Giant Freakin Robot

They say no news is good news, but when it comes to the Hollywood development process, no news often means a project has slid into that abyss known as Development Hell. Sometimes that’s bad news, if it’s a project you were really excited to see. But then other times, it just means all is right with the world. We’ll leave it to you to figure out which this qualifies as, but Bryan Singer’s Battlestar Galactica feature film is now on hold.

Speaking to Coming Soon, Singer reveals that his BSG plans have been back-burnered thanks to his new involvement with X-Men: Days of Future Past, the sequel to the surprise hit, X-Men: First Class. “I have that one on hold for a moment, so hopefully, I’d love to be able to get back to that, but for now I’m just focused on this X-Men business.” There’s no telling how long that hold will last, or when/if Singer will get back to his Battlestar Galactica movie, but it will likely be several years away at the least.

As with any high-profile director, Singer has a ton of different projects he’s involved with — or rumored to be involved with — at any given time. Singer’s been talking up his Battlestar Galactica movie since at least 2011, but news of the remake has been sparse in recent months. The last we heard anything was back in August, when he mentioned that the script was undergoing revisions.

Even before the controversial series finale, Ron Moore’s Battlestar Galactica reboot was dividing fans of the original series. While many enjoyed the more mature take on Glen Larson’s 1978 sci-fi series, others thought it diverged too much from the — admittedly a bit cheesy — source material. As someone who grew up with the show as a fondly remembered bit of my childhood, I was a big fan of the new version, and fine with it charting out its own path. Still, it was very cool when the show would throw long-time fans a bone by doing things such as occasionally using the 1978 version’s classic theme song. Here’s another intriguing bit of old-meets-new: actor Edward James Olmos delivering the original series’ closing narration: “Fleeing from the Cylon tyranny, the last Battlestar, Galactica leads a rag-tag fugitive fleet on a lonely quest…a shining planet known as Earth.”

Even though we’ve only seen six short episodes of it so far, Syfy’s web series, Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome has become one of the hottest topics in geek circles of late. A prequel set during the first Human/Cylon war, Blood & Chrome centers on a brash young William Adama (played by Edward James Olmos in the Ron Moore series, played here by Luke Pasqualiano). It certainly helps that pickings are mighty slim for fans craving a hardcore space-based science fiction series, but even if it had plenty of competition, Blood and Chrome would be pretty damn awesome. One reason amongst many: the show looks just as good as the BSG series, despite being produced for a much smaller budget.

Friday has always been a great day. End of the work week, with nothing but fun potential to look forward to. Recently, however, it became just a tad bit more awesome. That’s because Friday now means new episodes of Syfy’s kickass web series, Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome. Episodes 3 and 4 of the 10-part series focusing on a young William Adama (Luke Pasqualino) and the first Cylon War are now available for your viewing pleasure. Even better, the hosting folks at Machinima have stitched the two eps together so you can watch them back to back. Here’s bit of top-notch piloting and a brand-new mystery…