Bionic Woman

While Ryan and I were eating turkey last week, the rest of the Internet was buzzing with speculation that Katee Sackhoff may be leaving Bionic Woman.  Roco has the links here if you want to read the sources, but essentially folks are saying that Katee is either not happy with the show, fighting with Michelle Ryan in real life as well as on screen, or both … and as a result Katee is taking Sarah Corvus and her bionic toys and going home.

There are a lot of good, logical reasons why Sarah Corvus could be off the show including budget cuts, new show runners who don’t like the dueling bionic women concept, yet another character change for Jaime Sommers, or even the producers wanting Michelle Ryan to gain more fan momentum before they bring back Katee and her charismatic Sarah Corvus. 

But it seems illogical that Katee would just up and leave a prime time show that has gotten her a ton of good press … even though the reviews for Bionic Woman have been spotty at best, Katee has gotten raves from fans and industry insiders who have praised her dark and dangerous portrayal of Sarah Corvus.  Even if she has had troubles with Michelle Ryan, which may or may not be true, she would also be a fool to piss off prolific producer David Eick who will probably cast her in another production once Bionic Woman and Battlestar Galactica are over.  Not to mention that talking bad about your coworkers to fans is just bad form.

Long time Katee fans know that Katee’s spunk can sometimes translate badly in interviews.  She is known for her unpredictable interview style, which fans and journalists love but probably gives her publicist nightmares (for example, she made comments at a Battlestar Galactica panel this summer that made it pretty clear she is familiar with the after effects of smoking pot … it was funny at the time, but not exactly what most television shows what their actresses talking about in front of the media). 

In this case the comments were not in an interview but in a fan Q&A at a convention, so we don’t have a lot of public information about what really happened.  There is a good chance that this rumor whirlwind could be caused by odd comments from Katee that were then taken out of context.  She is a polarizing presence for Battlestar Galactica fans, and some folks have implied that the fan who wrote the blog that started the rumors is simply trying to spin her comments as negatively as possible. 

As with all things Bionic Woman, we don’t have a ton of information and so only time will tell.  Supposedly Katee has a meeting with the producers coming up which will determine her role on the show going forward, but with the writer’s strike making everything unpredictable we may not know the fate of Katee, Sarah Corvus, or Bionic Woman for a very long time.