George Lucas Was FURIOUS Over Battlestar Galactica RIPOFF of STAR WARS
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- Опубліковано 2 жов 2024
- Star Wars was an instant success and a cultural phenomenon, so when Battlestar Galactica premiered in September of 1978, it was seen by George Lucas as a direct ripoff of Star Wars.
▶ Battlestar Galactica: The Complete Series [1978] - amzn.to/48ZopNA
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I don't think it was a ripoff but I do believe that the network used the success of Star Wars. Thanks for sharing.
I was getting ready to say the exact thing, but saw your comment. Spot on!
The only thing the same between Star Wars and BSG is they are both set in space. Star Wars used the success of how many sci-fi books and movies previous to it?
Soooo... they all ripped off Space 1999 ;) ...in one way or another. STNG and other series took similar storylines and plots...and believe it or not...from the Love Boat... and many early cartoon programs that had a good story line. Funny how they all competed in that way, and it still goes on today. Glen A Larson, Arron Spelling and a good list of them producers were good for that. Oh... and Space 1999... they ripped off a lot of Westerns... so it all comes and goes around
Glen Larson admitted that. Westerns used to rule the movies and TV because they were popular, but that didn't make Bonanza a rip off of Shane.
Lucas had his chance at TV but made crap like the SW Christmas Special and the Ewok things... he failed.. Galactica was actually great on it's own merit.
Ouch, touché.
This is my opinion, you don't have to agree with it, but, I hope you respect it.. I haven't watch the Star Wars Christmas Special, but I have heard from allot of people saying it was bad...
I remembered watching the Eworks special I didn't like the second one as much, but the first one I did like, I think, that these events were supposed to take place before Return of the Jedi, but not really sure.. It's called Cavern of Courage.. It was about a family who crashed landed on Endor.. They some how got separated..The parents were captured by this creature, but the children befriended the Eworks, thru Wicket, and they became part of the family.. They worked together with the Eworks to rescue their parents....
Then you had the Droids and Eworks Adventure cartoon.. I liked characters in it like Thal Joben, George Dusat, Kia Moll, Jan Tash, and etc.. I don't know if I spell their names right because I was a child watching it.. I think it was before the events of Star Wars because Droids had the adventure of R2-D2 and C-3PO going on strange adventures...
The Star Wars Holiday Special was AWESOME!
5:53 John Colicos, Lord Baltar in Battlestar, also played the first Klingon ever depicted on screen in Star Trek TOS .
Commander Kor.
The whole thing was essentially just sour grapes on Lucas' part, some of the artwork Ralph McQuarrie made for Star Wars that was rejected by Lucas made it's way into Galactica (albeit somewhat altered). By many accounts the feud between Lucas and Dykstra began even before filming had wrapped on Star Wars, Dykstra creating Apogee to go and make the effects for Battlestar really put a burr up Lucas' ass. The whole thing kinda makes me laugh as Lucasfilm wouldn't make a live action TV series until after Disney bought them out anyway and even in the 2010's Lucas himself said the cost of making a live action Star Wars TV series would be financially prohibitive if not unviable.
I liked bot but I don't think battlestar galactica was a ripoff as science fiction had tales like that for years. I still remember seeing those galactica jackets for sale in a sci fi magazine and being bummed out because I was too poor to get one.
:) Yup. "Fighting the Evil Space Empire" goes back to the era of silent movies... As a lifelong SF fan, I knew that BSG was just a" cheap knock-off", but I loved it anyways because I just couldn't get enough of that stuff. It took the Disney ST overdose to convince me that less can be more!
I remember those jackets for sale in Starlog Magazine. Man, sure wanted one. I probably would have been harassed by everyone if I had shown up my freshman year of high school looking so cool.
There's an anecdote about the suit... An expert witness took the stand [Heinlein? Asimov? I don't recall who...] and was asked about their thoughts upon first seeing Star Wars or BSG... Their response was "Nostalgia"
I'm baffled how the "Battlestar Galictica" remake was proof of a financially successful TV scifi, when there have been literally Dozens in the 80's and 90's that really showcased the market interest and potential. Like where is the mention of popular hit shows like "Babylon 5", "V", "Alien Nation", or even "Farscape", disproving Lucas's ego driven disbelief in the market potential.
I loved "V" and Alien Nation. I think those shows were very popular. I'm not sure about the others you mentioned. I wanted Babylon 5 but I'm pretty sure it wasn't a big success financially. Same with Farscape. I could be wrong. Sci-fi has always struggled with the masses but has always had a very strong cult following.
I Loved Battlestar Galactica when I was young as much as Star Wars!!
I still remember my mother calling to me while I played outside with my friends to come home "Battlestar Galactica is coming on right now!"
God Rest Her Soul she passed in 2018!
Sorry for your loss. Our mothers really make our lives so enjoyable. I only wish that our parents never aged and would stay with us forever.
George Lucas also took the funny robot ideas of LOST IN SPACE plus comedy of Abbot and Costello, Laurel and Hardy, plus THE HONEYMOONERS and applied that to R2D2 and C3PO as droids fighting and arguing over petty things just like human beings. Sounds familiar???😁😂😲🤣💯✅✔
STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE exists because of Star Wars. The audience benefits when everyone is allowed to make their own shows.
George Lucas himself heavily borrowed concepts, ideas and more from previous media to make Star Wars, he has even admitted so himself.
I can understand getting mad about the borrowed SFX equipment that they didn't want to give back, or trying to simulate Lucas himself is the one behind Battlestar, but other than that it was just him being big headed.
As a kid, I never connected the two; BSG was running from a dangerous enemy while SW was rebels fighting against a totalitarian emperor to restore "The Republic". Two completely different things to my kid brain.
True. But the aesthetic and many of the characters and concepts were identical.
Funny thing about the complaint of Battlestar being a Star Wars derived imitation, is in turn the fact that Star Wars itself always seemed heavily derived from Frank Herbert's Dune series, and the comic called Valerian. Always seemed Lucas was lucky not to be on the end of his own case.
True. Herbert noted 19 distinct and significant points of similarity between Star Wars and his book
George doesn't mind stealing from everyone else.
Lucas and Cameron owe Frank Herbert big time. F* them both.
Agreed, he’s stolen a living
He tried making flash gordan but couldn't get the rights so he technically made his own with star wars, not saying it's a ripoff just interesting inspiration
If Lucas was so upset about Star Wars viability on television, why did he insist on doing such a piss poor job on the Star Wars Holiday Special? And I didn't hear anything about George Lucas rushing to pay Akira Kurosawa any residuals for his "borrowing" the story from The Hidden Fortress...
What a Prima Donna!
1) George Lucas sited his work as an influence 2) George Lucas was the international executive producer on Akira Kurosawa's movie Kagemusha (1980) - so ripping off Kurasawa? Nah. If both respected each others work.
Hey George, ever hear about Dune?
Of course he has! Where do you think he got the idea for Tatooine?
It was trying to capitalize on the popularity of S/W.
It sounds to me like George got butt hurt
The greatest irony is Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi copied Battlestar Galactica with the heroes being chased across space by the evil empire.
I think Lucas was more worried about Galactica potentially cutting into his toy sales because that's what he cared about most at that point. Other than that, Galactica went to a snow planet before Star Wars. Count Iblis was much like Palpatine before Palpatine was introduced. He even shot lightning from his hand. Lucas may have been very afraid Galactica would do things first that he wanted to do later.
Maybe you could do a video about how Lucas stole Star Wars from the comic Valerian written in the late 60's.
You could say Star Wars ripped off Flash Gordon.
I remember those days of television. It wasn't unusual for TV to adopt a show that closely matched a popular movie. Alias Smith and Jones was little like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. And then there's the 60s with a whole host of spy shows because of the popularity of James Bond.
Thank you for this enlightening, entertaining video. I remember watching BG when it aired for the first time. For me, it did not resembled SW for second. It was much lower grade in FX quality, story line totally different, and so forth. I moderately enjoyed BG. I can't recall anything of the series any longer...
It’s actually quite funny that Lucas would consider BSG a ripoff when his movie was ripped off from everything from Valerian to the dambusters.
I have Dirk Benedict’s book. In it he talks about some at the studio not wanting him for the part (even though the script was specifically written for him being in the role). It came down to a meeting the day before the first day of shooting for him to be officially placed in the role.
Talk about how Frank Herbert was this close to suing Lucas. Thanks to Uncle George, Dune was impossible to film. I include the new wannabe Dune movie as well.
Isn't it interesting how George Lucas thought that he could corner the market of 'Good vs. Evil'. I wonder if Moses should try to sue BSG too, since it was similar to the concept of 'a rag-tag fugitive group, trying to escape the tyranny of the Egyptians... Or, Colonel Custer, for the show being too much of a 'last stand against overwhelming odds'. Or maybe how the Captain of the Mayflower should try to sue, because of a group of pilgrims, traveling to a distant land, in a ship, in an effort to seek freedom.
I think you get the picture... Just because it was set in 'space', suddenly George gets all teary-eyed. Like no one else is to ever create a story set in space, because it takes place in the same 'space' that he wrote his story about. Granted, I was a huge SW fan as a kid, and I liked BSG, but I also like Flash Gordon, and Buck Rogers, and about a dozen-dozen other shows and movies that were set in space.
.... And then, to top it all off, after the success of the Star Wars franchise, he decides to sell it off to Disney. Maybe he should go after Lara Croft, because she is the female version of Indiana Jones... We could go on and on, with potential knock-offs of LucasArts creations... Or, we can just be glad that we can enjoy Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek, Firefly, Farscape, and a host of other great 'space-faring' projects, despite the tears and hurt feelings of a millionaire movie creator.
It wasn't a ripoff; not even close. The story-lines and adversity themes couldn't be further removed. What happened is that Star Wars gave science fiction it's first ever period of legitimacy. It didn't last long, but it did offer us a brief period when sci-fi was taken seriously and we had a number of franchises including Battlestar Galactica, V, Star Trek, and later; Alien, Predator, and the Terminator explore a variety of adversarial themes and futurist scenarios. Sadly, we've gone back to the 1950s with "sci-fi themes" flagged alongside "offensive" language and "explicit content" warnings, this century.
As soon as George Lucas admits he ripped off all of the classic Greco-Roman myths he can start bitching.
Way back in the late 80s at college I did Greek & Roman Mythology as one of my humanities electives. Once we got to the subject of the Greco-Roman heroes the professors told several 100 of us in the main lecture that all of the Greco-Roman myths followed a pattern
*A special child blessed by the Gods would be hidden away, then given special training followed by their quest.*
AND YES long before we got to see Anakin as a child we saw the similarity with Luke Skywalker and YES out professor pointed that out. He then pointed out it was a typical theme that was used again and again through literature, theatre & film.
Fan comments basically explain it all pretty good, like Star Wars was more of an adventure story of a group of heroes traveling together through space during a galactic war, while Battlestar Galactica was more of a dire escape from a menacing enemy in hopes of finding Earth, a theme which George Lucas later turned more to using in his Empire Strikes Back which was more of a knock off of BSG, but back then we didn't worry about those things so much as long as it was good sci fi because that's what really mattered. Star Wars never the less was still top of the line from everything else sci fi and perhaps even to this day always will be, but despite its good revolutionary special effects, it was 2001 A Space Odyssey which really was the pioneer long before Star Wars came about and following after Space 1999 was also before Star Wars. BSG and Star Wars was a lot more like the Japanese anime of Star Blazers, (Space battleship Yamato), along with other Japanese anime and movies, so really it started more witch Japan Sci fi more then it did with each other. Star Wars was the better of the two, but BSG was more like Star Trek in that their story lines were a lot more flexible with many more possibilities when it came to being a TV series.
Star Wars was a space-age fairytale. And Cylons were 10 times cooler looking than the storm troopers from Star Wars.
How about the friendly ROBOT in tv's LOST IN SPACE?
So Lucas had a problem with Dykstra doing other projects, but was fine using his camera? What was that about loyalty, Georgie?
There was a - *_Sci-Fi Channel_* - special about this very subject way back in the late 90's. And one interesting point that they brought up was that - _the reason that there were no side arm blaster bolts in the Battlestar show was due to not copying Star Wars blaster blots during gun battles._
When I was a kid and watched this series, THIS, was a major gripe from me as the Star Wars style - blaster bolts - were one of my top favs from the movie, and felt that it should have been shown in the show to.
Well I guess that Lucas got them them to agree to that one to.
George Lucas should be Angry at himself for selling it all to Disney of all film companies …
Ripoff? How about at 7:55 the famous painting of the Last Supper is being ripped off.
If anything, I would think that Battlestar Galactica owes more to Fred Saberhagen's "Berserker" series than Star Wars.
Lost all respect for Lucas over this BS lawsuit.
I was 10 years old in 1978 when when the premiere episode/movie of Battlestar Galactica was shown on TV, and I also remember seeing a story in the paper about a month before the show aired about George Lucas and 20th Century Fox filing a lawsuit against Universal Studios for copyright infringement.
Those of us who are old enough to remember the late 1970s after Star Wars is that home video didn’t exist then, and only a very small number of households had VHS machines or cable TV. This meant that Star Wars being as popular as it was would not be available for audiences to watch at home until 1982 on home video (and not for purchase, rental only) then shown on cable TV in 1983 and network television in 1984. This meant Battlestar Galactica in September 1978 was the closest anyone was going to get to seeing anything like Star Wars on TV.
I don’t know how George Lucas could have thought people would mistake Battlestar Galactica as something he created because while it was entertaining to watch, it certainly wasn’t the high quality product George Lucas would make. If you sat down and watched and compared the two, one thing that’s obvious is Battlestar Galactica looks very dated and definitely a product of the late 1970s, while Star Wars still looks timeless. That’s why his story was shown in movie theaters, while Battlestar Galactica was shown on television first, and the 3 hour premiere was shown in theaters briefly in the summer of 1979.
Star Wars had the "Star Wars Holiday Special".
Battlestar Galactica had: "Battlestar Galactica 1980".
@RerunZone Lt. Starbuck and Bret Maverick are examples of a lovable rogue, in other words someone who tends to recklessly defy social norms and conventions, but who still evokes empathy from the audience or other characters. Dirk Benedict went on to play another lovable rogue, Faceman on The A-Team. Since then, this character archetype has virtually disappeared from TV. When asked about the casting of Katee Sackoff in the role of Starbuck, Benedict said that the feminist movement killed the lovable rogue.
Battlestar. Galactica and Star wars are two different titles--- they are both great.....
The story lines of both were rip-offs of Isaac Asimov's Foundation Series of books, and I'm sure several other SF writers published similar stories. As for the movies/TV shows, you can add ripping off elements of the swashbucker films of the 30's and war movies of the 40's and 50's.
Star Wars wasn't a rip off of anything that came before???!!! BG did take advantage of SW popularity but I didn't think it was a copy. In fact I considered it superior (FD: I have no love for SW). Silent Runnings was better than both.
Back during the 1970s, STAR WARS made its money at the movie theater plus toys and clothes and other merchandise. It wasn't until the 1980s and 1990s when VHS and DVD machines came out that the real money was made. So lighten up, George Lucas. You got rich, you advertised on tv to do it. There's enough money to go around. Don't act so pompous and greedy all of the time.
BG just got one the STAR WARS band wagon. How about thinking that everything was a rip off of the original TV's STAR TREK?
Lucas had a chance to bring Star Wars to TV. But instead of genuinely working hard to put together something great, he gave us that tripe known as the holiday special. And he’s just ticked that Dykstra brought his magic to TV to produce one of the greatest sci fi TV series in history! F you George!
Galactica was more an inspiration, than a ripoff from Star Wars with a lot of differences. The series didn't have a family aspect that were on opposing sides, but it did have a family theme, moreso than Star Wars. It's like comparing Flash Gordon to Buck Rogers, both are standalone space heroes who fought their fair share of bad guys, although it's a shame they never took anything from the book for Buck Rogers to give the season more flavor to add as to why he showed up in the 25th century. I feel what was truly missing was the lore for that's what gives any series worth watching and even so, another season of it. Speaking as a writer, if any idea I had was ever taken from me, I would want royalties as well but mostly the very least you can do is say it was inspired by this series.
Inspirations are often not even conscious. If you want to credit an inspiration, go for it! I don't think it should be required though. Lucas never credited the Bible or Japanese Samurai for inspiring parts of his story. I think he is just a hypocrite who is overprotective of his work. The one thing I understand is his frustration with ILM equipment being used by Universal without being paid for it.
Larson wrote Battlestar before Star Wars came out.
And both were played by Buster Crabbe.
I think Disney "Star Wars" is a direct rip off of Star Wars with a dramatically lower quality
Great shows back then and they were not woke, the Hollywood of today is an embarrassment.
Exactly 👍👍
I watched BG because of Lorne "Pa" Greene - and thoroughly enjoyed it overall.
One big similarity is that both are set in the Distant Past and very, very far away in a distant Galaxy. I don't think it was a direct Rip-off, but they defintely stole some ideas.
Not so much a rip off but SW made BG possible, that said the new version probably led to SW tv series being seen as viable.
Battle star Galactica at least respect the fans. George Lucas sold his opinion to Kathleen Kennedy.
A robot that looks like a dog who helps the hero? Guess they weren't watching Doctor Who at that time. Larson had the idea a decade before Star Wars, and the success of stars made it possible.
Jeez do some research. Glen Larson had the idea of Adam's Ark years before Star Wars was released.
Furious, lol, oh George u copied a few things
I watched it when it originally aired. I don't remember ever thinking it was great but it was sci-fi and there were really no other options at that time. I loved those cool jackets and the ships.
How was it a ripoff....i dont see them doing the same stuff as star wars
I had a huge crush on Maren Jensen. What a beauty 😍. The Colonial Vipers and the Cylon Fighters were cool ships.
I think to real science fiction fans, the similarities between Battlestar and Star Wars were few and superficial.
The Vipers and the X-Wings did have a kind of similarity. But, the Cylons were robots and the Stormtroopers were uniformed soldiers. Galactica was a military ship with a military chain of command. In Star Wars, the rebellion was a much looser confederation.
The cynic in me would say that George Lucas claimed they were so similar because he actually saw Star Wars as a marketing opportunity rather than a piece of science fiction art and was afraid he wouldn't be able to sell his toys and dolls to the kids who bought Battlestar Galactica toys.
For me it was Ann Lockhart, I was so smitten with her!
And interesting take on Lucas and the merchandising. Ya, he likely couldn’t stand the fact that BG was actually a visually stunning, well produced, captivating TV show. And he clearly hated Dykstra for making that possible. The thought his toy line would have to compete with that of BG also must have angered him beyond words
For me, I only had eyes for Princess Ardala from Buck Rogers. The idea that BSG is a rip off of Star Wars is absurd. Star Wars is more fantasy than science fiction. It introduces space wizards (Jedi). There is no such thing in BSG. BSG is about a war between man and machine. That's a very common science fiction theme. Maybe there was never a film that involved WWII air combat in space. You can't copyright space combat. Moreover, anime like Space Battleship Yamoto came out long before Star Wars.
Creative types are always ripping one another off. CBS listened to Roddenberry's pitch for Star Trek, then turned him down, but immediately used his cost saving ideas to make Lost in Space. It is one thing to be inspired by, but another thing to steal ideas. Even in the comics, Marvel ripped off DC's idea for a wheelchair bound man leading a group of super heroes, and many other characters, which annoys me severely. They had a department which did nothing but invent 1000s of names of superheroes with relevant powers, so they could copyright them. And, as my protagonist said in my novel when talking about her home town "The last group of buildings contained lawyers... may they be the very first to go when the big quake hits."
i do not see the resemblance at all. The law suit is nuts.
I do not think Battlestar Galactica was a rip off. Even back when I first saw them both. I like both.
Galactica was not a rip-off, but it was of course only made because of the popularity of Star Wars, At the time I really didn't like Galactica a lot, it was awfully cheesy, but watched it anyway. The newest version was great and really enjoyed it.
As to the ships, you can easily see that STAR WARS copied from STAR TREK and SPACE 1999 tv show or all of those ship model designers probably knew each other anyways.
It didn't do either.
And your lack of ?
Monotone...
Lousy Video !
Do what successful,
People do.
Eethink...
Rewrite...
Enjoyed your perspective, but at 6:00 you mentioned that Starbucks was meant to be a stand in for Skywalker. I was a teenager and saw both productions at the cinema, the Starbucks character was most definitely a stand in for Solo.
Starbuck…Starbucks is the coffee shop that makes $6 coffee
@@iamjackscompletelackofsurp9606 sounds like another copyright issue right there..
Didn't Rodderberry pitch ''A Wagon Train to The Stars...'' to the networks? There's your ''Battlestar Gallactica,''
He should be furious that he sold Star Wars to Disney.😮😮😮
Lucas, I feel ripped off SILENT RUNNING. BATTLESTAR GALACTICA producers and UNIVERSAL in all fairness should have listened to Lucas's script change ideas because these were not unreasonable. The casino with the three singers was a rip-off of the cantina in STAR WARS but the film's plot of searching for earth was definitely original. As a boy, I idolized George Lucas John Dykstra, and other behind-the-scenes film and TV talent. I don't stand a chance in my quest to be a screenwriter or behind-the-scenes worker in film and TV but both shows fired up my creativity. The late 1970's was a magical time for me and shows like STAR WARS and GALACTICA helped me forget my personal problems and troubles as a child. This was what appealed to the audiences of both shows. I liked the characters and story and interaction between characters mostly on GALACTICA. GALACTICA developed a life of its own after its pilot aired. Universal wanted a quick hit and rushed GALACTICA into production. If they had taken more time to develop the story and special effects and sets none of this may have ever happened.
Two friendly robots immediately come to mind, B9 from Lost in Space. B9 get it. Get it. And Robby from Forbidden Planet. Add in M4 from Star Trek episode Requiem For Methuselah who starts out firing on Kirk and crew but ends up making the cure for the plague on the ship.
I can get why Lucas was upset over BSG, and I might be too if I were in his shoes. But as a wee young sci-fi nerd with wonder in my eyes, I didn't see any similarities at all. Cylons were robots created by an ancient race of reptiles, while Stormtroopers were soldiers, clearly two totally different things!
George Lucas has a lot of nerve accusing anyone else of being a thief of other people's creations. The copyright holders of both Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon should have sued him because he blatantly ripped them off....
I don't have an opinion about this but I am glad Star Wars was made. If it wasn't for Star Wars, Mel Brooks never would have made SPACEBALLS!!
I saw BSG 1978 and Star Wars in theaters and was a huge fan of both. Nobody ever compared them. Star Wars always looked realistic where BSG looked like it was filmed on a studio lot much like the Flash Gordon Movie. The only series that ever came close to Star Wars on realism was the first season of Space 1999 which shared props and creative people with Star Wars.
I got loaded every Friday, along with my friend Jim Bill and watched the 1978 Battlestar Galactica.
I never forget Jim who is no longer with us, but my life is changed so no more dope.
I think Harrison Ford became a Superstar. I don't think Carrie Fisher or Mark Hamill ever became Superstars.
Both have spaceships with good guys and bad guys. Thats where the similarities end. Two completely different sagas. Personally I think their is room for both.
BG ripped off Dune because SW had earlier ripped off Dune so BG ripped off the Dune rip off!
In 1998, being 10y old, I saw in Polish a TV of BSG, the first one, and it was an amazing experience for me. Later that year saw the New Hope for the first time (SE was not big in Poland) and my conclusion was the BSG was a lot better and more interesting. Now I still prefer BSG than SW (even a lot more since SW became Disney SW).
I love what GL gave us but BSG is means more to me. Perhaps it is because of all the hell my country went because of the II WW and the stories I know which are too much hardcore for me to write down here but the story of BSG is closer to my heart
In my opinion Star Wars, and Battle Star Galactica had different story lines.. In Battle Star Galactica, you had the Cylons destroy the 12 Colonies, and they are searching for the 13 Colony Earth..
Sure they had battles with the Cylons, whose people advanced beyond because you never seen what a real Cylon looked like.. They talk about leading people on a journey or quest on the way to find Earth, to find their ancient ancestors.. This reminds me a little of Star Trek a little, but in reverse.. You have them going to planet to find Earth, but in Star Trek, they explore planets to seek out new life and new civilizations...
In Star Wars, you had Rebels vs.. Imperials
because the way the Empire wanted to rule the Galaxy where they forced people to obey there rules or else.. The Rebels didn't like it so they fought against the Empire.. They won their first battle against the Empire, and had to find a new hiding place because Darth Vader escaped, and he could bring a new fleet of Star Destroyers to wipe them out...
Lucas being furious about someone ripping off (as he saw it) his movie is very ironic as he basically ripped off every major plot thread he used in Star Wars from other movies & stories himself. The fact he had written Star Wars off as a flop and didn't even attend the premier speaks volumes to his character imho. The original TV series 'Battlestar Galactica' was hammy and cringe even back then and the relaunch was good for the first three seasons then rapidly went downhill, finally coming to a crass and preachy ending about the dangers of A.I. Proof if you ever needed it about the dangers of milking your success too much.
I never cared for Battlestar when it came out and hardly watched it. As for copying Star Wars I couldn't say, but it was boring to me.
So after much suing, whining and stalling Lucas finally took the money without making a tv version of star wars. Imho the 2003 version of battlestar is still a much better show than mandalorian or andor. Seems the future of star wars looks pretty grim outside of video games and battlestar had the last laught somehow😅
To me Stars wars was a ripe off of H. G. Wells "War Of The Worlds". A more powerful force out to eliminate a weaker force. But what is funny to me is the copy right laws with entertainment that are forever where as someone making something that changes everyone life for the better only has 20 years before people can copy it.
Ohfercrissakes this is planet Earth everything comes from trillions of other things. Even the Beatles. Not really, the Beatles were a bit original.
@RerunZone CGI's origins date back to at least the early '70s. The first feature film to make use of CGI was 1973's Westworld.
Galactica was not a rip-off show that rode on Star Wars coat tails. I remember watching the series as it aired and being disappointed in the repetitiveness of the SFX shots and the crappy tv lighting video tape I guess vs film. My option only as a 5th grader when it came out. I did give the theatrical release of the pilot a try but was not any better. Buck Rodgers fell into the same category as Galactica, though the earth starfighters were pretty cool and it starred Erin Gray.
The only similarity is they're both set in outer space. That's it. Other than both having space ships.
I love both, i think they are so different it's stupid; George was such a spoilt brat.
Like GL wasn't ripping off ideas right and left when he was creating the SWU. BS!
There were some similarities, but I don't believe it was a direct ripoff of Star Wars .
If we're gonna talk lawsuits, then both Star Wars and BSG TOS need to be sued for ripping off the friendly robot idea from the Lost in Space series that aired a decade earlier in 1965 and again in 1968. The laser guns are similar to the earlier series as well.
Or maybe the Hollywood types could stop backstabbing each other for no apparent reason and let everyone enjoy some good sci-fi action.
Nice work, George, a half-century ago. Please grow up.
I enjoyed the reboot of Battlestar Galactica much more than the later Star Wars movies.
They both sucked 👎
Only the effects and some ship designs were a bit of a rip of star wars. But the story was not.
I think it took an advantage of Star Wars popularity for the Small Screen!
Didn't George rip-off Herbert?
Most certainly it was a direct rip-off of Star Wars. I thought it back then, when it first aired on TV, and I still think it now. All of Star Wars elements were there, except good sci-fi. And it was Han Solo's character that Starbuck was patterned after. I tried to give the show a chance, but I just couldn't stomach it. It was too Saturday morning kid show-ish.😑
2:30 I never thought that, and neither did anyone else I knew.
As a long time scifi lover, I hated both of them!