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from the so-many-spinoffs-I'm-getting-dizzy dept.
CBS is launching a new Star Trek series, Strange New Worlds, which will be a TOS prequel set prior to Kirk assuming command of the Enterprise. As in season 2 of Discovery, the new series will feature Anson Mount as Captain Pike, Rebecca Romjin as Number One, and Ethan Peck as Spock. Discovery has been polarizing for Star Trek fans with many fans criticizing the writing of both Discovery and Picard, saying it deviated from the defining characteristics of Star Trek. Despite the criticisms, Mount's portrayal of Pike in Discovery was generally received well. The story for the pilot will be developed by Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman, and Jenny Lumet, the first two of which are executive producers of Discovery. Because filming of TV shows has generally been halted by COVID-19, it is not known when the series will film or premiere on CBS' streaming service.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Saturday May 16 2020, @12:43PM (10 children)
Hope it's good.
Kinda wishing they'd remake B5, but kinda not. Love B5 and would love to see a GREAT remake, but what are the chances of that....
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @01:48PM (9 children)
I also used to think/wish/hope they would remake B5, but I came to my senses years ago and no longer want that. Like most remakes today it would be changed so much that it would be just a shadow (no pun intended) of the original an another obvious and frivolous promotion of woke culture.
B5 is perfect the way it is and I hope it gets left alone.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Saturday May 16 2020, @02:27PM (3 children)
Yeah, leave B5 the hell alone. My wife and I bought the box set 20 years ago and recently watched it all again. The CGI has lost a little luster over the decades, but it's still serviceable and was amazing for the time. Also, it was the first major series I can remember that had a story arc. Star Trek then was all purely episodic with no connection between episodes. And the scenes between Garibaldi and G'Kar or those between G'Kar and Mollari are timeless. The lines from Zathras were so awesome they entered our family lexicon: "Zathras used to being beast of burden. Zathras have sad life, probably have sad death, but at least there is symmetry" (muttered in exasperation whenever one of us asks the other to do something he doesn't particularly want to do)
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @06:28PM
B5, previously known as TNT Boyz and Audio, is an American R&B music group originating from St. Petersburg, Florida, United States, which later relocated to Atlanta, Georgia. The group consists of the five Breeding family brothers, Dustin Michael (b. October 8, 1986), Kelly Allen (b. February 27, 1988), Patrick Owen (b. September 19, 1990), Carnell Frederick (b. Hunnicutt, November 30, 1991), and Bryan Jesse (b. October 14, 1993). They were formerly known as the TNT Boyz featuring only the four eldest brothers, but renamed themselves B5 when Bryan, the youngest brother, joined the group. From late 2009 to early 2010, they renamed themselves Audio and then returned to the name B5 on May 30, 2012. Bryan and Patrick left the group, leaving Dustin, Kelly, and Carnell to rename themselves Men in Black(MIB). After Dustin and Carnell had their own kids, they dropped out of the group leaving Kelly as a rapper and Dustin a soloist, while Carnell stopped making music to devote his time to his family.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Sunday May 17 2020, @01:05AM (1 child)
I know...what J. Michael Straczynski could have done with it now, though. But then again it would be different...
So good, but wish for more, like Firefly: would love to see more or a remake but it would be different and probably worse.....
....it's like the original Doctor Who First Doctor episodes: would love to see remade, but no...
The only way I'd want to see a B5 remake would be if J. Michael was FULLY in charge...but could you really replace Peter Jurassic (not dead...just old).....or G'Kar!!!
LOVE the way Mollari emphasizes every word like it's a meal to enjoy, lol.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Sunday May 17 2020, @01:25PM
Me, too, Gaaark, but I suspect we (or those like us) have to be the ones to write it. There is not much appetite for good storytelling in the entertainment industry anymore, because they have been overwhelmed by the conviction that they need to teach the rest of us a lesson of some kind.
Firefly and Serenity were particularly tragic because they were from a worthy universe that could have thrived if only the show creators hadn't chosen names that sound like feminine hygiene products. I once read a science fiction short story (maybe by Heinlein?) wherein two time travelers rescued Hemingway from his ignominous end to die more nobly on Mt. Kilimanjaro; Firefly would benefit from a similar intervention.
Alas, Zathras tell Zathras, but Zathras no listen...
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Thexalon on Saturday May 16 2020, @03:05PM (4 children)
The original Babylon 5 was quite intentionally an obvious promotion of what is now being called "woke" culture:
- Major characters who aren't white (Dr Franklin, Dr Kyle before him), and lots of other not-white protagonists.
- Major characters who aren't male (Ivonova, Delenn, Lyta, Talia, Na'toth), often in roles that aren't anything resembling so-called "traditional" femininity.
- Major characters who aren't completely straight (Ivonova and Talia), even if it's more implied than shown. Gay marriage is depicted as legal and normal (Franklin and Marcus on Mars, allegedly on their honeymoon).
- All kinds of religions and cultures are depicted, generally sympathetically. Sometimes a bit more subtly, e.g. people's names in a funeral scene.
- All kinds of rhetoric and plot points about how human's diversity and community-building are their main strength.
- Pretty much all of the human villains are white guys (Clark, Bester, Edgars).
- One of the major alien cultures, the Centauri, are a pretty clear stand-in for European colonial powers, and they are not depicted as the good guys by any means.
- JMS, a guy of Jewish descent, not only had a major Jewish character (Ivonova, again), but made specific references to persecution of Jews, e.g. G'Kar explicitly comparing the occupation of Narn to the Holocaust.
If you didn't get that, you weren't paying attention to what any of the characters were saying or why they were doing what they were doing.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @06:31PM
> - Pretty much all of the human villains are white guys with English accents
FTFY
(Score: 2) by The Vocal Minority on Sunday May 17 2020, @07:07AM
I don't think the OP means the same thing as you do when you speak about "woke culture".
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Sunday May 17 2020, @01:32PM (1 child)
Those are a bunch of really good points, but I think in that there is a larger lesson. Babylon 5 did have those elements, but it wasn't about those elements. The purpose of the story was not to rub the audience's nose in how bigoted and backward they were. In other words, it was good science fiction that imagined how different a future society could be, not a screed about how much everybody now sucks. As such, it was not "Woke" at all.
That is the difference that modern writers and producers don't get. What Babylon 5 (and many other shows, of course) did was storytelling, what modern writers and producers do is scolding. (and somehow it's a mystery to them why audiences are walking away)
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Monday May 18 2020, @10:21PM
... except for the whole bit where one of the characters gets recruited into a totalitarian regime, which many audience members might have fallen for. Or the many issues they had with anti-alien bigots who were basically no different from current racist bigots.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.