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More On Babylon
Last week Michael and I watched seasons 3 and 4 of Babylon 5. Hence, the silence here and lack of exercise, as we were watching episodes from the time we got home until past our bedtime, in the deadly, “This ended badly, just ONE more episode,” maneuver.
So Seasons 3 and 4 were FULL of cliffhangers. In fact, Season 3 ended with a character jumping into a chasm and disappearing and another character not returning from a battle. If I’d been watching that real time, my head would have exploded. Luckily, we could immediately put in Episode one of Season 4 and find out what happened.
Well sort of. It actually took many episodes to resolve everything, but at least we reached a point where we could turn the DVD player off and go to bed.
In summary, despite my misgivings about Seasons 1 and 2, Seasons 3 and 4 were very, very good. Firstly, the CGI got a lot better. Secondly, the story suddenly came together, and bits and pieces from earlier episodes finally made complete sense. I have to say that these two seasons contain some of the best storytelling I’ve ever seen. I love the way things came together, and things that happened in passing, or happened and were forgotten about, finally bore fruit. Absolutely lovely.
However, overall, I still don’t like this as well as I liked Deep Space Nine. It’s good–very good–but I still like DS9 better.
And I’m not sure about Season 5. We watched the first episode of Season 5 and decided to take a hiatus. Partially because we had things to do, and partially because I wasn’t that excited about the episode and all the changes. Two of my favorite characters are gone, and we’ve barely seen another of my favorite characters, so I was having a hard time getting into it. Thus a break is best.
Plus, that was a lot of time spent in front of the TV.
So, we definitely liked Season 3 and 4, but we’re not too sure about Season 5.
But for now it’ll be good to take a break.
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July 10th, 2006 at 8:48 pm
i am in complete agreement re: seasons 3 & 4 and about season 5. i think i’d still rate B5 higher that DS9 for a few reasons; the MOST important being the 5-year story arc that was written (mostly) entirely before shooting began…at least the storyboards were done. It was, in reality, an epic.
i am enjoying the 2 daily episodes of DS9 on Spike, though, and my impression of the show gets better every day. (except for Jake. that boy is marginally better than insipid.)
July 10th, 2006 at 9:29 pm
Ahh… I LOVE DS9. Avery Brooks is fantastic-in fact most of the cast is amazing.
And it too has a story arc that goes the series–I think my raving about that was one of the reasons Erin recommended Babylon 5 to me in the first place. (Well, her and some other people who also liked DS9) I thought Seasons 3 & 4 of Babylon 5 were comparable to the DS9 story arc that ran through seasons 3 through 7. DS9 just had more time to run their story. (And as I said, we still have to watch season 5 of Babylon 5, but I wasn’t impressed with the first episode.)
And in DS9 I really like Jake. I thought they did a far better job with him than they did with other kids on Star Trek (especially Wesley Crusher).
In fact, some of my favorite episodes are in his story arc: “The Visitor” and “Explorers” and “Nor the Battle to the Strong”. Especially the first two, because they really focus on how important Jake and Sisko are to each other. Maybe it’s a girl thing, but I’ve not seen another science fiction show that shows the importance of the parent-child relationship, yet DS9 managed it with Jake Sisko and Molly O’Brian.
It’s little things like that, that make me love DS9 so much.
Okay. That and “The Magnificent Ferengi”
July 10th, 2006 at 10:32 pm
Yeah, I enjoyed Bab5 more than what I saw of DS9, but I definitely got the feeling they were shooting for the same thing, that epic tale rather than the story of the week. (I intend to start watching all of DS9 at some point–all of it is available through netflix too.) I was pretty ambivalent about Jake — I was never madly in love with the character, and actually I think I enjoyed Wesley more, but I do see what you mean about the well-done parent-child connection. (And I don’t have episodic recall of DS9, I may enjoy the character much more with rewatching.)
I did enjoy the fifth season of Bab5 in the end, but not as much at first because I hated the way it felt like a totally separate thing. A break is probably good, as you might enjoy more of what was enjoyable that way. I never did watch the spinoffs that came after about the Rangers and whatnot…now I wonder if those were any good. (Crusade I think it was.) I’m glad the later seasons were better for you than the first ones though!
July 11th, 2006 at 9:58 pm
I definitely recommend watching the entirely to DS9 in order. We have all 7 seasons if you want to borrow them. At least for now we’ve got Season 5 of Babylon 5, Season 1 of Farascape, plus things on Netflix (I’ve got Season of of, I think 6 feet under waiting there)
Only thing about DS9 is that you might want to borrow just the discs and not the whole box. The packaging is pretty bad, and some seasons are falling apart (those would be the seasons we watched the most)
I think the reason I liked Jake better is because he did his own thing. He didn’t want to go to Starfleet. He fought with his best friend. He disobeyed his dad in the way that normal kids disobey–hanging out with the wrong crowd, staying out past his curfew, etc. Jake just always felt more REAL to me as a kid.
And the episodic recall comes from having all seven seasons on DVD. I learned the names of my favorite episodes because that made them easier to find when I wanted to watch them again (and again and again). :)
I don’t know if I’d like a spin off about the rangers. One it would make me all unhappy about Marcus, and two, none of the other rangers I’ve seen seemed at all interesting, though it could just be because Marcus so dominated that portion of the story.
And I’m glad the later seasons have been better too! We’ve already foisted Season one off on my dad, and told him (keep watching–it gets better!)
And there really is a HUGE difference in the CGI between seasons 1 and 4. Season 4 had good CGI. Season 1 I found embarassing. :)
Though to be completely truthful, I think that Firefly is the best science fiction series ever.
“I think my days of not taking you seriously are definitely coming to a middle.”