Babylon 5 Series Review
Dec. 5th, 2018 08:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
arias_hollow**This is an old review I am cataloging and may not reflect my Current thoughts on the matter**
So, I just finished watching Babylon 5, and I figured I’d review the series as a whole before eventually rewatching it and reviewing it season by season. Since it’s a fairly long series and I have a lot of thoughts about it, far too many to put into a single review, I’m going to split my review into several categories, each one with two sub categories: what I liked, and what I didn’t like. The main categories will be: Characterization/Relationships, Story/Plot, Music/Visuals, and and then Summarizing Thoughts. This will be a spoiler-free review. Alright, here we go!
Characterization/Relationships
Overall Rating: 9/10
What I Liked: I have to say that characterization was probably one of the strongest points in the show. I absolutely LOVE every main character. Each one is very different from all the other characters, very unique, and each has a layered, multifaceted personality that is greatly explored throughout the show (well, except for the characters who were only main characters for a single season, but even they are at least likeable and interesting enough for what they’re given). This show is wonderful at writing friendships, they all feel so genuine and believable, and for the most part the challenges and strains put on those friendships are well-written as well. The show is amazing at capturing motivation, change, and conflict in its characters and it rarely glazes over the character’s flaws and personal problems. All the characters who are in it from beginning to end change and develop dramatically, but believably so that you can clearly see how they got from how they started to how they ended up. And this show is just really good at making you feel strongly attatched to every main character introduced; I wound up caring aboubt every single one to the point the point that when they were sad, I was sad, and when they were stressed out, I WAS FLAT OUT PANICKING. This series may be a plotty series, but what it really focuses on is how the characters affect, and are affected by, the situations they find themselves a part of.
What I Didn’t Like: While most of the time I was happy with how characters were written on this show, there were definitely still some flaws in that area. First off, this show is, in my opinion, terrible at writing romance. There were exactly two couples I actually enjoyed and cared about, one because it got four seasons worth of proper development, and one because both characters involved were main characters and were COMPLETELY AWESOME AND FABULOUS both seperate and together. All the others range from completely cringe worthy to simply boring. And the show dabbles in romance pretty often, so that was a recurring annoyance for me. My only other complaints are mainly a list of particular moments I found out of character or poorly developed, usually minor ones. The only two big complaints I have about characterization that I can discuss without spoilers are that in Season 5, the character Lyta had very vague motivations that weren’t explored enough to feel in character; and the character Lennier just…was out of character and largely absent, which was terrible because he was completely awesome in the first four seasons. :(
Story/Plot
Overall Rating: 8/10
What I Liked: This is a plotty series. Season 1 acts as a foundation building season, dropping plot points without the viewer even noticing it most of the time, and then seasons 2, 3, and 4 are basically non-stop, constant plot with little to no one-shots or filler. The show does a great job at keeping track of its many plot points, connecting them all in interesting and believable ways. You’re constantly wondering what’s going to happening next and the series rarely fails to impress and amaze you with what it puts together. What I like most about the plot from season 2 to season 4 is that it is exciting - the first six episodes of season 4 were some of the most anxiety inducing, warped, and fascinating episodes of the whole show for me. So it gets a lot of points for keeping me interested and making me feel genuine emotions.
What I Didn’t Like: Season 5. Okay, not all of season 5 was bad; I actually liked a lot of the episodes in it because of their great character moments. But plot wise, I feel it’s the weakest season. The whole series had been focusing on and off about how cruel and derranged the orginization of Psi Corps, which forcibly takes in and trains human telepaths, really is, and the fifth season gave some (poorly written) focus on how many telepaths wanted to be free of them. But it’s never resolved or addressed in any way that’s satisfying. They completely dropped one of the most interesting and complex plot points for no reason. We’re just supposed to accept that…everything is better? Except not really because Psi Corps is still at large? I don’t even know what happened there because it was never explained. And the ending to the series is extremely unsatisfying, the last two episodes are basically just eighty minutes of melodramatic sadness rather than trying to address or explain all of the many plot points that I, as a viewer, really wanted to see more of. Season 4 had some struggles with plot in the sense that the show thought it might be cancelled so it rushed some things, but still did a better job at tying things together than season 5 did. Actually, season 5 had the reverse problem; it knew it was going to end, the show was never planned to have more than five seasons, yet they still introduced plot-points too complex to fully complete with only one season. In short, season 5 had no idea what it was doing or how to end the series, although that mostly became a problem in the later part of it; the early part was actually pretty fun.
Music/Visuals
Overall Rating: 8.5/10
What I Liked: This show has a very nice soundtrack. It fits each moment well, and really adds to the feeling of each scene. It definitely has a very sci-fi feel to it, and also suceeds in sounding very emotional, which is fitting because there are a lot of emotions in this show. I particularly like the first two opening songs and the sad soundtrack, for it really makes those gut-wrenching scens all the more tragic. Visually, I really liked their filming of the space battles between ships; they were surprisingly fun and had much more going on then I’m used to seeing from sci-fi shows. Also they had very pretty looking death leasers and explosions, it made the fight scenes more interesting to look at when the ships weren’t doing a whole lot of manuevering.
What I Din’t Like: Um, I didn’t really have too many complaints about it visually. Sometimes they would make odd camera choices, and it’s pretty fond of surreal visions and dream sequences, but that didn’t usually bother me except for when it felt out of place or poorly explained. Oh, and season 1 struggled with props and costuming, it just…did. Everything looks so much more polished after season 1. Everything.
Summarizing Thoughts
Average Rating: 8.5
I really liked this show. It was fun, it was exciting, it was impactful, and it was mostly well plotted with extremely lovable, memorable characters. Yes, it had many flaws and a somewhat terrible ending, but everything leading up to that was so entertaining and well-done that it almost makes up for it. Even with its many problems, it is still a show that made me deeply care about every main character involved and had me genuinely invested in the plot, which more than I can say about a lot of series. So overall, I would recommend it to anyone looking for a good sci-fi show to watch. It balances hilarity and tragedy well (though tragidy is the more prominent element) and, with only a few exceptions, writes character motivation and personality extremely well, and writes some very beautiful friendships even if it struggles with romance (and even then I can still vouch for those two specific couples, which were actually quite lovely in their own, different ways). That being said, I’m looking forward to when I get the chance to rewatch it and review it season by season (which will contain way more spoilers, just as a forewarning).
So, I just finished watching Babylon 5, and I figured I’d review the series as a whole before eventually rewatching it and reviewing it season by season. Since it’s a fairly long series and I have a lot of thoughts about it, far too many to put into a single review, I’m going to split my review into several categories, each one with two sub categories: what I liked, and what I didn’t like. The main categories will be: Characterization/Relationships, Story/Plot, Music/Visuals, and and then Summarizing Thoughts. This will be a spoiler-free review. Alright, here we go!
Characterization/Relationships
Overall Rating: 9/10
What I Liked: I have to say that characterization was probably one of the strongest points in the show. I absolutely LOVE every main character. Each one is very different from all the other characters, very unique, and each has a layered, multifaceted personality that is greatly explored throughout the show (well, except for the characters who were only main characters for a single season, but even they are at least likeable and interesting enough for what they’re given). This show is wonderful at writing friendships, they all feel so genuine and believable, and for the most part the challenges and strains put on those friendships are well-written as well. The show is amazing at capturing motivation, change, and conflict in its characters and it rarely glazes over the character’s flaws and personal problems. All the characters who are in it from beginning to end change and develop dramatically, but believably so that you can clearly see how they got from how they started to how they ended up. And this show is just really good at making you feel strongly attatched to every main character introduced; I wound up caring aboubt every single one to the point the point that when they were sad, I was sad, and when they were stressed out, I WAS FLAT OUT PANICKING. This series may be a plotty series, but what it really focuses on is how the characters affect, and are affected by, the situations they find themselves a part of.
What I Didn’t Like: While most of the time I was happy with how characters were written on this show, there were definitely still some flaws in that area. First off, this show is, in my opinion, terrible at writing romance. There were exactly two couples I actually enjoyed and cared about, one because it got four seasons worth of proper development, and one because both characters involved were main characters and were COMPLETELY AWESOME AND FABULOUS both seperate and together. All the others range from completely cringe worthy to simply boring. And the show dabbles in romance pretty often, so that was a recurring annoyance for me. My only other complaints are mainly a list of particular moments I found out of character or poorly developed, usually minor ones. The only two big complaints I have about characterization that I can discuss without spoilers are that in Season 5, the character Lyta had very vague motivations that weren’t explored enough to feel in character; and the character Lennier just…was out of character and largely absent, which was terrible because he was completely awesome in the first four seasons. :(
Story/Plot
Overall Rating: 8/10
What I Liked: This is a plotty series. Season 1 acts as a foundation building season, dropping plot points without the viewer even noticing it most of the time, and then seasons 2, 3, and 4 are basically non-stop, constant plot with little to no one-shots or filler. The show does a great job at keeping track of its many plot points, connecting them all in interesting and believable ways. You’re constantly wondering what’s going to happening next and the series rarely fails to impress and amaze you with what it puts together. What I like most about the plot from season 2 to season 4 is that it is exciting - the first six episodes of season 4 were some of the most anxiety inducing, warped, and fascinating episodes of the whole show for me. So it gets a lot of points for keeping me interested and making me feel genuine emotions.
What I Didn’t Like: Season 5. Okay, not all of season 5 was bad; I actually liked a lot of the episodes in it because of their great character moments. But plot wise, I feel it’s the weakest season. The whole series had been focusing on and off about how cruel and derranged the orginization of Psi Corps, which forcibly takes in and trains human telepaths, really is, and the fifth season gave some (poorly written) focus on how many telepaths wanted to be free of them. But it’s never resolved or addressed in any way that’s satisfying. They completely dropped one of the most interesting and complex plot points for no reason. We’re just supposed to accept that…everything is better? Except not really because Psi Corps is still at large? I don’t even know what happened there because it was never explained. And the ending to the series is extremely unsatisfying, the last two episodes are basically just eighty minutes of melodramatic sadness rather than trying to address or explain all of the many plot points that I, as a viewer, really wanted to see more of. Season 4 had some struggles with plot in the sense that the show thought it might be cancelled so it rushed some things, but still did a better job at tying things together than season 5 did. Actually, season 5 had the reverse problem; it knew it was going to end, the show was never planned to have more than five seasons, yet they still introduced plot-points too complex to fully complete with only one season. In short, season 5 had no idea what it was doing or how to end the series, although that mostly became a problem in the later part of it; the early part was actually pretty fun.
Music/Visuals
Overall Rating: 8.5/10
What I Liked: This show has a very nice soundtrack. It fits each moment well, and really adds to the feeling of each scene. It definitely has a very sci-fi feel to it, and also suceeds in sounding very emotional, which is fitting because there are a lot of emotions in this show. I particularly like the first two opening songs and the sad soundtrack, for it really makes those gut-wrenching scens all the more tragic. Visually, I really liked their filming of the space battles between ships; they were surprisingly fun and had much more going on then I’m used to seeing from sci-fi shows. Also they had very pretty looking death leasers and explosions, it made the fight scenes more interesting to look at when the ships weren’t doing a whole lot of manuevering.
What I Din’t Like: Um, I didn’t really have too many complaints about it visually. Sometimes they would make odd camera choices, and it’s pretty fond of surreal visions and dream sequences, but that didn’t usually bother me except for when it felt out of place or poorly explained. Oh, and season 1 struggled with props and costuming, it just…did. Everything looks so much more polished after season 1. Everything.
Summarizing Thoughts
Average Rating: 8.5
I really liked this show. It was fun, it was exciting, it was impactful, and it was mostly well plotted with extremely lovable, memorable characters. Yes, it had many flaws and a somewhat terrible ending, but everything leading up to that was so entertaining and well-done that it almost makes up for it. Even with its many problems, it is still a show that made me deeply care about every main character involved and had me genuinely invested in the plot, which more than I can say about a lot of series. So overall, I would recommend it to anyone looking for a good sci-fi show to watch. It balances hilarity and tragedy well (though tragidy is the more prominent element) and, with only a few exceptions, writes character motivation and personality extremely well, and writes some very beautiful friendships even if it struggles with romance (and even then I can still vouch for those two specific couples, which were actually quite lovely in their own, different ways). That being said, I’m looking forward to when I get the chance to rewatch it and review it season by season (which will contain way more spoilers, just as a forewarning).
