• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Babylon 5 first time watching - specific viewing order?

It's not my opinion. And I'm not in the SiL is the greatest crowd, either, but it's an excellent epilogue to the whole story. To miss it is like poking yourself in the eye. Watch it once and then decide if it's worth it.

I agree. Another reason not to skip Season 5 is the episode "Day of the Dead", written by Neil Gaiman. Simply wonderful character stories, tying back to earlier events in interesting ways, that should not be missed...
 
No way I'm skipping Sleeping In Light. Agree Day of the Dead is good.

My logic behind skipping most of season 5.
I don't like anything about the telepath arcs in that season, and a couple other things about it piss me off, like the way they treated Lyta. Bester was a great character in the first four seasons, when he floats between side villain and villainous ally. Psi Corps as a main villain does not work for me in the slightest, and Bester's attitude which is endearingly villainous previously comes off as cliche over the top.
 
An Epilogue usually has something to do with the rest of the story; Sleeping in Light doesn't, at least not to the degree that it should.

It's a good episode; it's just not a good Series Finale, especially in comparison to The Deconstruction of Falling Stars.
 
Sleeping in Light is a masterpiece. Deconstruction of Falling stars is a self-indulgent, pretentious hodgepodge.
 
No way I'm skipping Sleeping In Light. Agree Day of the Dead is good.

My logic behind skipping most of season 5.
I don't like anything about the telepath arcs in that season, and a couple other things about it piss me off, like the way they treated Lyta. Bester was a great character in the first four seasons, when he floats between side villain and villainous ally. Psi Corps as a main villain does not work for me in the slightest, and Bester's attitude which is endearingly villainous previously comes off as cliche over the top.
As a huge fan of Pat Tallman, I like the telepath arc simply because it gave her a lot of screen time. I wasn't thrilled with the story, but I was happy to be seeing Pat.

As for Day of the Dead, we got part way thru the episode when I said to my wife, "Suicidal emo teenage girl. This must have been written by Neil Gaiman." :D
 
An Epilogue usually has something to do with the rest of the story; Sleeping in Light doesn't, at least not to the degree that it should.

It's a good episode; it's just not a good Series Finale, especially in comparison to The Deconstruction of Falling Stars.
Uh—-which show were you watching? SITL has quite a bit to do with the story of B5.
 
It was never meant to be a direct continuation of Season 5 just like had it aired at the end of Season 4 it would not have been connected. It was an Epilogue.

it's still a jarring jump after S5.. Wouldn't have been so jarring it had come at the end of season 4.
 
Sleeping in Light only works if you completely ignore the existence of Season 5. Period.

Otherwise, it's a confusing and unwieldy conclusion to an overall brilliant story.
 
Sleeping in Light only works if you completely ignore the existence of Season 5. Period.

Your opinion is clearly a minority one.

I really don't get why you're on such a crusade to convince a random guy on the internet to skip that one episode, and since he's already said he'll watch them all, a futile one at that, but whatever floats your boat I guess... :shrug:
 
Your opinion is clearly a minority one.

I really don't get why you're on such a crusade to convince a random guy on the internet to skip that one episode, and since he's already said he'll watch them all, a futile one at that, but whatever floats your boat I guess... :shrug:

At this point, I'm merely sharing my opinions on why I feel Sleeping in Light doesn't work as a finale.
 
I don't understand skipping an episode when first time viewing something, unless that episode is really bad. I'll be watching all the episodes. I skip Farscape episodes as I have seen it 5 times and West Wing as I've seen it 50 but new viewers I wouldn't tell them to skip any. Well besides the 9-11 episode of West Wing, it's shit and not part of the story.
 
SIL may or may not ultimately work as a show finale, but how hard is it to go in with the mindset of "this was filmed during S4 and won't necessarily reflect things that occurred during S5" and get over it?

DoFS is a great franchise finale in that it paints the show against a very broad canvas, but if you're looking for a finale that will show the fates of the characters you've come to know and love, then it is a failure, from that perspective.

Take both of those into consideration and it might be argued that "Objects at Rest" is the "real" finale. Filmed for S5, shows the short-term and hints at the long-term fates of most if not all of the principal characters, etc.
 
SIL may or may not ultimately work as a show finale, but how hard is it to go in with the mindset of "this was filmed during S4 and won't necessarily reflect things that occurred during S5" and get over it?

DoFS is a great franchise finale in that it paints the show against a very broad canvas, but if you're looking for a finale that will show the fates of the characters you've come to know and love, then it is a failure, from that perspective.

Take both of those into consideration and it might be argued that "Objects at Rest" is the "real" finale. Filmed for S5, shows the short-term and hints at the long-term fates of most if not all of the principal characters, etc.

1) Even with the knowledge of SiL being filmed in Season 4, it's still jarring to watch as the concluding episode of the series

2) TDoFS works as a Series Finale, at least for me, because it makes direct reference to events that happen in Season 5 and indirectly informs us about the fate of the station and our major characters
 
Anyone know if Amazon has any web front for just video service where I can pick from a recently watched list?

Searching ‘Babylon 5 season 1’ every time is annoying.
 
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top