INTERVIEW: DAN ABNETT & ANDY LANNING ON DYNAMITE’S BATTLESTAR GALACTICA

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Battlestar Galactica #1 cover by Alex Ross.

Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning (DnA) have co-written such books as DC’s legion of Super-Heroes, Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, and their own Hypernaturals at BOOM! now they turn their attention to the classic Battlestar Galactica for Dynamite. They recently told Westfield’s Roger Ash what readers could expect in this upcoming book.

Westfield: What attracted you to this project?

Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning: We met Nick ten years ago and really hit it off, so when he started up Dynamite it seemed practically inevitable that we’d end up working together on something. We never thought it’d take so long, but scheduling conflicts, finding the best project, and the fact that Dan and I were exclusive to marvel for three years, prevented us moving forward.

So, when we met up with Nick in San Diego in July and he mentioned a chance to work on Battlestar Galactica, we understood the stars had aligned perfectly and jumped at the chance.

We’re both fans of the original series, having grown up viewing BSG as kids in the seventies and certainly both of us are huge sci-fi fans. As we spoke and started knocking ideas around it became clear that with this year being the 35th anniversary of the original series airing, there was a chance we could get to do a classic BSG book as well as adding to Dynamite’s existing Galactica 1980 series.

So we‘ve ended up with the opportunity to do two stories: a classic BSG tale and a continuation of Dynamite’s Galactica: 1980 series, for us it’s the best of both worlds.

Westfield: Do you have any favorite Battlestar Galactica characters that you’re looking forward to writing?

DnA: Starbuck stands apart because of his personality- the cocky starfighter pilot who gambles and womanizes made him a fan preferred as well as a cool dude when we viewed the show as kids. He was BSG’s Hans Solo- a lovable rogue who everyone wants to be or hang out with.

Westfield: What can readers look forward to in the book?

DnA: The 35th anniversary book is our chance to tell a classic BSG story but where budget is no limit- so we’ve come up with the sort of epic ‘end of season finale’ type story that all the great sci-fi TV series do so well. It gives us a chance to explore and reconfirm what is so cool about the original series.

With the Galactica: 1980 story we’re playing in Dynamite’s existing continuity and get explore the notion of what has happened on earth in the intervening decades from 1980 to 2013. We’re very much following on from the reimagined continuity Marc Guggenheim recognized which set the story very much in the real world of 1980, cold war and all. It’s a great start point and we’re having fun developing the idea of how the countries and the people of earth have change over the course of over three decades of technological and scientific development under the assistance of benevolent visitors from the stars. This sort of world building and alternated reality setting are like cat-nip for us.

Battlestar Galactica #1 Eliopoulos subscription Variant

Westfield: You’ve become known for writing fantastic cosmic books. What is there about this genre that appeals to you?

DnA: There’s something fundamentally fascinating about science fiction that we keep coming back to- it’s an unlimited wellspring of ideas and stories. We’ve both always been sc-fi fans, because we were kids and were lucky enough to grow in an age when sci-fi really took off and were exposed to a lot of sci-fi across all media: in films with planet of the Apes, Alien, Blade Runner, star Wars, on TV with star Trek, lost in Space, Dr. Who, and Battlestar Galactica. then there were comics: we both read 2000AD and Starlord (the UK comic) as kids in the UK and we both share a love of the classic cosmic stories of Jim Starlin, Stan Lee, Keith Giffen, bill Mantlo. Our preferred heroes were characters like Nova, Starlord, the legion of Superheroes, Iron Man, and the fantastic Four, all of which you could argue are very sci-fi. No small wonder we were drawn to the cosmic books and have been very lucky to work on the characters we grew up reading and loving.

Westfield: any closing comments?

DnA: having fond memories for the original BSG series, being given the opportunity to add and develop the ideas and continuity of that universe is really exciting. We are in Battlestar heaven best now and hope that readers will join us for some exciting and unexpected stories that hopefully will expand the BSG legacy.

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Battlestar Galactica #1

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