I have both good and bad Babylon 5 news. First the good news. According to the usually reliable Production Weekly there will definitely be a Babylon 5 movie. This isn’t another mini-series being shipped straight to the Sci-Fi Channel and it isn’t some straight to video release. In a world where Firefly can get turned into a theatrical feature, it only makes sense that the second best Sci-Fi show (Farscape #1) to debut since the original Star Trek should be gifted with a spin in cinemas. I mean, Firefly was a show that didn’t even manage an entire season. B5 had 5. About time the series got some respect.
Entitled Memory of Shadows the film will absolutely be a theatrical release, so you can count on plopping your big fat comic book guy ass in a seat with a cup of soda so large it looks like a gag gift and a tub of popcorn better suited for containing wings of chicken than tiny, buttery kernals. The movie will be written by series creator J. Michael Straczynski who a lot of lame comic nerds don’t seem to “get” but since I don’t read comics I think he’s pretty great. The Steven Beck directed film will begin shooting in the United Kingdom in April, so it’s possible this could be a Spring 2006 release. A tidbit from Straczynski on his Usenet group: "Oh, and for the first time in five years, there is an office somewhere in England with the words Babylon 5 on the door..." You tease you.
Now the bad news. The film will not focus on the original primary cast. Whether or not they’ll be in it is another question, but this sounds more like its going to be a film set in the Babylon 5 universe, rather than an out and out Babylon 5 based movie. If you ask me, that’s a huge mistake. This movie will be about Earthforce Intelligence Officer Diane Baker hunting down an intergalactic conspiracy using Shadow (You know, the guys whose asses they kicked on the show. Pure. Evil.) weapons to wreak havoc on the galaxy. She’ll be aided by the techno-mage Galen (who is at least somewhat familiar to the B5 universe, having been a part of the quickly defunct spinoff series "Crusade"), but apparently not Delenn, Sheridan, G’Karr, Londo, Garibaldi, Ivanova, or any of the other characters from the show that we care about. I’d even settle for a Jeffrey Sinclair movie over this.
They’ve tried the spin off new characters in the Babylon 5 universe before with a terrible made-for-TV movie on Sci-Fi a couple of years ago. After the misery that thing inflicted on fans, you’d think they’d have learned their lesson. I mean, how hard can it really be to nail down Bruce Boxleitner to star in your pic? I bet he’d even wear his old Tron helmet if you asked, just for kicks. When they made Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Paramount didn’t truck in a cast of 80’s hotties to man the bridge of the Starship Enterprise as completely new characters.
Unless Production Weekly’s story description is wildly inaccurate, this could turn out to be a colossal disappointment for B5 fans. Babylon 5 worked because it was so staunchly character driven. What’s the point of a movie without all those characters?
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