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Babylon 5: The Complete Fourth Season
Babylon 5: The Complete Fourth Season
It was the year of fire... the year of destruction ... It was the year everything changed.
by Sergio Non

February 11, 2004 - Talk all you want about special effects, spaceships and alien costumes, but above all, the enduring mark of great sci-fi is ideas. It's especially true for sci-fi TV shows, which love to bludgeon viewers with Major Themes: Being Human (Spock, Data, The Doctor, various clones); Cultural Diversity (aliens, we love you); What Is Real? (time travel; holodecks; shape shifters); Privacy and Individual Rights (telepaths); Religion (The Force); and of course, The Meaning of Life (Yoda).
But Babylon 5 wielded the biggest, bluntest instrument of all, and it smashed through season four to create an outsized beast of grandiosity. Everything about this set screams of self-conscious ambition.
The Show
Ultimately, Babylon 5 was all about the ideas of its creator and executive producer J. Michael Straczynski, who wrote the screenplays for the majority of the shows, including every episode of the last two seasons. His ambition dominated Babylon 5 throughout its run: "I'm pretty rigorous in my scripts most of the time. I don't tend to allow for a lot of improvisation or a lot of changing around."
The content certainly drips with self-importance -- operatic music; exaggerated, acting; didactic dialogues about Really Important Topics; sweeping shots of battle -- and in its desperate attempt to be taken seriously, Babylon 5 ends up stagey and affected.
Why show consequences when his characters can tell us (and tell us and tell us and tell us) about them? Who needs naturalistic dialogue when there's preaching to be done? What's the use of small gestures when gesticulation can chew up the camera? Why cap the big showdown between Shadows and Vorlons with an exciting fight when you can end with a long-winded Sheridan speech?
Viewers might have thought the Shadow conflict - which powered the show for much of Babylon 5's first three years -- would take an entire season to complete, but it was resolved by the sixth show, Into the Fire, making the next 16 episodes feel a bit like one long denouement.

Warner Home Video
A Babylon 5 Season 4 DVD Menu.

By the time Babylon 5 finally delivers a massive space battle in episode 20, Endgame, it's hard to care. It didn't help that Straczynski mixed senseless space battle cliches like all-weapons-and-shields-are-down-so-let's-ram-them with one clever idea involving telepaths and ships.
Yet the maddening and unintentionally comic elements of Babylon 5 often worked.
Sometimes the outsized, over-the-top acting and dialogue approaches brilliance. The devious, sneering Ambassador Londo Mollari might be one of the greatest TV sci-fi characters of all time, and his actor, Peter Jurasik, gets to bluster and show off his outlandish accent to full effect in season four. Mira Furlan's breathless portrayal of Ambassador Delenn and Jerry Doyle's smartass, grumpy cop take on Chief Garibaldi are weirdly compelling.
And for all his wordiness, Straczynski can write remarkable scenes. Season 4's last episode, The Deconstruction of Falling Stars, offered a microcosm of the show's best and worst traits. Set up as a far-future historian's look back at the effect of Babylon 5 on Earth history, the script insists on extolling the greatness of Sheridan and his cohorts - you can't get more heavy-handed than Delenn glaring at a trio of academic strawmen and wheezing that Sheridan "was a good man."

Warner Home Video
If Worf can be a merry man, I can be a court jester.

On the other hand, Deconstruction includes a wonderful vignette that -- in a nod to the classic novel Canticle for Leibowitz -- features an older monk defending the Babylon 5 "myth" against the questions of his younger colleague; it's a touching, eloquent defense of religious belief, and especially surprising coming from a skeptic like Straczynski.
Lots to dislike, but even more to love. The ideas and their build-up make Babylon 5 worth watching, especially in its climactic season. If only the payoff were better.
Score: 9 out of 10

Warner Home Video
The typical reaction to watching Star Trek: Enterprise

The Video
Sadly, the video quality can make the watching a little hard on the eyes. Considering this is a science-fiction show with some fairly sophisticated 3D graphics, it wouldn't have been asking too much to clean up the video for DVD distribution.
Instead, the ongoing insistence on painting Babylon 5 as an Epic For Our Time may have actually made picture quality worse on DVDs. The live action sequences were shot in 16:9 format with high-definition television screens in mind, but to save money, the special effects were created for 4:3 viewing. Thus, all CGI effects are, in effect, blown-up on the DVDs, which present the show 16:9, in keeping with Straczynski's original vision.
The end result? For any scene with special effects, including composite shots that mix live-action and CGI, the same problems noted in IGN's previous review exist here: graininess, jagged edges and digital errors, even on non-HD television sets. If you don't have a high-definition television, try watching this on a PC's DVD player -- you may find yourself wondering if you're watching a DivX downloaded from the Internet or an actual DVD.
The quality on the trailers is even worse.
Score: 4 out of 10

Warner Home Video
Excuse me, what were you saying about my hair?

Audio and Languages
Babylon 5 does a workmanlike job with its 5.1 sound. Muscular surround sound systems can show off with the bombastic "No Surrender, No Retreat" musical suite -- you'll definitely know if your subwoofer works, and your rear speakers , while not used as extensively as in a high-quality theatrical release, get more of a workout than from most TV shows.
As far as the show itself, careful listeners will pick up a few incidental noises, as well as echo effects of computer voices -- check out the final sequence in Deconstruction for a good sample. However, as is often the case with TV shows, Babylon 5's battle sounds -- which rear speakers should be carrying more than any other track -- are generally front-loaded.
The set has subtitles in English, French and Spanish. Happily, the subtitles remain during the audio commentaries.
Score: 7 out of 10

Warner Home Video
Shame that 200 years from now, we still won't have a cure for baldness.

Packaging and Extras
The 6-disc set comes in a thin Amaray holders. It includes a pamphlet with brief synopses of each episode.
Audio commentaries include one for episode 4, Falling Toward Apotheosis, with actors Jurasik, Doyle, Bruce Boxleitner (who played Sheridan) and Patricia Tallman (telepath Lyta Alexander). Apparently it was recorded via remote, since some of the actors indicate they're in different locations. It's also entirely useless for anyone seeking insight into the show - the group spends most of its time cracking jokes about the shape of Doyle's head, followed by Boxleitner's ability (or lack thereof) to remember lines, and the Londo hairpiece that Jurasik wore.

Warner Home Video
Hey baby, come here often?

Perhaps the actors kept it breezy, knowing that Straczynski would more than make up for it with his excessively thoughtful audio supplement to two episodes, The Face of the Enemy and the aforementioned Deconstruction. The former also includes comments from director Michael Vejar. Straczynski also sits down for a separate interview that serves as an introduction to and overview of the entire show.
Disc Six includes a short documentary about the show's composer, Christopher Franke, a performance of the "No Surrender, No Retreat" orchestral suite, a gag reel and a Universe of Babylon 5 feature with tidbits about various Babylon 5 elements.
Preview trailers are included for each episode. Warner Brothers should have left them out -- what's the point of trailers for episodes that can already be watched at will? - and used the extra space for higher video quality.
Score: 7 of 10

Warner Home Video
This is what happens when some people try to hook up their own satellite dish.

IGN's Ratings for Babylon 5: The Complete Fourth Season

Rating | Description |
out of 10 | click here for ratings guide
9 | The Movie We love it, we love it not. We love it, we love it not. We love it...
4 | The Video Very poor, especially for a science fiction show.
7 | The Audio Fairly front-loaded for a 5.1 mix.
7 | The Extras Similar to previous efforts.
7 | OVERALL (out of 10 / not an average) |

Related Links

Babylon 5 S5 Due In April
Final season looks to be as loaded as previous sets.

Babylon 5 Revival Follow-Up
Jerry Doyle speaks out regarding plans for a B5 revival. And JMS responds!

Straczynski on Spidey 2?
IGN FilmForce has the truth about the latest rumor.

Babylon 5 on DVD: The Interview
J. Michael Straczynski talks to IGN about DVDs, Legend of the Rangers, comics, and more.

10 Questions: J. Michael Straczynski
The creator of Babylon 5 and Rising Stars gives his 10 answers.

Interview with J. Michael Straczynski (Conclusion)
"As things unravel, it's a larger conspiracy, so basically – after the second year – the show you think Crusade is would be a whole different show, with much more depth to it..."

Interview with J. Michael Straczynski (Part 3 of 4)
"I would go back in time and do it again... I would not do it a second time, because it damn near killed me the first time."

Interview with J. Michael Straczynski (Part 2 of 4)
My log line on Jake and the Fatman was 'He can’t walk. He can't act. Together they fight crime.'"

Interview with J. Michael Straczynski (Part 1 of 4)
"I’ve sold about maybe 85-90% of everything I’ve ever written. I have no explanation."

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DVD Details for Babylon 5: The Complete Fourth S...

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MPAA Rating: NR
MSRP: $99.98
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Running Time: 996 Minutes
Genre: Sci-Fi
Release Date: January 6, 2004
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