It's difficult to find a sci-fi project in recent years that wasn't based on an earlier film or television show, although "Minority Report," "Signs" and "Children of Men" did buck the trend.
Ronald D. Moore, creator of the modern "Battlestar Galactica," said that commercial priorities push risk-adverse studios toward properties with established names, but he said it's wrong to presume that artistic ambition is stifled by remaking the familiar. "Battlestar" is proof of that, certainly. Moore's version premiered as a miniseries in 2003 and took the core concept of the creaky 1970s show -- a ragtag fleet of humans fleeing an implacable foe of their own making, the sentient machines called Cylons -- and added dark layers of complexity with themes of religion, government-sanctioned torture, class struggle, terrorism and bioethics.
"In the same way that Shakespeare's plays can be revisited again and again in new ways and settings, with things like 'Star Trek' or 'Battlestar Galactica' there is enough of the core mythology there that you can change and adapt all the things around it for something very new and worthwhile," Moore said. "New generations can make it their own. Strong new interpretations build on the past, they don't repeat it."
He added that Gene Roddenberry's "Star Trek" marked a point where science fiction in Hollywood reached a different level. "There was enough there that it appealed to multiple generations and influenced creators. Some of those creators want to go back and work with these properties they grew up loving."
Perhaps, but returning again and again to the same ground leaves new frontiers unexplored. There's also the risk of franchises becoming calcified, campy or too self-referencing. And there is the simple matter of fatigue, and not just with fans. Roddenberry had no idea he was creating a pop-culture behemoth when he pitched television executives the idea of " 'Wagon Train' to the stars" in 1964, but the colossal impact of "Star Trek" left the creator feeling stifled as well. "I have felt many times trapped by 'Star Trek,' " he once said. "It cost me dearly."
Hollywood's sci-fi trinity
Because of intensely networked fans and all those fans-turned-creators, the galactic trio of "Star Trek," "Star Wars" and "Battlestar Galactica" are now tied into one another more than ever. "Battlestar's" Moore, a huge "Trek" fan through the years, said the military life and quest nature of classic "Trek" helped shape his show, and Moore himself was a key producer on "Star Trek: The Next Generation," "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" and "Star Trek: Voyager." And, of course, the airing of the original "Battlestar" in 1978 was clearly intended to draft off the popularity of "Star Wars," which was released a year earlier.
