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Sci-Fi Television Entertainment

Babylon 5 Actor Jerry Doyle Dies (dailymail.co.uk) 156

Slashdot reader tiqui writes: Jerry Doyle, best known for playing Security Chief Michael Garibaldi on Babylon 5 has passed away in Las Vegas at only 60 years of age. His B5 character was often paired-up with G'Kar (played by Andreas Katsulas who died in 2006 at age 59) and with Jeffrey Sinclair (played by Michael O'Hare who died in 2012, also at age 60) He seems to have lead an interesting life. Cause of death not yet known.
Slashdot reader The Grim Reefer quotes the BBC: Fellow Babylon 5 actor Bruce Boxleitner tweeted that he was "so devastated at the news of the untimely death of my good friend", while astronaut Scott Kelly said the news was "very sad to hear".
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Babylon 5 Actor Jerry Doyle Dies

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  • Garibaldi faked his own death to get to the truth about who hacked the Democrats.

    Damn B5 is one of the few series I want to see either remade, or expanded upon. Modern cgi would make those space battles even more epic.

    • by mfh ( 56 ) on Saturday July 30, 2016 @05:48PM (#52614133) Homepage Journal

      Garibaldi was awesomely acted by Doyle and he will be missed. RIP. Too young to die at age 60.

      Time to binge B5 for my respects. I would love to see a prequel called "B4", mostly because I like puns. Any remake would be able to examine closely the tropes of POV and "anyone can die" as they reimagine the series as a space epic. Game of Thrones in space is something that could potentially get a huge audience and would definitely be welcomed by all.

      • by haruchai ( 17472 )

        We know what happened (to) B4

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

        • Actually, according to Jinxy we know what happened to all the previous stations *except* B4 - all destroyed almost immediately. B4 though, we only know the very beginning of its story, and a few scraps of thousand year old legend. Could actually make for a wonderful prequel setting - almost no details and all that continuity demands is successful near-defeat of the Shadows.

      • Game of Thrones in space is something that could potentially get a huge audience and would definitely be welcomed by all.

        God no. Bad enough with JRRM chronicling the lives of everyone on one planet, let alone a galaxy full of them!

      • by doccus ( 2020662 )

        Garibaldi was awesomely acted by Doyle and he will be missed. RIP. Too young to die at age 60.

        Time to binge B5 for my respects. I would love to see a prequel called "B4", mostly because I like puns. Any remake would be able to examine closely the tropes of POV and "anyone can die" as they reimagine the series as a space epic. Game of Thrones in space is something that could potentially get a huge audience and would definitely be welcomed by all.

        The prequel would likelly disappear before it got finished....

      • by Agripa ( 139780 )

        [quote]I would love to see a prequel called "B4", mostly because I like puns.[/quote]

        That is going to be a pretty boring prequel. Maybe the History Channel would show it as a Modern Marvels special.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      I don't know... even with the flaws, Severed Dreams is still probably one of the most spectacular space battles of the small, or large screen-- not because it was massive (which it was), but because it was *personal*. The textures could be a bit more detailed, sure, and perhaps the particle effects could be amped up-- but I don't think it would change the impact the battle had on the viewer.

    • Love to see B5 done as a prequel, before humans came on the scene. The whole backstory was epic. Be nice to see a SF series with no humans in it.

      Except that chick that played the telepath. She wasn't that hot, but damn she was sexy. Patricia something if memory serves. Too lazy to google.
  • by ytene ( 4376651 ) on Saturday July 30, 2016 @05:26PM (#52614053)
    "Welcome home, Mr Garibaldi!!!" The thing that made Babylon 5 stand out - especially given the vast amount of money being thrown at other contemporary sci-fi shows of the era, like Star TreK: Next Generation - was the passion that cast and crew had for the show and the respect they had for each other. Over the course of five seasons, 110 episodes and a small collection of spin-off TV-Movies, we were all incredibly privileged to watch a collection of strangers come together, get to know each other, become friends, then absolutely fall in love with the show that they were making. Babylon 5 might have lacked for a lot of things, but never for the passion of what they were doing. You don't have to be a sci-fi fan to see that. And if, as we'd hope, Andreas and Richard and Michael and Jeff are all there waiting for him, I rather hope that Jerry's response, on hearing G'Kar's welcome, would respond in kind: "Even for a Narn - he's nuts!" We will remember your name - and cherish all that you left us. Rest in peace, Jerry.
    • by Kjella ( 173770 )

      "Welcome home, Mr Garibaldi!!!" The thing that made Babylon 5 stand out - especially given the vast amount of money being thrown at other contemporary sci-fi shows of the era, like Star TreK: Next Generation - was the passion that cast and crew had for the show and the respect they had for each other.

      I think it's the story wide arch and that most of the episodes helped form the characters, explaining why they did the things they do later. If you watch TNG and miss five episodes you've barely missed a thing, it's the same crew on the bridge and their characters barely change at all. Sure it's a new situation every time but you can pretty much drop the crew from the first episode into the last episode and it'd all play out the same.

      That said, I missed the beginning of the show and never got into it at fir

  • Michael O'Hare is saying:

    "Hello, old friend."

  • by spoot ( 104183 ) on Saturday July 30, 2016 @05:41PM (#52614105) Homepage

    In honor of Doyle, think I might fire up the series on my Plex server. Saw this news the other day, as it came across the radio business pipeline (he was a somewhat conservative talk show host with a daily show). As a side story, when Doyle was first starting his radio show into syndication, he was making the rounds at the radio biz conventions. I got to sit and talk with Doyle for about an hour at the radio and records talk convention in NY that year. He was trying to pitch his show to all the program directors and network big-wigs (I was then working for a talk talent consulting firm). Of course, all I wanted to talk to Doyle about was Babylon 5. You know what, he indulged me for an hour.. and let me be a fan. He seemed actually excited to talk about Babylon 5 with a guy who was a fan of the show. He was a real gent and very regular guy. Hopefully he's riding a Kawasaki Ninja with Lennier out on the rim of the broken wheel.

  • by shawnhcorey ( 1315781 ) on Saturday July 30, 2016 @06:07PM (#52614209) Homepage
    From the stars we came,
    to the stars we return,
    from now until the end of time,
    we therefore commit this body to the deep.
  • by Dynamoo ( 527749 ) on Saturday July 30, 2016 @06:09PM (#52614229) Homepage
    Jerry Doyle - Died 2016, aged 60
    Michael O'Hare - Died 2012, aged 60
    Jeff Conaway - Died 2011, aged 60
    Andreas Katsulas - Died 2006, aged 59
    Richard Biggs - Died 2004, aged 44
    Tim Choate - Died 2004, aged 49
    ..thank you all, wherever you are.
    • Jerry Doyle - Died 2016, aged 60
      Michael O'Hare - Died 2012, aged 60
      Jeff Conaway - Died 2011, aged 60
      Andreas Katsulas - Died 2006, aged 59
      Richard Biggs - Died 2004, aged 44
      Tim Choate - Died 2004, aged 49

      *

      Didn't we learn the other day, that deep spacemen die early from heart disease . . . ?

      I guess that it now applies to actors, who play roles as deep space astronauts.

    • They must not of paid them very much, rich people are supposed to live longer than this.

    • Dude, they have been extremely lucky to be in such a great show!

    • One wonders if the surviving cast members have difficulty getting life insurance?
  • by l0n3s0m3phr34k ( 2613107 ) on Saturday July 30, 2016 @06:13PM (#52614245)
    We've been binging B5 right now...on Season 5, episode 11. B5 is one of the best scifi shows ever. It was never afraid to show war, death, pain...and yet had many themes of hope and good triumphing over evil. It made a stark contrast between spirituality vs religions, and showed that nothing is pure good or evil.

    "Survive, and maybe one day, forget how much it can hurt to be human. " - Michael Garibaldi
    • The first or second regular-season episode (i.e., not the pilot) had the Soul Hunters. The Soul Hunters thought they were preserving the soul, which would otherwise be destroyed, while many others thought they imprisoned the soul (which happened in the case of one planet, as shown in one of the movies). This is never clarified in general. Therefore, at the end of the episode, Delenn was either freeing or destroying souls, we don't actually know which.

      At that time, I wasn't used to that kind of moral a

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Did they keep a cursed mummy or radioactive waste on the set or something? I've never heard of so many actors dropping dead after working on one set. And compared to the 5 year olds playing with crayons that make up most of the acting community these days most of them were Picassos.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by NormAtHome ( 99305 )

      I've often wondered that myself, the only other instance I can remember of something like this is the cast of the John Wayne movie The Conqueror. The movie was filmed in the desert where atomic testing was done and many of the cast including John Wayne fought and ultimately died of cancer. So many of the stars of B5 have died it's like the show was cursed or something, it's pretty terrible.

      • The movie was filmed in the desert where atomic testing was done and many of the cast including John Wayne fought and ultimately died of cancer.

        The Utah desert where the move got filmed was downwind from the Nevada test site.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downwinders#Health_effects_of_nuclear_testing [wikipedia.org]

        • Close enough to effect a large number of the cast and crew.

          • Close enough to effect a large number of the cast and crew.

            Yeah, the fact that Wayne and probably most of the crew where also heavy smokers had nothing to do with it. This massage brought to you by the American Tobacco Institute.

            • Yes, most of the crew including Wayne were smokers but would it have been as bad without the radiation exposure? Also I read a article a number of years ago (I can't find it right now otherwise I'd post a link) that at least three members of the crew died of cancers not usually associated with smoking such as leukemia and Agnes Moorehead (mostly know as Samantha's mother from Bewitched) died of uterine cancer, again not a type of cancer usually associated with smoking. Susan Hayward (the leading lady) died

      • John Wayne did smoke quite a lot too, so did a lot of people at the time so cancer isn't a surprise.

  • My favourite show of all time. He was perfect for the role and he played it well. Similar to JMS, can't speak much for his political leanings, but he was a genuine and authentic person from any interviews I've seen of him and snippets of his show.

    • Re:Sad news (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Zarjazz ( 36278 ) on Saturday July 30, 2016 @08:07PM (#52614701)

      Yeah, JMS mentions his politics here in a good obituary - http://www.epictimes.com/07/28... [epictimes.com]

    • by vux984 ( 928602 )

      He was perfect for the role and he played it well.

      Agreed. He and Peter Jurasik were particularly brilliant in their roles.

      Although I've heard his marriage with Andrea Thompson (Talia Winters) ending and the circumstances around it may have led to some of the some of the cast and plot issues issues with her sudden departure. Not suggesting Doyle was even at fault there... just an interesting behind the scenes footnote that reverberated through the show.

      can't speak much for his political leanings

      Yeah, he was practically channeling Rush Limbaugh on his show at times. And that I will fully put at Doyle

      • The love/hate relation of G'Kar/Garibaldi/Mollari with all the conspiracies and occasional seasoning with Bester is part of what made the show interesting. But even other characters were important even if they actually were more replaceable.

        Sometimes an actor is just right for the role, so to the degree that the role is tuned to the actor.

    • As a true nerd, I watched all the episodes on the DVDs that had commentary twice, once with and once without. Everyone else always seemed to not actually be their characters in the commentary. Doyle, on the other hand, just projected Garibaldi, and I couldn't pick out two distinct personalities.

  • Although I do suspect heavily that Doyle had alcohol-related problems much like his character. Sad.

    • by NormAtHome ( 99305 ) on Saturday July 30, 2016 @08:37PM (#52614793)

      I'm not sure it's widely known, but several years ago while he was visiting Germany for a convention he was mugged and badly beaten to the point where he had to have a metal plate in his skull. Bill Mumy mentioned that on Facebook in his memorium. Until the autopsy results are released it's impossible to know but to have a steel plate attached to your skull he suffered significant head trauma, it may be related to that but I'm sure we'll find out.

  • Where was Wlter Koenig at the time?

    I know it would be impossible to prove a telepath committed murder

  • I wonder how Claudia Christian is doing?

    The curse strikes again!
    http://www.imdb.com/list/ls056207990/

  • He's with Dodger now
  • by PortHaven ( 242123 ) on Monday August 01, 2016 @08:22AM (#52620767) Homepage

    That George R. R. Martin is the most frightful writer because all of his characters are killed off. But J. Michael Straczynski is far far more terrifying because his writing kills off the actors. :'-(

  • for the run of Babylon 5 on German TV channel Tele 5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

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