What About The Sets?

[Republibot 3.0]

I'm kind of a production junkie - one of those annoying kids who tried to figure out where the cameras and lights were when shooting a scene, and sketched out how I thought the sets were laid out and how they fit together and stuff - whcih has got me to wondering:

What's become of the B5 and Crusade sets?

When Crusade was cancelled, I know the sets for that show were "Folded and stored" in case the show went back in to production, or possibly they could be used somewhere else. That was a decade ago, however, and it's got to be expensive to preserve them if they're just gathering dust. Does anyone know what became of 'em? Are they still around, or have they been scrapped?

I'm also wondering what's become of the B5 sets. Some of 'em were obviously redressed and resued in the series (The Casino became the War Room, I'm pretty sure, etc) and others just disappeared (Ehrharts), and some made their way in to Crusade in one form or another (The bullet train, the reverse wall of the Zocalo, etc) - were these folded and stored, too, or were they just destroyed, or what's the deal?

Anyone know?

 

[Jan]

As you noted, a few B5 sets were stored for use in Crusade, the rest were scrapped. Mostly, at least. I know of two pieces of set which found their way to Ebay. One was one of the tiles from Medlab with the symbol on it, the other was a piece from Londo's quarters.

I'm sure by now all of the Crusade sets have been discarded.

I have three of the set models made by John Iacovelli for "The Gathering". If you're interested, you can see them at http://photos.b5archivist.com/GalleryThumbnails.aspx?gallery=212359&page=2

Jan

 

[KoshN]

As you noted, a few B5 sets were stored for use in Crusade, the rest were scrapped. Mostly, at least. I know of two pieces of set which found their way to Ebay. One was one of the tiles from Medlab with the symbol on it, the other was a piece from Londo's quarters.

I'm sure by now all of the Crusade sets have been discarded.

From one of my bookmarked areas of JMSNews:

http://www.jmsnews.com/msg.aspx?id=1-16584
Date: 6/26/2002 11:27:00 PM

We saved a small number of the B5 sets for Crusade (part of the zocalo, some
conference rooms, a couple of quarters and a hallway, that's about it) since we
were going to be going back and forth to B5. But when Crusade went down, those
sets were also elimated, as were the sets for Rangers.

The Crusade sets, yes, including the new ones ( http://www.jmsnews.com/msg.aspx?id=1-1945 and http://www.jmsnews.com/msg.aspx?id=1-1948 ) that TNT put all that money into during the first Crusade production shutdown, were destroyed more than seven years ago.

 

[Republibot 3.0]

@ KoshN: Damn. That's a pisser. That really is. I can't imagine that kind of waste. You'd figure they'd at least try to amortize their losses by using them in other productions. For instance, when "V" went south, the various sets from that show turned up for years in other NBC shows as "Labs" or "NASA Headquarters" or whatever.

Still, thank you for telling me. I'd wondered, and it's nice to be able to put a period at the end of that sentence.

@ Jan: Definitely I'm interested! Thank you! Looking now, very cool!

 

[KoshN]

@ KoshN: Damn. That's a pisser. That really is. I can't imagine that kind of waste. You'd figure they'd at least try to amortize their losses by using them in other productions. For instance, when "V" went south, the various sets from that show turned up for years in other NBC shows as "Labs" or "NASA Headquarters" or whatever.

Still, thank you for telling me. I'd wondered, and it's nice to be able to put a period at the end of that sentence.

That's TNT and Warner Brothers for you.

TNT: the SOBs who cancelled Crusade.

Warner Brothers: the people who lost all of the B5 & Crusade CGI files that Babylonian Productions turned in to them after Crusade went down, destroyed 99.9% of the sets [They had a doorway and a Starfury cockpit for B5: The Lost Tales.], and sold off or destroyed most of the wardrobe and props.

TNT is the monkey wrench though, that destroyed B5's post-1999 future on TV and in movies. Crusade's cancellation is the initiating event that led directly led to the loss of the CGI files. With that handicap, and Warners insisting on full ownership of the B5 universe on TV, nothing else could ever get traction. The Rangers pilot suffered because of the lost CGI files. There's less you can do on a single TV movie budget when you have to recreate what you should be able to just use, and then Warners insisting on retaining ownership of Rangers sunk it as as far as The Sci-Fi Channel/Universal was concerned. Then, the Rangers sets were destroyed. Then, for the "Babylon 5 - The Lost Tales" they had almost no budget and had to make all of the sets from scratch, and 99% of them were green screen sets.

 

[Republibot 3.0]

Yeah, it bothers me. There's so much absolute crap out there that won't die - Star Trek, I'm looking at you, Battlestar Galactica, you're next! - and then you get simple burrocratic greed that manages to render all this stuff stillborn. It drives me nuts. MGM is able to take a marginal property like the Stargate franchise and keep it running for fifteen years and 320 episode - and make it *good* - with such a halfbaked premise, and yet Warners, with vastly more resources, talent, and opportunity can't seem to stop screwing the pooch. It makes me angry, if I let it.

 

[KoshN]

....and yet Warners, with vastly more resources, talent, and opportunity can't seem to stop screwing the pooch. It makes me angry, if I let it.

Warner Brothers is their own worst enemy. They're utterly hopeless.

 

[Republibot 3.0]

Amen, brother, preach on!

And it's not just B5 - I suppose they could be forgiven for just mismanaging one odd property - but they really have been given every advantage, and they keep just pissing it away. When's that next Superman movie coming out, for instance? Oh, yeah: never.

 

[Jade Jaguar]

Warner Brothers is their own worst enemy. They're utterly hopeless.

I guess that means they are fratricidal...

 

[Republibot 3.0]

More like an unfortunate combination of "Conniving" and "Stupid." <G>

 

[KoshN]

More like an unfortunate combination of "Conniving" and "Stupid." <G>

Conniving and Stupid, and Shortsighted, Greedy, Selfish, and Amnesiac.

Add "Spiteful" and you have TNT-Atlanta of 1999.

 

[Republibot 3.0]

All of which would be acceptable, if it weren't for the fact that *both* of 'em (TNT and WB) are laying awake and nights, wishing they had the equivalent of Trek or Stargate, and not realizing they've had it all along.