Viewing Order

During the show's run, the showrunner J. Michael Straczynski (jms) was very engaged with the fan community online and gave a running commentary on the production of the show. His comments revealed some episodes had their originally planned airing orders reshuffled for various reasons.

Based on these comments (as well as the evidence of events within the episodes themselves) some fans have put forward suggested changes to the original airing order to enhance the viewing experience in different ways.

Naturally within a fandom there are a number of different views so the picture is varied - this page is intended to catalogue and compare the various orders.

TV Movies & spin-offs
While there is some amount of debate around the ordering of episodes within each season (see later sections), the majority of the viewing order debate is around when the Babylon 5 TV movies and spin-offs should best be viewed in relation to the main series itself.

This section compares five suggested options:

Original broadcast
This shows the order in which everything was originally broadcast in the US.

Lurker's Guide
This comes from the "Master List" on the popular fan site The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5 which is based on some of jms' online comments. Note the suggestion of watching In the Beginning first is debatable for first-time viewers - ItB is a much stronger start than The Gathering in terms of story and visuals, but it does includes spoilers for some events in the first four seasons. And also while some enjoy integrating the TV movies within the run of the show itself (as this order does) others find it interrupts the flow of the main story.

Authorized Chronology
During the run of the show Terry Jones began compiling the Babylon 5 Historical Database online. This involved scouring each episode (and other B5 media) to pick out every reference to events past and future, as well as establishing dates for events within the show itself where possible. During Season Five Fiona Avery at Babylonian Productions requested if the Database could be used as an in-house document to support the production of the show.

This therefore gives the order in which events 'historically' occurred according to this authorized internal production document. Whether this gives the best viewing experience will depend on individual taste. Notes for the ordering rationale are here.

Blackcoatcowboy order
This was posted on the b5tv.com forum by user blackcoatcowboy and is a mix of the Lurker's Guide and Chronology orders.

Focused Story order
This focuses on "the story of the last of the Babylon stations" as the story told across the five seasons of the main show. The spin-offs are considered separately, almost as 'short stories' set in the same world as the main 'novel' of the show, placing them after the main show in chronological order. The exception is In the Beginning which connects directly to the overall story of the series and sits well as a prologue (although as with the Lurker's Guide, for a first-time viewer starting with ItB is debatable - a first-time viewer may instead prefer to watch it chronologically at the end of the other TV movies).

Note 1: Since The Gathering is the series pilot it goes at the start of Season One in all suggested orders

Note 2: Since A Call to Arms is a backdoor pilot for Crusade it goes at the start of Crusade in all suggested orders

Note 3: numbering in the below table is not always continuous - the intention is to highlight where the different orders agree

The Gathering & Season One
There's less of an obvious through-line tying the first season together as the story hadn't yet got to the point where each episode flowed directly into the next. As a result there's more space for fans to find details within the episodes which suggest alternative orders.

Seven orders are compared in this section:

Original broadcast
The order in which the episodes were originally broadcast in the US.

Lurker's Guide
This comes from the "Master List" on the popular fan site The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5. The re-ordering for Season One places two episodes at the end of the season, based on online comments from jms.

HBO Max
This is the order (as of September 2021) in which the streaming service HBO Max presents the episodes. By accident or design, this matches an online post from March 1994 by jms written after only the first eight episodes had aired, describing the planned schedule for the remainder of Season One. This schedule also moves the two episodes rearranged by The Lurker's Guide and is so debatably closer to jms' original intention for those episodes.

Authorized Chronology
This is the order in which events 'historically' occurred according to the authorized internal production document, the Historical Database. Whether this gives the best viewing experience will depend on individual taste. Notes for the ordering rationale are here.

Character Arc Order
This order was created by user gs4291 in 2020, with the original aim of constructing an episode order for Season One without having to default to the broadcast order (as most other re-orderings do). After finding internal story continuity only gave half the data points needed to assemble a 'complete' ordering, gs4291 then also looked at how characters' interactions change over the course of the season. The final result is intended to not only set up and pay off plot developments in the most rewarding way, but also to give the most satisfying arc of character development to as many characters as possible. The detailed analysis behind the order can be found on this site.

Visual Evidence Order
This order was put forward by redditor avn3 in 2021 (in this post and later updated in this post) which considers the episodes as evidence, as if videotapes of actual events. Since these events must have happened in some particular order, the smallest clues may need to be found to rearrange them properly. 'Hard evidence' is prioritised, which may be as little as a title in a newspaper or a monitor in the background.

Modified Production Order
As a part of a Kickstarter update for his upcoming book All Alone in the Night: The Making of Babylon 5, Jason Davis detailed his suggested viewing order. It takes the production ordering as a starting point, with some adjustments for auctorial intent.

Note: numbering in the below table is not always continuous - the intention is to highlight the places where the different orders agree

Season Two
The storytelling starts to become more serialised in Season Two and a number of significant turning points in the premise of the show mean there's much less ambiguity to episode ordering compared to Season One - the focus is more on correcting for post-production delays.

Four orders are compared in this section:

Original broadcast
The order in which the episodes were originally broadcast in the US.

Lurker's Guide
This comes from the "Master List" on the popular fan site The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5 which is based on some of jms' online comments, particularly changes made due to post-production delays.

HBO Max
This is the order (as of September 2021) in which the streaming service HBO Max presents the episodes. By accident or design, this is the episodes' internal production numbering and in many cases matches the changes in the Lurker's Guide. Unfortunately however in the case of S2E19 Divided Loyalties and S2E20 The Long, Twilight Struggle the change makes one line in Twilight a non sequitur. Jason Davis' Modified Production Order follows this order, but with Loyalties and Struggle modified back to their broadcast order.

Authorized Chronology
This is the order in which events 'historically' occurred according to the authorized internal production document, the Historical Database. Whether this gives the best viewing experience will depend on individual taste. Notes for the ordering rationale are here.

Note: numbering in the below table is not always continuous - the intention is to highlight the places where the different orders agree

Season Three
The serialisation ramps up even more so in Season Three, and so again there is even less debate about the episode order.

Two orders are compared in this section:

Original broadcast
The order in which the episodes were originally broadcast in the US, which is shared by the order presented on HBO Max and by the chronological order in the Historical Database.

Lurker's Guide
This comes from the "Master List" on the popular fan site The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5 which is based on some of jms' online comments.

Note: numbering in the below table is not always continuous - the intention is to highlight the places where the different orders agree

Season Four
At this point the show has reached 'peak serialisation': the story of each episode flows directly into next and there is no debate around the ordering of the episodes themselves. Opinions only vary on how (or if at all) to integrate the TV movie Thirdspace, as discussed in the TV Movie section.

Three orders are compared in this section:

Original broadcast
The order in which the episodes were originally broadcast in the US, which is also presented on HBO Max, and shared with Jason Davis' Modified Production Order.

Lurker's Guide
This comes from the "Master List" on the popular fan site The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5 which is based on some of jms' online comments, although the placement of Thirdspace is based on fan analysis of evidence within the surrounding episodes.

Authorized Chronology
This is the order in which events 'historically' occurred according to the authorized internal production document, the Historical Database. Whether this gives the best viewing experience will depend on individual taste. Notes for the ordering rationale are here.

Note: numbering in the below table is not always continuous - the intention is to highlight the places where the different orders agree

Season Five
Here the show remains at 'peak serialisation' - the only debated episode position is the one not written by jms. Also opinions vary on how (or if at all) to integrate the TV movie River of Souls, as discussed in the TV Movie section.

Three orders are compared in this section:

Original broadcast
The order in which the episodes were originally broadcast in the US, which is also presented on HBO Max (except River of Souls is not on HBO Max).

Lurker's Guide
This comes from the "Master List" on the popular fan site The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5 which is based on some of jms' online comments.

Authorized Chronology
This is the order in which events 'historically' occurred according to the authorized internal production document, the Historical Database. Whether this gives the best viewing experience will depend on individual taste. Notes for the ordering rationale are here. The same ordering is used in Jason Davis' Modified Production Order.

Note: numbering in the below table is not always continuous - the intention is to highlight the places where the different orders agree

A Call to Arms & Crusade
The viewing order for Crusade is notoriously tangled - some background to its short but troubled production can help:

The opening episode was originally planned to be Racing the Night and production began with the Excalibur crew wearing gray & red uniforms. After five episodes had been filmed (with another five scripts in hand), the network called for a production hiatus to make changes.

These included a costume change to more functional black uniforms and a mandate to write a new opening episode introducing the characters in a more conventional style. To make sense of the uniform changes, it was planned to:


 * start the series with a number of 'black uniform' episodes, including the new opening episode
 * have an episode in which the the uniforms were changed to gray/red
 * air the originally filmed five 'gray/red uniform' episodes
 * have an episode in which the uniforms were changed back to black
 * air the remaining 'black uniform' episodes

After the production hiatus, eight episodes were filmed with the black uniforms, including the new opening episode (War Zone) and the first 'bridging' episode, explaining the change from black to gray/red uniforms (Appearances and Other Deceits). Of the other three completed scripts, the next to be filmed was the 'gray/red to black' bridging episode (To the Ends of the Earth) but before filming began the network called for production to cease and shortly afterwards the show was cancelled.

Five orders are compared in this section, each of which attempt to reconcile the above:

Original broadcast
The order in which the episodes were originally broadcast in the US - since the second 'bridging'episode was not produced, the decision was taken to air all the 'black uniform' episodes in one block, followed by the gray/red episodes, despite many of the 'black' episodes being written with the intention of being aired after the 'gray/red' block. While some episodes had dialogue re-dubbed to try and get them to fit in this new order, a number of continuity problems couldn't be avoided.

Script order
This is the order in which the scripts were originally written (originally without any thought to costume changes) which perhaps gives a guide to how the stories were originally planned to progress before the network's intervention.

Rerun broadcast
A few years after the original run, the Sci Fi Channel acquired the rights to air Crusade and (being familiar with the controversy) asked jms in what order he would like them to air the episodes. In this message he outlines his rationale: choosing to ignore the costume changes in favour of better introducing the story and characters (at least "as best [he] could remember it when they called"). War Zone and Appearances are placed at the end, outside the run of the other episodes, reflecting that they were only written to accommodate mandates imposed by the network. This order is used in the Lurker's Guide Master List.

Authorized Chronology
This is the order in which events 'historically' occurred according to the authorized internal production document, the Historical Database. Whether this gives the best viewing experience will depend on individual taste. Notes for the ordering rationale are here.

All-Inclusive
Published in Volume 2 of the Crusade: Other Voices script book series, as compiled by its Senior Editor, Jason Davies: "With the publication of all the extant Crusade material, a new all-inclusive order, interpolating all the various episodes, scripts, outlines and notes in to a cohesive whole, was needed to make sense of the series as it now stands." - Crusade: Other Voices, Volume 2 p361

Note 1: Since A Call to Arms is a backdoor pilot for Crusade it goes at the start in all suggested orders

Note 2: Although not strictly relevant for a viewing order, the three completed but unproduced scripts help explain the placement of some episodes in the All-Inclusive Order.

''Note 3: the number coding below attempts to highlight similarities between these diverse orderings using a prefix digit. '1-x' indicates a 'black uniform' episode when it's placed before the 'gray/red uniform' episode block. '2-x' indicates the 'gray/red uniform' episode block. '3-x' indicates a 'black uniform' episode when it's placed after the 'gray/red uniform' episode block. 'X-x' indicates an episode which has been placed outside the regular run of episodes.''