Of Galactica importance

New, updated sci-fi series is dark, violent and gritty — so unlike the original show

By ERIC DEGGANS
St. Petersburg Times

Science fiction often goes where traditional drama fears to tread.

Stay with me: Star Trek was making statements in the late 1960s about racism, warmongering and the Cold War (of course, the spaceship was commanded by an American, reassuring viewers about which nation really came out on top when history's dust settled).

USA Networks' recent series The 4400 debuted featuring a Scientologylike group and finished its most recent season in August echoing the hysteria of our current war on terror while centering on a character with a messiah complex.

Creative spark

Now there's the new Battlestar Galactica.

If this were a TV show set anywhere else, it would have a stack of Emmys for its groundbreaking themes, gritty drama and fearless storytelling. There is no better example of that creative spark than its two-hour Season 3 premiere, "Occupation/Precipice," at 8 tonight on the Sci Fi Channel.

Stay with me a while longer. Those familiar with the original '70s-era Galactica series likely remember a stilted, candy-coated TV ripoff of the Star Wars movies, complete with bad guys sheathed in clunky plastic costumes as well as former Bonanza star Lorne Greene.

A dark turn

One look at the Sci-Fi Channel's update shatters that prejudice. In this series, the Cylons, a machine race, have nearly exterminated the humans who created them in a galaxy far, far away. But that's where the similarities end.

As the season opens, the bad guys have taken control of a human colony in a brutal occupation they say is aimed at bringing the love of God to humanity. But their iron-fisted rule turns the colony into a gulag complete with torture chambers, suicide bombings, sexual-humiliation tactics, an insurgent rebellion and a police force composed of human collaborators.

Sound familiar?

"We're putting things out there other shows can't even touch," said Edward James Olmos, whose taciturn, conflicted Adm. William Adama is light years from Greene's hammy role.

"Nothing is going the way we thought it would in Iraq," said Olmos, who has spoken out on antiwar and pro-Latino themes in the past. "And in our world, we make you re-evaluate all the time who the good guys and the bad guys are. (Our heroes) are using suicide bombings to stay alive. So while you're being entertained like crazy, it also makes you think."

A bit of backstory: Olmos' Adama leads the only human warship to survive a crushing assault by the Cylons, some of whom look like humans, initially aimed at wiping out the race. The 50,000 people who survived initially intended to find their legendary homeworld, Earth. But many grew tired of the search and elected a leader who advocated settling on a habitable world and rebuilding their old lives.

Then, a year later, the Cylons discover that world, forcing Adama to flee and leave the humans he tried to protect at the mercy of the Cylons who once tried to kill them.

(SPOILER ALERT: Lots of information on the new season starts here).

Iraq connection?

The experience for those left behind is barbaric. Saul Tigh, Adama's second in command, loses an eye in a Cylon prison and is freed only after his wife provides sexual favors to a Cylon leader.

One character well known to Galactica fans kills himself in a suicide bombing that decimates the human police force. Starbuck — changed from the womanizing male character Dirk Benedict played in the '70s to a hard-drinking, self-destructive woman — is held captive by a Cylon bent on using her to produce a human/Cylon hybrid.

Some might assume a veiled criticism of the Iraq war in the decision to make the bad-guy Cylons the occupiers. But executive producer Ronald D. Moore says the new Galactica's goal is to make viewers question ideas they once took for granted.

"We keep playing around intentionally with the question of 'Whose side are you on?' " he said. "I take great delight in trying to explode every TV convention."

Moore's masterstroke: making some of the Cylons look human, in a nod to the sci-fi classic Blade Runner. Besides allowing producers to avoid showing the metal versions too often — sleek and computer-generated, they cost a lot to put onscreen — the Cylons' concepts of God and community prove a compelling new dimension.

Fast company

For those who question the issues he's throwing around, Moore can point to winning a Peabody award in April, joining shows including The Shield, South Park and House honored for public service and quality.

Not bad for a program that was savaged by some of the original series' biggest fans when it debuted in 2003, including original Galactica co-star Richard Hatch (Hatch eventually dropped his high-profile complaints after getting a recurring role as a rebel leader).

Moore notes that the series' name "is a blessing and a curse: It got the show made in the first place, but now we've gotten to a place where the title is holding the show back.

"You mention the show's name to people who watch Nip/Tuck and The Shield — fans of quality television — and they tune out. But if you say to me you don't like science fiction — well, this is the science fiction show you will like."

Olmos pumped up

Moore gets a chance to prove it as his hardy band of survivors considers how to handle those who collaborated with the Cylons, settling on a solution sure to remind some of post-apartheid South Africa.

"I think the first two hours of the new season are the best two hours of television I've been on in my life," said Olmos, who is directing the season's 12th episode. "Our show really throws the ball up in the air. And you don't even know if it's going to come back down again."