Brilliant and touching

I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

I do like Babylon 5, and was anticipating yet also was dubious of The Legend of the Rangers. Seeing it for myself, it was left wanting and had a lot of problems for me. However, it was not as bad as I'd heard and feared. Technically it was not bad at all, in fact quite good. The scenery is lit well and are intriguing, the special effects are decent(if not really great) and the photography is not too haphazard. The music is beautiful as well, while the character of G'Kar was fun in a hammy sort of way even if his main role in the movie was to tie the movie with the series. On the other hand, the script is of really banal quality and feels very hackneyed. The story has some great ideas, but never develops them all that well, and a vast majority of the storytelling felt thin and uneven in pace. The characters are not compelling in personality and felt cardboard in how they were written. The Hand especially were not handled very well at all. The acting felt bland, with the exception of that of G'Kar. On the whole, not terrible but it could have been much better. 5/10 Bethany Cox

I love Babylon 5. I have seen every episode of the series and the movies as well--so it's obvious that I really care about this show. Heck, I even saw the spin-off series, CRUSADE--that's how much I love the show!! And, in light of this love, it really hurt to watch such a seriously flawed and inferior product as THE LEGEND OF THE RANGERS. I guess that after having written so much that the series creator, writer and executive producer J. Michael Straczynski finally was due for a fall as this is easily the worst of the Babylon pantheon.So why was it so bad? Well, the fundamental idea of a new spin-off series wasn't the problem--this movie could have led to a decent series. However, the characters and writing just weren't up to snuff. Particular problems were a very, very predictable plot through at least the first half in which time and again I found myself guessing exactly what would happen next. In fact, my wife and I were both very accurately telling what would happen next because it all seemed so unoriginal and clichéd. Fortunately, it did improve later and I did like the escape pod sequences. In addition, the weapons officer and her gimmicky way of fighting was just embarrassingly bad and silly. She was completely one-dimensional and the fighting sequences made me cringe--they were THAT bad.So what you have left wasn't without some merit and I guess it is a passable 90 minutes of entertainment--but just barely. My advice is that if you are a Babylon 5 geek (like me), then by all means watch it. Otherwise--skip it and watch the series.By the way--take a look at all the ratings for this film. Like many popular sci-fi TV shows or movies (such as Star Trek or Star Wars), there are a small number of mindless zombies who declare that EVERY episode and EVERY movie is an artistic masterpiece--giving ALL OF THEM 10s!!! Now if you liked this movie, I have no argument with you. But, to take an obviously flawed movie that is clearly inferior to the previous series and films and STILL give it a 10 is just ludicrous. These zombies, I assume, are like cult members who CANNOT objectively rate anything from the series and think by giving EVERYTHING a 10 that they are somehow "helping" the show or being loyal. I am sure my harsh words will draw many "not helpful" ratings, but I don't care--the casual viewer needs to know that some reviews can't be trusted.

This film contains some very good dialogue, excellent special effects and a fine performance from the late Andreas Katsulas as G'Kar. However one particular scene in the film lets it all down- the way in which the Liandra fires its weapons in battle. The idea of someone holographically floating in space and punching and kicking to fire weapons is somewhat out of place in an otherwise excellent addition to the Babylon 5 universe.The performance of all the actors in this film is good in my opinion. The film should in my opinion definitely have been made into a series and the only reason it didn't attract large enough audiences was its being shown alongside a very popular and one-off football game, which was the last thing it needed.

MILD-ISH SPOILERS throughout.We live for the one, we die for the one. And so this needless attempt at another Babylon 5 spinoff series begins, with Ranger David Martel (Dylan Neal) breaking the Anla'shok code of honour and fleeing from battle rather than needlessly dying. His superiors punish him with the command of an old starship that lost its previous crew in battle. This previous crew still haunts the ship. Martel gathers a small crew, and their first adventure involves a lot of nancying around, chewing scenery and saying "We live for the one, we die for the one" every few minutes.The thing that made Babylon 5 so great was its five-year plot arc. All non-arc stories are remembered with distaste, in particular the dire TV movies like "Thirdspace" and "River of Souls". When B5 isn't doing its five-year arc, B5 just isn't working. So I don't think a "starship adventures" series would have worked, and this pilot doesn't do anything to disprove my theory. (We live for the one, we die for the one.)It's easiest to list the things that didn't work:G'Kar's appearance is the most welcome thing, but it feels pointlessly tacked on. He's the "bridge" between shows, rather like Picard's appearance in the ST:DS9 pilot, or Quark's appearance in the ST:Voyager pilot. He waltzes into private Ranger disciplinary hearings. He just conveniently happens to be one of the ambassadors picked up later in the episode. We live for the one, we die for the one... or did I say that already?Rather than introducing the new characters subtley throughout the episode, there is one big cheesy scene where the new crew gathers around a table to state their names and specialities. Imagine if a new Star Trek series started with a scene like: "Hi. I'm Will Riker. I'm a First Officer. Yay me!" "Hi. I'm Data. I'm a robot guy. I don't have emotions." "Hi, I'm Tasha Yar. I'm kinda butch and I'm going to die soon."The Rangers are nothing like their previous portrayal in B5. We remember Marcus Cole as the perfect blueprint of a Ranger, and none of the characters here compare. There is so little spirituality or nobility. The Rangers here are wise-crackin' gung-ho heroes. It's just not right. Oh by the way: we live for the one, we die for the one.The weapons thing. Oh dear. The first time the weapons chick (Cantrell) jumped into her virtual reality chamber and started punching and kicking fireballs to control the space battle, I thought it was pretty unique. It's good to make weapon control more interesting than simply pushing buttons. But then there was ANOTHER of these scenes, then another, and another. The last one was full on CHEESE, with Cantrell having what can only be described as a laughable spaz-attack. And can I just add: we live for the one, we die for the one.The "haunted ship" concept is very interesting, but it didn't work well here. There just wasn't room in the plot to squeeze it in. If the pilot went into a series I'd have loved to see more stories about the ghosts. But at the end of the episode the characters basically say: "Well, it looks like we've satisfied those ghosts and we won't be seeing them anymore." Damn!BIGGER SPOILERS NOW. This pilot introduces what could have possibly been the main nemesis for the series, known as "The Hand". These aliens are said to be about a billion years more ancient than the Shadows, and they have finally got back to our dimension. This just sucks. It undermines the Shadows totally. The TV movie "Thirdspace" did something similar with an ancient deadly enemy breaking out of another dimension, and it was annoying that time too. But anyway... we live for the one, we die for the one.So those are the bad things about Babylon 5: Legend of the Rangers. But it's not a total loss. There were moments of J. Michael Straczynski goodness. One thing you can say about his writing is that he's not afraid of full-on balls-out cheese. The usual charm and groan-worthy humour can be found here in small doses. And for all its faults, it's still better than an average episode of Enterprise. And aren't ALL pilots rubbish in comparison to the show that blooms from them? Wasn't B5's pilot quite rubbish and cheesy too? I'd have liked to test out Legend of the Rangers for a full 22 episodes before giving up on it.We live for the one, we die for the one. Or we just watch fairly average TV pilots for the one.