Last night, my wife and I finally got to watch the series finale. She’s new to the Bablyon 5 world but is lucky enough to have been given the chance to watch all the episodes in order thanks to the wonderful world of DVDs. Many times I would tell her how envious I was of her since (a) when I watched it on TV, the weekly and sometimes monthly waits between episodes were excruciating and (b) knowing what I knew was coming up, I could easily imagine the ride she would be in for. Within a few episodes, she was really amazed at how incredibly different and intelligent the series was and became a devoted fan.
And yesterday, watching the last episode on the last disk of Season 5, we were once again blown away. Regardless of the sometimes choppy quality of the final season, the powerful impact of that last episode was of a magnitude so immense that it had the both of us in tears. The power of the Sheridan/ Delen romance made their farewell so bittersweet and poignant that we could not help but be moved. The image of Delen reaching over to touch where John used to lay, and then turning completely to crush his pillow to her as she curled into a ball said so much without a single word.
How truly blessed have we fans been? JMS created a world so intricate and beautiful that we could not help being captivated. His characters and the actors who portrayed them were so believable we could not help but be pulled into their struggles and live through them. And now, years later, we have the chance to own the entire collection and immerse ourselves whenever we want. I could be greedy and say how it would be great to see more, but in hindsight, what we have already (especially when you add the extra knowledge gleamed from incredible books like the Psi-Corp and Centauri trilogies) is truly incredible.
(cross-posted to my personal journal)