As always, I don't think that such a question can be answered in a simple yes or no. On many levels, Babylon 5 succeded because it did do something that had never been done before. For all its trevails, it did go the entire five years. On the other hand, from the beginning I was a serious fan of the show. I was evangelical; I never missed an episode and was an active particpant in discussion both on the internet and on AOL. By the time season five came around, the desire wasn't there anymore. I missed most of the episodes of season 5. On the other hand, perhaps this is why Sleeping in Light worked for me. It was the last episode of season four and my sense of wonder and caring wasn't entirely spoiled by what was season 5.
It's interesting to look into the structure of Babylon-5. I certainly cannot speak for many other people, but the initial draw of Babylon-5 was the sense of mystery. Certainly I remember looking over the season-1 episode list and looking forward to episodes like "And the Sky Full of Stars". These episodes worked, I think. The acting was rough, the production wasn't perfect, but I think season one worked. But, then, mystery is easy. Season 2 extended much of this mystery, giving us "The coming of Shadows" and the famous final four, but even with a few revelations, it was still a sense of mystery and forboding doom that drove the series.
The greatest test of any project like this is whether it can go beyond the mystery. Piling mystery upon mystery can never work in the end. Twin Peaks is cerainly evidence for this. So, in season 3, with the halfway point approaching, there had to be a movement from mystery to plot. I find it interesting that, as I wrote this, had to go back and look at episode titles to recall what happened in season 4. That, in and of itself, is an indictment, but I think that up to the halfway point, season 4 did work. Season 3 was the story of the separation from earth. In some sense, this was ancillary to the main mystery of the first two seasons, but I do think it was central to the story JMS wished to tell. Some of this material was quite heavyhanded, however, from the blatant Chamberlain references to the Nightwatch. Perhaps this foreshadowed some of JMS's distaste for moral amiguity which ultimately manifested itself in season 4. The evil characters were too evil and the decisions were none too hard. The second half of the story culminated with John Sheridan's trip to Z'Ha'Dum and the revelation of the shadows' motivations. Various misunderstandings of evolution aside, Z'Ha'Dum remains a difficult episode to fully categorize. It was unquestionably JMS's grasp for the mythological. Sheridan jumps off the ledge into the abyss, sacrificing himself in a fairly classic trope. It could have worked, I think, but Sheridan had to stay dead. The resurrection that JMS intended with all its tragic consequences is quite difficult to pull off. Straight off sacrifice has a power that is difficult to deny. I don't want to fault JMS for trying something more difficult, but the fact that it didn't ultimately entirely work is unavoidable. Regardless, it is difficult to consider season 3 a failure. It was up and down, but, in the end, the taste left in the mouth wasn't unpleasent.
Season 4 was, in more ways that one, the beginning of the end. For one, it was the product of JMS's ill-fated decision to write an incredible number of continuous episodes. Certainly this led to a decline in quality, but I don't think that the failure of "Into the Fire" can be attributed to this. JMS has a strong propensity for deconstruction that, while often being a good idea, was quite often his downfall. This became extremely evident in season five, but I want to focus instead on the Shadow war and what it became. As far back as "Dealthwalker", JMS had insinuated that the Vorlons might not be the cliched mysterious benevolent benefactor that they were superficially presented as. In Z'ha'dum, JMS perhaps tried to give the shadows almost sympathetic motives, but I believe this failed. There is still the attempt to undercut the viewers' perception of motivation, however. I'm not sure when it occurred, but at some point when asked about which side JMS was on, the Vorlons or the shadows, he said, "the third side." This is not a problem in and of itself, but it is quite symptomatic of the underlying disease. While the death of Kosh worked on an episodic level, on the series level his replacement undercut any moral ambiguity that might have existed. While Kosh certainly did things that might have not always been beneficial, he was a character that the audience cared about. He ccertainly wasn't all evil. The replacement Vorlon had few if any redeeming traits. Fairly contemporaneous with this, JMS also turned the Vorlons into planet-destroying marauders. The decisons were no longer difficult. The shadows and Vorlons were both evil. There was no Kosh to make opposition of the Vorlons a hard decision. There was no subtlety. Regardless of the amusing atheistic subtext that seems to have gone utterly unnoticed, Into the Fire was an episode without any dramatic content. I think JMS intended the sturm und drang to be subordinate to the point of the episode. Ultimately, I think the episode was meant to be about independence. By deconstructing our benevolent benefactors, JMS was trying to communicate is that self-guidance is better than being guided of the unknown desires of an other. Into the fire was about controlling one's own destiny and not having to subsume one's self to the will of another, regardless of the age or power of that other. It's not all that bad of a point, really, and one worth getting across. However, Sheridan yelling "get the hell out of our galaxy" is probably not the best way to communicate this. Good drama requires a good conflict, and most good conflicts have to exist on something more than just big ships shooting at eachother. By removing the moral ambiguity and presonal conflict, Into the Fire was ultimately an episode about easy decisions. That, I think, was the central failure of Bablyon 5.
The rest of season 4 was up and down, left and right. It was the story of the conflict with earth. Here, something external began to wear on the show. For all of JMS's claims to the contrary, the end of season 4 was significantly rushed, and it suffered because of that. This, taken in addition with the fact that JMS was writing all of the episodes, led to a rather disjointed end of season 4, and the rather mediocre Deconstruction of Falling Stars. Sometime in this interval, my enthusiam waned. I caught the beginning of season five, but my viewership slowly fell away. Because of this, however, I think Sleeping in the Light worked for me. I don't want to dwell too much on on season five, but I do think that it was JMSs penchant desire to deconstruct that led to the disaster that was Byron. In his will to undermine the cliches that Byron represented, JMS forgot that the episodes that set it all up have to be interesting in and of themselves. Deconstruction cannot be a goal in a vacuum. Every episode has to stand on its own and the fact that the painful early episodes were being used to set up something ostensibly more interesting does not redeem them in any way. I cannot speak much for the post Byron episodes as I only really saw one of them. From various other comments, however, I believe that the problams extant early on still continued.
So, after much excess verbiage, I finally come to Sleeping in Light. I've been reading some other comments about it (on rastv) -- I hesitate to call them reviews, and I'm torn between a disgust for much of Babylon 5 fandom and a realization that, in not having seen season 5, I am coming from a different perspective. The failure to resolve loose ends is a criticism I cannot understand, however. It has been clear from fairly early on that JMS wanted to set Babylon 5 in a universe where things continued to happen for many years after the story. If nothing, Deconstruction of Falling Stars should have made that abundantly clear. Sleeping in Light was never meant to be a wham episode, as far as I can tell. Ever since Lorien's comment that Sheridan had twenty years left to live, I think it has been clear that Sleeping in Light was to be a denouement. It is not the final chapter of a book; it is the epilogue occurring many years later. It is the end of the story of John Sheridan. And, in this, I think it worked. I wasn't sure if the device of the rising sun would work when it was first introduced somewhat awkwardly in the episode, but I think that, by the end, it did succeed. As for Vir's story about the Pak'ma'ra, to those of you who do not understand it's relevance, I'm afraid there's little hope for you. Go rewatch the entire series. Maybe it will become clear. In ending the series, Sleeping in Light was a reunion and a leavetaking. Sheridan travels to the decomissioning of Babylon-5 and then to meet his doom at the sight of the final battle. It was perhaps a bit too drawn out, but the closing narration, the final 8 minutes JMS has referred to, really worked. It is quite fitting that Babylon-5 ended with the destruction of Babylon-5. It doesn't make much sense scientifically, but, dammit, I'm willing to sacrifice that a little bit for the nice symbolism. Claudia's final narration and the closing shot of Delenn on the bench ulitmately made be decide that the concept of the rising sun really worked. It was perhaps maudlin and overdone, but then, perhaps, such things aren't bad all the time. I think, however, that, in the end, it was a fitting close to the things that Babylon 5 was supposed to be about. The greatest success that Bablyon 5 had was that it sometimes succeeded.
And, so, we come full circle to the question of did Babylon 5 succeed in its mission. I think that, for all its flaws, it essentially did. It changed the way I think about sf on TV. Before Bablyon 5, there was essentially only Star Trek which, while enjoyable for seasons 2 through 5, had no essential depth to it. The difference is most easily illustrated by comparing All Good Things and Sleepin in Light. All Good Things was really an episode written to pander to fandom. It had some conflict; it had Q, Riker with a starship going warp 13 and some old faces, but ultimately, it lacked any center. It was just another episode and not all that good of one for that matter. Sleeping in Light, however, was something different. It was a denouement, a sense of closure and an epilogue. It was truly an end in a more literary sense than Star Trek ever aspired too. Babylon 5 proved that attempting the literary on television, atleast in the field of science fiction, wasn't impossible. In some sense, it changed the ground rules for the discussion of sf on television. The stranglehold of Star Trek fandom has been broken, and, finally new things are being tried. They might not always work, but even in failures like Earth: Final Conflict, there is hope.
Babylon 5, contrary to the claims of some fans, never, in my opinion, reached the level of the truly great literary sf, but it is impossible to say too much about the fact that it tried. Even if it was not succesful in everything it set out to accomplish, I think the fact that it tried is a success in and of itself. Babylon 5, for good or ill, made it to five seasons, trying to do what had never been done. That's enough of a success for me.
There are, of course, pleny of other things to say. Babylon 5 was also the first show to have a creator strongly interacting on usenet. There is a book's worth of material to be said about this, I think, about JMS, usenet, moderation, and the issues of online fandom, but I'm not sure this post is the place for saying them. For some, I'm sure my opinions are fairly well known. Most are probably saying "who the hell is this idiot?". Regardless, I still think there are some things I want to say, but that is all for another time.
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Last updated 3/23/02