I heard about the story about how Paramount turned down the Babylon 5 pitch, then turned around and made Deep Space 9. Of course the two shows went in different directions, and are each great in different ways. But there are eyebrow-raising surface similarities. Both shows are named after a numbered space station, feature a commander who is a prophesized savior, have long story arcs, explore moral complexity.
Yesterday I watched the movie pilot, The Gathering. There is another similarity I hadn’t realized before: both commanders are romantically involved with a freighter caption whose name starts with “Ca”!
it’s interesting the ways they got more similar as they went on, too. there’s one particular plot point that B5 does later on, after realizing they had accidentally been foreshadowing it, that comes from the pilot of DS9. i’m not saying they copied it but they couldn’t exactly unwatch it either. the suits at Paramount definitely fucked over JMS when they stole the basic premise, but once both shows were on the air i think they both benefitted from the unintentional dialogue between them
and fun fact: Lyta’s actress was also an extra and stunt double on DS9. reportedly she got a lot of complements on B5 in very hushed tones on the Paramount lot
DS9 was actually already in very early pre-production when JMS made his pitch. They also spent some time during his pitch trying to convince him to do it as a Trek show, which, in hindsight, was obviously an attempt to get him on their similar project. Then everyone who knew about the pitch got really hands-off with DS9’s development.
I heard about the story about how Paramount turned down the Babylon 5 pitch, then turned around and made Deep Space 9. Of course the two shows went in different directions, and are each great in different ways. But there are eyebrow-raising surface similarities. Both shows are named after a numbered space station, feature a commander who is a prophesized savior, have long story arcs, explore moral complexity.
Yesterday I watched the movie pilot, The Gathering. There is another similarity I hadn’t realized before: both commanders are romantically involved with a freighter caption whose name starts with “Ca”!
it’s interesting the ways they got more similar as they went on, too. there’s one particular plot point that B5 does later on, after realizing they had accidentally been foreshadowing it, that comes from the pilot of DS9. i’m not saying they copied it but they couldn’t exactly unwatch it either. the suits at Paramount definitely fucked over JMS when they stole the basic premise, but once both shows were on the air i think they both benefitted from the unintentional dialogue between them
and fun fact: Lyta’s actress was also an extra and stunt double on DS9. reportedly she got a lot of complements on B5 in very hushed tones on the Paramount lot
DS9 was actually already in very early pre-production when JMS made his pitch. They also spent some time during his pitch trying to convince him to do it as a Trek show, which, in hindsight, was obviously an attempt to get him on their similar project. Then everyone who knew about the pitch got really hands-off with DS9’s development.