Babylon5.....in HD!

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Nothing says big time production like having Gary Cole as the lead. I would've done it, but I was busy working at Wal-Mart.

"Lieutenant, whaaaaat's happening? Yeah, I'm gonna have to ask you to go ahead and come back in and stand watch on the bridge on Sunday, OK?"

 

[Noname Given]

(BTW, Yamato itself borrows heavily from Jason and the Argonauts, hence the ship being renamed Argo for Starblazers. But I'd classify its approach as stealing rather than copying.)

The ship was renamed "The Argo" because it was 1978 - and only 33 years after the end of WWII. IE Producers were nervous having the "Hero Ship" of what they saw now as a U.S. Kids show being named after an WWII enemy Battleship that took a lot of Americans lives. Many WWII Vets were in their mid to late 50ies and would see the show and some had kids /grand kids that would be watching the show.

It does indeed use the 'epic heroes journey' trope but was really an allegory to how the Japanese viewed WWII (with a happier ending after the Nuclear devastation)

 

[137th Gebirg]

Indeed. Leiji Matsumoto was a known pro-Japanese nationalist, painting the Gamilons and their planet bomb "nukes" as a thinly-veiled allegory for Americans and their bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The frequent nuclear holocaust imagery early in the first series was no coincidence.

I find it amusing how the rebooted 2199 completely remade the Gamilons into more of a Space Nazi thing, even going so far as renaming the single-named Desslock (or Dessler) as "Abelt Dessler", with his mother named "Adelsia Dessler", uncle "Erich Vam Dessler", elder brother "Mathius" and nephew "Lanhardt". In fact, ALL the Gamilon characters in 2199 have very Germanic/Tutonic-sounding names.

 

[Jan]

I remember JMS saying once if something WB owned burned down in South Africa it came out of any profit B5 made so therefore it didn't make any money. @Jan probably knows the whole story there. I know hollywood accounting is inscrutable.

This is an area where I tend to disagree with JMS to a certain extent. Yes, I know there's a certain amount of sarcasm in what he says but there's really nothing all that unusual about spreading costs over shows and just because B5 wasn't made on the WB lot doesn't mean that it shouldn't pay for it's share of costs.

For example: The show budget deals with all the things that are *directly* associated with making the show. But what about all the other costs like lot security or administrative payroll? Those are legitimate costs that are generally allocated among all of the properties of the studio.

Now when it comes to that famed fire in Africa, I don't know because I'm not a show business accountant but I really don't think there's really anything not covered by what's called Generally Accepted Accounting Principals going on.

 

[BillJ]

Indeed. Leiji Matsumoto was a known pro-Japanese nationalist, painting the Gamilons and their planet bomb "nukes" as a thinly-veiled allegory for Americans and their bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The frequent nuclear holocaust imagery early in the first series was no coincidence.

I find it amusing how the rebooted 2199 completely remade the Gamilons into more of a Space Nazi thing, even going so far as renaming the single-named Desslock (or Dessler) as "Abelt Dessler", with his mother named "Adelsia Dessler", uncle "Erich Vam Dessler", elder brother "Mathius" and nephew "Lanhardt". In fact, ALL the Gamilon characters in 2199 have very Germanic/Tutonic-sounding names.

With a clearer picture of what went on and the morality of it all, it makes sense to make some changes.

 

[Jedman67]

This is an area where I tend to disagree with JMS to a certain extent. Yes, I know there's a certain amount of sarcasm in what he says but there's really nothing all that unusual about spreading costs over shows and just because B5 wasn't made on the WB lot doesn't mean that it shouldn't pay for it's share of costs.

For example: The show budget deals with all the things that are *directly* associated with making the show. But what about all the other costs like lot security or administrative payroll? Those are legitimate costs that are generally allocated among all of the properties of the studio.

Now when it comes to that famed fire in Africa, I don't know because I'm not a show business accountant but I really don't think there's really anything not covered by what's called Generally Accepted Accounting Principals going on.

IIRC, Babylon 5 was distributed by WB (and therefore they retained ownership somehow?) but WB didn't produce it. B5 also had an extremely tight budget compared to TNG or DS9

 

[137th Gebirg]

^^^ Yeah, wasn't it "Babylonian Productions" that made it? That's what I remember it being back in the day.

 

[Noname Given]

^^^ Yeah, wasn't it "Babylonian Productions" that made it? That's what I remember it being back in the day.

It was the WB syndication network PTEN (which no longer exists of course). WB basically footed the bill for Seasons 1 -4 and I don't know whether TNT paid fpr S5 or just licensing and broadcast rights for S5; but WB retained the rights to B5 afterwards, ultimately.

 

[Jan]

As I understand it, WB financed the show through Babylononian Productions (which would have just been a company for the sake of bookkeeping) it but not up-front. Until and unless enough stations signed on to carry it in syndication, there was no season green light. Which is why, after PTEN dissolved, even though enough stations signed on for the season and it was greenlit, JMS tells in the B5 script books how WB didn't budget for it so JMS, Netter and Copeland had to take out a loan to start production pending the money getting freed up by WB.

 

[MacLeod]

What? They tried to do a direct to DVD outing of stories (didn't sell well); and then tried a THIRD continuation series attempt with "Legend of the Rangers" but as JMS just seems able to regurgitate the EXACT SAME TING over again (and badly too) - Read: yet ANOTHER even more ancient evil super race (that no one heard of until the plot needed it) out to end all life in the Galaxy...

Not everything gets (or deserves) an infinite shot at the well. (So to speak)

To be far JMS isn't the only one to regurgitate the same thing over and over, the writers over at SG-1 did it to a degree as well with the false gods of the Gou'ald in S1-8 of SG-1 only to have the false gods of the Ori in S9-10

Lets face it us viewers are hard to please do the same thing too often and it's a case of "It's the Same now it Sucks" change it (too much) and it's a case of "It's different now it sucks"

 

[137th Gebirg]

At least O'Neil poked fun at some of the cliched sci fi tropes when the bad guys predictably presented them to the team. One of the reasons it lasted so long as a show was that knew when not to take itself too seriously (remember the Furlings?). With the exception of Garibaldi, almost all of the B5 actors had a tendency to horribly overact their lines to the point of making Shatner look like a Shakespearean veteran. 1st season Sinclair was nearly unwatchable. Switching to Sheridan was a smart move. G'kar and Molari were, admittedly, one of the best things about that show and possibly one of the best "odd couples" in television history.

 

[Jan]

Read: yet ANOTHER even more ancient evil super race (that no one heard of until the plot needed it) out to end all life in the Galaxy...

Oh...I see you bought into what the alien Kafta said about the Hand. Can't imagine why anybody would do that, to be honest. I mean, really - what's a subjugated alien supposed to say? "Yeah, they're really not very bright but they whipped us, you bet'cha!"? Because what we actually *saw* was that the Hand were quite strong indeed but not very bright.

As for the whole 'race that nobody every heard of' bit...as Uhura once said, "It's a big galaxy, Mr. Scott". Why would anybody assume that they'd heard of all of the alien races in the B5 galaxy when the story of B5 that we'd seen was quite localized?