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Excitement at watching LotR for very first time!

D

Droshalla

Beyond the rim
I just had to express my joy at finally getting to see Legend of the Rangers: To Live and Die in Starlight. As a UK B5 fan with only terrestrial TV, and with no video/DVD release forthcoming, I thought I'd never get to see it.

I have to thank whoever it was that posted info about the Australian VHS release here some time ago as it allowed me to order it from Australia. Without that I would never have known it was available in PAL VHS over there.

It's been about 3 hrs since I watched it and I'm still getting my opinions together. It certainly wasn't bad, but then not perfect. It succeeded as an action adventure I think, and also as a set-up for a possible series. However, without the follow up series there's kind of a sense that nothing was achieved or resolved, but then that's enevitable I suppose. I think we could have done with the crew coming away with something more than their lives while still leaving plenty open. I liked the Liandra - a good little ship from the outside but I'm not sure about the closed circle of stations on the bridge. Perhaps taking claustrophobia a little too far but at least it's different.

I know that everything about the 'weapons system' has been discussed again and again, and I've read much of it. I don't think it was all that good, I didn't really like it, but I suppose it fits with the style and techniques of the Rangers and at least it's different. I would rather have new things tried and risks taken that don't come off 1 time out of 10 than just stick with the same old same old. Also, the idea of a haunted ship is very good and Dulann was probably the most promising character. For a series I think the crew would need thinning out a little and would benefit from some non-Ranger characters, but that's really a moot point now.

The effects were all very good, extremely good. Hyperspace is better now (and closer to the original concept I know) but I think they've kind of gone to the other extreme now... not quite subtle enough. Great music as always, I liked the main titles and the recurrence of the S5 theme at the end was very welcome.

Overall though, a little more dimension was needed to the plot I think, more levels, more depth. All things considered - although I mostly liked the end product of LotR - I think I would rather have seen a full Crusade series than a Rangers series if I had to choose.

God I have gone on, haven't I?... I'm just very pleased I was able to watch it at last. :D
 
Re: Excitement at watching LotR for very first tim

I know that everything about the 'weapons system' has been discussed again and again, and I've read much of it. I don't think it was all that good, I didn't really like it, but I suppose it fits with the style and techniques of the Rangers and at least it's different. I would rather have new things tried and risks taken that don't come off 1 time out of 10 than just stick with the same old same old.
Click to expand...

i liked that system, actually. not so much because of the originility or coolness of the effect, but because the music by chris franke in the two scenes was just perfect. I can even forget the pathetic scream at the end ;)
 
Re: Excitement at watching LotR for very first tim

When Cantrell was screaming her head off, I could just imagine the rangers on the bridge covering their ears. :LOL:
 
Here is what I thought of it:

From: http://amazon.imdb.com/CommentsShow?0280453

KoshNaranek
Ambridge, PA

Date: 26 May 2002
Summary: On the Whole, Disappointing, But Could Have Been Corrected In A Series.

I thought the movie should have SHOWN The Hand and their ships, say in flashbacks at the archeological site, maybe via newly discovered data crystals (like discovered hours ago, otherwise they could have viewed them on Minbar), or archeological carvings to be translated by say MAX EILERSON. After all, Max is probably working with IPX in 2265. It wouldn't be any stretch at all to see him on such an important dig. We should have SEEN "something" of The Hand, not just their cronies. We should have SEEN the archeological site. We should have SEEN remains of the probe that returned through the portal. Because we didn't SEE any of this, The Hand lack credibility of threat. Sure the dirty snowflake ship cronies were powerful, but they could be making all this stuff up. They could be doing it to sound like they have these big, bada** allies, but they could be lying. Without SEEING The Hand, it's like a buildup to nothing, a whimper not a BANG.

More Ranger ships should have been involved in the mission. They should have gotten at least a detailed Whitestar CGI model done to use on the mission, to make a stronger firefight and establish a level of enemy ship force that we could measure against the B5 universe ships, and to establish stronger visual ties to the "B5 Universe" with which we're familiar. That would have helped tremendously, lending much needed familiarity, and sense of scale. The three featured ships were all previously unknown, never seen before in the "B5 Universe." We don't know how powerful the enemy ships are, because we don't know how powerful the Valen and Liandra are. There was no known benchmark. Were it not for the Minbari, Narn, and Drazi characters we saw, and the couple Nial fighters (flying backwards :rolleyes: ) and Whitestars, and B5 that we very briefly saw, it was almost as if the characters were in a different universe, on a different show that had no connection to the B5 universe.

As it was, the movie reminded me of cotton candy, looks big, but there is a lot of air in there. Not much richness/complexity (thread density). Strangely, this is how I felt about Crusade episodes **when I first saw them** (in TNT's order), but Crusade had a lot more visual cues from the B5 universe. "To Live and Die in Starlight," didn't have nearly as many connections to the B5 universe. It was like the council we saw in the movie. A lot of people, myself included, thought it was the Gray Council. In all of B5, we'd only ever seen one Minbari council like that, and it was the Gray Council, so it was a natural assumption, and it was wrong. The question is, why try to fake out and confuse the audience?

The weapons pod sequences were BAD. When the movie gets to the minefield destroying scene, I have to leave the room. The thing is that such vigorous, large movements would seem to be inefficient, tiring and unnecessary, and when used in the scene, seem to be WAY, WAY over the top.

Why not point at a target with a finger, select weapons (assuming that there's more than one type of weapon available) and fire from a holographic console (like the console Dulann used just before he heard from the ghosts)?

And who says the weapons officer even has to be shown doing her thing, anyway? This is not like some strange thing we've never seen before. Ships fire, and things get destroyed. Did we see the weapons officer at work every time we saw the Excalibur firing in Crusade? No, and it's a good thing we didn't. When we did see the weapons officer, it was a weaker, more cumbersome scene. Show of hands: How many thought the Excalibur's targeting system was slow and unwieldy? I did! The problem is that an efficient system of firing (e.g. a joystick/videogame type of system) looks trite, because we're used to seeing it/using it, and associate it with "toys/videogames".

I say, leave targeting systems a mystery. If you try to explain it, you risk fumbling the whole concept, and making it look cumbersome, like they'd never be able to respond fast enough in a real battle. If you are going to show the details of the weapons firing and targeting systems in action, make sure it looks like it would be workable in a real battle.

Anybody remember the two motorized chair people in the Whitestar (in B5)? Whatever happened to them? Instead, we got Lennier and Marcus waving their hands over crystals and pushing a button. The latter worked much better. They left "how it worked" as a mystery.

Regarding the acting, I thought most of it was fine, except that Sarah Cantrell got stuck with some painfully bad lines. Of the new characters, I thought the standouts were Dylan Neal as Capt. David Martel, Alex Zahara as Dulann, Jennie Rebecca Hogan as Na'Feel, and Enid-Raye Adams as Firell. The last three, especially, appeared that they'd be playing these characters for a lot longer than one 90 minute movie.

The movie REALLY SUFFERED from lack of recognizable Babylon 5 universe CGI (the 5 years worth of CGI that "got lost").
 
Re: Excitement at watching LotR for very first tim

Why not point at a target with a finger, select weapons (assuming that there's more than one type of weapon available) and fire from a holographic console (like the console Dulann used just before he heard from the ghosts)?
Click to expand...

I think that was plan, but they didnt have money to build the console as JMS wanted it, so they improvised. I think i read taht in some post here.

I thought it was cool, anyways.
 
Thanks Droshalla.

Yup, I'm in the same boat, being in the UK, so PAL VHS will be more than fine!

Cheers, off to check it out now. Knowing my luck it will be out of stock and not coming back!!

:)
 
Re: Excitement at watching LotR for very first tim

Why not point at a target with a finger, select weapons (assuming that there's more than one type of weapon available) and fire from a holographic console (like the console Dulann used just before he heard from the ghosts)?
Click to expand...

I think that was plan, but they didnt have money to build the console as JMS wanted it, so they improvised. I think i read taht in some post here.
Click to expand...

Actually, the plan was a fancy weapons chair, motorized that sunk into the floor or something. It was cut for budgetary reasons.
 
I thought the movie should have SHOWN The Hand and their ships, say in flashbacks at the archeological site, maybe via newly discovered data crystals (like discovered hours ago, otherwise they could have viewed them on Minbar), or archeological carvings to be translated by say MAX EILERSON. After all, Max is probably working with IPX in 2265. It wouldn't be any stretch at all to see him on such an important dig. We should have SEEN "something" of The Hand, not just their cronies. We should have SEEN the archeological site. We should have SEEN remains of the probe that returned through the portal. Because we didn't SEE any of this, The Hand lack credibility of threat. Sure the dirty snowflake ship cronies were powerful, but they could be making all this stuff up. They could be doing it to sound like they have these big, bada** allies, but they could be lying. Without SEEING The Hand, it's like a buildup to nothing, a whimper not a BANG.
Click to expand...
I think the hand was NOT a big deal, which is why they were never shown. I think it was in the B5 episode SiL, that they name the important moments since the beginning of the Alliance, and the Hand was not mentioned. From this, I'm guessing that the Hand were nothing more then misfits that were trying to sound more dangerous and menacing by being mysterious.

More Ranger ships should have been involved in the mission.
Click to expand...
You have to remember that after the Shadow War, there was a lack of Whitestars and of Rangers, most of them were destroyed and were killed.

Were it not for the Minbari, Narn, and Drazi characters we saw, and the couple Nial fighters (flying backwards ) and Whitestars, and B5 that we very briefly saw, it was almost as if the characters were in a different universe, on a different show that had no connection to the B5 universe.
Click to expand...
I think someone on this site posted months back that JMS was trying to make LOTR different than B5, to place LOTR in the B5 universe, but have a totally new cast and story, maybe in order to lure people unfamiliar with b5 into the show.

As for the weapons pod sequence, I agree 100% with you, it was REALLY bad. I cringe everytime I see it.
 
More Ranger ships should have been involved in the mission.
Click to expand...
You have to remember that after the Shadow War, there was a lack of Whitestars and of Rangers, most of them were destroyed and were killed.
Click to expand...

JMS has admitted that perhaps there were 80 Whitestars left at the time of TLaDiS. See JMS' Reply to My "B5:LotR TLaDiS - Some Observations, Questions, etc. (SPOILERS) " BTW, some of his responses are flat wrong. e.g. "Recheck your tape...that shot ain't there."


Were it not for the Minbari, Narn, and Drazi characters we saw, and the couple Nial fighters (flying backwards) and Whitestars, and B5 that we very briefly saw, it was almost as if the characters were in a different universe, on a different show that had no connection to the B5 universe.
Click to expand...

I think someone on this site posted months back that JMS was trying to make LOTR different than B5, to place LOTR in the B5 universe, but have a totally new cast and story, maybe in order to lure people unfamiliar with b5 into the show.
Click to expand...

That's like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. You can have both, have stuff that will speak to longtime B5 fans, and later to the newbies after they've seen more of B5, without cutting almost all recognizable ties to the B5 universe. Crusade did that very well. We know the real reason for the lack of B5 visual ties was that Warner Brothers lost all the B5 CGI model files, and by the time this was discovered, there was no time (and probably money) to re-make this all from scratch, especially with the two strikes that were looming at the time.


As for the weapons pod sequence, I agree 100% with you, it was REALLY bad. I cringe everytime I see it.
Click to expand...

I squint and hit FF, or leave the room 'till it's over. The scream lets me know when to return to the room. :rolleyes: :( :rolleyes:
 
I am proud to say that my avatar is *not* from the screaming scene.

It was pretty bad.

As were some of Sarah's lines. I had brought some non-B5 fans to see Rangers, and they told me that they would never trust me to recommend a television show to them again. I think the scream had something to do with it.

There was enough in there characterwise to kick-start my fanfic, so it wasn't all that bad.

Le sigh. Woulda made a good series...
 
Garibaldi'sHair,
No, it's not out of stock. It took just over 4 weeks to arrive from there, and it was such a good feeling when it finally arrived. The cover could have been better I think; it wasn't very B5-ish if you know what I mean (not that you asked :D). It should have featured the logo from the main titles, but the photo of the Liandra was good though.

On other matters, what did everyone else think about the new Hyperspace effect? I said above that I thought it had gone to the other extreme. Agree, disagree?

Also, what happened to Epsilon 3 at the end shot? - it was mysteriously missing and a huge blue cloud had enveloped the station.
 
The missing Epsilon 3 was noted by many when Rangers showed in the States. I gather it was just not worth the extra money and effort to put it in. With all of the old sets and CGI stuff lost by WB.
 
I still don't know the full story of all the missing CGI. Is it gone forever, no hope of seeing the old Minbar again or anything? Also, if all the images were lost, did they just re-do the station or what?

On another matter, someone mentioned that that was not the Grey Council we saw. I must admit, after one viewing I thought it was. So what is it then, a Ranger council? If so, why all the grey robes and a circle of 9 in exactly the same style?

I'll probably watch it again soon to appreciate it better with all this new knowledge.
 
I still don't know the full story of all the missing CGI. Is it gone forever, no hope of seeing the old Minbar again or anything? Also, if all the images were lost, did they just re-do the station or what?

On another matter, someone mentioned that that was not the Grey Council we saw. I must admit, after one viewing I thought it was. So what is it then, a Ranger council? If so, why all the grey robes and a circle of 9 in exactly the same style?

I'll probably watch it again soon to appreciate it better with all this new knowledge.
Click to expand...
CGI worth several million dollars appears to have been thrown away. The Babylon 5 space station was either drawn from scratch or taken from the unreleased Babylon 5 game.

The council was the Ranger Council, obviously based on the Grey Council.
 
What I find amusing is that many models have been made and released to the public domain for many programs, mainly Lightwave, which was used in B5 as well. Granted, they're not quite as detailed as the ones used on the show, however, some of the renderings done are beautiful. If a bunch of people doing it as a hobby can pull it together... and I'm sure they would gladly donate their work... why not just use those public domain models?

Check it out:
http://www.ultradrive.com/b5_3d_index.htm

You can see some renderings here:
http://personal.southern.edu/~dascott/babylon5.htm

The previous link contains images of what a "Babylon 6" station might look like if designed by the Minbari and Vorlons.

A tutorial on how to do it using the models:
http://www.b5-blender.com/tutorial1.html

Enjoy!

-Tim

-Tim
 
Re: Excitement at watching LotR for very first tim

Let me just say that Babylon 5: Into the Fire did surve a purpose afterall
 
The council was the Ranger Council, obviously based on the Grey Council.
Click to expand...

I thought Entil'zha had direct authority over the Rangers? Even so, why the hooded robes? Grey for the Grey Council and hoods because they were a secretive bunch, but these lot have no need for it. Besides, surely other groups shouldn't be allowed to wear the robes of the Grey Council - it would be like having common Rangers wearing the Entil'zha robes, sacreligous.
 
So who was responsible for throwing away the millions of dollars worth of CGI? How was it allowed to happen? Does this mean its unlikely that any of the old B5 exteriors (Centauri Prime, Minbar, MarsDome etc) will ever be seen again in their original forms? (not that there's likely to be any new B5 stuff on TV anyway)
 
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