Season 5( which Im half way through) seems useless to me

Dunno, I like the end of S4, things ramp up and a lot of things are concluded. I can't see that as running down - except for maybe the last ep, the Deconstruction of Falling Stars - it certainly is different.

I, like most people, consider S5 the weakest season. But the end of it is killer.

Perhaps if S4/S5 events had been stretched out & combined like originally intended it would have been better. But internal drama made them rush stuff to tie up lose ends as they thought that there would be no S5. So S5 comes off erratic. A lot of time in S5 is spent on the telepaths, for example: this storyline should have originally occurred in between parts of the S4 storyline and a lot of S4 events should have taken longer to resolve.

Nick... I think the problem you're having with Babylon 5's fourth season is that the show climaxed at the beginning of the fourth season. The end of the Shadow War was the dramatic high point of the series, and everything after that is just coming down from there. Never mind that "War Without End" pretty much gave away most of what was going to happen in the second half of the series.

I can understand what JMS was trying to do... in that just because a war ends doesn't mean that it's completely over, but it unless it's done gracefully, it doesn't make for good drama.

As for season five being an imporvement, not really. Sort of. Neil Gaiman's "Day of the Dead" is a great standalone episode, and the last five or so episodes finish up the series where it needed to end. But everything else just feels sort of forced. There's also a casting shake-up that really sort of hamstrings the whole season. It was bad enough to lose a pivotal character; even worse when the replacement character stunk up the series.

I enjoyed the Scouring of the Shire episodes that happened after the big war. It all made sense. Here are some plot items I didn't like from the last couple of episodes. It looked like lazy writing, but I guess it was caused by caused by JMS wrapping up the storylines too fast.

Holy thread resurrection!

I had some good times watching this show. It had a lot of mediocre writiing and a lot of bad acting, but when the writing and acting were good, they were absolutely brilliant. The end of S2 through the end of S4 remain some of the best television I've ever seen. I still think S5 was a huge let down, and I disagree with the idea that it would have been better if it had been mixed in with S4. If anything, it all would have dragged S4 down.

BSG has certainly faded some of my love for B5, being a similar but generally superior show. If nothing else, it's certainly more consistent. BSG has also paid homage to (ripped off?) B5 at least a couple of times, particularly in "Exodus" during the first half of this season.

I also FINALLY finished Farscape last month with the last starburst set coming out. It's brilliant in it's own right as well...and is probably my favorite of the three...with BSG coming on strong. I think I prefer the acting in Farscape to all of the above, and though it lacked the feel of a strong overriding story arc, the story was certainly well done. I also thought the dialogue was much more interesting and wittier. I think I just like the lighter more adventurous tone of the show.

Edit to add...I forgot Firefly/Serenity! It's hard to include it since it was so short lived, but damn did I love that show...and in a way, it's good that it was so short lived in that it never had a chance to get stale. It's a great ride that you can knock out in a weekend.

All 4 are superior to any Star Trek.

Heh heh heh

Aside from the last episode, he's pretty much completely correct in my opinion...and you could easily just watch that episode at the end of season 4.

Fixed that typo.

Agreed, hands down some of the best B5 IMO.

Fair enough...not sure it needed a spoiler though.

I also think season 5 gets unfairly maligned for things that weren't really in the control of JMS. If they were sure they were going to have gotten that fifth season, the resolution of the Shadow War wouldn't have come until the middle or the end of the fourth season.

I just took the plunge into B5, I am on the second to last ep of the first season and am starting to get into it. One question though, does the video start to look better? It's pretty much about as bad as it gets as far as video quality goes.

S1 reels are in bad shape at times. S2 and later are definitely better.

The jump in video quality from S1 to S2 is very starteling

I agree that Farscape, Firefly and the first 4 seasons of B5 are probably some of the best Sci Fi shows ever.

I watched all 4 seasons of B5 with my partner, never having seen it during it's original airing, and fell in love with the show. One day while he was at work, I decided to watch the ending they had filmed for season 4 but put at the end of season 5 since I wasn't enjoying Season 5 that much. He 's never forgiven me for that!

After watching the first season and a half of Babylon 5, I got the entire series. I started it at the beginning of the year and haven't watching a non-rental movie since I started season 2. I'm done with the first disc of season 4. At this rate, I'll be done by April. Its too good.

I got the first four seasons on faith and just watched The Gathering and the first eight episodes of season 1. Hoping to stick with it and finish as much as possible before the DTV comes out.

I have watched through episode 4 of season 2 and have to say that das Monkey's post is spot on. I absolutely was cursing the recommendations of dvdtalk after watching some of the early season 1 episodes. But now the show is really picking up steam. I can't wait to see what season 3 holds!

I'm 5 episodes into S3 myself, and must say that things improved quite a bit in the 2nd half of S2. Most of S1 was pretty poor, but I didn't mind knowing that I was in store for bigger and better. I remember my roommates watching the show when S1 aired and I tried watching it with them, but could never seem to get into it. Now I can kind of see why.

Question - why did they change the episode intro in S3? It seems to refer to events that haven't occurred yet at the start of S3? Was this just a teaser of what the season would bring?

Finished up Season 4 today. The last ep of S4 is pretty darn cool! Quirky, but cool.

They weren't sure they were going to be renewed for the fifth season, so they had to provide some sort of closure. Season 5 seems like a bit of a letdown after the breakneck-paced season 4, but it's still pretty good.

What should I watch now? Season 5 or the movies? Not sure which order everything was released in.

I have a list of the order in which to watch everything, but it's at home. I can post it later. Or you could search older B5 threads and find it.

Edit: For where the movies fit in, check out this thread: http://forum.dvdtalk.com/showthread.php?t=445472

of this: http://forum.dvdtalk.com/showpost.ph...87&postcount=5

Being through Season 4, you're in the clear for the spoilerish stuff. "The Gathering" was aired before the series started - that could've been watched at the very start. It might seem a little strange going that far back (and some things changed from that first display of the B5 universe). "In the Beginning" aired after Season 4 - it confuses people because the title implies it should be watched first. But not really, since it's told in flashback with massive spoilers for Seasons 3 and 4. "Thirdspace" aired early in the 5th season I think ... and takes place for the characters about that time. It's a stand-alone story, though you could think of it as an extended Season 5 episode. All the other movies take place after the events of Season 5 (well, not counting the very last episode of the series).

I guess the ideal thing is to watch in production order. But the main thing (at least for me) is to avoid spoilers, and you're past that part now. So it's kind of up to you.