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Message

Subject: Re: Is B5 dead?
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 06:24:08 +0000 (UTC)
From: jmsatb5@aol.com
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated

"Are we now reduced to hoping for a book once or twice a decade? Is
there any
reason to have hope for more of what we love so much?
Is Babylon 5, as we know it....dead?"


This question comes up periodically, and I'll give it pretty much the
same answer that I always give...that there is a difference between
*dead* and *complete*.

If a novelist writes a book, and he doesn't write five more books in
that universe, with those characters, is the book dead?  Or completed?

When I embarked on B5, I wasn't out to create a franchise, wasn't
looking to springboard this out into a zillion other projects...I
resisted merchandising, and made it clear to all parties that this
would be five seasons, no more.  Because that's I figured it would take
me to tell that story.  The only thing I asked of the universe was that
I be able to tell the story to its end, and that I not die before
finishing it.  That's all.

And somehow, both happened...and I'm happy with that.

I've said it a hundred times before...if something happens to come up
in the B5 universe that's fun to tell, and someone wants to provide a
venue, great...if not, also great.  I told the story that I wanted,
needed to tell.  When Zack says, in SiL, "We did what we said we were
gonna do, and nobody can ever take that away from us," that was the
author speaking through him.

What I set out to do with that show, I did, and nobody can ever take
that away.  I told the story I wanted to tell.  Everything else is
lagniappe.

jms