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Babylon 5 omniverse
Babylon 5: In Valen's Name
The return of Babylon 4 leads the crew to a dangerous encounter and Delenn to revelations about the life of Valen.
80 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 1998
2 people are currently reading
180 people want to read
About the author
J. Michael Straczynski
1,371 books1,277 followersJoseph Michael Straczynski is an American filmmaker and comic book writer. He is the founder of Synthetic Worlds Ltd. and Studio JMS and is best known as the creator of the science fiction television series Babylon 5 (1993–1998) and its spinoff Crusade (1999), as well as the series Jeremiah (2002–2004) and Sense8 (2015–2018). He is the executor of the estate of Harlan Ellison.
Straczynski wrote the psychological drama film Changeling (2008) and was co-writer on the martial arts thriller Ninja Assassin (2009), was one of the key writers for (and had a cameo in) Marvel's Thor (2011), as well as the horror film Underworld: Awakening (2012), and the apocalyptic horror film World War Z (2013). From 2001 to 2007, Straczynski wrote Marvel Comics' The Amazing Spider-Man, followed by runs on Thor and Fantastic Four. He is the author of the Superman: Earth One trilogy of graphic novels, and he has written Superman, Wonder Woman, and Before Watchmen for DC Comics. Straczynski is the creator and writer of several original comic book series such as Rising Stars, Midnight Nation, Dream Police, and Ten Grand through Joe's Comics.
A prolific writer across a variety of media and former journalist, Straczynski is the author of the autobiography Becoming Superman (2019) for HarperVoyager, the novel Together We Will Go (2021) for Simon & Schuster, and Becoming a Writer, Staying a Writer (2021) for Benbella Books. In 2020 he was named Head of the Creative Council for the comics publishing company Artists, Writers and Artisans.
Straczynski is a long-time participant in Usenet and other early computer networks, interacting with fans through various online forums (including GEnie, CompuServe, and America Online) since 1984. He is credited as being the first TV producer to directly engage with fans on the Internet and to allow viewer viewpoints to influence the look and feel of his show. Two prominent areas where he had a presence were GEnie and the newsgroup rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated.
Straczynski wrote the psychological drama film Changeling (2008) and was co-writer on the martial arts thriller Ninja Assassin (2009), was one of the key writers for (and had a cameo in) Marvel's Thor (2011), as well as the horror film Underworld: Awakening (2012), and the apocalyptic horror film World War Z (2013). From 2001 to 2007, Straczynski wrote Marvel Comics' The Amazing Spider-Man, followed by runs on Thor and Fantastic Four. He is the author of the Superman: Earth One trilogy of graphic novels, and he has written Superman, Wonder Woman, and Before Watchmen for DC Comics. Straczynski is the creator and writer of several original comic book series such as Rising Stars, Midnight Nation, Dream Police, and Ten Grand through Joe's Comics.
A prolific writer across a variety of media and former journalist, Straczynski is the author of the autobiography Becoming Superman (2019) for HarperVoyager, the novel Together We Will Go (2021) for Simon & Schuster, and Becoming a Writer, Staying a Writer (2021) for Benbella Books. In 2020 he was named Head of the Creative Council for the comics publishing company Artists, Writers and Artisans.
Straczynski is a long-time participant in Usenet and other early computer networks, interacting with fans through various online forums (including GEnie, CompuServe, and America Online) since 1984. He is credited as being the first TV producer to directly engage with fans on the Internet and to allow viewer viewpoints to influence the look and feel of his show. Two prominent areas where he had a presence were GEnie and the newsgroup rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
February 5, 2017
I'd heard legends of the B5 comic books decades ago but never came across them before. I randomly found this one and the shadow one randomly at the Highgate oxfam and bought both. I'm really glad I did. This was a perfect little postscript to the story of Valen and Babylon 4. It read as a wonderful tribute to Michael O'Hare. Beautifully written, the characters felt and sounded right. It was like discovering another little piece of that universe. Like Delenn I was close to tears at the end.
September 19, 2021
Read upon completion of To Dream in the City of Sorrows.
I’m not sure how canon this was supposed to be. JMS wrote the first of three comics, and there was truly good stuff in here. Namely anything Delenn read off a computer screen was wonderful. We get a bit of a continuance from the earlier book, seeing Valen’s difficulties leading in war time. The storyline of a race which worshipped Valen despite not fully comprehending his teachings was a nice touch, but it didn’t feel like a true part of the canon. The last line about “finding her” would have been much more powerful without an obvious typo.
I’m not sure how canon this was supposed to be. JMS wrote the first of three comics, and there was truly good stuff in here. Namely anything Delenn read off a computer screen was wonderful. We get a bit of a continuance from the earlier book, seeing Valen’s difficulties leading in war time. The storyline of a race which worshipped Valen despite not fully comprehending his teachings was a nice touch, but it didn’t feel like a true part of the canon. The last line about “finding her” would have been much more powerful without an obvious typo.
March 7, 2016
Ambitious for a three-issue story arc, but oh-so-boring. There simply wasn't enough time to flush out all these concepts properly, and the end result is a fairly confusing mess. Since characters spend so much time inside their spacesuits, it's sometimes hard to tell them apart, and swapping out J. Michael Straczynski for Peter David after the first issue feels a bit like a bait-and-switch.
January 2, 2021
At some point around the time that Babylon 5 was airing 14 issues of comics were released under J. Michael Straczynski's supervision. They are now very out of print and, while you seem to get individual issues for an affordable price used, the TPBs are priced around a hundred dollars a pop. Luckily they are also readily available digitally for free if you just do a quick google search. I don't know how legal that is, but I'm not going to lose sleep over finding alternative means to read a comic that is not available in any other form.
At the end of the first season of Babylon 5 Michael O'Hare's personal health problems had reached a boiling point and he was forced to leave the show. Losing a lead is always unfortunate and difficult, but in this case it was even more so because season one had centered around a mystery involving his character, Jeffrey Sinclair, and why is was a pivotal figure in Minbari mythology. His departure meant some of the answers and plot points had to be rewritten which was doing smoothly and expertly enough that most fans assumed that was always the plan. In the third season Sinclair takes the station Babylon 4 back in time to use it to fight the first Shadow war, and uses the Triluminary to transform himself into the half Minbari messianic figure, Valen.
This comic begins at some point in the fourth season when Babylon 4 has suddenly reappeared and Sheridan, Delenn, Ivanova, and Garibaldi go aboard to investigate. They soon find themselves attacked by strange bug like aliens, and while quickly dispatching them find the station is going to crash into Epsilon Three. Meanwhile Delenn reads old logs about Valen's actions during the First Shadow war. The rest of the comic is mainly spent on flashbacks to the Shadow war while occasionally the human characters in the present try impotently to stop the stations degrading orbit.
This comic is extremely ambitious. It wants to tell a story of misunderstanding leading to conflict, with that misunderstanding echoing the one that almost let to the extinction of the human race in the Earth Minbari War. It has revelations about Valen, his teachings, his doubts about whether he should try to avert the greatest tragedies of his time. It also tries to have a compelling framing story with action and narrowly diverted disaster. Unfortunately it tries to do this all in three issues; I'm not sure this would have worked as one episode. It think it would have needed two episodes to really work, and I am convinced this would have been a lot better with 6 issues.
The art was also very sloppy with the ships looking unrecognizable and silly a lot, and the character likenesses really bouncing all over. It's written in part by Peter David and while David is a talented writer, I have never felt that he really had the right voice for Babylon 5 or a complete grasp of the characters. It's hard to explain, but the show always feels slightly off in his hands.
That said, I enjoyed this and found the ending very bittersweet. In my ideal world J. Michael Straczyski would write a series of comics to finish off the telepath war and Drakh war plot with a focus on finishing Crusade. Since that's never going to happen I'll just settle for these old side stories.
At the end of the first season of Babylon 5 Michael O'Hare's personal health problems had reached a boiling point and he was forced to leave the show. Losing a lead is always unfortunate and difficult, but in this case it was even more so because season one had centered around a mystery involving his character, Jeffrey Sinclair, and why is was a pivotal figure in Minbari mythology. His departure meant some of the answers and plot points had to be rewritten which was doing smoothly and expertly enough that most fans assumed that was always the plan. In the third season Sinclair takes the station Babylon 4 back in time to use it to fight the first Shadow war, and uses the Triluminary to transform himself into the half Minbari messianic figure, Valen.
This comic begins at some point in the fourth season when Babylon 4 has suddenly reappeared and Sheridan, Delenn, Ivanova, and Garibaldi go aboard to investigate. They soon find themselves attacked by strange bug like aliens, and while quickly dispatching them find the station is going to crash into Epsilon Three. Meanwhile Delenn reads old logs about Valen's actions during the First Shadow war. The rest of the comic is mainly spent on flashbacks to the Shadow war while occasionally the human characters in the present try impotently to stop the stations degrading orbit.
This comic is extremely ambitious. It wants to tell a story of misunderstanding leading to conflict, with that misunderstanding echoing the one that almost let to the extinction of the human race in the Earth Minbari War. It has revelations about Valen, his teachings, his doubts about whether he should try to avert the greatest tragedies of his time. It also tries to have a compelling framing story with action and narrowly diverted disaster. Unfortunately it tries to do this all in three issues; I'm not sure this would have worked as one episode. It think it would have needed two episodes to really work, and I am convinced this would have been a lot better with 6 issues.
The art was also very sloppy with the ships looking unrecognizable and silly a lot, and the character likenesses really bouncing all over. It's written in part by Peter David and while David is a talented writer, I have never felt that he really had the right voice for Babylon 5 or a complete grasp of the characters. It's hard to explain, but the show always feels slightly off in his hands.
That said, I enjoyed this and found the ending very bittersweet. In my ideal world J. Michael Straczyski would write a series of comics to finish off the telepath war and Drakh war plot with a focus on finishing Crusade. Since that's never going to happen I'll just settle for these old side stories.
January 3, 2013
Not bad; I liked the Valen backstory, but the plot was rather weak.
Want to read
January 12, 2013This book is available online but it must be rare, copies are $125 to start! I think I may skip this one, have already read the graphic novel version I believe.
June 26, 2023
Very quick graphic novel to read glad it expanded on events that happened in the episodes Babylon squared and war without end parts 1 and 2 overall good
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews