I confess I was a fan of Babylon 5 when it came out. Looking back the special effects are not the greatest but it was one of the first if not the first scify show to use computer graphics instead of models and I gather its budget was a lot smaller that similar shows like Star Trek.

The thing I liked about the series was that things changed from episode to episode. At the time one could watch star trek and if you missed an episode it did not really matter but with Babylon 5 things that happened in one episode had an effect on the characters for the rest of the season if not the entire show. Not every episode had major arch moments but a few did and there was build up in the background for others.

If you watched other scify shows at the time eg Voyager, the ship could be trashed at the end of an episode and in the very next episode it looks as if it has just come off the shipyard. There was an endless supply of torpedos and shuttles.

B5 was not perfect but they did try to be consistant. Someone is hurt in one episode they are still on crutches a later. A planet is attacked and people that the characters care about are hurt, they did not just forget about it or act as if nothing had happened the next day.

Spoiler alert.



Londo started off as a rather comic figure, a bit sad a sort of victim but changed to be the force behind untold suffering but eventaully he turned back and tired to make things right.

G'Kar and his people started off as potential villians who for the most of season 1 were the typical bad guys especially if seen throught the eyes of Londo's people. From season 2 they were on the back foot and later on G'Kar really changed to become quite a spirtual figure.

For the humans season 1 hinted at a deep resentment amoung elements of Earth Alliance over how they were unable to stop the Mimbari during the Earth Mimbari war and were it not for the mysterious surrender by the Mimbar at the Battle of the Line humanity would have been wiped out. That boiled over into the sort of resentment that allowed the Nazi's to come to power in Germany in the 1930's and Earth became a dictatorship.

Even some of the minor characters changed. Vir was like his master Londo a comical character but you saw his decency shine through when he tried to help the Narns during the occupation and eventually he actually became a significant figure politically for his own people and he was certainly significant to the mad emperor who was leading the Centari.

Season 5 did not do anything much for me but that was not really the show's fault. They had planned out a five year arch and in year 4 they were not sure if they were going to be renewed and had to rush a lot of story lines to finish them up only to learn at the last minute that they were getting a fifth season.