Bamber snippet

[jeeshee]

Aw, Jamie Bamber is adorable! In a little snippet of an interview on digital spy he claims that BSG could have been as big as Doctor Who if it weren't stuck on Sky:

"Battlestar Galactica actor Jamie Bamber has claimed that the show could have become a huge mainstream hit like Doctor Who if treated differently.

Bamber, who plays Lee 'Apollo' Adama in

Comments

[ragdoll]

Unfortunately, in the US, NBC tried to put BSG on the network for about a month and it tanked. So, had it been a network show rather than SciFi, there's a very good chance it would've been cancelled after 3 weeks and never gotten past the mini series. :-/

[jeeshee]

:( Shame. Maybe we should be thankful for 'cult' channels then, even if scifi are slightly dodgy.

[ragdoll]

Yeah. It's not the best of possible solutions, but I'd rather it be on a cult station for 6 years than a major network for 6 weeks. They have much higher standards in terms of audience. Of course, SciFi has been known to kill good programs too, which is why The Dresden Files was not renewed even though it was very good and got decent audience figures. SciFi's excuse was it got a good audience, but not the right people in it (I'm guessing they wanted more 18-34 yr old men which is the coveted demographic).

[ragdoll]

The summer of 2005, they ran part of the first series on NBC as an experimental summer replacement. They had been thinking about running it during the regular year (after SciFi ran it) but the numbers were so awful that they just gave up after 4 weeks, iirc.

[ragdoll]

I'm trying to find it right now. I know they did it -- it's where I first saw the series. I was in a hotel room in July 2005 watching it on NBC.

Here's an article on USA Today which makes mention of it (4th paragraph down:

But times have changed. In recent years, some networks have experimented with a handful of cable series, usually in summer and without much success. NBC tried Project Runway in 2006 and Battlestar Galactica in 2005, imported from its corporate cousins Bravo and Sci Fi Channel. ABC aired Kyle XY and Greek, both from ABC Family. CBS aired an episode of Showtime's Brotherhood.

[ragdoll]

Yes, it was reruns. I never said they were first run episodes. But it was 'new to NBC' which is how they were marketing it.

Here's an article about how badly the ratings went.

The plan was to air more on NBC later in the year AFTER the SciFi Channel had them since there is a very large percentage of the network audience who either doesnt get SciFi or never would watch it. Again, the ratings were horrible.

[anastashial]

They should have advertised it with something like "This is not your mother's Battlestar Galactica".

[ragdoll]

I honestly don't remember if there was any more promotion other than the 'it's new to NBC' thing which they'd used in the past. But yeah. I think the name itself is kind of a stigma to be honest. It took me 2 years to watch the show even though I'd been a big fan of Katee's and Jamie's and EJO's before it ever aired. I hated the original BSG as a kid and wouldn't go near it!

[anastashial]

I had a thing for both Hatch and Benedict so that powered my viewing of the original, 20 something fangirl at the time ya know.

Had never seen or heard of either Jamie or Katee. Knew Eddy's name but can't say that I recall seeing him in anything. Don't know how I first heard of new BSG, most likely in a video store. I'm a fan of Scifi, but not to the point of many others who can quote the names and tell me what happened in every episode of a show that ran five seasons. I just like to watch and read it in general. I do write fanfic and am active in several dedicated online communities now so I guess I'd be in the middle of the spectrum of fanishness.

So I bought the first two seasons on DVD and watched, must have been summer of 2007, and then eagerly awaited the release of the S3 DVDs. No cable TV so I watched all of S4 so far online.

[ragdoll]

I just never liked it as a kid. I remember watching it a few times and just thinking it was stupid and silly, and that was that. (I was a big Star Trek and Star Wars fan -- so yeah, pre-adolescent snobbery...)

I had been a fan of EJOs since Blade Runner and then Katee caught my eye in The Education of Max Bickford (she even sang on the show -- it's just evil that this series is not available anywhere). I knew Jamie from Hornblower too. I know I read/saw they were reviving the show for SciFi but missed the mini series. Tried to watch "33" when it aired and was confused as to what was going on so I just didn't tune in again. I did watch it when NBC showed it -- I remember one of the episodes was "You can't go home again" -- again, had no clue what was happening

[anastashial]

Enjoyed all of Star Trek even what others didn't like. DS9 was my fav, one of my top five SciFi shows still. Didn't see the last two Star Wars movies IIRC (not counting the recent animated thing, not been into animation since childhood cartoons which I did enjoy), more just never got to it then any lack of desire. Caught both Katee in Bickford, and she has a gorgeous voice, and Jamie in Hornblower within the last half year, both on YouTube IIRC.

I just did a fanfic on Lee's musings on the events of You Can't Go Home Again last weekend for a challenge at SciFi_Muses. It's called Moon Rips My Heart.

Haven't met Jamie but got to question him on the phone for Sean O'Macs internet radio show back in May I think.

I've heard in several places the UK DVD do have deleted scenes, but no one in my circle has yet confirmed.