Babylon 5 Reboot in the Work, ‘Babylon 5’ reboot in development with original series creator J. Michael Straczynski at the helm.
A reboot of the 90s sci-fi epic “Babylon 5” is in development at The CW network, Variety has reported.
Creator of the original show J. Michael Straczynski will write the project and act as executive producer under his Studio JMS banner. Warner Bros Television, which produced the original series, will produce the new show.
Needless to say, this news has been nothing less than a seismic event in the sci-fi social media circles.
The original show starred Michael O’Hare as Jeffrey Sinclair, a human commander assigned to the titular, five-mile long space station located in neutral territory, a port of call for travelers, smugglers, corporate explorers and alien diplomats at a time of uneasy peace and the constant threat of war.
His complicated background with one of the main other races involved in the place formed the crux of the first season before Bruce Boxleitner‘s Captain John Sheridan took over in the second, and steered it through the remainder of the show along with his colleagues. They dealt with disagreements, crises and, oh yes… fought a massive, galaxy-spanning war again ancient alien forces. Claudia Christian, Jerry Doyle, Andreas Katsulas, Peter Jurasik, Stephen Furst, Mira Furlan and Richard Briggs were among the other regulars.
Babylon 5 Reboot in the Work
In 1994, J. Michael Straczynski (Sense8, Changeling) brought the world a science fiction show like nothing we’d ever seen. Babylon 5 told a single five-year story, filled with foreshadowing, deep political intrigue, and characters who grew and evolved, at a time when most TV shows still reset the agenda after every single episode.
He wrote the vast majority of the award-winning show himself, and it appears he may be about to do it again — Warner Bros. Television is now in development on a “from-the-ground-up reboot” of Babylon 5 with Straczynski as writer and showrunner, designed to air on the CW.
Here’s the full description Warner Bros. provided to The Verge:
In a from-the-ground-up reboot of the original series, John Sheridan, an Earthforce officer with a mysterious background, is assigned to Babylon 5, a five-mile-long space station in neutral space, a port of call for travelers, smugglers, corporate explorers and alien diplomats at a time of uneasy peace and the constant threat of war.
Read A collection of best the games in 2021.
His arrival triggers a destiny beyond anything he could have imagined, as an exploratory Earth company accidentally triggers a conflict with a civilization a million years ahead of us, putting Sheridan and the rest of the B5 crew in the line of fire as the last, best hope for the survival of the human race.
That’s pretty much a dead-on description of the original show, minus some big surprises. So as a long-time fan myself, I have extremely mixed feelings!
In one sense, it’s pretty exciting because Straczynski told fans for years that Warner Bros. wanted nothing to do with the show ever again. “They literally told my agent ‘We have no plans, and no intentions, of letting anything else be done in terms of television with Babylon 5,’” he tweeted in 2018, and that seemed to be that.
The Bottom Line
Unlike last season, the cast of Saturday Night Live is going through a pretty hefty shake-up before Season 47 debuts in a matter of weeks. Long-time cast member Beck Bennett has departed the series after eight seasons on the show. Bennett, largely known for his portrayals of former Vice President Mike Pence and Russian President Vladimir Putin, cut his teeth doing YouTube sketches before joining the show at 30 Rock.
Bennett’s being joined by Lauren Holt as the two cast members who won’t return for Season 47. Holt signed onto the show prior to Season 46 and is departing after just one season.
Bennett took to Instagram Monday afternoon to share a tribute to his time on the show. “Love you, SNL. Gonna miss you so much,” the comedian shared. “Thank you for 8 years of remarkable people and incredible experiences that completely changed my life. I had so much fun.”
Read Elon Musk is going to launch new crypto
