BABYLON 5 Reboot in Development for The CW from J. Michael Straczynski

 
And so, it begins...again.

Deadline is reporting that The CW is developing a "from-the-ground-up" reboot of '90s science fiction TV series Babylon 5, once again produced by series creator and writer J. Michael Straczynski.

According to the article, the reboot will be written by Straczynski and "revolves around John Sheridan (played by Bruce Boxleitner in the original series), an Earthforce officer with a mysterious background, who is assigned to Babylon 5, a five-mile-long space station in neutral space, a port of call for travelers, smugglers, corporate explorers and alien diplomats at a time of uneasy peace and the constant threat of war. His arrival triggers a destiny beyond anything he could have imagined, as an exploratory Earth company accidentally triggers a conflict with a civilization a million years ahead of us, putting Sheridan and the rest of the B5 crew in the line of fire as the last, best hope for the survival of the human race."

Set across the years 2257 through 2262, Babylon 5 debuted in syndication on February 22, 1993 with "The Gathering", a pilot movie, before the full series began on January 26, 1994. The series ran for five seasons across 110 episodes until November 25, 1998, with each season taking place over a single year. It also spawned five TV movies, a direct-to-DVD production called Babylon 5: The Lost Tales, and the spinoff series Crusade.

The series depicted a future where Earth has a unified Earth government and has gained the technology for faster-than-light travel using "jump gates", a kind of wormhole technology allowing transport through the alternate dimension of hyperspace. The Colonies within the solar system and beyond, make up the Earth Alliance, which has established contact with other spacefaring species. Ten years before the series is set, Earth barely escaped destruction by the technologically superior Minbari, who sought revenge after an Earth starship unwittingly killed their leader during first contact, only for them to unexpectedly surrender on the brink of victory. Earth has since established peaceful relationships with them and the Earth Alliance has become a significant and generally respected power within the galactic community.

The other species include the imperialist Centauri; the Narn, who only recently gained independence from the Centauri empire; and the mysterious, powerful Vorlons. Several dozen less powerful species from the League of Non-Aligned Worlds also have diplomatic contact with the major races, including the Drazi, Brakiri, Vree, Markab, and Pak'ma'ra. An ancient and secretive race, the Shadows, unknown to humans but documented in many other races' religious texts, malevolently influence events to bring chaos and war among the known species.