Eric Paddon
December 29th, 2004, 09:16 PM
For many of us, one reason why "Battlestar Galactica" was able to reasonate in ways that other sci-fi series before it had not done, was because it was one of the first series to offer a forward moving storyline. Unlike "Star Trek", which was completely self-contained to the point that a person could watch a third season episode and a first season episode back to back and not see too many difference, BSG built on situations from previous episodes and the characters accordingly had to adjust themselves because of what had gone on before. Not since the first few episodes of "Lost In Space" had there been anything like this.
Today, the idea of a continuous, forward moving story arc is something we take for granted in sci-fi television, and compared to the standards of today, BSG admittedly has its flaws. The continuity is not razor sharp, and we sometimes see premises thrown at us that disrupt things we knew earlier (like for instance in "Take The Celestra", the emergence of Aurora and the idea that she was a girlfriend of Starbuck's up to the time of the Destruction comes way out of left field considering that we thought Starbuck was only really serious with Athena at that time).
After writing a number of fanfic stories, I was first asked to contribute an adaptation of "Fire In Space" for what at the time (circa 1996) was a project that simply invovled adapting episodes that had not been part of the novelizations. But I took it upon myself to write this story in a way that would not simply adapt it by repeating everything that was on-screen, but rather to tighten up the continuity with what had been established. That meant retaining the general storyline, dialogue, and actions of the characters so it would seem familiar to a fan of the series, but adding extra elements and even adjusting the plot to improve the overall quality of the story.
After doing "Fire In Space", I then decided to move to other episodes, including ones that had already been novelized beacuse now the idea was to adapt every episode of TOS in a way that they could all read as a continuous story arc with perfect continuity flow. Today, nearly nine years later my personal project is two thirds done with 12 of 17 episodes adapted in this format (not all in sequence. The ones I have still yet to do are "The Lost Warrior", "Gun On Ice Planet Zero", "Baltar's Escape", "Experiment In Terra" and "Take The Celestra".)
In this new section, the intent is to inspire not simply feedback on my own adaptations, but to stimulate discussion and creativity based on this premise: How would you remake Battlestar Galactica in terms of using only the stories that were actually filmed (adding no new independent stories), and maintaining the original order in which they were aired? Specifically, what would you do to make sure all 17 stories could be presented anew in a way that maintained the integrity of the original, but at the same time opened them up to deepen the character further, provide important foreshadowings (like for instance, dropping hints about Commander Cain's existence before "Living Legend" or clearing up the matter of Starbuck and Aurora long before TTC)
Each person should feel free to chart his or her own course of how they would go about this. I think in the end if we give some thought to this, we'll end up proving how the existing template of Galactica stories that were broadcast can perhaps someday (if the continuation that we hoped for never happens) be transformed into a remake that would maintain the integrity of the characters and philosophy of the original, while simultaneously taking advantage of tighter writing standards of continuity and character to get that overall sense of flow.
In my next post here, I will provide an outline of how I made changes and additions to "Saga" to set the tone for the season as a whole, and where I felt that in the interests of credibility some minor aspects of what was broadcast needed to be downplayed or dropped/changed altogether. Yet even when making alterations, keeping the integrity of the episode as we knew it remains the first goal. In the course of doing this project, I have found to my surprise that even the most supposedly "silly" plots of the original series can with just a little fine tuning be turned into perfectly plausible storylines.
Today, the idea of a continuous, forward moving story arc is something we take for granted in sci-fi television, and compared to the standards of today, BSG admittedly has its flaws. The continuity is not razor sharp, and we sometimes see premises thrown at us that disrupt things we knew earlier (like for instance in "Take The Celestra", the emergence of Aurora and the idea that she was a girlfriend of Starbuck's up to the time of the Destruction comes way out of left field considering that we thought Starbuck was only really serious with Athena at that time).
After writing a number of fanfic stories, I was first asked to contribute an adaptation of "Fire In Space" for what at the time (circa 1996) was a project that simply invovled adapting episodes that had not been part of the novelizations. But I took it upon myself to write this story in a way that would not simply adapt it by repeating everything that was on-screen, but rather to tighten up the continuity with what had been established. That meant retaining the general storyline, dialogue, and actions of the characters so it would seem familiar to a fan of the series, but adding extra elements and even adjusting the plot to improve the overall quality of the story.
After doing "Fire In Space", I then decided to move to other episodes, including ones that had already been novelized beacuse now the idea was to adapt every episode of TOS in a way that they could all read as a continuous story arc with perfect continuity flow. Today, nearly nine years later my personal project is two thirds done with 12 of 17 episodes adapted in this format (not all in sequence. The ones I have still yet to do are "The Lost Warrior", "Gun On Ice Planet Zero", "Baltar's Escape", "Experiment In Terra" and "Take The Celestra".)
In this new section, the intent is to inspire not simply feedback on my own adaptations, but to stimulate discussion and creativity based on this premise: How would you remake Battlestar Galactica in terms of using only the stories that were actually filmed (adding no new independent stories), and maintaining the original order in which they were aired? Specifically, what would you do to make sure all 17 stories could be presented anew in a way that maintained the integrity of the original, but at the same time opened them up to deepen the character further, provide important foreshadowings (like for instance, dropping hints about Commander Cain's existence before "Living Legend" or clearing up the matter of Starbuck and Aurora long before TTC)
Each person should feel free to chart his or her own course of how they would go about this. I think in the end if we give some thought to this, we'll end up proving how the existing template of Galactica stories that were broadcast can perhaps someday (if the continuation that we hoped for never happens) be transformed into a remake that would maintain the integrity of the characters and philosophy of the original, while simultaneously taking advantage of tighter writing standards of continuity and character to get that overall sense of flow.
In my next post here, I will provide an outline of how I made changes and additions to "Saga" to set the tone for the season as a whole, and where I felt that in the interests of credibility some minor aspects of what was broadcast needed to be downplayed or dropped/changed altogether. Yet even when making alterations, keeping the integrity of the episode as we knew it remains the first goal. In the course of doing this project, I have found to my surprise that even the most supposedly "silly" plots of the original series can with just a little fine tuning be turned into perfectly plausible storylines.