Episodes
Disc One: “Episode 1: Midnight On The Firing Line”, “Episode 2: Soul
Hunter”, “Episode 3: Born To Purple”, “Episode 4: Infection”
Episodes
Disc Two: “Episode 5: The Parliament Of Dreams”, “Episode 6: Mind War”,
“Episode 7: The War Prayer”, “Episode 8: And The Sky Full Of Stars”
Episodes
Disc Three: “Episode 9: Deathwalker”, “Episode 10: Believers”,
“Episode 11: Survivors”, “Episode 12: By Any Means Necessary”
Episodes
Disc Four: “Episode 13: Signs And Portents”, “Episode 14: TKO”,
“Episode 15: Grail”, “Episode 16: Eyes”
Episodes
Disc Five: “Episode 17: Legacies”, “Episode 18: A Voice In The Wilderness,
Part 1”, “Episode 19: A Voice In The Wilderness, Part II”, “Episode 20:
Babylon Squared”
Episodes
Disc Six: “Episode 21: The Quality Of Mercy”, “Episode 22: Chrysalis”
Stars:
Michael O’Hare, Claudia Christian, Jerry Doyle, Mira Furlan, Richard Biggs,
Andrea Thomson, Stephen Furst, Bill Mumy, Caitlin Brown, Andreas Katsulas, and
Peter Jurasik
Guest
Stars: Paul Hampton, Andright Chamberlain, W. Morgan Sheppard, John Snyder,
Clive Revill, David McCallum, Marshall Teague, Julia Nickson, Walter Koenig,
William Allan Young, Tristan Rogers, Sarah Douglas, Robin Curtis, Cosie Costa,
Tricia O’Neil, Stephen Lee, David L. Crowley, Maggie Egan, Aki Aleong, Gerrit
Graham, Joshua Cox, Greg McKinney, Theodore Bikel, David Warner, William
Sanderson, Tom Booker, Jim Norton, Gregory Martin, Jeffrey Combs, John Vickery,
Louis Turenne, Denise Gentile, Kent Broadhurst, Tim Choate, June Lockhart, Mark
Rolston, Macaulay Burton, and Ed Wasser
Writers:
J. Michael Straczynski, Lawrence G. DiTillo, D.C. Fontana, David Gerrold, Mark
Scott Zicree, Kathryn Drennan, Christy Marx,
Directors:
Richard Compton, Jim Johnston, Bruce Seth Green, Janet Greek, John Flinn, and
Lorraine Senna Ferrara
Created
By: J. Michael Straczynski
Produced
By: John Copeland
Executive
Producers: Douglas Netter, and J. Michael Straczynski
Feature length: 956 minutes
Extras: Introduction By J. Michael Straczynski, Episode Commentaries For “Signs And Portents” and “Chrysalis” By J. Michael Straczynski, “The Making Of Babylon 5 Vintage Documentary”, “Back To Babylon 5 New Documentary”, “The Universe Of Babylon 5: Includes Computer File Archives Offering: 1) Background On The Human/Alien Historical Events And Political Situations That Foreshadowed The Creation Of Babylon 5, 2) Station Personnel And Diplomatic Personnel Profiles, 3) Technical Section Focusing On 23rdCentury Interstellar Transport”, “Virtual Station Tour: Outlining Babylon 5’s Structure And Sectors”
Languages:
English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and French Language Monaural Sound
Subtitles:
English Captions and Closed Captions and French and Spanish Language Subtitles
Packaging:
Book Style 6-Disc Digipack Within A Glossy Cardboard Slipcase
Chapter
Stops: 6 Per Episode/132 Total
Sound:
Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and Monaural Sound
Year
of Television Broadcast: 1994/DVD Release: 2002
Home
Video Distributor: Warner Home Video
MPAA
Rating: Not Rated
Reviewer:
Mark A. Rivera
I
remember first hearing about “Babylon 5” from a co-worker who I temped with
in the summer of 1992 while on break between college semesters. He communicated
his excitement to me about this new sci-fi show that was coming that was going
to best thing to run on TV since “Star Trek: The Next Generation” and so on.
That summer I began to see blurbs about this new show called “Babylon 5” in
a variety of magazines ranging from “Starlog: Spectacular,” which had run
this big foldout story about the incredible for their time CGI effects being
performed at Foundation Imaging for the show, to “Writer’s Digest,” which
featured frequent articles on dramatic writing by Series Creator J. Michael
Straczynski and Series Story Editor Lawrence G. DiTillo.” Then I attended a
“Star Trek” convention and all everyone was talking about in between the
guest appearances and so on was “Babylon 5.” One could purchase the pilot
teleplay among all sorts of vendor items on the sales floor. By this time I was
completely hooked, but had to wait until February of 1993 when the series pilot
“The Gathering” finally aired on broadcast television. This was the original
cut with the Stuart Copeland music that aside from the Japanese laserdisc import
has never been made available on home video in America.
Last
year the prequel TV movie “In The Beginning” was released with the new
version of “The Gathering” that was reedited and with a new score by
Composer Christopher Franke when the series moved to cable televisions’ TNT
for the fifth and final season of the show. While I respect the changes made for
what is now the only version of “The Gathering” officially available on home
video as a domestic release, I do wish the original cut was made available on
DVD too, but alas Warner Home Video has treated fans of the series to something
better by releasing the entire first season of “Babylon 5” to DVD-Video in a
six-disc set handsomely packaged in a six-disc Digipack style book, which is
appropriate since “Babylon 5” is essentially an epic novel for television
with a beginning, middle and an end. This packaging is similar to how Artisan
Home Entertainment released the Director’s Cut of “Frank Herbert’s Dune”
earlier this year, except thankfully Warner Home Video has packaged the book
style Digipack within a glossy cardboard slipcase, which features wonderful
graphic artwork and looks handsome in a book case with other DVD box sets. On
the back flap of the Digipack are some liner notes by J. Michael Straczynski and
within the 16-page insert booklet that features episode information are liner
notes by series Executive Producer Douglas Netter.
With
the success of the pilot, “Babylon 5” season one “Signs And Portents”
began to broadcast as a part of the syndicated PTEN (Prime Time Entertainment
Network) on broadcast television. However after the first season, finding
Babylon 5 on TV would sometimes feel like a treasure hunt because for often the
network that aired the series in New York City for example bounced the show
around to Saturday afternoons and even as late as 1 in the morning or so on the
weekends until after the first four seasons, the show moved to Turner Network
Television. Now the entire “Babylon 5” TV series including the six TV movies
are broadcast on Sci-Fi in their matted widescreen aspect ratio with the
exception of the spin-off “Crusade,” which is broadcast in a (1.33:1) aspect
ratio and appears to follow the rotation following after the last episode of
season five on Sci-Fi.
“Babylon
5” was one of the first science fiction television series to be shot from the
beginning with the eventuality of 16 by 9 television broadcasts in mind though
there has been some debate about what is exactly the correct widescreen aspect
ratio for the series. Well these episodes look like they are framed at about
(1.85:1) to me and considering the amount of care that has gone into this DVD
release, I can only state that the episodes appear to look fine and I don’t
get the sense that I’m missing something or an image has been chopped away
when I watch all 22 season one episodes. The pilot was shot on a (1.33:1) aspect
ratio and though it is letterboxed when broadcast on Sci-Fi, the (1.33:1) aspect
ratio found on last years’ DVD release of “The Gathering” is correct. To
break with the technical aspects right away, every episode is 16 by 9 enhanced
and the picture quality is uneven, but better than the original analog
broadcasts that I remember. At times some scenes reveal a bit of background
noise and some scenes appear to have a bit of grain and even some scratches that
appear to be from the source materials used and not a result of the MPEG-2
compression process. The later episodes look better for the most part. The
technology of CGI has grown a lot since 1994 so while this might have been state
of the art for television at the time, understandably the series’ effects look
a little bit like videogame effects, but the strength of “Babylon 5” like
other great genre TV shows before it has always been in the storytelling and
since people still watch older programs with effects that are even more dated
than the ones presented here, I think both the casual viewer as well as the
hardcore “Babylon 5” fan will find watching these episodes to be so engaging
that aside from a few indoor composite shots involving the actors, they will
have no problem buying into the story and forget about the quality of effects as
a whole. Personally, I think “Babylon 5” looks pretty darn good on DVD and
despite what I have detailed above, the series appears to be withstanding the
test of time and still holds up well today even with the advances in CGI
effects.
The
English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Soundtrack is a notable improvement over the
original Dolby Surround Soundtracks and there is a French Language Monaural
Soundtrack as well as English Captions and Closed Captions for the hearing
impaired encoded on to each DVD along with French and Spanish Language Subtitles
included as options.
Nearly
ever episode of “Babylon 5” has a little seed that develops as the series
grows from season to season with payoffs sometimes not occurring until the very
end of the series itself. I debated while watching these discs whether or not I
should make reference to how the payoffs come about in latter series episodes,
but ultimately I think I would be wrong to take it for granted that everyone has
seen the series so rather than potentially spoil surprises to come, I have
decided to note the important, but general episodes in series one that contain
important information for balance of the series, but I will not point out
exactly what that is until the later seasons come out on DVD and then I can
refer back to the episodes where the story seeds were first planted.
Sometimes
what seems like a trivial storyline in “Babylon 5” is only the precursor for
something larger and more dramatic to follow. So the essential must watch
episodes within this DVD set include “Midnight On The Firing Line,” “Soul
Hunter,” “Born To Purple,” “Mind War,” “And The Sky Full Of
Stars,” “Deathwalker,” “Signs And Portents,” “Eyes,”
“Legacies,” “A Voice In The Wilderness, Parts I & II,” “Babylon
Squared,” and “Chrysalis.” Among some of the notable genre film and
television actors to make guest appearances in the first season are W. Morgan
Sheppard, John Snyder, David McCallum, Walter Koenig, Robin Curtis, David
Warner, Jeffrey Combs, Tim Choate, and June Lockhart. Acclaimed Author Harlan
Ellison served as the series’ Conceptual Consultant and D.C. Fontana was among
the writers to pen a teleplay in the first season.
“Life
is full of mysteries. Consider this one of them.”
Series
Creator, Writer, and Executive Producer J. Michael Straczynski provides two
episode length audio commentary tracks for the key installments of season one,
“Signs And Portents” and “Chrysalis.” Straczynski is very articulate and
well spoken and he brings a more easygoing quality to the commentaries than I
had expected with a very direct and nonchalant discussion of the challenges
faced in trying to bring “Babylon 5” to the small screen, developing the
characters with the actors as well as his style of direction in terms of plot
developments, which is to surprise the actors as well so that as certain story
elements come together the performances are more natural. He also discusses the
attention to scientific detail as well as how the future world of “Babylon
5” reflects very much upon the events of the last half of the twentieth
century, the imperfect human condition as well as the strength in faith that one
person can do something to bring about a greater change that could be for the
better or worse of society. He explains that the characters change constantly
through the course of the series so they are not that same people we knew in
season one as they are in season two. In addition he reflects on the role of
responsibility and consequence in the choices the characters make throughout the
series and the irony that comes through by the series’ end regarding who ends
up in a better place, who does not though he does not go into any great
specifics.
The
rest of the extra features are on discs one and six with a 57-second videotaped
introduction by J. Michael Straczynski as well as biographical notes on
Straczynski and Douglas Netter on disc one. Disc six features “The Making Of
Babylon 5” featurette hosted by Walter Koenig (18:53) and “Back To Babylon
5” (12:50), which features newly videotaped interview segments with Producers
J. Michael Straczynski, Douglas Netter, and John Copeland, Production Designer
John Iacovelli, Visual Effects Designer Ron Thornton, and Actors Richard Biggs,
Jerry Doyle, and Stephen Furst among others.
There
are interactive profiles within “The Universe Of Babylon 5,” which includes
Data Files on “The Grey Council” (: 34), “Psi Corps” (: 35), “Soul
Hunters” (: 43), Mutai (: 41), “Battle Of The Line” (: 31), “Babylon
1-4” (: 41), “Epsilon 3” (: 37), “Alien Races (: 37), and “Shadows”
(: 39). Personal Files for “Jeffrey Sinclair” (: 37), “Susan Ivanova” (:
35), “Michael Garibaldi” (: 36), “Dr. Stephen Franklin” (: 36), “Talia
Winters” (: 34), “Delenn” (: 31), “G’Kar” (: 32), “Londo Mollari”
(: 33), and “Kosh Naranek” (: 36) as well as Tech Files on “Star Furies”
(: 39), “Jump Gate” (: 30), “Earth Alliance Vessels” (: 32), “Alien
Vessels” (: 30), and the “Raiders” (: 36) are provided with information
circa the Earth year 2258.
There
is also an interactive tour of the “Babylon 5” space station with and
general overview (: 38) and descriptions of “Brown Sector” (: 35), “Red
Sector” (: 30), Yellow/Grey Sectors (: 30), “Blue Sector” (: 32), and
“Green Sector” (: 30). The original 32-second television promos for all 22
episodes are also included within the episode menus for each respective
installment on each DVD. The episodes on each disc can be viewed one of the
other or individually too.
The
main menu is nicely animated with morphing cast members circa season one and the
interactive tour of “Babylon 5” also features animated transitions and all
of the interactive menus are easy to navigate.
“You
have… forgotten something.”
Collectively,
I think this is a good start to what I hope will be a terrific set of
season-by-season DVD sets of “Babylon 5” coming soon. “Babylon 5: Signs
And Portents: The Complete First Season On DVD Box Set” is available now at
retailers on and offline from Warner Home Video.
©
Copyright 2002 By Mark A. Rivera
All Rights Reserved.
The Top Ten TV On DVD-Videos Of 2002 As Reviewed At GENRE ONLINE. NET
