Battlestar Galactica On SciFi Channel

[Atrocities]

Originally posted by PvK:

quote:

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Originally posted by Atrocities:
... Prior Star Wars I think.
...

Definitely post-Star-Wars. 1980. It's a Star Wars derivative (as well as a 7 Samurai / Magnificent 7 derivative), like the Buck Rogers movie was.

PvK

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Description
Seven mercenaries are recruited from throughout the galaxy to save a peaceful planet from the threat of an evil tyrant bent on dominating and enslaving the entire universe.

Yup, 1980 release with (waltons) John Boy playing the hero. This would have been right up SciFi channels ally. Looks like a SciFi channel D movie.

[Atrocities]

I really don't care what people say now, I still think the Cylons from the original BSG were awesome looking machines. I don't get this revisionistic re-writing of history to say that they were ugly, stupid, and silly. Who the hell is saying this? Mostly kids who grew up in the 90's and the technological advancement of CGI. Hey kiddies, this was real cool back in 1978, oddly enough the year "after" star wars came out, and it helped to pave the way for more the CGI effects that you all seem to love so very much. To me the original BSG was, and is, a nice looking show with original ideas, special effects, and costumes that, even by to days standards, are impressive for the era. They were real, and not computer generated. It really does make me angry to listen to these actors/actresses who play in the new BSG mini series when they trash talk the original series when most of them weren't even alive to have seen it.

I saw it on Sunday September 17th 1978, and to this day I can still remember thinking how cool those cylons looked. They set a standard for the series that said, hey we are not going to humanize a race of robots created by a race of reptilians. The Cylon race, the reptilians, were exterminated by the robots they created. Ronald Moore just took that tid bit and made it a human one. Humans created the cylons, not god. Well it is a dramatic statement, but it is way to much like Blade Runner and so many other Quter Limit episodes that I can't even begin to count.

The uniqueness of having the Cylons as a completely unhuman created race of machines bent on the destruction of humanity was just as appealing, and in my honest to god opinion, it was a better story.

The new Cylons, the robot ones, look CGI, and they are not as impressive on screen as the old chrome silver and gold ones from the original series. But hey, I guess the CGI cost for making the old chrome ones was to high.

[geoschmo]

Atrocities, I agree with you the original cylons were cool looking, but you seriously thought the rest of the effects stand up even today? Have you watched any of the reruns on sci-fi recently or are you just going by faded adolescent memories.

I think most of the people ripping on the old cylons aren't complaining about the look so much. It's just that they were pathetically inept, slow, clumsy, and couldn't hit the side of a barn with a bLaster. Why would a supposedly advanced race go out of their way to create a combat droid that looked like a human in a chrome suit, but couldn't move half as well as one?

[Starhawk]

Yeah they were not complaining about the LOOK of the old Cylons as much as how clumsy they were and how hard it was for the men inside them to do anything.

The costume took like four hours to put on, they couldn't sit down at all and oh Lord help them if they had to go the bathroom because it took a few hours to get the costume OFF too.

The Cylons "armor" was painfully hard to get to do anything gracefull and they made the "feel" of the show as "How the hell did the Colonies lose to these tin cans?" when you see a single warrior taking out like eight of them or a single viper taking out four of their raiders it just ruined the effect of the Colonies losing to them in the first place. I mean they are just so inept the colony fleet should have decimated them even WHEN it was suprised.

The new Robotic Cylons (yes they have a large number of Centurions) move like humans and look like they can kick serious ***. Not to mention that if you see the intros to the space battles the Cylons have truely OVERWHELMING numbers and rather advanced tech which makes it easier to understand the colonial fleet being defeated. But I have also heard they are redoing the WAY the battle for the colonies is fought completely so that it makes more sense. I personally am looking forward to this new show and won't judge anything until I see it.

[Atrocities]

Geoschmo, for the era that they came from the special effects were impressive. But by todays standards they are indeed campy. Hell even effects done in the movie ID4 are weak by todays standards.

Starhawk, I did not say that they should make new costumes for actors to play in. I said that the cost for making the original cylons in a CGI format was obviously to expensive.

I seldom understand the need to reinvent the wheel when the old wheel worked fine. Just rebuild it with current technology. I for one think that CGI rendered original Cylons, with humans cylons as well, would have worked neatly. I have seen the "new" cylon robots, and they are kinda spookly looking, but I honestly prefer the originals far more than I do the new ones.

[Cheeze]

I can really only remember one line from Battle Beyond the Stars:

Zador? Of the Malmouri?

I want his head.

It's also a pretty cool observation that The Seven Samurai was inspired by the spaghetti westerns. I like how Robert Vaughn, who played the cowardly character in Magnificent Seven (George Peppard's character in BBTS, I think), played the cool warrior with no fear (Yul Brynner in Magnificent Seven) in the BBTS.

EDIT NOTE: I was wrong, the spaghetti westerns followed Seven Samurai. In particular, Sergio Leone's Fistful of Dollars (adapted from Yojimbo). Kurosawa was inspired by epic westerns (films directed by John Ford in particular) when making his films, including Seven Samurai. I meant to say westerns, but I was hungry, and spaghetti slipped in there.

I'm looking forward to Battlestar Galactica. I like how the predominant weapon seems to be missiles. Guess the point-defense isn't quite that good in that universe.

[ December 05, 2003, 22:33: Message edited by: Cheeze ]

[Loser]

Originally posted by Cheeze:
It's also a pretty cool observation that The Seven Samurai was inspired by the spaghetti westerns.

Umm, I think it was the other way around, actually.