The Big Tent - revisited
 

http://www.scifi.com/mbb/browse.php?aid=4793

Tom's post at the Alliance reminded me of one I posted in Sciffy a few months back. Feel free to reprint it. If it is true that the miniseries will prompt new interest in BSG, let's use that to "our" advantage, by which I mean those in favor of Desanto/Larson.


Date: 08/06/2003
From: larocque6689

If you take the "clones" out of the equation - this is still emotional territory for a lot of us. What you have are various "flavours" of Battlestar fans, most of which like the original show, and most of which supported at least one version of the various revival projects out there.

I'm all for the Big Tent. In fact, we had the Big Tent - briefly. There was a period when supporters of a Hatch-led reunion were campaigning to get the rest of the fans on board. Those who didn't generally were pro-Larson or were not totally convinced Hatch was the best road to travel. It got downright nasty for a while, not nearly as nasty as now though.

I supported Singer/Desanto even PRIOR to the endorsement from the Richard Hatch camp. I was confident they would do a good job. I didn't even care whether or not they would re-use the original cast members. My thinking was that if they could take an X-Men comic book and make a movie that was still very much X-Men (notwithstasnding deviations from the comic series), certainly they could do the same with Galactica.

I was even more thrilled when their project evolved to the point where several original series people were slated to be involved.

I like talking about this "era" of BSG fandom because this was when all the different camps made peace. There was something for everybody here. Continuation supporters (especially within the "Hatch" camp) would see Starbuck strapped into his Viper once more. It would be set in the future, so we would see plenty of new faces, and not just the BSG Retirement Crew Party. Hatch was on board. The old-time fans (among them Larson suppoerters) were on board. It was a moment of peace when we all got along. The Big Tent.

Alas it was not to be.

I felt badly for Desanto and his team and was sad that this would not be. My first reaction to the Moore script was violent. "This is not my battlestar." I dropped out of fandom and missed out on much of the acrimony of the past year. But that's another story.

Well, like it or not, we're split up into camps again. Some have taken a violent dislike towards the remake. I suspect this is based on the fact that most of us would have preferred Desanto's project. For the sake of my own sanity, I prefer to think of both projects as "apples and oranges" - two different things. It allows me to look forward to Ron Moore's project (even if this isn't what I waited 25 years for) and at the same time give my support to prospective "continuation" projects such as the rumoured Desanto/Larson project.

I think we should give a welcoming hand to "remake" supporters, even if most of us did not want it. At the same time, these supporters should understand why many of us are still loyal to the idea of a "continuation". To me this is not an Either/Or equation. Moore's project will fly this December (notwithstanding "popcorn" protests and ad boycots), while we'll just have to sit and wait out on the Larson/Desanto front.

Let's bring back the Big Tent. We all love the original show (whatever its defects). What we have in common is more important than our differences.