Babylon 5 Turned The Most Controversial Topic In Human History Into An Emmy Winning Story

By Jonathan Klotz
| Updated 43 seconds ago

In the history of the world, nothing has united people or divided people, like religion. It can bring peace and meaning to one person’s life while destroying another’s. To say that discussing religion in public is controversial, is if anything, an understatement. Babylon 5 ran headlong into the topic early on, using “Parliament of Dreams,” the fifth episode of Season 1, to show the good, the bad, and the importance of religion, culminating in a final shot that serves as creator’s J. Michael Straczynski’s mission statement for the entire series.

Everything that Makes Babylon 5 Great: Religion, Murder, And Love

Babylon 5 is the center of trade, commerce, and diplomacy for hundreds of species, which means when the Earth Alliance dedicates a week to celebrating religions, there’s hundreds of different celebrations on board. Each civilization showcases their dominant religion, resulting in the Minbari’s religious caste hosting prayer sessions, the Centauri throwing a party, and other, less-represented species get quick moments showing what’s important. 

The main plot of the episode has nothing to do with the religious celebration. Narn Ambassador G’Kar is trying to survive an assassination attempt he knows is coming from a political rival out for revenge from beyond the grave. Paranoid, G’Kar assumes it’s his new aide, Na’Toth, overlooking that it’s in fact, the courier his rival sent with the death message. We get an early glimpse into the character G’Kar would become when he and Na’Toth stop the assassin, and let’s them get away. After all, the punishment for failure from the assassin guild is death, so why bother getting his hands dirty? 

As usual, there’s another side plot focusing on giving fans a deeper understanding of one of the characters, in this case, Commander Sinclair (Michael O’Hare) dealing with the reappearance of his on-again, off-again lover and one-time flight student, Catherine Sakai. Now working as a planetary surveyor, Catherine ended up becoming rich thanks to her latest discovery, choosing to celebrate alongside Sinclair. Decidedly “on-again” for now, Catherine promises she’ll come back, and unlike Londo’s love, rest assured, she comes back. 

An Emmy Winning Episode

Babylon 5 pivots back to the religious festival for the closing moments of “Parliament of Dreams” in a major way. Finally, Sinclair is going to show the alien diplomats Earth’s dominant religious culture. He leads them to a long, long line of humans, each representing a different religion found on Earth, starting with an atheist. It’s a brilliant moment that plays out right into the credits to showcase how many religions are to be found on Earth and that Sinclair intends on respecting every single one of them. 

“Parliament of Dreams” was honored at the 1994 Emmys for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Makeup for a Series thanks to all of the alien prosthetics used throughout the episode. The regular alien cast, including Ga’Kar, Londo, Koth, and Deleen, established the look for their respective species but the talented team behind the scenes used this episode to start working out their stock alien background designs. Babylon 5 felt like a real space station populated with hundreds of different species thanks to the team’s dedication in creating unique, memorable looks, even if you only see them in the background of a few shots. 

By the end of the series, there’s no doubt that Babylon 5 was ultimately a show about religion. The ultimate fates of multiple characters, including Sinclair and Neroon, is tied directly into their religious journey. “Parliament of Fates” is an early, beautiful indication to the importance of religion, and why humanity is unique in the universe.