Horror Channel blasts off with BATTLESTAR GALACTICA from March 24

Those shiny humanity destroyers, the Cylons, are back as Horror Channel presents one of Sci-Fi’s most iconic TV franchises, Battlestar Galactica. The original 1978 – 1979 series will be aired at 8pm on weekdays from Wednesday March 24. 8pm until the 10th May.

The Emmy-winning show depicts the epic futuristic battle between the last remaining population of humans and their evil robotic nemeses – the Cylons. Spiralling through space on their titular fleet, the human forces, led by Commander Adama (Lorne Greene), search the Universe for the last known plant refuge – Earth. Also stars Richard Hatch as Captain Apollo (a role that earned him a Golden Globe nomination for best actor in a television series), and Dirk Benedict as Lieutenant Starbuck, the womanizing, cigar-smoking, card playing and incredibly skilled Colonial Warrior.

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. The Twelve Colonies have been engaged in a lengthy war with the Cylons, a cybernetic race whose goal is the extermination of the human species. The Cylons offer peace to the humans, which proves to be a ruse.

With the aid of a human named Baltar, the Cylons carry out a massive nuclear attack on the Twelve Colonies and the Colonial Fleet of starships that protect them, devastating the fleet, laying waste to the Colonies, and destroying all but a small remaining population. Scattered survivors flee into outer space aboard a ragtag array of spaceworthy ships. Of the entire 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.

Although the series was cancelled after 24 episodes, a write-in campaign revived the show as Galactica 1980 with 10 episodes. Books have also been written continuing the stories and Battlestar Galactica was remade in the early 2000s with a reimagined miniseries and a weekly series.

Watch the Battlestar Galactica trailer here