If it were just Babylon 5, with no movies or spin offs...

[Candlelight]

We have 110 episodes and that's it, no possibility of tv movies, no Crusade, no LOTR, TMoS or Lost Tales, no novel or comic tie-ins.

What would have liked to have seen in those episodes?

I think the big thing still outstanding is the telepath war and the fate of bester, the latter of which was covered in the psi-corp novels. I would have preferred to have seen that than the season five we got.

Of the TV Movies, In The Beginning and Thirdspace could've been slotted into the fourth season. The others aren't necessary.

A Call to Arms and Crusade could've happened in the background of the fifth season; maybe instead of another civil war, Minbar is targeted by the Drahk and infected with the plague.

To Dream in the City of Sorrows would've been a nice parallel/B-story in Points of Departure, mirroring Sheridan settling into his role on B5.

Am in two minds regarding In Valen's Name. On one hand it would've been nice to have seen B4 again but then again I like the ambiguity as to her fate. There's something sad about having her survive for a thousand years only to be destroyed when Delenn finds her.

 

[Pemmer Harge]

Make sure In the Beginning gets incorporated into those 110 episodes.

 

[RandyS]

Make sure In the Beginning gets incorporated into those 110 episodes.

Yes, take out all the Londo in the future scenes and put it right at the beginning.

 

[Sindatur]

I would've liked to see In The Beginning worked in, as well as To Dream in the City of Sorrows, But, I don't think I'd really change anything else. Sure, S5 had it's problem, starting up cold, after closing up all the threads in S4 (rather than starting S5 threads at end of S4, while finishing up the S4 threads at the begginning of S5, to make a smoother transition), but, I like what we got with Alliance and Lyta's development, and the Shadown Tech, and Centauri Prime, etc. Even Byron's gang would create a hole if they weren't there, and I beleive that thread would've been better, if worked in slowly earlier, rather than being the prime focus of early S5.

 

[Mr Light]

When I have hours to kill tomorrow I'm going to make another hypothetical episode list

 

[Candlelight]

When I have hours to kill tomorrow I'm going to make another hypothetical episode list

Awesome.

 

[chrisspringob]

My fantasy version of Seasons 4 and 5 would have the Season 4 storyline stretched out a bit more, with it ending on either "Face of the Enemy" or "Intersections in Real Time". The Earth Civil War would extend through the first five or so episodes of Season 5.

The rest of Season 5 would be about the Telepath Crisis, the resolution of the Garibaldi/Bester storyline, and the Centauri arc. The Byron story would be dropped completely.

The Telepath Crisis and Garibaldi/Bester storyline would follow on immediately from the end of the Earth Civil War, as there would be immediate political blowback against Psi Corps for its complicity in Clark's reign of terror, and a group of rogue telepaths (including Lyta) would immediately try to capitalize on that, and make a move against the Psi Corps. Garibaldi would also be involved, using the resources of Edgars Industries against Psi Corps and Bester.

Garibaldi, Lyta, and perhaps a few other characters would remain on Mars and/or Earth for most of these episodes (as that's where the bulk of the action would be) rather than immediately return to B5 after "Rising Star". Meanwhile, the formation of the ISA and the beginnings of the Centauri/Drakh arc would be getting started back on B5.

There'd also be a big role for Ivanova (in my reimagining, Claudia Christian never leaves the show ) in the Telepath Crisis, though I'm not sure what. Certainly, her latent telepathic abilities would end up have some plot purpose. They'd probably be publicly revealed in the end, but that wouldn't be terrible, since Psi Corps is no more after the Telepath Crisis.

I would also hope that there'd be more of a character arc for Sheridan in Season 5, given that he's supposed to be the lead character of the show. Unfortunately, by the time he becomes ISA president, there isn't really that much more for his character to do. Maybe there'd be further fallout from his role in the Earth Civil War, or residual emotional turmoil from his torture in "Intersections in Real Time", or maybe he doesn't patch things up with Garibaldi so easily over his betrayal in "Face of the Enemy".

Or something like that.

There's no real need to include the story of Thirdspace or River of Souls in B5. A Call to Arms and Crusade were nice, but there's no reason to include that story within B5 if there's no spinoff show. And In the Beginning is a nice story, but I wouldn't try to shoehorn it into the main series. If there are some particular reasons to include flashbacks to that era, then you can include bits and pieces of In the Beginning. But no reason to drop the whole thing into the main show.

 

[Candlelight]

My fantasy version of Seasons 4 and 5 would have the Season 4 storyline stretched out a bit more, with it ending on either "Face of the Enemy" or "Intersections in Real Time". The Earth Civil War would extend through the first five or so episodes of Season 5.

My preference would've been to cut it even sooner, as people have noted the season would've ended very similar to the way season three ended. The ending to Moments of Transition (where Sheridan vows to end Clark's reign after the attacks on civilians) perhaps.

I would also hope that there'd be more of a character arc for Sheridan in Season 5, given that he's supposed to be the lead character of the show. Unfortunately, by the time he becomes ISA president, there isn't really that much more for his character to do. Maybe there'd be further fallout from his role in the Earth Civil War, or residual emotional turmoil from his torture in "Intersections in Real Time", or maybe he doesn't patch things up with Garibaldi so easily over his betrayal in "Face of the Enemy".

This was one of the biggest disappointments of the season. I think they should've built up Sheridan's inauguration to maybe mid-season, rather than blowing it in the first episode. It could also have been an extremely powerful and emotional scene, yet JMS ruined it with his usual humour.

In the Beginning is a nice story, but I wouldn't try to shoehorn it into the main series. If there are some particular reasons to include flashbacks to that era, then you can include bits and pieces of In the Beginning. But no reason to drop the whole thing into the main show.

Agreed, especially considering we saw some of it already in And the Sky Full of Stars, A Late Delivery from Avalon and Atonement (the latter granted had a lot of In specially-shot In The Beginning footage anyway).

 

[Mr Light]

First of all I'm not going to bother to carry out the Crusade storyline, aside from the Drakh attack on Earth being a downbeat series climax.
I'm also not going to bother with the Telepath War as I always found it intensely uninteresting.
It's tempting to try and include the novels, but that would just open a vast can of worms. You couldn't do the Technomage Trilogy justice
without including all of Crusade as well, plus where it was going to go. You could end the series with a run in the future showing the
Centauri Prime trilogy, but that would eat up 6-12 episodes all on its own.

Season Four

401 The Hour of the Wolf
402 Whatever Happened to Mr. Garibaldi?
403 The Summoning
405 New Shadow War Episode
406 Falling Toward Apotheosis
407 The Long Night
408 Into the Fire Part One
409 Into the Fire Part Two
410 Epiphanies
411 In Valen's Name (finding B4 in present, Valen flashbacks)
412 Atonement (In the Beginning Part One)
413 In the Beginning Part Two
414 Thirdspace (single episode)
415 The Illusion of Truth
416 Racing Mars / Lines of Communication
417 Conflicts of Interest / Rumors, Bargains and Lies
418 The Minbari Civil War Big Battle
419 Moments of Transition
420 No Surrender, No Retreat
421 The Exercise of Vital Powers
422 The Face of the Enemy

Season Five

501 Intersections in Real Time
502 The Very Long Night of Londo Mollari
503 Between the Darkness and the Light Part One
504 Between the Darkness and the Light Part Two
505 Endgame
506 Rising Star
*******IVANOVA STAYS!!!! NO LOCHLEY!!!!
507 No Compromises / The Paragon of Animals
508 A View from the Gallery (minus Byron )
509 Strange Relations / In the Kingdom of the Blind
510 A Tragedy of Telepaths / Phoenix Rising (that makes only three Byron appearances )
511 Day of the Dead
512 The Ragged Edge
513 Meditations on the Abyss / Darkness Ascending
514 And All My Dreams, Torn Asunder
515 New Centauri War Battle
516 Movements of Fire and Shadow
517 The Fall of Centauri Prime
518 A Call to Arms Part One: immediately following the Centauri defeat
519 A Call to Arms Part Two: they don't connect the Drakh to the Centauri
520 Wheel of Fire
521 Objects at Rest
522 Sleeping in Light

 

[Sephiroth]

thats the one thing that annoys me about B5 as someone who has only recently found appriciation for the series is that I have to hunt down out of print books to get the resolution to one of the most promising and built-up-to events in the series