Wonderful! Wonderful! Babylon5 is back! This is what I was thinking when I first saw the COMMERCIAL for this TV movie. After disappearing in syndication, we'd finally not only see new episodes, but now they had a regular time slot. PLUS, we had this TV movie. I can remember how excited my step-grandfather and I were when we larened The Battle Of The Line would be depicted here.

Of course, there are some nits. So Sheridan, Franklin, ang G'Kar have met before? This was never mentioned on the show. For that matter, how come Sheridan didn't recognize Delenn?

The PROMETHEUS is established as the ship that started the war both here and in Late Delivery From Avalon. However, in the Official A-Z Guide To Babylon 5, it's listed as something else (the exact name escapes me at the moment. I just know it started with an "A").

A 2nd Season episode states that Sheridan destroyed two other Minbari ships along with The Black Star using the minefield technique. They never show it. They only show the Black Star.

How come EarthForce never used Sheridan's plan again? I mean, drop some ProxFuze nukes in hyperspace, and blam! For that matter, how come Earth ships were never retrofitted to launch nukes? Minbari Cap ships are fairly stationary in every battle shown! Think of how many enemy cruisers could be iced with a single shot!

I guess it's true what my grandmother says. Humans are too stupid to live.

I was watching this with a friend of mine, who's one comment about the scenes with aged Londo was "Would you leave your children with this man? He doesn't look like a registered childminder to me!"

I've heard a rumour that Mr. Sinclair had re-recorded a lot of his bits from "The Battle of the Line", and certainly he was slightly more annoyed than he had appeared to be back in "Departures" (I think)... he never uttered a rude word that time, he did this...

So, Delenn goes from feminie to androgenous between In the Beginning and The Gathering. She goes from andorgenous to feminie again between The Gathering and "Midnight on the Firing Line". What is it weth her? She is constantly changing... (sorry to sound like Jerry Seinfeld).

Sorry, all... I mispelled feminine twice plus with once. I apologize.

I can explain all the past sequence nitpicks. They all come from the story being told by Emperor Mollari, and he was not at every event as it occurred. That's it... his memory and story (he could have been exaggerating).

But if it was all from Londo's mind, then how did he know about the more secret events such as the Grey Council meetings or the appearance of the Vorlons?

In the episode 'Soul Hunter', there is mention of a wall of bodies to protect the soul of Dukat. Why do we not see this happen ? the mention of the soul hunters is a little thin on the ground altogether. It just seems a little odd, especially as the soul hunters are a race with such potential.

Delenn must have eventually told Londo about the Vorlons, or that it was quite obvious... I mean it was no secret that Vorlons and Minbari had been in "close" touch over the past thousand years.
And JMS has said that the Soul Hunter subplot would have added to much time to the movie (which was running long enough as was). He just edited it out, but it was there, though it wasn't seen. Or maybe some of the tale ws related through the Keeper? Hmmm.... the Shadows knew there was somethign going on between the Vorlons and the Minbari...

-"How come Sheridan didn't recognise Delenn?"
Didn't they mindwipe Sheridan just like they did to Sinclair? Just because half the galaxy hasn't come up to him telling him that there is a whole in his mind doesn't mean that there isn't one.

Besides, Delenns face was half hidden in cloth, Sheridan only saw her for about 5 seconds, and he WAS under a great deal of stress at the time.

MOH never re-recorded his lines, he swore in 'And The Sky Full Of Stars.' It was all the same footage (insde the cockpit at least). I think under the situation - his race almost about to be wiped out' we can forgive him for a minor swaerword. :) Personally, I'd have used a something a lot more colourful, although I'd have also wet myself at that point.
The Nevelisation said that Londo got much information from other sources. Susan told him the story of her brother one night in the Zocallo. Delenn told him some stuff about 10 minutes before the movie started. And Londo no doubtgot some off of his large collection of spies.
The Soul Hunter/Dukhat (remember the 'h') stuff is in the novel, as is an earlier meating between Sheridan and Sinclair.
Theres the nit of Sheridan saying a 2 megaton nuke. That really should be amuch higher number, like 20. A two megaton nuke would have just tickled the Minbari ship from that range.

Still, loved the film, especailly the music during the Battle of the Line. I've always loved 'The Requiem for the Line', and this was a superb arrangement of it.

As to the official guide, I guess this follows the Trek canon bit. All the official guides are cannon unless the contradict what is shown on the show.

The film did have a lot of clips from previous eps.
I counted:
And The Sky Full Of Stars
Points of Departure
A Late Delivery From Avalon (with Michael York!)
War Without End
Attonement (and it was great to see this fight from the human side, to see the thoughts of the Captain,and why he fired).

Any others?

This movie shows Delenn flat out lied for no reason in "the Gathering." In the pilot she says "I look forward to meeting a Vorlon." "In the Begining" shows she has not just meet a Vorlon, but Kosh by name. Whats up with that?
I personally also wasn't thrilled about the whole 'secret peace treaty meeting' part of the plot. It wasted to much time that could have been spent on more productive ways. One part that was in the book that I missed in the movie was the reception after the initial confrontation, were Londo says "this isn't a party, its a wake for the human race." Then they get the word about the Minbari attacking the outpost.
It also raises another question. If Kosh and Ulkesh were on the Minbari cruiser when it was attacked wouldn't the Vorlon government be kinda honked about that?

Ulkesh migh have wanted to make some sort of reperation against Earth for that, but Kosh would have probably talked him out of it. Apart from Kosh in Interludes and Examinations, and the events of Z'Ha'Dum, almost nothing seems to phase the Vorlons.

When Delenn first meets with Kosh in Dukhat's sacred place, she asks "What do you want" Why do they not object to this question?

Good point!

After countless requests, TNT has scheduled encore showings of the Babylon 5 TNT Originals. Please note the times and dates and be sure to check our schedule prior to the actual airdates.

A CALL TO ARMS airs on Wednesday, June 9 at 8 pm ET/PT.
THIRDSPACE airs on Wednesday, June 9 at 11 pm ET/PT.
RIVER OF SOULS airs on Thursday, June 10 at 1 am ET/PT.
IN THE BEGINNING airs on March 28 at 10:30 pm ET/PT and on Thursday, June 10 at 3 am ET/PT.

I'm really looking forward to seeing In the Beginning! in just 2 weeks!

Though 10:30P on a Sunday doesn't seem to me to be the best time to air it

A Comment about the Schedule:
TNT seems to be planning a B5 night on Jun 9, which I believe is the Crusade premiere.

Seems like the ultimate B5 night!
ACTA
Crusade
ROS
ITB
all in one night!

ANP

In The Beginning is on Tonight!

10:30P on TNT!

ANP

Wow! Having finally seen this outing, that's about all I can say. Great job, by all of the creators.

It really puts the E/M war in perspecive.

One Cool Thing We Saw:
-The blood of the Lexington's captain floating in "Z gravity" (I wonder why they say is that way, I always thought it was "Zero G").

One Cool Thing I Wish We Saw:
-a crewman floating across the bridge.

ANP

I only caught the tail end... What was the bit at the end with Londo? It looked like he had Delenn and Sheridan as prisoners?

That's a clip from a third-season episode called "War Without End." Explaining it would give away a lot of really neat stuff. If you really want to, you could find info on that episode on the internet, but it would be worth it to watch for that two-part episode when it airs again.

yeah it's very good, unlike this bore

The starship beginning with 'A' was the 'Amundsen'.
In the role playing game, it states that the Prometheus is a 'Nova' class Dreadnought. They look like 'Omegas' with bigger guns and no rotating section. And the 'Amundsen' and 'Hyperion' were both 'Hyperion' class cruisers. The RPG material is meant to be supervised by JMS to be canon.

Any Russian experts help with this?

Susan's surname is Ivanova. Ganya's surname is Ivanov. Knowing nothing about how Russians use their surnames, I was prepared to accept this, assuming that perhaps women's surnames were given a feminine ending. However, in the first season episode Born to the Purple when Susan speaks to her dying father, he is credited at the end as Andrei Ivanova. Why is Ganya's surname different?

It should have been Andrei Ivanov, at least according to the current naming convention. And the Russians are traditionalists.

And in "Endgame," Susan says that she is the daughter of Andrei and Sophie Ivanov. [no "a" on the end]

"This movie shows Delenn flat out lied for no reason in "the Gathering." In the pilot she says "I look forward to meeting a Vorlon." "In the Begining" shows she has not just meet a Vorlon, but Kosh by name. Whats up with that?"

In The Gathering Delenn does not say that she looks forward to meeting a Vorlon for the first time, she just says she looks forward to meeting a Vorlon. This is not a lie, just a statement of fact cleverly worded to make the listener assume extra meaning into it.

There are scenes that were in the Peter David novelisation that would have went well in this and just added perfectly to it. The two that stick in my mind is when Jankowski is back at Earth during a celebration after 'kicking some Minbari butt' and getting out alive, Londo walks in and says "This is not a party, it is a WAKE", and at that moment ISN comes on with news of the first counterattack from the Minbari.
Later, when Jankowski is needed, (Since live captains are getting harder to find) they go to his room and he has shot himself in his head with his PPG. On his TV (or equivalent) there are spliced shots of the celebration intermixed with footage of the Minbari slaughtering Earthforce.

During the Battle of the Line, Delenn comments on how brave the Humans are, and Koplann shrugs it off as desperation. This response seems odd because the Minbari appear to admire the willingness of those at a disadvantage to fight on in spite of the odds. I'm sure that there is some admiration for the Humans' tenacity from the Minbari, but military and political reality prevent them from expressing it at the time. I think it would be interesting if Koplann expressed his admiration, having nothing to lose since it would all be over soon, and Delenn suggested that it was really desperation, possibly feeling sorry for how hard they are fighting and how easy their fleet is having it.

I don't think the Vorlons were that concerned about being on the Minbari cruiser. They probably knew the attack was imminent anyway. Remember they spent all that time with Valen/Sinclair and they undoubtably learned alot about the next thousand years from him.