Babylon 5 season 4

I have had no problem with any set to date.

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And we all hate you.

Found I couldn't get to sleep last night, so I gave up, went out to the living room and fired up the DVD player. I actually watched "The Hour of the Wolf" during the Hour of the Wolf. Then I watched "Whatever Happened to Mr. Garibaldi" before I - in an incredible display of will-power - turned off the TV and DVD player and went back to bed. Will continue with the set...

Later,

Joe

^^Ah well I guess I am in that category as well to I have not had any problem with my disks .At least not yet.

The Season 4 set was the first one I had problems with. The previous seasons were fine--no scratches. I guess I was lucky.

Tammy

I have had no problem with any set to date.

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And we all hate you.

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Don't give up hope yet, Joe. I may yet join the crowd. There is still Season Five to go plus Crusade and the B5 movies to go that could get messed up. :devil:

I have had no problem with any set to date.

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And we all hate you.

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Seconded!

Found I couldn't get to sleep last night, so I gave up, went out to the living room and fired up the DVD player. I actually watched "The Hour of the Wolf" during the Hour of the Wolf.

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But did you do the vodka ritual, as well? I think I might. It's 3 degrees F outside. Blueface is appropriate.

I got s4 last tuesday and I still haven't started watching it yet because of uni and martial arts and work. Aargh! I have no time!

Has anyone noticed anything strange about the audio on "Into the Fire"? On my disc, the musical score sounds fine, but the dialogue track sounds a little muffled for some reason. It's the only one on the disc like that and I can't figure it out.

My solution was to buy this snazzy DVD sized CD wallet I found over at Wal-Mart. It can hold 3 seasons of B5.

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I followed your example and found a CD wallet to hold 32 discs. It's perfect for holding 4 seasons of discs + In the Beginning + The Gathering + inlay cards. As I'm not buying season 5 (which I hate) or the other movies (which I prefer to skip), I'll have all my B5 DVDs in one wallet!

All I need to do now is wait for the R2 release of S4....in March .

I got my season 4 set on the 6th from Amazon.com. One disc was loose, but it has been fine. I have had very few problems with loose discs and no scratched ones (so far *knocks on wood*).In fact, my problem was getting the damn things off. I nearly had to break one disc to get it off the hub.

For some reason, they went very light on the extras for this set, which bothered me. The "No Surrender, No Retreat" suite was very nice, kinda like a musical "this season on B5". The gag reel was ok, but the choice of episodes with commentary must have been picked by someone with a serious crack habit."Falling Towards Apotheosis" and "The Face of the Enemy" I can deal with, but "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars"? Why? The episode never, ever impressed me, is barely entertaining and adds nothing to the season. "Into the Fire", "No Surrender, No Retreat" or "Endgame" would have been much better choices.

The Easter Egg is rather.... interesting. You have to go to "Personnel Files" and then "Lorien" and press the right arrow to highlight the 5 and then enter. It is a side-by-side comparision of the rough and finished CGI "fly-by' of the station that runs under the Season 3 opening credits. Nice, but, why?

All in all not bad, but not as good as the previous sets in terms of extras. I think everyone agrees that season 4 was the best season from a storytelling standpoint and everything we'd been watching for the past three years finally got paid off. On to season 5 (try not to gag!).

Come on man Deconstruction of falling stars was a fantastic episode, probably the only real science fiction episode in the series.

And come on guys stop discussing scratched discs and start talking about the set, what is picture and audio quality like. My supplier (I used a different one this time) is being slack in send out my copy.

My solution was to buy this snazzy DVD sized CD wallet I found over at Wal-Mart. It can hold 3 seasons of B5.

Click to expand...

I followed your example and found a CD wallet to hold 32 discs. It's perfect for holding 4 seasons of discs + In the Beginning + The Gathering + inlay cards. As I'm not buying season 5 (which I hate) or the other movies (which I prefer to skip),

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Just had to put my two cents in:

There is no season of B5 that I hate, and only one episode of one season comes close to that, "Believers." Re. the movies, the only one I might skip is "To Live and Die in Starlight" (the Rangers pilot), although, I may pick it up if there are some JMS extras on it. [Note that this is coming from somebody who has all of the original Dell books, even #5. i.e. This completest may even skip TLaDiS.]


Re. the set content itself, well, I haven't gotten past Disc 1 (Intro, and just the episodes. Haven't listened to the commentary, yet.), and Disc 6 extras (Universe of B5, and the suite). I really liked the intro. The gag reel seems pretty sparse.

Star Raiders clan? Raiders? Star Riders.

Edgars Industries of Earth? Earth? Mars.

Lack of attention to detail. I kind of wish they's run this stuff past a panel of fans before putting it on the DVDs. That would catch a lot of this kind of stuff.


Also, the dust and other film blemishes seem to be making a comeback. I'd hoped for a progression toward cleaner and cleaner images as they went to newer and newer film. Check the big honkin' circular blemish to the upper left of Cartagia's face on disc 1 (in one of his audiences with Londo). I think it's in the scene where he tells Londo about wanting deification, and the Shadows granting it.

but "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars"? Why? The episode never, ever impressed me, is barely entertaining and adds nothing to the season.

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Ummm, ok. I'll grant you that it is your opinion that the episode never impressed you, because different people have different tastes. But to say it added nothing to the season is absolutely and flatly WRONG.

Well depending on your viewpoint, it did I guess add nothing to the season as it didnt deal with the end of the shadow war, the mars fight for independence, or freeing Earth, but it is CRUCIAL to the overall Babylon 5 story. It showed the impact that a few individuals had on HUMAN HISTORY SPANNING OVER A MILLION YEARS! If that isn't a big impact, I dont know what is. The core of what B5 is all about is that individuals can change the world. Deconstruction showed us just that. That in 500+ years, Sheridan and company are still remembered. And that in a MILLION YEARS The Rangers which were formed and developed by a human Sinclair/Valen, and later brought back into service for good by Delenn and Sheridan had endured all that time --- long enough for humans to take their next step into First One status. There has never been a TV show or movie that has such a long lasting epic side of it until this. If you take this episode out, NONE of that part of the story gets told. It shows that the individuals make a permanant and lasting impression on human history.

So saying it adds nothing to the season isn't really accurate. Granted it doesnt add to the Season 4 arc, but it is pivital to the B5 story. If you want to be picky, War Without End I and II added nothing to Season 3. It didn't have to do with the current Shadow War per say, it didnt have to do with breaking away from Earth, it delt with Sinclair's Season 1 stuff and Valen 1000 years ago, but I will think everyone will agree how important a part of the Babylon 5 story that episode is. Deconstruction of Falling Stars is the same thing. We were very lucky to have this episode included in the 5 year run...

Ok, maybe the episode is good in that it shows what happens up to a milion years down the road, but why do we need a commentary on it? I would much have preferred commentary on "No Surrender, No Retreat", "Endgame" or "Rising Star". I guess JMS is keeping the tradtion of doing commentary on the final episode of each season.

At least the final episode of season 5 will have a commentary I will be interested in hearing.

Various Comments

When it became necessary to have a last minute replacement for "Sleeping in Light", JMS was in a pickle. All Season 4 threads had been resolved and he couldn't just start up Season 5. What he needed was an episode that existed indepndently of Season 4. "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars" was just that episode. It allowed JMS to explore the future history of B5, and to experiment with the format. Garibaldi's scene in Medlab also served as a sneaky teaser for Season 5. I'm not a big fan of this ep (no surprise since it's really a Season 5 ep ) bit it ain't bad for what it is.

As for the Season 4 DVD set in general. I found the sound on this one to be muffled in placed. I found myself adjusting the treble on a few episodes, particularly on "Endgame".

There is one HUGE HONKING ERROR on "Between the Darkness and the Light" that absolutely wasn't there before.

SPOILER




In the scene where Garibaldi has been captured by the Mars resistance, Franklin approaches him and pulls the hood off his head. He asks Garibaldi, "Why'd you do it?" Garibaldi says. "It was Bester". I believe you originally saw Garibaldi's face when he said this, but on the DVD you instead see a repeat of Franklin approaching Garibaldi with the HOOD STILL ON HIS HEAD as the credit for John Iacovelli appears below. I was like "Whoa, whoa, back up!"

I agree on the extras. They seemed a little slim this time. Not as many featurettes. They should also warn new viewers to stay the hell away from the intros unless they want to be spoiled to pieces.

The gag reel: They seemed to be avoiding a lot of the cursing outtakes in previous seasons (and we know there were many), but about 60% of them required bleeping this time around, which is not the funniest thing after a while. I probably enjoyed this gag reel the least of the bunch.

And that morphing on the main menus. That just creeps me out, always has. The weirdest thing though is that there are two frames of the Iavnova-Marcus morph where it looks just like George Harrison from around 1974. Just plain freaky.

Edgars Industries of Earth? Earth? Mars.

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Having just watched those eps last night I remember someone mentioning Edgars Industries had large holdings on Earth as well as on Mars.

The Edgars Industries Banner says:

EDGARS INDUSTRIES
Mars.Phobos.Deimos

Of course, a Mars-based company can have holdings on Earth, even operations there, but that doesn't make it an Earth business. It all depends on the original place of incorporation.

I think the confusion comes from that while Edgars Industries has it's headquarters on Mars, Edgars himself has his house on Earth (500 acres of wetlands, or something like that). He keeps the apartment on Mars because that's where his business is based.

I think the confusion comes from that while Edgars Industries has it's headquarters on Mars, Edgars himself has his house on Earth (500 acres of wetlands, or something like that). He keeps the apartment on Mars because that's where his business is based.

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Good point. Plus, it is logical Edgars Industries would also be incorporated on Earth since it has holdings/businesses there. For all me know the law might require this.

I think the confusion comes from that while Edgars Industries has it's headquarters on Mars, Edgars himself has his house on Earth (500 acres of wetlands, or something like that). He keeps the apartment on Mars because that's where his business is based.

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Actually Edgars would prefer to live on Earth year-round. He lives on Mars part-year for the tax benefit. I assume Mars is what they call an "enterprise zone".

I just finished watching "The Face of the Enemy" about half an hour ago, then immediately started watching it again with the commentary track.

The ISN anchor calls Edgars one of the richest men "on Earth" when reporting his death, and calls Edgars Pharmaceuticals one of the largest Mega-Corps on Earth. Edgars Industries may be the parent company, and the larger of the two, located on Mars for tax reasons. (Edgars mentions having to spend half the year on Mars to keep his tax breaks.) But the drug company is apparently a huge concern all by itself. I suspect that Edgars Pharmaceuticals came first, and remains on Earth* because there is simply a larger pool of trained talent, while Edgars Industries was established on Mars as an umbrella company for a number of Edgars interests having nothing to do with drugs.

Regards,

Joe

* They probably also have manufacturing facilities in Earth orbit and on the Moon for drugs and other products that can best be created in low or microgravity environments.