Customer Reviews

Babylon 5 Security Manual

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

 

 

Review of Jim Mortimore's "Babylon 5 Security Manual" : I can honestly say that this is the absolute worst attempt at writing about Babylon 5 that I have EVER seen. Jim Mortimore brings practically NOTHING new to the B5 universe, instead choosing to simply bring back old news and never going any deeper than a surface analysis. And even then, most of his "conclusions" (if I'd dare call them that) are wrong (THE ALLIANCE OF FREE WORLDS???). This book clearly demonstrates that he had no interest in writing this book other than his writer's fee. Even info that has been firmly established during epsidoes is contradicted in Mortimore's book (according to him, telepaths rated P4 and under are not part of the Psi Corps...) He also manages to mispell critical words like Z'ha'dum (or Za'ha'dum two pages later) and Trigati (or Tragati). Comes in handy when you're too ignorant to bother looking things up or actually correcting the book you're selling. I must sa! y that I feel insulted that such trash has managed to be published bearing the name Babylon 5, which, since it first aired, has been a product of unquestionable quality-until now.

If you're very into B5, then you will probably enjoy this item. It is good fun, with some interesting detail of the station (although if you're serious enough to buy such a book you will probably already know most of it).

My only real quibble would be that it isn't really that substantial, and after half an hour you feel like another one. :)

I liked how they had the intro from Michael Garibaldi. I was laughing myself silly at his one liners throughout the book. Mainly I liked the focus on the things you don't get to see up close(eg the bathrooms) The crimes section is great too. The transcripts of the different cases in the show was good too. This would be a good book to have in conjunction with the A-Z guide and Andy Lane's books.

This book had a ton of great visuals and occasionally made for interesting reading. It could have been better, had it not constantly treated you as if you were training to become a security officer. I was somewhat annoyed about how the author always stuck the words >>CLASSIFIED<< in place of the Great Machine on Epsilon 3. It should be obvious to long time residents of the station that there's something down there, so why the need for secrecy? I enjoyed the constant humor (especially the prohibited goods list). There are also several decrepencies concerning which sedurity officer is writing the book occasionally it's from Garibaldi's POV, others it's from Zack's, and sometimes an unnamed third party. I loved the Nightwatch legal documents, the security codes, and the list of various actual crimes. The technical drawings are excellant. Though there was an occasional mistake (Sheridan didn't blow up the Black Star at the Battle of the Line, he blew it up during a battle that took place in the asteroid belt between Jupiter and Mars), I loved this book.

The book is...umm...let's just say...interesting :) in that it contains *authorized* scale diagrams of the station, identicards, PPGs, Shadow ships, scouts, fighters, starfuries, thunderbolts, atmospheric shuttles, maintbots, jumpgates, MinFighters, and White Stars (I think that's about it) drawn by Timothy Earls, the B5 CGI director himself as well as tons of wonderful original CGI photos; however, the text itself seems to have been written without any official input at all - part of it is based on JMS' comments on the nets (VERY irregular especially when it comes to the technical side), while the rest is author's own creation and while logical in general, most of the specifics and fill-in-the-blanks will probably never be used on the show (especially the tons of in-jokes and mistakes). For instance, the dimensions given in the text accompanying the B5 scale diagrams originate from the fan-written station.txt file at ftp.midwinter.com, and these were calculated using direct on-screen measurements of the "Points of Departure" diagram! You'd have thought the writer could have taken the time to measure the official diagram (which BTW is the same as the one in the CD-ROM Guide)

I would have to agree with the previous reviewers in the sense that this does not give an in-depth view of the entire Babylon 5 series. Granted, this book is a great overview of the series (up to the end of Babylon 5's fourth season), but I suggest looking up other Babylon 5 materials if you need more information.

This is an excellent book! It shows all the workings of Babylon 5 and it also gives you a perspective of the day-to-day lives of the secerity officers. It gives you information from firing a PPG to handeling a diplomatic incident. I think this is an excellent book because it tells you everything you need to know about Babylon 5 and alien races. This is a must have for all Babylon 5 fans!

Very detailed, with a lot of information. Of course it could be larger, with much more information on other ships, aliens, etc., but it accomplishes everything it promises.

Nice blueprints and pictures, but a lot of discrepancies in the captions and descriptions...most of which have been mentioned in other reviews.

Very good shape, made it in time for game as advertised.
Quite helpful when dealing with the characters in game when on Babylon 5. Handy sourcebook.