All Battlestar Galactica productions share the premise that in a distant part of the universe, a human civilization has extended to a group of planets known as the Twelve Colonies, to which they have migrated from their ancestral homeworld of Kobol.

Of the Colonial battle fleet, only the Battlestar Galactica, a gigantic battleship and spacecraft carrier, appears to have survived the attack.

Under the leadership of Commander Adama, the Galactica and the pilots of "Viper fighters" lead a fugitive fleet of survivors in search of the fabled thirteenth colony known as Earth.

As James E. Ford detailed in "Battlestar Galactica and Mormon Theology", a paper read at the Joint Conference of the American Culture and Popular Culture Associations on April 17, 1980 (and published as "Theology in Prime Time Science Fiction: Battlestar Galactica and Mormon Doctrine", Journal of Popular Culture #17 [1983]: 83–87), the series incorporated many themes from Mormon theology, such as marriage for "time and eternity", a "council of twelve", a lost thirteenth tribe of humans, and a planet called Kobol (an anagram of Kolob), as Larson was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

[citation needed] Larson had envisioned Battlestar Galactica as a series of made-for-TV movies (a three-hour pilot program and two two-hour episodes) for the American Broadcasting Company (ABC).

During the eight months after the pilot's first broadcast, 17 original episodes of the series were made (five of them two-part shows), equivalent to a standard 24-episode TV season.

This series was a quick failure due to its low budget (e.g., recycling footage from the 1974 Universal Studios movie Earthquake during a Cylon attack sequence), widely panned writing, and ill-chosen time slot (Sunday evenings, a time generally reserved for family-oriented programming and, more specifically, also for the 60 Minutes newsmagazine program).

Other cast members included Jamie Bamber (Captain Lee 'Apollo' Adama), James Callis (Dr. Gaius Baltar), and Tricia Helfer as a Cylon-humanoid known as "Number Six".

[citation needed] The mini-series was a ratings success for the Sci-Fi Channel and they commissioned a new weekly Battlestar Galactica series to follow.

Several new characters were introduced, and Richard Hatch, who played Captain Apollo in the 1970s Battlestar Galactica TV series, also appeared in several episodes as Tom Zarek, a former political terrorist who later becomes part of the new Colonial government.

Due to production delays caused by the 2007–2008 Writers Guild strike, the fourth season was also split into two parts, with a seven-month hiatus in between.

The pilot was directed by Jeffrey Reiner and starred Eric Stoltz, Esai Morales, Paula Malcomson, Alessandra Torresani, and Polly Walker.

The Razor Flashbacks were a series of seven webisodes produced in 2007, set some 40 years earlier during William Adama's fighter pilot days during the later stages of the First Cylon War.

[16] Syfy approached show runner Ronald D. Moore to produce another spin-off set in the reimagined Battlestar Galactica universe, which was to begin as a two-hour pilot focused on William "Husker" Adama (portrayed by Luke Pasqualino) during the First Cylon War (as was glimpsed in Razor and the corresponding webisodes).

Syfy decided against moving forward with the Blood and Chrome TV series, but aired a 10-part webseries over four weeks via Machinima.com, beginning on November 9, 2012.

It was released theatrically in Canada before the television series aired in the United States, in order to help recoup its high production costs.

Written by Jane Espenson and directed by Edward James Olmos, The Plan storyline begins before the attack on the Twelve Colonies and shows events primarily from the perspective of the Cylons.

[21] Edward James Olmos reprised his role as Adama, and ten of the eleven actors who played Cylons appeared, including Michael Trucco, Aaron Douglas, Dean Stockwell, Tricia Helfer, Grace Park, Rick Worthy, Matthew Bennett, Callum Keith Rennie, Michael Hogan and Rekha Sharma.

[30] On February 12, 2016, Universal signed Michael De Luca, Scott Stuber and Dylan Clark to produce the Battlestar Galactica film.

Richard Hatch produced a demonstration video in 1998 to 1999 which featured several actors from the original series combined with state-of-the-art special effects.

It was intended to be telecast as a backdoor pilot in May 2002, and pre-production commenced and sets had even been partially constructed with a view to filming starting in November 2001.

[36] However, production delays caused by the September 11, 2001 attacks meant that Bryan Singer had to drop out, due to his commitment to direct the X-Men 2 movie.

The episodic novels featured expanded scenes, excerpts from "The Adama Journals", more background on the characters, and the expansion of the ragtag fleet to almost 22,000 ships as opposed to the 220 in the TV series.

Walt Simonson, who later wrote and drew Thor and had a long stint on Marvel's Star Wars comic, was the artist for the series at its conclusion.

[47] In November 2003, shortly before the premiere of the re-imagined TV series, Sierra released a 3D space combat Battlestar Galactica computer game for the original Xbox, PlayStation 2, and PC.

[50] Battlestar Galactica Deadlock is a 2017 3D turn based strategy game (released on PC, Xbox One and PS4) featuring the First Cylon War.

The game is set during a training mission, where two to four players maneuver pieces representing Colonial Vipers to capture a damaged Cylon Raider.

Each of the 10 playable character has its own abilities and weaknesses, and they must all work together in order for humanity to survive, as well as attempt to expose the traitor while fuel shortages, food contaminations, and political unrest threaten to tear the fleet apart.

[58] This high-technology attraction featured animatronics and live actors in a spectacular laser battle based on the television series, with a 200-foot long spaceship that "swallowed" the passengers.

[58] This was the first themed attraction to feature Audio-Animatronics characters outside Disney Parks, and was the first dark ride to combine sophisticated animatronics and lasers with live actors.