Battlestar Galactica reboot to get new reboot from Mr. Robot creator

All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again...

Read the whole story

 

[MuYixiao]

S3 and S4 came really close to, and possibly even entered, jump the shark territory with all of the mysticism and completely unexplained phenomena.

I hear this complaint frequently, and I find it quite odd as the mysticism was in there from the very start. The first season was all about the prophesies regarding the President and the destination. They needed a magic arrow to point the way "home". And it was strongly suggested that "Head 6" was some form of angel or demon.

It's a fair argument to say that later seasons took it too far (I disagree, but it's a fair criticism), but the mystical aspects didn't appear out of nowhere.

 

[Thr2hrmrf]

I greatly enjoyed the 2004 series even with the downturns it took along the way. How many times has a series ended in a way that satisfies all viewers? Answer: 0

Babylon 5.

Oh, sure, plenty of complaints about season 5, but I've not heard anyone complain about the ending.

there was an ending?

 

[Jiraiya]

I see you've forgotten "Galactica 1980". Good.

I kind of wish I could do that...

 

[Rommel102]

The writing was good throughout.

The controversy was when they wrote stories that were paralleling current events. Two things especially come to mind. In the season where cylons captured most of humanity:
1. the humans (good guys) used suicide bombers to revolt against cylons and at the time in the real world suicide bombing used against US occupation of Iraq was being called terrorism. People didnt like it when shown the viewpoint of the other side.
2. Then cylons used torture to try to get information and were shown to be monsters, while many in the US were in favor of torture against anyone we call terrorist or might be a terrorist. People didnt like it when it was shown that what they were supporting was monsterous.

Did the writers claim that was their intention, because the Cylon's kamikaze'd there ships (suicide) and the humans both 'spaced' (executed) Cylon prisoners and raped the Cylon 6 to break her will.

edit: half ninja'd by henryhbk

Thats not the point though.
There's no point in defending the cylons. They were indisputably portrayed as monstrous, and this is where many had a hard time with the show. Even if you can find a way to see the cylon's side of it, many saw these episodes as a slap in the face as far as their own political beliefs.

So what? Isn't questioning human behavior the best part of any good story?

 

[woodelf]

The writing was good throughout.

The controversy was when they wrote stories that were paralleling current events. Two things especially come to mind. In the season where cylons captured most of humanity:
1. the humans (good guys) used suicide bombers to revolt against cylons and at the time in the real world suicide bombing used against US occupation of Iraq was being called terrorism. People didnt like it when shown the viewpoint of the other side.
2. Then cylons used torture to try to get information and were shown to be monsters, while many in the US were in favor of torture against anyone we call terrorist or might be a terrorist. People didnt like it when it was shown that what they were supporting was monsterous.

We must've been traveling in very different circles back in 2004-2009. I remember reading lots of takes on how well done BSG was precisely for having the courage to call into question our orthodoxies about torture and suicide attacks; I don't remember anyone thinking it was a negative that BSG went there with its story, but do remember people (and press articles) complaining about other shows that uncritically accepted the political claim of the effectiveness of torture. I don't remember anyone having anything negative to say about BSG until it became clear that the writers didn't know what "the Plan" was and hadn't actually known at the start of the series who the Final 5 were (was that mid-season 3?). And even then, everyone I heard from still loved the show up until either (1) Starbuck's return or (2) the final couple episodes.

 

[Topaz3in6]

I would much rather see a soft reboot of Firefly, different characters but the same style and universe.

Firefly has reached legendary cult status. It cannot be rebooted for nothing could possibly live up to the expectations... save a Joss + all original cast + tiny budget + 'not trying too hard' attempt... maybe. Different characters would be begging for the wrath of fans.

 

[Jiraiya]

S3 and S4 came really close to, and possibly even entered, jump the shark territory with all of the mysticism and completely unexplained phenomena.

I hear this complaint frequently, and I find it quite odd as the mysticism was in there from the very start. The first season was all about the prophesies regarding the President and the destination. They needed a magic arrow to point the way "home". And it was strongly suggested that "Head 6" was some form of angel or demon.

It's a fair argument to say that later seasons took it too far (I disagree, but it's a fair criticism), but the mystical aspects didn't appear out of nowhere.

Not only this, but the mysticism was also there in the original series. It wasn't focused on quite as much once Count Iblis was dealt with, but there were repeat visits from the "angelic" beings that appeared then.

 

[FireWraith]

As long as it isn't really a reboot, I'm up for more of this universe. But yes, there needs to be an overall series outline from the start to avoid some writer continually patting himself on the back for how well he can pull rabbits out of his ass story-wise... until he eventually can't.

I concur - which is why I'm reasonably okay with having the guy who did Mr. Robot handle that.

Now, if we were tossing around names like "Abrams" or "Lindelof", I'd be running screaming for the hills instead.

 

[Jiraiya]

I would much rather see a soft reboot of Firefly, different characters but the same style and universe.

Firefly has reached legendary cult status. It cannot be rebooted for nothing could possibly live up to the expectations... save a Joss + all original cast + tiny budget + 'not trying too hard' attempt... maybe. Different characters would be begging for the wrath of fans.

Isn't "Firefly" owned by Disney now? That should give you hope.

 

[Rommel102]

I would much rather see a soft reboot of Firefly, different characters but the same style and universe.

Firefly has reached legendary cult status. It cannot be rebooted for nothing could possibly live up to the expectations... save a Joss + all original cast + tiny budget + 'not trying too hard' attempt... maybe. Different characters would be begging for the wrath of fans.

Isn't "Firefly" owned by Disney now? That should give you hope.

Have you seen any of the Disney Star Wars movies?

 

[DOOManiac]

I still gush over the series conclusion to Quantum Leap...

Now that's honestly a show I wouldn't mind seeing rebooted. Or rather, continued. Sam Beckett's son starts leaping to try and find his dad. They could even bring Scott Bakula back for a season finale or two...

But leave out leaping into animals this time around...

 

[snowman<ca>]

So how long before they're rebooting shows that haven't even ended yet?

DC has basically been doing that for years with the latest DC film universe reboot, while several of the same characters that have TV franchise running.

 

[Oz7]

Is it just me, or does it seem like SOP for a company that wants to do their own streaming service is to prop it up with space opera? Disney is doing The Mandalorian. CBS has Star Trek. Fox is relegating The Orville to Hulu. Now NBC and BSG.

I was able to watch some episodes of the Orville and Disco on a flight the other day. I could not suspend disbelief when it came to the Orville. Disco seemed to have two tones- dark and darker (if the latter was at all possible, painting reddish violet lights all over an already dark bridge when a red alert was announced. Why even bother?)

Neither seemed something I wanted to get into. I ended up rewatching an episode of BSG.

Hopefully, the BSG spin off is better than these two.

 

[woodelf]

Maybe in your market. But the original show date for the BSG finale was roughly a year before the first ep of Caprica on initial broadcast.

So while they probably had the storyline for Caprica before the BSG finale aired, but there's plenty of time involved that there's no guarantee they had the Caprica storyline (and thus the virtual reality thing) decided on before the BSG finale was written.

Um my market is the US market where it originally aired. You can even google it:

BSG Final Episode date: January 10th 2010
Caprica first episode date: January 22nd 2010

NM you are correct, Google is being odd with its ‘more info’.

I think it's showing you the date when the very last episode of anything that could be called "BSG" originally aired—I think that's the date for the release of "The Plan". Which, at the time, I took as more an ad for Caprica than an apology to those who didn't like the end of BSG.

 

[Jiraiya]

I would much rather see a soft reboot of Firefly, different characters but the same style and universe.

Firefly has reached legendary cult status. It cannot be rebooted for nothing could possibly live up to the expectations... save a Joss + all original cast + tiny budget + 'not trying too hard' attempt... maybe. Different characters would be begging for the wrath of fans.

Isn't "Firefly" owned by Disney now? That should give you hope.

Have you seen any of the Disney Star Wars movies?

Point taken, although I didn't find them terrible. I only meant that there's not a valuable property that they own that they won't someday exploit.

 

[CraigJ ✅]

Oh come on. Can we have a Babylon 5 reboot instead?

Firefly?

 

[dice1111]

Oh come on. Can we have a Babylon 5 reboot instead?

I want Space Precinct 2040! No one even remembers that one! Perfect for creative freedom.

 

[Sensath]

Is it April fools day already?

 

[Deleted member 4603]

S3 and S4 came really close to, and possibly even entered, jump the shark territory with all of the mysticism and completely unexplained phenomena.

I hear this complaint frequently, and I find it quite odd as the mysticism was in there from the very start. The first season was all about the prophesies regarding the President and the destination. They needed a magic arrow to point the way "home". And it was strongly suggested that "Head 6" was some form of angel or demon.

It's a fair argument to say that later seasons took it too far (I disagree, but it's a fair criticism), but the mystical aspects didn't appear out of nowhere.

Not only this, but the mysticism was also there in the original series. It wasn't focused on quite as much once Count Iblis was dealt with, but there were repeat visits from the "angelic" beings that appeared then.

The existence of religious characters, and the portrayal of their beliefs, I am fine with.

But it should wind up being "more science than faith" should the prophecy be true or whatever.

Just my take, naturally - again I love Star Wars and Babylon 5 and all sorts of other IP that has tons of mystical or pseudo-science or straight up unobtainium.

nBSG *started* as much more believable / grounded, and I wished they hadn't dove so deep into the metaphysics / mystical prophecy stuff.

 

[Ushio]

I greatly enjoyed the 2004 series even with the downturns it took along the way. How many times has a series ended in a way that satisfies all viewers? Answer: 0

Babylon 5.

Oh, sure, plenty of complaints about season 5, but I've not heard anyone complain about the ending.

The ending for B5 is and always will be season 4 episode 22 The Deconstruction of Falling Stars which should be watched after season 5 episode 22 Sleeping in Light.

 

[jdale]

The writing was good throughout.

The controversy was when they wrote stories that were paralleling current events. Two things especially come to mind. In the season where cylons captured most of humanity:
1. the humans (good guys) used suicide bombers to revolt against cylons and at the time in the real world suicide bombing used against US occupation of Iraq was being called terrorism. People didnt like it when shown the viewpoint of the other side.
2. Then cylons used torture to try to get information and were shown to be monsters, while many in the US were in favor of torture against anyone we call terrorist or might be a terrorist. People didnt like it when it was shown that what they were supporting was monsterous.

Did the writers claim that was their intention, because the Cylon's kamikaze'd there ships (suicide) and the humans both 'spaced' (executed) Cylon prisoners and raped the Cylon 6 to break her will.

edit: half ninja'd by henryhbk

Thats not the point though.
There's no point in defending the cylons. They were indisputably portrayed as monstrous, and this is where many had a hard time with the show. Even if you can find a way to see the cylon's side of it, many saw these episodes as a slap in the face as far as their own political beliefs.

Can a machine operating with no emotion and incapable of empathy due to the choices of its creators be considered monstrous though? I mean if a machine is following its predefined programming then who is the monster? The machine or the one that created it? Keeping in mind that Cavill and the others weren’t some evolutionary step within the cylon factories/growth. They were expressly engineered by the final five. So really it is the final five that were the monsters.

Sure, a creation can be monstrous. A creator can be monstrous. They can both be monstrous, it doesn't have to be one or the other. I don't think the creation gets let off the hook because of whatever circumstances made it monstrous to begin with.

 

[jamiejag]

I would much rather see a soft reboot of Firefly, different characters but the same style and universe.

So say we all!

Shiny!

 

[jdale]

Thanks anyway, I’d rather dress up a bucket of hamsters as the cast of BSG and see how well I can train them to act out the original series.

I think this idea could be a winner.

 

[All4vols]

Oh come on. Can we have a Babylon 5 reboot instead?

No. Because we'd have to call it Babylon 6...

 

[ip_what]

So how long before they're rebooting shows that haven't even ended yet?

Dick Wolfe says hi.

 

[Deleted member 4603]

Thanks anyway, I’d rather dress up a bucket of hamsters as the cast of BSG and see how well I can train them to act out the original series.

I think this idea could be a winner.

I... would subscribe to the streaming service that produced this, no questions asked.

 

[afidel]

Oh come on. Can we have a Babylon 5 reboot instead?

J. Micheal Strazincsky (spelling) won't let it happen. he has control of the IP and as such is actively blocking such attempts.

While it saddens me to know that B5 won't be rendered in high quality productions it makes me happy to know that a cheap rip off also won't happen.

Its worse than that. JMS has movie rights and WB has TV rights and refuses to sell to JMS.

Hmm, I wonder if TV rights in this case includes streaming rights, perhaps JMS can do a Netflix/Amazon series.

 

[ChrisSD]

S3 and S4 came really close to, and possibly even entered, jump the shark territory with all of the mysticism and completely unexplained phenomena.

I hear this complaint frequently, and I find it quite odd as the mysticism was in there from the very start. The first season was all about the prophesies regarding the President and the destination. They needed a magic arrow to point the way "home". And it was strongly suggested that "Head 6" was some form of angel or demon.

It's a fair argument to say that later seasons took it too far (I disagree, but it's a fair criticism), but the mystical aspects didn't appear out of nowhere.

Mysticism was more ambiguous in the beginning. Adama especially was using it cynically in order to give hope and purpose to the survivors. To start with "Head 6" was only a metaphorical angel/demon. Again what they actually were was left very much open.

 

[franksands]

Battlestar Galactica, which arguably launched the current era of plot arc-heavy, short-season dramas that now defines prestige TV, is coming back. Again.

You misspelled "The Sopranos".

I think you're looking for Babylon 5, the first TV series which has a multi-season plot.

 

[Zagen30]

Oh come on. Can we have a Babylon 5 reboot instead?

I vote no. That series was great, but it ran its course and told its story very well. Sure, the visuals would be better in a reboot, but I doubt the plot/characters would be improved.

To me, prime candidates for a reboot are interesting premises that were poorly handled the first time around (e.g. the original BSG), or good to great stories that are so old that they've mostly fallen out of the public consciousness. You might be able to talk me into things that didn't get a fair shake the first time around, like Firefly. But a relatively complete tale that's only ~20 years old? What are you going to add other than tens of millions of dollars of CGI?

 

[afidel]

Is it just me, or does it seem like SOP for a company that wants to do their own streaming service is to prop it up with space opera? Disney is doing The Mandalorian. CBS has Star Trek. Fox is relegating The Orville to Hulu. Now NBC and BSG.

I was able to watch some episodes of the Orville and Disco on a flight the other day. I could not suspend disbelief when it came to the Orville. Disco seemed to have two tones- dark and darker (if the latter was at all possible, painting reddish violet lights all over an already dark bridge when a red alert was announced. Why even bother?)

Neither seemed something I wanted to get into. I ended up rewatching an episode of BSG.

Hopefully, the BSG spin off is better than these two.

You're not supposed to suspend disbelief for Orville, it's a spoof ala Galaxy Quest.

 

[Deleted member 4603]

And yet... Orville is more Trek than Discovery, hands down.

 

[NeoMorpheus]

Some people are claiming to have access to the original Amiga files and are re-rendering.

http://www.b5scrolls.com/

For some reason, his videos with new renders were deleted on YouTube.


But there were some concerns, since one in particular was asking for donations to buy a better system and some people actually offered working systems and the person still wanted money.

Here is more info:

https://www.reddit.com/r/babylon5/comme ... ls_person/

He did provide some answers, but seems to have gone silent.

 

[NullSignal]

Is it just me, or does it seem like SOP for a company that wants to do their own streaming service is to prop it up with space opera? Disney is doing The Mandalorian. CBS has Star Trek. Fox is relegating The Orville to Hulu. Now NBC and BSG.

I was able to watch some episodes of the Orville and Disco on a flight the other day. I could not suspend disbelief when it came to the Orville. Disco seemed to have two tones- dark and darker (if the latter was at all possible, painting reddish violet lights all over an already dark bridge when a red alert was announced. Why even bother?)

Neither seemed something I wanted to get into. I ended up rewatching an episode of BSG.

Hopefully, the BSG spin off is better than these two.

You're not supposed to suspend disbelief for Orville, it's a spoof ala Galaxy Quest.

Season 1 was quite light-hearted in places, but it was never the focus of the show, and Season 2 takes itself a lot more serious. Being a spoof may have been the original pitch, but it's long ago abandoned any pretence at being a satire.

It's probably best described as an unofficial copy of Star Trek The Next Generation, with just enough changed to avoid being taken to court.

 

[ChrisSD]

And yet... Orville is more Trek than Discovery, hands down.

It comes across to me as TNG fan fic. And I mean that in both a good and bad way.

 

[RhoSinePhi]

If we're not done mining my childhood for Sci Fi TV show reboots then may I respectfully submit Buck Rogers? Please? My love for Colonel Deering is unrequited.

 

[NeoMorpheus]

I greatly enjoyed the 2004 series even with the downturns it took along the way. How many times has a series ended in a way that satisfies all viewers? Answer: 0

Babylon 5.

Oh, sure, plenty of complaints about season 5, but I've not heard anyone complain about the ending.

The ending for B5 is and always will be season 4 episode 22 The Deconstruction of Falling Stars which should be watched after season 5 episode 22 Sleeping in Light.

The original script was indeed 5 season, but JMS was forced to cram them in 4, since there was a rumor that the show was going to be cancelled (pulling this from memory, will confirm later), then after he did that, he got the green light for what we now call season 5.

 

[Deleted member 4603]

If we're not done mining my childhood for Sci Fi TV show reboots then may I respectfully submit Buck Rogers? Please? My love for Colonel Deering is unrequited.

And I still like their starfighters and some of the other ships from that show. I had the coolest 'Thunderfighter' toy that perfectly fit Kenner Star Wars figures

The... hawk-people ships... not so much

 

[NullSignal]

If we're not done mining my childhood for Sci Fi TV show reboots then may I respectfully submit Buck Rogers? Please? My love for Colonel Deering is unrequited.

Personally I'd like to see Flash Gordon redone. I mean the original 30's serial, not the 80's cheese fest.

 

[Deleted member 4603]

To be fair, the 80's cheese version was... reasonably faithful to the old serials, just added the cheese *thick*.

The costumes, the spaceships, the rocket-sleds, and the tendency to forget they had blasters and engage in swordfights were all very much in line with the original material