Rating: 
Summary: Ah, the best was yet to come!
Review: This season of B5 is bittersweet for fans, because it was both the best of seasons and the worst of seasons. The best, because it had some of the most moving moments in the whole B5 canon (the scene where the Liberation Fleet jumps out of hyperspace to Earthspace, with the music reaching it's height, is indelible). The worst because both the shadow war AND the earth war each their conclusion, prematurely, in this season. It is one slam-bang episode after another, as JMS fought was he thought was the fight to tell the last two seaons in one season - it left the cupboard bare for season five, but it left us with a powerful season of TV! I won't bother with a show-by-show description of what happens. Others, better qualified than I, will surely do so. But I will share what i think were the highlights of the season: 1. Sheridan's speech when arriving at earth was extremely well-written and delivered. Though Boxleitner has been called "wooden" in his style, this speech was a vindication for him. 2. The whole thread having to do with Sheridan's sacrifice on Zha'ha'dum was well-done. Not overplayed by anyone, it still cast a delicious pall over the season, making all choices seemingly minor in comparison.
3. The end of the Shadow War was well-handled. It showed that the enemy was not the one most alien in body, but the one most alien in mind, that was the foe. In the end, we understood the Shadows and Vorlons but never understood Bester or Clark. The former were beaten by reason, the latter only by force. 4. Tactics, especially those at Proxima Three, were interesting and important. It is a rare show that show more than just shooting until one side figures out a dodge to win against imposible odds. Sheridan's forces and tactics had this one won from the start - the cost was the only variable. There are some poorly-done elements. The Shadows and Vorlons are pathetic at the end. Lorien was a bit TOO deus ex machina for my tastes. Jerry Doyle is a bit too much overtaxed by the script, as is Patricia Tallman (both needed a couple of more episodes to make charactor changes believable). However, the season as a whole is magnificent. The intro sequence alone is worth the price of admission. This is must-get for B5 fans and TV sci-fi fans alike.
Rating:
Summary: This Rocks!! (Can I give it 6 stars, please?)
Review: This season was jam-packed with action, adventure and tragedy. What more can one want in a television series??
Ok, so there's the comment that the Shadow War ends anti-climatically. But that's what happens with a war of ideology. It cannot be won with wars or force, and warring over ideas can seem sometimes trivial from the outside. How does one solve the who is right argument?
What makes up for the lack of fighting is the Earth "civil" war and the Minbari Civil wars. Wars galore!, each with a purpose and meaning.
The "what happened to Mr Garibaldi" question was answered frustratingly slowly, and the resolution didn't get enough resolution for me. We don't have to see how Sheridan came to trust Garibaldi again, but it would have been nice to get a little more closure on that subject. After all Garibaldi did, Sheridan couldn't just trust him, could he? Or maybe he could, and that's a telling characteristic of Sheridan, and a brilliant piece of unspoken writing by JMS.
No flat characters here! Thanks to JMS and his dynamic writing, the characters of B5 twist and turn and show different sides to the audience with every new season, and every show within that season!
The CGI has improved, despite their tight budgets, and the show was supposed to end this season! What a way to go out, had it done so! Luckily, we still get one more season! The actors are deeply rooted in their characters and it shows!, the story line is top-notch and engaging throughout, and everything is actually *happy* by the end of this season! A thoughtful and exciting show. Very satisfying at the end.
Sadly, the end of the next, 5th and final season never gets closure, and the under-rated, under-funded "Crusade" never got off the ground. Pity. It needed proper treatment and respect and still does! I'm still hoping that someone somewhere will realise what a LOSS this story is uncompleted, and will fund it and treat it right. HOPE, everyone! It's what we've been taught to do!
Rating:
Summary: Excellent DD 5.1 audio, especially with a subwoofer!
Review: Wow, the sound blew me away! I could feel the jet engines rumbling. Ok ok, I know that you can't hear engines rumble in space, I liked it anyway. The voices are very clear and understandable. There is only one audio track though, no DTS or stereo track. The video was not nearly as good. As other reviewers have reported, there are some problems. I would still call it above average for a TV show. The video quality was better than my cable signal. It's in widescreen, of course (1:78:1). Although the extras aren't as good as the previous seasons of B5, they are still much better than many other TV shows. There's an easter egg, like the previous seasons. It's hard to stop watching. The episodes flow into each other and the tension increases throughout the season. There are several references to prior seasons. I don't recommend this DVD if you haven't seen the first three seasons, you won't get the full effect. Excellent DVD set.
Rating: 
Summary: The rape of better works continues
Review: Wow...all this to-do and it all ends with an anti-climatic resolution. Oh, and JMS continues to demonstrate his one amazing skill: blatant stealing and using ideas from much better works. But he does manage to disguise that from his audience (or rather, the not-so-bright members of it) with a lot of flashy, epic-looking battles.
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