Question on Season 2 Credits Sequence

[NotSoWize]

I'm just wondering if one of you who watched Babylon 5 "in the beginning" can help me out.

Season One ended with Delenn in her chrysalis and her appearance after emerging remained a mystery until the end of "Revelations," the second episode of Season Two. But, in the opening credits of Season Two, when Mira Furlan is shown as Delenn, the footage plainly shows the "new and improved" Delenn. Did the original broadcasts show the "old" Delenn in the credits until the "new" Delenn was unveiled or did they undercut the drama of "what the heck is in the cocoon" back then like the credits on the DVD do?

Just wondering . . .

[Jan]

Did the original broadcasts show the "old" Delenn in the credits until the "new" Delenn was unveiled or did they undercut the drama of "what the heck is in the cocoon" back then like the credits on the DVD do?

The original broadcasts showed the first season Delenn in the opening credits until after her appearance before the Council, then changed to the 'new' Delenn. Since JMS and Co. did the credits in-house, they didn't think anything of changing them as they needed (or wanted) to. Witness "The Corps is Mother..."

Jan

[BabylonRebel]

Wasn't there some problems where some areas got the 2nd set of season 2 titles for the first episode, thus spoilling Delenn's change?

[Radhil]

The original broadcasts showed the first season Delenn in the opening credits until after her appearance before the Council, then changed to the 'new' Delenn. Since JMS and Co. did the credits in-house, they didn't think anything of changing them as they needed (or wanted) to. Witness "The Corps is Mother..."

Jan

What she said. The DVD's don't have the credits as originally aired for those first few times, and in fact this is a slip-up that started with the SciFi channel re-runs. Somehow it got packed to the discs the same way. They managed to get it right for "The Corp is Mother...", and they got Bruce's voice over for S2 changing the same way it did when it aired... I don't know why they miffed that reveal.

[NotSoWize]

Thanks! That is what I figured, but then I did not understand why they did not show the original sequence on the DVD's since anyone whose first exposure to B5 is through the DVDs is having a major surprise ruined. It seems like that should have been corrected as soon as it was first recognized. Even if the original sequence was lost, it would not have been very expensive to run a little Delenn season one footage under Mira's name for the first two episodes of season two.

[BabylonRebel]

My DVD's appear normal - Delenn has her series 1 makeup for at least the first episode.

[jal]

recent dvds have been fixed as far as i know, i have the new B5 Universe boxed set but havent watched it yet to confirm things.

[Joseph DeMartino]

Warner Bros. hired an outside company to produce new widescreen masters for the Sci-Fi Channel broadcasts. Since they weren't told to do otherwise, they saved themselves some time and trouble by only doing one master for each season's main title sequence.

The new digital masters were later used as source material for all the DVDs, down-converted to NTSC or PAL/SECAM depending on region. The Region 1 releases got the "new" widescreen title sequences, as those were the only ones available in NTSC. However, in some countries the show had already been broadcast in widescreen, so PAL masters of all the main titles, including the "custom" ones, existed in 16:9. Thus the R2 DVDs have the correct credits on the key episodes, while the R1 versions do not.

I'm guessing that both BabylonRebel and jal are in R2 or elsewhere outside North America.

AFAIK Warner Home Video never went back to change the R1 DVDs (and I can't imagine that they would given what it would cost to deal with the issue and the fact that the bulk of buyers would have purchased their sets before the problem was identified.)

Regards,

Joe

[BabylonRebel]

yeah, I'm in merry olde England. I noticed that one of the early episodes of series one (around 'Born to the Purple' I think) has it's title sequence in widescreen for some reason.

[raw_bean]

?

The entirety of all the episodes of S1 are in widescreen!

[RMcD]

yeah, I'm in merry olde England. I noticed that one of the early episodes of series one (around 'Born to the Purple' I think) has it's title sequence in widescreen for some reason.

Does Ko'Dath get the credit in place of Na'Toth? That's an obvious difference in that episode's titles, and might explain why there'd be a difference in the print.