Battlestar Galactica Web Series Will Go Straight to TV

Battlestar Galactica and Caprica co-executive producer Michael Taylor announced in July a new BSG web series was in the works.

Blood & Chrome was set to revolve around the experiences of a young William Adama in the Twelve Colonies of Man during the first Cylon War. Taylor said it would depict “the realities of war as fought by soldiers on the ground (and in Battlestars and Vipers), and the somewhat less real version portrayed in the media.”

If greenlit, Syfy was set to produce nine or ten 10-minute episodes of the original web series, all shot on green screens using virtual sets. But, Syfy’s not greenlighting the web series. Instead, it’s greenlighting a TV pilot.

Maureen Ryan at TV Squad reports Syfy execs were so enthralled with Taylor’s script, they decided Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome

will air on the network as a “pilot for a possible young Adama TV series.” Production will begin in Vancouver in early 2011, with an air date in late 2011 or early 2012.

Mark Stern, executive vice president of original programming at Syfy, told Ryan how the scope of the project changed:

When we read Michael’s script, it was so clearly a full-blown pilot for a series…The scope is fantastic and bigger, I think, than anticipated, so we said, ‘Let’s do it as a 2-hour backdoor pilot.’ … We’re trying to get up and running as soon as possible.

No actors for the series have been announced, but Ryan was able to gather some clues about the Blood & Chrome storyline:

Blood & Chrome, which takes place in the tenth year of the Cylon War, follows Adama, a recent Academy graduate, as he and a rookie pilot take a female character on an important mission. There’s a potential love interest for Adama in the story, but the pilot is basically about that mission, which, if successful, could turn the tide of the war.

B&C was set to become the second online show to come out of the BSG franchise. In December 2008 and January 2009, Syfy released the The Face of the Enemy, which took home a number of Streamy Awards.