, but there was a comic book series by Marvel Comics and I believe that there was a novelization or even a book series based on the series. Is anyone able to confirm and include these in the article? --RedKnight (talk) 14:21, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Hi! Thanks to "TV GUIDE" I was able to join "The Science Fiction Book Club" back when the series was still on. One of the hardback books that I got in my introductory membership package was the novelized adaptation of the original theatrical movie, "Battlestar Galatica". In that movie Baltar got decapitated, while in the pilot version of the movie, he got to keep his head for the sake of the series. I also got the first issue of the adaptation by "Marvel Comics" in the regular size and in the giant size versions. Does that help? Also, there were further novels inspired by the series, just like with "Star Trek" and "Star Wars", et cetera. By the way, Lisa Hartman Black's father, David Hartman, hosted a special prime-time edition of "Good Morning, America" to prepare the TV audience for the series premise. Everyone here needs to realize that at the time the series was aired, specials like "The Devil's Triangle" on television, movies like "Chariots of the Gods", and books based on those themes, were very much in vogue, along with alternative culture themes like "Pyramid Power". An "NBC Classics Illusrated" version of "The Time Machine" had a pyramid shaped time machine, for example. So "Battlestar Galactica" having that opening credits montage about how life here began out there, et al, fit right in with the "Cult Pop Culture" fad going on back then. I hope that helps! LeoStarDragon1 (talk) 03:01, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Lawsuit

More information is needed about the lawsuit by Twentieth Century Fox and Lucasfilm. The article references a book by Fullen, but that information isn't quite correct. I have added some info based on a Court of Appeals case I found on Google Scholar, but more info is needed.

According to the referenced 9th Circuit case, Fox and Lucasfilm sued for copyright infringement, unfair competition, trademark infringement, and attorneys fees ("plagiarism" is not a cause of action). The trial court granted a partial summary judgment in favor of the defendants (Universal, MCA, and ABC), but only on the claim for copyright infringement. However, Fox and Lucasfilm appealed. The court of appeals reversed the judgment and sent the case back for a trial, stating

“ After viewing the Star Wars and Battlestar motion pictures, we conclude that the films do in fact raise genuine issues of material fact…At a minimum, it is a close enough question that it should be resolved by way of a trial. We intimate no opinion whether the films are substantially similar as to either idea or expression, but state only that reasonable minds could differ on those key factual issues. Thus, a grant of summary judgment was improvident. ”

References

The court opinion does not mention any counter-suit, though that doesn't necessarily mean that one wasn't filed--It wasn't relevant to the appeal.

This decision was finalized in May, 1983. Unfortunately, I cannot find any information on what happened after remand. This lack of information usually means that the case was settled (by mutual agreement) between the parties. But I don't have any source that tells how the case was finally determined. The Fullen source is obviously not aware of what the result of the appeal was (didn't have Google scholar when that book was published). If the case(s) had gone to trial, there would most certainly be news about it. Furthermore, if there were further decisions after the 1983 decision, these would likely be published. Also, all of the law journals that cite the 1983 case, never discuss or cite any subsequent proceedings.

At any rate, we still need a source for the counter-suit, and a source for proceedings after the 1983 appellate decision. Hypertextopher (talk) 00:12, 28 June 2010 (UTC)

I thoroughly agree with the above--it's rather remarkable that no one has been able to come up with more information. I've googled around a little on this topic, and it almost seems as though everything after the 1983 remand fell into a black hole. Even if the parties tried to settle as quietly as possible, or the plaintiffs simply dropped the case, you'd think that with such a high-profile lawsuit there would be SOME news about it in an archive somewhere. Someone help out here! Kevin Nelson (talk) 10:38, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Doea Wikipedia have a method in place for having an expert in legal research determine the disposition of the case from the original court records? — Senator2029 | talk 19:08, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

When the series is set

I personally don't like the sound of this sentence: "The implication of the final aired episode, "The Hand of God", was that the original series took place after the Apollo 11 moon landing in July 1969, almost certainly centuries later, allowing for the time necessary for the propagation at light-speed of television images of the landing to be received by the Galactica." Galactica could have simply been very close to Earth. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.73.229.189 (talk) 11:03, 14 May 2011 (UTC)