Customer Reviews

Babylon 5 - The Complete First Four Seasons

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Why pay $360.83 for this four year series when you can purchase each year separatly for a total of $314.93

Season 1: $79.98
Season 2: $79.98
Season 3: $79.98
Season 4: $74.99

Total: $314.93

Babylon 5 is a five mile long space station. Located deep in neutral territory, it is designed to prevent intergalactic war by providing a place where peace can be worked out between the races. Run by Earth, it was built with help from the Minbari after our war with them when we were almost wiped out. Since it is also a trade station, it attracts allies of all kinds on a daily basis.

Unfortunately, it also attracts trouble. There are raiders in the area, the Narn and Centauri have at best a fragile peace, and someone is always trying to smuggle something on board. Even worse, an ancient enemy is rebuilding forces, and the effects of this will reach all the way back to Earth.

Babylon 5 is still unique in television. It set out to tell a single story that had been mapped out beforehand. As a result, it sucks you in and doesn't let you go until you've reached the end. Season 1 is the most uneven, but the beginnings of the story are there, and it lays the background on the races and cultures we will be dealing with over the course of the show. Season 2 brings a new captain and a storyline that is gaining speed, season 3 brings surprises and increasing tension, and season 4 is full steam ahead as most of the plot lines are resolved (since season 5 was a last minute reprieve).

Of course, if you are looking at this page, odds are you are already a fan and looking for information on the sets. The picture, presented in widescreen, is hit and miss, with some dust popping up occasionally. It is clear and sharp most of the time, however. Sound is presented in full surround and has never sounded better. Each set contains two audio commentaries by series creator J. Michael Straczynski and a season intro by cast and crew. They also have some behind the scenes documentaries and encyclopedia entries introducing you to the world of Babylon 5. All the sets but season 1 have one audio commentary each by various cast members. And season 4 has a great blooper reel.

Whether you buy the seasons bundled like this or individually, don't miss your chance to own this fantastic TV series.

I only saw one or two episodes of B5 when it was on TV half a decade ago and at that point my friend, who was obsessed with it, said that it would be just as well to wait until they release it on dvd so that I can see them in order.

Those few that I saw in isolation were ok tv shows, nothing special really. But as a series it's awesome. They do a great job of setting up mysteries and slowly trickling out the details as the series continues for maximum dramatic effect.

The dvd's themselves are of excellent quality. Good menus that are easy to navigate. Very attractive packaging and nice little booklets with sumaries for finding your place. None of those new annoying adds that you cant skip though in the begining. The special features are ok, nothing great, but interesting and honest comentaries. Don't use any of the special features unless you are through with the series or they will spoil some of the suspense though.

By the way. In the begining the acting/directing is spotty and the special effects and sets are 'son of roger corman' low budget specials. But both got progressivly better as the series continued. It was an interesting historical series for television in this regard as well. And the story caries you through the rough parts until they hit their stride with the production values. Eventually both are consistently very good. They are some great space ships by Year 3.

I'm looking forward to year 5.

As far as I can tell, this is merely the first 4 seasons all together. Go and price buying the seasons separately; you'll find it cheaper EVEN ON THIS SITE. I can't detect any special features in this package that don't exist in the separate season DVDs that I bought as they came out.

Babylon 5 is very probably the best series ever. It is the only series (so far) that was fully planned out, all 5 seasons, before it was filmed. It is somewhat of a miracle that it managed to get made... so help convince nay-sayers that they're missing out! Buy the DVDs... just not THIS one.

If you have been a patient fan, this 4 season set is your reward. It captures all of the esstiential episodes of this great space opera. Never before have I been enthralled by such a long lasting and complex story arc. This series came at a time when fans of sci-fi desperately needed a new show. It filled the bill and then some. More gritty than Star Trek with an amazingly diverse cast of characters, this hi-tech drama sucked in into it's web and kept you wanting more. The CG effects were groundbreaking for the time and still hold up well these years later.
Put on your space suit and strap into your starfury, this is going to be a wild ride!

I'm a fan of 'Babylon 5', but buying a set that contains the first 4 seasons, and
not the final 5th season seems odd indeed.

Unless at a given moment the price for this plus buying the 5th season separately is a better deal,
I'd urge you to buy the whole set, 5th season included. Would you buy a terrific novel with
the last 50 pages missing?

An excellent and ongoing good vs. Evil Series that "smacks the pretty" off Star Trek and others. This series is collectable and really a great gift with many hours of excellent viewing enjoyment

An excellent series, Babylon 5, brings to the screen the ongoing adventures and parallel stories of prominent people aboard a major station under Human control in neutral space.
The setting is the Babylon 5 space station orbiting Epsilon 3. The year is 2258, ten years after the Earth-Minbari War, and representatives from the five major space-faring races, the Centauri, Humans, Minbari, Narns, and the Vorlons, as well as numerous minor races have all gathered at B5 in a last effort at maintaining galactic peace. The complications, however, have only just begun...
Michael O'Hare, Bruce Boxleitner, Mira Furlan, Jerry Doyle, Andrea Thompson (who is HOT!!!), Andreas Katsulas, Peter Jurasik, and the rest of the cast, have truly outdone themselves with their performances, which are outstanding to say the least. All the actors, without exceptions, give it their 100% and it really shows (the chemistry is AMAZING)! Very well written and very well presented, the series is without a doubt guaranteed to provide hours of entertainment.
In a nutshell, the show's strong points have to be:
1) The OUTSTANDING plot and subplots that keep getting better and better!
2) The GREAT character development, and
3) The wonderful feeling of being ADDICTED to the show and wanting more!

In short, Babylon 5 is a series definitely worth watching and one to seriously consider adding to your movie collection (if you haven't done so already)!

Babylon 5 was one of the best television series ever in the medium. Taken for all in all, it was the best SF/F show ever on television. This was because it didn't dodge the big questions:

Who are we?
What do we want?
Where are we going?

It made those big questions the central focus of the series. It was good because it didn't always provide clear and succinct answers to them. Also, it made things very much like they are in the real world. Impure or evil motives might lead to actions with overall good outcomes, and good intentions may well pave the road to hell.

J. Michael Straczynski is the reason is stayed focus on the large themes. JMS created the series and wrote all the episodes of the third session, as well as all the 4th session. He specifically looked to create myths that addressed the big questions in life.

You can't address the big issues without acknowledging the reasons that most people stop thinking about them: the minutia of life often makes us focus on little things that often don't bear on the larger issues. JMS wrote the series in a way that the big questions came into line with the little issues of life.

This focus allowed for characters to grow and change over the course of the series. For example, Vir, a character that starts off as a basic comic-relief player, yet ends up as one of those who can speak with great wisdom. The third session was when this change in him became evident. Also, the characters are not all perfect examples of morality and heroism: they each have their strengths and faults. This makes things much more believable. Especially since much of the underlying stories of good vs. evil is rather fanciful. In order to make it all believable is requires that there be underlying things that make sense, so that the home viewer can grab a handle on the program in order to anchor the rest of the story.

The normal human issues of alcoholism, drug addition, religion, family problems, bad marriages, etc. are all explored in the course of the show. This very much adds to the believability aspects of the program.

Many other shows with similar takes on the world of character development have been "St. Elsewhere", "Six Feet Under" and "Buffy: The Vampire Slayer". Even, dare I add it, various aspects of Star Trek, especially Deep Space Nine? (I won't go into the B5 vs. DS9 arguments.)

The acting in the show is normally good, with especially good performances by Andreas Katsulas as G'Kar and Peter Jurasik as Londo Mollari.

The first season of the show is very rough, with about half the shows going from bad to poor. That said, in second season things got much better. The third session of Babylon 5 is probably the best of the five sessions the program was on the air. With the fourth session very close in quality to the third. The fifth was weird... very well made, and at times very well written, but in the end the 5th season was about the same in quality as the second. That would have been fine if it had come before season three and four.

One of the minor overall problems with the show is that, although clean and succinct answers are not always provided, they are sometimes forced in when they shouldn't have been. I am sure that this was not the intention all of the time, as the shows creative force was JMS. It is just that it is expected in TV land that they be provided. Basically, I am sure they were sometimes added because TV executives probably insisted on them. Especially when the message sometimes is that "there is no clear message". This can, at times makes the show feel a little clunky and schizophrenic.

I know that my criticism of this may sound almost as if I am contradicting myself. And that may be a minor problem with it in the show... maybe the show is contradicting itself in some ways. But then, that's life.

Yes, Babylon 5 is the best sci-fi show ever produced. No doubt in my mind. It simply is.

Season 1 starts slowly. Mainly because the show was not written by J. Michael Straczynski (series creator) but by outside help. Result: Lousy B-movie scripts. Only 5-6 episodes are truly good.

But then Seasons 2-5 arrive, and the series truly shines. This is the CORE of the Babylon 5 story. J.Michael Straczynski took the reins and wrote ~95% of the show. AND IT SHOWS. Seasons 2-5 start with battles, end with battles, and have plenty of drama in the middle. A new race called "The Shadows" starts pulling strings, manipulating the characters, and ultimately spinning off a war. And just when you think all is dark and dreary and depressing... all hell turns loose! The drama just builds and builds and builds.

And then we have... THE GRAND FINALE TO THE NOVEL FOR TV: Set 20 years in the future, this single episode will bring tears to your eyes, because it shows the death of the hero: President Sheridan. As series creator J.Michael Straczynski wrote:

"The sad truth is that we die. That is not a happy ending, not a sad ending, simply a fact. The question is what we accomplish during the days and months and years preceding; do we leave the world a better place or a worse place? If we have left the world around us a better place, as these characters did, then it's a happy ending. - - - - - Ultimately, for me, the end of B5 is neither a sad ending nor a happy ending; I'd say it was a graceful ending, a dignified ending, an ending that said individuals can effect profound change, if they are willing to put their own lives and happiness on the line; not happy, not sad, but a testament to the idea that you have used your time here well."

"What interests me, what I wanted to do with making this show, was in large measure to examine the issues and emotions and events that precede a war... the effects of the war itself... and the aftermath of the war. The war is hardware; the people are at the center of the story." Well said Mr. Straczynski, and thank you for creating this wonderful show. Like a classic novel, Babylon 5 reaches beyond mere entertainment. Thank you.