As a Sci-Fi fan I’ve been a huge fan of shows like Battlestar Galactica, The Expanse, Terminator: TSCC, Star Trek, etc. I keep hearing Babylon 5 is awesome.
I was too young at the time to watch the series when it was on. But then as an older teen/ young adult I decided to give it a try. Everything was so cringe it was hard to get through 3 episodes. IMO the whole vibe was “safe…” maybe even a bit corny–not the intense, exciting, politically-tense space opera that I was told it was.
So maybe the beginning episodes are just world-building? What do other people think?
Certainly, I just phrased it that way as a lead-in to saying that B5 does definitely get to excitement, and is better for all the buildup. I watched it when it first came out, so at the time we had ST:TNG wrapping up, and only B5 and ST:DS9 as sci-fi on TV. That is to say, we were patient with both shows, because there wasn’t much else (good) to choose from.
Nowadays, there are more sci-fi shows than I can keep track of, so even though B5 is my all-time favorite, I recognize that it may not be as good (too slow?) for first-time viewers as newer shows which benefit from a couple of decades of improvement in TV production.
(The Expanse is definitely in my queue. Just need the time to get to it!)