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What was the objection?
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Sep 26, 2020 21:16
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Just that it was such an insane conspiracy theory that nobody would believe it, so it was a dumb plotline.
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Sep 26, 2020 21:26
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Grand Fromage posted:Just that it was such an insane conspiracy theory that nobody would believe it, so it was a dumb plotline. Having Delenn running around as exactly that makes it insanely easy to land that accusation against the rest of the station. Watching the show gives you perspective that a TV watcher on Earth or even a lot of EarthGov officials wouldn’t have.
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Sep 26, 2020 21:43
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Grand Fromage posted:Just that it was such an insane conspiracy theory that nobody would believe it, so it was a dumb plotline. Simpler times 
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Sep 26, 2020 22:00
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Grand Fromage posted:Just that it was such an insane conspiracy theory that nobody would believe it, so it was a dumb plotline. I was listening to their episode about “Voices of Authority” (s3e5), and they complained about how ridiculous and over-the-top the political officer was. If the last four years have taught us anything, it’s that a) fascists are often ridiculous and buffoonish, and 2) this makes almost no difference.
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Sep 26, 2020 22:27
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I remember when I first watched the show I thought it was real dumb that Clark had so much support since it was patently obvious to anyone that he'd assassinated Santiago and was a fascist. I did not have those thoughts in my current rewatch.
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Sep 26, 2020 22:46
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What's ridiculous about it now is that there's any semblance of finesse instead of being big huge and blustering. So much of it sounds ridiculous until you just see or feel the social pressure firsthand. It's crazy stuff. I only hope the lessons people have learned now wind up lasting into the future instead of some kind of "return to normalcy" farce covering it all up so it can happen all over again. Or continuing to happen without any interruption.
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Sep 26, 2020 23:35
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Did Clark have that much genuine support, though? In that sense of 'I'm surprised he had so much.' I always got the impression that there weren't many genuine Clarkists but there were a shitload of people who were scared to speak out or act against him because he'd execute and/or disappear them. When it came down to it, something like half of Earthforce turned against him and the moment there was no threat of reprisal there were people marching on his office. But he has Psi Corps and Nightwatch and so on.
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Sep 27, 2020 01:28
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The guy who replaces General Hague mentions he has majority support from the public in Severed Dreams.
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Sep 27, 2020 01:41
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Remember that even before Clark we're talking about a government that regularly sends troops in to 'put down' colonial rebellions. The people of Babylon 5 are unusually liberal, rather than representing wider Earth Alliance attitudes. It's more like Mars than Earth.
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Sep 27, 2020 01:55
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Grand Fromage posted:The Name of the Pod had a complaint I just heard about the bizarre and patently absurd conspiracy theory about B5 doing human hybrid experiments during the ISN episode in season 4, and while I get the objection at the time, it's hilarious listening to it now in the age of QAnon. SaintFu posted:I was listening to their episode about “Voices of Authority” (s3e5), and they complained about how ridiculous and over-the-top the political officer was. If the last four years have taught us anything, it’s that a) fascists are often ridiculous and buffoonish, and 2) this makes almost no difference. What can I say, 2019 was several decades ago and we were innocent young men.
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Sep 27, 2020 02:08
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head58 posted:What can I say, 2019 was several decades ago and we were innocent young men. Oh yeah, no shade, it's just amazing listening to it in 2020.
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Sep 27, 2020 02:12
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Lochley giving Sheridan poo poo for rebelling against an earth government that was literally controlled by ancient demon aliens was always baffling to me pre-2016, alas
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Sep 27, 2020 02:18
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We were also trying super hard to not be overtly political wrt current US politics, because we really didn’t want to deal with idiots writing to tell us that actually Homeguard was more like Antifa and Earthgov was clearly the Hillary Clinton administration and furthermore
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Sep 27, 2020 02:19
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Horizon Burning posted:Did Clark have that much genuine support, though? In that sense of 'I'm surprised he had so much.' I always got the impression that there weren't many genuine Clarkists but there were a shitload of people who were scared to speak out or act against him because he'd execute and/or disappear them. When it came down to it, something like half of Earthforce turned against him and the moment there was no threat of reprisal there were people marching on his office. But he has Psi Corps and Nightwatch and so on. Earth is said to be solidly supportive. I think part of the problem is that a vocal minority of supporters plus propaganda would make it difficult for people who oppose Clark to tell whether or not they're in the minority. Given the harassment we see from Nightwatch on the station, we can only guess how much worse things are on Earth. If you only watch Fox News and read the New York Post and the Washington Times, you'd be convinced that the vast majority of Americans support Trump and that other media are lying to you. Clark's regime would be even more effective at controlling the media, I imagine, given that they have both Psi Corps and Mr. Morden's friends to support them. People aren't that hard to fool, in aggregate, and that's without adding factionalism to the equation. Recall that Earth was almost completely depopulated within living memory; I rather imagine the bunker mentality that experience produced would have had a larger impact than 9/11 did in the US. B5 played differently during the invasion of Iraq, too. It's unfortunate how often it seems to be applicable to the world we live in.
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Sep 27, 2020 03:38
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Grand Fromage posted:The guy who replaces General Hague mentions he has majority support from the public in Severed Dreams. All dictators have huge majorities of support, on the surface, as long as their goons stay loyal.
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Sep 27, 2020 03:42
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Horizon Burning posted:Did Clark have that much genuine support, though? In that sense of 'I'm surprised he had so much.' I always got the impression that there weren't many genuine Clarkists but there were a shitload of people who were scared to speak out or act against him because he'd execute and/or disappear them. When it came down to it, something like half of Earthforce turned against him and the moment there was no threat of reprisal there were people marching on his office. But he has Psi Corps and Nightwatch and so on. I got the impression that even if they weren't genuine Clarkists, they still thought he was doing a good job representing Earth interests, sort of like how people don't like Trump but they think he's doing a good job handling the economy and that he was Santiago's VP so how bad could he be.
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Sep 27, 2020 06:07
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V-Men posted:I got the impression that even if they weren't genuine Clarkists, they still thought he was doing a good job representing Earth interests, sort of like how people don't like Trump but they think he's doing a good job handling the economy and that he was Santiago's VP so how bad could he be. So what you're saying is that Clark is Biden?
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Sep 27, 2020 08:16
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Jedit posted:So what you're saying is that Clark is Biden? Can we not do this here? We have two whole forums and about fifty million other threads to bitch about the upcoming election in.
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Sep 27, 2020 08:29
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Midjack posted:Can we not do this here? We have two whole forums and about fifty million other threads to bitch about the upcoming election in. The avalanche has already begun. It is too late for pebbles to vote.
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Sep 27, 2020 10:17
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Jedit posted:So what you're saying is that Clark is Biden? Clark was elected as vice president and arranged for his president’s death to become president. Obama is not dead. Nor is Trump, so I have no idea what you think you’re talking about. If you assume the majority of people think the former president died in an accident or a potential terrorist attack (it was probably aliens), I don’t think there’s a point of comparison to be made, but the one the show deliberately sets up is LBJ after JFK’s assassination. The only alternative I see that would fit the circumstances is Dick Cheney becoming president on an alternate 9/11 where a plane hit the White House and killed President Bush.
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Sep 27, 2020 14:35
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Narsham posted:Clark was elected as vice president and arranged for his president’s death to become president. In the 2000s it was a common belief among those on the political left that Cheney was in some way angling for the Oval Office, and that GWB would die in office or be forced to resign, leaving Cheney to take office. In the B5 discussion Usenet group I used to hang out in the comparison was made quite often.
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Sep 27, 2020 15:11
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Sounds kinda ridiculous considering how W just delegated to Cheney all the power he could ever want out of high office without any of the trouble of having to appear in any way likable to court the electorate. B5 doesn't really elaborate much on Earth's internal politics, but I assume that Santiago took Clark to widen his base. Clark did have an unprecedented endorsement from Psycorp, so some kinda crazy political maneuvering was happening. Or maybe Earth has some kind of ridiculous system where the runner up in a primary or something automatically becomes VP, so Clark got the office while being radically different from Santiago. There's no particular reason to assume that their government is well-structured. Presumably there's a bunch of issues aside from international space policy, and it wouldn't be surprising if foreign relations was actually one of the least important to human politics, because that's how it is in America. Ivanova voted on the basis of whose face she liked better.
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Sep 27, 2020 17:09
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Lemniscate Blue posted:In the 2000s it was a common belief among those on the political left that Cheney was in some way angling for the Oval Office, and that GWB would die in office or be forced to resign, leaving Cheney to take office. In the B5 discussion Usenet group I used to hang out in the comparison was made quite often. I remember JMS posted once that a White House staffer told him Bush and Cheney were big B5 fans. Never sure whether to believe JMS' stories though.
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Sep 27, 2020 17:50
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Politicians are weird people with weird opinions on fiction that presents commentary on them. I don't think anything can top Margaret Thatcher being a fan of Yes Minister and trying to do a lovely little skit with them.
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Sep 27, 2020 18:04
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Grand Fromage posted:I remember JMS posted once that a White House staffer told him Bush and Cheney were big B5 fans. Never sure whether to believe JMS' stories though. That's easy to believe. Clarke is clearly Lyndon B. Johnson to JFKs Santiago. They even remade his inauguration. Sheridan is
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Sep 27, 2020 19:43
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Grand Fromage posted:I remember JMS posted once that a White House staffer told him Bush and Cheney were big B5 fans. Never sure whether to believe JMS' stories though. It wasn't some White House staffer, it was Karl Rove. And he didn't tell JMS, he told Bruce Boxleitner (according to JMS). And Cheney wasn't mentioned. I don't imagine he watched a lot of sci-fi. Boxleitner is right-wing, and Jerry Doyle was definitely closer to the Bush/Cheney side of things than to the Clinton side of things. And Rove is unquestionably a nerd. The JMS Usenet post: http://worldsofjms.com/usenet/post/021126a.htm
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Sep 27, 2020 23:20
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Suppose it shouldn't come as that big of a surprise that John "nuke'em See you in Hell" Sheridan would be right leaning. but it still hurts 
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Sep 28, 2020 01:20
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At least a few of Garibaldi's more rightwing lines were taken from stuff Jerry Doyle said in earshot of JMS.
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Sep 28, 2020 01:56
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McCloud posted:Suppose it shouldn't come as that big of a surprise that John "nuke'em See you in Hell" Sheridan would be right leaning. but it still hurts Same
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Sep 28, 2020 03:41
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lol you guys have 90% of entertainment and media on your side, throw us a bone now and then
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Sep 28, 2020 04:16
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ultrafilter posted:At least a few of Garibaldi's more rightwing lines were taken from stuff Jerry Doyle said in earshot of JMS. Doyle hosted a radio show that was basically discount Alex Jones in terms of right-wing nutbag bullshit.
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Sep 28, 2020 05:06
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Son of Sam-I-Am posted:lol you guys have 90% of entertainment and media on your side, throw us a bone now and then *glass tinkle noise* No. *glass tinkle noise*
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Sep 28, 2020 07:10
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Narsham posted:
That certainly puts his character in Supergirl in a slightly different perspective.
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Sep 28, 2020 08:17
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V-Men posted:That certainly puts his character in Supergirl in a slightly different perspective. But nobody is going to say that Alan Bradley in the TRON movies is particularly right wing. Even Sheridan isn't especially right wing when considered as a whole. Jerry Doyle may have been Garibaldi, but then he was a broker who decided to have a go at acting; JMS shaped the part around the man because it got a better performance out of him. Boxleitner is an actor, and more than capable of not being himself on screen.
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Sep 28, 2020 09:15
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Jedit posted:But nobody is going to say that Alan Bradley in the TRON movies is particularly right wing. Even Sheridan isn't especially right wing when considered as a whole. Jerry Doyle may have been Garibaldi, but then he was a broker who decided to have a go at acting; JMS shaped the part around the man because it got a better performance out of him. Boxleitner is an actor, and more than capable of not being himself on screen. I sure wish I could find that speech the future Earthers make Sheridan give about blazing a path across the galaxy through the blood of alien children. But I def agree with you. Honestly Boxleitner can still deliver a stirring enough speech that I'd follow him into battle.
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Sep 28, 2020 12:02
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https://streamable.com/7ui8ik According to JMS's commentary on the episode, Boxleitner spent a while studying Hitler's mannerisms for that speech.
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Sep 29, 2020 01:05
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Vavrek posted:https://streamable.com/7ui8ik Aw they left out my favorite part: "Through your blood and the blood of your children, we will blaze a path across the galaxy. What we cannot take by force, we will win by subversion. And... in the end... we will bury you."
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Oct 1, 2020 11:05
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Midjack posted:Can we not do this here? We have two whole forums and about fifty million other threads to bitch about the upcoming election in. V-Men posted:The avalanche has already begun. It is too late for pebbles to vote. This made me laugh way too hard. Danke. Son of Sam-I-Am posted:lol you guys have 90% of entertainment and media on your side, throw us a bone now and then ZRM posted:*glass tinkle noise* No. *glass tinkle noise* Hah... you guys are making me die
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Oct 2, 2020 01:08
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Babylon 5 is an extremely good show.
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Oct 9, 2020 22:12
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