Aha, Possible Roots of "Skyler"

Muffit · May 10th, 2003, 08:17 PM

This may just be coincidence, but in view of the rumor that one of the BSG cast was meant to be called Skyler, I find it interesting that a famous starship capain of our acquaintance just happened to play the role of Skyler.

In the 60's, William Shatner plays a counterfeiter in the popular western "The Big Valley" (who turns out to be a good guy, although a bit of a scoundrel). His name in the show is Schuyler, pronounced Skyler.

Saw it tonight and I just thought this was interesting...

BST · May 10th, 2003, 10:08 PM

Muffit,

That episode of The Big Valley was on this evening. I believe it was on the Hallmark Channel. I missed most of it, catching only the last 15 minutes or so. (Had to take my saintly self to church).

OOPS, missed your last sentence. After seeing the 2nd paragraph, I immediately went into "Reply-mode".

BST

Micheleh · May 10th, 2003, 11:19 PM

AFAIK, Skyler was the original name for Apollo, but they changed it because it sounded too much like Skywalker.

Agelastus · May 11th, 2003, 12:44 AM

And we all know that Larson had no thought of the money...................ahem, success of Star Wars when he came up with Galactica..................................

Interesting how ideas accrete though. Skyler as a name would seem to indicate a developmental stage where by the mythic overtones we mostly admire seem to have been much less pronounced.

kingfish · May 11th, 2003, 07:15 AM

Hatch liked the name of Skyler and was shocked when he was going to play Captain Apollo. I heard the interview on Radio:Galactica. I like the name Apollo better due to the fact it is truly mythical.

Agelastus · May 11th, 2003, 08:13 AM

Hatch, huh.

Another freely admitted example of his bad thinking with regard to Galactica.

[To anyone new - no I REALLY don't like his novels!]

Micheleh · May 11th, 2003, 10:41 AM

You know what, though, Agelastus? Let me tell you somehting many people may not know. If you've read all of the Battlestar Galactica novels written by Richard Hatch and (co-author), there's a good chance you've never *really* read Richard's writing.

Sound strange? Not really. First off, the novels are collaborations, and the publishing house assigns the coauthors. Richard writes the synopses and drafts, and the coauthor refines and polishes them. This is no guarantee that consensus will always be reached, however. Then it's from there to the editor, and from what I understand, this editor is very agressive and not entirely interested in author input before making changes and modifications.

If you ever saw the original synopses before all the changes and modifications and editorializations, I think you'd be surprised, that's all.

Agelastus · May 11th, 2003, 01:17 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Micheleh
If you ever saw the original synopses before all the changes and modifications and editorializations, I think you'd be surprised, that's all.

I might very well be.

I'm not blind to the fact that they're collaborations - I just don't want to tar at least one other useful author with the same brush. Modern collaborations normally work like that, it seems to me. Consider the rash of Anne McCaffrey or Piers Anthony collaborations where you can clearly see the influence of the bigger name's standard story style but you can tell the prose is not theirs. Piers Anthony is the biggest culprit in this respect.

Moreover, some of the more objectionable things clearly come from Hatch, since he's explored the same themes in at least one other medium that I know of, that of comics.

I stand by my opinion of the baneful influence he would be to the creative side of a continuation/remake. Let him just be Apollo.

LadyImmortal · May 11th, 2003, 02:56 PM

I probably won't agree with you Agelastus. I've liked a lot (not all) of Richard's ideas (or his collaborators).

There've been a few things I didn't like - but then again the original wasn't 'perfect'.

That's how the monkey bounces.

I'd love to see a collaboration of ideas between Richard, whatever Singer/DeSanto was coming up with and even see what Larson has on his plate - so long as none of them ruin what the show truly is.

--Rhonda

Agelastus · May 12th, 2003, 12:34 AM

To agree to disagree is the beauty of the web.

newt · May 12th, 2003, 08:18 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Agelastus
To agree to disagree is the beauty of the web.

I disagree

Agelastus · May 12th, 2003, 09:32 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by newt
I disagree

I thought you might.

Dawg · May 12th, 2003, 09:37 AM

Well, I'm going to agree with Rhonda. There are parts of Armaggedon (the only one I've read so far) that really bring back Galactica for me, and parts I could do without.

I'm not going to disagree with anybody right now, because I'm at work and would probably get into trouble if I stayed on line a minute more.

Ooops.

I am
Dawg

LadyImmortal · May 12th, 2003, 10:01 AM

Dawg - LOL!

Me too.

--Rhonda

Agelastus · May 12th, 2003, 12:46 PM

So was I - not now though, thank the Lords of Kobol.................

Perhaps there were one or two minor things I liked about Armageddon myself (he gasps, the hands of various fellow travellers around his throat.)

But I'm afraid the flaws overshadowed them for me. Which is a shame, as I was rather eager to read the book when I first saw it.

skippercollecto · May 13th, 2003, 06:23 PM

I am responding to two different questions by two different people.
1. Regarding the "mythical" aspects of the names:
Over the years, I've read or heard various versions of how some of the names came about, which I won't go into here. But a number of the characters throughout the run of the series were originally given other names in earlier versions of the scripts. Not all of these names were Biblical, historical or mythological in origin. The following are the ones I know about:
Apollo/Skyler, Adama/Adam, Serina/Lyra, Caine/Jebadar Duncan (I'm guessing on the spelling) and Sheba/Alethea. There are probably others that I haven't heard about yet.
2. As for Skyler:
I first heard of Skyler in 1989, the first time I heard Richard Hatch speak. He appeared at Galactic Trekfest in St. Louis in April 1989. Richard said that when he read the first draft of the Galactica pilot, he turned down the role. The character he had been asked to play, Skyler, was cold-hearted and insensitive, and the plot did not have character development that he had wanted. But, Richard said, he really liked the name Skyler. It wasn't until after the script had been rewritten several times and the character made into a more dimensional person (and the show actually begun filming) that he accepted the role. But by that time his character had been renamed Captain Apollo. Richard said he didn't care for THAT name at first--in that dry, mock-innocent voice he sometimes uses, he compared the name to that of a superhero's, referring to him as "Crunchman."

Mary

P.S. Which leads me to another train of thought--from what I've read here and in other discussion groups about the remake of Galactica, the character of Apollo sounds much more like how he had originally been written as, the role that Richard Hatch didn't want.