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B5 convention

SpiritOneSpiritOne MagnetoABQ NM
in Babylon 5
To those of you who didn't show up to the Phoenix Comicon, you missed out. It was pretty fantastic. I met up with Darth Caligula, and got to hang out with Garret Wang from Voyager (yes he knows his show sucks, hes still cool as shit to drink with). The big B5 panel was really cool, lots of good stories, a nice remembrance for those not with us, JMS revealed the real reason why Michael Ohare left the show, Claudia and Pat talked about sex, Jerry just talked out of his ass but the crowd enjoyed it. Good fun. I even got held by John Barrowman (captain Jack Harkness from Doctor Who).

Comments

  • croxiscroxis I am the walrus
    Care to share for those of us who didn't make it?
  • SpiritOneSpiritOne Magneto ABQ NM
    [img]http://i.imgur.com/EckYEwS.jpg[/img]

    [img]http://i.imgur.com/kwiJeJy.jpg[/img]

    [img]http://i.imgur.com/eQY3dtC.jpg[/img]

    As for Michael Ohare, he actually started having some pretty severe mental issues. The guy was seeing things, and basically he was going crazy. JMS was pretty tore up talking about it later.
  • CurZCurZ Resident Hippy
    Here's a collection of photos: [url]http://www.flickr.com/photos/lathrum/sets/72157633726728362/[/url]

    Nice to see a large portion of the old gang back together again, with obviously some very emotional moments. I couldn't even recognize Walter Koenig at first. Understandable, given the rough times he's been through.
  • WORFWORF The Burninator
    There's a two hour video of the B5 panel on Youtube, not had a chance to watch it yet.

    [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGVXg6JnSE0]Part 1[/url]
    [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ek9u-8Eidk]Part 2[/url]
  • DarthCaligulaDarthCaligula Elite Ranger
    It was a lot of fun. Got autographs from a bunch of actors (not all though, the cost really adds up). Peter Jurasik and Stephen Furst are awesome. Mira Furlan didn't seem all that interested while signing, but she got really broken up at the reunion talking about the dead actors and how being cast on B5 really helped her at a time when she felt like a failure after immigrating from Yugoslavia. Oh yeah, about Peter Jurasik, he wasn't just signing his name, for everyone I saw getting his autograph (including me of course) he would write out something as well on the picture. I was talking to him about how I really liked how a little joke he played on JMS ended up making Londo's hair as long as it was, and so he wrote a joke on the picture about that.
    I might think up more later to talk about, but one other thing I was surprised about was a panel called "Babylon 5 Fandom Endures". SpiritOne, you know what we were talking about in that pizza place and my dismal opinion on some of this. Anyway, JMS was at that panel (which he actually wasn't scheduled to, it was a surprise to all of us) and pretty much the entire thing was about how the show's living on through things like Tumblr and such, and I decided to pretty much say my opinion about how I feel like stuff like that can only reach a small amount of people, that the show hasn't been on in the US in about seven years and that I felt like no one was going to remember it, and JMS actually agreed with me. He said I was absolutely right about how it not being on TV means that the only people who are going to discover this show are people who are searching it out, that you can't just happen to find it on TV, like you can with the repeats of Star Trek or Firefly. He encouraged us to "rise up" in a way and make WB... uh... I can't remember. Pretty much he wants our voices to be heard and such. I was just really surprised and very pleased that he agreed with me about that. I thought everyone was going to tear me apart for saying that, but I just figured that this was the only chance I would have had to comment on this sort of thing.
    I'll probably say more later about the convention.
  • WORFWORF The Burninator
    I came across this...

    [img]http://sphotos-e.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/976007_468406459902556_74071969_o.jpg[/img]
  • DarthCaligulaDarthCaligula Elite Ranger
    SpiritOne and I were joking that Jason Carter looks like a hobo off the streets.
  • DarthCaligulaDarthCaligula Elite Ranger
    So to go into more detail about Micheal O'Hare, about two thirds through filming the first season, Micheal started getting delusional, seeing messages to him in random things like newspapers, that sort of thing. He talked to JMS about how he needed to get treatment, and that's that discussion that we've heard about. JMS was actually considering shutting the whole show down, but Micheal encouraged him to keep going. So JMS said that later on they would complete Sinclair's story when Micheal was better, and they also recorded the "Hello old friend" video that Sinclair has delivered to Garibaldi later on. Apparently Micheal had a hard time holding it all together for that last third of the season. So maybe if you look at the production order and watch the later episodes, you might notice something. I haven't tried, but he also seemed a good enough actor that he could hide it and just play Sinclair.
    So he went in for treatment, JMS mentioned visiting him at some point and Micheal was really pale and looked terrible, but he also managed to make it to a few conventions I guess and by the third season he was well enough that he was able to come back and finish his story with "War Without End". I seem to remember JMS saying that Micheal still struggled with his mental problem in the years to come and so his acting career slowed down quite a bit. I also remember reading an interview with Micheal in Babylon 5 Magazine where he mentions taking more time to raise his son.
    Apparently only a few people knew about this. I can't remember who else. I think he said Douglas Netter, I know for sure that he mentioned Kathryn Drennan (JMS's former wife) and he mention one or two other people. At some point, I think some time after "War Without End" Micheal told JMS that he wanted everyone to know about this after he died, and JMS thought that was a ridiculous idea, that he would die before JMS. JMS said something like "Come on, we know you and Rick will outlive us all." Rick, as in Richard Biggs of course. So that's why he's finally telling us about this.
  • David of MacDavid of Mac Elite Ranger Ca
    [quote][COLOR=#FFFFFF][FONT=Helvetica][SIZE=13px]So maybe if you look at the production order and watch the later episodes, you might notice something.[/quote]

    I always thought it was weird that Sinclair only appeared in one scene in "Quality of Mercy." It would've seemed less weird if he just wasn't in the episode at all.[/SIZE][/FONT][/COLOR]
  • WORFWORF The Burninator
    That's not weird at all, it happens in lots of TV shows with a big cast.
  • DarthCaligulaDarthCaligula Elite Ranger
    Is this topic working? Can I post at all anymore?

    Edit: Hey! It's actually working! I can't post at all in the Star Trek or Test topics and I was wondering if it was working at all.
  • DarthCaligulaDarthCaligula Elite Ranger
    I also went to Claudia Christian's panel. She spent about half the time talking about her experiences on B5 and the other half talking about the Sinclair Method, which she used to overcome her alcoholism. I guess this explains what the Sinclair Method is: [url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclair_Method[/url] And apparently I was one of the few in the audience who had not read her book.
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