homepage Forums SimHQ Community Outer Space & Science Fiction Babylon 5.... YES it does get good!

Another B5 cast who died far too young, "Zathras" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Choate

Yeah, a very tragic motorcycle accident. At the other end of the spectrum, the main cast of ST: TOS has had much better luck with longevity. Deforest Kelley was the first to go and he was 79.

Lochley is ok to look at but what an underwhelming character otherwise.

I think the main factor there is that the character was a last minute/rushed creation by JMS when it became official that Claudia Christian would not return for season 5. I agree with your assessment though and will say that the Lochley character was just "meh".

How would you rate the B5 TV movies?

My rankings:

1. In the Beginning

2. A Call to Arms

3. Third Space

4. River of Souls

5. The Gathering

I've not watched any of them yet.

I think it's been too long since I've seen them. I'd probably move River of Souls to last place. It had a cool premise, but I don't recall much about it so it gets relegated to mostly last. Mostly on the basis that I forgot about it. Only beating out the one other movie that shall not be named.
A Call to Arms setup the spinoff Crusader series.
Third Space was a cool one off idea that I guess didn't really fit into any season or the serialized nature of the show. I liked it. I'd consider bumping this to second.
In the Beginning rehashes a bunch of stuff anyone who's seen the series before and it spoils stuff you don't usually find out until well into the second season or so. Probably not a big deal, but it makes it hard to recommend someone to start with it. That's just nitpicking though.
That leaves The Gathering in 4th, which doesn't seem right. It introduced a lot and was a bit slow at times but there wasn't too much wrong with it. Maybe I need to rewatch all this.

The last time I searched on Roku none of the B5 "movies" were available to stream

That's why the best options are always physical copies or the high seas.

I was under the impression that you bought all of the B5 DVD sets that came out in the early 2000's. I have my sets and will guard them closely until I die.

We finished the series last night. Found that Roku does have "The Gathering" so we will probably watch it tonight.


I swear there were several episodes I must have missed the first time 5 years ago, because I never remembered anything about them this time.

But I am left with several questions:

Is Vir being controlled by the Drakh?

Did Sheridan give his son the "gift" from Londo when he turned 16?

Did G'Kar / Lyta ever return? Obviously G'Kar came back long enough to kill Londo, if Londo's vision of his own death was true.

It's been like 5 years since I've seen the series but I seem to remember that it was only Londo who was under the control o the Drakh. Once he died and Vir took over the Drakh no longer had control since the assumption is that the Drakh parasite died when Londo died.

I distinctly remember the scene where Londo gives the urn with the "gift" to Sheridan but I don't think we ever see or hear anything about Sheridan giving it to David later on. If it happened, it definitely happened off-screen.

Lyta's exile and subsequent return is fully explained in the Telepath War novels that came out in the late 90's but it is never explained in the tv series itself.

True!

I hope Raw Kryptonite is doing well. He disappeared a long time ago.

There's a lot of that going on here

I started a couple of episodes of B5 on the PC to get some screen grabs showing the difference in CGI from season 1 to season 5. The difference actually seems more pronounced on my 60" TV, I don't think I am getting full res on the PC. Anywho...


Season 1 episode 1



Season 5 episode 1

I fully admit that when I first watched B5, I was struck by the really crappy looking special effects but both the story and the characters eventually turned out to be so compelling that I actually ignored the crappy looking effects after a while.

Yes, it's the same reason the original Star Trek holds up.

Watched "The Gathering" last night.

The changes in makeup for Delenn, G'Kar and Londo were all for the best. Delenn in particular looked horrible.

Peter Jurasik is just a phenomenal actor. The Londo arc is both awesome and heartbreaking. His "speech" on the downfall of the Centauri Republic ("There was a time when this whole quadrant belonged to us! What are we now? Twelve worlds and a thousand monuments to past glories. Living off memories and stories, and selling trinkets. My god, man! We've become a tourist attraction. "See the great Centauri Republic - open 9 to 5 - Earth time."") is great and delivered perfectly.

On the downside I didn't buy Takashima as second in command. Ivanova defined that role.

I did like Dr Kyle as chief of medicine.

I liked the weaponry, the "phaser" like guns, better than "PPG's".

Based on what I've read the actor who played Dr. Kyle had to back out of doing B5 due to health problems he was having at the time. He was indeed pretty good in the role but I'm glad we ended up with Richard Biggs.