It has been fifteen years since Babylon 5 first aired on television and a decade since its five year story-arc ran its course.  The series has gathered thousands of fans and spawned some very average made-for-tv movies (although Babylon 5: In the Beginning was excellent).  In 2007 its creator J. Michael Straczynski (JMS) was handed a smallish $2M to produce a series of new Babylon 5 tales titled, well, Babylon 5: The Lost Tales.  These didn’t go so well and in the end JMS announced to the world that he was putting Babylon 5 to rest.  Well sort of.

Just like the rest of us, JMS was happy with the original five year story of Babylon 5 and after receiving low budgets for all the B5 follow ups he decided subsequent B5 productions were doing more harm than good to the series.  With The Lost Tales not doing so well thanks in part to too small a budget, JMS decided that further B5 material would work against B5 than for.  He announced that he’d no longer go down the B5 path unless in the form of a big budget B5 movie.  No big budget movie, no more new B5.  For most fans, that news was taken as the nail in the coffin for the franchise.

But the nail may have just been pulled out.  JMS is the man behind the screenplay for Changeling and if you haven’t heard, Changeling has been nominated for a BAFTA award by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.  Also, although not nominated for a screenplay Oscar, Changeling has received three Academy Award nominations.  Further, JMS has written the script for Forbidden Planet and it seems his script is something special (even James Cameron is taking notice).  All these new developments and as luck would have it, attention has now turned JMS’s way.

According to Screenrant, the attention is from Warner Bros who seem to be impressed enough with JMS’s efforts on Changeling and Forbidden Planet that in respect to Babylon 5 they’ve asked him what he meant by “big budget?”  The indicator of course is that Warner Bros are wondering about the possibility of a big budget B5 movie.  If this is true and not just another rumor on the grapevine, then the possibility exists that Babylon 5 may yet find its way to the cinema.

I have no idea in what capacity, through which actors, and to what possible storyline JMS could make a B5 movie work.   But I do know two things:  JMS has some credit with a lot of people and, no matter what, if B5 hits the big screen I and many others will go along and watch it.  Given the massive B5 fanbase, I sincerely doubt that a big budget B5 movie could fail.  Given JMS’s recent writing success, and with awareness of the B5 fan base, hopefully Warner Bros will see that it can’t fail also.

One thing is now for sure.  B5 fans have started holding their breath for the day in which JMS announces, “Guess what, B5 is back, bigger, badder, and better than ever before.”

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