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MrL_JaKiri posted:What, even [redacted]? Every single episode of this show is great. Even the bad ones, and I am unanimous on this.
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Jul 17, 2020 13:20
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S2E21 - Comes the Inquisitor G'Kar reduced to yelling from a soapbox  I've been waiting for Vir in all this. Lennier sounds like he's been talking to Kosh... We have sent for an Inquisitor? We must be sure of you? How will she know who it is?! Gotta love a Vorlon plot. What the gently caress is this guy's deal? The Vorlons keep a 1800s British guy around as an Inquisitor? I am not surprised by the fact they've visited earth, they're an elder race, nothing they do can really be that surprising at this point. Loved the Vir/G'Kar scene. No apology could possibly suffice, but I don't think Vir could stop himself, he seems terribly upset about his own people. Nice thing of Garibaldi to do, assisting G'Kar. Good scene between them, though I wouldn't have blamed G'Kar for lying considering the situation.  Lennier is the one who ends up bringing Sheridan in to the interrogation. Sheridan being called in seemed intentional, so again I wonder if Lennier is working with Kosh in some way. Neat cane flame path. LOL he's Jack the Ripper? That's who they send to test people? It should have been obvious but I missed that they gave 1888 specifically the first time. I like that they use it as punishment for him, at least. Not sure how they got the message back from Narn in 24 hours using the rangers, also. Seems impossible without so-far unheard of tech. Even the psychic link we saw from the Centauri Emperor wouldn't help with a video feed. We establish that Sheridan and Delenn are worthy of championing the side of the light in the upcoming great war. Another good episode, though the use of Jack the Ripper felt kinda out of characterishly Doctor Who.
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Jul 17, 2020 18:02
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General thought about the season so far: it is going to be much harder to make my tier list for this season. There's been a lot of work done to redeem and flesh out the human characters. Talia seems to just be gone, and I don't know if it was a casting thing or not, but Lyta being a psychic for the resistance seems like she's meant to replace her. JMS seemed to realize that the new actress for Na'Toth wasn't nearly as strong and she basically got dumped entirely when she could have been all over this Narn invasion stuff - they did work to give her a backstory last season and then completely ditched her, but without actually getting rid of her. Lennier has been pretty meh this season. Vir is a rising star imo, he seems to be going through a real moral quandry and has had strong opinions since early season 1 - I hope we keep getting more of that as we move forward. Sheridan I actually like a lot now, he's siding with the Narns, as is Garibaldi, he was willing to sacrifice himself for Delenn (and her for him). Obviously G'Kar and Londo are still god tier from an acting and character perspective, though Londo has seriously put himself in a bad place. Gonna have to give it a think after I watch the finale, which may not be until tomorrow.
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Jul 17, 2020 18:30
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TheAardvark posted:S2E21 - Comes the Inquisitor Ivanova was calling earth in season 1. They clearly have ftl communications. Centauri are probably jamming all signals from Narn
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Jul 17, 2020 19:02
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MikusR posted:Ivanova was calling earth in season 1. They clearly have ftl communications. Centauri are probably jamming all signals from Narn Right, stupid.. the way it was presented in the episode I got it caught in my head they were going to have to somehow physically get things across. Obviously it's something with pirate radio kinda stuff and we have to assume the rangers had people on Narn already.
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Jul 17, 2020 19:04
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TheAardvark posted:S2E21 - Comes the Inquisitor One of my favs. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead.Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. How do you apologize to them? I can't. Then I cannot forgive.
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Jul 17, 2020 20:09
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DrBouvenstein posted:One of my favs.
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Jul 18, 2020 22:49
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S2ep13 - Hunter, Prey “Maybe someone should have labelled the future ‘some assembly required’.” Kosh’s ship would definitely look more impressive were it not for the graphics, but I appreciate the awe it inspires. I’m pretty sure it was mentioned before that the Vorlons have organic technology? I guess that was speculation at the time. The ship being an obvious extension of that, with the very cool weapon pod forming. I’d love to know what Kosh and the ship’s conversation was. Maybe that was a (very spiky) sensor, and Kosh asked for analysis, which the ship projected onto its outer hull? Kosh again mentions song/music in conjunction to telepathic factors (as he did with Talia during the bizarre conversation), making me believe that that is something akin to how the Vorlons perceive ESP abilities? Oh hey, Bernie Casey! And Tony Steedman! He’s one of those English actors that you see all the time growing up in the UK. Jacobs on the run from Earth because of what he knows is a good plot thread. It all gets wrapped up a little patly, but it’s interesting grounds for the first steps of Kosh and Sheridan by immediately asking for a favour with using his ship. Garibaldi notices a Ranger (I think?) when he and Sheridan come down the stairs, while Sheridan is noticing the red ribbon from Hague’s Deep Throat agent. His disguise being a fedora is comically terrible, but the trip down below seeing the alternate Down Below Zocalo was a fun detour. Dollar store Steven Seagal was not at all intimidating in any way. Above everything else, Sheridan and Kosh’s conversation is all levels of intriguing. They wouldn’t understand what he looks like inside the suit? Either he’s a non-Euclidean mass of extra-dimensional nature and a mere sight would make anyone go mad, or it’s a form that would be instantly recognised (a la Arthur C. Clarke’s Childhood’s End), and the wrong ideas taken. Kosh’s anger at ‘what do you want?’ made me laugh, and then I considered the implications of it being Morden’s line. The Vorlons know who these creatures are, Sheridan pointedly says the Vorlon technology is a thousand years in advance of Earth, and Kosh tells him he will ‘fight legends’. They’ve already been stated as some kind of returning ancient evil, so presumably the Vorlons are just as ancient, but they won the first time? 
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Jul 18, 2020 23:43
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Something The_Doctor said I'd like to comment on, but I'm far enough ahead to need to spoil separately: S2E21 My thoughts on Kosh's form remain the same as they have since episode 1: either an empty suit (AI), or a bog standard human/Centauri/etc. the same physical appearance as The Shadows would also make sense but they appear to be quadrupeds. Other than those, I can't see any other possible shapes they could be and have it be a huge deal. Even the "devil" appearance I don't think would really matter, since that's gotta be a thing that only humans would care about, and even they would get over it pretty quick given all the aliens we've seen. E: also the human appearance is more likely after e21 considering they've known of earth for apparently a very long time. could easily be an ancient human civilization, or one that got plucked and planted on some other planet thousands of years ago AARD VARKMAN fucked around with this message at 00:27 on Jul 19, 2020 |
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Jul 19, 2020 00:23
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I don't remember if you watched the pilot movie, The Gathering, but it may be relevant to your speculation.
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Jul 19, 2020 00:49
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SlothfulCobra posted:I don't remember if you watched the pilot movie, The Gathering, but it may be relevant to your speculation. S2E21 I saw The Gathering and in Lyta's mind Kosh had a human hand when he got poisoned. However I have never put much faith in anything from that - the entire thing could be bologna fed to Lyta and the doctor from the pilot. hell the entire plot of the pilot could have been another one of Kosh's little tests. actually the more I think about it the more I like the idea of the The_Doctor's Childhood's End theory because that would be cool if it turned out all the races also had history of devil types that looked exactly the same as earth ones E: about to watch the S2 finale AARD VARKMAN fucked around with this message at 00:59 on Jul 19, 2020 |
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Jul 19, 2020 00:56
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TheAardvark posted:S2E21 I didn't even remember that bit. What I do remember is that the original doctor seemed pretty amazed at the whole experience of seeing Kosh inside his suit, and maybe it was part of the justification for shipping him back to earth when the actor didn't sign up for the TV show. Which honestly could mean anything.
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Jul 19, 2020 01:06
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S2E22 - The Fall of Night Well, here we are, the season 2 finale. Been looking forward to this all day. Right from the title it looks like we're about to get in to the war with The Darkness. Sheridan doing pilot training. I think I can accept him being at risk to do this, I assume the guy who earned the title "Star Killer" was some kind of piloting prodigy back in the day. Lol I love that Vir and Lennier have apparently been commiserating with each other for a while now. I really like the dynamic of the ambassador/attache pairs in the show, I wish we still had the original Na'Toth from season 1. Drazi and Pak'Mara. The Pak'Mara are another race that has been mentioned repeatedly over the last several episodes - they even had their own special "PAK MARA USE ONLY" sign back in the space bathroom! The Centauri, predictably, moving on to conquer more worlds immediately. And then once they've got the whole known universe in a war the shadows will have us right where they want us Oh gently caress, Sheridan straight up confronting Londo. I once again have no idea why the earth alliance would delegate this position to a military officer and not a career politician. I'd think psi-corps would want someone they directly control doing this. Ah, the Ministry of Peace arrives finally. Lol at the random lovers' tiff And here comes the sales pitch on Ivanova. Bet this dude is a psychic. I guess we'll know since they established Ivanova can detect being read. All right, G'Kar's going to try and talk to the ministry.. countdown to them refusing him and announcing an alliance with the Centauri. Really working hard here to paint humans as evil with this night watch poo poo. Keffer gonna find him some Shadows. Also predicting Keffer's death now. Killing off a named, long standing human hasn't really happened yet and this show is pretty due for it. Surprise! Earth is allying with the Centauri!!!! It's painful because it's exactly the kind of thing we'd do. This universe is definitely the same timeline that elected trump. Nothing from Ivanova about the guy being a psychic, guess he's just a co-conspirator with the psi-corps. Ooh boy the earth alliance is NOT going to like this. Actually this could work out - him jeopardizing the alliance would be a blessing. Here we loving GOOOOOOOOOOOOO Eat poo poo, Earth Alliance. Eat big poo poo. Lmao Sheridan starting a war. Oh come the gently caress on don't tell me they're going to still offer the alliance. gently caress this is pretty tense. Looking forward to whatever Sheridan can get away with in this meeting. No way he's going to let this stand right? Lol G'Kar hiding behind a tree Rip Keffer. Oh gently caress! Sheridan! ¡¡¡¡¡KOSH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well okay then. The Childhood's End twist but angels lol. So that's a thing. A completely ridiculous thing. I'm thinking they're an intrinsically psychic race, hence the differing appearances for different people. They could also be the result of years of genetic enhancement.. anyway now that the Cork's out of the bottle we get more Vorlon info. They've been pushing races around for millions of years. gently caress they could have done anything to us in that time. If the shadows have fought the vorlons multiple times over the millenia, and are literally on the station as we saw with Morden, I'm surprised they couldn't figure out what race the Vorlons were until now. I'd have thought they'd recognize the suit or tech or be able to scan him or something. I guess they could be using completely different tech than they did in the past encounters to aide in keeping it a secret. Anyway they're millions of years old apparently so they're basically gods and there's no limit to things they could be doing. Lol at the ending voiceover exposition but kind of annoying we wussed out on getting Sheridan to confront the treaty and it just happens without any real recourse from him w/r/t the apology.
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Jul 19, 2020 02:25
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TheAardvark posted:Here we loving GOOOOOOOOOOOOO
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Jul 19, 2020 03:06
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SlothfulCobra posted:The Gathering Spoilers through the end of season 2 here: The Psi Corps mole was planned from the beginning, but obviously it couldn't have been Talia since she wasn't there. Instead it was intended for one of the characters who didn't make it to season 1. There's enough information in the pilot to figure out who originally had that plotline if you watch certain parts closely enough.
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Jul 19, 2020 04:05
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The_Doctor posted:S2ep13 - Hunter, Prey He was originally supposed to have been the president in Caves of Androzani, which would have been great. Not that David Neal is poo poo or anything.
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Jul 19, 2020 11:55
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TheAardvark posted:S2E22 - The Fall of Night The collectable card game used this as the picture for the card "Lack of Subtlety".
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Jul 19, 2020 11:55
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MrL_JaKiri posted:He was originally supposed to have been the president in Caves of Androzani, which would have been great. Not that David Neal is poo poo or anything. Huh, that would have been interesting. For me, my biggest memory of him is from Citizen Smith. 
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Jul 19, 2020 12:47
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S2ep14 - There All the Honor Lies “Beauty... in the dark.” Merchandising! Can I buy a plush Kosh?  The Londo figure is something I’ve definitely seen at conventions, which in turn led me to eBay, and I’m probably going to be buying some toys when this is all over. The scene of the human and Drazi wearing masks of different races was remarkably fun. The only sour note on that whole plot is the weird bit at the end where he flips out over a bear. Who does that? The setup for Sheridan being framed is remarkably obvious, and Garibaldi gets to the heart of it in a moment, and Sheridan plays incredibly dense. ‘Why was a PPG there? Gosh I must have just picked it up. Random floor PPG I guess.’ Come on! The show paints you much smarter than this! Races that do not lie is a often-trod sci-fi trope. Vulcans don’t except when they do, and of course the same goes for the Minbari. White lies to preserve honour are often the loophole too. The only really interesting part of that plotline is the lore about the Minbari clans. I assume these are smaller breakdowns within the castes, but they don’t elaborate on what clan exactly entails. Family? Houses of ideology/philosophy? Sports team supporters? I’m assuming the incident Londo talks about is his night out with Lennier. This situation does fall under the problem Star Trek has had on many an occasion where this could all be solved if they had a few security cameras dotted around the place. Interestingly they never follow up on the human thief who stole Sheridan’s link. I guess we’re meant to assume he was just some lurker who got paid? Kosh’s lesson was very beautiful, and the shot of him moving his head to the song was an oddly touching moment. The monastic chanting brings back the ‘song’ motif from before, so is he getting Sheridan in tune? Vir and Londo’s relationship errs on the side of sweet, although a decent amount of it can be read as the same ‘Londo wants to hold onto his very few friends’ beat in the previous ep with Garibaldi.
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Jul 20, 2020 01:17
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TheAardvark posted:The Fall of Night: Hey, remember Chekov's Defense Grid?  The scene of the station vs the Centauri battlecruiser is still one of my favorite in the show. I'm pretty sure JMS has said that Sheridan was 100% going to give that "As with everything else, it's the thought that counts" speech as his apology.
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Jul 20, 2020 22:18
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S2ep15 - And Now For a Word “The Psi-Corps Is Your Friend. Trust the Corps.” Torqueman isn’t several AU from Torquemada (which autocorrect accidentally clued me into, so good job Apple), so here’s the inquisition for B5 in glorious technicolour. ISN bearing heavily on the Fox News line (were they even a thing in 1995?) ISN’s sensationalist right wing reads are common parlance today, but in 1995? The bad faith questioning of Delenn springs to mind, attacking your interviewee, making it very clear these are people not to be trusted as fair and balanced. Interesting that this episode gives up a wealth of info about Earth and how it views B5 (41% disapproval rating!). The Office of Public Information and the Ministry for Public Morale are some terrifyingly facist concepts. The Psi-Corps ad is incredibly cheesy, complete with subliminal messaging. Ivanova hovering in the background of the tech’s interview and pulling focus was great. Minbar sounds lovely. 1/4 of it covered by ice and crystalline cities. The council chamber scene was the most raucous it’s ever been, but the camera work felt weird considering they were actual cameras given special permission to film. If anything surely they’d be more out of the way, rather than right in people’s faces? Weirdly, this episode felt like a catch-up to bring new viewers up to speed? There were a lot of potted histories and characters going over previous ground. Downside was that this meant it felt quite dull by not really engaging with the main players outside of staged interviews. A blockade of B5 by Centauri forces could have been a big story, but it just felt like dressing with little consequence. Maybe this was bigger in 1995, but for a 24 hour news cycle these days, this is just Tuesday on Fox.
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Jul 23, 2020 01:17
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The_Doctor posted:ISN bearing heavily on the Fox News line (were they even a thing in 1995?) ISN’s sensationalist right wing reads are common parlance today, but in 1995? Answer about real news service Fox news launched 1 year later. And it launched specifically to be a right wing biased news service. The joke at the time was "if you have to call yourself fair and balanced you're probably not"
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Jul 23, 2020 03:47
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An aside: I have the DVDs, but after some discussion in here about the version on Vudu being the superior 4:3 I decided to check it out. I was very worried at first when we watched The Gathering tonight because if anything that one might be even worse than the DVD version (although it's been a while). Its widescreen but it looks like not just the effects shots, but the whole thing, got the crop-and-zoom treatment that hampered the DVD effects shots. Also it had a terrible frame stutter. But the first few seconds of episode 1 put my fears to rest, the cgi looks smooth as butter. I'm happy I spent the money to support the greatest show of all time. Really looking forward to seeing this in a way I haven't for 20+ years.
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Jul 23, 2020 03:57
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Yeah, the Vudu versions are a far better experience than the DVDs, as I found out during my current rewatch. The composite shots and CGI are so much less distracting as they're not blown up and cropped. There's 3 episodes in the entire show that are 16:9 letterboxed on Vudu (probably couldn't acquire the 4:3 original), so I'd use the DVDs instead for these: S1E14, S3E10, S5E22. edit: At least S5E3 is also widescreen. Zat fucked around with this message at 17:05 on Jul 27, 2020 |
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Jul 23, 2020 12:29
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Are the other movies included as well, or is it just The Gathering, as the pilot?
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Jul 23, 2020 12:47
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The versions I’m watching on my Plex are quite clear, but I noticed during ‘Now for a word’ they zoomed in whenever there was text on screen, cropping the picture. Mine are all 16:9 too.
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Jul 23, 2020 12:54
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Son of Sam-I-Am posted:Are the other movies included as well, or is it just The Gathering, as the pilot? I don't actually know. Vudu is not available where I live, so I had to use other means to get to it, and I only have the main show.
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Jul 23, 2020 12:58
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The_Doctor posted:The versions I’m watching on my Plex are quite clear, but I noticed during ‘Now for a word’ they zoomed in whenever there was text on screen, cropping the picture. Mine are all 16:9 too. Sounds like those are at least based on the DVDs then.
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Jul 23, 2020 13:00
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Yeah any version that is widescreen will unfortunately have crops of any cgi or cgi/live composite scenes sadly This thread is wonderful and I shall bow out now. I think quite a few ppl in the main thread started rewatches because of this thread too, myself included
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Jul 23, 2020 13:19
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Alright, about to start the next ep. Do I do Knives or In the Shadow... first?
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Jul 25, 2020 22:50
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The_Doctor posted:Alright, about to start the next ep. Do I do Knives or In the Shadow... first? Definitely do Knives first. It was pretty clear that it was chronologically first, and it sets the tone for the season a lot better. IMO.
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Jul 25, 2020 23:07
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S2ep17 - Knives “Well, anyone willing to command Babylon 5 has got to be slightly insane.” “Knowledge is a great tool of politics.” “Insanity is part of the times! You must embrace the madness, let it fire you.” Sheridan going for the spooky bait again, especially right on his own station. Attaboy! Continuing a fine trend of 90s tv, he wanders Grey 10 with a torch/flashlight, and doesn’t turn on the lights. Considering this new alien only just came to B5, it sounds like there’s potentially more to explore in the Grey sector triangle. I want to believe. Thankfully Sheridan doesn’t spend the whole episode keeping his hallucinations to himself, and explains them out to others pretty quickly. Interesting we dip back to the Babylon 4 well, even it’s just for a ‘the fabric of space-time is especially soft here’. The alien story itself felt very short, with much more time devoted over to Londo’s arc. I can’t believe they devoted valuable space to a baseball diamond. Please, that’s what the holodeck is for. I do like that the little batting cage set they constructed for it looks appropriately rusty and run down. No-one goes there, no-one maintains this space; it’s good environmental story telling. Londo and Vir discussing Centauri opera, which all reads as faux Italian. Centauri culture itself always reads as like Interstellar renaissance Florence or Rome with dashes of the British Empire and pre-revolutionary France. It’s a heady mix of aristocratic houses of influence and court intrigue, with an Old World sensibility and sense of style. It all feels weirdly antiquated in the sci-fi setting, but I suspect that’s the point, and Vir pretty much confirms it in this episodes The Centauri continually cling to these old structures of their society, and make no attempt to evolve. Intriguingly, Urza didn’t know Londo was involved with Refa though? It seemed up till now that the Centauri court was very aware of Londo, who said he wanted to be behind the scenes, while Refa was the man in front of the curtain. If everyone knows about Londo, surely they know about his association with Refa too? The obvious read is that Urza already knew everything and the whole innocence bit was an act to get to the duel and sacrifice himself. He went to B5 knowing he wasn’t coming home. Vir’s facial expressions in the background of the scene where Urza challenges Londo are a delight, every moment a variation on ‘oh no, this is bad.’
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Jul 26, 2020 01:49
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The_Doctor posted:S2ep17 - Knives This is the biggest pet peeve of mine in the entire world, with every type of fiction. Anything past the point where the audience knows what's really going on is edging and edging is not how i like to watch my TV tyvm.
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Jul 26, 2020 02:46
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TheAardvark posted:
Very much same. Just explain what’s happening to other people who care about you, don’t keep it to yourself forever until it’s all too late. Edging is fun, but not in a tv context.
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Jul 26, 2020 09:40
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Today I begin season 3. 
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Jul 26, 2020 11:11
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TheAardvark posted:Today I begin season 3. Godspeed goonfriend
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Jul 26, 2020 11:45
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Hooooboy. Have fun.
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Jul 26, 2020 12:44
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sebmojo posted:Godspeed goonfriend The only thing I’ve been mad at is no-one picked up on my excellent ‘G’quanspeed’ pun I did in an earlier review.
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Jul 26, 2020 12:55
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TheAardvark posted:Today I begin season 3. You may want to clear your schedule and hydrate first, you're not going to want to get up again for a while.
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Jul 26, 2020 18:04
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The_Doctor posted:The only thing I’ve been mad at is no-one picked up on my excellent ‘G’quanspeed’ pun I did in an earlier review. Oh man that's a good one. I love dumb puns.
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Jul 26, 2020 18:38
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