RIP Peter David

News has sadly broken of the passing of Star Trek, Babylon 5 and comic book writer Peter David, at the age of 68.

Born in Fort Meade, Maryland in 1956, David became interested in comic books at a young age, through comics left in a local barbershop and TV shows like the Adventures of Superman. David's parents did not approve of his interest in superheroes, especially Marvel, forcing him to read them in secret. David stopped reading comics in his teens feeling he'd outgrown them, but was drawn back in by the Chris Claremont run on X-Men in the 1970s. David also developed a fandom of novels and short stories from reading Harlan Ellison, Arthur Conan Doyle, Stephen King and Edgar Rice Burroughs.

David started his writing career by covering the Washington WorldCon in 1974 for The Philadelphia Bulletin, and then started writing shot fiction in the 1980s which appeared in venues such as Asimov's. He switched to working in publishing, making his way into working for Marvel in the sales department. Switching to editorial was unconventional, but David managed to do it and his first Spider-Man story was published in 1985.

Peter David made his name with his 11-year run on The Incredible Hulk, starting in May 1987 and continuing to August 1998. David's run on the title was acclaimed, with him introducing or popularising many concepts, including the Grey Hulk.

David was keen to keep a toe in the book publishing world and published his first novel, Knight Life, in 1987. David wrote both original series under his own name and the pen-name David Peters, and tie-in fiction. He eventually wrote 101 novels in total, a colossal figure.

Outside of his Marvel association, David was best-known for his work on the Star Trek franchise. In 1988 he started writing the DC Comics Star Trek series (meaning he was working for Marvel and DC simultaneously) and also penned his first Star Trek: The Next Generation novel, Strike Zone, for publication the following year. He eventually wrote 41 issues of Star Trek comics and 48 Star Trek novels.

He was particularly acclaimed for his nailing of the voices of the different Star Trek crews, and his sense of action and humour, as well as paying attention to continuity. His most beloved Trek novels were Strike Zone, Q-in-Law, Imzadi and the Borg epic Vendetta, which a lot of fans believed should have been made into a movie. Some of his later novels were more daft, including at one stage having a Borg "supercube" consumed Pluto "ending the debate once and for all." David was also notable for creating the New Frontier series and penning a remarkable 27 books in the series.

In 1994 David was contacted by J. Michael Straczynski, a fan of his comics work, and invited to work on his television series Babylon 5. David penned the episodes Soul Mates and There All the Honour Lies for Season 2, the former notable for introducing Londo's three wives and the latter for mocking Star Trek's focus on merchandising. The latter episode also sparked a friendly war with Straczynski after he pretended to get annoyed by a teddy bear David's wife bought for him and had the bear blasted into space in the final edit. David, who was friends with B5 actor Bill Mumy, collaborated with him on a TV show called Space Cases, in which the bear is recovered from deep space. David later wrote an episode of the ill-fated Babylon 5 spin-off show, Crusade. He later diversified into video games, working on Shadow Complex and Spider-Man: Edge of Time.

David later returned to the franchise to pen the very well-received Legions of. Fire novel trilogy (which tells the story of the fall of the Centauri Republic after the events of the show) and adaptations of the TV movie In the Beginning and Thirdspace.

Through the 1990s, David worked on other comic series including Aquaman, Supergirl and Young Justice, as well as his own original properties Soulsearchers and Company, and Sachs and Violens. In the 2000s he returned to Marvel to pen Captain Marvel, She-Hulk and Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man, as well as working on comics for other franchises including Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, as well as Marvel's adaptation of Stephen King's The Dark Tower.

David would eventually win a whole slew of awards for his comics work, including a much-coveted Eisner for his Hulk run.

David started suffering from ill health in 2010 when he suffered a herniated disc. In 2012 he suffered a stroke but made almost a full recovery. He was subsequently diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes. In 2022 he suffered an additional series of strokes, a kidney failure and a mild heart attack. These complications contributed to his sad passing away at too young an age.

Peter David was an exceptionally prolific writer, simultaneously juggling multiple comic book series and penning multiple novels a year. What was remarkable was that he combined a prolific output with a strong sense of quality control and sly humour. His Star Trek novels are among the very best ever published for that franchise, his contributions to Babylon 5 may be third only in importance to Straczynski and Larry DiTillio, and he was a noted supported of many charities and good causes. He could be irascible and opinionated, and a lot of his time in the comics field was spent arguing with other writers and creators (including Todd MacFarlane) over various issues.

Peter David's popularity wasn't just down to his work, but also his attitude, constantly giving the impression that he was a massive fan of science fiction, fantasy and superheroes and constantly showing enthusiasm for the field, its writers and its fans. He will be immensely missed.

BABYLON 5 reboot still in development, streaming services showing interest

Confirming what was rumoured last year, the Babylon 5 reboot project is officially dead at the CW. The CW has focused its attention away from drama towards cheaper television fare. As also expected, Warner Brothers has not junked the project entirely but, after regaining the rights, is now shopping the project to streaming services, with at least two apparently showing interest. Original Babylon 5 creator, showrunner and head writer J. Michael Straczynski remains attached to the project.

Which streaming services are interested is as yet unknown. The most logical option, HBO Max (recently retitled just Max), is seemingly out of the question because they have their own budget and development issues in the wake of their recent Discovery merger (one of the few shows to survive the merger process, Our Flag Means Death, was cancelled last week). HBO proper do not seem interested, despite the presence of self-confessed Babylon 5 fan George R.R. Martin in the development process there.

Warner Brothers has excellent relations with Netflix, and is currently producing the Sandman live-action show for them. Sandman showrunner-producer Neil Gaiman is a good friend of Straczynski's, and wrote an episode for the original Babylon 5 way back in 1998. One of Babylon 5's myriad alien races, the Gaim, is named for him. Straczynski himself has a relationship with Netflix, having co-produced the first two seasons of Sense8 for them almost a decade ago. Netflix also lacks a high-profile, ongoing, live-action space opera at the moment.

Amazon are also a possibility, as they currently lack a space opera show after the cancellation of The Expanse a couple of years ago.

Other streamers seem to be well set-up for space opera: Disney+ has multiple Star Wars shows in development and recently added The Orville to its streaming lineup, whilst Paramount+ is veritably drowning in Star Trek content, not to mention Halo. Apple TV+ has For All Mankind and Foundation as ongoing space-based shows.

An intriguing possibility is Tubi, an ad-supported streaming service which began operation in 2014 and has over 74 million users in the United States. Tubi is predominantly available in the United States and Central America, but GDPR issues have seen it unable to launch in the UK and European Union. Tubi has been airing Babylon 5 itself for the past few months.

Tubi mostly airs content from other supplies, but has aired some original programming, including the animated comedy Freak Brothers, a cooking show, the second season of The Nevers (after it was dropped by HBO). Tubi has voiced an ambition to create more original content for its service, and Babylon 5 might be an attractive franchise, especially if Straczynski can work his magic like it's 1993 all over again to produce the show on a competitive budget.

More news as it comes in.

RIP David McCallum

News has sadly broken that veteran Scottish actor David McCallum has passed away at the age of 90. McCallum was well-known for his roles in series such as The Man from UNCLE, Sapphire & Steel, and the NCIS franchise.

Born in 1933 in Glasgow, McCallum was raised in both London and (during WWII) by Loch Lomond. He initially pursued interests in music, learning the oboe and singing. However, he developed an interest in acting as a teenager and attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts in the 1950s, alongside classmate Joan Collins. McCallum had acquired his equity card at the age of 13 and began making regular TV and film appearances in the late 1950s, including a minor role in Titanic movie A Night to Remember (1958).

He achieved a major career breakthrough playing Lt. Commander Ashley-Pitt in The Great Escape (1963), followed by playing Judas in The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965). American TV guest shots on The Outer Limits and Perry Mason followed.

In 1964 McCallum was cast opposite Robert Vaughan in The Man from UNCLE. McCallum played Illya Kuryakin, an agent who is assigned by the Soviet Union to a joint USA - USSR intelligence organisation designed to tackle international terrorism and other potential threats to both powers. The show is ambiguous on Kuryakin's origins, but several episodes allude to a childhood in Kyiv, suggesting he is Ukrainian rather than the commonly-assumed Russian (Soviet = Russian being a common shorthand in British and American film and television at the time).

The show lasted for four seasons and 105 episodes. It was originally designed as a vehicle for Robert Vaughan with Kuryakin playing a secondary role, but McCallum's good looks and intense performance won him a horde of fans (MGM received more fan male for McCallum than for any other television actor in their history up to that time). He was promoted to co-lead. The show was cancelled during its fourth season, mainly due to a ratings drop blamed on a shift in tone towards gadgets, more humour and self-parody (possibly in response to the success of the Batman TV series). McCallum returned to the franchise with Vaughan in a 1983 TV movie, as well as parodying the show on a 1986 episode of The A-Team.

At the height of "UNCLEmania" McCallum released four albums of his original music. His best-known track from this period is "The Edge," a moody instrumental memorably sampled by Dr. Dre for his 2000 hit "The Next Episode."

McCallum divided his time between the United States and UK, playing in British series such as Colditz (1972-74) and American shows like The Invisible Man (1975). He got arguably his second-most-iconic role in 1979 playing Steel in Sapphire & Steel, opposite Joanna Lumley. Sapphire and Steel are interdimensional agents who are assigned to guard the flow of time against corrupting elements. Relatively little of their background is revealed, although it is suggested they are immortal and, outside of their jobs, are little interested in human affairs. 34 episodes divided into six serials were aired in between 1979 and 1982.

In subsequent years, McCallum enjoyed regular work as a guest artist. He appeared in shows including The A-Team, Matlock, Murder, She Wrote, Father Dowling Mysteries, seaQuest DSV, VR5, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Law & Order, Sex and the City, Jeremiah and JAG. During this period he chalked up a memorable guest role in the Babylon 5 episode Infection, playing a corrupt archaeologist. Writer-producer J. Michael Straczynski would later disavow the episode as one of the worst in the series, but more due to his script rather than McCallum's reliably solid performance.

The two-part episode of JAG (2003) he appeared in was actually a backdoor pilot for a spin-off show called NCIS; when the spin-off was picked up, he was cast in the role of Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard, a chief medical examiner. He was a regular actor on the first fifteen seasons of the show (2003-2018). He retired from the role full-time in 2018 but continued to make guest appearances in every subsequent season. His last appearance was in the Season 20 finale which aired in May 2023; due to the writer's strike, no further episodes of the show had been written or produced, so this will also be his character's swansong on the series. He also played the character in two guest shots on spin-off show NCIS: New Orleans.

McCallum also picked up a small number of voice roles over the years, including Batman: The Brave and the Bold and video games Privateer 2: The Darkening and Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls.

Babylon 5: The Road Home

John Sheridan, the first President of the Interstellar Alliance, has relocated from Babylon 5 to Minbar, which will serve as the new base for the Alliance. A routine inspection of a new Minbari power plant inadvertently dislodges Sheridan in time, sending him through a series of alternate timelines where his life, and the fate of the galaxy, took a very different turn. Somehow, he has to find his way home.

The Road Home is the first animated film in the Babylon 5 franchise and the first new instalment of any kind since the release of DVD movie The Lost Tales in 2007. The animated medium allows the surviving actors to reprise their roles and also allows new actors to take over the roles of those actors who are sadly no longer with us (and, as oft-discussed, Babylon 5's attrition rate of actors has been extraordinarily high).

The main appeal of The Road Home is nostalgia: the animated film is so steeped in deep cut lore references to the original show that I'm not sure how much newcomers will get out of it, let alone the massive spoilers it contains for the events of the series. For a B5 veteran, it is tremendous fun to once again see Bruce Boxleitner, Claudia Christian, Patricia Tallman, Tracy Scoggins, Bill Mumy and Peter Jurasik reprise their roles as Sheridan, Ivanova, Lyta, Lochley, Lennier and Londo respectively. Peter Jurasik in particular slips back into his role as if zero time has passed, and his vocal delivery is spot-on (apart from Tallman, the other actors do have some of the sound of the intervening three decades in their voices). The newcomers are mostly decent, with Paul Guyet outstanding in replicating both Michael O'Hare and Tim Choate's vocal performances as Commander Sinclair and Zathras. Andrew Morgado has the hardest job in replicating the unique vocal stylings of Andreas Katsulas and wisely doesn't even try, instead choosing a similar haughty tone and making it his own.

The character animation is very nice, with a good amount of expression captured from the original actors, although the space CGI is sadly disappointing and lacking in detail: the White Star ships look like unfinished pieces of clay and the Starfuries look like their mid-1990s Micro Machine models. It's genuinely disappointing to see the spacecraft looking so lacking compared to their original incarnations, despite some good design ideas (the Shadow warships now having moving protuberances, for example).

In terms of story and character, The Road Home is a mixed bag. Sheridan flipping between time streams is a nice reuse of story elements from the Season 3 two-parter War Without End, but this promising idea is wasted slightly in revisiting scenes and ideas from the original show that we already saw decades ago. Newcomers will be lost without context and OG fans will find this material redundant. As the movie wears on and we get into newer ideas and start seeing alternate timelines where things unfolded differently, things pick up. It's also nice to get to see things we never saw in the original show, like a Vorlon planet-killer in full action and a Minbari jump gate in operation. But whilst that kind of trivia satisfies, there are also a bevy of continuity errors elsewhere that grate.

As a Babylon 5 project, the film has a lot of wince-inducing dialogue and awful humour, which was a hallmark of the original show, and to be frank would be missed if it wasn't present at least to some degree. However, the original show balanced that out with some beautiful speeches and occasional gags that worked well. The latter are mostly missing from this movie. This movie also mistakes long-worn-out memes as humour, so we get a ton of Zathras focusing on his "comic elements" and completely missing the pathos and tragedy that made the character so compelling on his original appearance in the episode Babylon Squared. Tone is something the movie struggles with a lot: the film feels too light and funny for the massive, grave stakes of the story, and any notion of subtlety from the original series has been lost. In the original, the Shadows were master manipulators who rarely emerged from the darkness and worked through disposable intermediaries and minions. Here, they are recklessly suicidal drones who directly attack enemies in swarms, not caring how many die in the process.

The movie (**½) leaves a Babylon 5 fan feeling conflicted: it is undeniably fun to see these characters again, and it's particularly gratifying to see an actual sequel project involving almost the entire cast of the show, for the first time since the end of the original series (the various spin-off media and DVD movies since then have involved just a few characters, or newcomers). The animation is solid, the voice acting mostly excellent, and at 80-ish minutes the film does not outstay its welcome. But the story feels a little pointless, the humour is often painful and the "alternate universe" set up in the movie as a possible future setting for new material is (at least at this prototypical stage) uninspiring.

The film is available on DVD, Blu-Ray and digital platforms now.

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BABYLON 5 to get long-requested Blu-Ray release

Seminal epic space opera show Babylon 5 is to finally get a release on Blu-Ray, after many, many years of campaigning by fans. The set will be released on 5 December this year in the USA, UK and some other territories.

Babylon 5 aired for five seasons and five TV movies, airing from 1993 to 1998. An additional TV movie and a direct-to-DVD film followed in 2002 and 2007, along with a 13-episode spin-off show, Crusade, in 1999. Babylon 5 was reasonably successful on its first airing, becoming the first non-Star Trek space opera to last for more than three seasons in American television history. It won two Hugo Awards for Best Dramatic Presentation (for the episodes The Coming of Shadows and Severed Dreams, in Seasons 2 and 3 respectively), along with an Emmy for visual effects. Babylon 5 helped pioneer the use of both CGI and long-term, serialised story arcs in a television series. The series was hugely influential on its contemporaries (such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and succeeding shows, including Lost, which borrowed ideas from its story arc structure.

The show had a somewhat complex technical issue which has made re-releases problematic. Babylon 5 was one of the first - if not the first - American TV shows to be protected for widescreen shooting, with the plan to release the entire show in 16:9 widescreen ratio at a later date, after its original 4:3 airing. However, due to technical issues and communications mixups, the show's then-cutting edge CGI was only produced in 4:3. For the original TV release this was not an issue, but for the DVD release in 2002, this created a technical headache, as fans and the studio wanted a widescreen release. Unable to afford the cost of recreating all the CGI and composite scenes in 16:9 from scratch, the decision was made to use the widescreen live-action footage but to crop and zoom in on the CGI shots. This created a widescreen presentation which lost detail and sometimes important CGI elements from those shots. For composite scenes, this also meant occasional but noticeable rapid zooming in and out of scenes as they alternated from pure live-action shots to CG composites.

In 2021, Babylon 5 was released in a new "remastered" format. To create the best compromise version, Warner Brothers remastered the live-action-only footage in HD and also carefully upscaled the CG shots via an algorithm. As these things go, this was not too terrible, and the improved live-action footage is impressive. However, to achieve a uniform presentation, they made the decision to crop the live-action shots back down to their original 4:3 presentation, and then keep the CG shots intact. As a compromise, this was reasonable, although frustrating for fans who wanted to see the show in HD and in widescreen.

The only alternative is to completely re-render all of the show's CG elements from scratch and in 16:9. This is likely prohibitively expensive, as Babylon 5 sometimes had 100 or more CG shots in a single episode, and also requires all of the original greenscreen footage to have been preserved perfectly. 

A stopgap idea has been pursued by B5 fan Tom Smith for several years, involving taking the original shots, ship models and scene files and re-rendering them in 16:9 and in HD (or even 4K) using modern PCs. This produces a visually identical image to the original, but with a lot more detail (the original models were very exactingly built for the standards of the time) and looks very nice today. However, this is only possible where all of that material has survived, either in the WB archive or in the archives of the various animators and teams that worked on the show. Smith tracked down a lot of that material for Seasons 2 and 3, but for Season 1 only the models have survived, and for Seasons 4 and 5 it appears that very little has survived, so this is not a viable solution for the entire show.

It also appears that the "complete series" title might be something of a misnomer. Based on the 2022 re-release and some of the initial release info, it looks like the set will include all five seasons of the original show, remastered, plus the pilot movie The Gathering, which was not remastered (due to issues with the original source film). The other TV movies - In the Beginning, Thirdspace, River of Souls and Call to Arms - plus the spin-off show Crusade and the later TV/DVD movies Legend of the Rangers, The Lost Tales and soon-to-be-released animated movie The Road Home, do not appear to be included at this time. If it is confirmed that some or all of them will be included, this news will be updated.

BABYLON 5 animated movie gets a trailer

The Babylon 5 animated movie, The Road Home, now has a trailer and release date.

The film will be released on DVD, Blu-Ray, 4K and on-demand streaming on 15 August this year.

Set more than a year after the end of the original Babylon 5 TV series, the movie sees John Sheridan, former commander of Babylon 5 and the newly-inaugurated President of the Interstellar Alliance, arrive on Minbar to take up his new role. However, an exposure to tachyon energy results in him moving uncontrollably through time and even across different timelines (fans with long memories will remember Sheridan was previously exposed to such energies in the two-part episode War Without End). Visiting timelines where some of his friends are dead, or they lost the Shadow War, Sheridan has to make his way back to his own timeline, with the help of some old friends.

The animated movie sees Bruce Boxleitner, Peter Jurasik, Claudia Christian, Bill Mumy and Tracy Scoggins reprise their original series roles as President Sheridan, Emperor Londo Mollari, Captain Susan Ivanova, Lennier and Captain Elizabeth Lochley respectively. Due to the sad attrition of the original cast in the years since it ended, other roles from the show will be played by new voice actors: Paul Guyet as Zathras and Jeffrey Sinclair, Anthony Hansen as Michael Garibaldi, Phil LaMarr as Dr. Stephen Franklin, Andrew Morgado as G'Kar and Rebecca Riedy as Delenn. Mara Junot plays a Reporter and a computer voice, whilst Piotr Michael plays David Sheridan.

J. Michael Straczynski wrote the script, with Matt Peters directing and Warner Brothers Animation handling the artwork.

Straczynski and Warner Brothers have also been developing a live-action reboot of the show. This project was previously in development at the CW, although it seemed unlikely to proceed further there. Work on the project is currently on hold as a result of the currently ongoing Writers' Guild of America strike.

BABYLON 5: THE ROAD HOME gets cast list and release window

The Babylon 5 animated film announced last week now has a name, synopsis and cast list.

The animated film will be called Babylon 5: The Road Home and its synopsis is as follows:

"Travel across the galaxy with John Sheridan as he unexpectedly finds himself transported through multiple timelines and alternate realities in a quest to find his way back home. Along the way he reunites with some familiar faces, while discovering cosmic new revelations about the history, purpose, and meaning of the Universe."

The film's cast consists of:

• Bruce Boxleitner as John Sheridan
• Claudia Christian as Susan Ivanova
• Peter Jurasik as Londo Mollari
• Bill Mumy as Lennier
• Tracy Scoggins as Elizabeth Lochley
• Patricia Tallman as Lyta Alexander
• Paul Guyet as Zathras and Jeffrey Sinclair
• Anthony Hansen as Michael Garibaldi
• Phil LaMarr as Dr. Stephen Franklin
• Andrew Morgado as G'Kar
• Rebecca Riedy as Delenn
• Piotr Michael as David Sheridan
• Mara Junot as Reporter/Computer Voice

Boxleitner, Christian, Jurasik, Mumy, Scoggins and Tallman reprise their roles from the original television series. The roles of Zathras, Sinclair, Garibaldi, Franklin, G'Kar and Delenn have been recast as, unfortunately, their original actors are no longer with us (Babylon 5's cast has been noted for an unusually high attrition rate since the show ended in 1998).

Original writer/creator J. Michael Straczynski writes and executive produces, with Matt Peters as director and Rick Morales as supervising producer and Sam Register as Executive Producer.

The film has been produced by Warner Bros. Animation and Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment and will be released this summer. A precise date and release venue has not been announced yet.

The new animated film takes place in the same continuity as the original live-action series, which aired five TV movies and 110 episodes across five seasons, from 1993 to 1998. The show spawned a 13-episode spin-off series, Crusade, and two further TV movies in 2002 and 2007. The show has also generated a substantial amount of spin-off material, including two tabletop roleplaying games, a couple dozen novels, a wargame, spacecraft miniature kits and action figures. The series was noted for its pioneering use of CGI and pre-planned serialised story arcs at a time when most television shows still relied on an episodic model.

In addition to this animated project, Straczynski has written a pilot script for a possible reboot of the premise in live action, in a new continuity. This new script was in development at the CW for some time, but recent rumours have suggested that Warner Brothers are developing it directly for a different venue.

Surprise BABYLON 5 animated movie announced

Warner Brothers have confirmed that they have produced a Babylon 5 animated film, written and produced by original creator J. Michael Straczynski.

Straczynski had been hyping up a new B5 announcement for a few weeks, although cautioning this had nothing to do with the mooted live-action reboot of the show (previously in development at the CW but recently moved to Warner Brothers directly). Speculation had been rife over audio dramas, video games or comics, but an animated feature film is something of a surprise.

The setting, cast, release date and even the title of the film will remain under wraps for another week or so, with further information to follow. However, Straczynski indicated that the film is already complete and in the can, and the release date will be "very soon," presumably indicating this year.

Although the cast remains a matter of speculation, Straczynski had previously confirmed he had spoken to Bruce Boxleitner about the project, hinting at a return for Captain/President John Sheridan (or, possibly, Boxleitner voicing another character in a cameo).

More information will follow next week.

RUMOUR: BABYLON 5 reboot dead at CW, still in development with Warner Brothers

Rumours are swirling that the Babylon 5 reboot project may be getting a renewed lease of life.

As previously related, Warner Brothers put Babylon 5 into development with a whole new fresh lick of paint as a ground-up reboot, with original writer/creator/showrunner J. Michael Straczynski once again in charge. The CW picked up the project and spent two years developing a pilot script (an unusually long time) before the network was sold off to new owners, who promptly smoked almost its entire drama development schedule to focus on cheap reality programming. Although Babylon 5 2.0 wasn't quite dead, it had certainly been dealt a serious injury and did not look likely to survive.

However, Warner Brothers have taken the view that there's no reason to waste all that expensive development work and have been shopping the project to other venues. The most logical option, HBO Max, is seemingly out of the question because they have their own budget and development issues in the wake of the Discovery merger. HBO proper don't seem interested, despite the presence of self-confessed Babylon 5 uberfan George R.R. Martin in the development process over there.

That meant Warner Brothers having to team up with another streamer or network. WB have a good relationship with Netflix, where former Babylon 5 scriptwriter Neil Gaiman (he's also done some other work) is currently working on their adaptation of Sandman. It's also possible that Amazon might be looking for a space opera show to replace the recently-concluded The Expanse. Paramount+ have so much Star Trek on the go that it's improbable they'd want a competing space opera show, but they do also have Halo on the go, suggesting they might be interested if the script was good enough. However, having two space opera franchises in operation might instead just make that possibility even less likely.

Some rumours (cited here) have Apple TV+ circling the property. Apple TV+ also have two ongoing space opera franchises, with the original alt-history From All Mankind charting an alternate history of the 20th and 21st centuries where the Space Race between the USSR and USA never wound down in the 1970s but continued full tilt with missions to Mars. Meanwhile Foundation is a loose adaptation of the Isaac Asimov novel series of the same name. Apple TV+ has also enjoyed success with psychological SF thriller Severance and the partially SF-themed sitcom Mythic Quest (which featured an outstanding literary SF storyline in its second season featuring actors playing authors Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury and Ursula K. Le Guin).

However, Apple are possibly about to loose their biggest draw, with football comedy-drama Ted Lasso (itself a Warner Brothers co-production) set to conclude after three seasons. If Apple can't find a direct replacement, they might be looking to establish a broader portfolio of shows with broad appeal. Babylon 5 is often cited as being enormously ahead of its time, featuring serialised storytelling long before it was fashionable, cutting-edge vfx, epic space battles, rich political intrigue and complex characters, often acting in morally flexible ways.

There are all strong arguments, but it does not mean that Babylon 5 reboot will definitely go ahead, at Apple TV+ or elsewhere. It does suggest that the CW was not quite the last, best hope for the project, and there are other interests circling it.

BABYLON 5 celebrates its 30th anniversary

Seminal space opera television series Babylon 5 has celebrated its 30th anniversary. The show's pilot movie, The Gathering, aired for the first time on 22 February 1993.

Babylon 5 ran for five seasons, notching up 110 episodes, seven TV movies and 13 episodes of a spin-off series, Crusade, between 1993 and 2007. It also generated a huge number of tie-in books, comics and roleplaying games, as well a video game that was - still bafflingly - cancelled when it was 95% complete.

The show was mainly set between the years 2257 and 2262 and depicted the misadventures of the crew and diplomats on board Babylon 5, a massive space station designed to serve as a sort-of United Nations in space, between the borders of five major powers and numerous smaller ones. Babylon 5 was purposefully designed by its creator, J. Michael Straczynski, as a "novel for television," with one pre-planned story unfolding over five years. This level of serialisation was unusual at the time, although not completely unprecedented. It was more unusual that the story arc was planned out in some detail ahead of time, though.

After a rough opening season, Babylon 5 hit its stride in its second and third seasons, with both years winning Hugo Awards for Best Dramatic Presentation. A near-cancellation in Season 4 saw Straczynski wrap up the main story arc last few episodes, but a late renewal allowed him to end the story as planned, albeit with a somewhat more spun-out fifth season than originally envisaged.

Babylon 5 broke the mould not just for serialisation, but also for its pioneering use of CGI to depict all of its visual effects. Most contemporary space shows still used very expensive models. As the show continued, its use of CG became more innovative, extending to the creation of virtual sets and all-CG aliens interacting with human actors; commonplace today but remarkable in the mid-1990s. B5 also used the Internet in a pioneering way, with Straczynski taking advantage of the Internet to discuss behind-the-scenes trivia and worldbuilding information with eager fans.

Despite its innovative structure, excellent pacing and outstanding cast, the show teetered on the edge of cancellation throughout its run, and has never had more than a dedicated, cult audience. The show also suffered appalling attrition among its main castmembers, making a continuation unfeasible. A Babylon 5 reboot project has instead been gestating at the CW for well over a year, although recent sweeping changes at the network and a retreat from drama commissions makes that project now unlikely to proceed (although the possibility remains of it finding a home elsewhere).

The CW will not develop any pilots for 2023-24, likely ending BABYLON 5 reboot development

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the American channel CW has effectively abandoned the development of new, original drama programming. It will not pick up any new pilots for the 2023-24 season and may only renew three of its existing shows for next year (only one, All American, has been announced). For genre fans, this likely means the end of any chances for the Babylon 5 reboot project to move ahead at the channel.

The CW has spent many years as a relatively scrappy underdog, putting out a number of successful mid-budget shows like Supernatural and The 100 and a whole slate of DC Comics-adjacent shows like The Flash, Arrow, Superman & Lois and Legends of Tomorrow. These shows failed to turn a profit in first run, but did form a highly attractive package that was re-sold to streamers like Netflix for huge sums of money. Ill-advisedly, the CW terminated this deal to try to use its shows to push out its own streaming options as part of HBO Max. However, it was nowhere near as successful as the Netflix deal, putting the CW on the back foot. In early 2022, the CW was sold to Nexstar Media Group who immediately pivoted hard towards cheap reality programming and overseas imports. Ten CW scripted originals were cancelled immediately, with more following since.

The CW had previously picked up development rights to classic space opera series Babylon 5. The original series had run from 1993 to 1998, in first-run syndication and then on the TNT channel. 110 episodes were produced across five seasons, also generating six TV movies and a spin-off show, Crusade, that was cancelled after half a season. The show had not garnered a massive audience, but it had done solidly and turned an immense profit given its very low production costs (achieved through pioneering the use of CGI). The show had also picked up significant critical acclaim and multiple awards, as well as an enthusiastic cult audience. The show had pioneered serialised storytelling in dramas in an age of stand-alones and reset buttons, with writers including Damon Lindelof, the Wachowskis and George R.R. Martin citing it as an influential work. A partial HD remaster of Babylon 5 generated positive press coverage in early 2021 and introduced a new audience to the series.

Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski confirmed that a Babylon 5 reboot was in development at the CW in September 2021. Due to the changes at the CW, the show's development was unusually put on hiatus for a year after it was not picked up in the previous renewal window in February 2022. However, the latest news seems to make the reboot an even more unlikely project then it already was.

The project may not be entirely dead. The new CW is looking for more adult shows to appeal to older viewers, especially if they can be delivered for under $5 million per episode. A legacy show with name value aimed at adult viewers with a reasonable overseas resale potential might still interest the new regime, but it would now appear to be a slim shot indeed, and almost certainly not happening this year.

Additionally, it's possible another streamer or channel takes on the project, although it is unclear which ones would be interested.

J. Michael Straczynski calls on BABYLON 5 fans to help boost the show's reboot chances

Babylon 5 creator and showrunner J. Michael Straczynski has called on fans to join a social media franchise to boost the show's profile and help get a planned reboot of the show off the ground.

As reported previously, Straczynski is currently developing a Babylon 5 reboot project with Warner Brothers, potentially to air on the CW. A pilot script has been written and the CW took the highly unusual step of turning down the project for the 2022-23 season but keeping it in active development for the 2023-24 season. Apparently this delay was partially down to major seismic shifts both at the CW, which has been bought by the Nexstar Media Group, and Warner Brothers, which has been bought by and merged with Discovery.

Straczynski wants a show of support to show the interest in the show, using the hashtag #B5onCWin23 across social media platforms. The campaign began yesterday and appears to have been successful, briefly trending at #1 for the day and displacing even coverage of Queen Elizabeth II's funeral in London.

The effectiveness of the campaign remains to be seen, although companies do factor in social media presence and profile in making these decisions.

Babylon 5 is a science fiction, space opera franchise created by Straczynski. It originally ran for 5 seasons and 110 episodes airing between 1993 and 1998, along with 7 TV movies and a short-lived spin-off series, Crusade. The series which was mostly written by Straczynski (who penned 91 of the episodes) and won critical acclaim during its original run, including two Hugo Awards. The show was particularly noteworthy for its dedication to telling one continuous story across five seasons - common now but unheard of at the time - and its pioneering use of CGI for its visual effects, including some of the earliest TV uses of virtual sets and 100% CG creatures. The show was also recently given a HD makeover and re-release.

Since the conclusion of the original show, the cast has unfortunately suffered a high level of attrition, effectively blocking attempts to revive the show with a "next generation" approach. Straczynski has instead planned a reboot, telling a similar story in a similar universe but with substantial differences to the original.

BABYLON 5 reboot still in development amidst major changes at The CW

Mark Pedowitz, CEO of The CW, has confirmed that the channel's Babylon 5 reboot is currently still in development. This is despite The CW going up for sale and a whole slew of the channel's shows being cancelled.

Created by J. Michael Straczynski, Babylon 5 aired for a pilot, five seasons and four TV movies from 1993 to 1998, followed by a spin-off series, Crusade, that was cancelled after half a season in 1999. A subsequent additional TV movie aired in 2002, and another one was released direct to DVD in 2007. The show also incorporated spin-off novels and comic books. The show was noted for its pioneering use of both serialised storytelling and CGI. It had modest ratings during its original run but strong critical acclaim, winning back-to-back Hugo Awards in 1996 and 1997.

After the end of the original run, original creator-showrunner-writer J. Michael Straczynski (also noted for his work on He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, The Real Ghostbusters, Jeremiah and Sense8, as well as his comics book work and the Clint Eastwood/Angelina Jolie film Changeling) spent some years developing a feature film featuring the original cast. However, a large number of the original cast has sadly passed away, making a Next Generation-style continuation of the show impossible.

Renewed interest in Babylon 5 was generated by a middling HD remaster which was released in early 2021 (which updated the live-action footage but not the CGI). Word of reboot of the show followed in September. Unusually, it was confirmed in February that Babylon 5 would not proceed in development for 2022, but would instead be held back until 2023, apparently so it would not be impacted by the imminent sale of The CW network.

The CW was founded in 2006 as a merger of The WB and UPN, owned by Warner Brothers and Paramount respectively. The two channels had struggled for a decent market share and joined forces to ensure more resources. The channel initially saw a reasonable hit with Supernatural and then a number of shows based on the DC Universe, starting Arrow and continuing with The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow, Black Lightning, Supergirl and Batwoman. The network also established other hit properties with The 100, Riverdale and The Vampire Diaries, among others. The network became stereotyped for having shows aimed at younger audiences with variable special effects, low budgets and a cheesy, old-fashioned feel. However, the network also became immensely profitable through a 2011 deal with Netflix worth $1 billion, which subsidised shows that aired to low ratings on their original American airing but garnered a much larger international audience.

The Netflix deal was terminated in 2019, with CW shows instead finding an outlet through direct overseas sales and American streaming via HBO Max. However, this did not in any way approach the sheer income generated by the prior Netflix deal. As a result, the network starting cancelling shows at rate of knots, culminating in a massacre in May 2022 when ten shows were cancelled, including Legends of Tomorrow. The CW is now being sold to the Nexstar Media Group.

The news that the Babylon 5 reboot is not dead is good, but it should come with caveats. It is possible and likely, once the deal is completed, that Nexstar will install their own CEO to replace Mark Pedowitz, who notes that he is a huge fan of the original show and has been trying to bring it back for many years. It is unlikely that a new CEO will be as invested in the project as him. New channel CEOs in fact usually terminate any shows in development they were not involved in and bring in their own projects to develop. There are a few exceptions, but they are rare. If Nextstar retain Pedowitz in the role, it's much more likely that the B5 reboot will happen. More news as we get it.

BABYLON 5 reboot to remain in development for another year

J. Michael Straczynski has provided an update to the percolating Babylon 5 reboot at The CW. The network has chosen not to pick up the pilot for its autumn 2022 launch slate, but, in an unusual move, is keeping project in active development with a view to it potentially launching in autumn 2023 instead.

According to Straczynski, the development process was complicated by the recent sale of the CW network, which had an impact on the type of shows and pilots in development. During this process, it appears that Babylon 5 fell outside the parameters of shows that were being picked up. Babylon 5 is something of an outlier for The CW, which has a lot of youth-oriented shows and superhero series. Babylon 5, on the other hand, is an adult-focused epic space opera.

Mark Pedowitz, President of The CW, has kept the show's development ticking over for an extra year whilst the dust settles from the sale of the network and everybody involved can see how the sale affects other shows in development.

If Babylon 5 is picked up for 2023, it will be very appropriate, as that would mark the 30th anniversary of the original show's debut.

BABYLON 5 reboot in development with J. Michael Straczynski in charge

It's been rumoured and discussed many times over the years, but something is now officially happening: a Babylon 5 reboot is in the planning stages with original creator and writer J. Michael Straczynski attached.

The new project is being helmed by the CW, although reportedly the show will retain a similar sensibility to the original and will not skew younger, as a lot of their content does. The show will open with Earthforce officer John Sheridan being assigned to Babylon 5, a massive space station serving as a diplomatic exchange and trade hub. Simultaneously with his arrival, an exploratory Earth mission inadvertently triggers a conflict with a more advanced alien civilisation, threatening humanity and several other races.

So far, this is only a development announcement and the show has not yet been greenlit to series or a pilot stage. It is unclear if any of Babylon 5's other creative forces are involved, such as fellow executive producer John Copeland, composer Christopher Franke or the visual effects team, or if any of the actors from the original series such as Bruce Boxleitner, Claudia Christian, Patricia Tallman, Peter Jurasik or Bill Mumy may return in new roles.

A reboot was considered the more likely form for the show to take, due to the deaths of so many original series actors (including Michael O'Hare, Jerry Doyle, Richard Biggs, Mira Furlan, Andreas Katsulas and Stephen Furst) making a sequel series unlikely. The original show is also considered a cult success without the familiarity of, say, a Star Trek or Star Wars, making a reboot of the original story more viable.

The original incarnation of Babylon 5 debuted in 1993 with a TV movie called The Gathering. Five seasons followed, totalling 110 episodes (with Straczynski writing 93 episodes in total), along with four TV movies and a spin-off series, Crusade, which ran for one season. Straczynski later penned a potential pilot for a second spin-off, Legends of the Rangers, and a straight-to-DVD movie in 2007 called Babylon 5: The Lost Tales. Warner Brothers expressed an interest in developing more content, but Straczynski bailed out of the project due to a lack of budget and interest in developing a spin-off feature film he'd penned. The franchise also extended to tabletop roleplaying games, miniatures wargames and a line of novels.

Babylon 5 won two Hugo Awards during its time on air and attracted immense acclaim for its heavily serialised, pre-planned story arc at a time when most TV shows were still episodic. Babylon 5's structure and storytelling ambitions inspired other writers, including Damon Lindelof, Joss Whedon and the Wachowskis, whilst Ronald D. Moore consulted with Straczynski during the development of his take on Battlestar Galactica. Babylon 5's epic story and meticulous worldbuilding drew on sources such as J.R.R. Tolkien, Frank Herbert, Ray Bradbury and British SFF shows Blake's 7, The Prisoner and Doctor Who for inspiration, as well as the original Star Trek (Straczynski tapped a number of writers from the original Star Trek to work on the show in its first season). The show also won numerous awards for its cutting-edge (for the time) digital effects, which paved the way for CGI dominate the TV visual effects industry.

Warner Brothers recently released a high definition remaster of the original series on streaming services worldwide. Although the live action footage looks vastly superior, the CGI is variably upscaled.

Straczynski's star has risen since Babylon 5, with him penning multiple successful comic books, developing the story for the 2011 Thor movie (as well as cameoing in the film), being nominated for an Oscar for his script for the 2008 movie Changeling and co-writing the Netflix series Sense8 with the Wachowskis. Straczynski recently released a well-received autobiography, Becoming Superman, and a new novel called Together We Will Go. He also recently completed the editing of his friend Harlan Ellison's fifty-year-gestating short story anthology The Last Dangerous Visions, which is expected for publication next year.

This is a promising development, although fans will likely be concerned that the CW is developing the property rather than HBO or HBO Max, which could perhaps give the series the resources and exposure it deserves. It will be interesting to see how this develops.

J. Michael Straczynski volunteers to take over as DOCTOR WHO showrunner from Chris Chibnall

Noted American SF screenwriter, producer and showrunner J. Michael Straczynski has thrown his name into the ring to take over Doctor Who once incumbent Chris Chibnall departs at the end of 2022.

Straczynski is a noted Doctor Who fan of many decades' standing, having watched the show when it aired on PBS in the United States in the 1970s. Straczynski, a self-confessed Anglophile, was also a massive fan of The Prisoner and Blake's 7, and has frequently cited all three as influences on his classic space opera series Babylon 5.

Straczynski has also cast Doctor Who alumni on his showers: Guy Siner (Genesis of the Daleks) appeared as a Minbari on Babylon 5 and Christopher Neame (Shada) was a "Knight" on the same show, whilst Sylvester McCoy (the Seventh Doctor) and Freema Agyeman (Martha Jones) appeared on his later Netflix series Sense8.

Doctor Who has traditionally always been headed up by a British showrunner, although its original creator Sydney Newman was Canadian and the show's second showrunner (though the term did not exist back then), John Wiles, was South African. Even the producer in charge of the 1996 American Doctor Who TV movie was British, Philip Segal.

Furthermore, even if the BBC were willing to look beyond Britain for a new showrunner, they seem to have a specific antipathy towards American writers. Acclaimed SF and horror novelist Joe Hill pitched three scripts to Doctor Who with the help of Neil Gaiman and received a shocking reply from the BBC saying, "We have never let an American write Doctor Who, and if we were going to, we wouldn't start with you."

So the chances of Straczynski being considered for the role appear to be slim, despite the fact he's a very popular choice among both fans and more general viewers and would tick the boxes of being a strong SF writer of great experience, a very experienced showrunner and also a writer noted for tackling wide-ranging and diverse subject matter. It seems more likely that the BBC will be looking for a British (or, at the very least, non-American) producer instead.

A semi-HD version of BABYLON 5 has been released to streaming services

A high-definition version Babylon 5 has been released on HBO Max in the US today, until the title of "Babylon 5 Remastered." The international Amazon and iTunes version of the show have also been updated to the new format.

I previously reported last year that a "remastered" version of Babylon 5 had been released on some streaming services, although it was released in standard definition only and the only major change had been shifting the format back to the 4:3 (non-widescreen) image that the show had been originally broadcast in. This change in format was good news because it meant restoring the show's pioneering CGI to its original format. The show had originally had its live-action footage shot in and protected for widescreen, but the CG and composite (live action/effects combinations) shots were only created in 4:3. To overcome the problem, the show's previous widescreen releases (such as on DVD) had cropped the effects footage by zooming into the image until it filled the screen, resulting in a loss of image quality. However, the "remaster" in standard definition otherwise seemed a bit pointless.

Today's move significantly improves the live-action image quality, with that footage now in higher definition. Warner Brothers report that they rescanned the original film negatives to create HD live-action shots (complete with colour correction and removing damage and problems) and have improved the CG footage by reverting to the original 4:3 image and applying some up-resolution techniques. These techniques have limits - the CG and composites still look lower-resolution and somewhat blurrier than the live-action footage - but they do look moderately better than before. The biggest problem is the credits at the start of each episode which now look somewhat washed out. Also the title sequence was natively created in widescreen even in the 4:3 cut, making the titles look almost comically tiny in the centre of the screen, which is a shame but unavoidable without remaking them from scratch.

The result is, having watched one episode to completion (Season 3, Episode 10, Severed Dreams) and sampled scenes from several others (And Now For a Word, Intersections in Real Time), probably the best the show has looked to date. The live action scenes are much better and the CG, although definitely still blurrier than is ideal, is at least hugely improved over the DVDs and the previous streaming releases. The loss of the widescreen live-action footage is a shame, though, and I suspect will annoy some fans, even as the improvements to the effects shots will please many others.

The new HD-ish version of Babylon 5 is also apparently headed to Blu-Ray, with various news sites and international sellers claiming that a box set release could happen as early as March, although some sites have since changed their dates to December, suggesting a date is not fully fixed.

There are several problems with the remaster. The first is that whatever technique they used to re-scan the original footage was clearly not on a par with the excellent Star Trek: The Next Generation remaster undertaken in 2012-15. The live-action footage from that remaster looks like it was shot yesterday, the footage in Babylon 5 does...not. It's still a big improvement on what we've seen before, but it's clearly not in that league. There are still artifacts particularly in dark scenes where pixilation is clearly occurring, probably not helped by the bitrate most streaming services use; these issues may not be present on a Blu-Ray transfer.

The pilot episode, The Gathering, has also not bee remastered; the original film footage was either lost completely or badly damaged in flooding in the studio (one rumour back in the day was that the film had also been nibbled on by rats), so it is presented in standard definition.

More concerningly, there are about three minutes of material missing from Season 1, Episode 20, Babylon Squared and around two minutes missing from Season 4, Episode 1, The Hour of the Wolf. Hopefully this will be fixed soon and will not be on the Blu-Ray release.

It is clear, unfortunately but understandably given Babylon 5's relative obscurity, that Warner Brothers are not prepared to spend the ~$20 million or more it would cost to completely remaster the show properly, that is do a high-quality scan of all of the film footage and then re-render the CGI at native HD resolution in widescreen (although one fan has recently recreated some scenes using the original CG models and scene data files at a much lower cost, with impressive results).

It looks like this might be the best we're ever going to see the show looking. If so, it's a reasonable compromise and will make attracting new viewers a bit more palatable.

RIP Mira Furlan

In tragic news, actress Mira Furlan has passed away at the age of 65.

Furlan was born in Zagreb, Croatia, in the former Yugoslavia. She became interested in acting as a teenager, and learned English due to being a fan of American and British music. She studied acting at college and made her TV debut in 1976 in a TV movie, Knez. She became a regular on television in the series Velo Misto in 1980-81 and gained acclaim for her performance in the 1985 movie, When Father Was Away on Business.

Furlan married her Serbian husband, director Goran Gajić, in the late 1980s and commuted between Zagreb and Belgrade where he was directing plays. She appeared in productions in both cities. Although Furlan considered herself a Yugoslav first and foremost, this became an unpopular position as the country was riven by fierce nationalism between its constituent parts. In 1991, after the civil war that would lead to the break-up of Yugoslavia began, she was fired from the Croatian National Theatre for refusing to stop acting in Serbia. After some discussion, she and her husband fled the country and moved to New York City.

A year later, they relocated to Los Angeles when Furlan was cast in her most famous role, that of Minbari Ambassador Delenn in Babylon 5. The role was challenging, as Furlan had to act through significant prosthetics. In addition, she had to play a character whose gender was indeterminate, who would undergo a metamorphosis at the end of the first season to become female. Although she was fine with the prosthetics, she was less happy when she learned her voice was going to be electronically distorted to hide her gender as well. It was decided to drop this idea for the pilot. When the show was renewed for a full season, it was also decided to modify her makeup to be less restrictive. The metamorphosis saw the makeup reduced further, which helped make Furlan more identifiable with her character.

Furlan played Delenn in all five seasons of Babylon 5, becoming one of the show's leading players, and in several spin-off TV movies based on the series, as well as an unreleased video game.

She also voiced the role of Silver Sable on the Spider-Man animated show and was a guest star on several other shows.

In 2004 she was cast on the television series Lost, the biggest show on American TV, playing the role of French castaway Danielle Rousseau. She appeared in twenty episodes spanning the whole show; her character was killed off in the fourth season, but she was able to reappear in the final season thanks to flashbacks, time travel and parallel universes.

In addition to acting on stage and screen, she did voice work for several video games: Payday 2 (2013), Elite: Dangerous (2014), Uncharted 4: A Thief's End (2016) and Mafia: Definitive Edition (2020). Her recent roles include Vonn Odara on Space Command and the Traveller on Just Add Magic. During recent years, Furlan was a frequent attendee at Babylon 5 fan conventions.

Furlan had been ill for some time, although there had been hopes of improvement recently. Babylon 5 showrunner J. Michael Straczynski confirmed her passing on social media. She is survived by her husband and son. An intense and skilled performer, she will be missed.

BABYLON 5 joins HBO Max in the US on 26 January

Classic science fiction series Babylon 5 will join HBO Max in the USA on 26 January.

The show has bounced around several different streamers in the last few years, most recently finding a home on Amazon Prime before being pulled a year ago. It's unclear if this version of the show will be the somewhat-nominally "remastered" version that's been cropping up on paid services recently, but it seems likely.

I have a recommended viewing order here for those planning to jump on the show for the first time.

Warner Brothers releases a somewhat-exaggerated BABYLON 5 "remaster"

Warner Brothers has begun releasing what they are - with some exaggeration - calling "Babylon 5 Remastered" via streaming services Amazon Prime and iTunes.

In truth, this is not really the original show remastered but more "reverted," that is, returned to its original format in which it was broadcast in the 1990s and subsequently released on VHS. The show was subsequently re-edited in widescreen in 2004 for release on DVD and later streaming services, but this involved digitally cropping and zooming the various CG and composite effects shots, resulting in noticeable and frequent drops in visual quality as the show moved between live-action-only and effects material. This "remaster" does nothing more than revert to the original, non-widescreen broadcast version of the show, run through a colour filter. The result is nothing like a remaster, but is superior to the widescreen version of the show at the cost of losing the widescreen image.

The problem was originally caused by a mismatch in the original production of the show. The series was shot on 35mm film in 16:9 widescreen, but was mastered on 4:3 video for home release. The plan was to create a widescreen version of the show to future-proof it for later generations, and a non-widescreen version for contemporary viewers. Unfortunately, a miscommunication and Warner Brothers' refusal to buy the effects team a $5,000 widescreen reference monitor meant that the CGI and other vfx footage was only rendered and shot in 4:3 in the first place. When Warner Brothers wanted to create a widescreen version, they found that the live-action footage existed in widescreen but the CG and composites did not. Their only solution was to zoom into the effects images until it filled the widescreen image, at the expense of losing material from the top and bottom of the screen. This created various problems, most notably increased pixilation and "fuzziness" of the effects images and details being lost from the CG footage.

There were two solutions to this problem: either revert to the original 4:3 masters or re-render all of the CG and effects footage in native widescreen and HD. This latter approach would be mind-bogglingly expensive. A similar project in 2012-15 for Star Trek: The Next Generation cost well over $20 million and that was for a show where most of the effects were created in-camera, so were easier to recreate. The ST:TNG remaster project also bombed on home media release and never turned a profit. Babylon 5 had much, much more CGI and far more vfx shots than ST:TNG (even considering that TNG was 68 episodes longer than B5). Warner Brothers have shown little to no appetite for a project of this scale and complexity for a show that, with the best will in the world, is far more obscure than ST:TNG. One fan recently re-rendered some shots using the original CG models and scene files in widescreen and HD, but it took over 100 hours with home equipment to do just a few minutes of footage, demonstrating how expensive and time-consuming it would be to do the entire series.

As a result Warner Brothers have gone for the low-hanging fruit of reverting to the 4:3 original footage and applying some colour saturation filters. To be fair this has resulted in an image that is noticeably sharper and warmer than the widescreen DVD conversion, and of course it means the CG is now back to its original format and all the better for it. Calling it a "remaster" is definitely an exaggeration, though.

"Babylon 5 Remastered" is currently being released piecemeal on streaming services. Warner Brothers have not yet announced any kind of home media release, but considering this isn't a proper HD remaster, I'd be surprised to see one.