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 kodos wrote:
so we should never make anything new because if the "normies" have no previous knowledge that there is already something behind, it cannot work

You're not advocating making something completely new; in your last post, you referred to spin offs based on the existing show.

 kodos wrote:


another TV Show or movie inside the B5 universe, something about the Rangers, Mimbari War, or taking on Valen and doing a show about the Shadow War could work well
but doing a reboot of B5 will fail from the start

A spin-off that doesn't significantly time jump that must adhere to established asthetics and canon isn't arguably any more "new" that a reboot that uses the original names and overall general plot/themes but rewrites the rest of the 95%. It's totally fine if you like/want a spin-off but I don't believe "newness" is the key difference. I haven't seen anyone in the thread advocating for a modern retelling (i.e. Shakespeare style) with the same scripts and plots as the original run with new actors/props/cgi but rather (at least in my case) a BSG style reboot. I much prefer the 2004ish reboot to the 1980 spin-off or Richard Hatch's attempted 2000ish spin-off/continuation proposal. Ymmv.


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 kodos wrote:


I am not very happy with most things that come out of Hollywood these days and most remakes are usually just copies to please fans without doing justice to the show

I agree with the first part but not the second. It feels like most rebooted things out of Hollywood place current year ideology (not the same as actual morality and/or a message) over story and real character development and frequently are done to spite the existing classic fan base preemptively deemed "toxic". The end result is the same with it not doing justice to the show. That doesn't mean it can't happen though but rather just makes a good reboot that scratches the classic itch while still being new enough to expand the fanbase beyond the core less likely.

you said a spin-off cannot work if the normies to not know the original show and background

yet there are several spin-offs around that are much more popular than the original show and/or no one really knows something about the main show

even in a bigger franchise, people can watch Deep Space Nine without ever seeing anything else from Star Trek before and don't need to know who Kirk or Picard was to understand the show


and the BSG style reboot is a good example, they wanted to make BSG again with good effects but did not really have an idea what else they should do with the show

if they make this thing with B5, missing the points of the original and don't know what story to tell outside "but it looks nice", it won't work out well


so, yes you can make something new that is using the B5 universe, it would not matter for those who don't know anything about it but a new SciFi show as long as the plot does not need you to know the original one

stories about Rangers or Valen, nice to know where they came from, but needed for the "normies"

 Overread wrote:
The problem with reboots and remakes and all that is that they very often aren't interested in telling the original story and want to tell their own.

.....

So yeah remakes/reboots can be a minefield of issues.

Wouldn't that be expected/intrinsic to the terms reboot and remake? I'm not sure what an entirely faithful modern version of a classic is called... A retelling? Regarless, I totally agree with the last part.


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 kodos wrote:
you said a spin-off cannot work if the normies to not know the original show and background

I think you're confusing me with someone else. I don't believe I said that; I do however think having a popular original show vastly increases the success of a spin-off compared with a spin-off of an unpopular show. At least in geek fandom, I can't think of an example of an unpopular or cult hit show that had a mainstream successful spinoff though I'd love to hear examples otherwise (No sarcasm... It's great geek trivia).

 warboss wrote:

 kodos wrote:
you said a spin-off cannot work if the normies to not know the original show and background

I think you're confusing me with someone else. I don't believe I said that; I do however think having a popular original show vastly increases the success of a spin-off compared with a spin-off of an unpopular show. At least in geek fandom, I can't think of an example of an unpopular or cult hit show that had a mainstream successful spinoff though I'd love to hear examples otherwise (No sarcasm... It's great geek trivia).

yes, sorry was thinking about the previous post made by someone else while writing it

and the first shows that come to my mind would be J.A.G. with Navy CIS as its spin-off
another one would be Family Matters as spin-off from Perfect Strangers (and at least here no one really knowed anything about Perfect Strangers)

while those shows might not be that "unpopular" (depends on region though as B5 was also much popular here were those 2 shows were not), the spin-off was much more popular

 kodos wrote:


and the BSG style reboot is a good example, they wanted to make BSG again with good effects but did not really have an idea what else they should do with the show

if they make this thing with B5, missing the points of the original and don't know what story to tell outside "but it looks nice", it won't work out well

You really think they had no idea where they were going or what they wanted to do with the BSG reboot other than just good effects? I couldn't disagree more as I think the show was very well planned and consistently executed as a sci fi action grim space opera for the first 3.5 seasons roughly. Admittedly they forgot the action sci-fi part for most of the last season and a half (or at best purposefully substituted in/ramped up the spirituality for it) but I didn't get the feeling that they were just throwing everything at the wall to see what might stick ala Star Trek Discovery.

I think a modern looking hopeful during times of war B5 that has the same main factions and characters and well as the same main storybeats (Earth minbari war, b5's purpose, Narn Centauri confluct, shadows awakening and relationship with the Vorlons, etc) could work with plenty of room to put their own twist to it.


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 kodos wrote:
yes, sorry was thinking about the previous post made by someone else while writing it

and the first shows that come to my mind would be J.A.G. with Navy CIS as its spin-off
another one would be Family Matters as spin-off from Perfect Strangers (and at least here no one really knowed anything about Perfect Strangers)

while those shows might not be that "unpopular" (depends on region though as B5 was also much popular here were those 2 shows were not), the spin-off was much more popular

No worries as I figured that was likely the case. You do bring up an interesting point in that some subjective differences in popularity may be regional. I watched and enjoyed as a child and young adult (respectively) Perfect Strangers and JAG and both were popular enough to last multiple seasons as well as both of the spin offs you mentioned. I didn't know Family Matters was a spin off of Perfect Strangers but here it too was also more popular at least in my area of the US at the time (though the original was still very popular as well). Same with JAG and CIS (both that I didn't know it was a spin off and that the latter show was longer lasting and more popular overall). I think those two are examples of popular shows in their intended original marketplace (the US) having more popular spin offs rather than the originals being unpopular but admittedly my own enjoyment at watching them all might be influencing that opinion as I haven't actually looked at the old ratings.

Just a footnote, I still make "Don't be ridiculous" jokes with the cousin that I lived with while watching Perfect Strangers as a kid including at least once so far in 2021.

Family Matters was the one popular sitcome everyone aired by its time
Perfect Strangers hardly anyone had seen it before

JAG while I have seen it and liked it, was more like a niche late afternoon show while NCIS the primetime show of many channels

@BSG
well, they had no real idea what "the plan" should have been right from the beginning but just used it to get the show going

the idea from the original, war with machines, odyssy thru space with some mysteries along the way, and finally reach earth and than add the "looks good" factor

that the show was seen as iniovative by that time as making a SciFi show for adults (were only kids watch such stuff) with a "complex" plot made it popular in the US
here it was not really seen as something new or innovative while still being popular as SciFi (and still most people who watched it knew about the classic show as well and compared it)

I think it is really something regional and a big difference in US and EU

chaos0xomega wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Chaos0xomega, was that one exception the Marvel Movie Thor?

No, Thor had nothing to do with WB. It was a Wachowskis film by the name of Ninja Assassin.

Straczynski has a story credit and a cameo in Thor, so I thought that must be the one thing you said he had done without WB patronage since B5 ended.


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The reboot BSG really only “works” because the original didn’t hold up. And by works, I mean the first two seasons were good, then the show nBSGed the bed. Like Lost, the problem was precisely that the writers didn’t know where the story was going and were, in fact, seeing what sticks.

Also lol that nBSG is Sci fi for adults.


If there need to be reboots, I’d prefer they messed around with shows that weren’t so well executed, like oBSG. There would be a lot less backlash for a mediocre reboot of Buck Rogers or V than for a mediocre reboot of Babylon 5. There’s also more room to expand the themes and more.

so we should never make anything new because if the "normies" have no previous knowledge that there is already something behind, it cannot work

Thats an incredible logical somersault that you took there. You're still able to make new stuff, but you have to acknowledge when you're dealing wiht a property 20+ years stagnant you have to retread some common ground first, i.e. take one step back to take two steps forward. Besides that, I would argue that spinoffs aren't exactly the definition of "making something new".

you said a spin-off cannot work if the normies to not know the original show and background

yet there are several spin-offs around that are much more popular than the original show and/or no one really knows something about the main show

even in a bigger franchise, people can watch Deep Space Nine without ever seeing anything else from Star Trek before and don't need to know who Kirk or Picard was to understand the show

Are you trying to prove my point for me? Deep Space Nine was on the air concurrently with 2 other Star Trek series (The Next Generation and Voyager), one of which had been on the air for about 5 years before Deep Space Nine launched, and about 3-4 films that had come out in the 5 years leading up to Deep Space Nines release, not to mention a number of comics, novels, video games, and other pop culture staples. Deep Space Nine was as current as current could possibly be, audiences knew what Star Trek was, they knew who the characters were, and it was easy to step into a spinoff in that context, even if you had never actually watched Star Trek before - because it was societally relevant and highly pervasive.

Babylon 5 has been off the air since 1998, there have been precisely zero books, comics, video games, or any other form of media dealing with the setting released in almost 20 years (the last novel came out in 2002). Aside from that, the only B5 related content published was a handful of rpg sourcebooks and miniatures game rulebooks (i.e. nothing relevant - even most hardcore B5 fans probably never touched them), all of which went out of publication 13 years ago. Even watching reruns of the show has been difficult for the past 20+ years, if not impossible. For the most part it hasn't been syndicated or aired on regular reruns anywhere, for a number of years it was streaming *nowhere*, and for a while VHS/DVD options were non-existent or out of print. B5 has virtually zero market penetration, this remastered release is the most visible and accessible that the series has received in decades and its not immediately clear that its making inroads with anyone who wasn't already a fan of the series, in part because its paywalled on Amazon/iTunes and only available for on-demand streaming on HBO Max which is still a fairly small streaming service (literally 1/5th the size of Netflix). It has a very steep hill to climb before its in "yeah, theres an audience for this" territory needed to justify not rebooting the franchise - and even then it would be hard to do spinoffs when most of the actors are dead and the production assets are nonexistent. Chalk up a few more points to the "reboot" category.

Thats not the environment you launch a spinoff in, thats the environment you do a full reboot in.

and the BSG style reboot is a good example, they wanted to make BSG again with good effects but did not really have an idea what else they should do with the show

if they make this thing with B5, missing the points of the original and don't know what story to tell outside "but it looks nice", it won't work out well

The BSG reboot is the perfect example of why to do a reboot - it was massively successful and extremely popular. It earned critical acclaim everywhere, won countless awards, launched several actors careers, launched a number of spinoff series, comics, and books, and in general made the producers quite a nice little sum of money (contrast to B5 which only really ever lost money), likewise based on a show that had disappeared from the general cultural awareness about 20-25 years prior.

Now, *you* may not have enjoyed the BSG reboot - but you evidently were not the audience for it. Myself, personally, I loved it - I was only vaguely aware of the original existing, likewise for many of my friends, etc. Younger audiences born in the 80s and 90s have absolutely eaten Moore's BSG reboot up, and by and large most of us don't seem to care very much for the original and have never watched it. 100% honest, I would not have bothered with the show at all if it was a spinoff or continuation of the original, it simply did not appeal to me when I eventually did try to watch it, it was too dated and old.

and the first shows that come to my mind would be J.A.G. with Navy CIS as its spin-off
another one would be Family Matters as spin-off from Perfect Strangers (and at least here no one really knowed anything about Perfect Strangers)

Again, making my point for me. JAG TV Series: 1995-2005. NCIS? 2003 - Present. The shows overlapped, JAG was still popular when NCIS was launched.
Perfect Strangers: 1986-1993. Family Matters? 1989 - 1998. Again, the shows overlapped. There was an awareness and familairity with the subject material.

Babylon 5? 1993-1998. Its 2021 bro, even if they started today a B5 spinoff wouldn't be out before 2023-2024 at the earliest. A 25 year gap with zero content, no books, comics, spinoff shows, movies, etc. Its effectively a dead franchise. This is where you do a reboot. This is not comparable, even remotely, to DS9, NCIS, or Family Matters.

Straczynski has a story credit and a cameo in Thor, so I thought that must be the one thing you said he had done without WB patronage since B5 ended.

No you got it backwards, he's only worked on non-WB related projects with one exception (Ninja Assassin), i.e. hes only worked with WB once since B5 ended.

Ah, I misunderstood your point earlier.

Also, Babylon 5 had a straight-to-DVD movie with more modern special effects in 2007.

chaos0xomega wrote:

Now, *you* may not have enjoyed the BSG reboot - but you evidently were not the audience for it. Myself, personally, I loved it - I was only vaguely aware of the original existing, likewise for many of my friends, etc. Younger audiences born in the 80s and 90s have absolutely eaten Moore's BSG reboot up, and by and large most of us don't seem to care very much for the original and have never watched it.

maybe were you are around, but kids of the 80s and 90s here were well aware of the orginal BSG, because it was one of the SciFi shows that aired during the "kids time" on the weekend (together with Star Trek TOS)
I guess the US had their Saturday Cartoons, kids here got their share of classic SciFi, so most of the target audiance for the reboot had seen BSG as kid

chaos0xomega wrote:

Thats not the environment you launch a spinoff in, thats the environment you do a full reboot in.

only if you assume that a connection is needed to see the show
as I said, JAG had a very different target here and nearly none of those who regulary watch NCIS now even know that the shows are connected or have seen it before

so how could NCIS, as a show set in the same Universe, within the same organisation, having some cameos and connections, work well if none has seen the original (for an audiance that basically just new that the US has a Navy and not more background information)

I don't if the are regular reruns of B5 in the US, but in German TV there is always at least 1 channel showing it
so even in 2021 people watch B5 on TV

 kodos wrote:

I don't if the are regular reruns of B5 in the US, but in German TV there is always at least 1 channel showing it
so even in 2021 people watch B5 on TV

I haven't seen it on TV in decades in the US and it wasn't even on any popular streaming sites for many years. For a while, it seemed to exclusively be on a new streaming platform that I had never heard of run by a cellular phone company (go90 by Verizon). Finally two years ago, it made an appearance for about a year on Amazon Prime but soon left (obviously to premiere now on HBO Max which is owned by the corporate comglomerate that also owns Warner who made the show); I only watched a few episodes but the substandard quality of the video stream turned me off to a complete watch. I can't speak about the availability of the DVDs but their relatively poor quality in this region combined with the complete lack of anything official in any form of HD didn't help either.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Ah, I misunderstood your point earlier.

Also, Babylon 5 had a straight-to-DVD movie with more modern special effects in 2007.

They did? The last movie I know of was released was in 2002, The Legend of the Rangers.

I don't if the are regular reruns of B5 in the US, but in German TV there is always at least 1 channel showing it
so even in 2021 people watch B5 on TV

That would be news to me, as JMS and others within the B5 fan community that document this sort of stuff seem to be wholly unaware of the existence of broadcast reruns of the show on any network in any country.

Babylon 5 Lost Tales.


It was better than Legend of the Rangers...kind of.

I'm enjoying the resurgence of B5 talk. Out of curiosity, is anyone posting here under the age of the show? i.e. <28 years old?

Also, which show is the more underrated and forgotten... B5 or Seaquest DSV? I think the later is more forgotten but the former is more underrated.


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edit: Oh wow.. it appears that the show is almost exactly 28 years old according to the wiki as the pilot film premiered on Feb 22nd. Happy belated birthday, B5!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylon_5

Seaquest, Andromeda and Space: Above and Beyond are all pretty forgotten. I would need to rewatch them, but I feel like they would not hold up, so probably not underrated.

The writing for that dolphin was absolute garbage.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Seaquest, Andromeda and Space: Above and Beyond are all pretty forgotten. I would need to rewatch them, but I feel like they would not hold up, so probably not underrated.

The writing for that dolphin was absolute garbage.

Yeah, it was incomprehensible at times!

I think it's probably best that Space Hercules is mostly forgotten; it was barely adequate by the standards of its day similar to that Earth Final Conflict show. Still, it didn't stop me from watching both on Saturdays instead of studying and both did have the occasional good moment. I did like the design of the Andromeda ship though... Space Above and Beyond was a better show iirc but had a flawed basic premise that I just couldn't overlook; there is no way a semi-realistic military would spend the likely hundreds of millions of dollars each to train and outfit squadrons of elite space fighter pilots only to have them constantly land their expensive craft and hoof it as infantry grunts to accomplish missions.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Seaquest, Andromeda and Space: Above and Beyond are all pretty forgotten. I would need to rewatch them, but I feel like they would not hold up, so probably not underrated.

The writing for that dolphin was absolute garbage.

'Gene Roddenberry's' Andromeda? It was on Amazon Prime a while back when I had a free trial. I managed... 2 or 3 episodes before giving up. It was just a terrible mess at basically every level- story, characters, effects, setting, nonsense takes on philosophy. The whole thing.

When it originally aired, I think I watched the pilot episode and not much else. And I vaguely remember the later seasons when they were in some bubble reality or something? When it shifted to the Sci-fi channel and amazingly became even worse. [Well, amazing that the show could get worse, not that something moved to Sci-fi and got worse]

The truly baffling thing is it won a fairly big pile of awards at that time, which makes me wonder about how few shows there were and/or how terrible the various award processes are.

I’ll always have a soft spot for Amdromeda as it appeared in internet spacebattle culture. “200gt/s pwnzors ur mom!”

Space Hercules had the problem that the original main plot was seen as too complex after the first season and the show was changed from a more serious scifi story to really being Space Hercules (and this they delivered very well)

chaos0xomega wrote:

That would be news to me, as JMS and others within the B5 fan community that document this sort of stuff seem to be wholly unaware of the existence of broadcast reruns of the show on any network in any country.

German Tele5 is currently in season 5
not sure but think in France the last rerun was 2013 or 2015

I think the aforementioned issues with format, lack of masters, etc. put TV stations off of reruns. Ironically/annoyingly if they had made the full widescreen version originally, it probably would have been one of the first things to be rerun when HD services first rolled out, as they would have been looking for anything that would justify the increased resolution.

I bought Space: Above and Beyond a few years ago purely for nostalgia value, but it actually holds up remarkably well, much better than I was expecting.

What the hell is Space Hercules?

chaos0xomega wrote:
What the hell is Space Hercules?

Kevin Sorbo started getting more and more creative control over Andromeda, much to the shows detriment according to certain circles. Hence the nickname.

chaos0xomega wrote:
What the hell is Space Hercules?

It's a slightly playful to derisive name for the Andromeda syndicated series with Kevin Sorbo from the early 2000's. I use it personally in a more playful/sarcastic sense as I did actually watch the show and enjoy it to some degree despite its many faults during the initial run.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andromeda_(TV_series)

Ah, gotcha. Never really watched Andromeda, wasn't aware.

EDIT - I hate Kevin Sorbo, but this show sounds awesome.

Andromeda was good fun, got a bit odd/funky at some stage, but then I'd fallen out of watching it and there's a few bit twists as it goes on. It's certainly trying well, but you can tell they don't have Jim Hendson when you compare the puppet and model quality to the likes of, say, Farescape. But its a good clean bit of fantasy fun in space.

Andromeda as a series has the premise of the latest season of Discovery. Federation (I forget what it was called in Andromeda) ship sent to the future where the federation no longer really exists, and the crew works to reestablish it and it’s ideals. I enjoyed it back in the day. Earth: Final Conflict was another oldie I liked from around that time.

chaos0xomega wrote:

The BSG reboot is the perfect example of why to do a reboot - it was massively successful and extremely popular. It earned critical acclaim everywhere, won countless awards, launched several actors careers, launched a number of spinoff series, comics, and books, and in general made the producers quite a nice little sum of money (contrast to B5 which only really ever lost money), likewise based on a show that had disappeared from the general cultural awareness about 20-25 years prior.

Now, *you* may not have enjoyed the BSG reboot - but you evidently were not the audience for it. Myself, personally, I loved it - I was only vaguely aware of the original existing, likewise for many of my friends, etc. Younger audiences born in the 80s and 90s have absolutely eaten Moore's BSG reboot up, and by and large most of us don't seem to care very much for the original and have never watched it. 100% honest, I would not have bothered with the show at all if it was a spinoff or continuation of the original, it simply did not appeal to me when I eventually did try to watch it, it was too dated and old.

This.

The creators knew *exactly* what they wanted from the show...maybe it didn't resonate as well outside the US because a lot of the themes involved reflected what the country was going through post-9/11. (Then again, you're watching an American TV show. So...sorry, not sorry?) Just because they didn't plan out every season -- and this aspect of B5 is wildly overrated, BTW -- doesn't mean they didn't have vision.

Also, I watched the original as a kid and loved every second. Saw episodes again on the SciFi channel many years later and was absolutely shocked at how bad they were. Recycled plots, painful scripts...so much bad acting. It was a far better show conceptually than in actuality.

 gorgon wrote:
and this aspect of B5 is wildly overrated, BTW

Yep, its not even entirely true. I mean, sure JMS planned out the plot from the beginning, but between a number of cast departures and changes, having seasons canceled and then restarted midway through filming at least once, studio interference mandating changes to the plot and story, etc. the end product deviates pretty dramatically from what he originally planned in quite a few ways.

chaos0xomega wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
and this aspect of B5 is wildly overrated, BTW

Yep, its not even entirely true. I mean, sure JMS planned out the plot from the beginning, but between a number of cast departures and changes, having seasons cancelled and then restarted midway through filming at least once, studio interference mandating changes to the plot and story, etc. the end product deviates pretty dramatically from what he originally planned in quite a few ways.

The key is that at the time a lot of TV series and almost all sci-fi were based around the repeat event of the week formula. Star Trek Original Series was Alien of the week with no interconnecting elements and very limited character growth. Many many others were the same. B5 did have alien of the week themes, but there was a huge amount of interconnected elements going on through its whole series. The idea that predictions and story events setup in the very first episodes would not be resolved until the final seasons was groundbreaking for its time. Plus they were handles that were intended to be developed and thus received proper support throughout. Eg the prediction that he'd become Emperor wasn't just a throw away line in one episode; it was a key part of his characters plot that was brought up many times and developed, adjusted through the time.

Yes things changed; heck a massive change was losing the lead actor who was pinned as a major cornerstone of the series story. But the story was worked around those changes and eventualities. The reality changed the end goals somewhat, but the fact was the end goals were part of the story structure.

We honestly don't start to see story telling like that in TV again for a very long time. Even many modern series still go for the repetitive theme of the week. Drop into NCIS adn barring actor changes through the years you can pretty much get up to speed in the first few moments unless its the first or last episodes of a season. Even when characters change the "role" is filled by another. If the Director dies there's a new Director etc...

Fifteen quid extra and I can only get series 1? Nah, I’ll keep watching the DVDs. The CGI isn’t as distracting as the 90s fashion anyway.