This is a re-post of a story I had up on the old version of this site. I haven’t modified this in the slightest as I still feel pretty much the same about what I wrote. I might actually give even more points to Babylon 5 at this point though…
So, it has been brought to my attention that people think that Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was the best Star Trek series, if not best science fiction series, to ever exist, and while I continually hear this, even from my own Trek friends, I would have to disagree, at least in part.
Before you accuse me of missing something, I have seen every episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Babylon 5, and despite my history both with The Next Generation and Babylon 5, I will endeavor to be as fair as possible.
I will agree that Deep Space Nine had some of the best characterizations of the crew in any Star Trek series. I enjoyed the Dominion War immensely, and the Defiant brought lots of childish giggling to this Star Trek fan, but I don’t think it was better than Babylon 5.
Don’t throw stones at me please! I know it is a bit difficult for fans of Star Trek to understand where I am coming from but Deep Space Nine didn’t get good until they got the Defiant. Before that it was so heavily laden with religious undertones, I felt like I was drowning in it.
While Deep Space Nine came out a year before Babylon 5, interestingly enough the stories paralleled each other quite closely.
Space station based, science fiction show, where the Captain is “special”, the station is home to many different races, there is a war, and the captain is given a cool ship. Pretty darn similar when you boil it down to its roots, yet there are enough differences to set one apart from the other.
Captains
Sisko - Benjamin Sisko wasn’t even a Captain when he was given his assignment to run Deep Space Nine. He quickly became the Emissary of the Prophets for the Bajorans, despite being at odds with this religious position, he later embraces it. He is a strong character, with a fighting spirit, something that slowly gets replaced with more of a commanding attitude, so much so that they bring in Worf to be the new “fighting spirit” for the show.
Don’t get me wrong, Sisko kicked some serious alien butt in the show, but he wasn’t ever able to become a really deep character I could get into. He kept getting too caught up in family, religion, and duty. They had to send Worf out to do some fighting that Sisko could have done earlier in the show.
Sinclair / Sheridan - First there was Jeffrey Sinclair, he was an interesting guy, but he was really wasn’t aggressive enough, and he kind of got on my nerves. In the second season, a new Captain, John Sheridan, came to the station, and he go things done. He stopped the Shadow war, overthrew his own government, and became the President of the Interstellar Alliance.
One of my favourite things about Sheridan is that he never sent other people to do what he could do. He’d leave one of his crew to handle things at the station and go and destroy some alien ships himself. Heck, the guy died, and was brought back to life to continue fighting.
Winner: Babylon 5
Crew
Deep Space Nine - There are four people that I enjoyed in Deep Space Nine’s crew, and two of them are from Star Trek: The Next Generation. The four people I really liked include Miles O’Brien, Worf, Julian Bashir and Odo. Honestly, the only reason Odo is so cool is because of his ability to shape shift. His crush on Kira, and the episodes where he can’t change his form made me yawn excessively.
Kira Nerys, the second in command, is an annoying woman that thinks she is tough, yet acts like a little girl every time a decent looking dignitary comes on board. Jadzia Dax was an interesting character who they never should have killed off, but if I had to endure one more episode about the multiple personalities her symbiont holds, I would have gone crazy. Don’t get me started on the comic relief of Quark.
Babylon 5 - We definitely have some colourful characters on Babylon 5, and while I wouldn’t say they are better than their counterparts on Deep Space Nine, they are definitely different. In Michael Garibaldi, we have an alcoholic security chief who gets shot in the back by his own security officer, who then gets his brain modified by a psychic organization to become hyper-paranoid. Garibaldi eventually becomes the CEO of a huge company on Mars.
Then there is a drug addict Doctor, Stephen Franklin, that gets so strung out he decides to quit cold turkey until he learns who he is. The guy gets beat up, nearly dies and sees himself.
Then there is the commander, who is bi-sexual, and eventually gets so injured that she is terminal. The guy that loves her comes and gives up his own life for her by hooking himself up to a machine that transfers life energy.
I don’t think anyone from the main crew isn’t messed up.
Winner: Star Trek
Station
Deep Space Nine - A Cardassian built station originally known as Terok Nor. Originally used as a tool of oppression, DS9 becomes a trade hub, and defensive outpost due to its proximity to a stable wormhole. The station is said to be able to support 7,000 inhabitants.
The station had some retractable weaponry, which was used a few times, and really got my adrenaline pumping. It was well defended in that respect, as it took on multiple ships, destroying quite a few.
I was surprised that Starfleet in their infinite wisdom never replaced the aging Cardassian station, especially as the importance of the area it inhabited became more and more important. Many issues that the crew had were due to it being a Cardassian station.
Babylon 5 - Babylon 5 is the fifth in a line of space stations, measuring five miles long, the station was designed to be a neutral place for many races to meet up. The main bulk of the station is a rotating cylinder which is used to create gravity.
Like Deep Space Nine, Babylon 5 has many hidden weapons which are very impressive. Some short range turrets, longer firing pulse weapons, but no shields. This is an issue that bothers me a few times throughout the series, as the station receives a fair bit of damage from incoming fire. But watching it destroy ships, fighters, and all types of incoming projectiles is exciting.
Babylon 5 is much larger than Deep Space Nine and as such can house upwards of a quarter million people. Much more than an outpost, Babylon 5 is a multicultural metropolis.
Winner: Babylon 5
Ships
Defiant - Deep Space Nine got a really fun ship to play with. The story of the show was a bit stagnant not being able to explore, or leave the station in anything other than an underpowered runabout, but when the Defiant came the show really started to pick up steam. The Defiant is an overpowered, highly maneuverable little ship with huge amounts of fire power, great defenses and the ability to cloak.
The ship moves nice and fast, and is exciting to watch. It made me want to be in that ship, where as combat on the Enterprise is boring and basically two dimensional.
Whitestar - It is fast, small, and powerful. In pretty much every way, it is similar to the Defiant, except it can’t cloak, doesn’t have shields, and while interestingly styled, it sometimes looks like a weird plucked chicken.
One thing the Whitestar does that I haven’t seen the Defiant do is use its inertia to fight from many angles. As it flies by an enemy ship, it turns and fires while still moving away. It is really interesting to see it maneuver like a fighter, rather than a heavy ship, though it makes me wonder if it has any aft weapons to defend itself.
I didn’t pick the music…
Winner: Tie (Defiant could wipe out a dozen Whitestars, but the Whitestar is cooler.)
Conclusion
While there is so much more depth to the shows, technologies, and the universes they reside in, I have to admit that Babylon 5 really comes out a head in so many ways for me. Sure the technology might not always seem as advanced as Star Trek, but it feels so much better. The characters on Babylon 5 have real problems, and are easier to empathize with. Star Trek has this clean and polished feel to it, that Deep Space Nine slowly wore away at, but I don’t think they went far enough, and the heavy religious undertones, while also in Babylon 5, weren’t thrown in your face for you to ignore or digest.
As you can see, I am all about the technology, and the special effects and this is why some of you are going to be put off by me as a science fiction geek, but I promise you, I will work on exploring the stories and working on appreciating them, but for now, Babylon 5 is my winner.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
No question in my mind. so no need for long winded comments from me.
Babylon Five rules. Period.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is one of the reasons I married @halyma.
As a near-rabid TNG fan, I was eager to see a new series, but after watching a chunk of the first season, I gave up on it.
Babylon 5 was the opposite - I got hook-line-and-sinkered by it early on. We used to have B5 parties, where we’d have taped a month’s worth of episodes and we would gather at our place, or at a friends and watch them all.
Sleeping in Light is probably the absolute best final episode of any show I’ve seen.