Babylon 5 vs Star Trek

I think both great for their own reasons, Roddenberry was a genius, a visionary and a dreamer. He hoped the human race would out-grow its human problems, no more war, perfect socialism, no religious conflicts, no money....it was too ideal sometimes but way ahead of its time. JMS gave us Shakespeare, Dune and the legandary predictions and timetravels of King Arthur and Arthur C. Clarke in space. Both Trek and Babylon-5 have heavily borrowed from each other, I would argue DS-9 being the most un-Roddenberry Star Trek ever made.
 
Parson said:
(Personally, I like the more positive spin of Trek, and especially the better special effects.)
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I tend to agree. Star Trek is fun with moments of depth. B5 is deep with moments of fun. The older I get, the more I find that I prefer shows like TNG or TOS over B5.

As a side note, I've heard that DS9 is good, but it never seems to grab me despite repeated attempts.
 
psikeyhackr said:
I watched The Gathering when it first aired and was not too impressed. I didn't think it could a great series until I saw Soul Hunter.



LOL

psik

PS - I think this reviewer sucks.
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I suggest trying the reviews of SFDebris. He has some excellent insight into B5 and DS9 and is fan of both. He really despises Voyager and Enterprise, though if you watch his reviews you'll understand why.

Personally I grew up with DS9 so it will always have my preference. I came to B5 late, but I now love them equally.

When introducing people to B5 I always show them "in the beginning" first.
 
I came here searching for an alternative to the now defunct SFX.co.uk forum. Since they fused with gamesradar, the forum is gone forever taking insightful views on life, death and Sf with them. I still buy the magazine however. But their last one was about 50 years of Star Trek and covers all the different shows. But nothing on DS9, they don't even mention it.

So far I'm impressed with what I'm seeing here
 
Star Trek always gave me the feeling that everything was going to be fine by the end of the episode, whereas B5 often had an unexpected sting in the tail which kept me glued to the screen.
One of my favourite B5 episodes is "Confessions and Lamentations", where the crew try and stop a deadly plague wiping out an entire species on the station, while Delenn offers the sick aid when they lock themselves away. I seriously doubt that Star Trek would have given us the ending we got.
 
Khuratokh said:
I suggest trying the reviews of SFDebris. He has some excellent insight into B5 and DS9 and is fan of both. He really despises Voyager and Enterprise, though if you watch his reviews you'll understand why.

Personally I grew up with DS9 so it will always have my preference. I came to B5 late, but I now love them equally.

When introducing people to B5 I always show them "in the beginning" first.
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That's introducing some seriously major spoilers though! I always used to tell people to stick with the first half of season 1 and it kicks off after that (I said the same thing about Fringe too after it settles down a bit), and if they still didn't like it after that then it probably wasn't for them (and they were obviously wrong :) )
 
Ed Ryder said:
Star Trek always gave me the feeling that everything was going to be fine by the end of the episode, whereas B5 often had an unexpected sting in the tail which kept me glued to the screen.
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From an acting and plot point of view B5 was superior. But I liked the view of the future of Star Trek. I liked the cool tech of Star Trek. I liked the characters much better in Star Trek. It may be because the original Star Trek was shown in the 60's before I had much of a sense of special effects, but I don't remember being overly upset at the FX of Star Trek, and often frustrated at the chincy looking FX of B5. And I believe that I'm in the majority here because Star Trek continues to do re-runs and haven't seen a B5 listing since the last episode limped into the sunset.
 
Ed Ryder said:
That's introducing some seriously major spoilers though! I always used to tell people to stick with the first half of season 1 and it kicks off after that (I said the same thing about Fringe too after it settles down a bit), and if they still didn't like it after that then it probably wasn't for them (and they were obviously wrong :) )
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True about the spoilers. But I feel B5 has so much to offer, that I want to give people some hope for the future when in season 2 things start to get really good. Few are willing to watch 22 eps before it gets good (which is true of most of the Treks too) too many judge an entire ashow on the quality of the first 5 episodes. In the 90's shows had a lot more time to grow the beard. Now if you don't grab an audience in the first few eps you will get cancelled.
 
T.n.g. opemned the door for baylon 5 not long after the next generation debut we had aliennation war of the worls this wa s the era for sci fi t.v. if u like one why not like mos tof them>?
 
B5 was not over the top! Londo Mollari's hair says otherwise!

I loved the JMS season arcs - the long stories were really good. I know Voyager and DS9 had longer arcs than say TNG or TOS but still not as consistent as B5.

For me (as a young lad) B5 was a bit more grown up and felt more like "adult" sci fi than the ST at the time. Although I am a AST fan as well!
 
I never really got on with B5 - the too obvious SFX grated for me. That said my favourite ST was indeed DS9, my favourite intro however was Voyager. Anywho feel free to geek out at all the series themes...



and then realise that ST beats B5 in a battle ;) (runs and hides!!!)

 
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