Babylon 5

[jonesy]

Add to this the fact that Claudia Christian's (Ivanova's) departure was not part of the plan.

For me Ivanova was the glue that held the station together. When the character departed the show stumbled.

 

[MarkB]

I was told that the series climaxed in season 4 because when the show was originally created the main writer, J. Michael Straczynski, planned out five seasons. Then the show wasn't doing so good at the end of the first season, so they asked him to cut it back to 4 seasons. He complained, but cut back his epic plot. Then it started to get popular in seasons 3 (or somewhere thereabouts), and they asked him to bring it back to 5 seasons. He complained again, because things had already been put in motion, and the show had too much momentum for it not to climax in season 4, so he largely kept the 4-season script and just added a fifth "epilogue" season on the end.

That doesn't match my recollection at the time. Season 4 was considered to be the last season late enough into production that the series-finale episode, Sleeping in Light, was written and largely produced before season 5 was green-lighted, though it was held back from broadcast until the end of season 5.

 

[jonesy]

Here's jms himself answering to the S4/S5 thing in the middle of S4:

Re: I wish JMS had ignored the season 4 / season 5 thing. (7 Mar 1997)

"I've isolated the threads that would go into a year 5; if we get year 5,
I'll pull the triggers on that, and we'll do those stories. If not, those
threads will go into the sequel. Either way, we're covered...because I
can't ask fans to stick around for 4 or 5 years of a show, and not achieve
resolution."

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Count me in as another Sinclair fan. I liked the character.