Seeking Opinions about Babylon 5 and Andromeda

djf021

Hello everyone,
I never got a chance to watch Babylon 5 or Andromeda. Now, thanks to HBO Max and Amazon Prime video, I can.
While I have no doubt Star Trek is better of course, what are your opinions on these two?

Worth it?

phoenixc

I would say both are worth watching.

Babylon5 is the better of the two I think, it was one of the very early examples of a series using a comprehensive story arc while still being episodic, and is still the gold standard for that format. You might have to give it a few episodes because there is so much going on that it takes a bit to get all the groundwork in, and it may seem a bit random early on but stick with it and it all comes together soon enough.

Andromeda is the other way around, it is best at the start but gets rather rocky later on because high writer turnover and other behind the scenes problems caused a lot of plotline thrashing so the story quality is erratic and it keeps retconning itself near the end. It's good enough that even those problems do not drag it down too far to be watchable.

rattler2

B5 is good. And considering it was a mid 90s show it was one of the first to make heavy use of CG, and while it kinda shows today, its still actually rather high quality. Not only that, they understood humor to break up the tension at times. Garabaldi's "second favorite thing in the Universe" being one of them. And in Season 5 they do have an "Average Joe doing their Job" episode with a couple maintenance workers while things happen around them, and actually make fun of one of the things we see guys in the background doing.
I'm not saying it was THE first to make heavy use of CG. I kinda wanna say that honor may go to seaQuest.

Andromeda... personally I would say ignore the existance of Season 5 entirely. That whole season just made NO sense whatsoever.

pottsey5g

While Star Trek is overall better there are some areas Babylon5 is better at. This is excluding the B5 Pilot which is dreadful and doesn’t represent the rest of the show.

• B5 has less bad episodes on average than other Sci-Fi shows, even the worst B5 episodes tend to be decent enough. Making it very watchable over all seasons
• More realistic characters, flaws, human nature which in turn makes the characters and show more interesting. The Star Base feels more like what a real living city and star base would be like if we had a real one.
• Overall story arc across multiple seasons is one of the best I have ever seen if not the best and better then Star Trek. It is one of the few shows where they clearly planed Season 5 out before filming season 1.
• On the negative side the B5 spin offs don’t live up to the quality of B5 and B5 films are very hit and miss.

djf021

Thanks for your thoughts guys! I'll probably end up watching both, but I'm thinking I'll try B5 first.

jonsills

I'm even more limited - the first two seasons of Andromeda were really promising, then it became the Dylan Hunt Superhero Hour because Sorbo forced Wolfe off the production staff.

B5, though, is worth it all the way through, and according to Joe Stracynski the newly-released version did the CGI effects much better than the DVD. (Had to do with rights, and the fact that somebody's ego at the old network is heavily involved. Probably won't get a truly remastered version until whoever was offended by it finally dies or quits.)

starkaos

If you have Amazon Prime, then Farscape is another good option. Overall, I would rank them:

1. Babylon 5
2. Farscape
3. Andromeda

No scene in any other Science Fiction series comes close to this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0n2vurSBIQ

resumod

starkaos wrote: »

If you have Amazon Prime, then Farscape is another good option. Overall, I would rank them:

1. Babylon 5
2. Farscape
3. Andromeda

No scene in any other Science Fiction series comes close to this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0n2vurSBIQ

Personally I would set Firefly and Earth Final Conflict before Andromeda.
Last one hit the wall too, but not as hard in my opinion.
Maybe even Lexx, but that one was hard to swallow sometimes.

And don't get me started about Star Blazers: Space Battleship Yamato 2199 and 2202. Those had something.



But when talking about Babylon 5 I always have to think about one of later the movies, that was a prequel to the series.

Mostly spoiler free.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzJaQtZty5M

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHQnnoU4i5w

rattler2

I also liked Babylon 5: Thirdspace. However I would recommend not watching that one until you're somewhere around season 4 I wanna say. I think the movie is set midway through s4.

Unknown

This content has been removed.

disposeableh3r0

> @starkaos said:
> If you have Amazon Prime, then Farscape is another good option. Overall, I would rank them:
>
> 1. Babylon 5
> 2. Farscape
> 3. Andromeda
>
> No scene in any other Science Fiction series comes close to this.
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0n2vurSBIQ

As I recall that did eventually happen

starkaos

disposeableh3r0 wrote: »

> starkaos said:
> If you have Amazon Prime, then Farscape is another good option. Overall, I would rank them:
>
> 1. Babylon 5
> 2. Farscape
> 3. Andromeda
>
> No scene in any other Science Fiction series comes close to this.
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0n2vurSBIQ

As I recall that did eventually happen

Which is what makes it so much better.

davefenestrator

B5 was great. Do stick with it, in season 1 the actors were still finding their footing just like in SG1.

Andromeda ... eh, what I watched of Hercules in SPAAACE was OK but I never finished it.

Farscape started out decent and got weird but great as it went on.

rattler2

davefenestrator wrote: »

Andromeda ... eh, what I watched of Hercules in SPAAACE was OK but I never finished it.

We don't talk about season 5.

mustrumridcully0

Babylon 5 is a brilliant show. It has its flaws, and it will show its age, but it had a really strong story line with plenty of good character arcs. Babylon 5 story was well plotted in advance, and that pays off well. The weakest season is probably the last, because they had to rush major storylines in season 4 because all pointed to them being cancelled. But then they got another year, and the material wasn't just quite there to make season 5 as interesting as the previous 2.

Andromeda was a more action-oriented show than Star Trek or Babylon 5, but it also had some really cool world-building and little fun details. Unfortunately, the main actor wanted it to be more Hercelus in space than what the lead writer wanted, which lead to him being forced out (or leaving?). My favorite character on the show, Tyr Anasazi, was also getting sidelined. Really a shame we didn't get to see Keith Hamilton Cobb more in genre TV shows or movies. I think he had at least the potential to be a Jason Momoa a decade or two earlier than Momoa. But hey, if he enjoys theater work more, more power to him.
Like Farscape, one of the characters in the show had to take a seat back because the actor started getting health problem from the prosthetics. Another real shame, but the loss in writing quality is what really caused the show to decline.