1. All Good Things...
Finally, Straczynski is not afraid to let his characters die. He knows they're mortal (most of them) and susceptible to the same fate as us all. A show that lets its stars die makes for a far more interesting one than the likes of Star Trek where, when you hear for instance Worf has died, you know they'll find a way to bring him back. When the uncertainty is there it's much easier to worry about the characters and to be concerned when they are under attack or get injured. When Garibaldi disappears at the end of season three, he's not see until season four is in full swing, and you do begin to wonder. And when Sheridan jumps at Zha'Dum you can almost make yourself believe he is gone: after all, Sinclair was replaced, why not Sheridan? The biggest shock of all though is the death of Marcus Cole, in a typically Shakespearian tragic plot, where he literally gives his life for the one he loves. At the end of that episode, Franklin is rushing to get back to him, knowing what he intends and desperate to stop him, but unlike Trek where, in the nick of time our hero arrives, here the doctor is too late and by the time he arrives his friend is already dead. Also add in the death of Shon in season one's standalone episode "Believers", and you can begin to get a good sense of why this series was so loved, so different, so mature and so successful, and why in the end, if Star Trek had a bigger, older, more worldly-wise brother, that brother was J. Michael Straczynski's masterpiece of science-fiction, Babylon 5.