Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

The thing with writing a negative review for a show that everyone loves is that when those people come here to buy this season and see a 2-star review, they get mad. And then they vote against the review. Whatever, don't shoot the messenger. Or do, it's not like I get paid for this. If you read the 5-star reviews below, many of those ALSO mention that this season is weak, BUT they still give it 5 stars because it is the beginning of a fantastic series. I'm rating THIS SEASON, not the series. I'm a big fan of the series, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to pretend that the first season was perfect (5 stars) standing alone. Hardcore fans do B5 a disservice by praising this season to the sky, because when newcomers watch it with no prior exposure to the later quality, they just end-up thinking "what was wrong with the people who gave this 5 stars? I'm not getting the next season, 5-star ratings or not." (Don't take my word for it: There's an early review below that says exactly this, essentially, if you look on the review page.) I see everyone below raving about the quality of the first season and I think that they all must be watching a different show. The later seasons improve by leaps and bounds, that is for certain, but the first season is useful only in the foundation it builds for those seasons. Otherwise it is painful to watch (I am trying to get my husband to watch the whole arc, and he is finding the first season as hard to get through as I did my first time out). The later seasons are NOT better because Bruce Boxleitner is a stellar actor--this is not a Sinclair vs. Sheridan thing. This is a shoe-string budget to supported budget, growing into character, maturing plotline and writing, kind of thing. What is wrong with the first season? 1) The dialogue is AWFUL. It is predictable and cliche-ridden, stilted and melodramatic. I find it most similar to the types of dialogue I see most sci-fi fans make fun of on soap operas. The nature of the dialogue leads contributes to the other problems... 2) The delivery of the dialogue is laughable. I suppose, when faced with melodramatic, stilted dialogue, even good actors end up delivering it with almost comical dramatic overplay. Overly pregnant pauses, jumping to the extremes of emotion rather than building or portraying a range (as most humans do in daily life), these characters are much more two-dimensional than in later seasons. 3) The philosophical discussions are trite, and tend to suffer from the effects of points 1 and 2 above. There is no nuance here--these plot lines are obvious, blunt instruments where the complexities of the moral quandries seem feigned to demonstrate depth, but really are very obvious, very black and white. Just because a sci-fi series talks about social issues doesn't make it deep. Once again, I think the later seasons really do an excellent job at rectifying all of the above--is there any better treatment of right and wrong in scifi than the battle with the shadows? But, seriously folks, the difference between those later seasons and this one in terms of skill in rendering is the difference between light and day. We need to be able to balance our love of the series and JMS by recognizing that this isn't 5-star work. Or else you have to add more stars to rate later seasons, don't you? You need to watch this season in order to understand the later ones, so buy it, grit your teeth and get through it. Then start Season Two--and the fun begins.