I do believe it was intended to be that way. I have the book that contains all the episodes in order. I heard about this show in 1997. Hubby begged me to record the episodes for him that were being shown in order. It was hard at first trying to find enough VHS tapes. They were more expensive at the time. I ended up recording over my movies for him to get them all. They the tapes were sold dirt cheap. So I redid them all. lol Well when DVDs came out he trashed the tapes. Men!

You are absolutely right. J. Michael Straczynski created and produced Babylon 5 with a fairly definite beginning, middle and end. He wasn't making this up as he went along. There might be a few exceptions here and there but pretty much every episode was a part of the foundation of the overall story.

This is my third fave sc-fi franchise after Trek & SG1/SGA. The only part I really hated was what happened with Garibaldi.

I loved the early Garibaldi. He was kind of corny and fun. Later on, well not so good.

@Jetfire59 You mean with Bester?

@RustyShackleworth said:

@Jetfire59 You mean with Bester?

That and him falling of the wagon.

Bester, the guy you love to hate. Loved him on Startrek not so much on Babylon 5.

@Sharron Hayward said:

Bester, the guy you love to hate. Loved him on Startrek not so much on Babylon 5.

Motion seconded, M'Lady.

@Jetfire59 Michael Garibaldi was a wonderful character (nothing against Jerry Doyle but I think much of the time Doyle was pretty much playing himself as Garibaldi) and in the early seasons he's definitely more "light-hearted" but becomes much more cynical and jaded by he end of the series. Sadly Doyle died from alcoholism which also plagues Garibaldi. Never a dull character, I think the highlight of Doyle's acting and range we see in Garibaldi was in season 4. He's been alerted by Bester, leaves B5, joins William Edgars, nearly gets killed by the Mars Resistance and redeems himself at the end.