Babylon 5: The River of Souls (1998 TV Movie) User Reviews

Not sure what the point was...

[JoeB131 · 6/10 · 21 December 2009]

I'm a big fan of Babylon 5, which I thought was probably the best example of serial Space Opera ever put to film- even better than Star Wars or any of the ubiquitous Star Treks.

This film features two very good guest stars- Ian McShane and Martin Sheen. Fans of McShane from Deadwood or Kings are probably going to be disappointed here. His performance is relatively understated. Sheen portrays a "Soul Hunter" tasked with recovering a race memory that the hunters stole, only to discover the race was on the verge of reaching a higher plain of existence.

This is mostly a showcase for Tracy Scoggins as Captain Lochley, and she does a really good job here. She was considered and rejected for the role of Janeway in Star Trek Voyager, and you can see where it was truly their loss.

The problem was, with this as well as "Thirdspace", that the purpose was to create a Babylon 5 story outside the Five year Story arc. Sheridan and Delenn and G'Kar and Londo are the big players, this is the bit players having a bit of fun, but it's not crucial to the story.

Still, there is just enough fun here to make it enjoyable.

fun

[pviateur · 7/10 · 12 July 2021]

Strong first half especially scenes on Soul Hunter's planet but plot involving Babylon 5 blowing up is routine. Holo brothel sup plot is unfortunate as is writer/creator Strazynski's dialogue. In particular, scene where characters are discussing the soul, the word "afterlife" should have been used instead of "Heaven." But worth watching for any Bab 5 fan.

The Soul Hunters

[claudio_carvalho · 6/10 · 2 January 2021]

The obsessed Professor Robert Bryson (Ian McShane) is in a planet looking for the eternal life and soon he is hunted down by the owners, the Soul Hunters. Meanwhile, Capt. Elizabeth Lochley (Tracy Scoggins) is sued by the lawyer of the shyster Jacob Mayhew (Joel Brooks). When a soul hunter (Martin Sheen) visits her, she has another problem to resolve in the station.

"Babylon 5: The River of Souls" is a good film about Babylon 5. The plot is very tense and well resolved in the end. Martin Sheen has a good performance. The conclusion is excellent and is worthwhile watching this movie. . My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Babylon 5 - O Rio das Almas" ("Babylon 5: The River of Souls")

Silly, aimless detour in a great series of films

[Milpool · 9 January 2000]

Usually, JMS and his crew do a great job. There is no argument that Babylon 5 may have been the finest science fiction series ever to come to television. In this entry in the long series of good films, however, things become a little more slack, and the result is an uninvolving, mildly amusing detour. A Dumb subplot involving the fight with a virtual brothel does nothing to help this film; it is, in a sense, weighted down by the inability of the producers to add anything new into the Babylon 5 universe. Instead of generating a strong storyline, the creators have opted for a plot about a lost "river" of souls and the claimant who arrives unexpectedly to collect his stolen property. Martin Sheen as the alien "soul hunter" is one of the most ludicrous examples of miscasting since Tom Selleck as King Ferdinand in Christopher Columbus: The Discovery.

Makes me wish Lochley better utilized in series

[LordManhammer · 6/10 · 4 August 2023]

I never much liked Capt. Lochley, but I see now that's because she was too minor a character in the final season of the series. I may have enjoyed another season of her in charge of Babylon 5, without so many of the original characters around. I surprise myself here because I am usually so sentimental about actors leaving shows--and I got super sad about Mollari becoming alienated from his friends at the end--but this movie was satisfying in its simplicity. The series was also being dragged down by the maudlin romance between Sheridan and Delenn.

These moves are essentially long episodes, but I like that. The major downside here is that I thought they'd gotten rid of the animosity between Lochley and Garibaldi a few episodes into the final season, and I didn't like seeing it return.

More Ghosts in Space

[Gislef · 6/10 · 4 January 1999]

Like Thirdspace before it, River of Souls attempts to put the supernatural into the B5 mythos (via Lovecraft to some degree) and give it a science fiction spin. While it doesn't descend to the levels of Star Trek's "metaphasic spirit" techno-babble, it still comes across as a bit odd. There are interesting performances by Martin Sheen and Ian McShane, and some follow-up on aspects of the B5 universe (such as the Soul Hunters, and Garabaldi's management of Edgars' Industries). But at the end of the day, it doesn't seem to add up to much. The B plot seems like an attempt to insert some broad comedy (it is funny, just unnecessary), and an excuse to put Tracy Scoggins in a skimpy outfit. Overall, an adequate entry into the B5 series, and more connected to the "mythos" than its predecessor, Thirdspace.

Certainly not the best, but a decent movie

[*Prometheus* · 7/10 · 10 November 1998]

Well I gave this movie a 7. It was better than "Thirdspace" but not as good as "In the Beginning" as far as the B5 movies go. I really think the television series did a much better job overall with the special effects and character portrayal. Let's hope the producers and cast get the next series "Crusade" up to the standards of B5.

Fun little stand alone film

[davidmalaimo · 9/10 · 15 November 2018]

Okay, I kinda loved this one. I was weird and a bit experimental. Not like, "twin peaks the revival" experimental, but it tried some things. It was off beat, cheesy. A lot of weird CGI worlds and stuff which is always fun! The brothel was aesthetic for sure, probably not what holographic brothels are gonna look like but seems like a plausible thing. Also, you learn more about the Soul Hunters, which if I recall correctly, are the only things that really grind Delenns gears. And I think that was season 1. I love it when they take deeper looks into races that, you know they wanted to, but just wasn't pertinent to true overall plots. But yeah, if you go into this just expecting something cool, fun, weird, and just want to see a few friendly faces and adorable bald heads, then you should enjoy this

Sadly, this isn't as good as most of the regular episodes of Babylon 5

[planktonrules · 4/10 · 28 June 2007]

Before this made for TV movie began, I had relatively low expectations. That's because it was made after the final episode of the series had aired and many of the series originals were gone. There is no President Sheridan, Delenn, Lennier, Londo, Vir, G'kar or Lyta. If you remember, on the second to last episode of the series, all the regulars except Zack, Vir and Captain Lockley left B-5 permanently. Now for this film they did bring back Garibaldi (who was not in the last B-5 movie) to join Zack and the Captain and the Doctor makes a brief and irrelevant appearance. But because so much is gone of the old chemistry, this film already is severely handicapped.

The movie is about a Soul Hunter (Martin Sheen) who is led to Babylon 5 in search of a globe filled with souls that had been stolen from a hidden repository by an archaeologist (Ian McShane). A lot of spooky mumbo-jumbo stuff occurs but frankly it was all pretty silly and pointless. Yeah, yeah, the station nearly blew up but was saved and all, but frankly I felt like it was a case of "been there done that--and done that a lot better in the past".

The secondary plot, provided more for comic relief, was much more interesting, as an entrepreneur installed a holo-brothel and those in command weren't sure what to do about it and when they tried to pressure them to close, they were slapped with a lawsuit. This was fluff, but it did provide a few laughs--something the other dreary plot was surely lacking.

By the way, Sheen at first did a good job playing the Should Hunter--with his wild eyes and bizarre delivery. However, repeatedly throughout the episode he fell out of character. This should have been spotted and corrected.

So the final verdict is this is only for total die-hard B-5 nuts (like myself). Others seeing it might assume the series sucked--which is a great injustice. This is a great example of a show not knowing when to quit.

The best of the films. Love Zack & Lochley.

[Cylex · 10/10 · 6 September 2003]

An excellent film with great performances from Zack & Lochley. Much to their displeasure (& mine) Garibaldi arrived on station. (All due respect to Jerry Doyle but in Seasons 4 & 5 I lost sympathy for the character.) It doesn't take him long to start criticizing Zack (who I love best of all on the show)and taking charge. I'm sure Zack could have coped. The Soulhunter plot is fascinating, especially if you believe in heaven as Zack does. The humour supplements it nicely. 10/10

How to watch the B5 movies

[bpeck13 · 5/10 · 8 October 2008]

You can buy the first two movies (In the Beginning, The Gathering) separately, but in order to get all five B5 movies (the first two plus Thirdspace, The River of Souls, and A Call to Arms), you have to buy them in a box set.

The first two movies are out of order—they should be In the Beginning and then The Gathering. These movies are GREAT for background information. They really should be watched before watching the series.

Thirdspace is a detached from the rest of the movies and series. It comes after the end of the Shadow War (season 4, episode 6), but then there is no mention of it again. If you never saw this movie, you wouldn't miss any continuity. The only thing it clears up is why Lyta Alexander and Zack Allen never got together.

The River of Souls occurs in apx. Year 2263 and is less detached because B5 has encountered Soul Hunters before. This just gives more insight to them. It is like an extra episode in Season 5.

A Call to Arms (Year 2267) is a prequel to the Crusade series. If you aren't planning to watch the Crusade series, there is no reason to watch this movie.

Season 5 should go like this:

1. Season 5 Episode 21 "Objects at Rest" (Year 2262) 2. The River of Souls movie (Year 2263) 3. A Call to Arms and the Crusade Series (Year 2267)—optional. I suggest these be watched separately from B5 series as they really don't enhance or expand on the B5 series. 4. The Lost Tales—Voices in the Dark movie (Year 2271) 5. Season 5 Episode 22 "Sleeping in Light." (Year 2280)

6. The Legend of The Rangers: To Live and Die in Starlight (after the Year 2280)—optional. Does not add nor detract from the series.

Soulitary Confinement

[Poseidon-2 · 8 November 1998]

One billion souls, ready to escape and wreak revenge upon their captors. Of course, they don't actually escape, at least not all of them. And they don't even scratch the Soulhunter (played fairly by Martin Sheen) until the very end, when he willingly sacrifices his soul to build a bridge to peace.

The special effects were nice, as always with Babylon 5, but the plot I thought was lacking. When the highlight of a film is seeing Tracy Scoggins in hot pink lingerie, you can't say much about the storyline.

A Strong movie, if you take out the humour

[delenn-11 · 10/10 · 24 June 1999]

I thought "The River of Souls" was a very good Babylon 5 movie, with some exceptional performances from Martin Sheen, Tracy Scoggins and Ian MacShane. If this were an episode of the series (without the humour) it would probably be one of my favourite stand-alone stories of the series.

Personally, I've always preferred Scoggins to Christian, although granted JMS didn't write her as well for much of the series and she did have to endure the Byron/Telepath plot. If you take out the smutty humour about the brothel and the "poorer" actors in those scenes, then this movie is solid stuff. Probably my third favourite of the four movies, but in no means bad at all.

This drek is worst than any of the regular season episodes.

[D Airey · 2/10 · 9 December 2000]

I'm a big fan of B5, having caught on only at the end of season three. I faithfully watched all the previous seasons when it was syndicated, concluding that it was one of the most well-thought out story arcs to ever hit television. Even the filler episodes were interesting. The movies, also, were well produced and as entertaining as anything to hit the theaters.

Which brings us to 'River of Souls'. Naturally, after seeing everything else, I had high expectations. Martin Sheen appears to be acting in an Ed Wood movie rather than a serious Sci-Fi story. The story itself, might have looked good in outline form, even made it to the story board. However, it suffers obviously when it came time to filling this notion out into a two hour movie. There are no special effects to keep us entertained in the total absence of a compelling story. There are places where they were obviously short of time and just improvised the dialog to fill the story out. Had this made the regular season, it would have rated among the worst of the episodes.

The best Babylon 5 "Movie"

[XweAponX · 10/10 · 16 October 2019]

If you consider that "Third Space" might be the second best.

There are many reasons why this standalone Babylon 5 "episode" put out by Turner the year after Babylon 5 ended it's "five year mission" is the absolute best of the entire series and standalone "films "and other related Babylon 5 spinoffs, Martin Sheen is of course being the best reason, the reappearance of Michael Garibaldi is another. Other interesting things appear like Ian McShane as a thoroughly unstable scientist, and of course the best reason, Tracy Scroggins as a Lockley Hologram with less clothes on.

What this particular "episode" of Babylon 5 has got going for it, and this is something that has been part of Babylon 5 for a long time, is that we have a very dark and mysterious story intertwined with high comedic elements, and they work together here as well as they did during the series in general. This is just a point that I diffidently need to remind the other so-called Babylon 5 fans here, that comedy plus dark elements were part of the structure of the series from the very beginning, including "The Gathering". So I really don't understand why they are complaining about the mixture HERE, where the production of Babylon 5 had more room to explore these facets in an "elongated" episode.

And of course, after a disturbing "grave robbing" seen that involved McShane, we get into the comedy elements before we realize something else is not quite right: there is a "holobrothel" on Babylon 5, however, these are not at all like the holosuites owned by Quark on Deep Space Nine, which I am pretty sure that this is a reference and homage to in the first place- because of the fact that this holobrothel appears to be put together by scotch tape and paper clips, whereas in Deep Space nine they used cutlery and a metal ladle as conductive elements (see deep space nine episode "our man Bashir".)

So we have this almost high comedy routine between Lockley and the crooked brothel owner "Jacob Mayhew" played by Joel Brooks, and even a triangle of sorts at that when you add in the antics of ambulance chasing lawyer "James Riley" played by Stuart Pankin, which is traditional comedy of the variety that we used to have in the 1930s pre-code films, and don't forget the involvement of Zack (Grease's Jeff Conway, rip).

With this circus in place, in steps Dr. Robert Bryson (McShane), Who was being paid by Garibaldi's former boss to look for eternal life, and you think he is going to add more comedy into this farce but instead he has something that used to belong to a race that we have only seen twice before: the Soul Hunters.

Enter Martin Sheen as the Soul Hunter.

The only soul Hunter we had ever met previously was the one who was after Delenn- in the very second episode of the Babylon 5 series played by William Morgan Sheppard, an actor eccentric enough to portray that particular soul hunters instability.

And it is surprising to find out that the soul hunter portrayed by Martin Sheen is not at all unstable. In fact he is a "young" soul hunter, he is very idealistic about the work that he does and he defends what the soul hunters do to Lockley in a very reasonable manner, although she has good arguments as to why souls should not be trapped and kept in dark whisper galleries.

Many of the things that we previously knew about soul hunters were actually shown in this episode, including the violation of one of their sanctuaries for souls.

So on one hand we have this farce including a holographic brothel and it's faulty wiring and the owners scummy lawyer, and then we have this quite marvelous tale of the soul hunters and the fact that they may have made a certain prideful mistake.

Just remember "the mind sees what it needs to see"- Dr. Franklin appears briefly not as himself but as one of those mental apparitions that Lockley needed to see.

What I liked mostly about this particular Babylon 5 "movie" is that it happens after the events of the television series and so there are no appearances by President Sheridan or Delenn, or Gkar and Londo, this is just life on Babylon 5 after the events of the series, life goes on, even though we know that there are Drakk milling about the galaxy waiting to pounce on Earth with one of the shadow Planet killers- which happens in another one of these made for TV by Turner Babylon 5 movies.

Although I have explained some of the interactions of this episode, I have not gone into detail about those, so no, I am not going to check spoilers.

One of B5's weaker stories

[rawdon · 2/10 · 18 November 1998]

I was very disappointed in this movie. Plotwise it was weak bordering on silly: Souls who can affect reality in the way they do? A mission apparently critical to the Soul Hunters entrusted to one of their younger members? And the whole B-story with the "holobrothel" and the lawsuit against the station was so awful that at one point I blurted out to the television, "Why are you wasting my time with this?"

Thematically, "River of Souls" didn't really go into the question of the soul in any more depth than the original episode "Soul Hunter" did. We see that Soul Hunters can make mistakes, but we still don't get a feeling for their culture. (Are there any female Soul Hunters?)

The acting was okay, given the material they had to work with, and the special effects - especially the planetscapes in the first act - were very impressive. But overall, I'd say give this one a miss.

The main plot was excellent, but the sub plot...

[Op_Prime · 28 September 2000]

The Soul Hunter plot to this movie was excellent. That brothel sub plot was a little funny, but totally unnecessary. Martin Sheen gives an excellent performance. I also like how they make good use of Garabaldi. The special effects were great as usual. This an okay entry to the B5 story.

Imagine my surprise - Martin Sheen!

[whogirl · 10 May 1999]

I'm an admitted Babylon 5 fanatic, so I looked forward to seeing this film with some anticipation. And imagine my surprise when Martin Sheen waltzed into the screen! I thought he did a very good job. The film was pretty good - for some reason the films seem weaker than the series, most likely because they don't really fit into the web-like plot structure of the series.

Lovejoy in Space!

[Leeandkate · 14 September 2000]

I wonder whether Ian McShane's long-running role as antiques dealer Lovejoy on BBC TV influenced in any way his casting here. You'd think he'd be a bit more comfortable in the role, anyway.

However, the one role that always seems to get overlooked is Richard Biggs' near-cameo as Dr. Stephen Franklin - or at least someone who looks like him. Speaking in a bizarre "Kobayashi-from-The-Usual-Suspects" accent, and with a completely different set of mannerisms, you feel the hair on the back of your neck rise as you realise this isn't the Dr. Franklin we all know and love.

For me, that is the most memorable scene of this film, it beats Tracy Scoggins in lingerie anytime. This IS the Internet, remember - it's possible to see her with a lot less on!