ComicMix

In an overdue announcement, Sci Fi Channel has formally picked up Caprica as an ongoing series.  The show, a prequel to Battlestar Galactica, will star Eric Stoltz, Esai Morales, Paula Malcomson and Polly Walker in a story set fifty years prior to BSG.

Variety describes Caprica as a “Family-drama-themed series will focus on the Earthlike planet of Caprica as two rival families deal with, among other topical issues, the broader implications of their society’s emerging artificial intelligence technology sector.”

Ronald D. Moore and David Eick, along with Remi Aubuchon (24) will executive produce as they have on BSG. Caprica‘s pilot was co-written by Aubuchon and Moore and directed by Jeffrey Reiner (Friday Night Lights).

A promo for the series can be found at the Sci Fi website with a “Coming Soon” despite the trades saying it won’t air before 2010. Production will begin in the summer of 2009 while BSG will begin airing its final ten episodes in January.

"Battlestar Galactica was absolutely our flagship show. It put us on the map and helped transform the perception of the network," Sci Fi president Dave Howe told Variety. "We want people to come to this who have never heard of Battlestar Galactica. I think, because (Galactica‘s) backdrop was space and spaceships, there was a barrier to entry for some viewers. Caprica has none of that. It’s an intense family drama set on an Earthlike planet, in the near future, speaking to a lot of the ethical dilemmas that we as a human race are going to have to face very shortly."

Ain’t it Cool News provided complete character breakdowns containing plot points.

* DANIEL GRAYSTONE (Eric Stoltz) is literally the father of the Cylons, a fortysomething “spectacularly wealthy” computer designer.

* ZOE GRAYSTONE (Alessandra Toreson), Daniel’s hot 16-year-old daughter, dies in a suicide bombing. Daniel learns that Zoe – like iconic Twin Peaks dead teenager Laura Palmer – had many secrets. For one thing she was a closeted monotheist! For another, she was even more of a technological genius than daddy Daniel, and succeeded in secretly uploading her personality and DNA into a holographic avatar. Daniel comes to combine the Zoe avatar with stolen technology to create the first Cylon, “a robotic version of his dead daughter.” Oo!

* JOSEPH ADAMS (Esai Morales), Bill Adama’s pop and Romo Lampkin’s future mentor, is a fortysomething Tauron native who long ago emigrated to Caprica and overcame anti-Tauron prejudice to become an influential defense attorney on the capital planet. Joseph’s wife and daughter (Bill’s mother and sister) die in the same blast that killed Zoe Graystone. Joseph Adams and Daniel Graystone, despite their very different backgrounds, are bonded by the tragedy. Adams, who still has “powerful ties to the Tauron crime underworld” helps Greystone create the first Cylon by stealing cutting-edge robotic technology from a Tauron computer developer.

* TAMARA ADAMS (Genevieve Buechner), Joseph’s dead daughter, may also be resurrected as a robot, but Joseph – much like the dad in Stephen King’s Pet Sematary – comes to regret his role in the Cylonic creations.

* AMANDA GRAYSTONE (Paula Malcomson), Daniel’s thirtysomething wife, is a successful surgeon devastated by the loss of her beloved daughter Zoe.

* TOMAS VERGIS (Roger R. Cross) is Amanda Graystone’s Tauron ex-lover and one of her husband’s chief competitors. Following Zoe’s death, Amanda covertly returns to Vergis’ bed to learn more of the tech that might be used to resurrect her daughter.

* SISTER CLARICE WILLOW (Polly Walker) is another closeted monotheist and the headmistress of the Athena Academy, the polytheistic religious school Zoe attended. A product of colonial slums, the sister is presumably responsible for converting young Zoe into a monotheist.

* BEN STARK (Avan Jogiais) is Zoe’s unbalanced monotheist-fanatic boyfriend, the suicide bomber who kills, among many others, Zoe, Tamara, Bill Adama’s mom and himself in a horrific train bombing. He, too, secretly uploaded himself into a holographic avatar. But his can only be contacted by headmistress Willow.

* WILLIAM ADAMS, a dour 9-year-old introvert unaware of his Tauron heritage, is Joseph Adams’ sole surviving child. Like John Connor, he will prove humanity’s savior in a universe ruled by murderous robots.