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So Mr Straczynski... it's now 'after April'...

If there was enough demand for B5 product to justify making a movie that costs $100 million, there'd also be more than enough demand to sustain a book series.

Movies aren't made because there's a demand, they're made because the studios believe there's a good chance of getting a return on their investment. Now a perceived demand may factor into that belief or it may not. Was there a huge demand for a film featuring large boats an iceberg and an annoying song before Cameron went and broke box office records? Was there a huge demand for comic book films *before* the first X-Men was a success? No. Indeed some of the best films ever have been sleeper hits, some were considered complete disasters during production and some of the biggest flops of all time were made because there was a perceived "demand" for the subject matter.

Of course nothing is guaranteed and Hollywood logic isn't the same as our Earth logic so don't go expecting the studios to suddenly start making sense. After all, M. Night Shyamalan keeps getting hired; where's the sense in that?! ;)

I'll correct myself; I have read City of Sorrows but ages ago.

The technomage trilogy is interesting, but the two storylines I liked least in B5 was telepath and centauri stories, and so those trilogies don't interest me (although the fate of Bester does).

The Psi Corps books are, I think the strongest of the trilogies as they can more or less stand on their own as sci-fi literature, so even if you don't especially care for the teep centric episodes on the show I think they're still worth reading.

Indeed, the first book (*minor and vague spoilers ahead*) covers a fairly large chunk of B5's backstory, spanning a period from the first detection of telepaths in the early 2100s through the various social and political upheavals on Earth (including first contact with the Centauri) and basically ends around the time of the birth of Bester. The second and third books are basically all about Bester, telling his story from childhood, being raised and trained in the Corps, through a number of very relevant events in the post Minbari war period that ties in with a lot of the shadowy government/black ops activities on the show (Bureau 13, Syria Planum, the Icarus, IPX etc.) and ends with him ready to go chasing after Ironheart. You may be disappointed by the third book as, while it does indeed depict the final fate of Bester, it covers a much smaller span of time and series completely skips over the telepath war (at the time it was expected that Crusade would delve into that I think.) Without giving too much away, it's basically Bester on the lam, trying to make a new life for himself with both the "new" Corps and Garibaldi hot on his heels.

So yeah, the first two books at least cover a lot of ground in the B5 universe that adds a lot of backstory to certain events and even fully depicts a few scenarios only seen or mentioned in passing on the show (including a very memorable few chapters dedicated to Lyta's brief intern-ship.)
 
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If there was enough demand for B5 product to justify making a movie that costs $100 million, there'd also be more than enough demand to sustain a book series.

Movies aren't made because there's a demand, they're made because the studios believe there's a good chance of getting a return on their investment. Now a perceived demand may factor into that belief or it may not.

Holy crap, you really don't know business do you?! :wtf:
Movies aren't made because some people just want to spend money to tell a nice story. No, it's to make money!

If the studios "believe there's a good chance of getting a return on their investment" that means they believe the demand for that product is there. It's a gamble. If they're right, they make money. If they're wrong, they don't.

That is ALWAYS a factor. None of this "may factor . . . or not." YES it always is a factor!

The demand is for a quality and/or entertaining movie so if the studio turns out a poor movie they're not supplying what is being demanded.

Mr Awe
 
Does a B5 movie have to carry the branding? A standalone movie set in the B5 universe should work, a simple story strong enough to standard without the Trade Marks and branding, but just happens to include jump gates, hyperspace, teeps and boneheads maybe.

And it really could be anything. An SFX fest style space combat feature, like Star Wars without the cheesy robots, maybe set during the Minbari or Dilgar war. Or it could be explorers v alien nature a bit like Pitch Black. The mind police perhaps? Some Hard Sci Fi theme possibly. Or how about IPX tomb raider style in space, an interstellar Lara! It could even be set present day, Centauri tourists.

What I'd like to see on screen is the events leading to the ban on cybernetics.
 
Does a B5 movie have to carry the branding? A standalone movie set in the B5 universe should work, a simple story strong enough to standard without the Trade Marks and branding, but just happens to include jump gates, hyperspace, teeps and boneheads maybe.

Nice in theory, but all the marketing would reference B5 anyway. Just like all the Serenity marketing referenced Firefly, even though the film was designed to stand alone.
 
I'm not sure why others are suggesting it has to do with other stuff when the "After April" comment was in response to future Babylon 5 projects specifically.

I'm pretty sure it's going to be a B5 Broadway musical. I mean, what else could it be? Not books (no interest), not a movie (too expensive), not a tv movie (too cheap), so prepare for some melodious Minbari, cacophonously chanting Centauri, and vocal Vorlons.
 
Outsource it? Never. Half the joy would be found in hearing JMS try to turn his long-winded dialogue into singable verse. :p
 
Half the joy would be found in hearing JMS try to turn his long-winded dialogue into singable verse. :p
Well he has written some songs for a show previously; on the Ghostbusters special, "The Halloween Door."

For that matter, he wrote the lyrics to the song that Cailyn sang in 'Walkabout'.

And I'm going to be kind and *not* mention the other song in B5 that JMS wrote. :p

ETA: Ooops, Mr. Light beat me. Except that I'm not certain about JMS writing the "Face" song. The lyrics aren't in the script the way they were for the one in 'Walkabout'.

Jan
 
Could it be an animated movie?
They could use voices of Delenn, Sheridan, Garibaldi, Ivanova, Marcus and come up with an interesting story that B5 fans could enjoy.
Its not like we are going to see thouse characters played by the same actors again anyway.

A machinima-based TV series would probably give the best results for the least expenditure. The use of such a technique would, of course, limit the potential markets into which you could sell such a show. A motion capture movie (as used in Avatar, Beowulf and so on) might not come in that much cheaper than building sets and using green screen for virtual sets. However, as you say, the actors aren't getting younger so a studio would probably want to limit their appearance to cameos at most. Bruce Boxleitner is the only one that execs would probably think is a recognisable name. Now, Bruce Willis as Garibaldi, that I'd like to see. ;)
 
A machinima-based TV series would probably give the best results for the least expenditure.

Is there a Babylon 5 computer game to "film" it in?

Not a recent one. There are a number of professional machinima software tools and lots of quality 3D models of B5 ships available. Representations of the actors wouldn't be too difficult to generate. If you use mo-cap at all, it doesn't need to be done by the voice actors themselves. Virtual sets would presumably be way cheaper than the real deal. It's a compromise but I think it's probably the only way we'll get any further B5 universe stories on TV. I'm willing to be proved wrong, of course.
 
^I think you mean 3D animation in general. Machinima refers specifically to stuff that's recorded while being acted in real-time in a game engine.
 
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