For me, the concept of the Rangers isn't tied to Norris; that isn't
the reference I was talking about. Being on that show, I kinda had to
look into the history of the Texas rangers in general, and being the
curious kind of guy I am, I widened out into the Army Rangers, and other
sorts. I'd been looking for a kind of name to attach to this group, and
the more I thought about it, the more it fit.

As far as the costume is concerned...it's not medeival based; if you
look at the ranger's outfit, than go look at a Minbari warrior outfit,
you will discover a LOT of points of comparison. It was *designed* to
echo Minbari warrior caste clothes, to reflect the fact that these two
sides are working together. Go fire up "Legacies" and look at his
uniform, then look at the ranger. You'll see the similarities in
silhouette and line in various places.

Of course I've read and enjoyed Tolkein. But as I've said, I have
no interest in doing LoTR with the serial numbers filed off. I've
dropped references to it in dialogue, but the structure of the story has
nothing whatsoever to do with LoTR. Basically, a lot of people have come
up and said, "Oh, this is the same as Foundation," or "This is the same
as LoTR," or "This echoes a lot of Dune," or "This is obviously a
Homeric tale," or "There's a lot of Star WArs here." It uses the same
tools as all mythic structure fiction uses. Hence it resonates. But I
didn't sit there and think, "Hmm...Gandalf left, so I'll have Sinclair
leave." That's just plain silly.

It's really a matter of what you bring to the table, that affects
what you see in the story.

The roots of the symbolism and structure of B5 go back a hell of a
lot longer than this. Here...I'll give you one free.

G'Kar is in many ways my Cassandra figure, who in the Greek tales
was granted the gift of prophecy...all the disasterous things she
predicted would come true...but she was cursed by the gods that NO ONE
would ever believe her. And later, when the war was at its height,
she ended up in the service of.....

Okay, five points to the person who can supply that answer, and see
the connection.

jms