Alioth
Regular
While we speculate on and await the answer to whether there will be "More B5 on the Way" and what that will be, I thought it might be interesting to poll the board here as to what area of the B5 universe they'd like to see a series, miniseries, or movie cover. I'm not sure if JMS ever looks at boards like this to get a feel for the opinions of fandom, who knows, he may.... 
Here are the poll options, which I divide into two general areas: Material that already exists in some canonical form or would significantly overlap with existing material (including the original series timeline itself), and material covering spaces and times not at all covered (or barely covered) in any previous canonical material.
Already existing material:
1--The Centauri Trilogy. The story of Londo's "reign" as Emperor and puppet to the Drakh, and Vir's eventual liberation of his world from that order. Could have other previously unmentioned events of the same time period tied in, such as the Drakh's doings elsewhere, the Excalibur (or others) finding the cure to the Drakh plague of Earth, the Telepath War (might Centauri telepaths also have been involved), etc., but the main arc would be based on the Trilogy.
2--The Technomage Trilogy. This story almost completely fits into the same time frame as the B5 series and parallels it nicely, but from a completely different perspective. I've found though that the books themselves probably wouldn't stand alone well without prior knowledge of B5--they seem to be written assuming that the reader will already be familiar with the series, key characters like Sheridan, Londo, etc., because they are not developed independently in the books for the neophyte. This is actually also true of the Centauri Trilogy above, and the PsiCorps Trilogy, but probably most crucially so here. So some additional exposition might be needed for the benefit of those who never watched the original series. But potentially this could make a fascinating and visually stunning miniseries, with some pretty heavy themes.
3--The PsiCorps Trilogy. There is a big hole between books two and three where the Telepath War occurred though, so a series or miniseries following the trilogy would probably want to include the Teep War and what Bester did in that, as Book 3 starts with him suddenly being a hunted war criminal for activities done therein. I assume no canon material of any kind has covered the Telepath War because JMS wanted to keep that open for some future release. Just the Telepath War itself is another poll option below.
4--The Shadow Within. This would likely be a single movie, covering the doomed voyage of the Icarus.
Material not yet covered:
5--The Shadow War from the perspective of Earth. The rise of Clark, Earth's descent into an Orwellian dictatorship, Shadow (and possibly post-expulsion, Drakh) maneuverings and manipulations of the power players of the Earth Alliance, PsiCorps activities and maneuverings, sung and unsung heroes of the Resistance on Earth, Mars, and other colonies, secret Ranger operations therein, etc. In the original show, some of the more blatantly Orwellian acts of the government and the rather quick descent into them struck me as almost unbelievable (that they could happen, no, but that they happened so quickly, like within a year or year-and-a-half, yes)--usually it takes a bit longer to boil a frog, but maybe there were things going on well before that facilitated this sudden change--maybe they were already halfway there at the beginning of the series, but we didn't see much of that. This could provide more depth to that, and maybe serve as a good cautionary tale. Would parallel B5 seasons 1-4 and maybe previous, but like the Technomage Trilogy from a completely different perspective, with a different set of main characters (General Hague and probably William Edgars among them).
6--The last Shadow War, circa 1000 years before B5. The story of Valen's leadership of the Minbari, G'Quan on Narn during the Shadow residency there, possibly the Centauri-Xon conflict and the first Centauri Emperor (IIRC that was also supposed to be 1000 years prior to B5, probably not by coincidence either), Weirden and the Technomages, etc. If we incorporate humans into this, we'd have to figure out plausible covert doings with them by the First Ones or their proxies (maybe Drak'hul?)--I almost wonder if such a series or miniseries could succeed without the incorporation of any humans in it (excepting, after a fashion, Valen, but...).
7--The Telepath War. We really, really don't know much of anything about what supposedly happened here, just a few reflections of the event from way after the fact (and that Lennier died in it). I for one am really curious.
8--Continuation of the Crusade series. Were they the ones who found the cure (we know it was found), and what might the Excalibur have done after that, assuming it was found well before the 5 years was up? I think I've heard that JMS had something else in mind, that the race for the cure wasn't the entirety of his intended arc with that series and wouldn't have covered the whole time line.
9--The Legend of the Rangers. Whatever that series would have been.
And then there is the obligatory Option 10, which would be "Other" (and which one should explain in the thread).
Hopefully the poll goes through correctly and not like the glitch with the Ep thread polls. Feel free to choose more than one, but confine your answers to what you'd particularly favor--we'd all probably like to see any of these as we're hungry for anything B5, but don't go voting for all of them else the poll would be kind of meaningless....
Also, any potential problems you see with any of these scenarios, feel free to comment as well.
Here are the poll options, which I divide into two general areas: Material that already exists in some canonical form or would significantly overlap with existing material (including the original series timeline itself), and material covering spaces and times not at all covered (or barely covered) in any previous canonical material.
Already existing material:
1--The Centauri Trilogy. The story of Londo's "reign" as Emperor and puppet to the Drakh, and Vir's eventual liberation of his world from that order. Could have other previously unmentioned events of the same time period tied in, such as the Drakh's doings elsewhere, the Excalibur (or others) finding the cure to the Drakh plague of Earth, the Telepath War (might Centauri telepaths also have been involved), etc., but the main arc would be based on the Trilogy.
2--The Technomage Trilogy. This story almost completely fits into the same time frame as the B5 series and parallels it nicely, but from a completely different perspective. I've found though that the books themselves probably wouldn't stand alone well without prior knowledge of B5--they seem to be written assuming that the reader will already be familiar with the series, key characters like Sheridan, Londo, etc., because they are not developed independently in the books for the neophyte. This is actually also true of the Centauri Trilogy above, and the PsiCorps Trilogy, but probably most crucially so here. So some additional exposition might be needed for the benefit of those who never watched the original series. But potentially this could make a fascinating and visually stunning miniseries, with some pretty heavy themes.
3--The PsiCorps Trilogy. There is a big hole between books two and three where the Telepath War occurred though, so a series or miniseries following the trilogy would probably want to include the Teep War and what Bester did in that, as Book 3 starts with him suddenly being a hunted war criminal for activities done therein. I assume no canon material of any kind has covered the Telepath War because JMS wanted to keep that open for some future release. Just the Telepath War itself is another poll option below.
4--The Shadow Within. This would likely be a single movie, covering the doomed voyage of the Icarus.
Material not yet covered:
5--The Shadow War from the perspective of Earth. The rise of Clark, Earth's descent into an Orwellian dictatorship, Shadow (and possibly post-expulsion, Drakh) maneuverings and manipulations of the power players of the Earth Alliance, PsiCorps activities and maneuverings, sung and unsung heroes of the Resistance on Earth, Mars, and other colonies, secret Ranger operations therein, etc. In the original show, some of the more blatantly Orwellian acts of the government and the rather quick descent into them struck me as almost unbelievable (that they could happen, no, but that they happened so quickly, like within a year or year-and-a-half, yes)--usually it takes a bit longer to boil a frog, but maybe there were things going on well before that facilitated this sudden change--maybe they were already halfway there at the beginning of the series, but we didn't see much of that. This could provide more depth to that, and maybe serve as a good cautionary tale. Would parallel B5 seasons 1-4 and maybe previous, but like the Technomage Trilogy from a completely different perspective, with a different set of main characters (General Hague and probably William Edgars among them).
6--The last Shadow War, circa 1000 years before B5. The story of Valen's leadership of the Minbari, G'Quan on Narn during the Shadow residency there, possibly the Centauri-Xon conflict and the first Centauri Emperor (IIRC that was also supposed to be 1000 years prior to B5, probably not by coincidence either), Weirden and the Technomages, etc. If we incorporate humans into this, we'd have to figure out plausible covert doings with them by the First Ones or their proxies (maybe Drak'hul?)--I almost wonder if such a series or miniseries could succeed without the incorporation of any humans in it (excepting, after a fashion, Valen, but...).
7--The Telepath War. We really, really don't know much of anything about what supposedly happened here, just a few reflections of the event from way after the fact (and that Lennier died in it). I for one am really curious.
8--Continuation of the Crusade series. Were they the ones who found the cure (we know it was found), and what might the Excalibur have done after that, assuming it was found well before the 5 years was up? I think I've heard that JMS had something else in mind, that the race for the cure wasn't the entirety of his intended arc with that series and wouldn't have covered the whole time line.
9--The Legend of the Rangers. Whatever that series would have been.
And then there is the obligatory Option 10, which would be "Other" (and which one should explain in the thread).
Hopefully the poll goes through correctly and not like the glitch with the Ep thread polls. Feel free to choose more than one, but confine your answers to what you'd particularly favor--we'd all probably like to see any of these as we're hungry for anything B5, but don't go voting for all of them else the poll would be kind of meaningless....
Also, any potential problems you see with any of these scenarios, feel free to comment as well.
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