Perhaps. But don't think for a moment that they weren't enough to almost kill the show.
Jan
The old "DS9 stole from B5" thing
- Thread starter Forbin
- Start date
Perhaps. But don't think for a moment that they weren't enough to almost kill the show.
Jan
First let me state, again, I don't care about the who stole from who thing, DS9 and B5 are my two all time favorite shows, s, this is merely a curiosity, because it is an incredible coincidence
Sheridan took his Sunday Drive to Meet Lorien (Aired in November 1998, but, was ready to be aird a year earlier at the end of S4, until TNT saved the show for a S5)
Sisko took a Sunday Dive to hang out with his mother (Aire May 1999)
Did JMS pitch enough about the futur story plans to hint at the ending to his arc? I know his original idea was much different as to the end game for Babylon 5
This is not an attempt to stir up anything, or provide proof of anything, it's just a curiosity, since Sisko ws pretty much set up for his end of Arc with the pilot, and it was pretty similar to the end of Sheridan's arc.
Sheridan took his Sunday Drive to Meet Lorien (Aired in November 1998, but, was ready to be aird a year earlier at the end of S4, until TNT saved the show for a S5)
Sisko took a Sunday Dive to hang out with his mother (Aire May 1999)
Did JMS pitch enough about the futur story plans to hint at the ending to his arc? I know his original idea was much different as to the end game for Babylon 5
This is not an attempt to stir up anything, or provide proof of anything, it's just a curiosity, since Sisko ws pretty much set up for his end of Arc with the pilot, and it was pretty similar to the end of Sheridan's arc.
Likewise both series involve the use of a small prototype ship post first season, and using the station(s) to coordinate large fleets of different races against a threat coming from far away. Not trying to stoke a flame war, but the similarities between the shows go much further than the pilot episodes.
With that i fully agree, those are only superficial and in the end not important.
I'm surprised that those are the points, jms used to make his case while there are (or at least so it seems to me) much bigger issues of the themes i mentioned previously, which are important to the initial situation of B5 and also are at the core of DS9 before the Dominion arc was introduced.
And of course there's the Canadian series Cold Squad which somehow gave birth to the American series Cold Case. Although in that case, the makers of the original show actively considered SUING those who made the 'other' (but did not actually do it).
Perhaps we shouldn't care. Of course, our perspective as fans is likely to be different from those of the creators themselves. When answering the question "so what?" if DS9 stole from him, JMS wrote this back when both shows were on the air:
http://jmsnews.com/thread.aspx?id=_DS9 = Babylon5 So what?&topic=comics
I always thought that B5 had more in common with Lord of the Rings than DS9.
Also I dont recall DS9 being affiliated with PTEN, it was a syndicated show that was shown on independent stations ( some of whom did join WB and UPN) I don't see a mention of Paramount in Wiki about PTEN just Warner Bros and Chris-Craft. Paramount and Warner did join forces to form the CW, but that was a few years later. And Star Trek Voyager was the show that launched UPN. Maybe the post's author is conflating several events?
Hey if you're gonna steal, steal from the best.
Yes they do, but I still maintain that both are good, and it doesn't matter which came first, or whatever the legal ramifications are. For us, the fans, it was a win-win situation.
Berman and Piller, who actually conceived and developed DS9, had a very different recollection of how it came to be and didn't much appreciate jms's speculations.
Faced with the high media-profile announcement of a sequel series to the extraordinarily popular ST:TNG at a time when B5 was barely greenlighted as a TV movie, Straczynski clearly comprehended the dangers of people coming away with the mistaken impression that B5 was lifted from DS9, and getting the "we were first" story out there seems to have been pretty important.
I eagerly await the verdict in the lawsuit.
DS9 and B5 were back to back on Wednesday nights on my PTEN Station, which eventually became UPN for Voyager. B5 was carried on PTEN Stations, WB Stations, and I believe some still independent ones.
Yeah, I saw DS9 on Channel 44 in the SF Bay Area which would become a UPN station ( and later the CW), but I think it was also on Channel 11 which at the time was an ABC affiliate. So I don't think it was part of the PTEN slate.
Yea, KBHK was what I was talking about as well. Was DS9 carried on 11 as well? I don't remember that, was that the weekend airing? (KBHK CH44, I believe was carried on Ch12, though)
Might have been. IIRC, DS9 was shown before or after the PTEN block, which is why it was back to back with B5.
DS9 was straight syndication, so it was often on stations with PTEN shows, because PTEN only had 4 hours a week of programming at its max. If you saw Voyager on that station it was likely one of the Chris-Craft ones. Chris-Craft itself had put up a lot of money for season one; in season two the stations themselves had to make up that difference when the company backed UPN instead. A lot of other independent stations were added at that time. Since UPN and WB didn't have full week schedules at the time either it was possible to see all the UPN/PTEN/WB shows mixed on the same channel.
Then there's all the various fairy tale/mythology/fantasy shows around right now, what with Grimm, Once upon a Time, and Lost Girl.
What I'm curious about is: If DS9 did co-opt any of B5, what was the ultimate harm, if any? Were there any specific ideas that JMS wanted to use on B5 that he was forced to abandon because DS9 beat him to the punch? If not, I don't see what the big deal is. Both shows had very long runs.
And if it's any consolation, this summer the Phoenix ComicCon is having a huge Babylon 5 20th anniversary cast reunion. OTOH, no one seems to give a crap about DS9's 20th.
The only DS9 actors we've ever gotten here in Phoenix are Michael Dorn (kinda doesn't count) and Chase Masterson. (I miss Chase Masterson. She flirted with me. I know it was merely professional flirting to try to get me to buy her movie and her CD, but still... damn.
)