Well, here's a date to write down: March 23rd. That's the last day of
filming on Babylon 5: Year One. It took us seven years to get here, and
suddenly the last day of the first season is just around the corner.

We'll know if we get picked up around late April/May. Look for an "eep"
if I can't say anything official.

The weekend after we finish, we're going to take over a bowling alley for
a B5 wrap party. Went out today and bought myself a new pair of bowling
shoes, bowling glove (with wrist support), and actually invested in a proper,
custom bowling ball. Will practice a bit between now and the party. Part of
this emanates from Your Executive Producer's desire not to stand there
throwing gutter balls in front of Ye Cast and Crew, and another part emanates
from the fact that I actually *enjoy* bowling, and have been waiting for an
excuse to indulge.

(I actually used to be very good at it. Practiced every week. At a
bowling alley in Richardson, Texas -- and it's noted because it was part of a
bowling class, monitored by an instructor -- I actually bowled a *perfect
game*. Just once. All that came to an end in 1977 or so, when I got mugged
and had my hand broken in a couple places, making it both impossible and very
painful to bowl for years afterward. I may finally try and work my way back
into it a bit.)

Really sad...most TeeVee producers play tennis, or golf, or swim a few
laps in their olympic pool...I like bowling, and comic books, and watching
awful movies. A man of the people. Unfortunately, the people left town
without me, and didn't leave a forwarding address....

We're halfway through filming the two-parter, "A Voice in the
Wilderness," which is coming along nicely. From a CGI and sets point of view,
this is the largest and most ambitious thing we've shot yet, with more of each
category than in any other episode. The last episode to be shot will be Larry
DiTillio's "Eyes," which is sort of a nice wrap-up to the season, almost an
overview. Once again, nothing that happens this season is simply
forgotten...and a *lot* of it comes due in this episode. It actually manages
to incorporate references to about 6 prior episodes without being obscure
about it.

Even though we don't yet know about Year Two, we have to begin planning
for it on a story level. I've begun breaking out the individual threads
that'll come up then, and have begun laying them out in terms of individual
episodes. We'll also have a post-mortem on Year One with all departments, to
see what we did right, where we can improve, and where we can go beyond what
we did this season. In the best of all possible worlds, as the technology
keeps changing around us and getting better, we would like to keep pace with
that and constantly upgrade for a more realistic look...and for greater
options. How can we do *more*, and do it better? I don't think we can *ever*
afford to get complacent, and we have to keep challenging ourselves each
season to raise the ante another notch.

Now it's all in the hands of the Neilsens....

jms