Unofficial Battlestar Galactica Blog

BSG thoughts and bits

Here are a few things happening in BSG land:

• Grant Gould has another print up for auction at eBay. Starbuck and a gun. What more can you ask for?
• In other Grant Gould news, he will be attending San Diego Comic-Con, Wizard World Chicago, Dragon-Con, and MN FallCon this year, so if any of you are going to those shows and would like some original art, drop him an email (grantgould@hotmail.com) and order it ahead of time.  That way you can just pick it up when you get there and won't have to worry about waiting in too long of a line. Support the artists!
• I am particularly bummed that Wizard World Chicago is happening while I am on a trip to Alaska... finally a cool convention shows up and I am out of town! What are the chances?!
• Joss Whedon (Firefly, Buffy, etc) gushes about Battlestar Galactica in his own blog comments. It is pretty amazing for him to say that a show like BSG makes him want to go to writing school.
• I didn't watch this the first time around, but I enjoyed watching it this time... Trey Parker and Matt Stone praise BSG in their Peabody acceptance speech. "Somewhere somebody's blog just blew up."

Until the next link fest!!

The sexy Cylons of BSG in EW

The Cylons of Galactica appeared in Entertainment Weekly. The battlestar_blog LJ community has it posted:

Battlestar Babes

Is it just me or does Grace Park look like Lucy Liu in that photo? Tricia looks like she is going to an 80s prom or something!

Update 6/28/2006 7:30am CST

I should have put a spoiler warning on this. There is some spoilerage at the end of the sidebar next to the photo! Don't read it if you don't want to know!

Cylon action figure photos

The San Diego Comic-Con had an exclusive number of Cylon action figures. Check out the photos:

SDCC Cylon Action Figure
(scroll to the bottom)

How long until they are on eBay?

Hands-on with the BSG CCG

Critical Gamers has a hands on look at the Battlestar Galactica collectible card game:

The Battlestar Galactica CCG seems to do a good job mixing things-up by simplifying certain game elements while adding complexity to others. For instance, there are only 3 types of resources (land types) which are used to play cards out of your hand. Simple. There's also a game mechanic that allows players to discard anything in their hand to add to their permanent resource generation. These simplifications streamline gameplay, and eliminate land starvation potentials.

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The article is heavy on the CCG jargon, as it should be. I managed to turn my friend Kevin into a video gamer... maybe we can hook up some CCG action... probably not.

Variety mentions BSG emmy hopes

The more I read, it seems that everyone is pulling for Battlestar Galactica to get noticed! Check out what Variety has to say:

Bonnie Hammer knows that "Battlestar Galactica""Battlestar Galactica" is alien to most Emmy voters.

The critically acclaimed skeinskein isn't one that fits in the kudofest's universe: It's set in space. On the Sci Fi Channel. With a largely unknown cast.

Three strikes? Not according to the president of USA Network and Sci Fi, who believes the show deserves an Emmy nom for drama so much that she's putting her money where her mouth is. Hammer's team is spending what insiders peg to be more than $1 million on the Emmy campaign behind "Galactica" -- hefty coincoin for a basic-cable net.

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Can any one think of shows in the past with so many industry insiders on their side? It seems that everyone that watches the show tends to dig it. I can't help but hope a few Emmy voters can be swayed! Let's all hope together! Go! Now! You aren't hoping hard enough!!

BSG Season 2 DVD Releases

A little more information has filtered onto the web regarding the release of season 2 for BSG:

We've got some DVD news that's going to make a lot of you happy. Universal has just officially announced the release of Battlestar Galactica: Season 2.5 for 9/19 (SRP $49.98). The 3-disc set will include all 10 of the remaining episodes from the season in anamorphic widescreen video with Dolby Digital 5.1 audio, along with an extended version of the Season 2.0  cliff-hanger episode Pegasus. Additional extras will include all of producer Ron Moore's podcast commentaries, deleted scenes and producer David Eick's video journals. There's no word yet as to whether Season 2.0 and 2.5 will be sold together as a 2-pack, or as a single release at a later date.

This was reported by Digital Bits and pointed out by a BSG fan in the comments.

Galactica Station is reporting that in the UK, all 20 episodes are coming out in a single release:

The Sci-fi Channel's hottest TV series returns as Battlestar Galactica 2 blasts onto DVD. As the epic second season begins, the fight to save humanity rages on - even as civil war looms within the fleet between the followers of President Roslin and Commander Adama.

You can now preorder the DVD containing all 20 episodes of season 2 from Amazon UK

availability: Due for release on 14/08/2006
price: £34.99

DVDs everywhere! The summer is just flying by for me! There are going to be new episodes before we know it!

Report from the Season 2 CD release party

Patrick Crowley was lucky enough to attend the Battlestar Galactica season 2 CD release party in LA and has a great post (with photos) up at his blog. Check it out!

I was lucky to be one of the very few fans that got tickets to Sunday night’s

Official Battlestar Galactica: Season Two Soundtrack Album Release Show in Los Angeles.

I actually live in San Diego, not LA, but it’s close enough that I’d figure it’d be worth the drive up (and the more painful drive home… I didn’t get back until 2am Monday morning). And it’s Galactica, right?

So, let’s get to it. The doors were supposed to open at 7pm, so I arrived around 6:30. Initially, there were only half a dozen fans, but the line eventually grew to maybe 20 or 30 people before we started entering the club.

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Awesome write up! Thanks Patrick! I now feel like I was there! Almost...

HNR says Galactica should get an Emmy

Hey, I completely agree with Robert Falconer...and Canda's The Globe and Mail. Check out the article:

It seems we're not the only ones who've been waxing loquaciously about Battlestar Galactica. Just about every major media outlet - including those generally considered among the most prestigious - have been singing the praises of this ground-breaking space drama (or perhaps we should say a drama that just happens to be set in space) for the past year. From Time magazine declaring it 2005's best TV series to making the American Film Institute's top-10 list, the series continues to find support.

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We can hope right?

Yummy BSG news treats

It is the off-season... so here are a few links to keep you nibbling.

• Check out some wallpapers by JefferySG. They are pretty sweet. What I haven't seen are any good dual-monitor BSG wallpapers. If you have, put a link in the comments.
• The rumor on the street is that there isn't going to be a complete DVD set released for season 2... at least not this year... 2.5 is all we are going to get. Anyone else heard differently?
• Head over to the Hasbro site and check out the three new titanium BSG toys coming to a store near you. They are Colonial I, the Raptor, and the Viper MK VII. It is a flash site so you will have to click around. I can't link you straight in. Oh and watch your volume. The site has some pretty loud music.
• I came across a pretty cool BSG sketch in progress. Check it.

That is all I got for now.

Busy days, but still time for BSG

So this post is half BSG related and half personal.

I am working on another project at the moment that has just exploded and it is eating up all my time. My buddy Steve and I started a website called 360voice.com. If you have an Xbox 360 and an online gamer account, you can sign up and the site automatically generates a blog about what games you play every day. It has become extremely popular forcing us to transition to dedicated web hosting and spend the entire week scrambling to keep the site from crashing under the amazing traffic load. You can follow along in the dev blog if you are really interested.

So, if any of you have noticed that traffic is a bit sparse, that is the reason. Hopefully things will slow down soon and I can settle back in to my BSG geekdom. But really quickly, I just wanted to go through my link list and email news... then it is back to writing some code!

1. According to the Malnurtured Snay, TVShowsonDVD is reporting that BSG season 2.5 will be released on DVD Sept. 19th and will include the extended cut of Pegasus. This is only the second half of season two... no word on when the complete season will be released... if ever. You can read more and see the artwork.
2. Speaking of Season 2.5, BSG News, the deleted scenes for it are up on SciFi Pulse.
3. Specialist Cally hit up a tiki bar and there are pictures to prove it!
4. The BSG collectable card game was released and according to Jon who emailed in, it is a lot of fun!
5. A web cast of the BSG event at the Museum of Television & Radio is now available. Go watch it, but beware of spoilers!

So that is all for now!

Original artwork for sale on eBay

Head over to eBay and put up a bid for an original piece of artwork by Grant Gould:

This is an original piece of artwork hand-drawn by Grant Gould (Sketch Artist for the "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith," "Lord of the Rings: Evolution," and "Complete Avengers" trading card sets) featuring the character Boomer and a Cylon Centurion from the amazing SciFi series Battlestar Galactica!

The artwork measures 9" wide and 12" tall and is on sturdy Bristol Board. It was drawn with pencil and brush pen, and then colored with Prismacolor markers. This is a one-of-a-kind piece and was created exclusively for this auction. Artwork will be mailed to the winner in a protective envelope so that it isn't damaged.

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Auction ends June 12th!

Grant does great stuff. I was happy to come across this auction.

Official Soundtrack press release

This was sent to me by a rep from CineMedia Promotions. It is the official press release for the Season Two soundtrack:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA: SEASON TWO SOUNDTRACK TO BE RELEASED BY LA-LA LAND RECORDS ON JUNE 20

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA TOUTED AS ONE OF THE TOP 10 SHOWS CURRENTLY ON TV BY TIME MAGAZINE AND TV GUIDE

(June 1, 2006- New York, NY) – Considered one of the top 10 shows currently on TV by Time Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, and TV Guide, Battlestar Galactica is the #1 show on the Sci Fi Channel.  On June 20, La-La Land Records will release the Battlestar Galactica: Season Two soundtrack, featuring more than 78 minutes of the best musical moments from the 2nd season of the Sci-Fi Channel's critically acclaimed, top-rated television series starring Edward James Olmos, Mary McDonnell, James Callis, Tricia Helfer and Katee Sackhoff.

Composer Bear McCreary builds on his impressive Season One accomplishments and once again delivers a sensational, emotionally rich score that ingeniously melds orchestra, vocals, percussion and synthesizer.  The Season Two CD contains few tracks which are longer in length.  Says McCreary, “The first one was a soundtrack.  The second one is an album.”

The Battlestar Galactica: Season Two soundtrack features performances by Supernova String Quartet (on “A Promise to Return” from The Farm), vocals by Raya Yarbrough (on “Lords of Kobol” from Pegasus), and vocals by Bt4 (on “The Cylon Prisoner” from Pegasus).  Former Oingo-Boingo members Steve Bartek, John Avila and Johnny "Vatos" Hernandez play on the track from “Black Market”.  And the main title theme from Battlestar Galactica, composed by Richard Gibbs, is also on the soundtrack.

Fans of the original series will be excited to see that the theme from the original Battlestar Galactica series, composed by Stu Phillips, has been adapted and arranged by McCreary.  The homage to the television show that inspired this new incarnation leads off the soundtrack.

Composer Bear McCreary is a classically trained composer with a degree in Composition and Recording Arts from the prestigious USC Thornton School of Music.  He has composed score for over thirty independent films, including director Jon Chu’s musical short When the Kids Are Away and the Discovery Channel miniseries The 5 Coolest Things.  McCreary was among a handful of select protégés of late film music legend Elmer Bernstein (THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN).

The third season of Battlestar Galactica will begin airing in October on the Sci Fi Channel.  The Battlestar Galactica: Season Two soundtrack will be available in stores or from www.lalalandrecords.com on June 20, 2005.  The soundtrack from the Battlestar Galactica mini-series and the Season One soundtrack are both available from La-La Land Records.

The top of the release is in CAPS in case you missed it. *smile*

Very soon it will be mine... very soon...

Firefly writer pens a BSG script

A few readers emailed in with this news. Jane Espenson will be writing an episode of Battlestar Galactica for season three. From Jane's website:

Jane is writing an episode of Battlestar Galactica and she couldn't be more thrilled!  Air dates will be announced when we know them.

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I have to say that I was a huge fan of Firefly, not while the show was airing, but quite a long time afterward on DVD. Jane wrote the episode Shindig which was definitely one of my favorites. It will be interesting to see how her sense of humor and wit translates to the much darker characters of Battlestar Galactica.

I wouldn't mind seeing a tad more humor in Battlestar Galactica. I feel the storytelling should be allowed to take itself completely seriously, but it is nice to have characters that can look all the setbacks and challenges in the face and make fun of their situation. Baltar has this element to him... Kara does as well... but often in a very hopeless sort of manner... not the camaraderie that was pervasive on Firefly. Who knows if such a dynamic is possible on BSG. I guess with Jane we might find out.

I would never want BSG to become Firefly... but I wouldn't mind seeing them experiment a little bit with the dynamics of humor during the utter hopelessness of the Cylon occupation.

Galactica mini-busts

A reader emailed in the other day claiming that a shadowy preview photo was possibly the bust of a cylon. It turns out that person was 100% correct. Patrick Wang from shopafx.com emailed in with the news and a link to photos:

The hottest show on the Sci-Fi channel just got hotter! With a third season on the way this Fall, fans are hungry for Battlestar Galactica collectibles. AFX is honored to fill that need with the first in a line of upcoming mini busts. Made of polystone resin, this exclusive "premium format" mini bust stands approximately 7.5" tall, making it slightly larger than the upcoming standard releases.

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It looks like you can only buy these at the San Diego Comic-Con. So if you needed an excuse to go, this might be it!... if you are a bust kind of person.

More details on "Caprica"

Slice of Sci-fi pulled out a nice non-spoiler section of Ron Moore's interview in SFX Magazine.

The newest issue of SFX Magazine has an interview with Battlestar Galactica producer Ronald D. Moore in which he talks about his new series spinoff called “Caprica.”

In the exclusive interview Moore says, “It’s a different kind of show. More of a drama. It’s corporate intrigue and interfamily politics…there are rival companies that are trying to develop the same technology. The government plays a role in trying to sort of get certain military aspects of the technology in place. It’s all coloured by the fact that we know none of this is going to come to a good end. This is a doomsday scenario that we know is leading to something really, really bad, that you’re watching unfold before your eyes…

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It sounds like they are really trying to position the show as an entirely different feel from the current BSG. I haven't made up my mind if that is a good or bad thing. One one side, if they make Capirca too similar, we will continually compare the two... if you make it too dissimilar, the positive association that we have won't carry over. It sounds like an interesting challenge... a very ambitious one for a show only in it's third season.

The world is running on Internet time these days though... things just move faster.. audiences expect more. Maybe we are witnessing the newest trend in entertainment: complete and total market saturation. Perhaps there will be a time when shows do not even take a season hiatus... they just go from one episode to the next, week after week alternating the cast between different parallel story-lines.

Sci Fi could have done that with Stargate SG1. They could have shown the normal Stargate for a few months, then while that crew was on break show Stargate Atlantis. Something like that might just work these days! We would never have to go a week without our favorite shows!

BSG Homeworld 2 mod

Are you a strategy gamer specializing in interstellar tactics deploying capital ships and fighters in an effort to turn your enemies into space debris? If you are than you have probably played Homeworld 2 and are eagerly looking forward to the Battlestar Galactica mod!

View the trailer
Windows media

Download the mod
Required Homeworld 2 install

I am not a big real-time strategy gamer, let alone in the three dimensions of space... but as a gamer I can seriously appreciate the effort that went into this.

Book review: The Cylons' Secret

Timothy Sandefur has an advanced review posted about the Battlestar Galactica novel The Cylons' Secret. He wasn't that impressed:

I’ve just finished an advance reading copy of the new Battlestar Galactica novel. I won’t spoil the story for you, except to say that you shouldn’t get your hopes up. On the positive side, Gardner makes the story much more science fictiony than BSG has sometimes been; I’ve long thought that the show has been slightly overzealous in avoiding futurism. But the combination of deities ex machinae (three, by my count), marvelous coincidences (at least two), and complete lack of foreshadowing, render the plot utterly unbelievable and uninteresting.

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That is sad to hear... It sounded like a really good premise. Anyone else have a different opinion?

Battlestar Galactica is almost true

Check out this "almost true" news post about BSG:

Those events, previously thought to be just a fabricated storyline for the show, are actually real events. The show was actually created by a few people from a scout ship to help prepare us for the fleet’s arrival. There was a previous Battlestar Galactica television show, which was also meant to prepare us, but the fleet’s arrival had to be delayed due to the Cylon’s finding their trail.

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So... in case you all were wondering... yes... BSG is real... this is the Matrix... and there is a pot of gold at the end of the Rainbow! YAY!

BSG chosen at Spaceys 2006

Just like last year, Battlestar Galactica walked away with the viewer's choice for a TV series. Check out the highlights which include some BSG cast members!

This award show keeps getting better. This year we got let Richard Dean Anderson take the camera and surprise us with a wacky montage. Bryan Singer presented a SPACEY (even though it is weird, considering he knows Kevin Spacey). Katee Sackoff and Grace Park present from the set of Battlestar Galactica, and Kim Poirier gets in a bar brawl.

Watch the highlights

Thanks to Claire for writing in!