Category: Season 1

Shortly after the arrival of new doctor Stephen Franklin, an alien spacecraft of an unknown design tumbles through the hyperspace jump gate, on an uncontrolled collision course with the station. Sinclair manages to retrieve the ship just before it collides with the station, and its sole occupant is taken to the medlab. Ambassador Delenn reacts with horror at the new arrival, describing him as a Soul Hunter, a figure feared in Minbari lore. Though Sinclair and Dr. Franklin dismiss Delenn’s frantic warnings about the alien as superstition, it becomes clear when Franklin’s patient awakens that it does have some business with the Minbari on its agenda – especially Delenn, who turns out to be more than she appears.

written by J. Michael Straczynski
directed by Jim Johnston
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: W. Morgan Sheppard (The Soul Hunter), John Snyder (Soul Hunter #2), Toni Attell (Med Tech #1), Jim Bentley (Man), Mark Conley (Tech #1), David D. Darling (Guard #1), Ted W. Henning (Guard #2), Marianne Robertson (Tech #2)

Notes: It is in this episode that we first learn Delenn is a member of the Minbari Grey Council, and also first hear of the Minbari compulsion to safeguard their souls. Later in Points of Departure it is learned that their own souls are not the only ones the Minbari are concerned with.

Dr. Vance Hendricks, one of Dr. Franklin’s med school mentors, arrives on Babylon 5 in a cloud of mystery with a collection of pristine artifacts from the planet Icarra, which has been dead for over a thousand years. One of the artifacts takes control of Hendricks’ partner and transforms him into a killing machine designed to eliminate any life form which is not pure Icarran. Since the Icarran race has been dead for centuries thanks to creatures just like this, every living being aboard the station is in danger – a situation which Sinclair decides to take into his own hands despite Garibaldi’s protests.

written by J. Michael Straczynski
directed by Richard Compton
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: David McCallum (Dr. Vance Hendricks), Marshall Teague (Nelson Drake), Patricia Healy (Mary Ann Cramer), Sav Farrow (Tech #1), Daniel Hutchison (Security Guard), Sylva Kelegian (Tech #2), Tony Rizzoli (Guard), Marianne Robertson (Tech #3), Paul Teuell (Customs Guard)

Notes: We discover, later in the series, that Interplanetary Expeditions, Hendricks’ employer, is the same outfit that unburied Shadow vessels on Mars and Ganymede.

Infection was the first hour-long episode of Babylon 5 produced.

Mayan, renowned Minbari poet and old friend of Delenn, is aboard the station to entertain the Minbari population and enlighten others of Minbari culture, when she is brutally attacked by masked members of the Home Guard, an isolationist terrorist group from Earth whose members seek to flush all alien influnces out of human society. Other violent attacks on non-humans concern and outrage the aliens aboard Babylon 5. One assault leaves Vir’s nephew in a coma. G’Kar stirs up trouble in the name of justice, trying to get the alien residents of Babylon 5 to rise up against their human neighbors, while uncomfortable questions about the influence of the Home Guard trouble Sinclair, who ultimately must take a direct hand in affairs.

written by D.C. Fontana
directed by Richard Compton
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: Tristan Rogers (Malcolm Biggs), Nancy Lee Grahn (Shaal Mayan), Michael Paul Chan (Roberts), Rodney Eastman (Kiron Maray), Danica McKellar (Aria Tensus), Diane Adair (Mila Shar), Richard Chaves (Alvares), Mark Hendrickson (Thegras), Chuck Butto (Security Officer #1), Ardwight Chamberlain (Kosh), Mike Gunther (Alien #1), Marianne Robertson (Dome Tech)

The blackmail of a security guard for his gambling debts allows two shady characters aboard the station with their equipment, which requires a lot of power and is intended for a specific subject – Commander Sinclair. The commander is kidnapped and wired into a virutal-reality cybernet, in which he is interrogated by an unknown but determined adversary whose purpose is to uncover memories of what happened when Sinclair’s ship went missing for the 24 hours prior to the Minbari surrender in the final battle of the Earth-Minbari War. Sinclair resists his opponent’s attempts to get into his mind, but finally he remembers events that have been blocked from his memory for a decade: the destruction of his entire squadron, his capture by a Minbari battle cruiser, torture, and a mysterious encounter with twelve figures cloaked in grey, one of whom he suddenly remembers well – Delenn. The memory could cost Sinclair his life.

written by J. Michael Straczynski
directed by Janet Greek
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: Christopher Neame (Knight Two), Judson Scott (Knight One), Jim Youngs (Benson), Justin Williams (Mitchell), Joe Banks (Guard), Gary Cervantes (Strongarm #1), Mark Hendrickson (Grey Council #1), Fumi Shishino (Security Guard), Macaulay Bruton (Aide), Marianne Robertson (Tech #1)

Notes: Upon closer examination, “Knight One,” played by Judson Scott, could be a member of Psi Corps – he’s wearing the gloves.

A family of a devout people known as the Children of Time arrive on the station seeking medical treatment for their son, whose respiratory blockage will prove to be fatal if not treated soon. When Dr. Franklin proposes surgery, however, he stumbles across their belief that puncturing the body allows the spirit to escape, and they refuse his help. As he manages to stall them by asking them to consider a more risky alternative treatment, Franklin petitions Sinclair for permission to overrule the parents’ authority so he can save the child’s life. Sinclair has to walk on eggshells around both parties, but cannot avoid making a ruling on the matter that could undermine Babylon 5’s neutral status. And all this time, a child’s life is slipping away…and Dr. Franklin decides to take control of the situation himself.

written by David Gerrold
directed by Richard Compton
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: Jonathan Charles Kaplan (Shon), Tricia O’ Neil (M’ola), Stephen Lee (Tharg), Silvana Gillardo (Dr. Maya Hernandez), Ardwight Chamberlain (Kosh)

With a visit from the recently re-elected President of the Earth Alliance looming in the immediate future, preparations are in full swing, including maintenance on a docking area which will be the home of a new fighter squadron being brought to Babylon 5 by the President. An explosion in this area brings the President’s chief of security, a woman whose father was killed in an incident 17 years ago engineered by criminals to frame Garibaldi, aboard the station to investigate. A dying worker points the finger at Garibaldi for planting the bomb that damaged the fighter bay, and the President’s security chief pronounces Garibaldi a fugitive from justice. Though he is on the run, Garibaldi puts his life on the line by continuing to investigate the real cause of the explosion as the President’s visit draws near.

written by Mark Scott Zicree
directed by Jim Johnston
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: Elaine Thomas (Lianna Kemmer), Tom Donaldson (Cutter), David Austin Cook (Special Agent #1), David Crowley (Lou Welch), Maggie Egan (INS Reporter), Jose Rosario (Nolan), Robin Wake (Young Lianna), Mark Hendrickson (Alien #1), Rod Perry (General Netter), Marianne Robertson (Tech #1), Mark Ginther (Dagool)

Original title: A Knife In The Shadows

LogBook entry by Earl Green

When an impatient Narn ship captain panics, he causes a catastrophic head-on collision in the station’s spacedock, destroying his ship and killing some of the dockworkers. The spokesperson for the laborers refuses any of Sinclair’s proposed solutions to their protests, and the word comes through from Earth – since the workers are under a government contract, any strike they declare is illegal and can be remedied under the Rush Act, which empowers the government to force laborers to continue their work or face arrest. A labor negotiator is sent in from Earth in hopes that the situation can be brought to a satisfactory resolution, but he seems all too ready to have Garibaldi’s security forces carry out the Rush Act. Sinclair decides to take matters into his own hands with his own unique and risky interpretation of the Rush Act.

written by Kathryn M. Drennan
directed by Jim Johnston
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: Katy Boyer (Neeoma Connally), John Snyder (Orin Zento), Aki Aleong (Senator Hidoshi), Patricia Healy (Mary Ann Cramer), Michael McKenzie (Narn Captain), Jose Rey (Eduardo Delvientos), Ricardo Martinez (Worker #2), Marianne Robertson (Tech #1), Floyd Vaughn (Worker #1)

Original title: Backlash

LogBook entry by Earl Green

A spaceliner just arriving from Earth carries blasts from two of the crew’s respective pasts – Rabbi Yosef Koslov has come to Babylon 5 bearing a legacy from Ivanova’s late father, for whom she has yet to sit shiva; and discredited boxing champ Walker Smith, an old friend of Garibaldi’s, has come on board to enter the Mutai, a deadly one-on-one freestyle martial arts competition open only to selected alien races. Ivanova disappoints Koslov when she refuses to spend any time to pay last respects to her father, and Smith is frustrated when Garibaldi isn’t supportive in his controversial bid to become the first human being to fight in the Mutai. Some of the Mutai’s alien spectators aren’t thrilled with Smith’s challenge either – even to the point of plotting to kill him before he can disgrace the tournament.

written by Lawrence G. DiTillio
directed by John C. Flinn III
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: Greg McKinney (Walker Smith), Soon-Teck Oh (The Muta-Do), Don Stroud (Caliban), Theodore Bikel (Rabbi Koslov), James Jude Courtney (Gyor), Robert Phalen (Andrei Ivanov), Lenore Kasdorf (ISN Reporter), Michael McKenzie (Migo), Marianne Robertson (Tech #1)

Notes: Curiously enough, Ivanova can be seen early in the episode reading Working Without A Net, the [fictional] autobiography of series creative consultant Harlan Ellison.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Delenn and Lennier form a welcoming party for arriving human “true seeker” Aldous Gajic, whose announcement that he has come to inquire with the alien ambassadors the whereabouts of the Holy Grail draws incredulity from Sinclair; however, Gajic is allowed to make appointments with the alien representatives to aid in his search. Along the way, he encounters a young thief named Jinxo, a former construction worker who participated in all five Babylon stations’ creation. Jinxo is on the run from Deuce, who is running an extortion ring below decks apparently with the help of Ambassador Kosh. Despite the fact that Jinxo tried to steal from him on their first meeting, Gajic takes him under his wing and tries to instill a sense of worth in him. When Gajic runs afoul of Deuce and his thugs while trying to protect Jinxo, he may have to trust everything to his new protege’, for he will not complete his quest.

written by Christy Marx
directed by Richard Compton
music by Christopher Franke

Guest Cast: David Warner (Aldous Gajic), William Sanderson (Deuce), Tom Booker (Jinxo), Jim Norton (Ombuds Wellington), Linda Lodge (Mirriam Runningdeer), Ardwight Chamberlain (Kosh), John Flinn (Mr. Flinn), Marianne Robertson (Tech #1)

LogBook entry by Earl Green