Spacecenter Babylon 5: Das Tor zur 3. Dimension

Okay, admit it. You've wondered about TNT's influence over B5 after it moved to that channel. Well, this movie proves it. Okay, would JMS have written something as violent and effect-full if TNT HADN'T been shoving the whole 'demographic' thing down his throat? I mean, all those shots of the fist-fighting was a little over the top. But on whole I'd have to say that it was a terrific movie anyway. Okay, a LITTLE dull. But the special effects were GREAT!!!! One complaint though. (Same complaint as the one I have with the ep 'Day of the Dead'.) They missed a PERFECT opportunity to bring back Marcus.

Holy Lovecraftian influence! Saw this on a b5-movie marathon between 'In the beginning' and 'River of souls', and this got me excited the most. Anyone who reads good ol' H.P. Lovecraft's novels should know why.

The story at the beginning is like a sci-fied up of 'Call of Cthulhu', with the addition of all those inevitable B5-elements. However, in the latter part of the movie, the plot entangles to itself badly. Too much happening with so little time, leading to a slightly disappointing end. Oh well. At least it was enjoyable.

Of the feature films stemming from the B5U, this is my favorite. Looking at it 22 years on, it's amazing how well it has held up. The way its various influences (HPL, Triplanetary, Quatermass, etc) are almost seamlessly incorporated into the mythos of B5 contributes the film's quality, its storytelling and its endurance. Despite the preponderance of CHI and plot-driven action, there are still some great characterization moments, in particular the elevator scene with Zach and Lyta, further establishing Zach as the hopeless romantic always finding (and losing) hope.

I've never liked this film very much and in fact it's probably the only time I watched a story of B5 and didn't like it on first watching, it's never really improved much.

Generally the acting is fairly poor, Shari Belafonte does a passable job and the main acting is poor all round except for a slightly improved performance for Patricia Tallman and one good scene between Tallman and Conaway.

In fact I'd say watch the elevator scene and listen to Trent's explanation about what happened to Lyta Alexander when she went into vorlon space, but ignore all the rest.

This film was set in Season Four of the show, but sadly pales to all the episodes of that season except for "Conflicts of Interest" and "The Illusion of Truth".

By far the worst of the B5 movies.

A reasonable outing.

B5 - and JMS writing in particular - works better when not contained to standalone episodes. Give him space to breathe, and his musing flows far better. He has room to comment, moralise and philosophise beautifully. Give him a single story and he tries to cram in too many explanations and plot movements which start to clog up the script. This is a pity as the script is what he is good at.

So a nice story, but a little uneven. Sometimes continually underlines the same plot points over and over killing room for nice stand alone dialogue or character exposition. Other times, the character scenes (the lift scene ) are too long an neither help the story or offer any depth for their duration.

That said, the SFX is very nice, the music from Franke is far more classically orientated than before and it's a nice chance to try and highlight some of the minor characters. The story idea is reasonable, if a little unusual in scifi tone for B5 (befitting Trek more) and it lacks some of the regular B5 heavyweight actors (G'Kar and Londo are sadly missing and Delenn has few scenes).

Nevertheless, an enjoyable if a little vacuous compared to what one comes to expect from B5. The aural and visual experiences are good, the actors are solid and the story good enough to standalone. Not perfect, but still a good slice of pulp scifi action.