From: mmcalees@cs16.UVic.CA (Michael McAleese)
Subject: Re: Babylon 5:  WHAT EXACTLY IS IT?
Summary: A quick explaination
Organization: Those Dudes
Date: Fri, 25 Dec 92 18:08:17 GMT

In article <alix.725262045@pv663d.vincent.iastate.edu> alix@iastate.edu (L.A. Melloy) writes:
>I've been seeing all this discussion about the new series, Babylon5, but I
>realized after seeing a commercial for it on Fox yesterday, that I have NO
>IDEA WHAT IT'S ABOUT.  Can someone out there in netland maybe post a short
>summary for those of us who have been buried in books all semester?  Thanx.

  Hmm. Okay, here's a try. Babylon 5 is a new SF series that has got quite
a bit of good word-of-mouth advertising on the new, mostly because the 
creator and guiding light of the show J. Michael Straczynski posts to the
net or GEnie about the show and his progress in getting it to the screen.
What he has to say about what he's attempting to do has struck a responsive
chord in many SF fans, who, like him, were wanting someone to do a decent
television SF show. The unofficial motto of Babylon-5 is "No cute kids or
robots... ever." For the actual background of the show I include a section
of the Babylon-5 FAQ, available for ftp from ftp.coe.montana.edu in
ftp/pub/TV/guides/babylon-5 (get it, all your questions are answered there).


FROM: The BABYLON 5  Frequently Asked Questions List

The version: Updated 6/10/92 - Compiled by Lee Whiteside

[lots of stuff deleted for brevity]

Section II: The Babylon 5 Universe

1.  What is Babylon 5 about?

     The date: 2257 A.D.

     We have gone to the stars, and found that we are not alone.  We have
moved quickly out, establishing relations with other civilizations that
has let us leapfrog technologies via an information and cultural exchange
with at least one other culture.  Many contacts have been friendly.  Some
have not been quite so benign.

     From 2236 through 2247, war raged between the Earth Alliance and the
Minbari, an alien federation.  The EA was losing, badly.  As a last
resort, a suicide perimeter was set up around Earth, known as the Line. 
Every last ship we had was on the Line, in a desperate defense of
Homeworld.

     And on the brink of winning the war, just as they were breaking
through the Line...the Minbari surrendered.  To this date, no one knows
why.  They could have won, but chose not to.  The secret behind their
surrender will gradually play a part in our story.

     But that was now 10 years ago, in our story.  There is now an uneasy
peace between the Earth Alliance and the four other alien federations. 
To help cement that peace, the EA has constructed BABYLON 5.

     BABYLON 5 is a five-kilometer-long space station in neutral space
more or less central to all five of the different alliances, human or
alien.  To get to one or the other, you have to pass through this sector
of space.  Thus, Babylon 5 has been created as a sort of port-of-call for
travelers, statesmen, emissaries, traders, refugees and other, less
savory characters.  Five kilometers long and two kilometers wide, Babylon
5 is divided into separate, discreet sections that rotate at differing
speeds to provide different gravities to accommodate those who come to
the station.  There are also sections with alternate atmospheres.

     The station boasts living quarters, customs areas, docking bays,
meeting areas, a casino, several bars/nightclubs, command and control
spheres fore and aft, and a decent defensive grid.  In addition, each of
the various federations has one official representative aboard the
station (with the station's commander representing the Earth Alliance),
so that it also functions as a sort of mini-U.N.

     It is home to humans and aliens in various roles, some arriving or
departing every day, others working there full-time.  They live on the
very edge of the frontier, in the sense that if they get into trouble,
there's no one who can arrive in time to help them.  Because of the
nature of the travelers, they bring their stories with them to Babylon
5 rather than having to seek them out.  The stories are of people in
flight, seeking sanctuary; stories of smugglers, assassins, traders,
mappers, dignitaries and others, all on urgent missions of one sort or
another.

     If STAR TREK was "Wagon Train to the Stars," then BABYLON 5 is
Casablanca in space.

     It is humanity's last hope for peace, a single hope in the middle
of an uneasy, fragile peace.

     And it *is* fragile, and dangerous.  It is called BABYLON 5 because
the first three efforts to build the station were sabotaged and 
destroyed.  The fourth one disappeared without a trace 24 hours after
becoming operational. No one knows what happened to it.

     And *that*...is only the beginning of our story.

[rest deleted]

-- 
*     mmcalees@csr.uvic.ca (Michael McAleese) : I speak only for me...       *
  "Man can believe the impossible, but never the improbable." - Oscar Wilde
  (For snooping governments: heroin, cocaine, FBI, CSIS, CIA, albatross...)