Nothing really big and shocking in here, but it’s still, after all this time, refreshing to see someone as influential as JMS actually take the time to discuss things directly with the fans. Now if only, say, Rick Berman did stuff like that… Anyway, attached to this is the latest status report from the “Legend of the Rangers” set.

From: [email protected] (Jms at B5)

Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated

Subject: brief report from jms

Date: 21 May 2001 05:49:04 -0700

Well, all of last week I was in Vancouver for the first week of shooting on the

two-hour TV movie BABYLON 5: LEGEND OF THE RANGERS. (I’m back now for a

while.) It’s been a terrific experience to date. The dailies look great.

Mike Vejar is on board to direct, and is keeping the look and feel consistent

with what we’ve done before, but at the same time (in collaboration with our

new Director of Photography Henry Chan) is taking the look even a step further.

The sets (courtesy of production designer Steve Gaeghan and his band of

artistic types) look more detailed, more textured, more realistic than much of

what we’ve done before on B5. (This is in no way to diminish what we did in B5

on sets, it’s just a different approach.)
Andreas Katsulas showed up mid-week as G’Kar, and despite having been away from

that makeup for three years, was instantly back in character starting with the

first shot and straight on through.
The cast have proven themselves excellent. It’s natural to take some time to

find your character, and find the lines…but from the moment they landed on

set, they had their lines letter perfect, and the chemistry is there between

them. SFC has seen the dailies and they’re absolutely enchanted with what’s on

film.
I wish I had colorful stories to tell, but we’re talking here about a bunch of

dedicated professionals who appreciate the legacy of B5 and are doing

everything they can to make this next installment the best possible. (About

the only negative thing to happen all week was my losing my California state ID

midweek, which I’ll have to go in to replace this week at my local DMV.) It’s

a very elaborate production, with everything from pyros to wire works and other

stuff, in addition to the usual glut of CGI we tend to do, but so far it’s all

going quite well.
I’ve been taking digital pictures of the production which will soon be

available on the SFC website…and there are some beauts there. I’ll let you

know when they’re up.
In the interim…know that the show is going extremely well, and I think that

people are going to like the cast a lot. They’re good, well-trained, dedicated

people. 
I think it’s going to go over very well indeed.
 jms
([email protected])

(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,

permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine

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