Is it true...

[CraigV]

Is it true that the original series was taken off the air because of a pending law suit by George Lucas because he thought it was too much like his Star Wars movies? :?:

[Scorpiuscat]

Thats the first I have ever heard of that  :shock:

Lets hope the admins around here have an answer, I would be curious.

[masterwolfe]

Hmm you know I VERY vaguely remember hearing that as well, not sure where tho.

[julix]

Here is the information I have so far..........
Lucas and Fox did eventually file a lawsuit, upon it's(BG) creation Lucas met with Larson and had him agree to avoid doing certain things
One such example was that the laser fire would not be the beams that were seen in Star Wars.  I believe the suit was settled ouside of court so its terms are unknown.  As far as the reason for the original battlestar being cancelled it was mostly do to the cost(one of the most expensive) shows to put on the air, due to the state of the art special effects as well as many complex network underground and inconciviable workings :wink:

Warrior or Tag would aslo have more info..............guys?

[julix]

BTW.......Welcome Masterwolf and Craig

[CraigV]

I guess that makes sense. The effects were pretty groundbreaking then, and was definitely the appeal to a lot of people. Of course, it was the story & characters that kept the movies so popular.

I guess one could say there was some similarity between a few of the ships, and at times, the Cylons did look a little like storm trooper's. However, the story lines were completely different. Guess George was trying to raise some money to make some more movies
 :lol:

[Breea]

You have to remember too back then that the special effects were not cgi
formatted so it was much more time consuming.
Breea

[masterwolfe]

BTW.......Welcome Masterwolf and Craig

Thanks, julix

[Warrior]

ABC Execs and money (cost per episode) are what killed BG, not SW's suit.

As for the SW suit, Lucas and Co. LOST in court in their claims BG was a rip-off.
But BG was always labeled as such because of that failed suit. Per julix's post, Larson *did* agree to not call certain things by certain names, but that was it.

The only thing BG was guilty of regarding SW's was the fact that ABC wanted to cash in on SW's popularity.

It actually had nothing to do with BG itself at all, as it was originally conceived back in the 60's as Adam's Ark.

[julix]

Thanks Warrior......

Just think of all the Sci-fi we have now because of Lucas's little movie that opened the flood gates because the suits realized they could make big bucks with Sci-fi!!!!!!!!

[thomas7g]

I'm not the big expert on this. But I do recall that Glen Larson had created a preliminary version of Galactica before Star Wars. At the time I think he called it Adam's Ark. Or something like that.

Now I do think there are alot of similarities to Star Wars, and thought of by ABC as a way to cash in on the Star Wars fad, but I consider that part of the history of the creation of the show. The show itself was pretty wonderful. Especially considering the rather insane rush ABC demanded to produce the episodes. (to catch as much of the Star Wars fad as possible). And personally, I myself like the characters more in the orignal show than Star Wars. But that's just a personal preference.

I also remember Universal and George Lucas reaching an agreement, prior I think to the airing of the show. Certain changes were demanded and were made such as no laser beams shooting out of black laser guns. Why I don't know, Star Trek had that before Star Wars. But even after Battlestar met Lucas's condition, he still sued, and eventually lost.

but here wee are today.

[julix]

Thanks Tom ....
great info as well!