Babylon 5 reboot?
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Caporegime
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I'd struggle to watch Babylon 5 I think.
I didnt watch DS9 until 2003 when the DVDs were released and I thought it was great - I started watching it on Netflix last year and though it is still great, the standard definition fuzzy picture, cheap sets and (mostly) very dated CGI have not been kind. Some of the stories are quite dated as well now, it was constrained by the network and decade it was shown, but TV has gotten enormously more complex since IMO.
I didnt watch DS9 until 2003 when the DVDs were released and I thought it was great - I started watching it on Netflix last year and though it is still great, the standard definition fuzzy picture, cheap sets and (mostly) very dated CGI have not been kind. Some of the stories are quite dated as well now, it was constrained by the network and decade it was shown, but TV has gotten enormously more complex since IMO.
The slew of under 30s wouldn't have paitance to watch it. So all the intrigue will be changed to fight scenes as that what the idiot focus groups want.
Crusade was basically him trying to do a B5 story, whilst the network were trying to cancel the contract for "cause" by forcing him to make major changes whilst it was in production, including sexier characters/more skin and a simpler story to make it more appealing to the sort of people that liked their female characters wearing bikini armour and more explosions or shoot outs with less story (they'd signed based on B5's success but different execs took over and wanted sexier and simpler or better yet to kill it off).
Much of the time when he's been left with creative control he's done an outstanding job, even when he's been fighting to tell stories his way he's usually done a good job. I was reading his autobiography a while back and it was surprising how many things he'd worked on that i'd enjoyed and in several cases had managed to tie nonsense together to tell a story, and in other cases how even as a kid I'd noticed something got worse and realised why upon reading it.
IIRC he's done some of the best runs in several comics, B5, Sense8, the first (good) season of The Real Ghostbusters, He Man, Jayce and Wheeled Warriors (he comments about how they tried to tie that idiocy together), a bunch of the better episodes of Murder She Wrote, Changling and Jeramiah which was great.
I'd say he's probably still got it in him, he's kept busy polishing his skills as a story teller and certainly kept up with changes in technology and how TV/film is made., and his hits have probably outweigh his failures despite the fact that he seems to be very much a creator who has in the past walked away from jobs/industries for a while if he's had enough issues with the management.
Soldato
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I'm going to hold off judgement for now because it's MJS at the helm. But it being The CW has me worried.
That looks epic!
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The re-renderings just highlight how much effort went into the original models!
Is it unfair to think someone can make something better 30 years later? If they can't make it better (so by definition just make it worse), then they should leave it alone. I don't think you're being unfair to compare a new B5 (with nearly 30 years of advancement), to the original version. If it can't surpass the original, then don't make it.
Just already feel like i'm not giving it a fair chance as I don't believe they can improve upon the consistently good performances across the majority of the ensemble cast. That's my biggest gripe with this reboot, even if they got a handful of great actors, B5 was lightning in a bottle with it's casting, to do that twice would be something to behold.
To be fair, we've seen many reboots in movies and TV. The vast majority of them were not good, so B5 would have to be very much an outlier to be as good as what was a very remarkable TV show. It's not like CW is known for it's great shows, and the few hits they do have quickly go bad.
If you look at something like Battlestar Galactica, the original was actually not that good (more of a live action kids show with space ships), so taking that concept and making it a great, adult SF show was well beyond my expectations. How is B5 going to be better than the great stories and characters (played by great actors) JMS already wrote? Just updating with cheap CGI and bodging the rest isn't going to be enough.
I'm willing to give a new show a chance depending on reviews (it is B5 after all), but it's got to be held to the high standard of storytelling that the original had.
Soldato
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One direction worth considering now CGI is both better and relatively cheaper is having less humanoid alien species. We all get that Star Trek, Star Wars etc had to do what they did on a budget of person in suit because plausibke aliens was mostly in the too difficult box. I mean even the Alien is just a man in a suit but the camera angles and appendages sell it well. For B5 which is truly aiming to be alien if you were remaking you could "alien up" the cast and have less humanoid species.
But yeah it's got to be good to make it worth doing.
But yeah it's got to be good to make it worth doing.
Soldato
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A lot can be done with CGI now of course that wasn't possible then remember that insectoid gangster from series one they didn't bother with him after that he was just too obviously puppetry and too much to be doing with. CGI alone doesn't necessarily make for a good show, of course.