Babylon 5’s The Road Home Ending Explained

Warning: The following contains SPOILERS for Babylon 5: The Road Home.

The ending of Babylon 5: The Road Home is truly a beginning, establishing a fresh start for the classic science fiction series. It is still uncertain if the animated feature might serve as the basis for the long-awaited and long-delayed Babylon 5 reboot. In any case, it sets the stage for a new saga set in J. Michael Straczynski’s universe.

Set several weeks after the legendary hero’s departure from the Babylon 5 station, Babylon 5: The Road Home follows John Sheridan as he becomes unstuck in time. As the film progresses, Sheridan passes through several points in his past, present, and future, before wandering the multiverse while being chased by a shadowy figure. Sheridan ultimately winds up on a completely different version of Babylon 5 facing a younger variant of himself.

Related: Did DS9 Plagiarize Babylon 5? Star Trek Controversy Explained

How The Road Home Reboots Babylon 5

It soon becomes apparent in Babylon 5: The Road Home that the timeline of this new Babylon 5 is radically different, with the younger John Sheridan having been in command for almost two years and having never heard of the Shadows. By that point in the elder Sheridan’s life, the Shadow War had already begun in earnest. He stops talking about the Shadow War for fear of disturbing their timeline but begins suffering from displacement sickness before he can be questioned further.

Thankfully, a Zathras of the new reality arrives with a device he says can stabilize Sheridan’s position in time, space, and reality. The shadowy figure chasing Sheridan also appears, but he realizes that it is his wife, Delenn, who has been after him all this time. The two clasp hands and vanish in a flash of light, returning to the original timeline, with only Zathras, the younger Sheridan, Security Chief Michael Garibaldi, and telepath Lyta Alexander witnessing the incident. This sets up a new Babylon 5 timeline, similar to how the 2009 Star Trek movie created the Kelvin Timeline.

As Babylon 5: The Road Home closes, the younger Sheridan describes the encounter to the Minbari Ambassador Delenn, who is revealed to have not yet undergone the process that changed her into a Human-Minbari Hybrid at the start of Babylon 5 season 2. There is some comedic irony as the younger Sheridan wonders about the identity of the mystery woman who saved his elder variant, unaware that he is speaking to her. As they walk and talk through the station’s casino, there are other signs that while this Babylon 5 is familiar, the timeline has been reset to something similar to Babylon 5 season 1.

G’Kar’s Fate Beyond The Galactic Rim Explained

John Sheridan’s journey through the multiverse indirectly reveals the result of G’Kar’s journeys following Babylon 5 season 5. The former Narn ambassador turned prophet left Babylon 5 to explore the galaxy, needing to put some distance between himself and his followers. Later stories, like the pilot for the spinoff Babylon 5: The Legend of the Rangers, revealed an older and wiser G’Kar, but no details were ever revealed about what he found beyond the Galactic Rim.

At one point during Babylon 5: The Road Home, Sheridan winds up at “the edge of everything” and is confronted by a being who takes on G’Kar’s form. When Sheridan inquires about G’Kar, the being confirms that the Narn prophet found out what was beyond the Galactic Rim. He does not exactly say what G’Kar found, but the implication is that he discovered some of the First Ones, the all-powerful eldest beings in reality.

Zathras Is Part Of A Clone Race

First introduced in the Babylon 5 season 1 episode “Babylon Squared,” the odd alien Zathras disappeared as mysteriously as he appeared on the lost Babylon 4 space station. He was later confirmed to be a technician who tended to the Great Machine on Epsilon-3 and played a role in establishing the stable time loop that led to the creation of the modern Minbari society. A second Zathras was introduced in Babylon 5 season 4 who confirmed that he was the brother of the first Zathras and that there were originally 10 brothers, all named Zathras.

Babylon 5: The Road Home reveals that the many versions of Zathras are part of a clone race, the Zathrii, created to maintain the Great Machine. Precisely how many Zathrii exist is unknown, but it is far more than the 10 from the original series. The revelation that the Zathrii are clones also explains the original Zathras’s fatalistic attitude and lackluster response to the prospect of dying or being lost in time. If something happens to him, the Great Machine can always make another Zathras.

The Zathrii are also revealed to be united across all time and space. They are able to communicate with their fellow Zathrii in parallel realities using an advanced quantum communication system. This enables the Zathras who started working on a reality stabilizer for John Sheridan to send instructions and blueprints to a Zathras in the reboot reality at the end of this Babylon 5 movie.

Does The Road Home Set Up The Babylon 5 Reboot?

Babylon 5: The Road Home establishes a fresh start for the Babylon 5 story in a new universe, but it is unclear if it is directly setting up the Babylon 5 reboot. At the time of the film’s release in August 2023, a live-action reboot of Babylon 5 on The CW network was “on hold” until the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes were resolved. Even if the new series is not picked up, Warner Animation might produce more animated movies set in the Babylon 5 multiverse if Babylon 5: The Road Home sells well.

Is There A Post Credit Scene?

There are no post-credits scenes in Babylon 5: The Road Home. However, the credits do end with a special title card honoring the original Babylon 5 cast members who died after the series ended in 1998. This was meant to honor their work on the series, even as Babylon 5: The Road Home celebrates the show’s 30th anniversary.

The Real Meaning Of Babylon 5: The Road Home

Like the original Babylon 5 series, the movie Babylon 5: The Road Home is built around the twin themes of love and individualism. Love is established as a universal force, capable of moving and attracting things, like gravity or magnetism. Delenn’s quest to rescue John Sheridan is proof of this. Sheridan’s journey also draws a link between the quantum mechanical belief that an observer changes the thing they observe and the philosophical belief that one person can make a difference. This odd blend of mysticism and science lies at the core of Babylon 5’s unique aesthetic and established the series as something special in the field of science fiction.