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								<title>Overview of the Babylon 5 storyline</title>

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								<h1 align=center>Overview of the 5-year plan</h1>


								<p align=center>

									from J. Michael Straczynski, creator, writer and producer<br>

											copyright 1993<p>


									There has always been a plan for a series to follow. If anything,

								that was the point of the entire exercise...to tell a story. To create a

								novel for TV that would span five years, for which the pilot is the opening

								chapter. Having now seen, or about to see the foundation for that story,

								and before being asked to lend support to that series, you have a right to

								some sense of what that series would entail, and what you're being asked

								to support. One should never sign a blank check on the bank of one's

								conscience. So here's a preview.<p>


									You will find out what happened to Sinclair, for starters, during

								the Earth/Minbari war. For nearly 10 years, Sinclair has worked to convince

								himself that nothing happened to him on the Line other than what seems to

								be the case: that he blacked out for 24 hours. He's just managed to convince

								himself of this. Now, suddenly, someone comes into his life and with seven

								words -- you'll know them when you hear them -- completely unravels the

								self-deception. He knows then that something DID happen to him, that someone

								DID mess with his mind...and he is going to find out who, and why. <p>


									The ramifications of that discovery will have a major influence on

								the series, on his relationships, and the future of not only his character

								but many others. <p>


									You will see what a Vorlon is...and what it represents. And what

								it may have to do with our own saga, and a hidden relationship to some of

								our other characters (watch the reception scene carefully). We'll discover

								that there are MANY players in this game. You'll find out what happened to

								Babylon 4, and it will call into question what is real, what is not, and

								the ending of that episode is one that you have not seen before on

								television. <p>


									We'll find that most every major character is running to, or away

								from something in their hearts, or their pasts, or their careers.

								Garibaldi's checkered past will catch up with him in a way that will

								affect his role and make him a very different character for as much as a

								full season, and have lasting effects thereafter. Lyta will take part in

								a voyage of discovery that will very much change her character. She will

								be caught up in a web of intrigue and forced to betray the very people

								she has come to care for. <p>


									We will see wheels within wheels, discover the secret groups

								behind the Earth and Minbari governments who suspect, with good reason,

								that one of the B5 crew may be a traitor, who sold out Earth during the

								Earth/Minbari war. <p>


									Some of the established empires in the pilot will fall. Some

								will rise unexpectedly. Hopes and fortunes will be alternately made or

								destroyed. At least one major race not yet known even to EXIST will make

								its presence known, but only gradually. Some characters will fall from

								grace. Others will make bargains whose full price they do not understand,

								but will eventually come to realize, and regret. <p>


									At the end of the first season, one character will undergo a

								MAJOR change, which will start the show spinning on a very different

								axis. The first season will have some fairly conventional stories, but

								others will start the show gradually moving toward where I want it to go.

								One has to set these things up gradually. Events in the story -- which is

								very much the story of Jeffrey Sinclair -- will speed up in each subsequent

								season. <p>


									Someone he considers a friend will betray him. Another will prove

								to be the exact opposite of what Sinclair believes to be true. Some will

								live. Some will die. He will be put through a crucible of terrible force,

								that will change him, and alter his destiny in a profound and terrible

								way...if he goes one way, or the other, it will determine not only his own

								fate, but that of millions of others. He will grow, and become stronger,

								better, wiser...or be destroyed by what fate is bringing his way. In sum,

								it is a story of hope against terrible adversity and overwhelming odds.  <p>


									Each of our characters will be tempted in a different way to ally

								with a dark force determined to once and for all destroy the peace. Some

								will fall prey to the temptation, others will not, and pay the price for

								their resistance. <p>


									The homeworld of one of our major characters will be decimated.

								War will become inevitable. And when it comes, Babylon 5 will be forever

								changed. <p>


									That, in broad brush strokes, is a little of what I plan to do

								with the series. It is, as stated, a novel for television, with a

								definite beginning, middle and end.


								<h2>Has the show deviated from the original idea?</h2>


								<em>May 10, 1996 response to a viewer question: some of the above seems to

								not apply any more.  Is the series off track?</em>


								<p>

								It's a fair question.  I'm going to try and deal with it as

								best I can. The problem, first and foremost, is trying to explain the

								craft of writing to someone who isn't a writer.  This isn't intended as

								a slight; if a brain surgeon tried to explain his work to me, I'd be

								about as much in the dark.  I have no idea where music comes from; I

								can sit with Chris Franke for hours, trying to understand that process.

								I never will.  I'm not hardwired that way. I *am* hardwired for

								writing.  So it's not a judgment, just a minor truth.


								<p>

								The creative process is fluid.  Has to be.  Consider for a

								moment the position in which I find myself.  Let's say I'm writing a

								novel.  I start with a fairly clear notion of where I'm going.  Six

								chapters in, I get a better way of doing something, so I go back and

								revise chapters 1-5, so it now all fits; you never see what went

								before.  Now, compare that to a situation where you're publishing each

								chapter as you go, and you can't go back and change anything. (This is

								pretty much the situation Dickens found himself in, as he published his

								works chapter by chapter; you can never back up, only go forward.)


								<p>

								At the same time, because we're using actors who have real

								lives of their own, to whom things happen -- broken limbs, health

								problems that may preclude appearing in a given episode, sudden career

								changes, you name it -- you have real-life obstacles constantly in your

								way.


								<p>

								The closest thing I can compare this to...is if you're on

								stage, in front of a large audience, and you have to do a very

								elaborate dance...and all the while people are throwing bowling balls

								and chainsaws at you.  You either learn how to accommodate all that,

								and keep pretty much on rhythm, or you're dead.


								<p>

								This show was originally conceived in 1986/87.  About 10 years

								ago. Back then, all TV episodic stuff was done pretty much from one

								person's point of view, your nominal hero.  Yes, you'd occasionally

								dive outside that for a quick scene with other characters, usually to

								set up something, but for the most part, it was about that one person.

								In MURDER, SHE WROTE, Jessica Fletcher was always at the heart of every

								episode; you had the occasional guest character with whom she'd

								interact, and the recurring supporting cast, but none of them ever

								changed, and none of them ever really took center stage for more than a

								few minutes at a time.  That's how TV has been done up until now.


								<p>

								Novels, on the other hand, are often omniscient in narrative

								structure, and you blip in and out of multiple points of view.  THE

								STAND, for instance.


								<p>

								Now, I've done both; I've written novels and I've written TV.

								When it came time to pull together B5 initially, you go into the "okay,

								who is the TV point of view character" question.  Which was Londo's

								narration, and which was the way I'd learned to write TV all these

								years.  Once the series got going, it quickly became apparent that I'd

								have to learn a whole new way of writing TV that was a lot more like

								what I'd been writing in my novels, which were multi-POV huge stories.

								It's a kind of writing that's never really been done before for

								American TV; and I had to somewhat invent that style or form of writing

								as I went, in front of millions of viewers.


								<p>

								You can't prepare for something like this, as much as you try,

								because it's never been done before.


								<p>

								(On reflection, probably the closest thing to what I've been

								doing here was the miniseries The Winds of War, in terms of the

								multiple viewpoints involved.)


								<p>

								Also, in the last 10 years, I've become a better writer,

								learned more about my craft, added more tools to my toolbox.  That

								means being able to perceive better ways of doing things now than I

								could've seen before.


								<p>

								So here we are.  I sit at my word processor with my notes from

								1986, and I see a better way of doing something from those notes...do I

								go with what's there, or do I strike off and do the better approach,

								PROVIDED that it still takes me where I want to go in the arc?  To

								ignore it is to be inflexible.


								<p>

								I've stayed fluid.  It's the same way I write a novel.  You're

								just seeing the *process* acted out right in front of you, a process

								which normally the public never gets to see.  That, I think, is some

								part of what you're reacting to.


								<p>

								<em>[Text removed to avoid spoilers -- see the

								<a href="/lurk/find/CompuServe/cs96-05/85.html">original message</a>]</em>


								<p>

								It's not just a matter of "living in interesting times."  What

								makes a story is *causality*.  A sequence of linked events.  "The king

								died, and then the queen died" is not a story.  "The king died, and

								then the queen died of grief" is a story.  It is an arc, however small.


								<p>

								Finally, I'd just note the posts -- public and private -- from

								folks who have sat down and watched the *whole show* as a unit, once

								per day, or several per day...and the linked aspect, the real *arc* of

								the show, becomes far more apparent when watched that way right now.

								It's there.


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								<h5>

								Last update:

								May 12, 1996


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