Before: It’s about midnight on November 25, twenty-two hours from the airing of Babylon 5′s last episode. I’ll have plenty of thoughts on the entire ride, I’m sure, once it’s over. For now, though, I feel a sense of anticipation eerily similar to the hours leading up to my graduation from college, although not quite as intense. Old friends are going away, and even though I might see some of them again in some other fashion, our relationships will never be the same. The triumph of Babylon 5 was that its characters seemed real – they lived in a universe every bit as unstable as our own, and went through the wringer week after week. And the part of me that still responds to great storytelling went through it with them. I won’t miss that wringer, I won’t miss running around to find a blank tape for this week’s episode, and I won’t miss screaming “That bastard!” when the end credits come up and leave me hanging in suspense. (Well, maybe I will miss that last one a little.) But I will miss those moments when the characters became real and shared their lives with me. I’ll miss the times they taught me something about myself, or about this “real world” everybody keeps telling me about. I’m OK with that; it’s time to move on. I just hope I don’t spend so much time dwelling on the fact that tonight will be the last time I get to hang out with these friends that I forget to enjoy the time itself.

21 hours left…

After: I couldn’t do it.

I tried, but I couldn’t let go. I sat in front of my TV Wednesday night, and even as I tried to appreciate what I was watching, my brain kept analyzing every second. Too many thoughts about characters missing, actors leaving, plot threads left untied…too much not wanting it to be over.

Thank the heavens for encore showings. Tonight, I just turned on the TV, and with no anticipation, no expectations, I could simply watch.

Damn.

It wasn’t perfect; it wasn’t even my favorite episode of the series. But I will carry the image of Delenn reaching out for John and finding only a pillow as long as I have two neurons to rub together. That’s part of what made Babylon 5 special – it touched the heart.

And as I work my through a doctoral program in philosophy, grappling with the works of a host of great thinkers, I will hear Lorien asking his questions: “Who are you? What do you want? Why are you here?” And now, “Where are you going?” Because B5 stirred the mind as well, and that made it very special. As I think of it now, it isn’t really over; not until it ceases to touch hearts and stir minds. And that, for sure, will be a long time coming.

And if there is better praise to be given to a story, I sure can’t think of it.

Dave Thomer
theLogBook.com Assistant Editor

Sleeping in Light was a fine ending to the “Best Science Fiction series of the ’90′s” (as TNT humbly said, and I agree with). We all knew Sheridan had to die. But how would he face that death? Like most fans, I spent five years watching Babylon 5, and being surprised at many critical avenues. Coming of Shadows and Severed Dreams blew me away. And I’m still amazed that neither Andreas Katsulas or Peter Jurasik were ever nominated for Emmy Awards for their work as G’Kar and Londo.

Sleeping in Light, like all good B5 episodes, brought up more questions than it answered. But everything that was to be accomplished was accomplished. And just as the much celebrated novel structure demanded, the last chapter tied up the big loose ends, leave just enough hanging to bring out the second book – in this case Crusade.

I watched Titanic the same day I watched Sleeping in Light. Frankly, Sleeping in Light had a more powerful emotional impact than James Cameron’s epic.

Robert Parson
theLogBook.com Staff Writer

Chances are that, at some point this month, a station near you aired the TV movie Merlin: The Magic Begins, starring Jason (Robin of Sherwood) Connery and Gareth (Blake’s 7) Thomas. This latest television incarnation of Merlin supposedly detailed Merlin’s first adventure, long before his days of service to King Arthur. It is an era of tyranny, tenuous power struggles, and catty, not-quite-ready-for-Melrose-Place actresses in cleavage-baring costumes.

To be sure, there was actually an interesting story, perhaps more interesting in its potential than in its execution, but Merlin: The Magic Begins was undermined by some substandard scriptwriting and acting. It was sad to see Gareth Thomas return in this sort of program, delivering what was arguably the best performance in the entire show. The time he spent starring as Blake in Blake’s 7 probably came in handy as he portrayed Blaze, a determined and charismatic, if world-weary, leader. (I doubt that the name similarity is any coincidence, either.) Even with silver hair and 20 years worth of extra weight, Thomas was easily recognizable.

Jason Connery was passable as a young, angry, uncertain Merlin, but the junior Connery has been typecast far too long in the role of a boyish innocent thrust into an all-encompassing quest. Graham McTavish, who played evil wizard Rengal, and Lara Daans as Morgana utterly failed to convince or interest me. There was also an actress whose name I didn’t catch, portraying Morgana’s young seer, who was almost laughable in her role. Oh well…at least the good guys had some decent acting on their side.

Merlin: The Magic Begins was an obvious attempt to tailor what could’ve been a better-written, better-acted, and more serious story toward the target audience of Hercules and Xena, an audience whose attention is coveted by an already crowded field of substandard players (TNT’s lousy Robin Hood series, and the late and unlamented Adventures of Sinbad, to name but a couple). The effects weren’t up to the standard of Flat Earth’s CGI work for Hercules and Xena, and the studio sets were dismal, though the outdoor filming was decent.

I also had a problem with numerous examples that the writers simply hadn’t done their homework. The script played fast and loose with many established points of Arthurian mythology, making a number of glaring mistakes. It didn’t feel like any attempt was even made to reconcile the story with the legend of Arthur as we know it now. It felt more like someone watched almost every movie or TV show that was ever derivative of Arthurian myth – I could spot several references which were much closer to borrowing from George Lucas than from Mallory, including a scene where Morgana considers converting Merlin to “the dark side” – and then tried to graft this heavily derivative new chapter onto the original legend.

This probably would’ve seemed far less silly if it hadn’t aired relatively soon after NBC’s vastly superior Merlin miniseries. But at least Thomas and Connery were in it, so it wasn’t a total loss.

Merlin: The Magic Begins

screenplay by Tom Richards & Christopher Roosen

story by Tom Richards & Jim McGuinn

directed by David Winning

music by David Bray

Cast: Jason Connery (Merlin), Deborah Moore (Nimue), Gareth Thomas (Blaze), Graham McTavish (Rengal), Paul Curran (Kay), Fiona Kempin (Leona), Andy Bryden (Hengist), Gordon Hall (Vidus), John Woodford (Gander), Tony McMann (Samson), Lara Daans (Morgana), Corey Haim (Wilf), Audrey Lupke (Vivian), Sam Barnett (Siren), Bea Taylor (Siren), Jo Harriet (Siren), Suzanna Critchity (Siren), Sam Mann (Siren), Katarina Boyd, Michael Boyd, Peter Begbie, Finn Begbie, Nicky Wilson, Jamie Wilson, Amy Lockett, Florence Caines (children)