I liked it - with reservations.
The show is not quite true to the original Babylon 5 universe. Some details are outright ridiculous such as the operations of weapons/tactical (The weapons officer is floating around in some sort of holographic representation of the space surrounding the ship and boxes/throws charges towards the attackers - It took me a while to get over this nonsense). A more down-to-earth approach (pun intended) would have done just fine.
Another thing that rubbed me the wrong way was at least one not-so-subtle sexual innuendo that would have never made it into a B5 script.
The visuals were often impressive although the blue-screening seemed to be a shoddy job. I guess the budget was a little tight although other areas seemed rather lavish. Not sure what was going on there.
The crew is younger and the captain a definite pretty boy - A poor choice if you ask me. A Sinclair type would have done better and raising the average age would have lent more credibility to the characters.
The martial arts side-plot was ok but slightly overdone. Mimbari are more the Buddhist type and B5 ain't no Western. They are not as easily antagonized as we were led to believe.
Nevertheless, there was a certain spin to the show that was definitely reminiscent of B5 which was clearly enhanced by the presence of the (only surviving) G'Kar character. The plot had the air of the mystical, something I had always enjoyed on B5 and that was never achieved by the successor.
The dynamics between the characters worked, the Mimbari seemed true to life, Tannier made a good follow-up character and Gus Lynch's character was a great idea. Funny and warm.
The special quality of the spaceship that is destined to be (at least originally) the focus of the story also added to the makeup that set B5 apart from other space epics. And an epic this can clearly become if, and that remains to be seen, the writers will have as much of the original vision as necessary in order to *not* turn this into a series of independent episodes without evolving storyline.
I think the pilot holds more promise than the misguided Crusade. Replace Dylan Neal, possibly Myriam Sirois, and go with it, I'd say.
The show is not quite true to the original Babylon 5 universe. Some details are outright ridiculous such as the operations of weapons/tactical (The weapons officer is floating around in some sort of holographic representation of the space surrounding the ship and boxes/throws charges towards the attackers - It took me a while to get over this nonsense). A more down-to-earth approach (pun intended) would have done just fine.
Another thing that rubbed me the wrong way was at least one not-so-subtle sexual innuendo that would have never made it into a B5 script.
The visuals were often impressive although the blue-screening seemed to be a shoddy job. I guess the budget was a little tight although other areas seemed rather lavish. Not sure what was going on there.
The crew is younger and the captain a definite pretty boy - A poor choice if you ask me. A Sinclair type would have done better and raising the average age would have lent more credibility to the characters.
The martial arts side-plot was ok but slightly overdone. Mimbari are more the Buddhist type and B5 ain't no Western. They are not as easily antagonized as we were led to believe.
Nevertheless, there was a certain spin to the show that was definitely reminiscent of B5 which was clearly enhanced by the presence of the (only surviving) G'Kar character. The plot had the air of the mystical, something I had always enjoyed on B5 and that was never achieved by the successor.
The dynamics between the characters worked, the Mimbari seemed true to life, Tannier made a good follow-up character and Gus Lynch's character was a great idea. Funny and warm.
The special quality of the spaceship that is destined to be (at least originally) the focus of the story also added to the makeup that set B5 apart from other space epics. And an epic this can clearly become if, and that remains to be seen, the writers will have as much of the original vision as necessary in order to *not* turn this into a series of independent episodes without evolving storyline.
I think the pilot holds more promise than the misguided Crusade. Replace Dylan Neal, possibly Myriam Sirois, and go with it, I'd say.