Novo Babylonia - B5 fanfic radio drama

[Ubik]

I listened to a short clip of one of these fan made episodes and it jarred my memory.

I do know that I and a few others have mentioned as to why there weren't any full cast audio dramas produced on either CD or other formats.

These audio dramas could easily have been a low cost way of continuing Crusade and exploring the planned story arc for Legend of the Rangers. After all, JMS was writing for different comics during that same time period and could have written and produced those full cast audio dramas.

I know Big Finish inquired about licensing some B5 audio dramas and it was 'prohibitively expensive'. A shame WB don't seem to want to play ball. I do wonder if we'll ever see the Crusade audio dramas that were meant to appear with the subsequent WTHH books, or if it's yet another B5 thing that will get put off indefinitely.

Seems like an ideal thing that Studio JMS could have perhaps produced, but with the website down, I have no idea of the status of that either.

[Truth66]

I listened to a short clip of one of these fan made episodes and it jarred my memory.

I do know that I and a few others have mentioned as to why there weren't any full cast audio dramas produced on either CD or other formats.

These audio dramas could easily have been a low cost way of continuing Crusade and exploring the planned story arc for Legend of the Rangers. After all, JMS was writing for different comics during that same time period and could have written and produced those full cast audio dramas.

[phazedout]

Say the word and I'll happily start a spoiler-free thread! Okay, not that anybody really needs me to do it but it would make me feel useful!

But you *are* useful Jan, you wield the Spam Hammer Of Doom (tm. Pat. Pending).

[Jan]

BTW, if you are on your first watch through of B5... PLEASE let us know your experience, even if you want to talk a bit about each episode... or things you liked, things you disliked. It's always great to hear perspectives from new viewers / fans. We can have a spoiler free thread! People around here are generally quite respectful and careful not to ruin that sacred first run through of B5.

Say the word and I'll happily start a spoiler-free thread! Okay, not that anybody really needs me to do it but it would make me feel useful!

[Ubik]

I just saw the scene that contains your signature lol

BTW, if you are on your first watch through of B5... PLEASE let us know your experience, even if you want to talk a bit about each episode... or things you liked, things you disliked. It's always great to hear perspectives from new viewers / fans. We can have a spoiler free thread! People around here are generally quite respectful and careful not to ruin that sacred first run through of B5.

[Ubik]

I just saw the scene that contains your signature lol

Great scene! Love Kosh!

[djsacrosanct]

I just saw the scene that contains your signature lol

[Ubik]

I will give it another go. Thank you I should probably be careful though, I don't want any spoilers for the show. I'm only at the end of season 2. It's probably best for me to come back to the forum once I've finished.

Unsure if anyone else has given it a go tbh.

[djsacrosanct]

It's all here to stream. Links work for me:

http://www.novo-b.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=Main_Page

It may improve as it goes on. I have perhaps judged it a bit harsly for fanfic.

I will give it another go. Thank you I should probably be careful though, I don't want any spoilers for the show. I'm only at the end of season 2. It's probably best for me to come back to the forum once I've finished.

[Ubik]

I notice that this is no longer available from the site. If anyone happens to have saved/hosted it, please send me a pm. Thank you.

It's all here to stream. Links work for me:

http://www.novo-b.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=Main_Page

It may improve as it goes on. I have perhaps judged it a bit harsly for fanfic.

[djsacrosanct]

I notice that this is no longer available from the site. If anyone happens to have saved/hosted it, please send me a pm. Thank you.

[Ubik]

I tried to listen to this today as there's now quite a lot of it.

I gave up after two episodes. David Sheridan and other main characters sound angry and gruff all the time... which is just plain annoying. It also tries way too hard to base it's exposition on past events and extrapolate as opposed to inventing something new and fresh. It suffers from long sections of 'B5 history lecture' as info dump... "and that was when Valen did bla bla bla, so bla, and therefore bla"... sigh.

Mostly, I can't cope with most of the voice actors and the badly written dialogue, so had to stop.

[JoeD80]

I think Joe's rule for fan-fiction has generally been "don't put it anywhere I can see it." He can't risk it in case he does something else in the Babylon 5 universe so that people don't accuse him of taking their story ideas.

This is what happened in season two when a fan inadvertenly posted something along the lines of "what about a story where xyz" and it was the outline Joe was working on at the time. Joe had to phase that out for a bit until that fan went out of his way to apologize and sign release forms for it. (That's the episode that became "Passing Through Gethsemane.")

Having to track down these things can take up a lot of time that could be better spent writing so I can't blame Joe for his policy.

[Garibaldi's Hair]

I would hope JMS would be fine with fans being creative and playing in the B5 universe.

Doesn't really matter what he thinks, since it likely isn't his call anyway.

[Ubik]

Somebody called JMS attention to it so it probably won't be around long.

Jan

I suppose the contentious issue is going to be that they’re using established and copyrighted characters from the B5 universe. Had they created all new original characters, there wouldn’t be a problem. I can see WB slapping a ‘cease and desist’ on them, which is a bit of a shame. I would hope JMS would be fine with fans being creative and playing in the B5 universe. I mean look at the many ‘original trek’ spin off web series made by fans, or general B5 fan fiction. I definitely don’t see this as harmful to B5 in any way. It’s not for profit fanfic. Is that really a problem?

I've downloaded what there is to listen to later. Suggest anyone else who wants to check it out does so too.