David Eick Loves lucy

Source: If Magazine

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA is one of the most talked about dramas on television today. With a Peabody Award to their credit, the creators behind the series, Ron Moore and David Eick continue to forge ahead and break new ground in what is viewed as the Science Fiction genre. Eick is always happy to talk about his baby, and in this third part of iF MAGAZINE’s exclusive interview we find out how he really feels about the characters he helped create.

iF MAGAZINE: Was it tough to kill certain characters this season?

DAVID EICK: I think in the case of Ellen Tigh, there needed to be damage, measurable permanent damage to some of our people as a result of the events on New Caprica. In the case of Tigh, I remember Ron [Moore] walked in one day and I asked him how the writing of the two-hour premiere was going. He said, “Well, I think it’s going really well. Tigh lost an eye.” I was shocked that Tigh lost an eye, but he had a really interesting point that he felt the need for some visual evidence of what happened. It wasn’t just going to be a fantasy that ten episodes later when everyone is sitting in the poker room having a good time, there still has to be some legitimacy and some respect paid to those we left behind and the casualties we suffered and the emotional trauma experienced. So, the missing eye does that every time you see the man. I don’t want to make an off-hand comparison, but the people who survived concentration camps in World War II have tattoos on their arms. Any time you see a human being with those kinds of marks it takes you back and you will never forget and that’s sort of the point you aren’t supposed to. Beyond that we also needed to have some consistency in how we treat the people we care about, in that they don’t get off the hook just because we care about them. For example, if we say the rules of engagement are "we are at war and if you collude with the enemy you die period," if you start making exceptions to that rule you lose. That means even if the collaborator is someone we love, even if it is the wife of the guy leading the resistance you still have to do it. You can’t make exceptions. The only way you make that point, and maintain the degree of reality and conviction about your storytelling is to not be a hypocrite when it comes to things like that.

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