Crusade 1-01: War Zone

Episode:

1

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

Janet Greek

|

Air Date:

09-Jun-1999

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching an episode of the short-lived Babylon 5 spin-off series Crusade! I thought it was called Babylon 5: Crusade, but nope it's just Crusade.

The series began airing about six months after the end of Babylon 5, in June 1999... which means if I'd just waited another couple of months I could've published this on the show's 25th anniversary. It's too late for that now, I already promised this would be my next review, but it shows how it helps to plan things in advance.

Crusade had actually been planned out while Babylon 5 was still airing and they'd kicked off the show's story arc in the movie A Call to Arms back in January. Everything was going great... until it wasn't. The TNT network's meddling made such a mess of the continuity that it's hard to figure out what order to watch the episodes in. It's not as simple as just putting the events in a sensible order as there's a change in uniforms partway through the series, so all the grey uniform episodes have to be in a block together.

War Zone seems a safe bet as a starting point, seeing as it's chronologically earliest and it's numbered episode one, but creator J. Michael Straczynski would disagree. He wasn't impressed by how it turned out and would've preferred that the series had started off with the 9th episode, Racing the Night. His thinking was that he'd already established the premise in the movie so there was no need for a lot of extra exposition.

Okay, I'm going to be going through the episode scene by scene, sharing my reactions and observations as I go, so there are going to be SPOILERS here. There'll also likely be a few spoilers for Babylon 5 and A Call to Arms, but I won't ruin any Crusade episodes but this one.

Babylon 5: A Call to Arms - Part 3

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching the final third of the 5th Babylon 5 movie, A Call to Arms.

I'm getting really close to the end of the Babylon 5 franchise now, with only 13 episodes of Crusade, one more pilot movie and two Lost Tales left to go before it's all over. Oh, plus an animated movie that came out of nowhere recently. And there is always the threat of that reboot series actually getting made, along with more animated films. But after all that I'll be done.

I suppose it could be worse. I could be working my way through Doctor Who or Star Trek...

This is the third and final part of my A Call to Arms review, so if you want to go back to PART ONE or PART TWO click the appropriate text. This is going to include big SPOILERS for the movie and the rest of Babylon 5, but I'll not spoil anything about Crusade.

Babylon 5: A Call to Arms - Part 2

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching the middle third of the Babylon 5 movie A Call to Arms, which is basically the pilot for the short-lived spin-off series Crusade. Or the prologue to it at least. It lays the groundwork.

The film aired on TNT right at the start of 1999, just 7 weeks after the previous movie, The River of Souls... which was arguably a bit too soon. Especially considering that it had only been a month since viewers had said an emotional goodbye to the characters in Sleeping in Light. It's like when half the Star Trek cast came back for the movie Star Trek: Generations right after wrapping their era up with Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, except worse because those guys at least waited three years!

This is part two (of three) so if you want to go back to PART ONE, click that text. This will include big SPOILERS for the movie and the rest of Babylon 5, so be aware of that. I'll not spoil anything about Crusade, however.

Babylon 5: A Call to Arms - Part 1

Written By:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Directed By:

Mike Vejar

|

Release Date:

1999

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, it's the first part of my three-part review of the Babylon 5 TV movie A Call to Arms! Here's a fun fact for you straight away: this is one of only two Babylon 5 stories to share its name with a Deep Space Nine episode (the other being Chrysalis). 

A Call to Arms is the last of the four Babylon 5 TV movies made for TNT, as The Legend of the Rangers was actually made for the Sci Fi Channel. Legend of the Rangers features a new cast and new sets, and it goes off doing its own things. Call to Arms, on the other hand, is a proper Babylon 5 movie, featuring the station and the lead characters and everything. A Call to Arms and The Legend of the Rangers are similar in some ways though, as they were both designed to function as a pilot movie and both of their spin-offs got cancelled before a single episode had aired. At least Call to Arms' series, Crusade, was able to get 13 episodes filmed before being shut down.

Call to Arms also had the proper Babylon 5 production team behind it, with J. Michael Straczynski writing and Mike Vejar returning to direct. They didn't bring back composer Christopher Franke however, making this the first B5 story to be missing his music since the original pilot (and they eventually went back and rescored that to match the rest of the series). Instead, this features a soundtrack by Evan Chen, who'd continue to work on the Crusade series.

Alright, I'm going to go through the whole film scene by scene sharing my reactions and observations, so there will be huge SPOILERS here for the movie and perhaps the rest of Babylon 5. I won't spoil a thing about Crusade or Legend of the Rangers, however.

Babylon 5: Season 5 - The Wheel of Fire Review

Today on Sci-Fi Adventures I'll be writing a bit about the fifth and final season of Babylon 5! And I suppose I should say something about the series overall as well. If I can remember enough of it.

I can't promise I'll say much here you haven't read a thousand times before on a thousand other websites, or heard on a thousand podcasts. Maybe you've even watched a thousand YouTube videos. But I do have one unique fact for you that no one anywhere has ever mentioned before: each season of Babylon 5 features slightly longer episode titles on average than the previous one, and by season five the titles are, on average, 42% longer than season one titles. I hope this extremely trivial trivia brings joy into your day.

But did longer episode titles mean better episodes? Was the miraculous fifth season renewal a good thing overall? Did Babylon 5 actually stick the landing? I'll tell you what I think and then you can tell me what you think in the comments afterwards.

There will be SPOILERS here for pretty much all of Babylon 5, aside from the spin-offs and Lost Tales. That's The Gathering all the way to Sleeping in Light.

Babylon 5 5-22: Sleeping in Light

Episode:

110

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Air Date:

25-Nov-1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I did it, we're here, it's the last episode of Babylon 5, episode 110 of 110. I have finally reached Sleeping in Light! Though here it looks more like Sleeping in Bed. I suppose they do have that lamp on.

It had originally been filmed as an extremely final season 4 finale when their network was collapsing and the future looked bleak. But when the miracle happened and TNT gave them a fifth season, it provided them an opportunity to film an alternative end to season 4 and hold onto this for a while. That means that the episode finally aired 394 days later than planned! The actors and crew knew the story, people from the media got hold of the script, but it seems like no one ever said anything in all that time.

It's the first and only episode of the series to be directed by showrunner J. Michael Straczynski. In fact it was his first time directing anything. Personally if I was going to try my hand at being a director I wouldn't start with the finale to my epic sci-fi series. Endings are incredibly important to a story, they're one of the things that people remember most and it colours their opinion of the whole saga, so screwing up here would be very bad.

Okay you're if you're reading my final B5 review you probably already know the drill by now, but I write about entire episodes scene by scene, with a recap under screencaps, so there'll be HUGE SPOILERS. I'll not spoil anything that happens in the spin-offs, Lost Tales, or any other series however. So if you're hoping for me to compare it to Deep Space Nine's finale, that's not going to happen. I could compare it to a certain other Trek finale though, with its 20 year time jump.

Babylon 5: The River of Souls - Part 2

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm still making my way through the 1998 Babylon 5 TV movie, The River of Souls. This is part 2 of 2, so if you want to go back to part 1, click HERE.

There are actually six Babylon 5 movies, kind of:

• The Gathering (1993) - The original pilot movie.
• In the Beginning (1998) - A prequel about the Earth-Minbari War.
  
• Thirdspace (1998) - Lovecraftian weirdness during season 4.
  
• The River of Souls (1998) - You are here.
  
• A Call to Arms (1999) - A lead-in to the Crusade spin-off.
  
• The Legend of the Rangers (2002) - The pilot for a spin-off that never made it to a series.
  

So even though I'm in the final stretch now there's plenty left for me to write about. In another timeline I'd be going straight into writing about the Babylon 5 reboot series afterwards, but that's seeming less than likely at this point. Still, at least I can write about a couple of episodes of Crusade. Yay.

SPOILER WARNING: I'll be writing about this whole movie and mentioning things that happened during the series. I'll not spoil a thing about Crusade or Legend of the Rangers however.

Babylon 5: The River of Souls - Part 1

Written By:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Directed By:

Janet Greek

|

Release Date:

1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures I'm watching the third of the Babylon 5 TV movies made for the TNT network: The River of Souls. I keep wanting to call it River of Souls but there's definitely a 'the' at the start.

The first two TNT movies, Thirdspace and In the Beginning, were filmed before season 5, in May-June 1997, but this was filmed after the series had wrapped, between 1st-21st April 1998. It's a film about the Soul Hunters, from one of B5's least-loved early episodes, so I wonder how many people showed up for work on that first day wondering if it was an amazingly elaborate April Fool's prank. The series was over, writer J. Michael Straczynski could've told a story about anything, but he decided give the Soul Hunters another shot!

At least the film's got a good director: Janet Greek. She had directed stories like Signs and Portents, Chrysalis, The Coming of Shadows and The Fall of Night. Plus it features some real stars in the cast, including The West Wing's Martin Sheen and Deadwood's Ian McShane. No seriously.

Chronologically the movie should come about halfway into a season 6 that doesn't exist, but it actually aired with three episodes of season 5 left to go. They moved it up a couple of weeks so that the finale wasn't overshadowed by it (or vice versa), messing up the order. I'm watching it after Objects in Motion and Objects at Rest however, so there may be SPOILERS here for the two episodes... in addition to all the stories that came before them. I'll not be saying a word about anything that comes after though, so this is first-time viewer safe.

Babylon 5 5-21: Objects at Rest

Episode:

109

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

John Copeland

|

Air Date:

18-Nov-1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching the penultimate episode of Babylon 5: Objects at Rest. Episode 109 out of 110.

Babylon 5 was always meant to last five seasons, but for a while it seemed like it would be cancelled at the end of its fourth year. To avoid leaving the story unfinished, showrunner J. Michael Straczynski rushed to get the main storylines concluded at the end of season four and filmed a final episode to wrap everything up called Sleeping in Light. Then they got a fifth season after all, so the final episode was put away for a year until it was time. I'm bringing this up now because it means that Objects at Rest was the last ever Babylon 5 episode to be filmed.

It was also the third and final episode to be directed by producer John Copeland, who'd previously directed Endgame and The Ragged Edge. Those were both very effects-heavy episodes, but I'll be surprised if this episode goes in that direction. In fact I think I'm going to be surprised whatever happens. All the plot I can remember from my first watch already happened in The Wheel of Fire and Objects in Motion.

Alright, I'll be going through the whole episode giving my scene by scene recap and reactions with screencaps so there will be huge SPOILERS here, for this and earlier stories (except for The River of Souls which I'm saving). I'll not say anything to spoil what happens next though, not that there's a whole lot of 'next' left at this point.

Babylon 5 5-20: Objects in Motion

Episode:

108

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

Jesús Salvador Treviño

|

Air Date:

11-Nov-1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching Babylon 5 season 5 episode 20: Objects in Motion. Hey wasn't that the name of a Firefly episode? Oh sorry, I'm thinking of Objects in Space.

Objects in Space was the final episode of Firefly, this on the other hand is just the final Babylon 5 story to be directed by Jesús Treviño. He was one of the chosen few to have been asked to direct one of the movies (along with Mike Vejar and Janet Greek), but Thirdspace had been and gone by this point. He did return to the B5 universe one last time for an episode of Crusade however.

This is also one of the rare episodes to give Harlan Ellison a story credit (along with writer J. Michael Straczynski), which probably means he suggested something for one of the plots.

SPOILER WARNING: I'll be recapping, screencapping and commenting on the whole episode, scene by scene, so if you don't know what happens in it yet, you will do after reading this. I'll not be spoiling anything that happens afterwards however, not that there's much left to spoil.

Babylon 5 5-19: The Wheel of Fire

Episode:

107

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

Janet Greek

|

Air Date:

04-Nov-1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching Babylon 5 season 5, episode 19: The Wheel of Fire! I'm getting really close to the end of the series now so I'm almost out of pictures of an episode title over a shot of the station. This is one of the better ones though I reckon, the lighting on it looks great.

Each of Babylon 5's seasons was named after one of the most important episodes that year, and this is the one that season 5 took its title from. That puts it in the company of Signs and Portents, The Coming of Shadows, Point of No Return and No Surrender, No Retreat, so if it doesn't immediately make it onto my top 10 list it's going to be a massive let down.

Here's some trivia for you: 60% of these monumental season title episodes were directed by the same director, Janet Greek, and she came back for this one. I've read that showrunner J. Michael Straczynski considered her and Mike Vejar to be his two favourite directors on the show and I can see why. This was her final episode, but she did return for the movie River of Souls and two episodes of the spin-off series Crusade.

I'm going to be recapping and reviewing the episode one scene at a time, so there will be massive SPOILERS here, for this and earlier stories. I'll not be spoiling anything that happens next however, so if you're watching the series for the first time this will all be safe to read.

Babylon 5 5-18: The Fall of Centauri Prime

Episode:

106

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

Douglas E. Wise

|

Air Date:

28-Oct-1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching Babylon 5 episode 106, The Fall of Centauri Prime. I suppose lots of planets have an autumn.

Babylon 5 originally took a bit of a break after the last episode, Movements of Fire and Shadow, and even more of a break in the UK. In fact viewers had to wait over four months for this episode! That's way more than the month I've kept you waiting, so I'm not even feeling guilty. There were no more breaks after this though. They aired this final stretch of stories over five weeks, with the movie River of Souls thrown in as a bonus. In the UK, Channel 4 did one better by airing them over five days. Unfortunately it was scheduled a little earlier than usual... at 11:30 AM as part of The Bigger Breakfast block.

The episode was directed by Douglas E. Wise, nephew of Robert Wise (director of The Sound of Music, The Andromeda Strain and Star Trek: The Motion Picture). It was the only episode of the series he directed, but he'd been on the series for a while at this point working as a the first assistant director so I'm sure he knew the difference between a Centauri and a Minbari.

I'll be going through the entire episode writing my comments under screencaps, so there will be massive SPOILERS below. I'll also be spoiling the hell out of anything relevant that led up to it, though I'll not say a word about the episodes that come after.

Babylon 5: Thirdspace - Part 3

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm finally going to shut up talking about the Babylon 5 movie Thirdspace. I just have to write about what happens in the ending and then I'm done. Though if you want more words you can check out PART ONE and PART TWO and read how the story got to this point.

This review will contain SPOILERS for the movie and the first half of season 4, but I don't intend to give away any more than that, for the sake of people watching the series for the first time. There should always be people watching this series for the first time.

Babylon 5: Thirdspace - Part 2

Today on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm writing about the middle third of the Babylon 5 movie Thirdspace. If you want to go back to PART ONE then click that text and you'll go straight there.

There'll be SPOILERS here for the first half of season four, but I'll try not to give away anything about what happens next. Sure the movie aired near the end of season five, but some people might decide to watch the films where they fit chronologically, and I don't want to ruin one damn thing for first time viewers.

Babylon 5: Thirdspace - Part 1

Written By:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Directed By:

Jesús Treviño

|

Release Date:

1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching the Babylon 5 TV movie Thirdspace. Not The Third Place, that's a PS3 advert directed by David Lynch where he plays a duck.

The series hit a bit of a snag during its fourth season as PTEN, the network airing B5 in the US, collapsed. Fortunately it found a new home with the TNT network for its final season and they even wanted them to produce some B5 movies! Thirdspace was the first of the these movies to be filmed, however it's technically the second film as it aired 7 months after In the Beginning (on July 19th 1998 if you're curious). That puts it three quarters of the way through season 5, which is why I'm writing about it after ep 5-17, Movements of Fire and Shadow, even though chronologically it fits somewhere in season 4. Ep 4-09, Atonement, seems the most suitable place for it to slot in, though it would have to take place between the first scene and the rest of the episode.

Like all the best movie DVDs, Thirdspace's disc comes with a commentary track and it's loaded with people. There's director Jesús Treviño, Bruce Boxleitner (Sheridan), Patricia Tallman (Lyta), Jeff Conaway (Zack), and Stephen Furst (Vir), and they're a good group of people to hang out with for 90 minutes. It also features SPOILER. Just one single spoiler, at least that's all I noticed

This recap/review, on the other hand, is going to be WALL TO WALL SPOILERS, for this movie and any relevant episodes leading up to it. But if you're watching through the series for the first time you'll be fine here, I'll not ruin anything that happens next.

Babylon 5 5-17: Movements of Fire and Shadow

Episode:

105

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

John C. Flinn III

|

Air Date:

17-Jun-1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching the Babylon 5 season 5 episode Movements of Fire and Shadow. Sounds like it should be the name of a Game of Thrones novel, but you know that things are getting real when the word 'Shadow' shows up in a B5 episode title.

It was the final episode to be directed by John C. Flinn III, but he carried on in his other job as the series' director of photography until the end. The main thing I remember about Flinn's episodes is that he's not great at shooting actors in monster suits, but if they can avoid that here this might be a good one.

We're getting really close to the end now, only 5 episodes left after this one, but they decided to be cruel during the show's first airing on TNT and make people wait 19 weeks for the next episode. That's four and a half months! We had it even worse in the UK, as we had to wait 2 weeks longer than that. Though they did at least air the B5 movie Thirdspace in the meantime... which confusingly slots in during the events of season 4.

I should probably mention that there will be SPOILERS beyond this point for this episode and earlier episodes too, but I've written this warning over a hundred times now and I'm getting pretty bored of doing it, so you're just going to have to live without it this time.

Babylon 5 5-16: And All My Dreams, Torn Asunder

Episode:

104

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

Goran Gajić

|

Air Date:

10-Jun-1998

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures I'm watching Babylon 5 season 5 episode And All My Dreams, Torn Asunder. Now there's a proper Babylon 5 title for you. In fact it's so Babylon 5 that JMS basically used it once already for season three's Severed Dreams. This is just a more poetic and less pithy way of phrasing it.

It's really rare to see an episode begin with the word 'And' like this. In fact outside of Babylon 5, the only other episode I can think of that does is Star Trek's And the Children Shall Lead. Babylon 5 was written by one guy for the most part though, so he had plenty of opportunities to express his idiosyncrasies. Which means we got And the Sky Full of Stars in season 1, And Now For a Word in season 2, plus And the Rock Cried Out, No Hiding Place in season 3. Season 4 missed out unfortunately.

The episode was directed by Goran Gajić, who was Delenn actress Mira Furlan's husband. It's the first and only episode he ever did for the series, which was apparently Warner Bros' fault more than anyone else, as creator J. Michael Straczynski had wanted to hire him for a while. The episode also had a different director of photography than usual, with Fred V. Murphy II taking over from John C. Flinn III for the 8th and final time. I'll be curious to see if it looks any different with all these new people behind the camera.

Okay I'll be rewatching, recapping, reacting and dropping massive SPOILERS for this entire episode, and some earlier episodes as well. I'll not be spoiling anything that comes next however.

Babylon 5 5-15: Darkness Ascending

Episode:

103

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

Janet Greek

|

Air Date:

03-Jun-1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures I'm watching Babylon 5 season 5 episode 15: Darkness Ascending. A bit of a miserable title for this one. Also most of the time the series puts its episode titles over an establishing shot of the station, but twice this season they've put it over one of the characters instead and both times it's been Garibaldi. So there's some immensely pointless trivia for you.

The episode was directed by Janet Greek, which is a name that showed up a lot in seasons one and two, especially at the start of the most important episodes, but then disappeared entirely for seasons three and four. This is her third episode this season though and she'll be back for two more stories before it's all over.

Warning: I'll be recapping, screencapping, reacting to and commenting on this entire episode, so there will be SPOILERS below. There may also be spoilers for earlier episodes too. There will not be spoilers for later ones.

Babylon 5 5-14: Meditations on the Abyss

Episode:

102

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

Mike Vejar

|

Air Date:

27-Mar-1998

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures I'm watching Babylon 5 season 5 episode 14: Meditations on the Abyss. I'm not sure about that title as meditation isn't typically all that thrilling. Though abysses can be dramatic sometimes I suppose, especially when there's a risk of all your hopes and dreams falling in. James Cameron even made a film about one once.

The episode was written by showrunner J. Michael Straczynski, though that goes without saying really. There are just eight episodes left after this and they're all by him. This was the final episode to be directed by Mike Vejar however, which is a shame because he's a contender to be the greatest director B5 ever had. He did come back for the movies and the Crusade spin-off though.

SPOILER WARNING: this is episode 102, which means there are 101 other episodes that I could spoil at any time, and I'm definitely going to spoil this one. The particulars of subsequent episodes will remain undisclosed however.

Babylon 5 5-13: The Corps is Mother, The Corps is Father

Episode:

101

|

Writer:

J. Michael Straczynski

|

Director:

Stephen Furst

|

Air Date:

15-Apr-1998

---

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm finally getting back to Babylon 5! It's been a whole month since I wrote about a B5 episode, but I guess that's kind of inevitable now that I'm alternating between Sci-Fi Adventures and Super Adventures every week. Plus this isn't the only science fiction series I'm writing about.

I've failed to find any evidence of this to back me up, but I remember once reading a magazine which called this episode The Crops is a Mother, the Crops is a Father and that's always stuck with me. Even though actual content of the story has faded from my brain.

Incidentally its actual name is the longest title in Babylon 5's whole run, with an astonishing 8 words and 32 letters (and a comma)! That's three times your average sci-fi title... probably (I haven't actually checked them all). I can tell you that it's beating Doctor Who's longest title, The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe, by one whole letter. But it's trailing behind Deep Space Nine's Looking for par'Mach in All the Wrong Places (36 letters), Discovery's The Butcher's Knife Cares Not for the Lamb's Cry (38 letters) and Star Trek's For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky (40 letters).

I tried looking at some other series too but I got as far as Farscape's Self-Inflicted Wounds, Part 1: Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda (43 letters) before deciding that any longer titles should be recategorized as short stories and giving up.

This was directed by Vir actor Stephen Furst, who seemed to be showrunner jms's go-to for weird format-breaking episodes, as he also did The Illusion of Truth and The Deconstruction of Falling Stars. I suppose the series must get more normal after this as this was his final episode as director. Though he did direct two episodes of the spin-off series Crusade.

SPOILER WARNING: I'm going to spoil the entire episode scene by scene and I'll probably spoil something from earlier episodes as well. I'll not say a thing about what happens afterwards however.