|
skooma512 posted:I also like they weave it into the story later but using the markab gate as a weapon, because it's not being used by anyone by scavengers now. This is far better than having an entire species wiped out and it not having any kind of consequences later. It’s honestly not as bad as you remember it being. At least that was what I thought after my first rewatch. And there’s still some good things intertwined in there. And the Centauri Prime stuff is WORTH IT.
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 13:24
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 23:10 |
|
|
skooma512 posted:I also like they weave it into the story later but using the markab gate as a weapon, because it's not being used by anyone by scavengers now. This is far better than having an entire species wiped out and it not having any kind of consequences later. Well worth watching. Even at its worst, it's better than most of S1 and there are some really interesting structural things JMS does. Everyone just gets distracted by the dropping number of WHAM episodes or misses the degree to which the whole season is about how being a big-drat-hero doesn't necessarily make you a highly qualified and successful political or administrative leader. If you find Sheridan being a bit humbled and massively in over his head, you might not like those bits much, but you're missing not just great Bester bits but almost all the great G'Kar/Londo double-act scenes as well as a few more great moments for most of the remaining cast. Just accept that all the cringeworthy telepath cult stuff was deliberately written as cringeworthy and cult-ish; it just has staging, acting, and writing decisions that work against that and make it feel like someone trying to give us a Christ-like hero and failing (and not someone giving us a Christ-like hero and insisting we should be very frightened). Byron isn't quite as bad as the Nightwatch officials we loved to hate earlier in the series, but he's not all that far removed from them, either. I've watched through four times now and I like S5 better and better with each rewatch.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 18:49
|
|
|
S5 is better than people give it credit for, but yeah I just skip the byron scenes. It's easy in a world where you can just fast-forward stuff that isn't working for you personally.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 18:57
|
|
|
Jedit posted:There's a not entirely unsubstantiated theory that the Drafa Plague was created or refined by the Shadows. There's evidence that the Markab knew the Shadows were returning before Delenn told anyone about it. It was hubris that got them, but the possibility exists that they were pushed. I dunno. The Shadows are not just wiping out races for the evulz of it. They don't want the younger races dead, but converted to their way of thinking. Their philosophy is that conflict makes races stronger, conflict is the path to growth. Engineering a disease to completely wipe out a species doesn't really seem like it would make them stronger OR help a neighbour become stronger.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 19:19
|
|
|
Yeah and it's important that the Shadows aren't evil, per se. I mean there is something to be said for their method of instituting personal growth versus the opaque and order-driven vorlon perspective. Which is the whole point. Killing a bunch of people randomly with no purpose in the greater narrative isn't really that Shadow.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 19:21
|
|
|
On the subject of season 5, I envy anyone who has more B5 to watch for the first time.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 19:22
|
|
|
Pick posted:Killing a bunch of people randomly with no purpose in the greater narrative isn't really that Shadow. Only really if they're bored and wanna stir the pot a bit.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 20:13
|
|
|
Jedit posted:JMS has never exactly hidden the inspiration he took from Lord of the Rings. In the book the struggle does not end with the destruction of the One Ring; nor does the story in B5 end happily as soon as the villain is defeated. Yeah, I get that it's kinda a LOTR thing, I was wondering if the overly long and unnecessary post-evil segment (just like the Scouring of the Shire is) was intended as such, or the oddness of the shows fate made it required and JMS was just spinning it as a LOTR thing.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 20:51
|
|
|
Jedit posted:Also the plot didn't end in early S4, only the Shadow War. The Shadow War was always intended to end at the end of S4, with the Earth Civil War and Fall of Centauri Prime arcs being S5. Source for this because JMS said that S4 was supposed to end with Intersections in Real Time, well into the Earth Civil War arc.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 21:01
|
|
|
We all would have been better off without the Lyta/Byron gently caress scene.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 22:48
|
|
|
Midjack posted:We all would have been better off without the Lyta/Byron gently caress scene. jesus that was a weird loving scene
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 23:02
|
|
|
Stabbey_the_Clown posted:I dunno. The Shadows are not just wiping out races for the evulz of it. They don't want the younger races dead, but converted to their way of thinking. Their philosophy is that conflict makes races stronger, conflict is the path to growth. Engineering a disease to completely wipe out a species doesn't really seem like it would make them stronger OR help a neighbour become stronger. The Shadow Wars have been escalating, though. Last time round the Shadows genocided the Narn telepaths; this time both sides have planet-killer fleets. I don't consider it outside the bounds of credibility that a righteous and intellectually rigid race like the Markab - who were never going to convert to the Shadow way of thinking once the Vorlons got their hooks in - could have been targeted for extermination. Interesting thought: what if Drafa was a Vorlon plague deployed to keep the Markab on side by showing what happened to people who weren't, and the Shadows just reactivated or recreated it a thousand years later?
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2018 23:24
|
|
|
Stabbey_the_Clown posted:I dunno. The Shadows are not just wiping out races for the evulz of it. They don't want the younger races dead, but converted to their way of thinking. Their philosophy is that conflict makes races stronger, conflict is the path to growth. Engineering a disease to completely wipe out a species doesn't really seem like it would make them stronger OR help a neighbour become stronger. Yeah actually, this brings up a good point. The Shadows would have liked them, cause they wiped out the Hyac-do, showing the Hyac were stronger.
|
|
#
?
Jul 16, 2018 17:59
|
|
|
ZRM posted:Yeah actually, this brings up a good point. The Shadows would have liked them, cause they wiped out the Hyac-do, showing the Hyac were stronger. Except the Hyach wiping out the Hyach-do is an object lesson in how that kind of thinking is ultimately self-destructive. It's the sort of thing that the Shadows would kick under the rug and never bring up again.
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2018 00:50
|
|
|
Doctor Zero posted:It’s honestly not as bad as you remember it being. At least that was what I thought after my first rewatch. And there’s still some good things intertwined in there. And the Centauri Prime stuff is WORTH IT. I agree. I remembered it very negatively then when I rewatched it was... still not great but there isn't actually that much of it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2018 02:02
|
|
|
hope and vaseline posted:jesus that was a weird loving scene jms posted:Any special procedures for the scene between Lyta and Byron? Apparently, watching it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2018 02:32
|
|
|
Darth Freddy posted:Strong is a understatement. With all the camera time they gave the little girl you would normally think they were going to save her. The moment where the girl loses her balance is one of the most heartbreaking moments in TV history. Mira Furlan sells her part beautifully.
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2018 02:59
|
|
|
William Edgers in S4E16 used the Russians as example of handing over power willingly to strongmen, in 1917 and 2013. They arguably did when they allowed Medvedev to hand the Presidency back to Putin, in 2012  I know this is total confirmation bias but Russia seems to attract all these weird little predictions. Ghost Recon 1 in 2001 depicted Russians invading South Ossetia in 2008, they ended up doing exactly that.
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2018 07:26
|
|
|
Jedit posted:The Shadow Wars have been escalating, though. Last time round the Shadows genocided the Narn telepaths; this time both sides have planet-killer fleets. I don't consider it outside the bounds of credibility that a righteous and intellectually rigid race like the Markab - who were never going to convert to the Shadow way of thinking once the Vorlons got their hooks in - could have been targeted for extermination. Didn't we also have several dead worlds in Crusade that were said to have been wiped out by the Shadows and their minions? Seems like they really didn't have too many issues wiping out whole civilizations.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 00:51
|
|
|
Burning_Monk posted:Didn't we also have several dead worlds in Crusade that were said to have been wiped out by the Shadows and their minions? Seems like they really didn't have too many issues wiping out whole civilizations. Yes. And the Drahk plague in Crusade was itself Shadow technology. I presume that the Shadows would have deployed the plague in a number of situations: 1. Someone else answers "what do you want" not as a "return to glory" but "every last stinking X wiped out" and the Shadows oblige with a plague. That's species specific, 100% contagious and 100% fatal. And takes just enough time to kill everyone that they can cause maximum chaos through their response. (Keep in mind that the Shadows would potentially be OK if a race managed to survive the plague.) 2. Plague a race, then offer them a cure. Instant slaves. One presumes that this approach eventually fell out of favor. 3. Technomages have capacities with nanotech that sounds pretty much exactly like how the Drahk plague works. It's possible that in earlier times, individual technomages were capable of plagues similar to that if they so desired, meaning the Shadows would only be indirectly responsible. The advantage of the plague over a planet-killer is that the victims have time to respond (and nothing to lose), and that it can't easily be traced back to the Shadows.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 03:55
|
|
|
Burning_Monk posted:Didn't we also have several dead worlds in Crusade that were said to have been wiped out by the Shadows and their minions? Seems like they really didn't have too many issues wiping out whole civilizations. I thought that was more "Daddy's gone and we're playing with his guns"?
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 04:01
|
|
|
Neddy Seagoon posted:I thought that was more "Daddy's gone and we're playing with his guns"? That was the former Shadow thralls in the present, like the Drakh using the last Shadow planetkiller and then the plague on Earth. (Presumably some unchained Vorlon allies would've gotten into the mix sooner or later also.) The worlds the Excalibur was researching were victims of previous First Ones war cycles.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 07:21
|
|
|
McSpanky posted:That was the former Shadow thralls in the present, like the Drakh using the last Shadow planetkiller and then the plague on Earth. (Presumably some unchained Vorlon allies would've gotten into the mix sooner or later also.) The worlds the Excalibur was researching were victims of previous First Ones war cycles. I seem to recall Lorien pointing out that the purpose of the Shadow War cycle had become to perpetuate the cycle itself rather than to decide who was right and who was wrong. It's logical to assume that the two sides would be eliminating any race that did finally choose the other's path. The Minbari would probably have been taken out except for their bottled emotions; Delenn spins the Earth-Minbari War as a tragedy caused by the Minbari being so orderly that they all went mad together, but really they're a chaotic people holding themselves in check with the rigid order of the Vorlons.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 08:05
|
|
|
The idea of there being physical embodiments/champions of abstract forces such as chaos and order whose conflict embroils the whole galaxy is such an old school cosmic sci fi thing. It's like the guardians of time in Doctor Who, or Marvel's cosmic pantheon, or something that Star Trek would find on some random planet filled with "higher beings".
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 16:53
|
|
|
I have a small Crusade story. I'm sort of of the edge of a social group that organised the fan/scifi events in Australia. Galen was a guest and I was his minder for a bit around the time the lost tales was released. I talked with him a little bit and told him I thought it was a shame Crusade was cancelled, he didn't seem to care at all and was more interested in talking about the new tech and cgi that made lost tales possible. Having torrented it a few weeks before and found it disappointing and cheap looking the conversation just tapered off.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 17:09
|
|
|
I think the weird thing for me about the Shadow War cycle is that while it's portrayed in dialogue as two superpowers manipulating things behind the scenes to try and bring younger races around to their way of thinking, the Shadow Wars seem to be about rallying the troops and driving off the Shadows themselves rather than their proxies.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 21:33
|
|
|
Farmer Crack-rear end posted:I think the weird thing for me about the Shadow War cycle is that while it's portrayed in dialogue as two superpowers manipulating things behind the scenes to try and bring younger races around to their way of thinking, the Shadow Wars seem to be about rallying the troops and driving off the Shadows themselves rather than their proxies. It started out that way but over tens of thousands of years the shadows (and vorlons) started getting more and more direct. The shadows have been the most obvious during the show but the vorlons probably actually started the escalations by tampering with the races physiologically.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 21:58
|
|
|
Have to wonder... if there really were so many previous cycles of the Shadow Wars, and if most of those past combatants are no longer around, how many times could the cycle have climaxed with the Vorlons and Shadows running around with their planetkillers? How many interstellar civilizations were annihilated, how many times has sapient life had to crawl up from the muck so the ancient assholes could start all over again?McSpanky posted:That was the former Shadow thralls in the present, like the Drakh using the last Shadow planetkiller and then the plague on Earth. (Presumably some unchained Vorlon allies would've gotten into the mix sooner or later also.) The worlds the Excalibur was researching were victims of previous First Ones war cycles. Ah, I never watched Crusade, so I never heard that before.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 23:36
|
|
|
I do like how the Vorlons were not the obligate good guys, and in fact were fairly evil themselves. It is a nice twist and change of pace for the ancient races to be really two sides of the same coin and the other races are the actual protagonists.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 23:43
|
|
|
skooma512 posted:I do like how the Vorlons were not the obligate good guys, and in fact were fairly evil themselves. It is a nice twist and change of pace for the ancient races to be really two sides of the same coin and the other races are the actual protagonists. It is extremely cool that they’re equally evil, which is not really as evil as blindly ideological and in need of some perspective checks.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 23:56
|
|
|
It could've been done badly but yeah, the gradual reveal of the Vorlons being as bad as the Shadows was great. Finding out that oh no, the Vorlons aren't good, it's just Kosh is good and the other Vorlons don't trust him because of it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 23:57
|
|
|
Kosh IS good.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 23:58
|
|
|
Kosh 💕
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2018 23:58
|
|
|
We are all Kosh (I've had KOSH vanity plates on my cars since like '98 -- no one has ever had a clue what the plates mean though and when I tell them they are even more confused)
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2018 01:10
|
|
|
Pick posted:Kosh 💕 We are all Kosh.  E:f;b My ex and I watched Babylon 5 as it aired. (She wasn’t my ex then). I remember when JMS said on Usenet that after we knew what the Shadows are doing 30% of the fan base will probably agree with them. And he was right on. My ex was one.  We were T one point going to get VORLONS and SHADOWS for personalized plates but we couldn’t get Shadows. For the best after all I guess. Doctor Zero fucked around with this message at 01:40 on Jul 19, 2018 |
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2018 01:37
|
|
|
Ahhh holy poo poo you guys the centauri just beat the narn and londo is stone cold demanding g'kar go to trial. Sheridan looked like he was going to murder londo for yelling at him. I honestly can't watch anymore tonight but God drat that ending was hard, I think I hate londo. Edit: "the centauri learned this lesson once. We will teach it to them again." 
Kingtheninja fucked around with this message at 03:12 on Jul 19, 2018 |
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2018 03:10
|
|
|
Oh man. There’s... so much for you. There’s so much in your future
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2018 03:22
|
|
|
Kingtheninja posted:Ahhh holy poo poo you guys the centauri just beat the narn and londo is stone cold demanding g'kar go to trial. Sheridan looked like he was going to murder londo for yelling at him. You will look back on this experience as the time you definitely thought it couldn't get any better, and then it does.
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2018 04:36
|
|
|
If I remember right the "energy mines" the Narn cruisers shoot were also intended to be part of the EarthForce Omega destroyer's loadout.
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2018 06:19
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 23:10 |
|
|
Kingtheninja posted:Ahhh holy poo poo you guys the centauri just beat the narn and londo is stone cold demanding g'kar go to trial. Sheridan looked like he was going to murder londo for yelling at him. Also love that poo poo-eating smile on Sheridan's face as he says "I'm afraid that's not possible.  " in response to Londo's demand for G'kar's surrender.
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2018 06:26
|
|