TV Guide has just put up a ton of video interviews from backstage at Comic-Con with the BATTLESTAR GALACTICA cast.
Tricia Helfer:
Katee Sackhoff:
Jamie Bamber:
Michael Trucco:
James Callis:
For more TV Guide Comic-Con videos, go to to their main video page.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
TV Guide video from Comic-Con
Study The Classics
Faithful Sitrep reader and eagle eyed BSG fan Wendy Towne, points to an interview with Ronald D. Moore in Agent DVD by John Latchem, about what is coming along for BSG in home video, new webisodes, and extended cuts of episodes in the second half of season 4. Excerpts follow:
The first 10 episodes of the fourth season recently aired and are likely to see a home video release later this year in anticipation of the final stretch of episodes, which Moore says will answer a lot of the questions raised during the first three seasons.
In the lead-up to the final episodes, Moore says the production team will create a new series of online shorts, similar to “The Resistance” webisodes that were made before the third season. Unlike “The Resistance,” the new webisodes will not take place between the episodes, but will go back and explain things that happened earlier during the course of the show. In this sense, Moore says, the shorts will serve a function similar to the Razor direct-to-DVD movie produced last year.
Also, Moore says the eventual DVD release of the final half of the fourth season should include a longer version of an episode he directed, called “The Disquiet That Follows My Soul.”
“We’ll probably do an extended cut of that with a new commentary,” Moore says. “And I imagine we’ll do a new cut of the finale.”
To follow “Galactica,” Moore is developing a pilot for Fox called “Virtuality,” about astronauts on a 10-year mission. He also has signed to do a trilogy of sci-fi movies for United Artists and is preparing what he calls a companion piece to John Carpenter’s The Thing.
But Moore is not completely abandoning the “Galactica” universe. Production is underway on a spinoff prequel, called “Caprica,” which delves into the origins of the robotic Cylons and the political rivalry between two families. The cast includes Eric Stoltz, Esai Morales, Polly Walker and Paula Malcomson.
“It’s coming together great,” Moore says. “It’s a very different time and a very different setting. It’s not about space, but about these families and their machinations.”
Justine of All About Tahmoh Penikett found a series of amazing pro photos taken of the BSG cast at Comic Con.
Crazyvictoria on the BSG Blog has an update and photos of upcoming BSG action figures, including Adama and Roslin figures, and figures tied to RAZOR.
Laura Bramley of Hamilton College reports on a new Battlestar Galactica academic study:
Texts like the Iliad may be old, but they are called classics precisely because they are timeless, turning up over and over again – sometimes in unusual places. Christopher Bouton (class of'09), a rising senior from Beverly, Mass., is spending the summer researching the connections between Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Virgil's Aeneid, and two slightly more recent productions: "Blade Runner" by Ridley Scott and the television series "Battlestar Galactica" by Ronald Moore.
Bouton is collaborating with Winslow Professor of Classics Carl. A. Rubino on the project, which is funded by the Emerson Foundation Grant program. Created in 1997, the program was designed to provide students with significant opportunities to work collaboratively with faculty members, researching an area of interest. The students will make public presentations of their research throughout the academic year.
A history major with a minor in classics, Bouton is no stranger to research. Last summer, he won a fellowship from the Society of Historians of the Early American Republic, which enabled him to attend an intensive three week program along with nine students from other colleges. Bouton worked with professors to examine school integration in Nantucket in the 1840s, a project that will be the basis of his senior thesis.
This summer the work is slightly different, however. Bouton has already studied modern ties to the Iliad, the Odyssey and the Aeneid in Rubino's "Heroism, Ancient and Modern" course, and he says that studying "Blade Runner" and "Battlestar Galactica" is very different kind of research from his work about Nantucket schools. "Listening to dialogue and watching action is much more engaging than looking at microfilm," he comments. At the same time, doing research on popular media brings its own challenges, one of which is making sure that the research is relevant to others. Bouton says he was drawn to studying "Blade Runner" and "Battlestar Galactica" because of his own interest in the productions, but to pursue a research project, it was important to have a broader underlying motivation than mere fandom.
That foundation lies in thematic connections on issues such as the nature of humanity and heroism. In the classics, explains Bouton, the characters are set apart from normal humanity, the "universal us," and the figures of the Iliad seem to be superhuman. "We get the sense that this is a story, but this isn't us," he says. In the dystopian future of "Blade Runner" and the world of "Battlestar Galactica," those same questions resurface, since each production features a small population of isolated humans in surroundings dominated by human-seeming robots. The classical themes turn into a discussion of what makes humanity unique when it can be simulated almost exactly by machines.
Now beginning the writing phase of his project, Bouton says that it has allowed him to extend his knowledge of the classics, something that he will not be able to pursue after leaving Hamilton, since he plans to attend graduate school and earn a Ph.D. in history. The chance to follow diverse interests is one of the reasons he came to Hamilton, he says, and his research this summer has been an opportunity to do just that.
I'd love to see the results of that research.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Apollo Bar
What Superhero power would BSG's Apollo, Jamie Bamber want? TVGuide.com asked a bunch of Comic Con attendees this exact question. Check out this video briefly featuring Jamie Bamber, Tricia Helfer, Rainn Wilson, among others in San Diego:
Watching Kristen
E! Online's Watch with Kristen has some BSG news in their Spoiler Chat Q&A:
Mena in Los Angeles: I just read that Battlestar Galactica will air its "final, final" season in January. Any hints on what to expect?
I can tell you that when I asked Jamie Bamber about the last 10 episodes, he was positively effusive. This wasn't just an actor reading his lines flogging the show—he was truly in awe of the final three eps. According to Jamie: "They're amazing. Ron's finale is just sensational. All I can say is they're well-deserving of being the last episodes of Battlestar Galactica." So excited! Also, by the by, Jamie's wife is just about the coolest girl you could ever meet. She's the kind of girl who tells you that you have something in your teeth before you interview her husband and helps you get it out...(Not that that happened to me or anything. No thireee! Wait, thorry...need to get this rathpberry theed out of my teeth...No siree!)
For a really big spoiler/speculation about a possible fate for Number 3 Lucy Lawless, read Kristin's full report, and scroll down a bit to find it.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
WANTED: PHAETON TOTE
Did any of you con-goers spot this Phaeton bag at SDCC, the subtle first move in VIRTUALITY's marketing? We are still roaming the net seeking reports of Ron Moore's other panel at the con, so if you were at the Saturday night TV Guide: Hot List panel, perhaps you could leave a comment here...
[Hat tip to The Good Ship Phaeton blog]
A desire so strong it's a tad painful.
[ETA on this post the next morning: Sorry folks, nothing to see yet, Sci Fi Channel did NOT show new BSG footage during EUREKA last night. But TV Squad still said what they said...we'll do some snooping and try to find out what's up.]
I may be projecting, but let's play connect the dots.
TV Squad has put their panel recap online today and it includes this line: "We were shown a preview clip that will air soon on Sci Fi, which had clips from the remaining episodes."
Twitterer Kenny Chiwa is apparently interning for the Sci Fi Channel in LA this summer. He wrote this yesterday: "Make sure to watch Eureka on SciFi tomorrow night at 9pm for some new promos!"
Is anyone going to watch EUREKA tonight? *desperation creeping into voice*
P.S. - TV Squad also mentioned Sci Fi Channel is promising to start giving video embed codes for their Con vids. That'll be nice. Maybe they'll be on Hulu? Heck, the entire DOCTOR HORRIBLE'S SING-ALONG BLOG is now on Hulu...why not a few panel vids.
Hot and Dirty
MSN Movies celebrates HOT & DIRTY: STARS WE LIKE BETTER GRIMY...
Our favorite frakked up pilot is in good company here with James Bond, Jack Shephard, Jim Morrison and Dirty Harry:
Katee Sackhoff Ace pilot Kara Thrace of "Battlestar Galactica" wasn't lying when she told Apollo, "Me in a dress is a once in a lifetime opportunity."Thank goodness.
That might have been one of the more ridiculous scenes in an utterly riveting show. A formal dance?
Curled hair? Thank goodness the writers have given us plenty of dirty, sweaty, and even bloody scenes with Starbuck.She's an inspiration to all women who'd rather wrestle with aliens and assorted authority figures than with a blow dryer and brow tweezer. To us, that sounds totally out of this world.
Project Abraham update
Here's an update on Katee Sackhoff's role in the slowly unfolding transmedia/ARG for Resistance 2.
Multipleverses got a promotional USB drive at SDCC this weekend that contained all the videos left to date at Project Abraham...as well as the cover of a newspaper with more info about what Katee's character is up to.
In addition, two other related sites are now live: Get A War Job and America First America Only.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Super Size Me
BSG Executive Producer David Eick, talked to Nephele Tempest of Sci-Fi Wire about season 4.5 getting longer:
The second half of the fourth and final season of SCI FI Channel's original series Battlestar Galactica promises fans a number of extra-long, jam-packed episodes as it works toward the climactic finale, executive producer David Eick told fans at Comic-Con International in San Diego on July 26.
In a subsequent interview, Eick told SCI FI Wire that producers have been "able to convince the network to let us air ... long episodes--[to] take single episodes and make them double episodes, ... [and to take] double episodes and make them quadruple episodes."
Eick added: "Our episodes are always ... long, and we're constantly getting into the editing room with 10, 15, sometimes 20 minutes of material that you can't get into an episode." With just a half-season remaining, Eick said, "the story has become so critical in order to realize the arc of the series that we can't just cut stuff out and save it for later or push it 'til next year, the stuff we're used to doing. It's all got to be there."
So perhaps Eick means that some regular episodes will run a few minutes longer than usual and be super sized. We already know the original intention was that the Series Finale would be a 2 hour episode, that has since been expanded to run for 3 hours. But, the Final Episode was so epic in production, they have enough material to make it a 4 hour finale. We already know from Maureen Ryan's interview with Ron Moore that the Final Episode will be longer for the DVD version than what will be aired on TV. Unless, Sci-Fi has agreed to have it run for an additional hour.
To recap: Originally season 4.5 was going to be 10 hours. Then by adding a 3rd hour to the Final Episode it grew to 11 hours. So, if the Finale gets a 4th hour to air, we'll be seeing 12 hours of 4.5, hopefully if all this works out with the Sci-Fi Channel.
Entire BSG 2008 Comic-Con panel video
The entire BATTLESTAR GALACTICA 2008 Comic-Con panel is now online. Warning for adult language. Thanks Mr. Smith!
Mark Verheiden describes the event thusly:
Jam packed as usual with literally thousands of enthusiastic fans. Kevin Smith was a funny and blisteringly profane toast-master who elicited a lot of good stuff from the assembled cast. Plus there was a trailer with some new scenes from the next bunch of shows (with a lot of material from the episode I wrote, he notes proudly). It's always amazing to feel the intensity of the crowd at these events.
I know a lot of you are wondering when this 4.5 promo is going to leak to the nettywebs...well I say, we shall see. The footage from last year's Con, as well as that shown at the Dome event last year, never made it onto the web. So...we'll see what happens this time.
Oh, and SciFi.com? Your lack of video embedding code is so 2006. You slay me.
[If you're interested, all of Sci Fi Channel's panels are also posted now, via this Comic-Con page.]
Sunday, July 27, 2008
"This show is so good that it'll get you pregnant."
More news and panel recaps from Comic-Con:
Maureen Ryan's reports on the BATTLESTAR GALACTICA panel, and TV panels in general.
The LA Times Hero Complex blog.
Slash Film's Jon Christensen, who just drank the BSG kool-aid last summer, has the most detailed description of the Season 4.5 promo trailer that I've seen thus far. 4 out of 10 on the Sitrep spoiler scale. IGN.com's panel recap is also pretty well-detailed.
Fan reports/photos/videos from withaterrace and own_the_sky. (Photos above from own_the_sky.)
An LA Times post-DOLLHOUSE panel video interview that starts with Joss Whedon (with a bit of Adam Baldwin), and ends with Tahmoh Penikett discussing BSG:
Here is withaterrace's video of Tahmoh Penikett describing how he got his part in DOLLHOUSE:
Joss'd Blog has posted audio of the entire DOLLHOUSE panel.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
OT: Lost
The Tailsection has the complete video of Team Darlton's talk at Comic Con, including the new Marvin Candle video. AICN has more Lost panel info. James Hibberd adds his round up.
The New York Times has a general story reporting on Comic Con.
ETA: Maureen Ryan's excellent account of the Lindelof/Cuse festivities.
More From Comic-Con
i09 just posted their post-panel chat with David Eick and several castmembers...as well as some gorgeous BSG political poster art by Laurent-LX.
EW.com PopWatch has posted about the BSG and DOLLHOUSE panels.
Thanks to reader canadiangirl-86 for pointing up this short Tricia Helfer interview with mahalodaily.com:
[btw, mahalo has a terrific load of other con interviews and panel videos on their youtube channel.]
Fans are beginning to post their photos on the skiffy board...try here and here for starters.
Photos by ptanabe and CylonRomo; click to embiggenMiscellaneous Comic-Conery
All About Tahmoh is tracking all the liveblogging, tweets, and whatnot from the DOLLHOUSE panel that Tahmoh Penikett took part in. EW.com has just posted a great little pre-panel interview with Penikett, Eliza Dushku and Joss Whedon:
Limited to just 500 replicas, each one of these babies is being hand built by the model-making wizards at The FX Co...We were also extremely lucky to have just about the entire cast of Battlestar Galactica, plus Executive Producer Ron Moore, sign a bunch of the Raider plaques – every Raider will come with a signed plaque from one the BSG crew, at no extra charge. As for whose signature you’ll get if you get a Raider, well, let’s just say we’ve left that up to the Gods.
io9 cornered Paul Campbell at his KNIGHT RIDER panel and confirmed we will not be seeing any more Billy Keikeya on BSG. Sigh. While we wait for SciFi.com to get the panel video online, NBC.com has the KNIGHT RIDER panel posted.
The LA Times Hero Complex blog posted a short interview with con guest (and con guest booking agent) Erin Gray.
The first videos from the con are starting to trickle onto youtube (or, in the case of TWILIGHT, they're pouring into youtube)...below is a snippet of Richard Hatch at the Thursday panel. Let us know in the comments if you find any good stuff; or post it over on our friendfeed room.
Discover blog is promising to post video of Thursday's Science of Sci Fi panel. Meanwhile con-goer b!x has photos of the Hatch/McCreary panel starting here.
Speaking of videos...take a look at this TRON 2 preview that leaked this morning. Wow. I am so, so there!
"They wouldn't kiss, though, no matter how much I begged them."
Here are some more reports from the BSG Panel at Comic-Con...
The Live Feed (non-spoilery)
io9.com (mild spoilers)
PopCritics Liveblogging the BSG panel
Go here to read it.
I got a text that Jamie Bamber and Tahmoh Penikett are on stage with the previously announced folks.
ETA: just got a text from a friend describing some of the new Season 4.5 footage shown...for mild spoilers, it's posted over in this skiffy thread using white-out text.
ETA 2: Well PopCritics' feed seemed to die partially through the panel, but The Futon Critic has something up. More as it comes in today.
Off Topic...but related
Fun but OT: the video of LOST's showrunners that was shown just before their Comic-Con panel today. (hat tip to Watch With Kristin)
Can you guess what the "related" part is? :P
CapriCast - video #1
Comic Con Report for Day 2 - Lines, lines, lines.....and a Big Frakkin Bag!
As most of you know, when I'm not doing my day job or my other blogs, I have fun with the Adama for President site. I brought a selection of stickers and mini posters to give away while here, but so far it's been a bit limited. Why?
Because there's a rule here - if you give away something...anything you will be besieged by millions of fans, instantaneously. Trying to get the Big Frakking Bag or a complete set of Battlestar Galactica buttons was no easy matter. We realized quickly that if we started handing out something for free, we might get trampled by the mob and miss today's Dollhouse and BSG panels. So we're giving 'em all away, today while we wait in line for a good spot in Ballroom 20. (Please, don't mob us!)
One thing that became apparent as we made our way around day 2 was that we had a choice - do all the panels like we wanted, or do the Con floor, but doing both was tricky. We ended up going to some "off topic" forums for "Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends" and "24" that were hilarious, though. Our strategy today is to fight like frakk to get into the "Dollhouse" Forum, since they do not clear the room in between panels, and it's just before the BSG one. Folks if you see two nerds in Adama for President shirts desperately trying to get in, help a fellow traveler if you can, please....
This morning we're going to try and get more BSG buttons and assorted swag before going to the Big Panel Discussion. We're armed with tape recorders, cameras, batteries and a whole lotta queue karma to do a proper write up on what Our Favorite Show's Actors are up to!
As always , follow me on The Twitter and look for more pics on The Flickr!
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