Babylon 5: In the Beginning (1998)

Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful

best movie i've ever seen.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Having watched virtually no "Babylon 5" but willing to check out this series, I made the mistake of assuming I should start with this prequel TV movie, chronologically the "first" story in the series' universe.Turns out the prequel was obviously to provide pre-existing fans with bonus backstory -- so much so that at times, the film simply gives up on making sense as a standalone product.As a framing device, we get a badly-lit emperor narrating historical events to a bratty little noble and his sister. At no point does the film care to explain why half the buildings outside the palace are on fire.The emperor tells the story of Earth's war with aliens called the Minbari. He focuses on the role played by Delenn, a young Minbari leader, and John Sheridan, a human military officer. The war story is the bulk of the movie, until it swerves into left field by thrusting Sheridan and Delenn into a radical context that has nothing to do with the story we've seen up till now. I don't think Delenn and Sheridan ever even met, but suddenly they're shown to be held captive together in parts unknown, not to mention lovers. And again, it's left completely unexplained. I don't think it was the filmmakers' intention to leave me laughing as the end credits rolled.It doesn't help that the film's structure grows crude. The bulk of the film is well-paced, examining the causes of a deadly war and its first few months. At about the 75 minute mark, however, it pulls the rug out from under a plot it's been developing and suddenly compresses 3 years of events into a few minutes. This is done mostly via battle scene overdrive. These battles are the movie's best CGI, but I'm not sure anyone over 19 will be interested in all this carnage, particularly with the clichéd voice-over. There's something perverse about the narrator celebrating courage while we watch a slow-motion stabbing.The film's actual resolution is an anticlimax. I can only guess it contains references to TV canon designed to please the established fan.On the plus side are the costumes and makeup, into which most of the budget seems to have gone with good effect. Poor Andreas Katsulas must have spent hours in the makeup chair, so I'm glad he shines in the role of G'Kar. His reptilian getup is amazing, right down to the scarlet eyes. Theodore Bikel and the too-quickly-dismissed Reiner Schone offer solid support.When Sheridan assumes command during a crisis, the filmmakers make great use of limited resources, using close-ups and rapidly-shifting lights to ratchet up tension. The Grey Council stands out as excellent minimalist work from filmmakers who were limited to cheap sets. The Council sequences are stylishly lit and well-directed -- way more so than that annoying Delenn/Lenonn dialogue with the candle flames passing in front of the lens.

"In the Beginning" is a mark of brilliance...a perfect made for TV movie for the Babylon 5 series. It is the best of the B5 movies with the second being the pilot episode.ITB chronicles the genesis of the Earth Minbari war which was a holy war started by misunderstanding between Humans and a powerful alien race called the Minbari. In the struggle, a huge chunk of humanity is killed as the Minbari march towards Earth, destroying human colonies on the way.Since this movie comes near the end of the 3rd season and out of chronological order, it answers many unanswered questions that B5 watchers would expect to be answered from the 1st Season onwards.On its own, the story is PERFECT. There is plenty of CGI war scenes, plenty of dramatized war scenes and plenty of intrigue. A perfect reason to bother getting into the series itself if you weren't a fan.

Although this movie came a long time after the series premiere, it was actually the first piece of B-5 I saw. It's a great movie on it's own, and a perfect way to start the whole series, because you get all the background info. The movie revolves around the Earth-Minbari wars, a war erupting when a captain from an earth-warship reacts to a Minbari greeting in a hostile way, resulting in the death of several hundreds of thousands of Earthlings. And that's all you need to know, the rest will show itself when you watch the movie.The action is great, special effect OK (they were never great, sad to say) and the acting first-class! So go see this movie, and then follow up with probably the second-best Sci-Fi series EVER (after Enterprise of course...:))

As with most TV movies that are effectively a story arc, "In the Beginning" is only attractive to fans of the series. But for these people, this movie adds critical background information only hinted at in the series, and as well, casts one of the significant characters of the show into a different light. Now we can see a little of why the first four Babylon stations were destroyed, and how Sinclair and then Sheridan were fated to be the keystones in the development of Earth-Mimbari relations.Finally the linked histories of Delenn, Sincliar and Sheridan that are alluded to throughout the series are explained, revealing some of the deep background created by J. Michael Straczynski that helped add to the series strength. The acting is well crafted, highlighting the depth of skills in their craft of the major cast. What I found particularly intriguing was the manner in which Straczynski rounded out the character of Llando by having him slightly distort the historical events covered in the series (only apparent to someone who had paid particular attention to the original TV screening).