(UTV | COLOMBO) – One of the key genre progenitors of modern serialised television is set to be rebooted. Variety reports that “Babylon 5” is set to get a do over with original creator/writer J. Michael Straczynski spearheading the new project for Warner Bros. Television and The CW.
The series follows the officers and key ambassadors onboard the titular five-mile-long space station during a time of uneasy peace between the five major races. Over the course of the series, both an intergalactic war with the ancient ‘Shadows’, and the rise of a fascist world government on Earth played out
Unlike most series (especially at the time), the original was conceived from the get go with the entire timeline mapped out before and after the events of the show – so right from the start it allowed for teases of story and character threads that paid off years later.
Straczynski himself, who also co-showran “Sense8,” wrote much of the show’s 110 episode run with the show starting out standalone, moving into heavy serialisation and then pulling back to more standalone again. He also built in ‘trap doors’ allowing for actors to exit and timelines to be squished where necessary.
The new take is described as a “from the ground up reboot,” not a revival so original actors like Bruce Boxleitner, Claudia Christian, and Peter Jurasik aren’t expected back. Quite a few of the show’s original cast members have passed away since the show’s release like Mira Furlan, Jerry Doyle, Andreas Katsulas, Michael O’Hare, Jeff Conaway, Stephen Furst and Richard Biggs.
In the new take 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.
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.
An HD remaster of the original arrived on HBO Max and VOD services like iTunes earlier this year.