Babylon 5: In the Beginning (1998) (2025)

Popular reviews

• Review by {Todd} ★★★½

  "I would love to walk on the beach with you for five minutes" - Creepy Old Londo Mollari.

  Susan Ivanova's older brother seems to be from wherever Tommy Wiseau is from, and perhaps is related to him.

  A progressively drunker Emperor Mollari tells the story of the Earth/Minbari war (ten years before Babylon 5) to two rich children. It turns out the Minbari war was started by a cocksure dude trying to be a badass. Turns out that is the start of every war... ever. Some dude being a badass. Those Minbaris got oil or something? I still don't get why we went after them.

  This was released in January of 1998, a few weeks before the beginning of the…

• Review by RuleofTwo ★★★★

  (Show Review)

  What began as a charming yet highly underbudgeted chaotic and often inept riff on Star Trek with sprinklings of fantasy and Tolkeinisms meticulously transforms into a political allegory measurable to any of the most coveted of science fiction literary treasures. J. Michael Straczynski’s penning of a diplomatic station as an olive branch to a divided galaxy becomes the center for warmongering, trigger obsessed Dennis Hopper terrorists, recycled air pandemics and back-alleys dealings with spiritual forces not yet understood. The most consistently praised aspect of the show is the chemistry between Londo, the ambassador for the Centauri race and G’Kar Ambassador to the Narns. The Centauri leaders are quick witted hedonists who conjure up delusions of grandeur regarding their…

• Review by Robin Moon (fae/faer) ★★★

  I don't actually have a ton to say about the movie itself, aside from the fact that it's actually kind of sloppy and weird? Like, especially the idea of Londo telling this story (and having any idea what's happening during some parts of it that didn't involve him at all). I guess it was kind of necessary to have a framing narrative in order to gloss over some long periods of time without exposition dumps, but it just felt like a pretty odd choice to have it be that particular character at that particular moment.

  The narrative itself was... fine? We'd already seen a lot of what it depicted during various flashbacks throughout the series at this point, but I…

• Review by KPNUTS ★★★★ 10

  Ahead of rewatching season 5 and the upcoming animated movie, I thought I would revisit the television movies from my joint favourite science fiction series. Alongside Star Trek, Babylon 5 is an incredible achievement by its hugely talented creator J Michael Straczynski (JMS). It told an epic story across five memorable seasons whilst utilising an ensemble cast, state-of-the-art visual effects and a powerfully evocative musical score.

  In the Beginning is rather like The Hobbit or the Star Wars prequels: it explores the mythology of the more iconic works, fleshing out characters and events whilst expanding the scope of the fictional universe.

  This is a stirring piece of miliary science fiction and space opera set in the 23rd century. Politics,…

• Review by Joel anVALISok ★★★★

  When Babylon 5 switched to being on TNT they commissioned this made for cable movie to catch new viewers up on a show that was about to start its fifth season. Only the wraparound parts of Londo sitting on the imperial throne telling this story are really new. The rest was mostly revealed in the show already except for a parts with Sheridan. The battle of the line at the end, even though we know all about it, really makes this worth watching. The rest is sort of a previously on, even if the footage wasn't on screen before and is new.

  Watched for Council of Geeks and Jessie Gender's Jumpgate podcast.

• Review by drmorbius79 ★★★½

  With the recent passing of Jerry Doyle (Garibaldi), it was a good time to go back and check out some Babylon 5. I watched the entire series a few years ago but haven't seen a single episode since then.

  Plus I never got around to watching the TV movies that were produced for TNT, even though I owned them on DVD for a while.

  This originally aired on 1/4/98 (18 years ago!)- it served as both a prequel for the series to this point and a teaser for Season 5. It has some pretty massive spoilers, so definitely don't watch if you've never seen the show.

  Overlooking the dated early CGI effects, and some of the bad acting and makeup-…

• Review by cryptoriana ★★★½

  crazy that B5 tv movies beat out literal major motion picture Trek ones. history will vindicate JMS and bastard dog Rick Berman will be ground forever between the teeth of Cerberus.

• Review by SpaceCadetJuan ★★½

  73 This is a rather odd project. It aired between the 4th and 5th seasons of the show, by which point pretty much every plot twist of the Earth/Minbari war had already been revealed via flashbacks and exposition. It basically dramatizes and fills out information that viewers already knew. On the other hand, while being a prequel to the series it's inadvisable to watch this first, because it blatantly spoils many revelatory moments of the first three seasons.

  About the only thing new about it is we get to see that Sheridan, Franklin and G'Kar previously met and had an adventure before being reunited years later on the station. Also that Sheridan briefly encountered his future wife for a few…

• Review by Ian Lindsey ★★★½

  Babylon 5: the Phantom Menace

• Review by Bryan Lomax ★★★★

  When I first saw this film I enjoyed it but it had the feeling of being too cobbled together with footage from previous episodes of the series. It's been some time since I watched the show so, watching it now purely as a standalone movie, I felt like I was able to watch it on its own terms. As it stands it's a pretty darn good movie that reminded me of just how great the show became in its prime (seasons 3 and 4) with its complex characters and rich mythology. I'm not sure it will win over the uninitiated. The significance of Sinclair popping up in the final moments will most likely be lost on them as well as…

• Review by Spaceman Chris ★★★

  This a prequel of sorts to the Babylon 5 series explaining the complicated relationship between the humans, Minbari and Centauri and the eventual contruction of the Babylon 5 station.

  The thing is that the whole thing is a story being told bya character some twenty years later so it's not the best way to get introduced to the series, particularly as there are some spoilers throughout the story.

  It works fine as a breather between seasons four and five, but it does suffer from the thing most prequels have where characters who have never met (as far as we're aware) encounter each other, go on missions and then never mention them again. It's the whole "Why doesn't Ben Kenobi mention…

• Review by Rick Bman ★★★½

  This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

  Just finished the series so now I am watching my way through the movies.

  This was a interesting look at the Earth/Minbari War, even if we had already seen most of the pivotal scenes during the actual run of the show. It manages to give a few more details here and there.

  Using Molari as a framing device for this story did seem a bit of an odd choice, but in the end it works well enough. I like how the end of his framing bits lead directly into an important scene from the show (I really need to watch that timey, wimey Babylon 4 episode again).

  Maybe I was just tired this morning, but I teared up a bit when the President was giving her speech asking for ships to defend the line so some civilians could escape earth.