Olmos transports from 'Family 'to 'Battlestar Galactica'

Pittsburgh Post Gazette ^ | April 29, 2003 | Rob Owen, Post-Gazette TV Editor

[RayBob]

The first season of PBS's "American Family," in which Edward James Olmos plays the conservative patriarch of a Hispanic Los Angeles family, comes out on DVD today.

But it's his role as another patriarch that's bound to get TV viewers in their 30s and 40s talking. Olmos is filming Sci Fi Channel's miniseries remake of the late '70s TV show "Battlestar Galactica." Olmos takes over the role of Commander Adama, originally played by the late Lorne Greene.

[Paul C. Jesup]

I mean cannot go wrong with having Marines is space fighting a war.

[Michael Barnes]

I love a woman with a gun...

[Michael Barnes]

Best I could find for ya at the moment..

[discostu]

Space Above and Beyond blew chunks, the characters were far to whiney to be real Marines, the story was a blatant (and poorly done) ripoff of Ender's Game, and the whole "tank" subplot was idiotic at best. The only thing it had going for it was R Lee and they killed him in the pilot. It was canceled because nobody watched the damn thing. My wife loved the show because I did the dishes to avoid watching it.

[Michael Barnes]

Space Above and Beyond blew chunks

heh-heh...No doubt!

[Paul C. Jesup]

It was an action series, it never claimed to be anything more than an action series and it was an enjoyable action series. Except for you (as usual) everyone I have talked to LIKED the series.

[shpanda]

That is one beautiful girl. She must not have been much of an actress or we surely would have heard more from her.

[shpanda]

Dr. Quinn was the most disgusting show I have ever seen.

I know it was because the single most disgusting girl I have ever known just loved it.

[Question_Assumptions]

WHAT? Cyclons look like HUMANS???? WTF!!!

Really want to be annoyed? Rumor has it that Starbuck is female in the new version.

I've always wanted to tell Harlan Ellison that I thought The Starlost was one of his greatest works but I don't want to go down in the history of science fiction fandom as the man who gave Harlan Ellison a fatal heart attack.

[Question_Assumptions]

Nuts, I loved Galactica . . . why not honor it with a decent remake.

If the rumors are true, this one will fail in the "decent" department.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

I saw that too. At first, I thought it was Mystery Science Theatre 3000...but no...sadly it was not. Although, I think I have seen it on MST3K.

[Alex Murphy]

Almost as bad as Lost in Space.

Speak for yourself :) There are a few of us who enthusiastically enjoy the movie. I know we're in the minority, but we're out there!

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Bring back Space Above and Beyond

Hu- ahh! Now that was good TV. Bring back Chiggy von Richtoven!

[af_vet_rr]

I smell a backstory being dictated by budget limitations. Human-looking enemies don't require expensive robot suits.

Bingo! We have a winner! Of course almost all sci-fi series have serious budget limits - the majority used and re-used footage over and over. Hell, some use footage from other series (ala SeaQuest using Airwolf footage), I'm thankful they are going with a backstory of the Cylons looking like/being clones of humans, than using old Cylon footage, lol.

Clone Cylons are a copout though - it'll be easy to provide filler material/episodes, just have them infiltrate the human population, like Bladerunner or something along those lines.

[Question_Assumptions]

Bring back Babylon 5.

As much as I enjoyed Babylon 5, it ran its course and probably overstayed its welcome by a season. Science fiction fans need to stop demanding that series and movies be milked until they are dried husks of their former selves. Look at the newest Star Treks if you want to see what happens to a series when they just won't let it go. I'd rather see things end on a high note.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Anyone remember the Moonbase Interceptors?

I remember. But I always questioned the wisdom of an interceptor with only one round of ordnance. Shoot yer load and hit the road!

[Question_Assumptions]

That's why there were three of them.

[HamiltonJay]

Starbuck a woman???

Why has the scallywag become a bad character????

I do agree if you want to update BG you need to give women better characters than the orig. The one was a pilot but her character was still weak... and the other one was either a prostitute or a nurse depending on what episode it was.

What's next? Adama is the president of NAMBLA and Apollo's son is his lover?

SciFi.. you are going to take it on the chin for this one... you are going to make BG 1980 look good if this is all true.

[yarddog]

Another beauty who dropped out of sight was Judy from the original TV series "Lost in Space".

She was drop dead gorgeous but I got to noticing she really wasn't much of an actress. The same is probably true of Maren Jensen who was also about as pretty as they come.

[HamiltonJay]

Cyclons biggest problem cost wise, wasn't the suits, it was the filming of them. The reflective nature of the suits meant you had to really work to make sure the camera etc weren't being reflected back into the lense by them. Didn't you ever notice how dark the scenes nearly ALWAYS were if the cyclons were in them.

If it is a production cost thing, its more to do with that, than suits.... I am sure they could have used the existing ones for production.