SCI FI Channel has announced that Battlestar Galactica will move to a new timeslot starting January 21, 2007: Sundays at 10 p.m. ET/PT, following the premiere of the new original series The Dresden Files at 9 p.m. Battlestar Galactica has been airing episodes of its current third season on Fridays at 9 p.m. ET/PT. Executive-produced by Ronald D. Moore and David Eick, the series stars Edward James Olmos, Mary McDonnell, Jamie Bamber, Katee Sackhoff, James Callis, Tricia Helfer and Grace Park.
Ronald D. Moore, executive producer of SCI FI Channel’s original series Battlestar Galactica, told fans that the upcoming third season of the hit SF series could see some fatalities among the characters. “Oh, there’re some changes in the air,” Moore said at the 64th World Science Fiction Convention, or WorldCon, in Anaheim, California, over the weekend. “We’re going to lose some people this year. Not all of our friends are going to make it all the way.” Moore declined to be specific, but said that the show’s writers have finished breaking the story arc for the end of the upcoming third season.
When asked whether the show was still true to his initial vision, Moore said he felt it was on track, but that there had been surprises along the way, from both writers and actors, that made both the storyline and the characters richer.
Season three of Battlestar Galactica begins airing October 6 at 9 p.m. ET/PT.
Earlier this month, NBC Universal announced that SCI FI Channel would broadcast original Battlestar Galactica webisodes on its new broadband Internet channel SCI FI Pulse. Pulse is also increasing the amount of series providing totally original additional material. Now the title of the Web-based, limited series has been revealed: Battlestar Galactica: The Resistance.
The announcement was made at NBC Universal’s official upfront press briefing. The network upfronts are aimed at advertisers but also let viewers in on the final decisions about what shows are returning, which have been cancelled, and what new series have been picked up for the fall.
The Resistance will lasting ten episodes, and will fill in the several-month gap between Season Two and the upcoming third year, during which the new Colonial home of New Caprica is under Cylon occupation.
Season Three is currently filming in Vancouver for an October 2006 premiere.
James Callis, who plays Baltar in SCI FI Channel’s original series Battlestar Galactica, told SCI FI Wire that the upcoming third season will build on the events of last season’s shocking finale. “In the upcoming episodes, the simplest way to explain what happens is that the wheat is separated from the chaff,” Callis said in an interview at this month’s Saturn Awards in Universal City, California. “I’m not actually sure at this moment which I belong to, which bothers me, whether I’m the wheat or the chaff. All I know is that we are necessarily separated.”
At the end of the second season, the last surviving humans found themselves trying to eke out an existence on the rugged planet of New Caprica, when the Cylons invade and occupy them. Callis agreed that the new season has drawn comparisons to France under the Nazi occupation of World War II. “And the first few scripts of this particular season are phenomenal,” he said. “And far darker and more gritty and more worrying than anything that you have seen before. I really am not just saying that. I remember just reading it going, ‘My God almighty, this is remorseless and relentless.’ And as such should be very gripping television. Even though it’s very, I think, the word is dystopic.”
Battlestar Galactica returns with new episodes in October.
Katee Sackhoff, who plays fighter jock Kara “Starbuck” Thrace on SCI FI Channel’s original series Battlestar Galactica, told SCI FI Wire that her character is in for a rough time - and a new haircut - in the show’s upcoming third season. Speaking in an interview on the set here of her new film, White Noise 2: The Light, Sackhoff said: “I just lost a huge battle with the producers as to my hair and what length it should and should not be.” (Sackhoff’s blond hair was streaked with bright red for her role in the supernatural horror sequel film White Noise 2.) “So it’s going to be gone. Shorter than it was in the miniseries.”
Sackhoff said to look for a big change in the fifth episode of the upcoming third season, after four episodes that promise to test the already-battered Starbuck to her limits. “She goes through a lot of turmoil in the first four episodes,” she said. “More than we’ve ever seen [from] her. The depths of despair she finds herself in are pretty deep at the end of episode four. And she kind of re-establishes her commitment to the military in episode five, which is the haircut.”
Continue reading Sackhoff Talks Starbuck And BSG Season Three
The presidential election between Baltar and Roslin takes place with the same uncertainty that followed the 2000 race between Bush and Gore. And the winner is… the person with the most votes, of course! It’s no surprise that Galactica’s 90-minute season finale closes with a cliff-hanger. The real shocker tonight is that the episode’s biggest surprise isn’t centered on who won the presidency; it’s what happens at the end of that extra half hour.
As Battlestar Galactica wraps up its second season tomorrow night with a 90-minute finale, its cast is just about to start shooting season three. Sci Fi has already announced that Galactica will return to its Friday night timeslot in October, although a specific date has not been revealed. The network has ordered 20 episodes. Lucy Lawless will return as cylon for a 10-episode arc next season. It looks like we’ll get to see most of the major cast members again next season, too. Filming of season three of BSG starts in April in Vancouver.
