Director: Jesús Salvador Trevino
Cast: Bruce Boxleitner, Claudia Christian, Jeff Conaway, Patricia Tallman
Have I Seen it Before: Yes. My memory of it is that it was my least favorite of the four TV movies aired by TNT during the last year of the television series.
Did I Like It: Ultimately, I do think that my memory of not thinking much of it holds up under the scrutiny of time and experience.
The TV budget—and the Babylon 5 special effects, which have clearly not aged well—can’t sell the horror. The artifact which tries its damndest to bring a touch of the Lovecraftian to The Last Best Hope For Peace looks more intricate and lovingly created than the swirling CGI sprites that normally passed for the ships and creatures on this show, but I can’t move on from the feeling that it looks like a cut scene from a video game, and not a cut scene from a modern video game, mind you. One from the 1990s. How did we ever think this show was ahead of its time, special effects-wise? The mind boggles.
The story is this weird blip, this huge epic moment that takes place in the middle of the most epic season of the show’s larger storyline. There is no lead-up to it within the context of the show, and it is never mentioned again. It’s especially strange, when one considers that Sheridan (Boxleitner) is dealing with Interplanetary Expeditions (IPX), the organization his wife worked for, and there’s only a perfunctory reference to that fact. It should weigh on him heavily, especially because that history caused him to die and come back from the dead less than a year ago. Wouldn’t that have more of an effect on him?Ultimately, it feels like an episode from the show’s first season, before ti had found its purpose or stride as a novel told over several years.