Babylon 5 - Season 4

It was the year of fire
The year of destruction
The year we took back what was ours.

It was the year of rebirth
The year of great sadness
The year of pain
and the year of joy

It was a new age
It was the end of history
It was the year everything changed

The year is 2261

The place: Babylon 5.

Catch the morphing menu's at the wrong time for hilarious effects.

If you're bothering to read this review you're probably already a fan of Babylon 5, and you know Babylon 5 was almost never released on DVD. The story goes that as the series was released on VHS, sales were dwindling and the marketers thought that the series had no fans and wasn't worth releasing any further, in fact the VHS release was never completed. However, the fans made their voices heard, the reason the VHS sales dwindled was because they were waiting for the superior DVD format to hold their favourite TV Sci-Fi show. The studio execs listened and gifted us with this brilliant and ground breaking series on DVD (and them with a whole stack of cash to roll around naked on, bless them).

Season 4 picks up, naturally where Season 3 left off. The majority of the main characters are strewn all over the galaxy. Sheriden is believed dead after this pre-destined journey to Z'ha'dum, Garibaldi is missing in action after a battle with the Shadows, Ambassador G'kar is in his usual state of despair over the oppression of his people by the Centauri, while Molari is on the Centauri home world dealing with his own problems and the clearly insane emperor. Back on the station, Susan Ivanova is left to manage the station and defend it from Shadow attacks and Earthgov, who want to arrest all the command staff for treason.

While the series was always intended to have a 5-year story arc, Season 4 has the unique distinction of having what could only be referred to as a "false ending". You see, rumours that the series was to be axed before completion led JMS (series creator J. Michael Straczynski) to rewrite a number of episodes so that in the event of the rumours coming true the series wouldn't come to an end with unanswered questions. Luckily, Season 5 was approved and filmed, but that's the topic for another review.

The 22 episodes of Season four progress the story, the shadow war gets into full swing with the forces of light rallying together to overcome the ancient and mysterious enemy.

Open the pod bay doors, HAL.

As the season unfolds, those thought dead end up being not so dead, the lost are found, events on Mars involving the psi corps come to a head, the impending civil war on Minbar erupts and threatens to destroy everything Delenn holds dear, at the same time, a civil war on Earth threatens to consume the planet.

Finally, the "false ending" I hinted at shows us the impact Babylon 5 has 1, 100, 500, 1000 and 1000000 years in the future. It's quite a ride.

The episode list for season four is:
The Hour of the Wolf
What Ever Happened to Mr. Garibaldi?
The Summoning
Falling Toward Apotheosis
The Long Night
Into the Fire
Epiphanies
The Illusion of Truth
Atonement
Racing Mars
Lines of Communication
Conflicts of Interests
Rumors, Bargains and Lies
Moments of Transition
No Surrender, No Retreat
The Exercise of Vital Powers
The Face of the Enemy
Intersections in Real Time
Between the Darkness and the Light
Endgame
Rising Star
The Deconstruction of Falling Stars

The entire season has been reprocessed into an all-new digital widescreen transfer (16:9, 1.77 aspect ratio), but as with previous seasons the CG segments which were originally shot in 4:3 have had to suffer somewhat to make it into the 16:9 aspect, nothing too noticeable and it certainly does not detract from the overall look of the picture.

The image quality has improved over previous seasons but the grain is still quite distracting on some scenes, particularly dimly lit inside shots (of which there are quite a few). The image can also often tend to be a bit soft with fine detail being lost on wide angle shots, mostly obvious on people's faces.

While the source material was limited by being a TV release on a tight budget, the soundtrack has been remixed to Dolby Digital 5.1. Clearly the extra effort has been spent here to do a proper mix.

All the channels are clear and distinct with surround used to good effect although in places the obvious limitations of the original source become apparent, never to the point of destroying the experience but purists will always find fault if they really want to.

The set consists of 6 discs, 5 of which contain the bulk of the episodes with the final one containing most of the the extras.

There are 3 audio commentaries on 3 key episose in Season 4.

Waiter, there's a fly in my soup!

The episode entitled ‘Falling Toward Apotheosis’ features cast members Bruce Boxleitner (Sheriden), Jerry Doyle (Garibaldi), Peter Jurasik (Molari) and Patricia Tallman (Leeta). As with cast commentaries of previous seasons this one is mostly filled with jokes about cast members hair or makeup with the odd interesting fact about filming the series.

There are two other commentaries in this season, one by series creator J. Michael Straczynski (The Deconstruction of Falling Stars ) and one including director Mike Vejar (The Face of the Enemy).

Extras contained on that last disc are:
Brand new introduction by series creator J. Michael Straczynski
Just as it sounds, JMS introduces the series and includes some summary information on the main themes and intentions of Season 4.

Celestial Sounds featurette about series composer Christopher Franke and the making of the series music
Features interviews with the producers and Christopher Franke describing the process of scoring the series cut in with scenes and music from various episodes.

Don't shoot Kenickie!

No Surrender, No Retreat Suite – original music composed exclusively for the DVD
As explained in the Celestial Sounds extra, each episode of Babylon 5 contains an average of 25 minutes of original score. This 6 minute extra is a sort of compressed presentation of the main music used during this season cut with various scenes from the show.

Data Files: Voice of the Resistance, Edgars Industries, Mars Resistance, Battle for Earth, Proxima
Some additional information on various key events and concepts in Season 4, formatted as data files from within Babcom, Babylon 5’s internal communications network. There’s really nothing new revealed in any of these but they make a nice refresher or

Personnel Files: Lyta Alexander, Kosh II, Cartagia, Lorien, Neroon
This extra contains character summaries of some of the key characters in Season 4 presented in a similar style to the data files.

Gag Reel
Mostly poor quality footage featuring the usual forgotten lines and tongue tied cast, a good chance to see the characters making fools of the themselves, and particularly to see Delenn say F***.

Security Cheif Garibaldi on the left, I'm not sure who the other guy is.

I would count Season 3 as my favourite but Season 4 is definitely a close second, rich with action and intriguing storylines do I even need to state the obvious that this box set is a must-have for any Babylon 5 fan?

Season 5 isn't due to be released until April 2005, and should be closely followed by the single season Crusade spin-off and a Babylon 5 movie pack, which will contain the original pilot and all the Babylon 5 movies, so Babylon 5 fans, warm up your credit cards, you've got a big year ahead.