GALACTICA 6551: A fan-made virtual 2nd season of BSG by Revell-Fan

Dear fans,

one week has passed since the last episode - so it is time for the next chapter:
3. The Value of Life :)

This time it is a drama with a strong focus on the people in the fleet. The Cylons are back as the relentless, merciless killers known from the pilot episode, "Saga of a Star World". Searching for the humans who have destroyed their base on Ketma II (as seen in "1. The Present of the Gods" / to be published later) they raid one system after another. They encounter a new humanoid species on the peaceful world of Harkaria and follow their prime directive: Extermination. Galactica intervenes and saves several thousands of survivors. Now they are refugees helping refugees. Naturally such a role leads to conflicts. The most important issue after first aid is living space. Not everyone in the fleet is willing to help out. Starbuck meets a young girl who has lost her parents during the attack. Since he has experienced a similar fate he decides to take care of her - and to quit as a Viper pilot!

This story was composed of three individual stories which have been written independently. When I saw that these three episodes did not have enough weight to stand for themselves (they had been fairly short and had dragged out the journey over several weeks) I chose to melt them into one, which I liked. The title suggests what it is all about: "The Value of Life". This is not a question on life in general but on life of an individual. This story differs from previous ones because all the small battles (Apollo's affair, Boomer's friendship and Starbuck's mission) are lost whereas the big one is won (salvation of the Harkarian people). This serves to make the reader think about what really matters in life. Should you give up your own to serve a greater good like Nisa does, should you enjoy life at all costs, no matter the consequences (Sondra), or should you try to do the best you can, even if you have to realize that your success does not last forever (Starbuck). Well, just think about it and answer the questions to yourself. ;)

Happy reading! :)
 
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FYI: The "Eastern Alliance" has become the "Terran Alliance" after a Coup d'État on Terra, so if you read anything about that it is no mistake in writing. It will be explained in "1. The Present of the Gods". ;)
 
Working on the translation of the next episode (available next week). That one is fun and exciting and it vastly expands the Galactica universe. It marks the beginning of the "Earth" arc and is a very important part of the overall story (that means, don't miss this one!). :)

Please note that all scripts will be available as *.pdfs soon (English AND German versions @ASC Mclaren ;) ); so there is no real need to copy and save them from the threads. :)

If you have any comments, opinions or questions feel free to post them. :)
 
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Alright folks, it's time for

EARTH GATE!

Okay, you may guess straight from the title what this episode is all about and I admit, the title is not that original. I could have called it "The Race for Earth" but that one has already been used. Ah well, it is what it is. :)

Synopsis:
The Galactic fleet discovers an interdimensional jump gate in space which could transport all ships to Earth in an instant. However, the sun of the system is about to explode...

I hope that the title does not deviate from the fun the episode delivers. It is fast-paced and vastly expands the known Galactica universe. For the first time the Galacticans encounter an ancient alien species that was in contact with the "Great Powers" guarding the universe. These are tall hunch-backed beings with multiple limbs which look like a cross between the aliens from the movie "John Carter" and the aliens from "Cowboys vs. Aliens". However, unlike them these so-called "Pathire" are extremely friendly characters. It took a while for me to write them into the script. I always had the image of these creatures in my mind (including the hologram scene which in fact predates the hologram scenes from "Prometheus" - even though they look virtually identical my version was first! ;) ).

When I retrieved the script the creature scene was left out because I had no idea how to make it work. In the first draft it was only Boomer who found out how to make the alien devices work (which was as believable as alien computer systems being Mac compatible as seen in "Independance Day" :D ;) ). However, while revising I imagined the mental connection with an unkown alien device could have some side effects on a "small headed" human like such a simple one like a headache. So I chose to put Apollo into the big chair - which did the trick! Not only I was able to eliminate the logical error and to show the Pathire but to give a hint at what is to come in later episodes - which makes this episode extremely important. It is not only the beginning of the Earth arc but also sets in motion the events culminating into the Grand Finale.

FYI, in order to understand the end of the hologram scene completely you have to know that Apollo carries a tiny "light being" inside his head. It was "planted" inside him on Ketma II during his adventures in "The Present of the Gods" (still unavailable - SORRY! :( ). Apollo is not aware of that but it is this being that helps the humans to establish contact with the ancient species and to tune the instruments in a way that humans can understand and work with them.

And now to something different. I was thinking about how to visualize the big crystal (called "Crystalith" = a mix of the term "crystal" and the suffix "lith" / ...stone) which is very important for the course of the season. You have already seen a rough ink sketch here in this thread. To make this sketch more realistic I fired up SketchUp and tried to build it. The first attempt was something I had in mind which I thought would look better:

crystal1.jpg

A straight streamlined crystal. Hmm. Did not meet my expectations. Too boring.

Then I thought, why not replicating the structure I invented in the first place (what you see in the sketches):

crystal2.jpg crystal3.jpg

Well, that's better. But it looks a bit too "sterile" and "artificial". Naturally grown crystals have multiple facets. So I drew some lines connecting the edges of the shape seen above, tweaked a few things here and there and as a result I got THIS:

crystal4.jpg crystal5.jpg

I don't know how you think about it, but this looks pretty good to me. It represents strength and looks natural and visually interesting. I'm now working on the texture which will consist of various gradients. Stay tuned on this! :)



!!! SPOILER ALERT !!!
(Skip the next paragraph if you don't want to know how the episode ends!)

If you have been following this thread you might remember that the whole reason why I wrote the season was that I wanted to bring Cylon and Roman Centurions together. That required a way to make the Galacticans find Earth, and this episode is the vehicle doing it. It was conceived that way and this is why the storytelling is so fast and streamlined. It felt necessary to have a story-driven fun adventure now after the previous character drama in order to lighten up the mood of the show. Bringing the baseship back that has been hunting the fleet since the end of "Present of the Gods" was necessary to increase the tension, to show some incredible images (just imagine how she would have looked like sliced up), to bring justice to all she did to the humans and Harkarians and to have a first encounter with strike wings from Earth. The Cylon threat should be demonstrated and take the Earthlings completely off-guard. And finally you witness a fine big space battle. There were some parts playing on Mars as well but I chose to leave them out because they would have dragged the story too much (the fight scenes would have been repetitive), so the adventure jumps directly from the asteroid belt to Earth. One of the next episodes may hint at the Mars base having sustained some damage so you can imagine that the attack on Mars takes place simultaneously. :)


I hope you enjoy this adventure! :)
 
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Time for the next episode:

5. Evil Thoughts.

The fleet has finally reached its destination, the planet Earth. However not all Earthlings welcome the Galacticans with open hearts...

This episode deals with xenophobia and shows that happy endings do not happen all too often in real life. Getting to know each other and forming alliances is a hard process that requires patience, respect, hard work and dedication. "Evil Thoughts" depicts that the voyage of Galactica is not over . It turns from the search for a distant planet into the search for a new, undiscovered country (as in "Star Trek VI"). Actually, the topic of this ep is quite actual. The episode is a plea for tolerance. However, it was not my intention to present a depressing, overly realitistic depiction of events. Instead I wanted to write a rather light and fun show which serves as a prelude of the time travel episode that is supposed to follow next week (which - unfortunately - is still hidden in a crate like "Present of the Gods"). I guarantee that you will smile on more than one occasion while reading this story. And @Rhaven Blaack : Stay tuned for a special guest appearance from a familiar franchise..! ;)

Have fun and enjoy! :)
 
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I'd like to add some facts regarding the Making-Of of "Evil Thoughts". The story remained intact for the most part when I revised it earlier this year except for one thing, Cynthia's kidnapping. The first version was rather lame in that respect. Victor was called "Vladimir" first but every time I read the script I mistakenly referred to him as "Victor". That bothered me so much that I changed the name - he was just not a "Vladimir", he was a "Victor". And he still is now. ;) Okay. I needed a scene to reveal the evil plan of the antagonist and to give Apollo's friends a reason not to be in his vicinity. They should be occupied with something else while Apollo was moving away from them to kill the President. Since Cynthia was a new character she was supposed to be incorporated into the "Galactican family". The best way to achieve that was to let the Galacticans care for her. I was thinking about a quick solution which also fitted in the story and came up with a kidnapping. So far so good. But the way it was executed in the first draft was very different from the final revised version. Eerything starts with the book on her table. She goes to his quarters and gives him back the book. When she goes to the door and opens it Goon is standing before her who was about to meet Vladimir / Victor. For unknown reasons she immediately suspects Goon to be one of the goons (clever naming choice, huh? ;) :D ) who attacked Starbuck and Boomer in the hallway. Goon pushes her back into the room, Victor tries to calm her down and reveals himself to be the boss of the evil isolationists. The camera zooms in on her shocked face and the picture fades out. Now we jump to the point when Muffit leads the Galacticans to Victor's quarters. The cleaning robot refuses to help and Starbuck fires at the door. Our friends enter the room and find out that Cynthia was locked up in a wardrobe. They open the wardrobe and free the girl. All in all very amateurish and lazy and devoid of any tension. The flow of the new version is much better and more logical (I came up with the stolen bag which alerts Cynthia) and as a nice side effect it gave me the chance to give Crichton a bit more "screen time". :)
 
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Ladies & Gentlemen,

it's my honour to give you the first pages of the episode that started this whole project:

6. Experiment in History!

In essence, this is the Battlestar version of "Back to the Future II". I am very proud of this episode because it is pure fun. It is an action-packed adventure with great character moments, much tension and a shocking finale. I wrote it in one day (!) and one night. The story literally flew out of my fingers. One major revision was made shortly afterwards which eliminated two redundant trips from the town to the woods and back which not only shortened the story but also made it much more logical and streamlined. Unfortunately only the teaser and the beginning of the first act are available at the moment, the rest will be added as soon as I have found and translated it.

Since my internet speed is temporarily down it may take a while till all pages are uploaded (there are 11 in total, a few more are still in a crate). I'll be adding a few making of facts shortly. Stay tuned! :)
 
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Synopsis:

A routine patrol discovers a second Galactica which has been adrift for 400 years. Adama launches an expedition through time to find out what happened. Shortly before the away team leaps through time the Cylons attack. In a freak mishap the team strands in Ancient Rome, along with three Cylons. They are discovered by a Roman Centurion who is preparing a revolt against Emperor Augustus…

:)
 
Revell-Fan said:
I wrote it in one day (!) and one night.
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I was referring to the very first version which was written for "Seal Our Fate". As you might remember, SOF was a continuation of "Galactica 1980" set in the late 1990 / early 2000s and combined "Galactica", "Knight Rider" and "Columbo". The original title was "A Stitch In Time". I even still have a preliminary sketch for a possible cover:

Scan0007a.jpg

The re-write took three days and nights. I wrote the story on-the-fly and paused only for eating and sleeping. I simply had to write everything down. Another slight revision brought the already mentioned changes in the flow of the story. Nothing wild but it improved it tremendously.

To make your mouth water I'm giving you some more sketches which were used for the first act.

First: Standard fighters of the United Nations of Earth UNE:

Scan0028 (2)a.jpg

Two of these birds are shot down by the Cylon baseship which received the distress signal of her sister ship two weeks ago in the episode "Earth Gate".

The following is a transport vessel which can be equipped with various versions of cargo containers. The cockpit section is able to separate itself from the cargo area and navigate independently. Three of them are pulling the discovered battlestar to Earth. It's a possible candidate for a new paper model.

Scan0028a.jpg

Scan0117a.jpg

The two battlestars in Earth orbit. Please note the small spheres with the spikes. These are automated service drones zipping around like the lights in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind". They are used for maintenance and surveillance and clean and scan the outer hull of the second battlestar. There are anti collision lights at the tip of the spikes.

Last but not least some sketches of the people aboard.

Scan0139a.jpg
Scan0138a.jpg
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Yo guys, the next episode is available:

7. Tactical Preparations.

I am so sorry that the previous time travel episode is incomplete at the moment. The most important thing to know is that the Galactica crew has found out that the gate at Orpheus VI did not bring the fleet to the Earth they were looking for but to an Earth of a parallel universe. You can imagine the confusement and shock this revelation has caused. In this time of uncertainty a new party shows up. But is this a new ally or an old foe?

Due to the picture upload issues this script has no sketches yet.

As always I'll give you some facts and tidbits on the making of shortly. Stay tuned and have fun reading! :)
 
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What makes "Galactica" "Galactica"? Strong characters, dazzling visual effects, high production values, space ships and Cylons, you might say. That's correct but there is something more: The Quest. "Galactica 1980" showed what might happen when you take the quest element out of the story. Galactica turned into an "alien visitors story" - which in essence would work (if you skip the infantile elements :D ;) ); however, it wouldn't be "Battlestar Galactica" any longer. It took me a while to realize that which led to two different ways the ongoing story was approached. The first project was a straight attempt at making a better "Galactica 1980". That show was not completely bad. In fact if you are following the stories carefully you will notice that I am using several key elements from that show: The comlinks (small wrist watches with built-in communicators; in essence it was a nod at "Knight Rider" but "G1980" featured them first), the smaller hand lasers, time travel, an Earth companion working as a reporter and acting as a love interest for one of the main Galactica characters (Cynthia), the Turbobikes (which were supposed to be featured in the original series) and the title of the show (I only changed the year).

After the time travel episode the Galacticans stayed on Earth and started to experince various adventures on Earth and help the Earthlings to build up a strong defense against the dreaded Cylons (they even started to build a new battlestar). You would have learned how life on Earth and Mars would have been, why the Earthlings did not know anything about their intergalactic heritage any longer and met Jeffrey Thaunders, Cynthia's brother who did not like Apollo. The first episode after the time travel would have been "The Inheritage" follwed by "Close Encounters" and "Reunion".

"The Inheritage" played on Earth and described the hunt for Cassiopeia's old Geminean praying skull. It was stolen from her because it could be the first proof that Geminon and Earth shared the same roots. They encounter a creature that is able to turn into soil and thus disappear in an instant. Charles Shaughnessy starred as Professor Carl Bentley who had created this Golem from the remains of a former colleague of Cynthia, an archaelogist. Bentley is a hardcore Darwinist who believes that the arrival of the Galacticans would shatter the world of archeology and history and render every meaningful discovery obsolete and replace the whole history of man with a far-fetched God-was-an-astronaut theory. This episode featured a nightly excavation on a cemetary and the first car chase on Earth. The script was begun but remained unifinished because of the de-mystification of the crystal skull legends by several Discovery documentaries. However, the main element did not let me go, so I'm still thinking of using the crystal skull in "Charon" (still WIP, but this idea is much better because the skull is not just a static McGuffin but a device that actually serves a purpose).

"Close Encounters" is mostly the same story you will read in a few weeks. Most notable difference: It ended with a cliffhanger. While Galactica was on a search and rescue mission to save our heros from a planet inhabited by vampire monsters the Cylons attack Earth. They destroy large portions of the defense shield surrounding the solar system and proceed to Earth. Meanwhile Starbuck, Jeff and Apollo are forced to share an escape pod and are about to fly into a sun.

"Reunion" is what the name says: The escape pod is saved and returned home. The Earth forces prevail because of the intervention of another battlestar: The Pegasus is back! Re-united with the Galactican fleet the Commanders decide to put an end to the Cylon threat once and for all. They proceed to Cylon, destroy the suns of the system and wipe out the Cylon homeworld. All return to Earth, Cassie & Starbuck and Apollo & Cynthia get married, and all live happily ever after. Epilog: Deep in space an old foe is preparing his return: Count Iblis! Fade out, the end. Season done. Solid episode, three parter, but FAR FROM what "Exodus" offers. Wait and see. ;)

That was what COULD have been. Well then, when I realized that the quest had to be kept I decided to rewrite the scripts an to lead the Galacticans back to their original journey. "Tactical Preps" marks this turning point. I agree, having the crew stranded in a parallel universe is not the very best way to ressolve things because it may seem a bit lazy. But I needed a reason to contiune the journey and this was the most logical way to do since I have let them fly through an artificial wormhole which was affected by the electro-magnetic disturbances caused by the dying star of the system. The fact that the fleet was scattered all over the place when they arrived was a first indication that something got wrong. Now we learn that its effects have been even worse. The focus of the show was re-arranged, as was the order of the episodes. "Close Encounters" was pushed back. Since there was no interdimensional gate on Earth I needed to give the Galacticans a bit more time to build one and to look for suitable materials. So I had to have them spent a bit more time in Earth's orbit which made it necessary to include three eps on-the-fly. Originally conceived as filler episodes to make everything flow in a realistic time frame I soon found out that a mini story arc comprising of three episodes would do the job nicely. I turned them into these three eps and incorporated several ideas from the first planned storyline like the Golem which was reduced to a - plant. ;)
 
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Picture upload is operational again; I have added the sketches. ;)
 
I have uploaded the first PDFs of the stories to the Resource section. The original German versions are available, too, for those who would like to learn a foreign language. Please note that the texts were not translated word by word. My procedure so far:

I made a copy of the original German file. That assured me to keep the layout and all the inserted images in place.

Then I ran the text through Google translator to speed up the process. This saved me a lot of work since I did not need to write all the names down again.

After that I opened both files, German and Google-translated one, side by side, and went through the gibberish that was supposed to be English, and corrected the formatting. :D ;)

I corrected the mistakes (there were a lot of them but I noticed the results got much better a few weeks ago; either the translator was revamped or it was just me feeding a better writing to Google ;) ). The most confusing mistakes came with the name of "Kommandant Leiter". "Leiter" is a so-called "Teekesselchen" (homonym) in German which means it is a word with two meanings: "ladder" or "leader". Needless to say that Google was completely unable to distinguish between these meanings and the name of the character itself. :)

In some cases the translation pointed out sections which had to be improved in the original text to avoid repetitions or to change a term to make the text sound better and clearer. In other cases it was not possible to translate the German flawlessly in order to make everything sound good. In these cases I slightly rewrote the text so that the gist remained the same. This will become most obvious with the song of the fairy tale episode ("A Hero's Ballad"); I came up with a totally different text because the word by word translation did not rhyme at all. It was a bit tricky but the result was very pleasing. I had some trouble with one verse in particular which did not want to rhyme at all. Then, all of a sudden, I got an idea which I had to write down immediately in order not to forget it, which did the trick. Of course I got this idea when I was still in bed, at 2:10 AM. Typical. ;)

One final note regarding the availability of the PDFs: I'll upload them as soon as the scripts are complete. Incomplete ones and WIPs are published in the threads for the time being (like Episodes 1 & 6). Scripts with comic pages will become available as bundled ZIPs so that you get the complete story without having to download two files separately. :)
 
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You know I like incorporating well-known real-life actors into the show. This is done for two reasons: It increases the realism of the script and it saves me much time for exposition (to describe how the character looks, the way he / she behaves and so on). By stating the actor it should be very clear how the role is filled. And it gives a good master plan for the image the character creates in the mind of the reader. I tend to mix and match different time frames so you will find classic actors reprising their roles from 1979 like Fred Astaire and Lorne Greene along with stars from the 90s (Leelee Sobieski in her teenage years from "The Glass House"), 2000s (Corey Johnson as he looked in "Doctor Who: Dalek") and a few fresh faces from the 2010 upward. One character proved to be a bit difficult: "Gloria Rilkes". I knew the style and the "feel" of her, I even knew I had seen a fitting character before, but did not remember exactly who it was. Then I got it: Sonya Cassidy. She portrays the same character in four episodes (#3, #8, #9 & #15; she is not going to die, BTW, so she may be around somewhere in the background ;) ). If you don't know her just look her up; she was great in "Humans" and fits the bill here on "Galactica 6551". :)

FYI, if you look at the first issue of "Witchblade" (Image comic book series from 1995) you will see a similar approach which was surprising and breath-taking at the same time: artist Michael Turner drew a character with a striking resemblance to Chow Yun Fat! He is not credited by name but he definitely looks like him! WAY COOL! :cool:
p2_9.jpg

source: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-w8v8HRwTR00/U1sFzfX663I/AAAAAAAC6XU/YNGMSVRp2Vw/s1600/p2_9.jpg
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a-better-tomorrow.jpg

source: http://brothers-ink.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/a-better-tomorrow.jpg
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Episode 8 is ready! :)

This is part 2 of the mini story arc about the Cylon siege / Styx encounter. Sorry for the wait but I forgot to proof-read it and proceeded with the next eps instead...:bulgeeye:

Synopsis:

The Styx are orbiting Earth. Adama feels very uneasy and suspects a foul play. However, he cannot prove that their wish for political asylum is part of an evil plan. Having become addicted to gamble, Starbuck is blackmailed by his creditors. They force him to kill the President of the United Nations of Earth!

The next one will be the conclusion, however, it is still in development. Depending on the time I can spare next week it may take a bit longer for it to be released. The positive effect is, the ep will be published next so that you will be able to enjoy the adventure in the correct order. ;)
 
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Sorry for the wait, guys, but I'm stil struggling with the development of episode #9. Since it is still not what I want it to be I have decided to give you the first chapter of episode #10: Close Encounters. This is the Halloween episode featuring space vampires..! ;) :Bat:Bat:Bat

The rest of the story has to be proof-read and will follow as soon as this task has been accomplished. :)
 
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Rhaven Blaack said:
I have to say that that is a very interesting idea!
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I saw a photo on Facebook of a custom "Boomer" action figure, complete with removable Viper helmet. If I find it again I'll post it. I'm a retired commercial artist/graphic designer who makes custom movie set and comic book displays for action figures. If you want to get into the action figure comics let me know and I'll be glad to help with the set designs. Would take a lot of research but with the internet and DVDs we could probably pull it off.
 
Lee Clifton said:
I saw a photo on Facebook of a custom "Boomer" action figure, complete with removable Viper helmet. If I find it again I'll post it. I'm a retired commercial artist/graphic designer who makes custom movie set and comic book displays for action figures. If you want to get into the action figure comics let me know and I'll be glad to help with the set designs. Would take a lot of research but with the internet and DVDs we could probably pull it off.
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Thank you very much for the offer. However, I am not nearly that talented. I just like the concept and what the person did. On the other hand, I like to build models (as you have seen by my work), but that is the extent of my talent.
Speaking of figures, have you seen the figures that @Tirick has designed? If not, here is the link to his site: http://tcfgaming.com/ I did contribute (with a great deal of help from @Revell-Fan) both the BSG and BRTC25 figures. You can also see the figures that I made in my gallery.
 
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