B5 thoughts
Aug. 4th, 2007 05:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedi_of_urthWell, to take a break from the usual Doctor Who talk, I thought I'd talk a bit about Babylon 5 instead (of course I'm still using a DW icon, maybe I should go find a couple B5 ones), and it's maybe not a very well put point, probably because I often wide up not making points well, but it was something I wanted to discuss. Now I never got around to doing any comparisons to other shows, but I might later.
Alright, I’ve been watching Babylon 5 again recently and I can’t seem to place exactly why it is that I still love this show beyond all reason. Obviously, when considering the show as a whole, the story arc sets it apart from anything else, like ever, but there is still something that sets it apart just watching the episodes again.
And the closest I’ve been able to come it that, there is just a reality to the universe that is different from anything else. It feels like the universe existed before we ever started watching it, that the slice of time we’re seeing is the result of a history that is every bit as real and important to what happens now as what actually is happening now.
The characters do not exist independent of their pasts, their cultures, their feelings. The characters weren’t born the day they walked onto the station, they had lives before that. How they were raised, what they experienced as children, and in adult life before they came here has shaped them into the people they are when they arrive. The characters talk about their families, their training, their actions in past wars; it’s not always important, and it doesn’t always happen in character episodes, but it helps us know them because they talk like people, and it helps us understand why they make the choices they make.
Babylon 5 didn’t exist in isolation either. There was a universe outside the station, and there was life inside it that mostly happened outside the circle of people we followed. There were people that made decisions on other worlds, there were things that happened within other governments, and the world of the station Babylon 5 only felt the effects.
The universe changed, the characters changed, nothing was the same in the end as when it began. But it all just seemed real. And it’s something that I don’t explain well, but it just kind of is.
Alright, I’ve been watching Babylon 5 again recently and I can’t seem to place exactly why it is that I still love this show beyond all reason. Obviously, when considering the show as a whole, the story arc sets it apart from anything else, like ever, but there is still something that sets it apart just watching the episodes again.
And the closest I’ve been able to come it that, there is just a reality to the universe that is different from anything else. It feels like the universe existed before we ever started watching it, that the slice of time we’re seeing is the result of a history that is every bit as real and important to what happens now as what actually is happening now.
The characters do not exist independent of their pasts, their cultures, their feelings. The characters weren’t born the day they walked onto the station, they had lives before that. How they were raised, what they experienced as children, and in adult life before they came here has shaped them into the people they are when they arrive. The characters talk about their families, their training, their actions in past wars; it’s not always important, and it doesn’t always happen in character episodes, but it helps us know them because they talk like people, and it helps us understand why they make the choices they make.
Babylon 5 didn’t exist in isolation either. There was a universe outside the station, and there was life inside it that mostly happened outside the circle of people we followed. There were people that made decisions on other worlds, there were things that happened within other governments, and the world of the station Babylon 5 only felt the effects.
The universe changed, the characters changed, nothing was the same in the end as when it began. But it all just seemed real. And it’s something that I don’t explain well, but it just kind of is.
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Date: 2007-08-04 11:54 pm (UTC)I still think B5 stands up well to most if not all other science fiction, at least as far as plotting and characters go. Unfortunately, while the special effects were awesome for the time, they're merely OK (some would say awful, but I wouldn't) by today's standards. But it's not the SFX that matters to me, for the post part, although I do love good SFX. It's the characters, and the plot.
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Date: 2007-08-05 01:40 am (UTC)And sure the effects might not stand the test of time, but I do think they're still okay at this point, not great but there is a certain beauty to it. But it's not the effects that are going to make it last, what good effects are constantly changes, the story lasts, and well, to quote Delenn, Babylon 5 endures.