Babylon 5 - is it as good as Star Trek?

Post Reply New Topic

Hi, I just got the complete DVD set of Babylon 5 at Costco, they were only 19 dollars canadian each, and I'd never seen it but thought if they'd made that many seasons it must be good. I'm a big Star Trek fan, especially TNG. This is set on a Space Station so it may be more like DS9...

Anyway, before I start my big, solitary Babylon 5 Marathon and dissapear from the known world....
Babylon 5 - What do you think about it? Does it compare???

Its a great show. It is more similar to DS9 then TNG, in fact it is generally held that DS9 became more story-arc driven in imitation of B5. The effects are very good, great space battles and the physics and tech is a bit closer to reality then in ST. The B5 universe is far more gritty then the idealistic Federation and the characters often have very dark sides including revenge, pain and addiction. The stories are woven together with the overall history and series story arc, in fact viewing just a few episodes looses too much of the back story to be very enjoyable. So I really can't think of any way better to enjoy the series then own the whole thing on DVD!

I liked both shows. I am just a sci-fi alien lover.

Better. More of an arc story. The first season was really cheesy but once you get to the second season, strap yourself in!

Didn't care for it when I saw it, but I understand why people would like it. I'm a fan of the original Star Trek and the even-numbered classic cast films, and that's better than what i saw of BF5. "Doctor Who" is better than both tho.

here is a good B5 website with a full listing order of the show. The shows and the movies in this order. http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/countries ... plist.html
And i think B5 is the best so far. And star treak is ok too heeh

Babylon 5 is slightly better than any Star Trek series in my opinion. It's a much more mature, intelligent and political science fiction. The only downside is it's not as experimental and doesn't have as much novelty factor as Star Trek series. Star Trek is all about exploration, scientific experiment etc. and while there are elements of that in Babylon 5 that focuses more on the nitty gritty of life in space - international affairs, conflicts, power struggles, the economic and social realities of life in space in detail.

Thank you so much everybody for the really in depth comments about the show! Its going to make getting into this series so much better!! Cheers

Oh My God... Babylon 5 is scary! That is the difference between Star Trek and Babylon 5. Star Trek I was never really too scared, it was more like oh that’s so intriguing... etc... But I couldn't make it through the third Babylon 5 movie, I took it out - I was so disturbed, and I am now watching the TV series and it is genuinely, totally scary.
The clothing is better I have to say. And a lot of the set design. I'll have to watch it more to understand the rest of the great comments about story arc, politics etc... I am getting that its more political as well..

Babylon 5 was far superior to Star Trek. The pilot movie and the first season were not all that great but after that it really took off. All of the characters were more realistic and flawed than anyone on Star Trek. Situations never went as planned and were never wrapped up nice and neat at the end of each episode like they did in Star Trek.

Well, I'm half way through season two and this is what I have to say: I understand (or am beginning to) all the comments, it is really magnificent in many ways. Story arc I see just keeps getting better, and its darker but more satisfying in terms of character as well, in many places. I agree that its more political, or its more our world.

I love the psychics, and the Psy-core thing. That is so cool. And I love Delenn, she is my favorite character.
But I wish she did not have to molt. She was so cute and kind of transcendent looking before. I loved the crysalis though, I thought that was beautiful.

I am still in shock that the story lost Captain Sinclair actually. Why would they do that? I thought he was the best captain ever. The new one looks like a young Bill Clinton so I'm a little resistant to accepting it. But the show is great so I'm sure I will. I'm addicted to it.

Actually, it was Commander Sinclair.

Remember that most everything in B5 happens for a reason. Keep watching. You'll find out what happened/s to Sinclair.

Babylon 5 was much better than Star Trek (any) due to the fact that the entire story was laid out before the episodes were filmed. Star Trek is just a serialized space show.. one episode has very little to do with another one in terms of a storyline.

The only thing I didn't like about Bab5 is how static the Human characters were. All the alien characters changed and were always full of surprises... the humans though, never really changed.

Also could say that Bab5 had the absolute best script of any scifi show.


There was a parody of Babylon 5 and Star Trek made by fans. Its called -

Star Wreck: The Pirkening

It features excellent CGI animations and horrible finnish actors and even worse one-liners. However, the parody elements and the CGI more than make up for that

(and seeing Star Trek ships do combat with the Bab5 ships is pretty nifty too).

www.starwreck.com



Also suggest you look into LEXX, awesome series.

Thank you, and everyone, for the advice and links (I forgot to V001, for the fantastic link too, whoops)...

I will check out Star Wrecked, I looked at the website and it looks great, just the name is hilarious. A long time ago in my city we had a theatre play going on called Startricked, the next improvisation, and it was so funny, the actors had this great satire going on TNG, the funniest parts were the parodying of Guinan and Piccard. Its too bad thats not still around. I'm going to watch the Starwrecked thing after I'm finished my Babylon 5 Marathon though, in case the parody contains any plot spoilers, I want the overall story arc to remain a suprise. Its a good observation that the human characters remain static and aliens change, I think that can apply to other things as well, maybe because we often project flaws onto aliens more easily? I don't know. You're right though, the scripts and writing in general for this series is really impressive.

Lexx is Canadian I think. I know because its on our sci fi channel a lot and I've heard interviews saying so, but I've never given it a chance. I remember peeking in on it once and thinking it was very graphic and odd. I'll give it another try.

Cheers!

I really loved B5. Great depth and character growth over the arc. All the interconnections. Much better in many ways than the Trek series'. I got into Crusade as long as it lasted and was very disappointed when it was canceled.

In terms of story quality and acting, Babylon 5 puts Star Trek to shame... but that's just my opinion.