Battling back

"Battlestar Galactica" isn't just the best sci fi show on TV, it's one of the best shows, period.

If the science-fiction label has kept you from watching, the show is much more about people than it is about hardware, even though the concept — humans fleeing after an attack by robotic Cylons that nearly wiped them out — is certainly science fiction.

"All the key people ... were of the mind that the world didn't need another space opera," said executive producer David Eick. "There was already 'Star Trek' and all its imitators and all of its spin-offs. And why do another show about a ship in outer space unless there was some way of introducing something to that subgenre?"

So they took the failed '70s "Battlestar Galactica" series, which devolved into silliness about alien gambling casinos and monkeys in robot-dog suits, and turned it into something more closely akin to classic science fiction in the vein of Isaac Asimov and Ray Bradbury — "allegorical socio-political commentary."

"Somehow that felt like it has been lost in contemporary TV sci fi. ... So it really wasn't so much coming up with a new idea as it was going back to an old one, which is — let's use science fiction as the prism or the smokescreen that it was intended to be to discuss and to investigate the issues of the day," Eick said.

As the third season begins tonight (7 and 9 p.m., Sci Fi), the allegory is stark. Most of what remains of the human race is on a planet now occupied by the Cylons. And we're rooting for characters who are committing terrorist acts against their occupiers, while various members of the resistance are being tortured to extract information.

James Callis, who plays the nominal human president, Gaius Baltar, said shooting the occupation scenes "hit us very hard." Mary McDonnell (former President Laura Roslin) called it a "humbling experience" to deal with the echoes of Iraq and didn't run away from those comparisons.

"I think that's a good thing, because I think we've got to clearly identify that possibility within ourselves, given the circumstances for us to understand what's going on," McDonnell said. "The only way to solve it is to come to some kind of understanding with it. So, to me, it's a very brave and beautiful act on the part of David and (executive producer) Ron (Moore) and the whole team."

This is by no means a ripped-from-the-headlines show, however — it's exploring themes without trying to beat anyone over the head with a political agenda. As Eick correctly pointed out, "Galactica" has been criticized by some for being too right-wing in its storytelling.