7 ms·

If you decide to watch Babylon 5 for the first time, I suggest giving it a chance to get under your skin. There is quite a lot to get in the way of that such as

If you decide to watch Babylon 5 for the first time, I suggest giving it a chance to get under your skin. There is quite a lot to get in the way of that such as mediocre acting, cringey humour, low budget fx (all particularly prominent in season 1). But the pay off in seasons 3 and 4 is huge if you take the time to let affection grow for the characters. Babylon 5 was my first 'favourite series' that 'changed my life' etc etc so I guess I am biased!

whynotmaybe 8mo ago
No, you're not biased, it's simply the best! It's getting old but nostalgia kicks in as soon as I see a Vorlon ship
account42 8mo ago
Is that disclaimer really needed? As someone who watched the series the first time last year, the acting and humor seem fine for TV honestly. The CGI dated of course but not offensive either. If anything I found the later seasons more disappointing than 1 and 2 as smaller scale stories are replaced with moving the big plot forward, which still feels rushed somehow.
- jefc1111 8mo ago
  The disclaimer is just based on my own opinion, so inevitably there will be people to whom it does not apply. Some of the acting in season 1 is great, I would just say there are some spots where it kinda briefly falls through the floor. It may be just because I have seen it several times so am spotting things that I wouldn't have first time round. With season 4, I believe what happened is that towards the start of production JMS was told there would be no S5 after all, so he put all of S4 and S5 into S4 ... but then there was an S5 after all!
  - sidpatil 8mo ago
    > smaller scale stories are replaced with moving the big plot forward This is pretty common in TV shows, from what I've noticed. It takes a few seasons for a show to find its footing.
  - WorldMaker 8mo ago
    Yeah, Season 4 is acknowledged for compressing a lot of the story that would have been Season 5 in the original plan. The series finale ("Sleeping in Light") was even shot as a part of Season 4 and delayed once Season 5 was picked up to keep it the series finale. The epilogue it tells spins out enough past the show that it mostly isn't that noticeable, but the big tell is a brief appearance of Ivanova rather than Lochley, which doesn't really break the episode because of the out-of-order storytelling of the whole episode and the glimpses of the crew are "timeless" flashbacks, but it is interesting.
    - pwg 8mo ago
      IIRC, this was because there was significant uncertainty about whether the network exec's would cancel the show after season 4, so JMS reworked things so that 4 wouldn't end on an open-ended cliffhanger if that were to have happened. In the end, season 5 was given the go-ahead, and so now season 4 seems rushed needlessly.
      - WorldMaker 8mo ago
        The uncertainty is actually an interesting behind-the-scenes story that the mini-TV Channel hoping to grow up into a full TV Channel that B5 was distributed under was PTEN [0] and leading up to and during Season 4 of Babylon 5 PTEN split in a weird divorce to form the WB TV Network and the UPN Network. (It got its wish, it grew up into not one but two competing TV networks.) Season 5 was a last minute pick up/rescue by one of WB's cable networks, TNT. (TNT wanted more than just one season which led to the mess that was Crusade. As a Crusade fan, TNT was both the best and the worst of what could happen to B5.) (History repeating itself, and Babylon 5 being cursed to ironic timing, the WB Network and UPN eventually remerged to become The CW. A Babylon 5 reboot project development was started at The CW this decade, just before WB Discovery decided to get out of the broadcast TV business and start a fresh divorce at The CW somewhat resembling the PTEN divorce.) [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prime_Time_Entertainment_Network https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prime_Time_Entertainment_Netwo...
- isjdjwjdhw 8mo ago
  Completely unnecessary, yes. Babylon 5 is a product of its time, as is everything, but it is as fine a production as any other sci-fi-on-a-budget show from the early-to-late 90s. It’s a phenomenally intricate and interesting little universe with great characters and stories. No need for a disparaging disclaimer such as that.
- WorldMaker 8mo ago
  I have a bunch of friends that either never made it completely through Season 1 or complained all through Season 1. Season 1 is rougher than normal. The problem though is that while it is easy to tell people "Skip Season 1 of TNG or DS9" (which is relatively common advice for both shows), Season 1 has so many moments of character building and foreshadowing that pay off in later seasons that even the "worst" episodes are hard to tell people to skip. An example not quite off the top of my head is as early as Episode 2 "Soul Hunter". It's a goofy plot full of weird pseudo-scientific mysticism with a "special guest of the week" who basically never returns (excluding books and movies), so in most shows meets several definitions of skippable, but this episode also introduces Dr. Franklin, has several key Sinclair and Garibaldi moments, provides background lore for the Minbari and foreshadows certain Minbari things to come. That's just the second episode of the season. (Truly a rough start for some.) Another common example is "TKO". It's a silly boxing match episode, much of it doesn't do much for the series except set up some of Garibaldi's goofier side and maybe foreshadowing Garibaldi's flaws. But it's also the Ivanova confronts grief and her heritage episode, a key part of Ivanova's arc.
  - MindSpunk 8mo ago
    It pains me how important TKO is for Ivanova's character because it's otherwise got to be one of, if not the worst episodes in the whole show's run.
    - mnau 8mo ago
      Ratings agree with that assessment. TKO is the only episode rated "bad" of all seasons. https://seriesgraph.com/show/3137-babylon-5 https://seriesgraph.com/show/3137-babylon-5
- Sharlin 8mo ago
  When I re-watched B5 a few years ago, I wad surprised by the amount of humor and small pieces of situational comedy. It’s really missing from most 2000s TV dramas, everything became really serious after 9/11. If there’s humor in a 00s or even 10s "self-respecting" drama series, it’s usually dry, dark, and/or ironic.
jeffwask 8mo ago
I rewatched it last year during an old sci-fi binge, I had watched bits as a kid but never got it. I grew up on TNG and DS9 was my favorite, so I was probably biased. It's probably now number 2 for me behind DS9. I watched it again a few month later to catch all the foreshadowing I missed the first time. You are spot on that season 1 is a slow burn that ramps up to the amazing seasons 3 and 4. Best part, it has a clean conclusion without any sequel bait nonsense. Londo and Gkar are two of the best characters in Sci-Fi and their relationship is brilliant.
- stuxnet79 8mo ago
  As a DS9 fan myself I felt like B5 was the better show. DS9 had greater variance throughout its run, the standout episodes were phenomenal but also lots of weak episodes & filler. If there was tighter editorial control over the episodes & at least 30% of them got cut then it could be a contender.
  - jeffwask 8mo ago
    I probably agree but my emotional attachment to DS9 keeps it in front. It's also crazy how relevant to modern times the plot of B5 is and how many parallels you see.
    - jefc1111 8mo ago
      I hear this a lot about B5, and I get a _sense_ of it myself, but I'd love to know what people specifically mean. I.e. "X plot line is like Y thing" in real life right now.
      - jeffwask 8mo ago
        It's fascism. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imMGchI1EWY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imMGchI1EWY
        georgeecollins 8mo ago
alehlopeh 8mo ago
That’s not what “get under your skin” means.
- mortenjorck 8mo ago
  It has both positive and negative connotations depending on the context. For an example of the former, look at the lyrics to the Beatles’ Hey Jude. It’s been used that way since 1968!
- fsckboy 8mo ago
  yes, "get under your skin" can mean that, it can mean "can't stop thinking about" like the way somebody annoys you while it turns out you are falling in love
g-b-r 8mo ago
Low budget? I seem to remember it was lauded (but made on Amigas, if I'm not mistaken) I sure loved it, at least on my crappy 21" tv
- Sharlin 8mo ago
  It was lauded for being made on Amigas. The Season 1 CGI really is rather rough compared to TNG, never mind DS9. But it improved considerably in S2. Still, there are things like the starfield visible from C&C’s observation window never rotating because it was apparently too expensive to greenscreen it (presumably an actual physical rotating backdrop was also not feasible for whatever reason). On the other hand, I think B5 was the first TV series to use greenscreening to create large interior spaces like ship hangars.
  - p_l 8mo ago
    TNG was using mainly practical effects early on, which had benefit of higher visual quality but meant not as much could be done within the budget. Babylon 5 early and very enthusiastic use of CGI meant that the scope of what it could see was ridiculously bigger without reusing clips as much as some other places did.
- EFreethought 8mo ago
  One issue w/sci fi is that sci fi takes place in the future and/or has advanced technology then it is more likely to look dated than a typical sitcom where the sets are offices and living rooms.
jfengel 8mo ago
When I finally decided to watch B5 for the first time, season 1 was so bad that I literally turned it off and stared at the ceiling. (I was stuck in bed due to an injury.) Eventually, somebody curated a couple of season 1 episodes and told me to skip ahead to season 2. By the time it got to season 4, I felt it had risen to the level of "ok". I never found any of the characters compelling, despite some game performances. And I never found the plot all that interesting, either, though I can see why others might find it so.
- jefc1111 8mo ago
  This is what I was referring to in my original comment. My suggestion is that had you endured S1 fully, you might have felt S4 had risen to a higher level than "ok". That's not to say I begrudge you skipping through S1 ... I'd probably have done the same if I'd come across it in recent years as opposed to however many years ago it was. I'm not trying to change your mind really, but yeah - I think the value that you hear about in the characters and plot arise from the many small nuances which build up slowly over time.
eafkuor 8mo ago
> But the pay off in seasons 3 and 4 Having to suffer through two mediocre seasons is a dealbreaker in 2026 to be honest.
- Sharlin 8mo ago
  Season 2 is good to great, not mediocre. It’s just that S3 and S4 are even better. Season 1 you can skip most of the fillers if you’re in a hurry. There’s a plenty of curated S1 episode lists on the internet that tell you which episodes you don’t want to miss. It’s much better this way than the usual "first season excellent, second season okay, the rest are crud and only exist to make money".
- rhdunn 8mo ago
  There are several stand-out episodes in season 1 and 2, as well as several stand-out scenes; plus the second half of season 2 is not mediocre. You also miss out on character and world-building that happens in those episodes that help contextualize a lot of the later seasons. Plus, many reactors now have liked season 1 a lot better than when it initially aired.
- ndsipa_pomu 8mo ago
  "Suffering" would be putting it a bit strongly. Unfortunately, there's some very important episodes that set up major plot arcs that you don't get to appreciate until later on, so maybe it's worth just watching the best episodes of season 1 if you're impatient. Season 2 is better than mediocre.
- account42 8mo ago
  Chasing instant gratification is not a healthy way to live.
zelphirkalt 8mo ago
When I watched Farscape for the first time, I got a similar feeling. Costumes seemed weird, compared to Star Trek or Star Gate and some others. But I still watched and became a fan. Recently, I rewatched it and nothing seemed particularly weird or strange or low quality. I guess for Babylon 5 it will be a similar experience. Might watch that soon.

whynotmaybe 8mo ago

No, you're not biased, it's simply the best! It's getting old but nostalgia kicks in as soon as I see a Vorlon ship

account42 8mo ago

Is that disclaimer really needed? As someone who watched the series the first time last year, the acting and humor seem fine for TV honestly. The CGI dated of course but not offensive either. If anything I found the later seasons more disappointing than 1 and 2 as smaller scale stories are replaced with moving the big plot forward, which still feels rushed somehow.

jefc1111 8mo ago
The disclaimer is just based on my own opinion, so inevitably there will be people to whom it does not apply. Some of the acting in season 1 is great, I would just say there are some spots where it kinda briefly falls through the floor. It may be just because I have seen it several times so am spotting things that I wouldn't have first time round. With season 4, I believe what happened is that towards the start of production JMS was told there would be no S5 after all, so he put all of S4 and S5 into S4 ... but then there was an S5 after all!
- sidpatil 8mo ago
  > smaller scale stories are replaced with moving the big plot forward This is pretty common in TV shows, from what I've noticed. It takes a few seasons for a show to find its footing.
- WorldMaker 8mo ago
  Yeah, Season 4 is acknowledged for compressing a lot of the story that would have been Season 5 in the original plan. The series finale ("Sleeping in Light") was even shot as a part of Season 4 and delayed once Season 5 was picked up to keep it the series finale. The epilogue it tells spins out enough past the show that it mostly isn't that noticeable, but the big tell is a brief appearance of Ivanova rather than Lochley, which doesn't really break the episode because of the out-of-order storytelling of the whole episode and the glimpses of the crew are "timeless" flashbacks, but it is interesting.
  - pwg 8mo ago
    IIRC, this was because there was significant uncertainty about whether the network exec's would cancel the show after season 4, so JMS reworked things so that 4 wouldn't end on an open-ended cliffhanger if that were to have happened. In the end, season 5 was given the go-ahead, and so now season 4 seems rushed needlessly.
    - WorldMaker 8mo ago
      The uncertainty is actually an interesting behind-the-scenes story that the mini-TV Channel hoping to grow up into a full TV Channel that B5 was distributed under was PTEN [0] and leading up to and during Season 4 of Babylon 5 PTEN split in a weird divorce to form the WB TV Network and the UPN Network. (It got its wish, it grew up into not one but two competing TV networks.) Season 5 was a last minute pick up/rescue by one of WB's cable networks, TNT. (TNT wanted more than just one season which led to the mess that was Crusade. As a Crusade fan, TNT was both the best and the worst of what could happen to B5.) (History repeating itself, and Babylon 5 being cursed to ironic timing, the WB Network and UPN eventually remerged to become The CW. A Babylon 5 reboot project development was started at The CW this decade, just before WB Discovery decided to get out of the broadcast TV business and start a fresh divorce at The CW somewhat resembling the PTEN divorce.) [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prime_Time_Entertainment_Network https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prime_Time_Entertainment_Netwo...
isjdjwjdhw 8mo ago
Completely unnecessary, yes. Babylon 5 is a product of its time, as is everything, but it is as fine a production as any other sci-fi-on-a-budget show from the early-to-late 90s. It’s a phenomenally intricate and interesting little universe with great characters and stories. No need for a disparaging disclaimer such as that.
WorldMaker 8mo ago
I have a bunch of friends that either never made it completely through Season 1 or complained all through Season 1. Season 1 is rougher than normal. The problem though is that while it is easy to tell people "Skip Season 1 of TNG or DS9" (which is relatively common advice for both shows), Season 1 has so many moments of character building and foreshadowing that pay off in later seasons that even the "worst" episodes are hard to tell people to skip. An example not quite off the top of my head is as early as Episode 2 "Soul Hunter". It's a goofy plot full of weird pseudo-scientific mysticism with a "special guest of the week" who basically never returns (excluding books and movies), so in most shows meets several definitions of skippable, but this episode also introduces Dr. Franklin, has several key Sinclair and Garibaldi moments, provides background lore for the Minbari and foreshadows certain Minbari things to come. That's just the second episode of the season. (Truly a rough start for some.) Another common example is "TKO". It's a silly boxing match episode, much of it doesn't do much for the series except set up some of Garibaldi's goofier side and maybe foreshadowing Garibaldi's flaws. But it's also the Ivanova confronts grief and her heritage episode, a key part of Ivanova's arc.
- MindSpunk 8mo ago
  It pains me how important TKO is for Ivanova's character because it's otherwise got to be one of, if not the worst episodes in the whole show's run.
  - mnau 8mo ago
    Ratings agree with that assessment. TKO is the only episode rated "bad" of all seasons. https://seriesgraph.com/show/3137-babylon-5 https://seriesgraph.com/show/3137-babylon-5
Sharlin 8mo ago
When I re-watched B5 a few years ago, I wad surprised by the amount of humor and small pieces of situational comedy. It’s really missing from most 2000s TV dramas, everything became really serious after 9/11. If there’s humor in a 00s or even 10s "self-respecting" drama series, it’s usually dry, dark, and/or ironic.

jeffwask 8mo ago

I rewatched it last year during an old sci-fi binge, I had watched bits as a kid but never got it. I grew up on TNG and DS9 was my favorite, so I was probably biased. It's probably now number 2 for me behind DS9. I watched it again a few month later to catch all the foreshadowing I missed the first time. You are spot on that season 1 is a slow burn that ramps up to the amazing seasons 3 and 4. Best part, it has a clean conclusion without any sequel bait nonsense. Londo and Gkar are two of the best characters in Sci-Fi and their relationship is brilliant.

stuxnet79 8mo ago
As a DS9 fan myself I felt like B5 was the better show. DS9 had greater variance throughout its run, the standout episodes were phenomenal but also lots of weak episodes & filler. If there was tighter editorial control over the episodes & at least 30% of them got cut then it could be a contender.
- jeffwask 8mo ago
  I probably agree but my emotional attachment to DS9 keeps it in front. It's also crazy how relevant to modern times the plot of B5 is and how many parallels you see.
  - jefc1111 8mo ago
    I hear this a lot about B5, and I get a _sense_ of it myself, but I'd love to know what people specifically mean. I.e. "X plot line is like Y thing" in real life right now.
    - jeffwask 8mo ago
      It's fascism. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imMGchI1EWY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imMGchI1EWY
      - georgeecollins 8mo ago

alehlopeh 8mo ago

That’s not what “get under your skin” means.

mortenjorck 8mo ago
It has both positive and negative connotations depending on the context. For an example of the former, look at the lyrics to the Beatles’ Hey Jude. It’s been used that way since 1968!
fsckboy 8mo ago
yes, "get under your skin" can mean that, it can mean "can't stop thinking about" like the way somebody annoys you while it turns out you are falling in love

g-b-r 8mo ago

Low budget? I seem to remember it was lauded (but made on Amigas, if I'm not mistaken) I sure loved it, at least on my crappy 21" tv

Sharlin 8mo ago
It was lauded for being made on Amigas. The Season 1 CGI really is rather rough compared to TNG, never mind DS9. But it improved considerably in S2. Still, there are things like the starfield visible from C&C’s observation window never rotating because it was apparently too expensive to greenscreen it (presumably an actual physical rotating backdrop was also not feasible for whatever reason). On the other hand, I think B5 was the first TV series to use greenscreening to create large interior spaces like ship hangars.
- p_l 8mo ago
  TNG was using mainly practical effects early on, which had benefit of higher visual quality but meant not as much could be done within the budget. Babylon 5 early and very enthusiastic use of CGI meant that the scope of what it could see was ridiculously bigger without reusing clips as much as some other places did.
EFreethought 8mo ago
One issue w/sci fi is that sci fi takes place in the future and/or has advanced technology then it is more likely to look dated than a typical sitcom where the sets are offices and living rooms.

jfengel 8mo ago

When I finally decided to watch B5 for the first time, season 1 was so bad that I literally turned it off and stared at the ceiling. (I was stuck in bed due to an injury.) Eventually, somebody curated a couple of season 1 episodes and told me to skip ahead to season 2. By the time it got to season 4, I felt it had risen to the level of "ok". I never found any of the characters compelling, despite some game performances. And I never found the plot all that interesting, either, though I can see why others might find it so.

jefc1111 8mo ago
This is what I was referring to in my original comment. My suggestion is that had you endured S1 fully, you might have felt S4 had risen to a higher level than "ok". That's not to say I begrudge you skipping through S1 ... I'd probably have done the same if I'd come across it in recent years as opposed to however many years ago it was. I'm not trying to change your mind really, but yeah - I think the value that you hear about in the characters and plot arise from the many small nuances which build up slowly over time.

eafkuor 8mo ago

> But the pay off in seasons 3 and 4 Having to suffer through two mediocre seasons is a dealbreaker in 2026 to be honest.

Sharlin 8mo ago
Season 2 is good to great, not mediocre. It’s just that S3 and S4 are even better. Season 1 you can skip most of the fillers if you’re in a hurry. There’s a plenty of curated S1 episode lists on the internet that tell you which episodes you don’t want to miss. It’s much better this way than the usual "first season excellent, second season okay, the rest are crud and only exist to make money".
rhdunn 8mo ago
There are several stand-out episodes in season 1 and 2, as well as several stand-out scenes; plus the second half of season 2 is not mediocre. You also miss out on character and world-building that happens in those episodes that help contextualize a lot of the later seasons. Plus, many reactors now have liked season 1 a lot better than when it initially aired.
ndsipa_pomu 8mo ago
"Suffering" would be putting it a bit strongly. Unfortunately, there's some very important episodes that set up major plot arcs that you don't get to appreciate until later on, so maybe it's worth just watching the best episodes of season 1 if you're impatient. Season 2 is better than mediocre.
account42 8mo ago
Chasing instant gratification is not a healthy way to live.

zelphirkalt 8mo ago

When I watched Farscape for the first time, I got a similar feeling. Costumes seemed weird, compared to Star Trek or Star Gate and some others. But I still watched and became a fan. Recently, I rewatched it and nothing seemed particularly weird or strange or low quality. I guess for Babylon 5 it will be a similar experience. Might watch that soon.