Galactica 1980, how bad could it *really* be?...

Pretty Frakkin’ Bad is the answer…

I was looking through some of my old favorite TV shows on the Hulu website, they had some classic '80s shows from my childhood, Airwolf, A-Team, Classic Galactica, Buck Rogers, Miami Vice and others, I saw they also had Galactica '80, I had never seen it, but heard it was bad, but I figured “How bad could it be, really”

Dear OG I was wrong, G;80 was a horrible, horrible show, pathetic acting, recycled special effects, bad blue-screen and wire work, annoying “magical children”, it was just…bad, almost Manos bad

the Galactica people have the ability to super-jump, the two lead stars (Kent McCord and some other guy) have cloaking devices built into their watch-coms, leading to a lot of cheap, bad “invisibility” gags, the show was just bad, sloppy and, well, trust me, it’s BAD

the only episode I actually enjoyed was the finale “The Return of Starbuck”, which seeks to explain the distinct lack of Dirk Benedict’s character on G;80, this episode was clearly intended as a comedy, and they went over the top with it, in this episode…

Starbuck crash lands on a desolate desert planet after his Viper is critically damaged in a battle with a Raider, the Raider crashes as well, and Starbuck rebuilds one of it’s Centurion crew for companionship and “witty” banter

“TROS” was a so-bad-it’s-good ep, but the rest of the series, meh, not worth watching

if you go to the Hulu website and watch the show, out of curiosity, don’t say I didn’t warn you

Oh yeah, it was cheesy! It might have reached the point, though, where it’s so bad that it’s good… if you know what I mean.

Hey, I actually liked The Return of Starbuck (though it wasn’t really strictly a return so much as a departure). It was campy and cheezy, but I thought it was rather good (remember, Galactica wasn’t exactly at Star Trek TOS levels of high production values and non-camp even in the original show). I would have tweaked the end of the episode a touch, but certain elements of it (Starbuck holding a daily muster with the dead Centurions, briefing the “Troops” just to have someone to talk to).

Actually, it amuses me that Return of Starbuck got recycled into a new BSG episode, and a very good one too.

If you were the scriptwriter/ producer, how would you have done Galactica 1980? That is, how would you keep the show in production after the departure of all the major leads except for Lorne Greene, and with a reduced budget that sharply limited the special effects you could use?

If they’d kept the show in it’s original format, they would have had to start with an “almost everyone we know gets killed” episode that introduced the new leads. I can’t think of an example of any series that survived such radical surgery. Plus they would have had to rely almost exclusively on recycled footage for the space scenes; as it was, the original show did that heavily. The adage that producing a science-fiction television series is the equivalent of producing a feature length movie every two weeks applies strongly to the original show. In fact, Galactica was originally envisioned as an ongoing series of TV movies shown 3-4 times a year, but the network wouldn’t accept that format.

So pretty much the premise of “a generation later and set primarily on Earth” gets forced on you. That makes it hard enough to preserve any of the appeal of the original show. If I’d been the one to have to do it, I would have made the focus of the 1980 version how the Colonials discover the lost history of humanity: how Earth got split off from the rest of the colonies after the fall of Kobol, and just what the mysterious “angel” race is up to. Maybe have it turn out that some other colonials had found Earth centuries earlier and were secretly running their own agenda.

But yeah, definitely no magic children.

“The Return of Starbuck” was basically the “Enemy Mine” story. The episode is good because it starts out with a decent story.

Back in the day, BSG 80 made me appreciate the witty banter and special effects (and cleavage) of Buck Rogers.

I’m one of the few people that actually prefers original BSG to the modern version (I’m such a heathen!), but even I had trouble watching G80 reruns when they showed up on SciFi a few years ago.

Those flying motorcycles sure were cool, though. That’s pretty much the one thing I’d remembered about the show from when it was originally aired and I watched it as a kid, too young to recognize how lame the show was.

Warning, any exposure to Dr Zee will reduce your life span. Gal80 even had nazis.

That was the high point of the series for me too.

As an aside, the thread reminds me to google or wikipedia for one of the actors from the show. The dude who went back in time to join the Nazis to make them rulers of an Earth that can fend of the Cylons. He was in Airwolf last night and I’ve only just noticed he looked like he once had a burn injury to his face.

Richard Lynch;

That explains it.

Huh? Which one?

-Joe

The only thing I recall about that show was the flying motorcycles. They were great.

“You Can’t Go Home Again”, which has Starbuck’s Viper being badly damaged and crash landing on a desert planet, leading her to use a crashed Cylon fighter to effect a way off the planet (the details are different, but the basic plot is the same, like many of the new BSG episodes compared to old BSG episodes)

BSG80 is needed to fill the background of John Chrichton’s Dad.

OK, enough fun with shared actors…

A long time ago, in a …city far, far away

I was visiting my cousins who live in LA, and they had managed to score us some tickets to an “audience preview” of an upcoming TV show. This was 1977 or 1978 - within a year of when “Star Wars” had been released. We go to this thing, are handed our little “reaction monitor” (my term) devices and instructed on their use. We sit back, and we got to see the pilot (sans commercials) for this new show called “Battlestar Galactica”. You have to keep in mind this was after the groundbreaking special effects of “Star Wars”. So to see similar effects and space battles - soon to be on TV - was overwhelming. We cheered and gave overwhelming approval for the show (in our defense, the writing for the pilot far exceeded any of the subsequent episodes).

So then we anxiously wait for the show to finally air on TV. The studios clearly rushed to get this out to cash in on the “Star Wars” craze. And…what a disappointment. Within a month or two, I remember hearing it being referred to as “Battlestar Ponderosa”.

I remember catching some episode on reruns years later, and was stunned at how horrible it was (okay, to be honest the only real reason was to catch a glimpse of Anne Lockhart again). For all their menacing appearance, those lame Cylons not only moved in slow motion, couldn’t shoot worth beans, but had to communicate audibly ??? !

The SD ComicCon has been a steady “home” for the stars of that show. Anne Lockhart has been a number of times early on. And Richard Hatch sets up a booth from time to time. But the one staple for all the years I can remember attending is Herb “Boomer” Jefferson. He has a booth set up every year.

Cormac262 all I can say is that a man with my own name MUST be smart. :slight_smile:

He shows up at WonderCon in San Francisco every year, too.

How does he like being an Asian woman now?

I was an Asian woman for a time in the early nineties. It’s not so bad.

For about Twenty minutes, right?