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The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
S3ep2 - Convictions

Not many fishes
Left in the sea
Not many fishes
Just Londo and me.


I love the concept of B5 now being a place of pilgrimage after several races saw a holy being there. Oh, you crazy Vorlons. The monks from Arthur C Clarke’s ‘The Nine Billion Names of God’ showing up is an interesting side note.

Zach’s still wearing the Night Watch band? I thought he walked away from that.

Bombs! Zack’s security colleague seemed very laidback about an explosion going off in Down Below. Mate, this is a space station, that’s sort of something you should be concerned about. Carlson is that tired trope of angry insane loner who SHOUTS A LOT because he’s mad as hell and isn’t going to etc. Ho hum.

Londo is making it very hard to hate him when he’s being lovely and sitting with Lennier. But then for the whole first minute of coming round after the lift explosion, he completely ignores G’kar, not even looking at him. That said, the lift scene is amazing, not least for G’kar’s hilarious tiny voice “ᵂᵉ'ʳᵉ ᶦⁿ ʰᵉʳᵉ” mocking Londo. God, they’re so good together. :allears: G’Kar’s little ‘no!’ when they’re found is so funny.

Not a great episode, but the good parts are much enlivened by Londo and G’kar once more. Shame the plot happening around them is so dull.

NB: Garibaldi calls Morishi Jay at one point, but Jay is the laidback one at the beginning. :confused:

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Groke
Jul 27, 2007
New Adventures In Mom Strength
Yeah, now you know why Katsulas and Jurasik are the best things about the whole show.

ultrafilter
Aug 23, 2007

It's okay if you have any questions.


Yeah, those two really did steal the spotlight in pretty much every scene they're in. I really wish they'd been able to parlay that into better careers.

ConfusedUs
Feb 24, 2004

Bees?
You want fucking bees?
Here you go!
ROLL INITIATIVE!!





The_Doctor posted:

S3ep2 - Convictions

Not many fishes
Left in the sea
Not many fishes
Just Londo and me.


I love the concept of B5 now being a place of pilgrimage after several races saw a holy being there. Oh, you crazy Vorlons. The monks from Arthur C Clarke’s ‘The Nine Billion Names of God’ showing up is an interesting side note.

Zach’s still wearing the Night Watch band? I thought he walked away from that.

Bombs! Zack’s security colleague seemed very laidback about an explosion going off in Down Below. Mate, this is a space station, that’s sort of something you should be concerned about. Carlson is that tired trope of angry insane loner who SHOUTS A LOT because he’s mad as hell and isn’t going to etc. Ho hum.

Londo is making it very hard to hate him when he’s being lovely and sitting with Lennier. But then for the whole first minute of coming round after the lift explosion, he completely ignores G’kar, not even looking at him. That said, the lift scene is amazing, not least for G’kar’s hilarious tiny voice “ᵂᵉ'ʳᵉ ᶦⁿ ʰᵉʳᵉ” mocking Londo. God, they’re so good together. :allears: G’Kar’s little ‘no!’ when they’re found is so funny.

Not a great episode, but the good parts are much enlivened by Londo and G’kar once more. Shame the plot happening around them is so dull.

NB: Garibaldi calls Morishi Jay at one point, but Jay is the laidback one at the beginning. :confused:


The elevator scene is my personal favorite scene in the entire series. It so perfectly encapsulates the two characters and you need virtually no context to understand it. I've used it as a hook to draw in 3-4 new viewers over the years.

Action Jacktion
Jun 3, 2003

The_Doctor posted:

S3ep2 - Convictions

JMS wrote G'Kar's dialogue imagining him speaking in a meditative voice. It was Katsulas's idea to be laughing uncontrollably.

As you might have guessed, JMS wrote the sequence as a deliberate subversion of the cliché TV plot of two characters working out their differences with each other while trying to get out of a stuck elevator. Here, G'Kar refuses to do anything because he'd rather see Londo die.

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
S3ep03 - A Day in the Strife

“I don’t want to get killed because of a typo. It would be embarrassing.”

Wow, shipping dude was ready to start something. Bringing a weapon (a big rear end crowbar with extra spikes) to a hearing about slow customs procedures because they’re checking for illegal arms, but apparently he also left his tinfoil hat back on his ship. Simmer down, Rittenhouse.

What is this music Franklin is dancing to? It’s terrible. I guess drugs do make you dance to bad music.

Vir is not happy, and rapidly entering ‘Are we the baddies?’ territory. Londo trying to offload Vir to Minbar is a double edged missive. Wanting to put him somewhere safe and out of the way of the nasty business Londo is involved in, and also wanting to box up his external conscience and ship it off. Delenn’s exceedingly right. Londo needs Vir, and seeing him get sent off was like pushing a puppy away. :smith:

The Garibaldi Intervention Dinner is a nice touch, and that’s a ton of food. I’d noticed Franklin using stims over the previous season, but context always seemed to dictate the usage was appropriate then. The same was when other people have used them (the fugitive doctor Jacobs, if memory serves), to stay awake, although June Lockhart also lost her job to abuse. “I’ll do less” is pretty weak sauce, Stephen. Then you just up and lie. SHAME.

Sheridan’s abduction buddy! His English has improved immensely since then. I wonder when the life debt will come into play.

Na’Far has wonderful lips. But he’s also collaborator scum. G’kar deciding to stay was pretty obvious because if he left, he absolutely would have been killed. Garibaldi was right...? Again? There definitely feels like there’s been a rewrite on his character a bit, stamp out the fash stuff a bit.

The probe B (C?) plot feels oddly tacked on, like they needed something dramatic for Sheridan and co to do. The probe looked like Vorlon design with that living skin texture, so when it didn’t turn out to be theirs, the question of where it did come from is raised. I expected Brother Theo’s group of monks to come into play here with solving the questions. Last episode he said they were all masters of various fields, like some interstellar pub quiz team, so it felt like this would have been a perfect opportunity for them to shine.

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
S3ep4 - Passing Through Gethsemane

“Nightmares! The way my life has been going lately, who'd notice?”

Brad Dourif! poo poo-talking monks playing chess! TV people talking about chess like it’s some massive conundrum that can be solved in one move!

Was Kosh actually hiding in the hanger the entire time? Anyway, it’s Lyta back from Vorlon space, and they patched her up good. The bit about her basically being on the edge of death before being picked up makes me think of when Sheridan was able to be contacted by Kosh on the Strieb ship because his mind was quiet enough at that point. Similar principle, perhaps?

Garibaldi slipping back into his right wing death penalty vibe. No! You were doing so well!

The discussion about the Minbari belief system was rather lovely, with its explanation of the soul and the universe being one, and everyone is a part of that ur-soul-universe broken up into pieces. It’s very eastern philosophy/Buddhism. “Picture a wave in the ocean...” :unsmith:

That said, the info drop about Valen is very interesting. All previous mentions of him seemed analogous to a Jesus figure way, way back in Minbar’s past. A mere thousand years ago he came from nowhere, a Minbari not born of Minbari. Ok, so, a thousand years ago was the last war with the Shadows, which means the Minbari were presumably already space-faring by then. Coming from nowhere? Figuratively or literally? Like, he came from middle of nowhere humble beginnings or literally appeared out of thin air? And the ‘not born of Minbari’ sounds like the triluminary was put to work making a Minbari out of (presumably) a human. We know Minbari souls are being reborn in human bodies à la Sinclair so I presume there’s a long game here we’re just getting into.

The French ambulance/police siren in Edward’s vision was very distracting. Anyway, casting Brad Dourif felt like playing a meta version of ‘I’ve Narrowed It Down to the Guy I Recognise’. Like, you knew something was going to be up, and having Delenn and Garibaldi’s conversation in mind, it’s pretty obvious what happened. I realised there’s a great bit of foreshadowing in Edward’s line at the start: “Gambling is one of the lesser sins. I've always thought if you're gonna sin you may as well go for one of the really big ones.”

So Lyta has gills now? And whatever was going on with Kosh at the end there. Glowy telepathic contact stuff! I guess they’re very connected people. That’s going to be interesting to delve into.

AARD VARKMAN
May 17, 1993
We're on the same episode now! I'm gonna watch the next this weekend to celebrate :toot:

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
Every time one of the Narn mentions the provisional government, can hear Kira Nerys sneering ‘The provisional government!’ from the first ep of DS9.

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
S3ep05 - Voices of Authority

“I think you’re about to go where everyone has gone before.”

Zack is still wearing the Night Watch armband even though he knows what they stand for. Sad to see a man with no principles. His jacket not fitting as metaphor for him not fitting

Ooooh, First Ones talk. Draal being a MASSIVE HAM never gets old.

Christ, this Night Watch woman works for the trump administration. Its so weird that she’s a 1995 caricature of right wing thinking, but it’s all so eerily present day. “Pointing out our flaws is unpatriotic” is such a current day fascist way of thinking, it’s honestly scary. She absolutely looks like one of the many terrifying Fox News blondes too.

Sheridan’s first impulse for distraction is just to kiss her? That’s some amateur level romcom bullshit, JMS. Do better.

Ivanova in the machine just randomly coming across the Earthforce One footage? That was... lazy, but sure, useful. The bit salient point there was that Clark was talking with Morden there, widening the purview of the Shadow infiltration of Earth politics.

And the first part of it Ivanova’s time in the machine (the shot of Sigma 957 waking up was very evocative - I love the long abandoned cities and planets in space feeling) meant they got to take the White Star out for a spin again. Meet with a god, threaten a god, make the god do your bidding. Usual Tuesday afternoon. drat, Marcus is annoying though. I hope he’s not going to be a new love interest for her.

The First Ones ship was really cool to see again though, back from when Catherine saw it in S1. It’s a slight shame it wasn’t left as a mystery, but it’s a decent well to go back to. I also liked the stone face hologram depiction. It amused me that the face was reminiscent of a totem or Olmec stone head in the same way the Vorlons are angels. Are all the First One races various gods?

I’m glad they jumped straight to the Clark revelation being out there in the public, and didn’t sit on it for a couple more episodes. Interesting that Night Watch is apparently so short staffed that this situation needs everyone back, even the newly appointed B5 political officer/gestapo ring leader. I was also glad to see more than a few of the people in her meeting were uncomfortable with the Big Lie as she paraded on stage, talking of purges and sedition.

G’kar (and to a lesser extent Zack, but he’s a rube) noticing that something is going on with the senior officers and Delenn, but not knowing exactly what, is a intriguing note. Being on the outside, looking in, and piecing together things from what he’s noticed. We know the book of G’quan has Shadow depictions in it, so presumably Garibaldi will see that soon (although will he work it out from the pictures?). Make G’kar useful! Honestly, he’s a better help inside the circle than out.

“I don’t speak Narn!”
“Learn!”

Good episode, moving things along. I’m not as fascinated with the Earth plot as I am the Shadow war (although they are connected), but I’m getting there. I’m looking forward to seeing what happens with that, and what role B5 will play. I can definitely see some form of independence from Earth on the table, in the same way Mars was trying to strike out, rather than all out civil war. But who knows? The titles have a starfury firing on another starfury and that’s yet to be in an episode! :suspense:

mllaneza
Apr 28, 2007

Veteran, Bermuda Triangle Expeditionary Force, 1993-1952




The_Doctor posted:

S3ep05 - Voices of Authority
drat, Marcus is annoying though. I hope he’s not going to be a new love interest for her.

Oh dear.

Somebody fucked around with this message at 02:19 on Sep 6, 2020

Lemniscate Blue
Apr 21, 2006

Here we go again.

mllaneza posted:

(mod snipped)

Blind thread, friend.

Somebody fucked around with this message at 02:07 on Sep 6, 2020

SlothfulCobra
Mar 27, 2011

The_Doctor posted:


Christ, this Night Watch woman works for the trump administration. Its so weird that she’s a 1995 caricature of right wing thinking, but it’s all so eerily present day. “Pointing out our flaws is unpatriotic” is such a current day fascist way of thinking, it’s honestly scary. She absolutely looks like one of the many terrifying Fox News blondes too.


I feel like that reminds me more of the post 9/11 2000s. I don't think I hear people talk about "patriotism" anymore, they're past that excuse. It's still fairly prescient, although it may be that we're seeing that the seeds of what modern politics would become were blatantly planted all the way back then. I don't know much about what politics were like in the early 90s.

mllaneza
Apr 28, 2007

Veteran, Bermuda Triangle Expeditionary Force, 1993-1952




Lemniscate Blue posted:

Blind thread, friend.

I thought I was in that one.

I'm the blind thread reader.

Midjack
Dec 24, 2007



mllaneza posted:

I thought I was in that one.

I'm the blind thread reader.

This is the blind watch thread.

Angry Salami
Jul 27, 2013

Don't trust the skull.
I'm doing a double-blind watch, where neither I nor the commenters know if I've seen it before.

mllaneza
Apr 28, 2007

Veteran, Bermuda Triangle Expeditionary Force, 1993-1952




Midjack posted:

This is the blind watch thread.

Right. I screwed up.

Nipponophile
Apr 8, 2009

Angry Salami posted:

I'm doing a double-blind watch, where neither I nor the commenters know if I've seen it before.

I'm doing a super-blind watch, where I leave the show running in another room where I can neither see nor hear it.

AARD VARKMAN
May 17, 1993
It's actually kind of refreshing for the spoiler to be an honest to God thread accident and not someone being coy or stupid. :unsmith:

Ayin
Jan 6, 2010

Have a great day.

The_Doctor posted:

S3ep05 - Voices of Authority

Ivanova in the machine just randomly coming across the Earthforce One footage?
It's what she has deeply wanted to know, ever since the end of s1, so the machine obliged.

ultrafilter
Aug 23, 2007

It's okay if you have any questions.


Passing Through Gethsemane is another one of those episodes that's really lost its impact over the past couple decades. It's still a neat story, but when it first aired it was light years ahead of anything being done on television. Now everything else has raised the bar high enough that it doesn't stand out so much.

Grand Fromage
Jan 30, 2006

L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?


I'm also up to 305 on my rewatch and lollin' at this lady eating with cooking chopsticks.

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."

Grand Fromage posted:

I'm also up to 305 on my rewatch and lollin' at this lady eating with cooking chopsticks.

Is that what they are? I saw them and mildly wondered, but the thought was swept away as the episode went on.

Grand Fromage
Jan 30, 2006

L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?


The_Doctor posted:

Is that what they are? I saw them and mildly wondered, but the thought was swept away as the episode went on.

Yeah, I've never seen non-cooking chopsticks tied together like that and they were pretty long.

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
S3ep06 - Dust to Dust

“I will not support murder. We can not kill him."
"Can we wound him? Just a little?"

Fascists sure gonna fash when they want. That’s not an ideologically unsure person, that’s a cop who’s just been allowed off the chain to be as nasty as possible, and given authority to do so. Sheridan should have fired him on the spot.

I like the meta-reference of Garibaldi calling out Bester’s story about a dangerous individual coming to B5. Even I was sitting there thinking ‘what, again?’ Also, I’m tickled that murdering him was seen as a valid option. There were a tense few seconds there when I wasn’t actually sure if Ivanova wasn’t going to fire. And she did, even if it was belayed in time. Psyching herself up to it, justifying her actions, it’s quite the moment.

The solution of an ultimatum against Bester - Minbari telepaths or suppressant drug isn’t elegant but a much needed power show. Of course the fascist plays the moral high ground, it’s the only trick they know. Claim piety, display none. That said, did they really cut up Talia Winters?! Like, I can see them prodding her brain to see how the sleeper personality is working, but I have to assume Bester was just trying to get a rise out of them. I hope.

Bester seemed to really be enjoying himself working with Garibaldi, it was honestly unsettling. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and him to reveal he was still active (or semi) the whole time.

VIR! He seems much more relaxed, it’s nice. :smith: I liked the parallel that Londo sent Vir to Minbar as a joke, and that Londo was sent to B5 as a joke.

So someone exterminated the Narn telepath families, ensuring the genes weren’t carried on, and it was probably either the Centauri or the Shadows. We previously learned that the shadows used the Narn homeworld as a base, and they’ve been showing interest in telepaths this time round too. I’ve gone over this before, but it definitely seems like telepaths are a threat to them somehow, and maybe even the key to defeating them. Is their plan this time to get in with Psi-corp so the human telepaths are on their side and won’t help fight?

Don’t do drugs, G’kar! :ohdear: That said, G’kar’s trip into Mollari’s head had some fascinating moments. G’kar knows all about Londo and Morden and the causes and everything. Are we meant to infer from the vision (and his comments at the trial) that G’quan (I’m assuming the second Narn was G’quan) was a Vorlon/Kosh? We knew the Vorlons had visited the Narn from when Kosh caught Sheridan, but this felt different? Anyway, what does Kosh gain by even being there/stopping G’kar? Was Kosh telling G’kar that the Narn have to be sacrificed to win the war? Did he pull him out to stop him learning about the Shadows?

Is Psi-corps really fighting secret battles that no-one knows about? Or is that just Bester bluster? Last we saw of Psi-corps, they’re very much in league with the Shadows. I had a feeling they created dust as a way of kickstarting telepathic genes, and it turned out I was right. A little weird that they’d have that conversation right out in the open, but it’s one of those ‘remember this is a play’ moments.

Side note: Ashi can wreck me any time.

Really good episode, liked this one a lot. If I had a better set up, I’d go through the flash frames of G’kar’s rape of Londo’s mind. I don’t think there was anything new in there, but I’d like to have seen.

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
S3Ep07 - Exogenesis

Was that Sean Connery piloting that tiny ship into the giant opening? You know, like I did your whore mother, Sheridan!

Oh that C&C guy who’s always there has a name. Nice callback on Ivanova’s coffee (again negating all the other times other people have had coffee). Terrible romcom plot line. However I feel like Corwin’s not done yet, and he’ll get to rise to the occasion. Working with Ivanova that long must have rubbed off.

Why is Garibaldi talking about inviting Marcus? Aren’t the Rangers supposed to be a secret? Inviting him to a party seems particularly dumb. Of course Marcus is also dumb by having a VERY LOUD conversation on the Zocalo with Garibaldi about his secret contacts. No wonder G’kar and even a dumbass like Zack can work out something is going on.

Ew spine-bug appears to have wandered in from an X-Files episode, and even brought along its pizzicato strings for the soundtrack. The Vindrizi are a fascinating concept, even if they’re all a little fond of Roy Batty-esque speeches about ‘the things I’ve seen’.

Marcus’s package from Mars will be a week, so next episode?

Duncan looked and sounded so familiar, and it was bugging me the entire time, and it turns out he was the Golgafrinchan B Ark Captain in the Hitchhikers TV series. :allears:

So-so episode. JMS is really in love with his new toy, Marcus. Giving him lots of incredibly pompous dialogue just makes the character seem like he loves the sound of his own voice with an ego the size of Epsilon 3. As an actual Brit, he’s very Hollywood Brit, and I remember that archetype being very prevalent in the 90s (hello Giles). Thankfully TV has moved away from it a lot these days, so it’s just weird having to deal with what feels like a throwback now.

Grand Fromage
Jan 30, 2006

L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?


I don't think it's spoiling anything to say this but I'll tag it anyway. You may want to budget enough time to watch the next three episodes all at once.

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."

Grand Fromage posted:

I don't think it's spoiling anything to say this but I'll tag it anyway. You may want to budget enough time to watch the next three episodes all at once.

But I only have 1 TV. :ohdear:

CainFortea
Oct 15, 2004


Multiplex!

Blindeye
Sep 22, 2006

I can't believe I kissed you!

The_Doctor posted:

Every time one of the Narn mentions the provisional government, can hear Kira Nerys sneering ‘The provisional government!’ from the first ep of DS9.

Well, I mean, there is the theory about DS9 basing its premises off a beta-version of the Babylon 5 plot bible the show runner pitched to Paramount.

RedSnapper
Nov 22, 2016

The_Doctor posted:

But I only have 1 TV. :ohdear:

Excuses, excuses..

But yeah, what Fromage said, you may want to binge those

ultrafilter
Aug 23, 2007

It's okay if you have any questions.


Grand Fromage posted:

I don't think it's spoiling anything to say this but I'll tag it anyway. You may want to budget enough time to watch the next three episodes all at once.

If you don't wait at least a week between episodes you're not getting the original watch experience.

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."

ultrafilter posted:

If you don't wait at least a week between episodes you're not getting the original watch experience.

Honestly I only really have time for one a night anyway

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
S3ep08 - Messages from Earth

“If I was holding anything back, I would tell you.”

Why is Ivanova, a good Jewish girl, eating bacon?

Marcus’s pointless little “walljump” in the middle of his fight. Oh god that was hilarious.

POLITICS! The news reports from back on Earth all sound very familiar right now. ‘Reports dismissed by the administration as attempts to destabilise...
’. And now martial law on Earth. loving yikes. Must be awkward for Sheridan to think he helped bring that about, that it was his inciting incident that allowed EarthGov to declare martial law. :ohdear:

G’kar and Garibaldi’s scene is wonderful. Doyle is trying his best, but he’s not even quarter of the actor Katsulas is. Space to think, to ponder, to reflect, and write his De Pronarndis.

OH gently caress! A Shadow ship buried on Mars for a thousand years! Now let’s analyse. Seven years ago IPX dug up the shadow ship, so that’s before the Icarus went to Z’ha’dum. Earthgov shuttles were flying to the dig site, and then the other Shadow ship came to collect its sleepy bro. So, the Shadows were already pretty awake by the time Morden and Anna Sheridan got to Z’ha’dum. Also, this means Earthgov/Psi-corps were already in contact with the Shadows by then? They had meetings and deals struck with other representatives who were pre-Morden. So it’s very possible they’ve been in cahoots for easily the last decade, maybe even longer. Plus the fact that two ships were buried in our solar system. Was Earth 1000 years ago part of the war somehow? A staging ground the Shadows deemed useful for future use? Did they see the 13th century humans and made a note to keep an eye on them as a possible resource? Is that what Psi-corps are doing with the Shadows? Providing telepaths to pilot/be the living core for the ships? :psyduck: “Mr Mulder, they’ve been here for a long, long time.”

Why would Earthgov get this Ganymede ship anyway? Wouldn’t the Shadows just take it back? Or is it a Trojan horse on their part? Give this ship to the humans to ‘make us to become more like them’ as Kirkish put it?

The Jupiter battle was engaging, and a lot of fun. Crushing an insane Shadow ship in the gravity well of the gas giant, excellent strategy.

Making Sheridan then face off against his old ship was good metaphor, coupled with the earlier imagery of him taking off his badge and staring at it on the introspection deck.

Speaking of which, how long has Delenn known that Shadow ships need a living being as its core? And the necessary requirements for the bonding? Delenn knowing the tech specs of their ships takes some of the unknown quality away from them as a species. They’re meant to be analogous to demons, cloaked in mystery, but here’s the polarity frequency on their huge laser, and their ship OS has these bugs.

Also, what did Garibaldi see when he was on Mars? He said he saw some of it, but didn’t provide any details. Has he also known what a Shadow ship looked like this entire time (although probably didn’t connect the two - he had no reason to).

Definitely delving into romance arcs for Deleridan and Ivanova/Marcus. Even though Marcus is still deeply annoying, the image of him in his quarters making the organisational chart with card and glue and tape and glitter is incredibly funny.

Belter of an episode, and I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s a lot now. I wouldn’t have been able to binge 3 episodes in one go and do write ups, so one a day for 3 days will have to suffice. :shobon:

Action Jacktion
Jun 3, 2003

The_Doctor posted:

S3ep08 - Messages from Earth

Also, what did Garibaldi see when he was on Mars? He said he saw some of it, but didn’t provide any details. Has he also known what a Shadow ship looked like this entire time (although probably didn’t connect the two - he had no reason to).

That was covered in the Babylon 5 comic book. Here's a summary if you don't want to go looking for it:

Years before B5, Sinclair is sent to investigate strange happenings on Mars. He knows that a previous mission met with a mysterious accident, so he keeps things off the books by hiring the less-than-reputable Garibaldi to fly him around. Their ship loses power and crashes so they have to hike across the Martian surface looking for help, and they come across the buried Shadow ship as the other one is digging it out. Psi Corps has set up a structure nearby where unconscious humans are somehow being processed by an alien machine. Garibaldi and Sinclair steal a vehicle and get away. Later they tell their story, but when they return to the site there's nothing left, except Garibaldi finds a Psi Corps badge. In a flashback, we see that one of the humans put through the machine was Talia.

The comic came more than six months before this episode aired and even came out before "Divided Loyalties" aired.

Action Jacktion fucked around with this message at 05:26 on Sep 16, 2020

The_Doctor
Mar 29, 2007

"The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations, and divergences. How anyone can make head or tail of all this chaos, I don't know."
Oh heck, so there’s tie-in comics, and they’re plot relevant? That makes them fairly unique. Worth tracking down?

Midjack
Dec 24, 2007



I wouldn’t go to heroic lengths to get them; they don’t hold any critical plot information. They’re more “hey here’s this thing you saw on the show again, but now it’s SOMEWHERE ELSE! :monocle:” If you want more B5 the novels pick up some plot threads and extend them beyond season 5 and are generally regarded as good though hard to find.

Jedit
Dec 10, 2011

Proudly supporting vanilla legends 1994-2014

The_Doctor posted:

Oh heck, so there’s tie-in comics, and they’re plot relevant? That makes them fairly unique. Worth tracking down?

The first 11-issue run from 1995 is not strictly plot relevant, and there are some discrepancies between the comics and the show. There was also one more story which was released three years later, and you should avoid it at all costs for now as it is plot relevant and has huge spoilers for things you haven't seen yet.

Beyond that, avoid all ancillary material as it's either non-canon or far too canon.

Qwertycoatl
Dec 31, 2008

The_Doctor posted:


Why is Ivanova, a good Jewish girl, eating bacon?


It came up in S1 that she doesn't care about dietary laws

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Doctor Zero
Sep 21, 2002

Would you like a jelly baby?
It's been in my pocket through 4 regenerations,
but it's still good.

Qwertycoatl posted:

It came up in S1 that she doesn't care about dietary laws

I knew a professor of biblical studies who was Jewish and we went out to lunch. I asked about the dietary restrictions, which he told me about while ordering a cheeseburger (dairy on beef is a no no). so yeah, there's a wide difference between faith and orthodoxy.

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