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Babylon 5 S01E1: "The Gathering" - Episode Discussion
Link information
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- Title
- Babylon 5 | Full Episode | The Gathering: Season 1, Episode 1 | Beyond Infinity
- Authors
- ClipZone: Beyond Infinity
- Duration
- 1:34:50
- Published
- Feb 19 2026
This release has been so weird and confusing. So little fanfare/advertising for it, episodes popping up and being pulled down, no single playlist to see them all in order, it's very odd.
Anyway, I like the episode. The acting is pretty old-fashioned compared to modern TV expectations, feels like I'm watching people in a stage production, but it's charming and I like the characters.
Londo and Garibaldi are one of the things I remember most from the partial watch through I did way back when it was on Netflix, and I'm glad to see them again.
I agree - it's so bizarre to me that there is no playlist and the episodes are out of order. I spent 20 mins trying to find Midnight On the Firing Line (actual episode 1) and couldn't!
...not sure of the order they will be posted, but the lurker's guide to babylon 5 is still online and a great reference for recommended viewing order (and all manner of deep lore)...
(i still beep-beep my cats to this day)
Ooh, thanks for that, the viewing order list and individual episode pages are a great reference!
As a new person, should I start with "In the beginning" listed in the viewing order or the first episode listed here?
In the beginning is a prequel movie, I'd suggest waiting on it, personally and starting here
Yes. That movie contains several spoilers for the first couple of seasons, and B5 spoilers are radioactive given the depth and scope of the story. It's far better to start here.
That'd be my only issue with the official JMS watch order, though. The rest is perfect. I'd put In The Beginning after S3, that's the point where it won't spoil anything. It originally aired in between S4/5 on TNT. It's a must-watch, though - moreso than all of the other B5 films, I think it's the best of the bunch.
I'd agree it's the best of them! And yeah, it's definitely spoilery
Perfect, that's the context I was looking for. Thank you!
...it's fine either way, really...
...if you're patient with letting grand scope slowly precipitate organically then the original PTEN gathering presents a very dry, subtle tease entirely devoid of spoilers; if you prefer a more-modern narrative style with immediate plot engagement (or if you intend to watch the TNT special edition of the gathering) then in the beginning works well for framing the significance of babylon 5's grand story arc without spoiling the viewing experience...
...for what it's worth, in the beginning is kind of an awkward fit watched later in the series and really works best as an overture, but it's also easily skipped if you don't watch it first...
Appreciate it. Between your comment and others, I think I will come back to it later. I keep "meaning" to get into Babylon 5 so I'm trying to set myself up for success mainly.
So as long as this episode stays up, I figure we might as well try and get a rewatch going. Unfortunately the YouTube video now has been region locked to the US, but feel free to participate if you like to. Use best judgement on spoilers, and if something ties into something that's to come, use the details tags.
...while most salient points of discussion are covered in detailed episode pages over on the lurker's guide, it can be fun to go back and read period discourse on rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5, which included joe straczynski's comments as the series developed in real-time...
(note that google's usenet archive pretty much starts around april '94, after the eighth episode had already aired, so all the comments in my link above potentially include spoilers through the end of the first season, but starting from episode nine onward, their archive includes spoiler-free period discussion if you read backward from the last page)
I have dusted off my old complete DVD boxset, and that was really fun revisiting this again after so many years. Couldn't remember the plot as such, but I was immediately reminded of why Garibaldi, G'Kar and Mollari were such great characters. And I had almost completely forgotten about Sinclair
If this becomes a weekly thing, we are in for over 2 years with hopefully at least some people committed to a watch/rewatch.
So this introduces the space station, the alien factions and their ambassadors, relations between factions, some important events from their recent histories, and several other main characters. And there's a pretty interesting mystery.
I like it! Double episodes can sometimes overstay their welcome for me, but I never really got bored or disinterested, and the pacing of both the mystery and the lore dump felt good. It helps that there are so many interesting characters.
The CGI looks a bit less impressive than I remember it being. This pilot feels like it was made on a very strict budget, but that helps give it a certain charm.
The CGI in Babylon 5 is extremely early. So early they were using a bunch of Amiga 2000's networked together to render them.
Some of the effects have been particularly tortured as well, as they have been converted between letterbox and widescreen. Instead of redoing them, the effects were cropped and stretched for the new form factor.
So yeah, it definitely does not look good by today's standards. It does get better in season two, but it's still very much a time capsule of early computer rendering.
Iirc they were very often rendering right up until the delivery time when the episode had to be sent to the network. It also leads to a lot of reused effects shots, but I kind of love it. When turrets turn on or the jump gate opens it's nostalgic!
If you want to get a sense of how good the effects look, you have to watch them on a phone or tablet sized screen which is closer to the original resolution they were designed for.
I'll say this for the FX - they are definitely dated, but you will never see a scifi show that uses them better for storytelling than B5 did. The choreography, particularly in the larger set pieces, has never been matched. I'd say that the 2000s Battlestar Galactica is about as close to a B5 feel as any other series has come, and there's just loads more of it in B5 than in BSG.
...funny recognising how impressive it was for the time: that CGI won the 1993 emmy for outstanding individual achievement in special visual effects...
FYI for folks this is also showing as available for free on the Roku Channel! Not sure how regions work for that.
And that might be the best way to watch it in full? (although the "Babylon5Project" fan-edit is very good)
It seems like they might not put it on YouTube after all??
https://cordcuttersnews.com/warner-bros-discovery-removes-babylon-5-from-youtube-after-brief-free-run/
However, they don't list any sources... this might just be LLM slop! Not sure...
I know Plex has had it for free for a few years now, so maybe a similar deal exists for Roku channel (standard def, some ads, closed captions maybe)? I know the Plex one at least works in both the US and Canada
I have not had a chance to rewatch yet (again) but I love Babylon 5 so much. The Gathering shows a lot of the stuff they were interested in trying but couldn't always quite pull off and where some things change between here and the show proper. I really like Sinclair in particular but can't really say a ton more until we get into the first ep :)
...i preferred benjamin kyle and lyta alexander over stephen franklin and talia winters, and i'll always lament the lost narrative opportunity written into laurel takashima...
I didn't want to spoil the casting changes so I was waiting until next episode!
...i held my tongue on deeper comments but i figured since those are essentially direct replacements from pilot to series they don't really constitute spoilers...
Since the official source for this is... in flux with going private or being region locked for some people, I'll just point out there are dozens of active torrents for this show. One in particular is better encoded from best sources and fully complete.
I'll simply describe instead of link. It's an old torrent that will never die, and I don't mind bringing it up as a viewing option because if you download it, you'll probably buy the DVD or Bluray set before you even finish the series. This is the rare case where piracy usually does result in a sale. :p
Babylon 5- Comics- Novels- TV and Movies- 433 files, 64.60 GBHopefully they will resolve the issues they are having posting this on youtube so everyone can watch it there instead and show their support for the reboot. If not, well, no reason to stop the watch threads when we have other options.
Edit: In fact I'm watching the youtube episode now and yeah, the quality is serviceable but just a bit off. Essentially, there are two 'versions' of B5. There's the original widescreen DVD release and the 'remastered' version released to streaming services. So, your choices for watching are 720p 16:9, or 1080p 4:3. There are some fan upscales out there but they don't offer anything better than the DVD release imo.
Frankly, the original DVD release is the best one. The improvement in the image quality for the 1080p version is marginal, and the particular torrent I've mentioned did a better job with their denoise than the restoration did with the upscale.
If they ever do a real 4K restoration from the original widescreen negatives with newly created effects and put out a fully complete Blu-Ray box set I'll preorder it immediately. In fact I'd go as high as paying $500 to get that on my shelf. :)
Second episode is up now.
https://youtu.be/CAR19UJJ-sw
Topic is here:
https://tild.es/1sx3