The Scripts of J. Michael Straczynski, Vol. 1 347
chromatic writes "It's hard to overestimate the influence that Babylon 5 had on American
television, especially science fiction and dramas. When it debuted, it was a
smaller, scrappier competitor to Paramount's revitalized Star Trek franchise.
When it ended, it had proven that not only could you tell a complex, layered
story over multiple years (and through the demise of syndication, yearly
struggles with funding, and often frustrating and unexpected troubles with
schedules and actors), but that a lean, creator-driven show could succeed
artistically." Read on for chromatic's review.
| The Scripts of J. Michael Straczynski, Vol. 1 | |
| author | J. Michael Straczynski |
| pages | 454 |
| publisher | Synthetic Worlds Publishing |
| rating | Worth reading for B5 fans and television students. |
| reviewer | chromatic |
| ISBN | none |
| summary | Notes on and scripts to the first half of Babylon 5 season 1. |
Through the course of the show, its creator J. Michael Straczynski (JMS) wrote 92 of the 110 episodes filmed, including every episode of seasons three and four and all but one episode of season five-- a record-breaking achievement. Now he's publishing all of his scripts, as written, in multiple volumes from Babylon5Scripts.com.
There are plenty of books about screenwriting and many include a few examples of actual scripts (another book from JMS himself reprints the script to the Hugo-award winning second season episode "The Coming of Shadows"). Yet what other book or series of books even promises to show the development of a series from inspiration to the final frame of the final episode? What's in the book (and the forthcoming volumes) for a Babylon 5 or sci-fan, let alone someone interested in the mechanics of television?
The Scripts of J. Michael Straczynski, volume 1 includes the first five JMS-penned episodes from season one, as well as the unfilmed draft of the pilot movie "The Gathering". Each episode includes a short essay with notable information about the writing, planning, or filming of the episode. There's also a short section of photos at the end, along with seven memos from the start of the project through the filming of the pilot.
Subsequent volumes reportedly will include similar information. The second, including the remaining seven episode JMS wrote for season one, is out and shipping now. The rest will follow every few weeks. Positives
The big draw, of course, is the scripts themselves. In particular, the draft of the pilot episode, "The Gathering", has a few major changes from the filmed version. Delenn, the Minbari ambassador, is still a masculine character in this draft. Kosh, the Vorlon ambassador and victim of an assassination plot, has a lifemate travelling with him on the station. For the most part, the changes made before filming are obviously for the better. (Though cutting Kosh's lifemate was the right choice, losing a line of dialogue about one reason for the Vorlons's obvious paranoia about their biology was a pity.)
The scripts appear as written, including typos and, occasionally, vague hints to what will occur later in the series. For example, the first appearance of a First Ones ship (the Walkers at Sigma 957 in the episode "Mind War") has an explicit note that the as-yet unmentioned "Shadowmen" ship will look very different. Another suggestion during the scene of the battle with raiders recommends using real-world physics for the Starfury crafts to differentiate from other dogfights-in-space shows.
If you're interested in scriptwriting, directing, acting, or editing, comparing the script to the finished product may be very educational. Straczynski writes sparse action, leaving most of the interpretation out of the script. Of course, the episodes so far are mostly character and background pieces with comparatively few action or effects scenes needing guidance. It may be that larger battles and flashbacks have more description; it's too early to tell.
The new material is interesting, and in a few places tells stories that never actually left the set. One explains why the change of station telepath from Lyta Alexander to Talia Winters took place between the pilot and the first episode. Another expands on the trials of pitching a show to television executives, especially during the first few attempts of the late '80s. None of this is essential to enjoying the show, but it does provide background for why things in the series happened the way they did. Drawbacks
Other scripts contain scenes that never actually aired. It's not always obvious whether this was due to time constraints, edits, or other decisions. Aside from a few mentions in the episode introductions, there are no notes in the scripts themselves related to what did and didn't make it to the screen. This may not be a drawback; they're much more readable this way and serious students may want to watch and read the episodes simultaneously anyway.
Though the scripts represent the bulk of the show and the introductions and memos provide some detail, there are plenty of decisions made during filming that don't actually have explanations in the book where you might expect them. Walter Koenig's character of Bester, the Psi-Cop, has a crippled hand, yet the book doesn't mention this at all. It's difficult to know how much detail to include -- and the permissions and availability of the material may make it difficult to include (production notes? director notes?) -- but this is by no means the whole story. Keep the Lurker's Guide handy for more details.
The book itself is solid but not remarkable. The script formatting reproduces faithfully an actual shooting script in length and layout. The print quality is good.
Very picky readers may quibble about the length and weight of the book -- most of the non-script material uses whitespace a little too generously, with large top and bottom margins and more than double-spaced type allowing only around twenty lines of text on a letter-sized page. Hopefully subsequent volumes will tighten the layout somewhat. Conclusion
While it's always possible to find bootleg or transcribed scripts online or at conventions, often at vastly inflated prices, the chance to read the official versions as filmed is worth considering for serious students of film or television as well as Babylon 5 fans. The bonus materials are nice, but they're probably more interesting to fans than students; more information about the process of how a script went from the paper to film might satisfy both groups.
The quibbles are minor; if you're already a Babylon 5 fan, you know what to expect here. If you're not a fan or a screenplay geek, this isn't the place to start -- but if you find the creative processes behind television or movies fascinating, this is an easy way to soak up wisdom and hard-earned experience. It's well worth your time to compare a few episodes in script and filmed form.
chromatic's life goals include writing a novel (done), a comic book, and an episode of a television series. Then he can sleep. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
Well... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
So ... this is about Hill Street Blues? (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems to me that Babylon 5 was an attempt to produce something a little like Hill Street Blues in space. It wasn't as well written, acted, or
Re:A Bit Late Maybe...? (Score:3, Insightful)
Indeed. That's probably why the reviewer didn't review the show. He/she reviewed a book about the show.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
SeaQuest DSV: 1993
Adventures of Brisco County Junior: 1993
Time Trax: 1993
Earth 2: 1994
Sliders: 1995
Space - Above and Beyond: 1995
Oh... and then there was this other little sci-fi show which came out a year before B5 which did pretty well. It was about two FBI agents investigating aliens. Maybe you've heard of it.
In terms of getting sci-fi accepted on TV, I would say that "Quantum Leap", "Alien Nation", and "V", all shows from the 80s, were vastly more important than B5.
Firefly versus Farscape (Score:3, Insightful)
Not really (Score:1, Insightful)
And Hill Street Blues never played with the scope in other ways. Wars that lasted seasons, destruction of planets, occupation and genocide. Epic stuff that certainly Star Trek never really tried to pull off and that is far to wide fro the scope of a cop show, even a very good cop show.
Soap Operas and Hill Street Blues never tried that kind of scope, its nearly impossible to do, partially because audiences forget, and partially because the planning involved.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
And B5 first aired in January 1993 (the network chickened out and aired the pilot as a stand-alone movie, so the series launched the following year), so I'm not sure what you're trying to say with Earth 2 or Space: Above and Beyond.
As for the big sci-fi launch of '93, all I can remember is B5, DS9 and Space Rangers. JMS had been shopping B5 around for about 5 years, much longer than DS9 had been in development, and I seriously doubt anyone spent much time on Space Rangers.
Re:B5 was fun, but.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Ignore the spaceships and the funky haircuts on the aliens. Who is G'Kar? Who's asking you "What do you want?" in that seductive tone of voice. Who's being held in who's cellars, out of sight and out of mind? And remember, B5 had come and gone before any of us heard of Abu Ghraib!
Re:The creative processes behind television or mov (Score:3, Insightful)
I think you're forgetting the general quality of computer graphics in 1993. The Video Toaster was still the best reasonably-affordable system back then.
B5 looks a bit dated now, but so does any CG- or model-based sci-fi from the early 90s.
Are you kidding? (Score:5, Insightful)
The thing nobody has been able to match is to have an END. This sounds stupid, but it implies closure and a pre-written script that arcs over multiple seasons. It allows you to set up character attributes in season one that they will not make use of until season 4, and when done right it makes for a fantastic viewing experience.
Pre-scripting the story arc also allows for a continuity that would stop you from making a mish-mash of abandon technology and general stupidity like you always get in the Star Trek universe.
And I'm STILL understating it.
Re:B5 was fun, but.. (Score:1, Insightful)
The fact that B5 won numerous awards suggests that your opinion not withstanding, the writing was considered admirable by plenty of folks.
Re:So ... this is about Hill Street Blues? (Score:4, Insightful)
HSB was a great show, and yes, everything that came after it drew from that greatness, or was the worse for not having learned its lessons. I don't think that changes the impact that B5 had, though.
It was a splash of cold water to the networks. They were SURE that the SF&F markets had no interest in stories. They wanted phasers and green babes as far as they could tell. When the B5 audiences swelled, the big question was: why? When it started to win awards, there was a sort of cautious optimism. When it went a full 5 seasons, and swithched to a real network, "non-episodic" became a hollywood buzzword, and "B5-like" was a phrase applied by the marketing teams behind quite a few shows that you heard about and would never think had any connection.
Granted, there was no real, general understanding of what they had on their hands. The sequel series (Crusade) was horribly broken from day one as a result of a torrent of "notes" from TNT that destroyed any sense of what the original concept was. The suits also misunderstood the nature of the structure. They thought that X-Files and B5 had the same structure, and any attempt to explain the book-like structure of B5 was met with blank stares (I'm generalizing, this was not a universal failure, of course, just the norm). Still, there was a real change in the way Hollywood made TV, and every SF show and MANY of the non-SF shows to air since have had B5 to thank for that change. Buffy, The West Wing, Farscape, Firefly, and many other shows would likely not have been possible without B5s influence on the BUSINESS as well as on the writers, costume designers, make-up, special effects (call it cheesy now, but NO ONE thought you could do computer-generated effects for a series on-budget before B5 came out, doing it initially on Amigas).
B5 changed so much that, in retrospect, it's almost impossible to understand. You just can't bring yourself to accept that one show pushed the envelope in so many areas. JMS is an obsessive, territorial, hard-ass who many people in the industry have come to dislike, but credit where credit is due: his show was a turning point.
Re:B5 (Score:3, Insightful)
I once read that JMS's characters don't have conversations, they make soliloquies at each other.
I love B5, but I can't help but think about that when watching it anymore...
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
B5 had a grubby feel to it when compared to ST TNG and weird character appearances for anything that wwas not human. Like they were trying to look strange. I never got pulled in to it.
That's a bit unfair. Considering the budget that JMS was working with and the fact that CGI was still pretty new back then I'd say he did pretty damn well. As much as I love TNG, they had about a million dollar per episode budget if I recall correctly.
Of course, I'd make the argument that all the dependence on CGI actually has taken something away from Star Trek. Watch the TNG reruns on Spike TV. The Enterprise-D had graceful lines. It almost seemed magical to watch it move through space. They did all that with two shooting models -- a four and six foot if I recall correctly. The level of detail that they put into the sets and layout of the ship is still amazing to this day. I'd wager that we know more about the Galaxy Class Starship then any other fictional vehicle before or since.
Fast forward to DS9 or the Enterprise finale with the CGI images of Galaxy Class Starships. The CGI model of the Enterprise-D in ENT comes to mind. They just seem very fake to me. The magic is gone. The Enterprise-D represented a vehicle that could take us anywhere our imagination wanted to go. I started to lose faith in the Star Trek franchise when Paramount decided to destroy it for the sake of eye candy in Generations :(
Re:Are you kidding? (Score:4, Insightful)
More importantly still, it allowed his characters to develop like real people, ie. permanently. What Hollywood still doesn't really get is that this adds verisimilitude that you can't SIMULATE. People change, and change in permanent ways. With a finite arc (in X years, we are DONE), you can kill characters, change them radically, do whatever, and (here's the key) they don't return to their original "character concept" by the end of 45 minutes or a couple of episodes. Really, as a viewer you never know when you're going to be handed a major character change...which is neat.
Re:Nope, you're wrong too, nothing new (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, the concept of an "Arc" implies pre-written and thought-out scripts. Saying that a soap has an arc is kind of an insult.
Prescient? (Score:4, Insightful)
Once a viewer said that such features of a dictatorship could never occur in an established democracy. JMS responded that they are bound to happen as long as people think they cannot happen (paraphrased). I fear he was right.
Re:Nope, you're wrong too, nothing new (Score:4, Insightful)
Details changed, things got moved around, the first half of season 5 was mainly filler because those stoies got moved up to the end of season 4 -- but it was about the journey from point A in the first episode to point B in the last, and all the points along the way.
The soap opera model is designed to keep going indefinitely. You're not working toward an ultimate destination, you're working from what you have in place to see where you can go next. Even if you have things in mind to resolve one long-term story, you always have another one to launch to keep things going.
JMS has always likened B5 to writing a serialized novel for television. The soap opera model is more like standard super-hero comic books*. You might have a complicated, multi-year X-Men story, but you don't expect it to tell the entire story of the X-Men wrap it up with an epilogue and end the series when you're done.
* I'm not saying this to disparage soap operas or comics, and I'm well aware of comics like Preacher or Sandman that use the other storytelling model.
Re:Are you kidding? (Score:3, Insightful)