Babylon 5: The River of Souls, on TNT
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This is the third Babylon 5 movie aired by TNT. It premiered in 1998, a few weeks before the end of season 5, but it actually takes place six months after the series. I must have watched it when it first aired, and I watched it again on DVD in 2025 (on All Souls' Day). I thought I remembered how it ended, but apparently I was confusing this movie with a regular episode of the series, from season one. So, not much about the movie was particularly familiar to me when I re-watched it. But I did think it was pretty good.

It begins with an archaeologist named Dr. Robert Bryson leading a dig on a seemingly dead alien world. Searching for the secret of eternal life, he discovers a buried chamber filled with glowing orbs, which contain souls. An alien ship then shows up and fires on the other members of the expedition, but Bryson hides. Later he goes to Babylon 5, where he meets with Michael Garibaldi, who is now in charge of Edgars Industries. Garibaldi has been tracking down the various black projects of the former head of the company, and deciding whether or not to continue funding them. Before he can make a decision about funding Bryson's work, he demands to see Bryson's notes on what he's accomplished so far, while Bryson continues to research an orb he had stolen from the dig site.

Meanwhile, station personnel have to deal with an unauthorized holo-brothel that they've just learned about. When security chief Zack Allan threatens to shut down the brothel, the owner sues Babylon 5 and Captain Elizabeth Lochley. Then, a Soul Hunter (Martin Sheen) arrives at the station, demanding the orb be returned to his people. But by then, Bryson had gone into hiding with the orb, and began releasing souls from it. The souls begin taking on holographic bodies from the brothel, and cause a great deal of havoc. They intend to destroy Babylon 5, as well as a fleet of Soul Hunter ships that had surrounded the station, to avoid going back into captivity in the orb. At one point, Lochley is badly hurt by one of the souls, and her soul is brought into the orb where she talks to one of the captive souls, who appears in the form of Dr. Stephen Franklin. He makes a shocking revelation to her about the souls, which I won't spoil. (But I guess when it was revealed, or maybe even sooner, I did remember that part of the movie.) When Lochley wakes up in medlab, she tells the Soul Hunter what she had learned, which changes his mind. So he must try to convince his people to let the souls go; and Lochley, Allan, Garibaldi, and the Soul Hunter, must try to prevent the souls from destroying the station.

That's all I want to reveal of the plot, except that Lochley eventually finds a way to get out of the lawsuit brought against her and the station. Anyway, it was a fairly interesting story. And while I don't think the Soul Hunters are ever right to capture and preserve souls the way they do, without getting consent from the souls, what they had done to this particular group of souls was way worse than usual, but again, I won't spoil why that is. But there is hope for the souls' future, and the station is saved. And yeah, that's about it.