wergo

I'm a little confused by this one (no, I didn't watch it when it first aired). On the season one DVD, it's shown as a single 3-hour episode, with just one opening credit sequence. If it was a miniseries, did it air over multiple nights (two 90-minute episodes or 3 one-hour episodes?). If it did, why does the box set show it as a single realy long episode? The UK sites report that the UK DVDs use the "original" opening credits that Sky One used. Anyone know how they differed from the US credit, and how many episodes (4 45-minute one?) aired in England?

The US miniseries (one episode on the US box set) is spliced together from the individual UK series, right?

adamblast

The original US SciFi-TV miniseries was broadcast over two nights, each in a two-hour slot. Don't know why it was changed to a 3-hour single-shot for the DVDs, but I don't think anything was left out 'cept the 2nd credits. Never heard any complaints about it, at any rate, and I think we'd have heard plenty of shouts about an edited cut.

SciFi channel didn't like the theme music and made them change it for Season 1 of the US showings--very wierd, since the replacement music was even slower and more non-descript. They changed back to the "real theme" for Season 2 in the US. As far as I know, the only real difference between the UK sets and the US sets are the theme music for S1.

FinkPish

A 180-minute show will fill out to 4 hours with commercial breaks.

Brent_MN

I was just planning on starting this show... I saw there was a mini-series first and didn't know if I needed to rent that before S1. I guess I don't.

I'm not a big fan of Sci-Fi, but have heard that it's more of a place to set the show in and not the main focus. So, well, I gotta give it a shot.

Draven

I'd actually recommend renting the mini-series. The first episode jumps right into the action and, while it is possible to follow the story from there, the mini-series basically shows everything that happens to get them into space in the first place and it's worth seeing.

People have complained about the mini-series but I watched it and then went right into the series itself and I think it worked out fine. I knew it was basically back-story anyway, so I wasn't expecting the end-all-be-all from it.

Brent_MN

oh good, thanks for the advice!

adamblast

Just for clarity's sake: Yes! You should surely watch the miniseries first... but it's included with the current edition Season 1 DVDs, so it is mostly likely the S1 first disc...

dhmac

Definitely watch the mini-series first. I recommended the show to a friend, and he and his wife rented the disc with the first "series" episodes. He then wrote me back and said that they were total lost trying to figure out what was going on. I recommended that they rent and watch the mini-series before continuing, which they did and now they absolutely love the show!

milo bloom

I jumped in when Scifi did a marathon of the 13 regular first season episodes. I had read a few quick summaries of the miniseries, but I didn't watch it until I bought the full first season box with the mini-series in it.

Personally, jumping right in with 33 sorta gives it a "in media res"* feeling that you get from Star Wars ANH, what jumping right into the Star Destroyer chasing the Tantive IV.

And there has been very little, if any, Trek like "sci fi" storytelling on BSG. It's far closer to a Buffy TVS where it's actually about the people and the things that happen to them.


*, please forgive my bad Latin

bboisvert

Disc #1 of the season one set *is* the miniseries. And, yes, you should watch it. While it isn't as compelling as the show soon becomes, you do need the set up, character intros, etc. to fully appreciate the show.

I'm actually starting BG over from the beginning now (convinced my wife to finally watch it) and we've just finished Disc #2. This was my third time watching the miniseries and it didn't bug me as much as it did the first couple of times. It ain't perfect, but it's adequate to set up the show.

wergo

It's nice that the "miniseries" is included as episode 1. The only real complaint I have with the DVD sets is those stupid "previously on" tags aren't chapter-stopped. So, if you're watching a bunch of episodes in a row, it's a pain to figure out how far to fast-forward to get to where the episode actually stops.

Is it really THAT hard to either chapter-stop them, or put them as an alternate option in the main menu? Assuming I haven't suffered a major case of amnesia since I watched the previous episode, I don't really feel the need to sit through 'em. It's annoying and condescdning and insulting.

Besides, I've already wasted hours of my life watching those stupid FBI warnings each time I put a disc in, do I really need to waste MORE time trying to find the acual start of the episode?

milo bloom

The further you get into BSG, sometimes you'll see clips in the "previously-on" segment from the previous season, or two seasons ago. I do agree that it should be pretty simple to encode them as chapters on a DVD, but there is a possibility that you might miss a two year old clue in one of them.

wergo

Well, there's always a possibility I might miss a clue early in a novel, but I don't want a synposis at the beginning of each chapter either (though those would be easier to ignore). It's not as if they don't occasionally include flashbacks (or even expository dialogue) during the episode itself. Plus, they sometimes give away too many clues by what they show in the tag that ruins what should be a surprise moment.