Hard to say, I got hooked over time. For those of you who are interested, here's the story:
I've been watching B5 from the beginning, since I always remembered Soul Hunters. During that episode I realized what a great show it was. I also knew that the story was being told by Londo, so I must have seen the pilot. I don't remember much of my first viewing of season 1, but I always did remember the reappearance of Babylon 4 and the Minbari War.
When season 2 started, I was mostly impressed by the intro. It was different from the season 1 intro, and we were 1 year further down the story.
I used my VCR for the first time during the attack of the Narn homeworld, so I only taped the last part of the episodes. (The thing that for a time stopped me from getting hooked was I didn't want to become like those Trekkies) By the end of season 2 I got a lot of my friends watching it. They are still rubbing my nose in the fact that they saw 'The Fall of Night' (when Kosh shows himself) , when I missed it at the time.
When season 3 started a few months later, I started to tape every episode (but still missed the second one). I guess I was getting hooked, 'cause it was hard for me to wait a whole week before the next episode was shown. I also started to see the similarities between the corrupt government in B5, and our own society. 'Man, the makers of B5 have guts for criticising their own government', I always thought.
In my country, they stopped showing B5 after 'Ship of Tears', when the Shadows finally came out of hiding. I couldn't believe it was the last episode, and thought it was taken of TV by the US government or something. Without internet, I had no idea what was going on, didn't know our local tv stations were the ones f*cking it up. I only had 13 episodes on tape, and was desperate for more (sounds familiar?). A whole year went by before they showed season 3 again. But this time, Ship of Tears wasn't the last episode. And by the time I saw 'War Without End', I've became truly obsessed with the show. I suddenly realised the whole story must have been written before the first episode was filmed.
When they stopped showing B5 again after Z'Ha'Dum, I decided not to wait. I just had internet, and started to search for B5 episodes on VHS. Some time later I ordered the Season 4 VHS boxset, and the S1 and S2 boxsets after that.
By now, I have all 5 boxsets, the Crusade boxset, and my self-made B5Movie boxset is almost finished.
As you can see, It's been one hell of a ride for me.
(They never showed reruns of season 1 and 2 over here, and only about 6 months ago they finally finished season 5.)
