Michael Rymer Interviewed About Remake

[BSG_Sci_FiPulse]

Michael Rymer says original Galactica was a cheap knock off of Star Wars, how little he knows.

http://scifipulse.net/battlestarnews/BSG/Michael_Rymer_Interview.html

[Muffit]

Er... isn't the mini a cheap knock off of BSG? :)
:muffit:

[BSG_Sci_FiPulse]

And isn't Star Wars a cheap Knock off of several ancient myths and legands rolled into one. Isn't Babylon Five a cheap knock off of Lord Of The Rings only set in space.

That's what gets me about the likes of Rymer. They will make a statement like that, without realising that nothing is truly original anymore. I personally loved the original Galactica and found it more Entertaining than Star Wars. Star Wars movies were wonderful, but they do not have the longevity that Galactica has for me.

[Muffit]

Hi BSG_Sci-FiPulse! Yeah, it's really hard to find true originality in sci fi, especially after the 50's. That's why I like the old B/W movies so much.

A little known fact. A lot of people were pretty upset about the walking viper suggestion for BSG, thinking it copied Star Wars. Funny thing is, Empire Strikes Back did not even come close to inventing the walker. In 1898, H.G. Wells wrote The War of the Worlds. In the book version (as opposed to the film), he did not envision flying machines for the Martians (since the plane had yet to be invented). Instead, he envisioned them moving about in huge walking machines, virtually indentical to Star Wars.

In fact, I can reach over right now and see a picture of one on the cover of my War of the Worlds book from 1960! :)

I love BSG because it interweaves so many mythological elements, and they make sense cuz the suggestion is our ancient civilizations came from them. I even like the Mormon elements - though I do not share their beliefs, some of them are really unusual and intriguing, perfect for a scifi show.

Thanks for the info! :)
:muffit:

[BSG_Sci_FiPulse]

I definately understand where your coming from, and having read most of HG Wells and Jules Vernes books, I totally understand what wells envisioned for the aliens in war of the worlds. In fact their is a pretty good illustration of the walkers on the 1970's Music Album titled War Of The Worlds.

This new mini, as you know have been following it's progress, and will more than likely see it on tape when it comes out. But to be blunt and honest I will always prefer the original. Sure the original series suffered from clumsy writing at times. But it had a soul and a heart of its own.

This new mini though seems to have borrowed quite considerably from Blade Runner and it has probably nicked a few ideas from 5th Element as well, and kept certain designs and the destruction of the fleets story line. But as we have already discused, it is hard to come up with an original premise. What made B5 so good was although it borrowed story elements from Lord Of The Rings i.e. the Shadows = The Dark Riders and what not. It was not all that obvious because not everyone on the planet has been patient enough to read all 3 volumed of Lord Of The Rings.

[AlphaAce]

Well, we didn't see a rebel fleet in Star Wars until The Empire Strikes Back. The way GL presented the rebel fleet at the end of the movie reminds me of the rag tag fleet of BSG. I think GL got a few ideas from BSG, perhaps. Also, it was Adama in the War of the Gods that could move objects with his mind. We didn't see a Jedi do that until The Empire Strikes Back. TESB came out in 1980, almost two years after BSG.

Star Wars is very good and obviously much more popular than BSG, but BSG has a lot of good qualities and I believe even after all of these years is still very entertaining.

[AlphaAce]

After having read the article it isn't apparent that Michael Rymer still believes that BSG was cheap knock off of Star Wars:

"I wouldn't have wanted to do a continuation of the original show because frankly I didn't think the original show warrented it. Having seen the original show now, I feel it was very much a creature of the 1970s; it was a product of its time. Ron Moore's script carries on all the good elements of the show - which are the relationships, the politics and the central idea - but it also has a great correlation with our world right now."

It seems he is being somewhat fair to TOS in this paragraph.

[BSG_Sci_FiPulse]

The oprerative word is trying to be fair. Keep in mind that what I have posted on the site is not the complete interview. I cannot reproduce everything in these magazine articles for copy right reasons, so I tend to take the best quotes and editoralise around those quotes:)

[oldwardaggit]

Hummm, surprise , surprise. Another person on sci fi's version that didn't like the original but they don't mind using her name and taking that pay check. lol

Plus another Starwars dig thrown our way and they still want us to watch.

Oh well, I guess I really don't care much because I'm focusing on a continuation of the original by people that liked the original and can see what this huge fan base can see.

:)
OWD

[kingfish]

Originally posted by oldwardaggit
Hummm, surprise , surprise. Another person on sci fi's version that didn't like the original but they don't mind using her name and taking that pay check. lol

Plus another Starwars dig thrown our way and they still want us to watch.

Oh well, I guess I really don't care much because I'm focusing on a continuation of the original by people that liked the original and can see what this huge fan base can see.

:)
OWD



Shawn have you ever seen Queen of the Damned? It stunk big time. The late Aaliyah was the only brightspot. Interview With The Vampire was ten times better.

[jewels]

It just proves that the people involved with the production, just don't get it.

And Rhymer's an incredibly poor director if he let that horridly (and I do mean horridly) acted bar brawl between Paul Tigh and Kara Thrace in the mini and cut other, better scenes. What? You liked the baby murder scene in it entirety? I never got how the mother wasn't instantly all over Number 6: most mothers would have at least tried to deck her, screamed for the police or something....realism my arse.

[oldwardaggit]

Originally posted by kingfish
Shawn have you ever seen Queen of the Damned? It stunk big time. The late Aaliyah was the only brightspot. Interview With The Vampire was ten times better.

Queen of the damned stunk up
the big screen in my opinion and getting this guy to direct is just par for the course in my opinion.

And you are also right in the fact that interview with a vampire is head and shoulders above it's sequel.

I heard that interview won Anne Rice over. I wonder what she thought about queen of the dumb, ooops I mean damn.

Aaliyah was the best part of that movie just as Olmos is for this mini ( plus the great effects ) but it's a complete package that is needed for Galactica and the Sci Fi channel failed to deliver in my opinion.

OWD

[Charybdis]

First of all, I just can't get a grasp of using those danged mini names...Kara Thrace???? It just makes me want to gag every time I hear that name. It gives me the willies just typing it!!!

But I wanted to say something about Star Wars and having Jedi use powers to move objects. I think we are going a bit far comparing the Jedi moving objects in ESB to Adama doing it in BSG.

If you really think about it, the mind powers of the Jedi were established with the original Star Wars movie. Obi-Wan uses mind powers on the Stormtrooper on Tatooine and he also causes some sort of noise to distract the stormtroopers when he is shutting off the tractor beam.

But, Darth Vader also uses the force to choke Adm. Motti on the Death Star. It could be argued (for argument's sake) that Vader actually "moved" something in Motti's throat to cut his air off! So, technically speaking, there was mind power movement of objects in the original Star Wars which came before BSG!!!!

How's that???

[originalsinner]

HOG WASH HES JUST TRYING TO COVER UP THE LAME MINI AS BEST HE CAN, ITS BEEN SAID OVER AND FOR 25 YEARS, BSG CAN STAND ON ITS OWN, STAR WARS WASNT ABOUT A RAG TAG FLEET SEARCHING FOR EARTH.
Michael Rymer and Jar Jar Binks, someone look into that?

[goldcenturian]

The whole scary thing about the REAL Cylons was their complete lack of emotion! Completely logical, and efficient bent on destroying all humans. Yes, even the real Baltar, as played by John Colicos would have eventually been terminated too. Does anyone have any doubts of that, except the character, Baltar?
Who cares if the #6 fake Cylon has EMOTIONS? She's supposed to be a CYLON, not a human! It would have been more effective and affective if she had been written and portrayed as only programmed "acting" to get her way, not actually "feeling" anything. This way she is just (and I know how jaded this sounds) another serial murderer, no big deal. Oh, and I'm sure that Mr. Rymer would not have wanted to do a continuation: nobody would have asked him to direct it!! DUH!!!:laugh: