TV/Movies Megathread

[celedhring]

Watched Dungeons & Dragons. Very enjoyable, if forgettable, popcorn comedy-adventure. It has some pretty hilarious bits, like when they are chased by an obese dragon.

[Habbaku]

The D&D movie had no business being as good as it was. I quite enjoyed it and hopefully it makes enough to get a proper sequel.

[viper37]

The Babylon 5 reboot is in limbo.  The CW was supposed to produce it, but the network has been sold to Nexstar in the mean time and they shifted their strategy to mostly airing sports and reality tv with very few scripted tv.  Apparently, there's only 3 scripted tv shows on the network scheduled for next year, and one of them is All American, so that leaves room for only 2 other shows.  JMS posted something hinting to some problem with the Writing Guild Association as the reason for the delay/limbo.

In any case, since last week, he keeps posting hint that something big is coming, but it has nothing to do with the B5 reboot.
And today, he posts this:


Brand new Babylon 5 logo.

Yesterday or the day before, it was a picture of him and John Sheridan, aka Bruce Boxleitner.

I'm leaning toward a remaster.  Someone finally found the long lost masters at WB.

[Tonitrus]

I wonder if re-doing/updating all of the CGI effects/scenes is possible.  It's been too long since I watched it last to be sure.

[grumbler]

I wonder if re-doing/updating all of the CGI effects/scenes is possible.  It's been too long since I watched it last to be sure.

Yes.  All of the effects were shot in 16:9 and they'd just need to reskin everything to HD textures.

They could have done that at the start if Doug Netter had approved a $6000 monitor to allow them to see the results.

[viper37]

I wonder if re-doing/updating all of the CGI effects/scenes is possible.  It's been too long since I watched it last to be sure.

Yes.  All of the effects were shot in 16:9 and they'd just need to reskin everything to HD textures.

Hmm.  Let me try to remember.  The series itself was shot on 16:9.  All the scenes with actors are 16:9, cropped to 4:3 for tv.  But the CGI, I was under the impression it was always done in 4:3, and that's the problem with the lack of masters?  They have the film, but not the masters for the special effects, so if they wanted to remaster it for hd or ultra hd, they would need to redo all of the CGI as if it was the first time.


Edit:
ok, here's the wiki section:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylon_5#Mastering_problems

Though the CG scenes, and those containing live action combined with digital elements, could have been created in a suitable widescreen format, a cost-saving decision was taken to produce them in the 4:3 aspect ratio. When those images were prepared for widescreen release, the top and bottom of the images were simply cropped, and the remaining image 'blown up' to match the dimensions of the live action footage, noticeably reducing the image quality.^[154][144] The scenes containing live action ready to be composited with matte paintings, CG animation, etc., were delivered on tape already telecined to the 4:3 aspect-ratio, and contained a high level of grain, which resulted in further image noise being present when enlarged and stretched for widescreen.^[156]
For the purely live-action scenes, rather than using the film negatives, according to Copeland, "Warners had even forgotten that they had those. They used PAL versions and converted them to NTSC for the US market. They actually didn't go back and retransfer the shows."^[157] With the resulting aliasing, and the progressive scan transfer of the video to DVD, this has created a number of visual flaws throughout the widescreen release. In particular, quality has been noted to drop significantly in composite shots.^[158][159]

In 2020 a new remastered version was created (as detailed above)^[160] which restored the original picture quality and repaired the damage to the CGI scenes, although this also involved reverting to the original 4:3 aspect ratio. The negatives were scanned at ultra HD quality and then down converted to HD and upscaling programs were used to enhance the CGI to HD at the same time.

They could have done that at the start if Doug Netter had approved a $6000 monitor to allow them to see the results.

Was it even that much?  I thought it was even less than that.


Re-edit: 5000$.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylon_5#Mastering_problems

The widescreen conversion thing was executive short sightedness at its finest!!! We offered to do ALL of Babylon 5 in widescreen mode if Warner Bros would buy us a reference monitor so we could check our output (only $5000 at the time). Ken Parkes (the "Business affairs" guy) and Netter (penny wise, but pound foolish) said no! So we did everything so it could be CROPPED to be widescreen! Each blamed the other by the way. Doug Netter said, "Ken Parkes said no". Ken Parkes said, "Doug Netter said no". SHEESH!!! So for $75 an episode they could have had AWESOME near Hi-Def.


5000$ fixed cost.  That's pennies for a tv show.  FFS, they made all their special effects on a small home computer, a Mac, IIRC?

[celedhring]

The D&D movie had no business being as good as it was. I quite enjoyed it and hopefully it makes enough to get a proper sequel.

It doesn't seem to have made enough money to merit sequels, although I read there's a TV show in the works (with a different set of characters). 

Anyhow, I'm happy it washed off the stink of the awful Jeremy Irons flick.

[Josephus]

I had no problem with the storyline itself. It was actually heartwarming how it panned out. It was more the thinly veiled caricature that involuntarily rolled my eyes

I did have to watch some of the show wincing with my legs crossed though.

[Duque de Bragança]

5000$ fixed cost.  That's pennies for a tv show.  FFS, they made all their special effects on a small home computer, a Mac, IIRC?

Amiga(s) in the beginning, hardly just a small computer (no Apple II sorry-), late '80s/early '90s favourite.
It had a 68000 processor as early Macintoshes, however.

PS: 24 networked Amiga 2000 computers, after checking.

[viper37]

5000$ fixed cost.  That's pennies for a tv show.  FFS, they made all their special effects on a small home computer, a Mac, IIRC?

Amiga(s) in the beginning, hardly just a small computer (no Apple II sorry-), late '80s/early '90s favourite.
It had a 68000 processor as early Macintoshes, however.

PS: 24 networked Amiga 2000 computers, after checking.

Ok, bigger setup than I thought, but still impressive for the time, I guess, compared to what movie studios were using.

[Josquius]

Babylon 5's issues aren't in the computer graphics.
The entire pacing, much of the acting, and general 'feel' of the show has a real typical early 90s US TV quality.
I don't know what it is that the contemporary Trek series do different but they usually manage to avoid this despite also coming from the pre-Sopranos era.

[celedhring]

Babylon 5's issues aren't in the computer graphics.
The entire pacing, much of the acting, and general 'feel' of the show has a real typical early 90s US TV quality.
I don't know what it is that the contemporary Trek series do different but they usually manage to avoid this despite also coming from the pre-Sopranos era.

It's the opposite, actually. B5's issue is that it wanted to be more cinematic, while trying to fit within a traditional 22-episodes-a-season broadcast show, which have grueling production demands and schedules. There's a reason why modern TV shows have 8-10 episodes a season. Star Trek played it more safe.

[celedhring]

Fun fact - TOS didn't really leave much of an impact on me, so every time I see pics of Walter Koenig I think of Bester and not Chekov. 

[HVC]

I had no problem with the storyline itself. It was actually heartwarming how it panned out. It was more the thinly veiled caricature that involuntarily rolled my eyes

I did have to watch some of the show wincing with my legs crossed though.

Roy was so happy and they dashed his dreams

[Josquius]

Babylon 5's issues aren't in the computer graphics.
The entire pacing, much of the acting, and general 'feel' of the show has a real typical early 90s US TV quality.
I don't know what it is that the contemporary Trek series do different but they usually manage to avoid this despite also coming from the pre-Sopranos era.

It's the opposite, actually. B5's issue is that it wanted to be more cinematic, while trying to fit within a traditional 22-episodes-a-season broadcast show, which have grueling production demands and schedules. There's a reason why modern TV shows have 8-10 episodes a season. Star Trek played it more safe.

Maybe it's where they failed. Trying to be a movie whilst being made for tv = very typical made for tv movie look.
It certainly looks more dated than ds9.