B5 Scripts

This is just a note for B5 fans who may want to know about this:

Over the next year JMS is releasing a 15-volume set of all the scripts that he wrote for the TV series Babylon 5 (which is the vast majority of the episodes of the show).

These are the productions scripts and include scenes and dialogue that were filmed but never broadcast.

There are generally seven scripts per volume, plus a lot of bonus materials. The bonus materials include newly written introductions by JMS to the scripts, talking about how they originated, what was going on with the show at the time, what production issues were encountered, etc. The bonus materials also include behind-the-scenes photos from the set and a lot of production memos that he sent out during filming talking about the design of various props, alien races, and characters who were meant to be on the show (some of whom never were–like the The Boss and mysterious Mr. Jones).

I’ve seen the first two volumes (which are out), and they’re actually a lot cooler than I thought from the bare description of them.

Among other things, JMS explains things that weren’t necessarily clear on screen. F’rinstance: An early season 1 episode "Infection," which dealt with a piece of organic technology from the planet Ikara that grabbed a person and turned him into an "Ikaran war machine"–as Mr. Garibaldi once termed it. This episode was one of the first filmed and is generally regarded as one of the least successful of the show’s five year run (it’s basically a man in a rubber suit monster episode),

BUT

in volume 1 on the scripts, JMS explains something that could only have been obvious in hindsight (and wasn’t obvious to me even then until he pointed it out): the Ikaran device is (a) dark and scaly with lots of pointy, insect-like leg thingies, (b) organic technology, (c) that incorporates a living being into itself, (d) seizes control of his brain for its own purposes, and (e) turns him into a form of armament.

Does that sound like anything ELSE we encounter on Babylon 5?

It’s SHADOW TECH.

The Ikarans got ahold of some left over shadow tech from the last Great War and used it to try to impose genetic and ideological purity on their planet, leading to them all being wiped out (since nobody is ever pure enough).

The tech in question was one of the things that the Shadows used to create infantry units since, as JMS points out, an army needs to control the ground as well as the sky.

So. It’s still a man in a rubber suit monster episode, but at least it’s a man in a rubber suit monster episode that fits in to the overall shadow mythology that JMS created for his universe.

The volumes also contain alternate, unfilmed versions of some scripts. For example, volume 1 contains the original, unfilmed version of the series pilot, "The Gathering," which is significantly different from the one that finally got shot.

Volume 3 (coming out in January) is set to explain why actor Michael O’Hare (Cmdr. Sinclair) was forced out of the show by The Powers That Be and the introduction of Bruce Boxleitner (and who ALMOST got his role but at the last minute didn’t).

But the really COOL thing will be volume 15, which will be given FREE (including free shipping) ONLY to those who’ve gotten the rest of the set.

What will be in volume 15?

Take it away, JMS:

"It will also [in addition addition to a bunch of other stuff]contain the Babylon 5 writers bible…the production draft of "The Gathering" as a companion to the original draft offered in volume one…and something very special."

"For over ten years, fans have asked "What would Babylon 5 have been like had Sinclair stayed?" Well, that question will be answered in this volume."

"After we finished the movie, but before we got the series going, WB asked to see a breakdown on this five-year arc thingie. So I wrote a six or seven page, single spaced outline of the ENTIRE FIVE YEARS with Sinclair still in place. The document makes for fascinating reading when compared with the series as it developed. NOT ONLY THAT, but the same document has a brief outline for A POTENTIAL BABYLON 5 SEQUEL SERIES, which would have been entitled BABYLON PRIME."

"Finally, by popular request, the nearly-legendary alternate version of the script for “The Exercise of Vital Powers” containing the Londo/G’Kar seduction scene, written in as an elaborate practical joke on the actors, will also be included.

So, if you want

GET INFO ON THE B5 SCRIPTS.