Babylon 5 blind watch thread: Maybe they're Zorlons?

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Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

I have also started watching B5. I normally watch shows at a pretty glacial pace but I'm currently about to finish Season 1. Here is a list of things I vaguely knew about the series going in, potential spoilers idk:

-it's a space station in space
-one of the actors leaves after the first season? i think the captain but that's going to be weird given he clearly appears in the future in Babylon Squared but
-somebody has a great character arc i forget who but a bunch of nerds were talking about it once. g'kar maybe? probably a bunch of people do
-bad CGI. i mean it might be good for the time
-I had the impression of it as a zero-budget show that got by on the writing and had people in awful sets the whole time. i mean it's not high-glamour megabucks tv but it's not as janky as I thought it was
-i saw some clips on youtube a while back but i don't remember what was happening. at one point g'kar is making a good speech but i don't remember what it was about. at one point the station is in danger and an alien ship suddenly appears to defend them. i think it's probably the minbari lady. why did i watch isolated clips of a tv show with an ongoing plot I can't tell you.

yeah that's about it. thoughts on season 1 in the next post so you can avoid quoting these very substantive spoilers

# ¿ May 14, 2022 23:53

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# ¿ Apr 24, 2024 22:16

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Thoughts on season 1 except the last episode which I haven't got round to watching yet and a couple of episodes the internet told me to skip which I might end up going back to. apologies for probably misspelling all the character names/species over and over

I'm having a pretty good time with it so far! I mean it's a bit rough around the edges, but generally in the same way that say, the middle-grade star trek episodes in the same era could be. I just finished watching all of deep space nine so i'm always tempted to compare the two, though I don't know how fair that comparison really is. I guess a big difference here is the role of humanity here, in star trek it's a leader in the dominant power of utopian ideals that sometimes get mildly challenged by this week's Planet Of Philosophical Thought Experiments With Forehead Ridges but still ends the episode in control of it's own chunk of the galaxy. But here humanity is just another weird species that has just about managed to get the other planets to stop trying to kill it for a bit, with a society still full of gaping flaws.

I don't know if there have been any massive stand-out episodes so far. I liked By Any Means Necessary because I always love the "people go on strike" episodes. I don't think there have been any I'd call really bad either, though. I wrote down to skip Infection, Believers and TKO from a half-assed "what episodes should I skip" google search because I wasn't sure if I was actually going to want to watch the whole show but I might go back to those.

I did go back and watch TKO the other day, because a Jewish friend of mine mentioned how she liked how the episode depicted Judaism, and yeah I think it was worth watching, particularly because Ivanova is one of my favourite characters so far so it's nice to get some more backstory. Yeah, the dull other plot about the guy wanting to fight and then he fights and then he wins the fight was a bit... pointless, but it wasn't bad or anything. But then I thought DS9's Move Along Home was merely a bit silly as opposed to the sin against television some fans think it was, so take my opinion of what's good enough science fiction for what you will.

But yeah so far it's a good time and seems to be the kind of combination of space diplomacy and sci fi technononsense that I'm into.

Here's my thoughts on S1 E21, The Quality Of Mercy, that I just watched:

-Love the assistant Minbari's utterly dull life. I was raised in a temple and have done nothing but read and assemble a motorcycle this one time.
-the doctor ilegally giving people free healthcare. i did actually think ivanova was going to try to shut it down for a second. i am sorry i doubted you
-garibaldi real gung-ho about the death penalty. what a cop
-old lady's found a random bit of space junk and is using it for medicine without being able to read the instructions. i'm sure this will go well
-oh and they just routinely wipe people's brains instead of the death penalty apparently? garibaldi's a big fan so it must be fine
-"and in my eleventy-fifth year at the temple..." i love this nerd
-murderer guy doing his best hannibal lecter impression. not a good one but his best
-gets defeated by the healing machine being put into reverse. healer lady Did Nothing Wrong
-an important lesson is learned about centauri genitalia
-Also wait, haven't we seen that tentacle before? wasn't it on that creature that was eating people's minds a few episodes back. i guess it came from a centauri world so it might make some sense for them to evolve a similar penis. or the props department only had so many tentacles to make use of

The Centauri are a bit like the Ferengi in that they straddle the line between "silly fun comic relief" and "actively irritating terrible people", so I'm not sure yet what I think of them. Also not sure how I feel about Garibaldi, like I get how he's this morally grey damaged rear end in a top hat but he's also such a loving cop sometimes, like in this episode and the strike episode where he just jumps straight into brutalising civilians that it's hard to have much sympathy for him sometimes.

# ¿ May 15, 2022 00:36

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

ultrafilter posted:

You should watch the episodes you skipped at some point, and probably soon.

This ominous post has inspired me to go back and watch the two left over, starting with S1E4 "Infection"

doctor's Dramatic Voice friend shows up with a vague mission
guy dressed like a 1990s computer programmer works customs completely alone, turns his back on a guy while loudly and slowly saying how it looks like he might have smuggled something in, and shock-horror gets murdered
doctor's friend is an archaeologist who has found machines made of organic matter, seems very excited about the "turn these into weapons" angle
i see they do the same "real historical figure, real historical figure, fictional future guy" thing on this show too
archaeologist's muscle henchman decides to casually open the ancient artefact box, what could go wrong
ALIEN HYBRID ARM GUN MAN, ATTACK
archaeologist guy claims to have no idea and needs to study the artefacts more. i am doubtful
none of the three assistants in the command center can act worth a drat
they don't seem to have figured out what to do with this journalist character other than have her show up at command and get yelled at to leave
dude's turned into a clanking robot
the doctor tries to be all subtext about how the aliens are racial supremacists and then sinclair just comes right out and says "like the Nazis", but then does subtlety really pay when you're talking about fascism
the ultimate weapon that wiped out the entire race... let's try, uh, shooting at it a whole bunch, that'll do it
oh hey i was right about the weapons thing
and earth army is very interested! i'm sure nothing bad will come of this

bit plodding in the middle and a bit cheesy overall but not awful

grassy gnoll posted:

It's vitally important that you know the guy who played the serial killer was Drake from Aliens.

would you believe I have not got around to watching Aliens either. is he good in that

# ¿ May 17, 2022 21:01

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

S1E10, Believers

"i am never wrong" dr franklin being a bit rude about these people's religious beliefs
oh but they also don't like the concept of surgery
a combat situation requires a command officer, ~~so that the main cast is involved~~ for important reasons
ivanova having a fun little huff about not getting to go shoot at things
"you're just going to let him die? what kind of a god do you worship?" medical staff here not trained in diplomacy
ok the doctor rightfully chews her out for this we're not going full-on r/atheism here
in the cruellest decision yet, the parents don't let him watch television. "he can study the scrolls if he gets bored"
A Gloppit Egg, from the Planet Placebo. kind of a dick move for him to keep the parents in the dark about that
Finkle eggs, gloppit eggs, egg-sucking mammals, egg-worshippers, lot of eggs in this episode. was the scriptwriter hungry
after telling his coworker to be respectful he just shouts at them to stop deluding themselves. not sure this will go down well
the various ambassadors tell the parents to gently caress off with varying levels of kindness. love the Vorlon just calling them tiny pebbles, like yeah what other answer were you expecting
repeated 20 second clips of Ivanova's away mission that almost make it seem as if anything at all is going to happen in that plotline and then cut back to the A plot
kid tells Sinclair he wants to die, Sinclair decides to respect the family's religious beliefs
Doctor decides to do it anyway
Something interesting starts to happen in the B plot, we of course cut right back to the doctor
the parents are, shockingly, not happy
they suddenly turn gentler and take the kid with them. they're going to kill him aren't they
yes indeed they are. that was dark
and Ivanova's space battle was resolved entirely off-screen, great. did they have an extra 2 minutes to fill and just decided to do it in the most expensive way possible

i think i can see why that random guy on the internet said to skip this one. though for all I know maybe the Gloppit Egg becomes the main villain of Season 4, no spoilers

# ¿ May 19, 2022 21:04

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Chevy Slyme posted:

Believers is mainly interesting in that it is an extremely obvious and over the top �gently caress you� to the way Star Trek would have handled the same exact plot line.

I was partially expecting the other doctor to successfully find a way of treating it without breaking the skin, probably because I've seen so much Star Trek and that's very likely how a Star Trek episode would have ended it, with the help of some mumbojumbo tech nonsense from the B plot or something

Powered Descent posted:

I wondered the same thing. And we were both right, that's exactly what happened behind the scenes.

very sad to hover over the quote and see this post wasn't confirming my Gloppit Egg theory

# ¿ May 19, 2022 22:29

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

S1E22, "Chrysalis"

season finale so i assume something dramatic is going to happen

some guy called Petrov says something ominous, snuffs it
Sinclair's girlfriend is back
oh, his fiancee. i mean i've seen them together for all of one episode on-screen so i can't say i'm particularly invested in this couple yet
Narn and Centauri are feuding again. The Centauri do not know what a duck is, unlike on star trek where every animal in the universe is an earth animal with a planet name before it
creepy guy from a few episodes back is back and is being ominous again
babylon 5 has a giant hedge maze, because of course it does. no room for adequate housing for the Down Belowers though that would be silly
ominous guy Morden promises to solve all Mollari's problems in exchange for an unspecified favour in the future. To be fair it looks like Mollari knows this is a terrible deal but I assume he's desperate enough to take it
the oh what was her name bald lady has some vague conversations about questions and promises
Garibaldi finds some crime guys who say some vague ominous things. The levels of Vague Ominousness on this station are rising to dangerous levels
G'Kar is fatigued from his heavy schedule of boning the ladies. Sinclair tries to talk some peace into him. Do Narn get post-nut clarity
A giant Spooky Space Spider comes in and obliterates the Narn base causing the problem
i know full well that vice presidential viral infection on io is going to be a vital plot point due to how offhandedly it was mentioned
i wasn't sure if Garibaldi's assistant was suspicious or just badly acted. turns out suspicious
Garibaldi seems dead
no, he's still crawling. sloppy job, evil guys
G'Kar works out pretty quick it can't be any race he knows about, while bald lady continues vague ominousness
Garibaldi tells Sinclair something's afoot but not in time to save the president of Earth
New president sounds slightly more racist
Delenn! That's her name. She's... uh, a chrysalis now? sure why not

Things are now slightly less vague, and a lot more ominous. I was expecting perhaps a few more answers but I guess we've got four more seasons for that.

I don't have any particular end-of-season thoughts beyond what I put in my first couple posts here. I guess generally it seems like there's been a lot more setup than payoff, which I guess tracks with what I've heard all the nerds on the internet say about having to get through the first season. It hasn't had a stand-out holy-poo poo great episode yet, but it's been a decent time so far and there have been some good moments that show some promise. Still on board to keep watching. Particularly looking forward for the Gloppit Egg to become a fully developed character at the centre of the plot.

# ¿ May 23, 2022 21:04

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Season 2, baby!

S2E1

From the blurb I see it is in fact the captain getting replaced. I knew someone went after S1 but wasn't entirely sure who
Some captain guy who I assume will be the new one is told about some rogue Minbari ship
Ivanova has spent the week between seasons being followed around by a dense crowd of ten constantly yelling guys at all times
Sinclair is Not Coming Back. He is the new ambassador to Minbar. I wasn't sure if the character was just going to be recast or what was going on, but now we have a new guy reading the opening scrawl (and slightly better CGI in the opening?)
opening credits with the cast and big zooming in 5s is cheesy as hell though
still at least it'll help me remember everyone's names
Minbari lady is still a bunch of weird gunk, some new Minbari guy comes in and speaks ominously and, indeed, vaguely
the command gets water showers in their quarters, the rest get "vibe showers". no water, just vibes
new guy is the late president's first choice to replace Sinclair "if anything happened", so clearly old president knew something was about to go down
New guy gives a motivational speech about his gap year in Tibet, something about known unknowns, and is about to attribute a quote to Abraham Lincoln when something interrupts him
B5 staff still very easy to suddenly assault the moment they say they're slightly suspicious of you. the big mean guy doing the assaulting is leader of the rogue Minbari ship
the Minbari are pissed with the new captain because he killed a bunch of them in the war. it was a war deal with it m8s
I keep wanting to call it Planet Minibar, I assume that joke has been done to death already and then some but I still want to
"if you are going to kill me then do so, otherwise I have considerable work to do" i love this guy
Finally some actual revelations from the Minbari: they worked out Minbari souls are being reborn as humans so figured maybe a good idea not to murder them
Ivanova just openly blabs about the souls thing on the bridge I guess it's ok for all them to know now
Rogue Minbari ship comes in guns primed and ready
they just want to be shot to be martyrs, so they self destruct instead when that doesn't work
Minbari guy still has some more ominous vague exposition left over to say to Delenn at the end
THE CHRYSALIS MOVES!! DUN DUN DUNNN
New guy gets to finish his speech, in an empty room

Seems like a pretty "functional" episode, we got a bunch of exposition and we know who the new guy is, nothing too exciting

# ¿ May 30, 2022 21:12

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Every time they talk about Garibaldi I think of the biscuit.

S2E2

Mollari is just as weirded out about the cocoon thing as I am, nobody else seems particularly fussed though
G'Kar has been busy and is fighting some weird spaceships
Doctor wants to use the alien lifedrain device to cure Garibaldi
Captain's sister comes to visit so he has an opportunity to talk about his backstory
G'Kar returns: "Close the door. Weep for the future, Na'toth. Weep for us all". ok a friendly "hello" would have been nice
Garibaldi's awake, his assistant finds out, almost shoots Garibaldi as he almost remembers who shot him, i'm sure that would have gone down well
Delenn has hatched from her cocoon! She's not feeling great though
Garibald gets brain-scanned, remembers it's his assistant
I knew Delenn the Butterfly was just a ruse but I'm still kinda disappointed
new earth prez demands custody of the guy, whch isn't suspicious At All
Garibaldi tells creepy space guy that the Narn are going to investigate the ancient race, the Narn get killed immediately on entry. G'Kar is suspicious.
The shock reveal... Ambassador Delenn is back and she... she.... has hair!!
I guess that means she's human or something? Sure, the classic transspecies cocoon method, standard procedure
Captain was blaming himself for his wife's death, but luckily his wife sent a message to his sister just before her death along the lines of "Oh boy, I sure am glad to be going on this expedition. It sure isn't the fault of the captain guy, who I love very much. No siree. Entirely my decision.", so that's good
I do not want to meet the guy who named his Earth Cruiser "Von Braun"
Garibaldi suspects Psi Corps are involved
G'Kar reads some Earth poetry, I do like the sci fi bits where the aliens talk about our art works. At least he appreciates it more than Mollari liked the Hokey Pokey
Garibaldi's assistant is mysteriously intercepted on the journey to earth, surprise surprise

# ¿ Jun 2, 2022 21:18

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

S2E3, should I put the episode names in spoilers? People have been doing that

Garibaldi still suspicious of the new captain and not keen to return to work
Mollari agrees to do a bit of treason, putting him more towards the "terrible person" category
Sheridan, his name's Sheridan, i'm going to remember that now, Sheridan
Wait who's Warren Keffer
a TECHNO-MAGE!!! arrives
The Drazi are fighting each other to unconsciousness to decide who wins the next election. still better than the electoral college amirite
Ivanova gets promoted but now has the job of getting them to settle down
Love Vir's rambling about fate and currents
I want Vir and Lennier to go on an adventure together, Lennier can teach Vir about being remotely competent at anything and Vir can teach Lennier, I don't know, how to party or something
Mollari wants to consult with the TECHNO MAGES
The Drazi camps are chosen entirely at random. are we getting to some BOTH SIDES ARE THE SAME political satire here
that said my fine city of Edinburgh is currently run by a minority of 13/63 councillors because the two centre-left parties disagree on scottish independence, a policy that local councils have no say over, so I can't get too smug about silly stories of splitting over pointless differences
Ivanova's diplomacy attempt of just calling them idiots and messing with their scarves does not go well
Vir tries to speak to the TECHNO MAGES but they're too busy being dark and mysterious to talk to random ambassadors
i want to be a TECHNO MAGE
And the Drazi have started killing each other, that's great
OVER A HUNDRED TECHNO MAGES
Mollari's brilliant scheme to secretly record the master of technology does not go well
The techno-mages are leaving because something vague and ominous is coming
aww does this mean we won't see any more TECHNO MAGES
The green Drazi are going full-on genocide on the Purples. ok this is a bit more high stakes than edinburgh council's bad cycle paths
The Green Must Fight Purple simplicity is a bit much. wouldn't the greens have made a series of wojack memes about how the purples are threatening the fabric of society by now
Garibaldi gets his groove back and frees Ivanova from the clutches of the Greens with an elaborate pretend-salesman scheme
the TECHNO MAGES have sent Mollari a HOLO DEMON, which is basically the standard 90s fictional computer virus that animates flames on the screen
ok so just taking the leader's bit of cloth makes you the leader. wouldn't the leader have like tried to stop them taking it or something
"Rules change caught up in committee" yeah i feel you
The techno mages absolutely have Mollari's number and know exactly what kind of poo poo he is getting into. I would like to think there is still some hope he will listen, eventually

The Drazi plot was kind of silly but it meant well I guess. I would like if the TECHNO MAGES come back or at least turn out to have some purpose in showing up other than being Ominous Portent Of Something Bad About To Go Down Later On #37

# ¿ Jun 7, 2022 21:25

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Chevy Slyme posted:

The suits demanded that JMS write in a "Good looking hot shot young fighter pilot" character in season 2. So we get Keffer.

oh it's that guy who was weirdly prominent in the first episode of this season despite doing nothing except mildly grumble about some orders

# ¿ Jun 7, 2022 23:29

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

I remember reading Phillip K Dick complaining once that at one point one of the science fiction magazines demanded that every story had psychics in and that their powers conformed to specific rules, which i thought was exaggeration but maybe not that much

# ¿ Jun 12, 2022 13:05

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

S2E4 - A Distant Star

Ivanova's still got her injury from last episode, nice bit of continuity there
Big rear end ship comes in with one of Sheridan's friends captaining it. Sheridan's friend Stinky
the doctor puts everyone on a diet, i mean food plan
Stinky has seen a Big Ominous Something out in space one time. idk it sounds pretty weak he probably just imagined it. weird things in unexplored space? never
The Minbari are getting antsy about Delenn having hair now. Seems they don't know what is going on with her either.
Ivanova is told to eat more! hah women am i right
Sheridan is mad he's been made to run a city and not a starship
Stinky's ship has gotten lost in hyperspace, which is Very Bad
The doctor calls Delenn's change a "transition". in this three hour video essay I will explore the queer themes in
Maybe the pilot guy will get something to actually do now
Keffer finds the ship but a big spooky thing comes out of hyperspace and kills his good friend we just met
And Keffer dies? I guess that's a thing for him to do
Delenn consoles Sheridan. She said "transition" again!! in this five hour video essay
Oh wait Warren's alive, and he's promoted to lead pilot guy. That would have been pretty fun to introduce a new guy in the credits and then kill him off after four episodes but I guess if he's been put there by the studio we're not getting anything that silly.
Sheridan's gotten his groove back. I guess i'm too cynical for Delenn's "we are all star stuff" speech to feel that insightful but maybe the 90s sci fi audience was up for it.
The food plan plotline was a bit thin (pun not intended)

# ¿ Jun 12, 2022 20:38

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Qwertycoatl posted:

They didn't have a choice, Claudia Christian broke her leg, which is the real reason Ivanova was injured in the previous episode

love stuff like that, it's not quite up to the level of the bit in ds9 season 4 when Nana Visitor became pregnant and so they suddenly came up with a plotline where due to sci fi technobabble Major Kira had to carry the child of another character but still

# ¿ Jun 12, 2022 23:45

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Blindeye posted:

The original plan was that Delenn would also transition from Male to Female

this would have owned, i assume it was the suits being afraid of depicting anything that could have been taken as queer themes that did it in?

# ¿ Jun 13, 2022 12:45

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

S2E5 - The Long Dark

A ship approaches the station as some weirdly acted drug addict gets very excited in the slums for some reason
Starts raving incomprehensibly about vague upcoming doom, the main leisure activity on this station
The mystery ship is the same kind used in early deep space exploration by Earth
Got some cryogenic freezers in! One of them contains a SPOOKY SKELETON, but the other one has a human person who might be savable
Garibaldi for once doesn't agree that someone should be spaced. The madman's a war veteran. he lets him sleep and then calmly talks to him about how helpful counsellors are, reducing Garibaldi's Being A Cop points by a few
The skeleton has been MURDERED
"He died of organ failure." "Why?" "I don't know, they're missing." Yeah that'll do it
The other person on the ship is alive and not too happy about being in statis for over a century just to find out she could have just waited a few years for the Centauri to show up with jumpgate tech
G'Kar decides the best thing to say to a traumatised person just out of 100 years frozen is "go back to your own time". this man is employed as a diplomat
Dr Franklin manages to stop himself from the massive violation of medical ethics of making out with his patient, just barely
Crazy guy has another rant in the main hall bit, this time he has a bit more specific information for Garibaldi: something horrible has come to the station on the ship, which he recognises from the war
The world's least convincing "point of view of an unidentified monster killing a random civilian" shot follows
Garibaldi thinks the frozen lady is the monster that the guy described.
Franklin acting very offended at the implication he might sleep with his patients for someone doing all those face caresses five minutes ago
The aliens on the station also believe theory of a soldier of darkness coming onto the station
The veteran guy tells Garabaldi about when he met the monster, how a part of it is in him and it's calling to him. ok i made fun of his acting earlier but this was good actually
Garibaldi, Franklin, and the frozen lady go on a trip to try to find it. They find it.
Shooting it doesn't do much but veteran guy acts as bait and Sheridan puts into action his genius strategy of shooting it, but like, a lot. So it's dead now
Frozen lady needs a bit of time and wants to go to earth but that seems to be the only issue Franklin has with dating his patient, grand
The monster was heading towards the exact place that G'Kar said the forces of darkness were coming from. Sheridan and Ivanova look out pensively as the station continues its long journey to the fireworks factory.

# ¿ Jun 14, 2022 20:51

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

S2E6 - Spider In The Web

Talia is psychic-ing at a meeting, between some guy from the very generically named FutureCorp and Amanda Carter of mars. any relation to john
YES SHE IS A RELATION. nerrrds
Someone in THE SAN DIEGO WASTELANDS [dramatic music] is plotting something
Corp guy gets killed by some guy shouting "free mars"
The killer's comes after Talia again but she stops him by like, reading his mind or something
The killer is ID'd as a dead man, Talia reads him reliving the moment of death over and over
Sheridan finds an old horrific experiment where that's how you get a human brain distracted enough for a computer to take over
or as Garibaldi puts it, "cyber zombies". not quite as cool as the TECHNO MAGES but i'll take it
And yes that's exactly what he is, he finds Talia and makes her read his mind a bit more. Earth did it to him
He gets killed and then promptly explodes of course, so there's no evidence
Talia doesn't tell the captain Psi Corps was involved
The captain has his own theory: the shadowy Beureau 13. Buereu. Bureau. gently caress at least I could spell "Section 31"
back in San Diego Wastelands Dramatic Music a shadowy figure is in Bureau 13 but spreads it out into two sentences for dramatic effect. It's the Psi Corps lady from Talia's vision. dun dun duuuuhhhnnn

This was interesting! Project lazarus is a suitably disturbing thing to contemplate. I can't tell if they're leading towards Garibaldi and Talia becoming Just Friends as a resolution to Garibaldi awkwardly hitting on her that one episode or if they're going to pair them up despite no noticeable chemistry at all

# ¿ Jul 12, 2022 21:07

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

still watching from time to time and sometimes taking notes

S2E7 Soul Mates - Mollari's plot was a bit "ahahah women am i rite. whores and harpies all of them". i liked Delenn's hair trouble subplot, yes learning how to take care of long hair was a big part of my transition too

S2E10 GROPOS - There was not a single GoPro in this episode :mad:

S2E12 Acts of Sacrifice - This was a bit silly. Okay we get to watch Ivanova pretending to have an orgasm but like, i feel like it's okay to bother your commanding officer when it's to tell him you don't want an alien to have sex with you. also what happens when the alien finds out how human sex actually works. ivanova you've caused a diplomatic crisis

S2E14 There All the Honor Lies

seems a bit weird for the main commanding officers to be discussing merchandising opportunities for babylon 5 in such detail. almost as if this is some kind of obvious meta-plotline
"we're not some deep space franchise" - shots fired??? not a particularly good burn, if so
sheridan gets jumped by a Minbari guy and kills him in self-defense, obvious setup gun lying right there for him to use
"can you describe the witness?" "...bald with a bone on his head" - wow they all look the same, huh
ok so mollari's guy isn't dead. i was wondering who that Centauri guy was that got killed by the Narn gang in the other episode. seemed a bit quick for a recurring character death though tbh that would have been pretty cool just casually offing a guy, real anyone-can-die moment that would have been
the one witness is a space-transphobe, because, I cannot stress this enough, Delenn is trans
...why does the gift shop have action figures of specifically the ambassadors? seems odd for a space station gift shop. almost as if this is some kind of obvious meta-plotline
Kosh gives Sheridan a Deep Lesson by showing him a small room where aliens sing at him exactly like an earth church choir somehow. this presumably means something to someone
Vir hates his life. don't we all, Vir. I see Mollari shares my view of the action figures
the witness Minbari fails at the important rule of "maybe don't say in detail the crimes you did to someone who might be recording you, in a room where you haven't checked behind all the doors"
wait i thought the pilot guy died in that sheridan kidnapped by aliens episode. or was one of them a different pilot guy. i don't know. the man is so dull his appearance doesn't stick in my brain remotely. please do not cross reference this with my criticism of sheridan not knowing what the guy looked like i am never hypocritical
Looking up confirms it was in fact a different pilot guy! I don't care

# ¿ Sep 15, 2022 21:57

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Chevy Slyme posted:

FYI the early drafts literally did have Delenn doing a Gender swap/Teansition but IIRC it was abandoned largely for very 90�s logistical reasons that were also probably a convenient cover for the fact that it probably made a nonzero number of suits uncomfortable.

This was mentioned the last time I shoehorned a trans reference into my comments, it's a cool detail! I mean I was very much planning on excessively reading in to everything Delenn does for trans subtext regardless, but this does give me an excuse for it

# ¿ Sep 15, 2022 23:15

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

It does make me wonder how it would have worked out if they had managed to do it. As far as I'm aware there was hardly any representation of trans people on 90s TV beyond like, jerry springer and the like, so a show with a major recurring character who was both trans and sympathetic would have really been something at the time. Not to mention a trans man, which is still very rare on-screen. How far would the show have gone with making the analogues with real life trans people very obvious? Would the suits have realised things were getting a bit too gay and asked them to tone it down at some point? Would anyone outside or within the viewership make a noise about it, would anyone have noticed a queer character on a weird space show for nerds, would the bigots be too busy moral panicking about gay people to bother to learn what a trans person was beyond Buffalo Bill, would trans men today talk about coming out the cocoon. what could have been.

On a related note, generally how much did the suits bother Straczynski and the rest of them? Where were they on the scale from total micromanagement to not giving a gently caress at all

e: lol was looking at early trans characters and jesus christ, sort this by date and look at the horrific slim pickings of the 90s and 2000s. The loving Nutshack

Angepain fucked around with this message at 01:11 on Sep 16, 2022

# ¿ Sep 16, 2022 01:04

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Chevy Slyme posted:

Pretty sure the plan always would have been Trans Woman eventually, with a Male Delenn in S1

that does make a bit more sense with the casting a woman for it (though casting trans people has never been great in that regard)

# ¿ Sep 16, 2022 01:39

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

"the decision also rests heavily with @WarnerbrosTV" Ah, so it's hosed then

# ¿ Sep 20, 2022 18:36

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Funnily enough my very slow watch of B5 has also just gotten to 3x08. I just came in here for one reason: to vent about how much I hate Marcus. I actively do not care about this man. everything I know about him I resent having come into my brain.

At least the suit-mandated pilot guy from season 2 had the benefit of being completely dull and forgettable, this guy is just obnoxious. I hate his smug pretentious face. I hope he dies in a very boring way and nobody mentions him ever again. Ivanova you can do so much better

# ¿ May 4, 2023 00:19

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

S3 E11.5(?) : The Episode I Dreamed While Sleeping Off A Migraine

Sheridan goes into the "Cowboy Zone", which is a ripoff of the holodeck but with a cool mst3k-style corridor animation when you enter
He seems to go there to try to reason with projections of the people who bullied him at school. not sure that's healthy
Oh hey one of my friends is in this ep. she'd have been like 4 when this was filmed, must have been some good prosthetic work behind the scenes
Lengthy subplot about Sheridan finding out Earth is discriminating against left-handed people. this is a pretty heavy-handed metaphor for racism who wrote this
Now he's living in a room in my flat which didn't exist before. Hi John!

this is the worst episode yet. still at least Marcus isn't in it

# ¿ May 16, 2023 02:22

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# ¿ Apr 24, 2024 22:16

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

SlothfulCobra posted:

Also Andrea Thompson had some kind of grievance about her character not having a big enough role, which was part of the reason why she didn't come back.

This is technically a spoiler for the rest of the show, though I can't say I wasn't expecting it. Still, I do think it would have been nice for her to have stuck around - without her the Psi Corps are just another external danger to the crew that we can ignore most of the time, as opposed to a member of the crew who is both part of the corps and friends with the people working against them. Though I'm still just partway through S3 so I can't say what the role of Psi Corps ends up being of course.

# ¿ May 19, 2023 11:21

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Sci-Fi Wi-Fi > Babylon 5 blind watch thread: Maybe they're Zorlons?