The Alternate Battlestar Galactica Ending That Almost Was
As you’d expect, showrunner Ronald Moore had more than one idea about how to end his operatic space series Battlestar Galactica. In fact the ending you saw this weekend wasn’t his first choice.
Talking with io9 he reveals that he had something else on the front burner until after the writer’s strike, when they changed tracks. He says:
There was a different ending that we had, it was all about Ellen aboard the Colony. She was sort of turned by Cavil, because she found out that Tigh had impregnated Caprica Six, and that deeply embittered her. And she sort of became dedicated to the idea of destroying Galactica and the fleet out of revenge. And [she and Cavil] got Hera, and then the final confrontation became very personalized between Tigh versus Ellen, and should they forgive.
That was the story, generally speaking. We didn’t have a lot more than just what I spun out to you, when the writer’s strike hit. Over the course of the writer’s strike, I rethought about it and thought, “That’s not going to do it. It’s not epic enough. It’s not interesting enough.” That’s when we decided to start over, and reinvent the last arc of the show.
