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Babylon 5 is now streaming on HBO Max, one of the very best shows ever
- Thread starter gdt
- Start date
- Entertainment
I just finished my rewatch last week.
The back half of S5 was better than I remembered. I think back in the day it felt underwhelming since its more of a tragic denouement from S4, but watching it again I think its great.
The first half of S5 is about as patchy as the worst parts of S1.
I actually don't mind Lochley, both the character and how the actress performs her, just unfortunate how she entered the series and she feels shoehorned in with not a lot of space to build her.
Lennier plot had more build than I remembered, but when it turned it was pretty late in the game. Would have been more interesting if it happened earlier in the season and had more time to resolve.
Telepath plot was as blah as I remember, given JMS past I can see why he went with this plot, but I think there were more interesting paths they could have gone to get Lyta where she was going. Plus I know Ivanova was supposed to be entangled with Byron, although that idea also seems blah. Conceptually the thread is not awful, but the execution just feels all over the place. Also why do Telepaths always use guns when we've had seasons of them talking about silently causing death by squeezing arteries shut or melting peoples brains or whatever.
I guess it would have been a building B-plot during the Earth War in JMS original plans as opposed to having to carry the start of S5, S5 starting with the conclusion of Earth War would have been a lot better from a pacing POV.
The one offs I think are interesting ideas that are generally executed at the worst of S1 levels of poorly. Take A View from the Gallery, it might have been decent as a breather ep during the two big S4 wars.
The Drakh unfortunately feel completely undercooked - I really don't understand why they weren't constantly pushed all season as the bad guys across all the episodes. Its sort of implied they are behind a bunch of the strife going on as the Alliance forms, but given the lack of time this season I think JMS should have been more explicit - basically a sort of Shadow remnant version of the Alliance or something.
Still, overall enjoyed rewatching it and it goes out with a great run of episodes concluding in one of the best eps of the series.
The back half of S5 was better than I remembered. I think back in the day it felt underwhelming since its more of a tragic denouement from S4, but watching it again I think its great.
The first half of S5 is about as patchy as the worst parts of S1.
I actually don't mind Lochley, both the character and how the actress performs her, just unfortunate how she entered the series and she feels shoehorned in with not a lot of space to build her.
Lennier plot had more build than I remembered, but when it turned it was pretty late in the game. Would have been more interesting if it happened earlier in the season and had more time to resolve.
Telepath plot was as blah as I remember, given JMS past I can see why he went with this plot, but I think there were more interesting paths they could have gone to get Lyta where she was going. Plus I know Ivanova was supposed to be entangled with Byron, although that idea also seems blah. Conceptually the thread is not awful, but the execution just feels all over the place. Also why do Telepaths always use guns when we've had seasons of them talking about silently causing death by squeezing arteries shut or melting peoples brains or whatever.
I guess it would have been a building B-plot during the Earth War in JMS original plans as opposed to having to carry the start of S5, S5 starting with the conclusion of Earth War would have been a lot better from a pacing POV.
The one offs I think are interesting ideas that are generally executed at the worst of S1 levels of poorly. Take A View from the Gallery, it might have been decent as a breather ep during the two big S4 wars.
The Drakh unfortunately feel completely undercooked - I really don't understand why they weren't constantly pushed all season as the bad guys across all the episodes. Its sort of implied they are behind a bunch of the strife going on as the Alliance forms, but given the lack of time this season I think JMS should have been more explicit - basically a sort of Shadow remnant version of the Alliance or something.
Still, overall enjoyed rewatching it and it goes out with a great run of episodes concluding in one of the best eps of the series.
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Babylon Squared for me is always the episode that really really lights things up in terms of the potential of the whole show. Obviously there were good episodes before this, but this just sets up so much promise, mystery, and lore. It's tight and intense too.
I love it because it's the beginning of one of the most elegantly executed arcs I can think of in an episodic format. Babylon 5 was a precursor at doing this, and this is probably its best story arc in that regard. And yeah, that's when the show really starts to find its footing for me.
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Of course A Voice In The Wilderness does the same, but Babylon Squared is even better, and probably more vital to the overall.
But that planet is mega cool, of course.
after years of hearing great things about this show, i finally started watching it about a month ago. i'm around the start of season 3 now. i did watch a couple seasons of battlestar galactica 2004, but this has done a better job at holding my attention.
one thing that's apparent is how everyone is trying really, really, really hard to make this show something far greater than any one part is on its own. for the network it was on, it's definitely not low-budget, but against the imagination of the creator, it most certainly is. in places it almost feels like a stage play, where actors have to work with blocking and dialogue to sell the drama. and it weirdly works in the show's favor - like i can fill in the gaps with my imagination too.
one thing that's apparent is how everyone is trying really, really, really hard to make this show something far greater than any one part is on its own. for the network it was on, it's definitely not low-budget, but against the imagination of the creator, it most certainly is. in places it almost feels like a stage play, where actors have to work with blocking and dialogue to sell the drama. and it weirdly works in the show's favor - like i can fill in the gaps with my imagination too.
After all these years, I'm finally watching this. And yeah, season 1 is spotty as hell but there are glimpses of a really cool show so I stuck with it. I'm about halfway into season 2 and even with the occasional shaky episode I'm enjoying it immensely.
It's hard to believe that the writers clearly had so much of the plot planned out from day one. And just seeing heavily serialized storytelling in a season from 1994 (s2) is astonishing. While they're better in season 2, the special effects and budget issues are still the low point. ..but the show is just so ambitious that I can overlook it.
It's hard to believe that the writers clearly had so much of the plot planned out from day one. And just seeing heavily serialized storytelling in a season from 1994 (s2) is astonishing. While they're better in season 2, the special effects and budget issues are still the low point. ..but the show is just so ambitious that I can overlook it.
I'm in the middle of season 4 rewatch and it feels so cursed how rushed this season is after the perfect slow build of the first 3 seasons. There's very little gravitas or repercussions cause there's like 2-3 seasons worth of arcs crammed into the whole thing. Really sad for what this show could have been if JMS wasn't feeling the crunch to fit everything into this season
finished watching the show a couple days ago.
feelings are... it feels like season 4 was meant as the true end to the show and season 5 is a surprise epilogue. the climax happens with the end of the shadow war and the falling action happens mostly to decide how babylon 5 will serve as the center for the new alliance. season 5 expounds more on what happens to our main crew and where they'll end up, but it's sort of uninteresting because we know the fate of londo due to time travel shenanigans.
as a whole, the show has this massive ramp up in terms of stakes and then it slows down a lot, and then kinda ramps up again just to piss on londo in particular. it really felt like the happenings of season 5 and the later part of season 4 should have happened in seasons 2 and 3 with the shadows becoming major forces only in season 4.
and call me crazy, but season 1 was far more interesting to me as an idea. episodes centered around different cultures clashing and the way sinclair would resolve them was a lot of fun. how these people try to find peace with each other was entertaining - and the rising fascism from earth and the other schisms forming within and among other races also kept me more engaged versus the crew of babylon 5 battling some invisible foe.
i like the cast for the most part. jms writing everyone and everything probably affected my enjoyment of some of the performances when glibness could feel the same across multiple characters. andreas katsulas and peter jurasik were absolute standouts and they elevated the show.
it's not a show i can recommend, but i enjoyed my time with it. it's made with so much heart that it winds up hitting way above its weight class when it comes to budget. you can tell what it really wants to be if it had a lot more time and money to flesh out its world and story, but makes due with the limitations of 1990s non-fox/cbs/abc/nbc television.
feelings are... it feels like season 4 was meant as the true end to the show and season 5 is a surprise epilogue. the climax happens with the end of the shadow war and the falling action happens mostly to decide how babylon 5 will serve as the center for the new alliance. season 5 expounds more on what happens to our main crew and where they'll end up, but it's sort of uninteresting because we know the fate of londo due to time travel shenanigans.
as a whole, the show has this massive ramp up in terms of stakes and then it slows down a lot, and then kinda ramps up again just to piss on londo in particular. it really felt like the happenings of season 5 and the later part of season 4 should have happened in seasons 2 and 3 with the shadows becoming major forces only in season 4.
and call me crazy, but season 1 was far more interesting to me as an idea. episodes centered around different cultures clashing and the way sinclair would resolve them was a lot of fun. how these people try to find peace with each other was entertaining - and the rising fascism from earth and the other schisms forming within and among other races also kept me more engaged versus the crew of babylon 5 battling some invisible foe.
i like the cast for the most part. jms writing everyone and everything probably affected my enjoyment of some of the performances when glibness could feel the same across multiple characters. andreas katsulas and peter jurasik were absolute standouts and they elevated the show.
it's not a show i can recommend, but i enjoyed my time with it. it's made with so much heart that it winds up hitting way above its weight class when it comes to budget. you can tell what it really wants to be if it had a lot more time and money to flesh out its world and story, but makes due with the limitations of 1990s non-fox/cbs/abc/nbc television.
The show's first four seasons aired on the long-defunct network PTEN. When PTEN was going under, JMS didn't know if the show would get picked up elsewhere, so he accelerated the fourth season. It was originally going to run the full 22 episodes up until
Earth captures Sheridan
As a result, JMS made some stuff up in the first half of season 5, because he didn't need to wrap up the big stuff there anymore. Most fans agree the front half of that season is not great. Meanwhile, the back half is, more or less, as it was always intended to be. (And notably better.)
the telepath stuff came across that way. in my little recap i should give a shoutout to walter koenig. his role as bester was a lot of fun.
season 5's structure isn't a big issue for me. being an extended epilogue is fine, and objects in motion and objects at rest are great little finales for the crew before the final episode. the thing that bugged me more was lochley obviously replacing ivanova. it was more jarring than the alexander -> winters -> alexander switcheroos since ivanova seemed to have been built up to commanding babylon 5 over the course of the show and lochley seemed to be the same general kind of character.
I watched this decades ago, started a rewatch and fell off hard. Stopped at around the middle of season two.
Good news though, I plan on picking it up again soon. It's still a fantastic (if sometimes slightly uneven) show.
Good news though, I plan on picking it up again soon. It's still a fantastic (if sometimes slightly uneven) show.
Did anyone actually watch Crusade? First few episodes were a bit of a snoozer, but the back half started to get more interesting. I had to get it slowly from Netflix DVD
the CG is so dated it was somehow worse than Babylon 5
the CG is so dated it was somehow worse than Babylon 5
I feel you. Ivanova is... well, she says it herself; she's God.
Yeah, I watched it weekly. (In atrocious airing order.) There was some dumb stuff in there but a load of potential and several memorable scenes.
I've been watching this. Just started season 4.
Barring a few lousy episodes, I'm really enjoying it. I can hardly believe that this level of serialization and these massive character/story arcs were happening in 1994. It's well beyond what Deep Space Nine was doing.
I've always been put off by B5's special effects and I'm not gonna lie, the low budget really shows. ..but I really admire how the producers just didn't give a fuck. Those cool ideas got filmed, money or no.
Barring a few lousy episodes, I'm really enjoying it. I can hardly believe that this level of serialization and these massive character/story arcs were happening in 1994. It's well beyond what Deep Space Nine was doing.
I've always been put off by B5's special effects and I'm not gonna lie, the low budget really shows. ..but I really admire how the producers just didn't give a fuck. Those cool ideas got filmed, money or no.
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Price for the DVD set just dropped to $76 on Amazon in Canada. Minus a $72 stint black friday last year, it's the lowest price it's been since 2017. I've been humming and hawing for a while on watching this and this price finally got me to pull the trigger.
Looking forward to it.
<3 physical media.
Looking forward to it.
<3 physical media.
my favorite part about it was Galen, everything else was borderline watching a terrible Star Trek Voyager episode you wanted to end immediately
Honesty the Babylon 5 DVDs are lower quality than the HBO Max version. I believe these new ones got a visual remaster, plus the DVDs are cropped widescreen for the special effect shots.
I don't think there is a way to legally stream Babylon 5 in Canada. It's a lot of content to watch and who knows how long it's going to take so it's not something I would want to subscribe to something just to do anyway.
If you watch B5 before watching DS9, you wonder why everyone praises DS9 so much.
This was exactly my experience. DS9 has its charms but I find it very overrated, and quite bad as a long-form story.
B5 for me is around TNG levels of quality, so if you like space operas, there is really no way around it. Quintessential show.
The DVDs are really meh quality. Before the HBO max version they were as good as you could do though.
There are rumors of a BD set based on the remaster floating around. Something to keep in mind also.
I'd spring for it in a heartbeat.
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We've been showing our kids and we're a ways into S2.
S1 was not as bad as I had remembered. It's got some real duds, and O'Hare's pretty wooden. But the bones are good and some of the individual stories are still excellent.
But then you hit S2 and the whole thing just jumps forward in quality in a big way.
[Best of all, rewatching has allowed me to spruce up my Londo impression.]
S1 was not as bad as I had remembered. It's got some real duds, and O'Hare's pretty wooden. But the bones are good and some of the individual stories are still excellent.
But then you hit S2 and the whole thing just jumps forward in quality in a big way.
[Best of all, rewatching has allowed me to spruce up my Londo impression.]
absolutely though a watchlist is recomened for the firt season, also be aware it's a lower budget 90 sci-fi show so just go in with expectations in check. it does not have the budget of star trek, but has far grander ambitions.
IMO, there are things one show does that the other show didn't. Like, the stories focused on Sisko and his son were huge in my family, no way B5 could replicate that. On the other hand, the macro/long term plotting? B5 runs laps around DS9.
B5 is a show where it's worth it to watch every episode - there are a few iffy ones but you don't feel like you've got to get through a bunch of filler to get the the good bits.
DS9 is a great show and really elevates Trek but the fact that it even has an 'essential episodes' list that cuts out all the bad episodes and bottle episodes that do nothing to really highlight some characters shows how padded out it could be. I mean B5's S1 has some weak points, but you can outright skip like 2/3rds of DS9's first season and not miss a thing.
DS9 is a great show and really elevates Trek but the fact that it even has an 'essential episodes' list that cuts out all the bad episodes and bottle episodes that do nothing to really highlight some characters shows how padded out it could be. I mean B5's S1 has some weak points, but you can outright skip like 2/3rds of DS9's first season and not miss a thing.
Yeah, I would recommend watching this without a watchlist. Even the bad episodes are worth seeing.
Bad episodes in the first season have literally nothing on the average bad episode of TNG so avoid a watch list lol
Maybe skip the boxing one(tko) because it's pretty racist.
Maybe skip the boxing one(tko) because it's pretty racist.
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Started my watch. So far I've watched The Gathering and the first two episodes of season 1. The tech on this show is all over the place. They have regular ass 4x3 CRT's, 16x9 CRT's and LCD monitors(that I think might be PC Engine LT's). That's a wide range of screen tech.
It's crazy that the laser guns fire invisible beams and just make sparks where they make contact.
I can already tell they have a story bible and a plan and I can see the seeds being planted.
It's crazy that the laser guns fire invisible beams and just make sparks where they make contact.
I can already tell they have a story bible and a plan and I can see the seeds being planted.
Yep. As I said earlier in the thread, even the "bad/filler" episodes in season 1 will often have their own unique hidden clues and subtle foreshadowing that will blow your mind later on when you go back and rewatch the series.
The table top com units in the ambassador and staff quarters? I anyways wondered what those were, I actually think you're right that those actually could be PC Engine LTs, wow.
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I've started DS9 two times and find myself just stopping around ten episodes in. At least Babylon 5 has boatload of charm to it's slow first season. Is it worth actually fighting through the initial boredom of the show?
Episodic format really works against the show early on. There are so many misses in the episode roster. Yet, as the show progresses the cast becomes quite lovable and eventually you have actual story continuum. Overall it might not be strong as B5 but at times it comes close.
I think the payoff for sticking with DS9 is well worth it. Especially if you are looking for a B5 like show.
I might give it another try, then. There really isn't much that compares to Babylon 5, and I'm willing to struggle a bit to get into it. I only wish I liked the characters of DS9 more. The show seems severely lacking in charm up to the point to which I've watched.
The visual theme of the Gathering is never really recreated sadly. It had a cool look to it but it was made as a tv pilot so it's production is very different from the regular TV show. That said I think the show has a great look especially for it's time and with the high quality of the CG in the new version.
Also since the discussion about watchlists popped again I'll reiterate since I recently finished my full rewatch: don't skip anything!.
That's not that weird, they all existed at the same time in our timeline after all!
But, I know it's stupid because as much as I love CRTs still to this day for picture quality there's no way for CRTs to make it that far in the future. I have an affinity for the CRT aesthetic in sci-fi like in Alien but it totally dates the film too. But, all tech dates sci-fi shows.
The guns actually aren't lasers, they're projectile weapons that shoot a teeny load of super hot plasma.
Always thought it was cool they didn't go the laser route.
Yes, it's a rare show that mostly knows where it wants to go and how it's going to get there from the very start. Obviously, things change throughout production of any series, but they get integrated in a way that never feels like the creator was caught off guard by any of it.
The flip side of that, though, is that it starts to buckle a bit under its own weight in the back half (especially when JMS starts writing every single episode).
Still, can't blame anyone not sticking with DS9. It's 26 episodes per season and S1-3 have terrible ration of good/bad episodes.
I don't know if it was really JMS writing that made the show buckle. There was constant threat that the show will be canned so JMS had to revisit his delivery quite often. I don't know if season 5 would have been any better if they had more writers in the rolodex.
I mean, he pretty much wrote all the episodes from the start
S1 13 episodes out of 22
S2 15 episodes out of 22
S3 22 episodes out of 22
S4 22 episodes out of 22
S5 19 episodes out of 22 (well, he co-wrote two episodes with Harlan so basically 21/22.)
having a consistent writer is probably why it's my favorite show
it's like an actual story and instead of just episodes that share the characters. there are almost no shows which pull that off.
you'd probably have to find a show that's a retelling of preexisting finished work (eg. a book series) to find similar plot quality
it's like an actual story and instead of just episodes that share the characters. there are almost no shows which pull that off.
you'd probably have to find a show that's a retelling of preexisting finished work (eg. a book series) to find similar plot quality