Agreed that seasons 2-4 are great fun, though it is rather cheesy and there’s a lot of bad acting throughout. Though it’s never as terrible as the pilot…
What are the good bits of season 5? I stalled out partway through season 5.
Though the last ep of S5 is a nice wrap for the series, I honestly think the last ep of S4 (the Canticle for Leibowitz-style thing) was better.
River of Souls is largely a double-length remake of “Soul Hunter” from season 1. And RoS includes late season 5 spoilers.
Season 5 has its moments. The Very Long Night of Londo Mollari, A View From the Gallery, Day of the Dead and the last two episodes of the season (Objects) are all worth it. The telepath crap can be skipped easily. But there are killer lines scattered all through the season. Plus, you get a capper that goes all the way back to the pilot, where G’Kar asked Lyta what her pleasure threshold was.
“Oh, and you mentioned wondering what my pleasure threshold is. I just recently found out. … I don’t have one. Have a very, very nice day, G’Kar.”
– Lyta to G’Kar in Babylon 5:“Darkness Ascending”
The S5 episode “A View from the Galley” is pretty good. It’s basically a standard alien-attack crisis-of-the-week, except seen from the point of view of two random schlubs in Maintenance that we’ve never seen before.
I could probably find a couple more if I had a list of episodes and plot summaries in front of me.
I’ll drink to that.
It gets better, and then it gets worse. But the acting is always a little mannered, and the CGI is always a little ‘whee! CGI has just been invented!’
Season 5? I don’t recall a season 5.
I had a dream once, though, about a season involving a hippie telepath commune fighting against THE MAN. But it was so obviously hackneyed and awful that I knew it had to be a dream.
I haven’t watched any B5 in a long time, but I’ll add my voice to the chorus. Seasons 2-4 are quite good.
And she is the last thing you will ever see.
Which is arguably, more to the good than not - your end will be more or less the exact opposite of peaceful, but Ivanova’s damned easy on the eyes.
In defense of the CGI, though - if I had that many good ideas, I’d go a little crazy on the CGI too. Ships with rotating sections for “gravity”, the design of the Earth fighters - someone with more than a little exposure to “hard” science fiction put real thought into the designs.
And on the other end of the acting scale, you have John Shuck attempting to portray an anthromorphosized Honey Baked Ham store.
Well, watch about 5 episodes of it. Just read around to find the right ones.
One of my least favorite episodes, actually.
I like the Long Night of Londo, Objects at Rest/Motion, and the finale.
I don’t mind corniness in a TV show at all - if everyone is acting like a large ham, I can put up with it. And even get into it. But this, they aren’t even acting!
But I promise you, I am not giving it up yet. 
You kids today . . . When I was your age, we didn’t have CGI. We had stop-motion animation, and animatronic puppets, and matte paintings. And we were thankful!
Seriously, in its day, B5 was state-of-the-art. Sure, you could tell where the live-action ended and the CGI began, but it would have been just as obvious with stop-motion or with animatronics. Sure, matte paintings would have been seamless, but matte paintings don’t move. Sure, the CGI was not as good as Jurassic Park, but they had a much tighter schedule and a much lower budget. If you have ever done graphics on an Apple II, pixel by pixel, you will be amazed by B5’s CGI.
Don’t forget The Lurker’s Guide – check out the notes on each episode after you see it (IIRC, no spoilers in episode info, but lots on unanswered questions and the like).
http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/countries/us/eplist.html
Ah, this thread is bringing back my old obsession. And one of favorite all-time quotes:
“Vir, you moonfaced assassin of joy.”
Seeing a White Star for the first time is worth wading through Season 1.
I had the same experience, Anaamika, when a friend recently convinced me to watch B5. After the first couple of episodes, I was like, “Seriously? I thought you said this was good. This is a mega-cheesefest and the aliens just look goofy.”
Finally, through much coercion and threatening, he convinced me to stick with it, and by the end of season 1, I was hooked. I’ve watched through the end of season 4 and am kind of afraid to watch season 5, because I’ve heard so many bad things about it. But yeah, seasons 2-4 are sci-fi gold.
I remember cringing at the CGI at the time. I much preferred the models used on DS9.
Re: the OP, it gets better, but not that much better. I sat down and watched the series through a few years ago to see what I had missed since I had only seen it off and on over the years. It was good enough that I didn’t stop watching (until the last season, which I don’t think I finished), but it wasn’t good enough that I’ve ever felt the need to watch any of it again, though.
I also think the CGI gets way better around mid-season 3 or so. By season 4, it’s actually very good(for the time…around 1997).