Jeremiah, a New Series from B5 Creator, Debuts Sunday

wka writes "This Usenet post, by J. Michael Straczynski (creator of Babylon 5 ), outlines his new TV series Jeremiah . Based on a graphic novel series, it's a show 'about beginnings' after a killer virus has wiped out most of Earth's population, and it premieres on premium-cable channel Showtime Sunday night (regular airings to follow on Fridays). We can hope that the executives who interfered with Stargate SG-1 don't mess up this show."

Comments

"Survivors"

[Bill Kendrick]

Sounds like a similar premise to the excellent 70's BBC sci-fi "Survivors."

Kind of a depressing theme, tho. :)

Re:"Survivors"

[Jaster Mareel]

Yeah, I'm going to have to say this show looks pretty bad. They had star trek episodes based on this plot that never seemed to interesting. Any other show remotely close to this has sucked to, the only production i can think of that did this genre justice was the stand. The book was great, and i have to say the movie itself was pretty good.

Doesn't sound promising...

[maroberts]

..there have been any number of killer virus stories on TV and none of them have been any good. Lets hope Strazynscki (sp?) doesn't end up falling from his divine pedestal like when Gerry Anderson did Space Precinct.

Haven't we heard of this before?

[Saeculorum]

Doesn't this seem surprisingly similiar to the B5 movie A Call to Arms and the series Crusade? I'd've thought JMS would be just a bit imaginative in thinking of new series.

Why not..

[lowtekneq]

Why do you never see any Sci-fi shows about what the near future could really be like (sure a virus COULD wipe out humanity)? Something based on the book snowcrash would be pretty cool.

To JMS:

[jafac]

I was a faithful watcher of B5 and even the short-lived spin-off, and Legend of the Rangers.
What was the point of Legend of the Rangers? was it a pilot for an aborted series? Anyway, I will *not* be watching this new series, even though it sounds fairly interesting, and in the past you have delighted me with your story arcs and special effects, and colorful characters.

The reason is the network that's picking this up. I'm not going to subscribe to a general movie channel to watch a sci fi series. This show should be on the Scifi channel. Not Showtime. The best of luck to this latest endeavour. . .

Re:To JMS:

[Our Man In Redmond]

Yes, but Showtime has the resources to do something like this and do it right -- and in "do it right" I include "sell it to another non-subscription network after a year so us freeloaders can see it." Similar to what they've done with Stargate SG-1.

Most pay TV content that's any good eventually works its way onto a more accessible medium. Heck, even the lousy stuff eventually ends up on DVD in the hope that someone will buy it.

Oh yeah, and the only explanation for "Legend Of The Rangers" that makes sense is that it was a pilot for a new show. Although if they do decide to go ahead with a new Rangers show I hope it fares better than Crusade did.

Re:To JMS:

[mbourgon]

Actually, JMS said that there were two reasons he decided to do this new show:
1) Complete creative control
2) Big budget. He could make "his idea" of the show a reality.

And, just to be a karma whore... straight from JMS on rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated:

I haven't talked a lot about Jeremiah here because, basically, I haven't had time to put my thoughts together due to the rigors of actually *making* the
thing. But we're now closing in on the premiere, and I figured this might be a good time to start laying out some of the information. (This will, however, be kinda brief because I'm fighting a bit of a fever and intend to go lay down after this.)

The Showtime series tracks the aftermath of the Big Death, which wiped out roughly six billion people, anyone over the age of puberty. It's now 15 years
later, and people have been ridinng on the ashes of the old world for the most part, the available resources slowly declining and running out. It's a moment of transition: either the decline continues, or now that they are adults, people start to rebuild a new world out of the ashes of the old one. The question is what shape will that world take, and who gets to choose?

Our lead character, Jeremiah (Luke Perry) is a wanderer, trying to find out what happened to his father, who disappeared during the last days of the Big Death while en route to a locale specified only as Valhalla Sector. He wants to find out the end of the story. Along the way, he encounters our other lead, Kurdy (Malcolm Jamal-Warner), also a drifter, and the two are thrown together by circumstance into a duo. The two-hour premiere follows their lives, the dangers they encounter, establishes the world of our series, and sets the stage for a new dawn.

Basically, I wanted to do a post-apocalyptic series that wasn't all darkness and grimness...I wanted to tell a story about hope, that this isn't about
endings, it's about beginnings. When the Black Death hit, lots of people thought it was the end of the world. It wasn't. What followed the Black Death was the Renaissance, a new beginning, as our characters face a new beginning.
[JMS continued with an episode list]

Maybe I'll try it out, but...

[Skyshadow]

I could never really peg down why I disliked B5 so much. I mean, it had a lot of things going for it: a story arc, a vision of a flawed future where some aliens were more powerful than humans, etc.

But it *bugged* me. And it was beyond just the (extremely) crappy dialog, wooden acting and contrived plot happenings -- hell, if it were just that I wouldn't have liked TNG, either.

There was just something about the plot and characters that bothered the hell out of me, especially after JMS started writing all of the episodes. It got so bad that I would occassionally watch, but relied on episode guide websites to keep up with the happenings with the story arc.

Man, B5 bothered me. Yes, I'm aware that I sound a little on the neurotic side.

Re:Maybe I'll try it out, but...

[Bodrius]

I really liked B5, but I have to admit in the end I watched it out of loyalty for the good parts of the series, rather than because of its final quality.

I still think it was one of the best SF shows ever, but I can't help but think they went downwards since the first season, even though the story was supposed to actually start much later.

It seems to me that B5 was at its best before it became an epic story. During the first seasons (the prelude?) the characters were complex and subtle, the politics made sense, the storylines were interesting... you had a great sense of foreboding.

But when the epic started, the characters became complicated and yes, pulpish. The acting quality decreased. All sense of subtlety was lost, which also killed almost all the sense of mistery in the storylines. It seems their ambitious story made them lose control of the narrative.

erm I think you've missed something

[Anonymous Coward]

as I understand it this isn't all JMS own work. Jeremiah is based on Platinum Studios' graphic novel series by Belgian author Hermann Huppen.

http://www.comics2film.com/JeremiahArch.shtml

Re:So I assume this means...

[JeffL]

That reminds me, I still have one unwatched episode of Crusade left on my Tivo, from sometime last year, that I still haven't watched. I saw it the first time around, but for as amazing as (the first four seasons of) B5 was, Crusade mostly sucked.

I think part of the problem with the fifth season of B5, Crusade, and to some degree Legend of the Rangers, was kind of a too-much-of-a-good-thing syndrome. For example, in B5, [what's her name, the woman commander] gives a nice speech before attacking the Earth fleet, about being death incarnate and all of that. The speech was a bit cliche if taken out of context, but for the situation and the character it worked well. Mostly because through the show, she only gave a few speeches like that, maybe one or two a season. When they happened they were pretty cool, but then there are characters on Crusade that only talk in fancy speeches. It's too much, they lose all impact and end up just being cheesy Shatneresque spewing.

I am sure JMS still has it in him to make a good show, but I think he really needs to go back and watch the third and fourth seasons of B5, and maybe In the Beginning, and see what the balance was that really made them work. Don't just take the best bits and try to only use those in a show.

What will it try to be?

[hacksoncode]

I will start by saying that I really liked B5 (a lot... I think it's probably the most amazing science-fiction epic ever attempted).

Yeah, there were a lot of embarrassing moments in it, and quite a bit of trite dialog.

What was great about it was the it so devoutly tried to be good. There's so much crap on TV these days, that I just have to give JMS credit for sticking to his guns and telling a story.

Even if it was a bit of a cheesy space opera when all is said and done.

I guess what I'm waiting to hear is whether this series also is going to try to be good. I'm skeptical that the Showtime management will allow that.

But then I was skeptical when it was announced that Bruce Boxleitner was going to be the new lead on B5 too.

That's really just as scary as Luke Perry being in this one...

SciFi and Hormones...

[Genda]

I've been watching a steady shift over the last several years from SciFi that had previously been kinda fun and thoughtful... to thinly veiled mastabation fodder for pimply faced boys, who have a small interest in science and a major interest in hot babes in tight rubber suits.

Some twenty-something executive at MGM, who retired as a teen-something executive at MTV, decides what "SG-1" needs is to off the geek and replace him with hot bods to make the pubescent crowd stay tuned. The last season of "Earth, Final Conflict" has been so nasty it makes peoples brains bleed. The last couple seasons of "Voyager" had degenerated into some kind of soap opera that just happened by chance, to be located somewhere in the galaxy other than Earth. What do all these things have in common? The same push to shift SciFi into some kind of primtime porn-light... all that's missing is the Ka-Chunka-Chunka music... Think about it... silly plots, no cohesive threads, flat acting, and lots of sexual titillation. Of course since it's aimed at young'ens, you got to keep the titillation to just pokes and peeks (you don't want the religious folks chasing you with torches and pitchforks), but the innuendo still lives.

I am so sick and tired of people doing stupid shit by rote, like there is some kind of magic in the act, without thought or consideration to impact or consequence. Screw with a good show to kick up the pimple demographic and oops there goes the adult and women viewers! Oh, so sorry! Take the brains out of a show, destroy the entire freaking premise, and make it about some foxy chick battling scantily clad sexy aliens. Scuse me while I puke...

The worst is a whole spate of new shows (most of which were thankfully stillborn), that didn't even bother to suck the brain out of a decent show, but just started off as a sexy SciFi/Fantasy babe doing whatever... They're not even waiting till they've suckered in a crowd of viewers now, they're just going straight after the pimply demographic.

I'll watch the first few episodes, beause I like to give folks an even break. However, I expect the producers of this show to give me something worth staying for. Something clever, thought provoking, a whole lot more than the tripe that is currently aimed at socially challenged pubescent geeks in dire need of a suitable sexual targets upon which to fixate. Dressing Penthouse Pets up in aluminum catsuits with flashing lights is not my idea of good SciFi...

Then again, who knows this may be just someone else's cup... all ya need is a little KY and some Oxy-Five?

Re:Postapocalyptic depression

[Rimbo]

"If you want to make a hit, do a show that is connected to the present, that shows the fruits of out labors and dreams, not the failure of them."

If you'd actually READ THE ARTICLE, maybe you'd read that this is precisely what JMS is doing. He points to how people thought that after the Black Death, the world would end. it didn't; in fact, the Renaissance followed on its heels.

He wants to show how, after this "Big Death," people discover a chance to re-mold the world into a way that maybe is more of a utopia.

Take the whole world apart piece by piece, look at the lessons learned from the past, and try to put it all back together the right way. That's what JMS says he's after. That's not depressing... that is hopeful.

JMS

[Brendan Byrd]

If you've been keeping up with JMS's history with series, he doesn't take it up the ass just to ruin the story. He's been fighting the good fight to make sure his series doesn't get vamped up for bigger breasts and more action. If he doesn't like what the producers do, he says no (and it likely gets canned, like Crusade did).

As JMS has said, he's not going the TNT route again, and will never do a show unless he has complete control, which is why he's on Showtime. (Me wonders about why Showtime is screwing over SG-1, though.)