Battlestar: The Plan Secrets Teased!
Jane Espenson, who wrote the upcoming movie Battlestar Galactica: The Plan, said that the telefilm will retell the initial story of the SCI FI Channel series, but from the perspective of the Cylons, and that it will take advantage of revelations that will come in the upcoming new episodes of the show's fourth and final season.
"The events of The Plan are the events that you've seen ... in the show, from the miniseries to almost the end of season two," Espenson said in an exclusive interview. "So it's that chunk of time, but sort of seen with the Cylon perspective. So you're going to see a lot of stuff that was going on that you weren't aware of at the time: on Caprica, in the fleet. ... This was the time when the Cylons, as depicted in the original show, ... were very mysterious, enemies that would come out of the darkness and retreat. And this is ... what were they really doing all that time: what was the internal stuff. ... A lot of loose ends are tied up, a lot of questions are asked that you don't even know you have."
The movie--the second stand-alone telefilm based on the Peabody Award-winning show--deals with all the mythology's secrets. "If you had a copy now, you might feel that you could go ahead and watch it, because it's about stuff that already happened," Espenson said. "But don't do it. Of course, you don't have a copy now, because there isn't even a cut yet. ... But it's very much designed to be watched after the run of the series, because it definitely relies on stuff you don't learn until much later."
The Plan stars Edward James Olmos, who also directed; Dean Stockwell as Brother Cavil; Michael Hogan as Col. Tigh; and Michael Trucco as Anders, among others.
Espenson said that Olmos was very collaborative. "He and I had a lot of very long sessions of going through the script line by line, Eddie Olmos reading the whole thing out loud, just amazing as, you know, a one-man show every night," she said. "And just like going, 'Listen to this line, wouldn't this be better like this? Wouldn't this be better like this? Are you sure that we need this in this scene?' Just incredibly insightful, just working through it with Eddie, and [we] made a ton of changes in the preproduction phase and ended up with a really tight script that we filmed sort of as they were demolishing the sets out from under us. And [we] ended up with something that I think is so much better than our highest hopes had been for what this movie could be. It really sort of caps off the show."
"The events of The Plan are the events that you've seen ... in the show, from the miniseries to almost the end of season two," Espenson said in an exclusive interview. "So it's that chunk of time, but sort of seen with the Cylon perspective. So you're going to see a lot of stuff that was going on that you weren't aware of at the time: on Caprica, in the fleet. ... This was the time when the Cylons, as depicted in the original show, ... were very mysterious, enemies that would come out of the darkness and retreat. And this is ... what were they really doing all that time: what was the internal stuff. ... A lot of loose ends are tied up, a lot of questions are asked that you don't even know you have."
The movie--the second stand-alone telefilm based on the Peabody Award-winning show--deals with all the mythology's secrets. "If you had a copy now, you might feel that you could go ahead and watch it, because it's about stuff that already happened," Espenson said. "But don't do it. Of course, you don't have a copy now, because there isn't even a cut yet. ... But it's very much designed to be watched after the run of the series, because it definitely relies on stuff you don't learn until much later."
The Plan stars Edward James Olmos, who also directed; Dean Stockwell as Brother Cavil; Michael Hogan as Col. Tigh; and Michael Trucco as Anders, among others.
Espenson said that Olmos was very collaborative. "He and I had a lot of very long sessions of going through the script line by line, Eddie Olmos reading the whole thing out loud, just amazing as, you know, a one-man show every night," she said. "And just like going, 'Listen to this line, wouldn't this be better like this? Wouldn't this be better like this? Are you sure that we need this in this scene?' Just incredibly insightful, just working through it with Eddie, and [we] made a ton of changes in the preproduction phase and ended up with a really tight script that we filmed sort of as they were demolishing the sets out from under us. And [we] ended up with something that I think is so much better than our highest hopes had been for what this movie could be. It really sort of caps off the show."