Post by B5Erik on Jul 26, 2015 1:46:06 GMT
When A Call To Arms first aired I was very happy with it, overall. We got one last movie (well, what we thought was likely the last movie) with President John J. Sheridan, Michael Garibaldi, and Captain Elizabeth Lochley. It was also the de-facto pilot for the Babylon 5 spin-off, Crusade. Why wouldn't we be happy with it?
Well, the story was fairly good, but something just wasn't right. Clearly, the music wasn't right. Evan Chen is a fine composer and a serious talent, but his work on A Call To Arms just didn't fit. Yes, JMS wanted something different to create a new, different mood from what had been created by the amazingly talented Christopher Franke Babylon 5. And Chen's work on Crusade was better and more, "Babylonian," than it was for A Call To Arms (without sounding like
But that isn't all that didn't feel right. They mention Delenn several times, but she isn't in the movie. Neither is Dr. Franklin (because he's no longer a part of Babylon 5's staff). G'Kar and Londo were missing (with G'Kar exploring the outer parts of the galaxy with Lyta Alexander), and Lennier was missing because he was briefly willing to let Sheridan die during an accident on board the White Star taking Sheridan and Delenn to Minbar. With all those key people missing the movie feels empty. Their presence - or lack thereof - is palpable. You can feel that they're missing. Even Zack Allan makes nothing more than a token appearance.
So you combine the music that doesn't feel right with the presence missing of so many key characters and the atmosphere of the movie just seems wrong. What does that leave?
A good, but not great, story featuring a couple key members of the B5 universe and some new characters that JMS hoped that we'd come to love just like the previous ones (and, truth be told, we likely would have given a couple years on the air for Crusade). It's a decent movie in the B5 universe, but it just doesn't seem right. It seems off, for the reasons noted above. It isn't a satisfying send-off for Sheridan, Garibaldi, or Zack Allan. Unfortunately, The Lost Tales wasn't any more satisfying than A Call To Arms was. Maybe less so since we didn't get the follow up movies that were promised.
JMS did all he could to continue the B5 universe, but the studio and networks proved to be huge obstacles that couldn't be satisfactorily overcome. Had there been a NetFlix back then or the multitude of cable channels that produce original content Crusade likely would have found a new home and A Call To Arms would be viewed a little differently. Unfortunately, that's not how things were back then, and things didn't work out for Crusade or the attempted returns to the B5 universe. Thus, A Call To Arms is less than satisfying on the whole.
That's a shame. It shouldn't have been that way.
Well, the story was fairly good, but something just wasn't right. Clearly, the music wasn't right. Evan Chen is a fine composer and a serious talent, but his work on A Call To Arms just didn't fit. Yes, JMS wanted something different to create a new, different mood from what had been created by the amazingly talented Christopher Franke Babylon 5. And Chen's work on Crusade was better and more, "Babylonian," than it was for A Call To Arms (without sounding like
But that isn't all that didn't feel right. They mention Delenn several times, but she isn't in the movie. Neither is Dr. Franklin (because he's no longer a part of Babylon 5's staff). G'Kar and Londo were missing (with G'Kar exploring the outer parts of the galaxy with Lyta Alexander), and Lennier was missing because he was briefly willing to let Sheridan die during an accident on board the White Star taking Sheridan and Delenn to Minbar. With all those key people missing the movie feels empty. Their presence - or lack thereof - is palpable. You can feel that they're missing. Even Zack Allan makes nothing more than a token appearance.
So you combine the music that doesn't feel right with the presence missing of so many key characters and the atmosphere of the movie just seems wrong. What does that leave?
A good, but not great, story featuring a couple key members of the B5 universe and some new characters that JMS hoped that we'd come to love just like the previous ones (and, truth be told, we likely would have given a couple years on the air for Crusade). It's a decent movie in the B5 universe, but it just doesn't seem right. It seems off, for the reasons noted above. It isn't a satisfying send-off for Sheridan, Garibaldi, or Zack Allan. Unfortunately, The Lost Tales wasn't any more satisfying than A Call To Arms was. Maybe less so since we didn't get the follow up movies that were promised.
JMS did all he could to continue the B5 universe, but the studio and networks proved to be huge obstacles that couldn't be satisfactorily overcome. Had there been a NetFlix back then or the multitude of cable channels that produce original content Crusade likely would have found a new home and A Call To Arms would be viewed a little differently. Unfortunately, that's not how things were back then, and things didn't work out for Crusade or the attempted returns to the B5 universe. Thus, A Call To Arms is less than satisfying on the whole.
That's a shame. It shouldn't have been that way.