Babylon 5: Thirdspace (1998)

The crew of Babylon 5 discover an ancient artifact floating in hyperspace.

Director:

Jesús Salvador Treviño

Writers:

J. Michael Straczynski (creator), J. Michael Straczynski

Stars:

Bruce Boxleitner, Claudia Christian, Mira Furlan

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Bruce Boxleitner	...	Capt. John J. Sheridan
Claudia Christian	...	Susan Ivanova
Mira Furlan	...	Delenn
Richard Biggs	...	Stephen Franklin, M.D.
Jeff Conaway	...	Zack Allen
Stephen Furst	...	Vir Cotto
Patricia Tallman	...	Lyta Alexander
Clyde Kusatsu	...	Bill Morishi
Shari Belafonte	...	Elizabeth Trent
William Sanderson	...	Deuce
Kip King	...	Leo
Floyd Levine	...	Alex
Jeffrey Anderson-Gunter	...	Merchant
Josh Coxx	...	Lt. David Corwin (as Joshua Cox)
Judson Mills	...	Delta Seven

Storyline

The crew of Babylon 5 discover a mysterious artifact of unknown origin. The artifact influences the minds of people aboard the station and endangers the lives of everyone aboard. Takes place during season 4 of the Babylon 5 TV series.

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Plot Keywords:

second part | space opera | 23rd century | telepathy | alien invasion | 

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Taglines:

One mistake. One mistake out of so many. So many others.

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Drama | Sci-Fi

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Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

19 July 1998 (USA)

Also Known As:

Babylon 5: Guardians

Company Credits

Production Co:

Babylonian Productions, TNT

Technical Specs

Runtime:

94 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Trivia

Thirdspace was the first of the TNT movies filmed, but the second one aired, in July 1998. As it was actually filmed in late 1997, Claudia Christian was still part of the Babylon 5 cast at the time. When it was finally aired, Claudia had been replaced in the recurring cast by Tracy Scoggins in the part of Babylon 5 Commander under Sheridan.

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Goofs

The countdown timer on the nuclear bomb starts at 4:00 minutes, but then begins counting down from 4:59, 4:58, etc.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Sheridan: [voiceover] It was the middle of the Earth year 2261. The year between wars and the beginning of a new age. The Shadow war was over, but there was still a darkness waiting for us at home...

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Connections

Followed by Babylon 5: The Lost Tales (2007)

User Reviews

Not perfect, but certainly an enjoyable scifi romp.

A reasonable outing.

B5 - and JMS writing in particular - works better when not contained to standalone episodes. Give him space to breathe, and his musing flows far better. He has room to comment, moralise and philosophise beautifully. Give him a single story and he tries to cram in too many explanations and plot movements which start to clog up the script. This is a pity as the script is what he is good at.

So a nice story, but a little uneven. Sometimes continually underlines the same plot points over and over killing room for nice stand alone dialogue or character exposition. Other times, the character scenes (the lift scene ) are too long an neither help the story or offer any depth for their duration.

That said, the SFX is very nice, the music from Franke is far more classically orientated than before and it's a nice chance to try and highlight some of the minor characters. The story idea is reasonable, if a little unusual in scifi tone for B5 (befitting Trek more) and it lacks some of the regular B5 heavyweight actors (G'Kar and Londo are sadly missing and Delenn has few scenes).

Nevertheless, an enjoyable if a little vacuous compared to what one comes to expect from B5. The aural and visual experiences are good, the actors are solid and the story good enough to standalone. Not perfect, but still a good slice of pulp scifi action.