I hear a Babylon 5 reboot is in the works

[clearspira]

And by the way, the arguement that nothing makes these characters necessarily white or black, that arguement swings both ways and thus is completely useless in this context.

The argument is that the race of the character being irrelevant means the race of the actor is irrelevant, how does that swing both ways?

Because you know and I know that there will never be a white male Lt Uhura. It doesn't work that way. Sex and race swapping works one way and one way only.

That's because white cis male has long been the default for a character that doesn't fall into any particular category.

Translation: it does not and will not happen the other way.
2nd possible translation: white men should be happy that they are the only people on Earth that you can legally erase from media.

[Al-1701]

And by the way, the arguement that nothing makes these characters necessarily white or black, that arguement swings both ways and thus is completely useless in this context.

The argument is that the race of the character being irrelevant means the race of the actor is irrelevant, how does that swing both ways?

Because you know and I know that there will never be a white male Lt Uhura. It doesn't work that way. Sex and race swapping works one way and one way only.

That's because white cis male has long been the default for a character that doesn't fall into any particular category.

Translation: it does not and will not happen the other way.
2nd possible translation: white men should be happy that they are the only people on Earth that you can legally erase from media.

Please. You're going to act like the TV and movie industry haven't gone to white men as the default for decades? And ethnic actors have been mostly relegated to ethnic roles (and even to different ethnicities like a Latin American playing a character from northern India). It's been changing and a part of it is classic characters being played people of a different race because it doesn't matter.

If white men should be angry at anyone, it should be the industry for acting like they're the vanilla of humanity.

[Frustration]

Why can't we just have a new series, this time without studio interference a la Crusade?

[Winter]

Why can't we just have a new series, this time without studio interference a la Crusade?

To quote JMS "How do you telling continuing story of our original Londo without the original Vir? Or G’Kar? How do you tell Sheridan’s story without Delenn? Or the story of B5 without Franklin? Garibaldi? Zack?" B5's original continuity will no doubt return one day (maybe there will even be a crossover with it given how much popular multiverse stories are becoming) but I get where JMS is coming from. B5 is a story about the characters and many of the cast have sadly past away. I'm interested in seeing where JMS takes this series and hope for the best and if it's not good something else will come along and the original isn't going anywhere.

[Deledrius]

The question I have is whether the reboot will be less or more blatant about the Middle-Earth-borrowing than the original B5 was.

Or the Knights of the Round Table borrowing, which was so blatant the characters noticed it.

That too! Amusingly, it occurs to me that the characters might also have noticed the LotR elements too, if only it were also in the public domain. I'm sure the production team only felt safe officially recognizing the elements no one could sue them for incorporating.

[Madner Kami]

To quote JMS "How do you telling continuing story of our original Londo without the original Vir? Or G’Kar? How do you tell Sheridan’s story without Delenn? Or the story of B5 without Franklin? Garibaldi? Zack?"

Well, simple: Don't. If you feel you can't continue the story, then don't restart it just to keep telling more. Either that or cast new actors and live with the reality of TV/movies.

[Frustration]

Why can't we just have a new series, this time without studio interference a la Crusade?

To quote JMS "How do you telling continuing story of our original Londo without the original Vir? Or G’Kar? How do you tell Sheridan’s story without Delenn? Or the story of B5 without Franklin? Garibaldi? Zack?"

I don't necessarily WANT the 'continuing story' of those characters, as much as I loved them. When Crusade came out, I didn't bellyache because it largely didn't involve B5 characters. It had NEW characters, with new and interesting personalities, problems, and situations.

Why can't we get a NEW show, set in the B5 universe, about new situations and people?

(One obvious plausible speculation: JMS's contract with WB says that he gets a certain percentage of the profits from B5, and he has publicly called attention to their slimy bookkeeping that claims B5 has never made a profit. As all sane creators do, JMS wants to make money. It seems likely that he's reached the point where he's willing to seriously compromise or abandon his artistic goals in favor of making a buck. His other recent projects have been modestly successful, but not to the degree of his masterwork, and he's clearly looking for a big score.)

[Riedquat]

Why can't we just have a new series, this time without studio interference a la Crusade?

To quote JMS "How do you telling continuing story of our original Londo without the original Vir? Or G’Kar? How do you tell Sheridan’s story without Delenn? Or the story of B5 without Franklin? Garibaldi? Zack?"

I don't necessarily WANT the 'continuing story' of those characters, as much as I loved them. When Crusade came out, I didn't bellyache because it largely didn't involve B5 characters. It had NEW characters, with new and interesting personalities, problems, and situations.

Why can't we get a NEW show, set in the B5 universe, about new situations and people?

Amen to this. JMS has created a big enough fictional universe that should be able to support plenty of stories with different characters, just as stories (supposedly) set in reality do. Small universe thinking's the issue!

[hammerofglass]

Why can't we just have a new series, this time without studio interference a la Crusade?

To quote JMS "How do you telling continuing story of our original Londo without the original Vir? Or G’Kar? How do you tell Sheridan’s story without Delenn? Or the story of B5 without Franklin? Garibaldi? Zack?"

I don't necessarily WANT the 'continuing story' of those characters, as much as I loved them. When Crusade came out, I didn't bellyache because it largely didn't involve B5 characters. It had NEW characters, with new and interesting personalities, problems, and situations.

Why can't we get a NEW show, set in the B5 universe, about new situations and people?

Amen to this. JMS has created a big enough fictional universe that should be able to support plenty of stories with different characters, just as stories (supposedly) set in reality do. Small universe thinking's the issue!

The problem I have with this is that a lot of the appeal of the series is that this little gaggle of nobodies on a mostly diplomatic station turn out to be the Most Important People in the Most Important Time in history. The Dawn of the Third Age, the End of the War in Heaven, the Birth of the Interstellar Alliance which will reign a million years, etc. Doing another story in the same setting feels a bit like introducing the Illiad to a fresh audience with a side story about what's going on in Laconia.

[Riedquat]

The problem I have with this is that a lot of the appeal of the series is that this little gaggle of nobodies on a mostly diplomatic station turn out to be the Most Important People in the Most Important Time in history. The Dawn of the Third Age, the End of the War in Heaven, the Birth of the Interstellar Alliance which will reign a million years, etc. Doing another story in the same setting feels a bit like introducing the Illiad to a fresh audience with a side story about what's going on in Laconia.

When I was talking about the same universe I didn't just mean on Babylon 5. Just anywhere else in that fictional setting, any planet, ship, whatever, quite possible one that's never been mentioned before and so on.

Having said that there have been plenty of stories retold over times, some for the better, some for the worse.