@Knixon said:

He described it as an episode involving mind-reading and perhaps Psi Corps although his character would not have been a telepath and certainly not what became his recurring character of Bester. And that a British actor wound up doing that one-time role.

Or possibly the episode "And The Sky Full Of Stars" which did involve a lot of "mind reading" although Psi Corps was not involved, and Christopher Neame who played the main bad guy is also British.

That's the episode he was talking about.

. S1E08 "And the Sky Full of Stars": production code 106

. S1E06 "Mind War": production code 110

@Knixon said:

Today I happened to see an interview with Walter Koenig that I hadn't previously encountered. In it, he says that JMS had originally offered him a one-time guest appearance, which he wasn't able to do because he was still recovering from a heart attack.

He described it as an episode involving mind-reading and perhaps Psi Corps although his character would not have been a telepath and certainly not what became his recurring character of Bester. And that a British actor wound up doing that one-time role.

Now that sounds to me like the episode "Eyes" where he would have taken the place of Gregory Martin (who is British) who played Colonel Ari Ben Zayn.

Or possibly the episode "And The Sky Full Of Stars" which did involve a lot of "mind reading" although Psi Corps was not involved, and Christopher Neame who played the main bad guy is also British.

But the thing is, both of those episodes aired AFTER "Mind War" which was Koenig's first appearance as Bester!

So what's the deal? Is there an earlier episode I'm not remembering, involving Psi Corps and a British actor? Or is it another famous example of how, like often happened with original Star Trek, episodes were not made in the same order they were shown?

Here's a blurb from the Wikia page:

"The part of Knight Two was originally written with Walter Koenig in mind to play the part, however in early 1993 Koenig suffered a heart attack and would still be recovering from surgery when ("And the Sky Full of Stars") was due to start shooting in September. J. Michael Straczynski initially tried to have the shooting postponed to accommodate Koenig's recovery time but when this didn't pan out, Straczynski instead promised to write another new character, which became Alfred Bester."

https://babylon5.fandom.com/wiki/Knight_Two

@wonder2wonder said:

@Knixon said:

He described it as an episode involving mind-reading and perhaps Psi Corps although his character would not have been a telepath and certainly not what became his recurring character of Bester. And that a British actor wound up doing that one-time role.

Or possibly the episode "And The Sky Full Of Stars" which did involve a lot of "mind reading" although Psi Corps was not involved, and Christopher Neame who played the main bad guy is also British.

That's the episode he was talking about.

. S1E08 "And the Sky Full of Stars": production code 106

. S1E06 "Mind War": production code 110

So maybe there was at least 4 weeks between the productions, which gave Koenig enough time to be ready. In the interview it sounded more like a couple months, but that's possible too.

Apparently there was enough time before they were due to be aired, that JMS could "hold back" an even EARLIER episode, until Koenig was available.

What production number was "Eyes?"

I don't usually get into the wikia stuff for any show, there often seems to be a lot of opinion masquerading as fact.

@Knixon said:

What production number was "Eyes?"

. S1E16 "Eyes": production code 122

But 122 would make it the season finale? Which "had to be" Chrysalis in order to lead into Delenn being different in season 2. Unless "The Gathering" was 101 and/or 102, or something...

Well I read on wiki (the regular one) that Chrysalis was production number 112. So they were all over the map on that show.

@Knixon said:

But 122 would make it the season finale? Which "had to be" Chrysalis in order to lead into Delenn being different in season 2. Unless "The Gathering" was 101 and/or 102, or something...

Well I read on wiki (the regular one) that Chrysalis was production number 112. So they were all over the map on that show.

"Chrysalis" had to be shot earlier, because of the extensive post-production work needed:

JMS:

Today, incidentally, I finished the outline for "Chrysalis," which will be the last episode of this season, though we'll be shooting it much earlier, about 2/3rds through the run. It's a real corker in which we absolutely kick over the table and all hell breaks loose bigtime. This one I'm really looking forward to writing.

I'm in the strange position of writing the season end episode now, to shoot #12, since it's going to require a lot of post production work, and it definitely puts one in a very strange state of mind. I have to be careful to refer to things that've happened in the past episodes, from the perspective of the last episode of the season, but which haven't yet been written or filmed in real-time. So I'm writing the second half of some stories before having written the first half (though I obviously know where they're all going)...which really bends your brain around after a while.

This episode is going to be highly classified; we're going to limit distribution of scripts, and parts of scripts, put canary traps in all of the scripts that are distributed, and otherwise keep this one quiet. All I can say is that we're going to kick over every table we've got. In any season finale, there are maybe 4-5 things you know when you sit down to watch the show that they'll NEVER ever do. So we're doing all of them. If this one doesn't keep you glued to your seats, you've lost your chair.

Production number usually denotes the order in which episodes were written and the intended order for them to be seen, as with TOS where Shore Leave should have been seen several episodes after Balance Of Terror, to deal with things such as Angela appearing to have a new guy the very next episode (as they were aired) after the one she was going to marry, is killed.

In terms of post-production, I'm not sure why Chrysalis would have so much more work to do than the two-part A Voice In The Wilderness, for example, which was numbers 120 and 121 but aired as 18 and 19. Or Babylon Squared, which was production number 118 then aired as 20. Those episodes all seemed to have more spaceships and etc requiring post-production work, than an episode like Chrysalis.

@Knixon said:

Production number usually denotes the order in which episodes were written and the intended order for them to be seen....

You're right. In this case, JMS wrote the episodes in a different order (previous post, second paragraph quote).

@Knixon said:

In terms of post-production, I'm not sure why Chrysalis would have so much more work to do than the two-part A Voice In The Wilderness, for example, which was numbers 120 and 121 but aired as 18 and 19. Or Babylon Squared, which was production number 118 then aired as 20. Those episodes all seemed to have more spaceships and etc requiring post-production work, than an episode like Chrysalis.

Well, "Chrysalis" was the most important episode of season one, and JMS seems to have written (most of) the other episodes with that in mind (previous post, second paragraph quote).

To get the finale right, he might have wanted extra time - more than usual - in the post-production phase, for example for the editing of certain scenes.

In the third paragraph of the quote (previous post) he also said: "In any season finale, there are maybe 4-5 things you know when you sit down to watch the show that they'll NEVER ever do. So we're doing all of them."

This 'doing all of them' will certainly take more time to edit, than the usual episode, where not everything is done.

All in all I think that JMS just wanted the finale of the first season to be perfect, and if anything had to be corrected or changed, there would be ample time to do this.

Side note:

Most of the episodes in season 2-5 were broadcast in the same order as the production codes.

A big exception is the series finale S5E22 "Sleeping in Light", which was produced a year earlier (before the renewal of the fifth and final season by TNT; season 1-4 were by Syndicated), and was intended as the finale for season four. Its production code then was '422', which was changed to '523'.

The episode "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars" was filmed as the first episode of season 5. Its production code then was '501'. After it replaced "Sleeping in Light" as the finale of season 4 (S4E22), its production code was changed to '422'.

Changing production numbers after the fact, seems wrong. Especially when we've seen that production numbers for B5 - unlike most shows - had not (previously) been intended to reflect their airing sequence. As with Chrysalis being 112 rather than 122, and not being changed later to reflect "reality."

That said, it's understandable that JMS would write at least part of Chrysalis before some other episodes of season 1 - although not why it would actually be produced/filmed earlier - because there were things he intended for it to have, and it was important that episodes which would be seen before the finale both actively support it and not actively contradict it.

But I just don't see that leading to requiring more post-production time than an episode with more special effects. Editing existing material of actors speaking etc, just wouldn't take as long as creating cgi spaceships etc, especially for B5 season 1 which was pioneering a lot of that using "consumer desktop" levels of technology which took a lot longer than is required now.

It might make more sense to refer to the old/original "production number" system as just "writing order," since it doesn't really seem related to how much production time was actually required. And CERTAINLY not related to the order they were (meant to be) shown/seen.