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How would you reboot B5?

I suspect it will mean that twist is gone, since it was not part of the original plan. Departing from it would probably help make the remake more it's own thing.

But I just loved that twist to the real-history/myth question.

I admit, I will have a hard time with a non-Andreas-K person playing G'Kar. And how can anyone else possibly pull off Londo? :)
 
Apologies if I've posted this here before but here's what JMS said about reboots (and G'Kar) back in 2011 when the reboot series failed to materialize. Sadly, I didn't keep a link to the entire thread on Facebook and it's pretty impossible to find anymore.

Doran, the reason I asked the question -- and if you come in here loaded for bear and start throwing around assumptions without a shred of actual, specific information you deserve the reply you get -- is that I wanted to see if you had an informed opinion or if you had no idea what the hell you were talking about. It's the latter.

If you or anyone else thinks that I'm going to simply redo the exact same story (your accusation) in the same way," same characters, same start point" (your words again)...that person is an idiot. There would be no point. Zero, none, nada.

Take G'Kar, for instance. In my notes, there is no new character named G'Kar because for my money, no one else can ever BE G'Kar, so G'Kar is a religious figure, a legend, not unlike G'Quon. Did you know that? No. Why? Because you don't have the freaking pages in front of you and you're acting like a hysteric.

Despite what some folks say, the fact is that saying "reboot" is like saying "science fiction," it means what you're pointing at, and there are all kinds of permutations of what that means. It (and remember we're talking about something that is not currently on the boards) can't be a straight-ahead sequel because the market can't sustain it when the show hasn't been on the air in the US in over a decade. That's never, ever going to fly. It can't be called Babylon 5 if there isn't a place called Babylon 5, so the station has to be in existence, otherwise you can't use that name. You could do a show about the telepath war, but you couldn't call it Babylon 5 unless there's a Babylon 5 there, otherwise it'll confuse the hell out of new audiences (oh, that's named for a station that used to be there in another series you never saw).

The challenge I set for myself in this is very simple: knowing what I know now, having grown a lot as a writer since 1992 (or for that matter the late 80s when I started writing the pilot), having the experience of the original show in what worked and what didn't, and with all the technology available to us now that wasn't there in 1992, if I were to put the show together right now, what would it look like? That, for my money, is what a reboot is.

So no, I don't like it when you come in here, Doran, and make baseless accusations about something you actually know nothing at all about. You made a direct statement that I was going to do the same thing in the same way with the same characters all over again, and that has NOTHING to do with what I have (or had) in mind.

You ask a smart-alec question, you get a smart-alec response. If you come in loaded for bear don't expect me to be a stationary target for your comments. And don't hide behind the "well, fans have a right to know" thing because I've been keeping the fans accurately in the know for decades. I respect the fans too much to do otherwise. The poor behavior is yours for making an accusation that had nothing to do with facts. Yes, fans have a right to speculate, and should, but when speculation arises, one asks a question, one doesn't come in with an accusation. There's this notion that I've fought for years, that a person can come into a web site or page and be as offensive or patronizing as they want, but if the other person responds in the way ANYONE would respond if you pulled that crap in person, somehow THAT'S the offense. Sorry, I don't buy into the bullshit.

If you want to know something, ask a fair question and I'll always provide a fair and reasoned response. I've been doing it since 1992. Act like a jerk, and I'll call you on it every time.

To everyone who is not Doran: we're talking about something that's a moot point at the moment anyway. The discussions I'm having with the studio are business oriented regarding B5 and not in terms of a specific new show or a new project. It may be a year before any of those talks go anywhere. So can we not burn down the town over something that's not actually being discussed at the moment?

Emphasis mine. I don't think we're gonna get a remake in the classical sense at all. Don't know what it'll be, but I'm really looking forward to it.

Jan
 
I had forgotten how angry he got at some questions.

I have seen remakes and they usually did reuse the same characters. Silly me, for asking, but his won't use the same characters.

O.K.
 
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Apologies if I've posted this here before but here's what JMS said about reboots (and G'Kar) back in 2011 when the reboot series failed to materialize. Sadly, I didn't keep a link to the entire thread on Facebook and it's pretty impossible to find anymore.

Doran, the reason I asked the question -- and if you come in here loaded for bear and start throwing around assumptions without a shred of actual, specific information you deserve the reply you get -- is that I wanted to see if you had an informed opinion or if you had no idea what the hell you were talking about. It's the latter.

If you or anyone else thinks that I'm going to simply redo the exact same story (your accusation) in the same way," same characters, same start point" (your words again)...that person is an idiot. There would be no point. Zero, none, nada.

Take G'Kar, for instance. In my notes, there is no new character named G'Kar because for my money, no one else can ever BE G'Kar, so G'Kar is a religious figure, a legend, not unlike G'Quon. Did you know that? No. Why? Because you don't have the freaking pages in front of you and you're acting like a hysteric.

Despite what some folks say, the fact is that saying "reboot" is like saying "science fiction," it means what you're pointing at, and there are all kinds of permutations of what that means. It (and remember we're talking about something that is not currently on the boards) can't be a straight-ahead sequel because the market can't sustain it when the show hasn't been on the air in the US in over a decade. That's never, ever going to fly. It can't be called Babylon 5 if there isn't a place called Babylon 5, so the station has to be in existence, otherwise you can't use that name. You could do a show about the telepath war, but you couldn't call it Babylon 5 unless there's a Babylon 5 there, otherwise it'll confuse the hell out of new audiences (oh, that's named for a station that used to be there in another series you never saw).

The challenge I set for myself in this is very simple: knowing what I know now, having grown a lot as a writer since 1992 (or for that matter the late 80s when I started writing the pilot), having the experience of the original show in what worked and what didn't, and with all the technology available to us now that wasn't there in 1992, if I were to put the show together right now, what would it look like? That, for my money, is what a reboot is.

So no, I don't like it when you come in here, Doran, and make baseless accusations about something you actually know nothing at all about. You made a direct statement that I was going to do the same thing in the same way with the same characters all over again, and that has NOTHING to do with what I have (or had) in mind.

You ask a smart-alec question, you get a smart-alec response. If you come in loaded for bear don't expect me to be a stationary target for your comments. And don't hide behind the "well, fans have a right to know" thing because I've been keeping the fans accurately in the know for decades. I respect the fans too much to do otherwise. The poor behavior is yours for making an accusation that had nothing to do with facts. Yes, fans have a right to speculate, and should, but when speculation arises, one asks a question, one doesn't come in with an accusation. There's this notion that I've fought for years, that a person can come into a web site or page and be as offensive or patronizing as they want, but if the other person responds in the way ANYONE would respond if you pulled that crap in person, somehow THAT'S the offense. Sorry, I don't buy into the bullshit.

If you want to know something, ask a fair question and I'll always provide a fair and reasoned response. I've been doing it since 1992. Act like a jerk, and I'll call you on it every time.

To everyone who is not Doran: we're talking about something that's a moot point at the moment anyway. The discussions I'm having with the studio are business oriented regarding B5 and not in terms of a specific new show or a new project. It may be a year before any of those talks go anywhere. So can we not burn down the town over something that's not actually being discussed at the moment?

Emphasis mine. I don't think we're gonna get a remake in the classical sense at all. Don't know what it'll be, but I'm really looking forward to it.

Jan

Sounds like a re-imagining rather than reboot but that's just semantics I guess.

And yeah he flies off the handle sometimes. But I guess that's a consequence of his passion.
 
I had forgotten how angry he got at some questions.

I have seen remakes and they usually did reuse the same characters. Silly me, for asking, but his won't use the same characters.

O.K.

As I recall, his response was strong but not out of line at all. Somebody had gone on his FB page and repeatedly posted uninformed guesses as fact and then proceeded to criticize from there.When called on it, the poster got snarky. Not terribly bright on the man's own page.

I'm guessing that he will be using some, if not most of the same characters, just not the original actors in their original roles due to their ages now. But one reason I'm especially looking forward to it is because he's said he wants to use the original actors in other roles.

Jan
 
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Although, a LOT of his B5 themes and material does get recycled into his earlier comics work, sometimes almost verbatim.
Some themes have always been explored by his work, starting as early as He-Man with stories of self-sacrifice ("Origin of the Sorceress".). His "we are grey; between the candle and the star" speech was in fact in Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors long before it was in Babylon 5. But the whole feel of Babylon 5 is its own story I think. Scenes are re-interpreted and moved to different contexts bringing out different emotions.
 
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I was reading the 'supposed' original B5 / B Prime notes and thought ''that could work''.

With todays tech and with a top notch group of acting talent it might just well be utterly brilliant.
 
What does "supposed'" mean? Joe wrote this early in season one.

JMS 9/25/93 said:
Just recently, btw, I gave Larry DiTillio a printout with just a little of the coming 5 year arc...if he's going to story edit, he needs to know what lines not to cross, and I can't ride herd on that all the time.

JMS 4/9/94 said:
Three people have seen a ten-page synopsis of the full five-year story, and are sworn to absolute secrecy about it. Larry, as I mentioned earlier, read it, and his first reaction was, "You're out of your f*****g mind." A second person began crying at the end of it.
 
I believe it was Michael O'Hare who shed the tear, wasn't it, JoeD80?

Jan

OK. Would still be epic though if handled correctly.

Getting the character of Commander Sinclair into the B5 Story... as he should have been if not for M O Hare's unfortunate illness.
 
Getting the character of Commander Sinclair into the B5 Story... as he should have been if not for M O Hare's unfortunate illness.

Okay so since I am new here I've been reading and reviving some threads. Recently there has been some speculation about recasting characters in another thread so I thought I would find a reboot thread to discuss this in more detail. Thankfully this last post gives me somewhere to start. So consider this thread revived.

As much as I would love to have seen O'Hare continue into Season 2 and onward in the arc to see where it went I'm not sure that it would have been as interesting, or at least not as unique. I think the fact that he was so successfully replaced in the show gives Babylon 5 a real unique story. I'm not saying it would have been bad had he continued, but from a storytelling point of view it might have seemed more basic to have a hero continue versus the twist we ended up with.

So when the reboot feature film happens I think we are all going to be treated to alternate Universe Babylon 5. I think the setup will be the same, United Nations in Space. What I am really curious to know is if he will do a feature that is the opening of Babylon 5 or will it be a feature based on why there needs to be a Babylon 5. After that decision I think JMS will tell us a new story that is the same as the old story. I don't mean the same plot, but the same and/or update themes and meanings.

Having read through the thread I've seen things I've liked and disliked. Here are a couple of things I can remember offhand. One is a remark Ubik made about the lighting and how the reboot should look more like The Gathering, darker and more lived in. I agree with this to a large degree. Science Fiction movies today tend to rely on bright and shiny because it seems futuristic or something. My opinion is that much of the station should have a dim look to it. We are talking about a large tin can in space after all. That does not mean there aren't places that should be bright and colorful. There should be a bright Zocalo, but there should also be low rent shopping areas. There should be bright places, but not everywhere.

I don't recall who said it, but the storytelling should definitely be more adult. There should be ambiguous characters, but not EVERY character should be ambiguous. I mean Sheridan played the classic hero, but both he and Delenn did questionable things. To a degree I think Sheridan did them more so. The thing is much of the time the audience had to think about it and in many instances it was slow burn. You had to realize over time that what he did might not have been the best move. You always knew that what he or Delenn did usually came from a good place in their souls, but they weren't perfect and even they had their ingrained biases.

Okay it is late and I am flagging. I will say one more little tidbit. I read someone mentioned seeing the story of the Icarus. Well if the original arc is going to be retold in the form of a reboot I absolutely would not want to see the story of the Icarus until late in the show. One of the best parts of B5 was the slow reveal on the Icarus. Seeing the Icarus go to Z'Ha'Dum and awaken the Shadows early in the arc would not be nearly as interesting as slowly finding out about it over time.
 
A reboot without B4 going back in time and Sinclair's whole fate would seem weird to me, in the extreme. That was the best moment in science fiction television, for me. It was so perfect, I had no idea for years that it wasn't the original story plan.

Sinclair could have done some of the Marcus stuff.

I really can't say what I'd love to see in a remake, other than having more science fiction that isn't almost a cardboard cut out of the last one. Entertainment has gotten into a rut. I watch more sic fi on BBCA than anywhere else, these days.
 
A reboot without B4 going back in time and Sinclair's whole fate would seem weird to me, in the extreme. That was the best moment in science fiction television, for me. It was so perfect, I had no idea for years that it wasn't the original story plan.

Sinclair could have done some of the Marcus stuff.

I really can't say what I'd love to see in a remake, other than having more science fiction that isn't almost a cardboard cut out of the last one. Entertainment has gotten into a rut. I watch more sic fi on BBCA than anywhere else, these days.

Like many stories I would have loved to see things have played out over more time. I know Sinclair was on Minbar for over a year, but I would have liked to see that stretched out longer to give more substance to the Rangers devotion to him. And I agree with hypatia on B4. I HATE time travel in Science Fiction, but to date that is still the best use of time travel I've ever seen - and I've see A LOT because it seems like 95% of Science Fiction seems to want to throw time travel in at some point.
 
:LOL: Yes, time travel and Star Trek seem to get together more often than is reasonable to willingly suspend disbelief. :thumbs: But at a one-time, extremely dangerous and energy intensive event plus some powerful help made the entire loop suddenly put the Earth-Minbar relationship become crystal clear in a way that was never expected (by me).
 
But at a one-time, extremely dangerous and energy intensive event plus some powerful help made the entire loop suddenly put the Earth-Minbar relationship become crystal clear in a way that was never expected (by me).

Me either. Never saw it coming. :thumbsup: As a matter of fact if I had seen all of Season One the first time around I would have hated seeing Babylon Squared. That episode alone might have made me rethink watching the series just because there was time travel and the setup for future episodes to have time travel. This might be the first time I've realized a positive reason I didn't see all of Season One when it first aired.
 

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