It's pandemonium as thousands of Battlestar fans jostle for position before doors open; an aptly dressed and outnumbered red-shirted security guy tries to hold the line. CLICK TO ENLARGE.
During a panel in front of a packed house of thousands at yesterday's ComicCon in San Diego, Battlestar Galactica cast and executive producers lobbed some bombshells into the crowd. They candidly prepared viewers for an intense, dark and brutally honest third season, and warned that viewers would be "saddened."
The series will explore issues ranging from suicide bombers to pandemics and some characters will depart.
Edward James Olmos (Adama) offered this frank assessment. "I'm known for being very serious and and I am very serious - this is the darkest show I've ever been a part of in my life."
Executive Producer David Eick told the standing-room-only crowd that as season three begins New Caprica is still occupied by the Cylons. Baltar is the titular president of an occupation government and the Galactica is somewhere in space, plotting to rescue the trapped colonists with only "two battlestars at half strength" at their disposal.
On the ground, characters are divided. Some have taken sides, said Eick, others are "in between and one in particular is missing a vital part of his anatomy."
At that point in the presentation the crowd groaned, many unsure if Eick meant the remark in jest. But then he turned serious. "Yeah - think about that on the way home," he said, eliciting uneasy titters from the fans. "It ain't pretty. It's a very dark and provocative and a challenging beginning of the tale of what happens to these people on New Caprica."
Lucy Lawless, who joins the series for a ten episode arc, then stepped in to break up the darkness drumbeat a little. "There are some great moments of hope and redemption in there too," she asserted.
Later she commented the "struggles, the darkness of their situation, make the sweet [moments] all the sweeter. It's a real triumph, particularly for Adama and the whole crew, when they pull it together and get through some really hideous, post-apocalyptic chapters."
Olmos lavished praise on the writers and producers. "What Ron and David and the writers have done has been monumental. This show, the reason I got involved in it, is because of that single aesthetic. His writing was superb, the idea of keeping this reality in the midst of what was happening after 9/11.... it's a reality that we're all facing. So the truths that were happening to us sociologically now were truths that we could now look at, and we had to take a look at, and he was willing to go into that."
But Olmos continued to shake his head and laugh ruefully, "I..I must tell you this is the darkest show I have been on," he repeated, "and I say that w/ love because basically it makes you think.....In essence you're [the viewer] going to really get yourself confused because of the way that they've [the writers] structured the understanding between the human beings and the Cylons - the technology we created that comes back to haunt us - and it's monumental."
Olmos also disclosed the series will explore the psychology of suicide bombers who "take out five Cylons. It becomes incredibly dark. And an incredible journey as we step into this world for the third season - much more so than any season than we've had."
He also joked it would be "better to watch CNN, okay?"
"The relationships this year are so deeply rooted in...hurting each other. I gotta tell you. I'm not kidding you," he said, "I think the most stunning part of the relationship is Lee, my son, who has a tremendous, tremendous relationship going w/ Dualla and Starbuck, really out of Page Six in NY [Post]. You'll enjoy it. A lot of people leave us too. You'll be very saddened by that."
Approaching the close of the panel, both Olmos and Eick had warmed to their subject considerably and were on a spoiler roll. Eick confirmed the character departures and Olmos pointed out that the series darkness is rooted in reality He then revealed a big spoiler and issued a strongly worded warning about pandemics.
The quotes are here, in their entirety:
Eick: You're going to see all your favorites back from the previous two w/ some new characters thrown into the mix. It's going to be an interesting season. We're going to lose some people that I think we're all very fond of. There are going to be some losses that the family is going to take. The family is also going to have some victories that they haven't had in the past. they're going to make some break throughs in some relationships. There's going to be some pairings that I think you've been waiting to see if they'll ever get together or ever say what they mean to each other. And the answer to that is "yes" but it ain't gonna be that simple. Because nothing's that simple on Battlestar Galactica. I think this season you'll see that we took a lot of chances w/ the characters. They go in a lot of unexpected directions."
Olmos: What the writers have been able to create, the darkness comes from the reality...the reality of,,, something we know very well. And it makes you rethink... because I dare somebody to tell me who the good guys are and who the bad guys are in this show. As you get into it deeper and deeper you start to realize the Cylons are much more cohesive in understanding their experience and what they're trying to get out of their experience than the humans.
We end up - I'll just put it to you this way - in the show this year we are going to touch the issue that is most affecting the planet which is the pandemic - which is coming, and you all know it's coming, and yet no one is really preparing for it. The bird flu pandemic. Until it hits you like it hit in 1918 and took out 40 million of us, you don't really get it. And in this case we use it the same way the English used it against the indigenous people here in the United States. Human beings use it against the Cylons. And we spread a pandemic amongst them. and it's incredibly difficult to take. it's just incredible. And then you realize, how else are they going to do it. there's nothing left. I'll put it to you this way. At last count we were less than 38,000 people. So you'll have to figure out how we got from 49,000 at the end of the second season to now this new number, 38,000. We're losing FAST.
Comments