Farscape or Babylon 5?

[kirk55555]

Grail (Babylon 5) - This was an entertaining episode. I liked the court scene in the beginning with the guy taking the alien to court for the alien's family abducting his grandfather Londo was great, like always. The grail seeker looked familiar, so I looked him up, and he was the earth hostage from Star trek V, Chancellor Gorkon in ST VI, and Gul Madred in TNG. I don't have much more else to say, except that I liked this episode.

 

[Sindatur]

Grail (Babylon 5) - This was an entertaining episode. I liked the court scene in the beginning with the guy taking the alien to court for the alien's family abducting his grandfather Londo was great, like always. The grail seeker looked familiar, so I looked him up, and he was the earth hostage from Star trek V, Chancellor Gorkon in ST VI, and Gul Madred in TNG. I don't have much more else to say, except that I liked this episode.

Yea, David Warner is pretty much a SciFi/Fantasy Staple (He's got an episode of Doctor Who coming up after the first of the the year). He's even done Doctor Who Audio plays, and many, many TV episodes, Movies, Video Games, animated voice overs.

 

[Greg Cox]

Grail (Babylon 5) - This was an entertaining episode. I liked the court scene in the beginning with the guy taking the alien to court for the alien's family abducting his grandfather Londo was great, like always. The grail seeker looked familiar, so I looked him up, and he was the earth hostage from Star trek V, Chancellor Gorkon in ST VI, and Gul Madred in TNG. I don't have much more else to say, except that I liked this episode.

Yea, David Warner is pretty much a SciFi/Fantasy Staple (He's got an episode of Doctor Who coming up after the first of the the year). He's even done Doctor Who Audio plays, and many, many TV episodes, Movies, Video Games, animated voice overs.

Not to mention Tron, Time Bandits, and Time After Time.

Heck, he's even in Titanic!

 

[kirk55555]

Eyes (Babylon 5) - Another B5 episode that shows that the future of humanity isn't pretty, in fact, government wise, it gets worse. They had a colonel who was pretty much psychotic going around interrogating people with a telepath. I hope the "loyalty brain scan" isn't wide spread. Even for Babylon 5's universe, thats pretty screwed up. I get how it would be done in investigations, and it sounds like the regulations don't allow for scans without charges (even if the colonel tried to interpret the rules that way), but the fact that such a psycho could go so far is kind of freaky (not that I should be surprised, it seems like 90% of the politicians are corrupt, and probably 75% of the military). I liked seeing Jeffrey Combs, its always cool seeing him cameo in stuff, and I liked that his character wasn't a part of the colonel's insanity, he was just doing his job and stopped the colonel when it turned out he was unstable. The motorcycle parts felt like product placement, and were kind of annoying, but not a big deal. I can't say I really liked this episode, but it wasn't a bad episode.

 

[RandyS]

Not to mention Tron, Time Bandits, and Time After Time.

Heck, he's even in Titanic!

Twice as a matter of fact. Before David Warner played a fictional characters in the 1997 movie, he also played real life passenger Lawrence Beasly in 1979's SOS TITANIC.

Sorry to derail the point of the thread. To get it back on track, OP: glad you saw "Eyes". That's one of my favorites of season 1.

 

[Professor Zoom]

And a silly bit of trivia: the Colonel is played by the son of Beatles producer George Martin.

 

[Leroy]

Overall, I liked the first season. It had some horrible episodes (A Human Reaction, Jeremiah Chrichton)

Really? I thought 'A Human Reaction' was considered a fan favorite, it's also one of my top eps from the first season it's also a very important episode in regards to the shows arc without going into spoiler territory.

 

[kirk55555]

Yeah, I hated A Human Reaction (it was discussed on whatever page of this thread where I first talked about it). I couldn't stand the episode, and I'd say it was definately the worst episode of the season to me, with Jeremiah Crichton a close second.

I might start Farscape season 2 soon, although I may wait until finishing Babylon 5 season 1. I've decided to watch all of Farscape Season 2 except "Taking the stone". An episode focusing on a character I really dislike is bad enough, but it seems like even people who like her hate the episode, for the most part, so its definately getting skipped. Whenever I start it will probably be like last season, no rush and maybe only an episode every few days, depending on my mood.

 

[Methos]

Eyes (Babylon 5) - Another B5 episode that shows that the future of humanity isn't pretty, in fact, government wise, it gets worse. They had a colonel who was pretty much psychotic going around interrogating people with a telepath. I hope the "loyalty brain scan" isn't wide spread. Even for Babylon 5's universe, thats pretty screwed up. I get how it would be done in investigations, and it sounds like the regulations don't allow for scans without charges (even if the colonel tried to interpret the rules that way), but the fact that such a psycho could go so far is kind of freaky (not that I should be surprised, it seems like 90% of the politicians are corrupt, and probably 75% of the military). I liked seeing Jeffrey Combs, its always cool seeing him cameo in stuff, and I liked that his character wasn't a part of the colonel's insanity, he was just doing his job and stopped the colonel when it turned out he was unstable. The motorcycle parts felt like product placement, and were kind of annoying, but not a big deal. I can't say I really liked this episode, but it wasn't a bad episode.

The PsiCorps arc is actually one of my favourites with Babylon 5...

Spoiler

it's sad they tapered off without covering the telepath wars, that would have made an amazing arc to cover in the show... they tried with a bit of Season 5, but it was nowhere near as good as the books indicated

M

 

[Trubinator]

Yeah, I hated A Human Reaction (it was discussed on whatever page of this thread where I first talked about it). I couldn't stand the episode, and I'd say it was definately the worst episode of the season to me, with Jeremiah Crichton a close second.

I might start Farscape season 2 soon, although I may wait until finishing Babylon 5 season 1. I've decided to watch all of Farscape Season 2 except "Taking the stone". An episode focusing on a character I really dislike is bad enough, but it seems like even people who like her hate the episode, for the most part, so its definately getting skipped. Whenever I start it will probably be like last season, no rush and maybe only an episode every few days, depending on my mood.

I'm still in utter disbelief of this! Not only is AHR a fan-favorite but it was the first episode that I absolutely thought was epic. To this day I still love rewatching that episode ... even out of context with the rest of Farscape.

 

[Reverend]

Not to mention Tron, Time Bandits, and Time After Time.

Heck, he's even in Titanic!

Twice as a matter of fact. Before David Warner played a fictional characters in the 1997 movie, he also played real life passenger Lawrence Beasly in 1979's SOS TITANIC.

Sorry to derail the point of the thread. To get it back on track, OP: glad you saw "Eyes". That's one of my favorites of season 1.

Three times IIRC. I'm pretty sure he was also in 'A Night to Remember'!

Eyes (Babylon 5) - Another B5 episode that shows that the future of humanity isn't pretty, in fact, government wise, it gets worse. They had a colonel who was pretty much psychotic going around interrogating people with a telepath. I hope the "loyalty brain scan" isn't wide spread. Even for Babylon 5's universe, thats pretty screwed up. I get how it would be done in investigations, and it sounds like the regulations don't allow for scans without charges (even if the colonel tried to interpret the rules that way), but the fact that such a psycho could go so far is kind of freaky (not that I should be surprised, it seems like 90% of the politicians are corrupt, and probably 75% of the military). I liked seeing Jeffrey Combs, its always cool seeing him cameo in stuff, and I liked that his character wasn't a part of the colonel's insanity, he was just doing his job and stopped the colonel when it turned out he was unstable. The motorcycle parts felt like product placement, and were kind of annoying, but not a big deal. I can't say I really liked this episode, but it wasn't a bad episode.

JMS was very careful to establish that there are very specific rules regarding the use of a telepath in any kind of courtroom setting. For example, legally speaking you can't just have a telepath scan someone accused of a crime to establish their guilt or innocence. The presumption of innocence, the right of due process and the burden of evidence still exists and are very carefully guarded. Anything a teep sees while in the mind of a defendant is inadmissible in a court of law.

Most of what we see Talia doing as a commercial teep are surface scans between two consenting business persons in order to determine if a negotiator is being truthful or attempting to deceive. In those cases the teep's employer must simply take their word for it, but that kind of thing doesn't fly on the witness stand.

What they can do however is scan a (consenting) victim or witness to *help* them remember details of the crime, but again, the teep's own perceptions are not admissible unless supported by corroborating physical or overwhelming circumstantial evidence. The Psi Corps novels go into this a little more and it's explained that the reason behind all this has to do with a certain well known historical precedent (contrary to pressure from certain senators in Earthdome.) The (co)founder of Psi Corps didn't want to risk a similar backlash to his teeps that occurred in the wake of the Salem trials...not that he hesitated to use his teeps for some very shady dealings himself, but that's another story.

As for these "loyalty scans"; they're a new thing, mostly due to the social/political fallout from the Earth-Minbari War and you'll hear more about what's behind them later on down the line.

 

[Greg Cox]

Not to mention Tron, Time Bandits, and Time After Time.

Heck, he's even in Titanic!

Twice as a matter of fact. Before David Warner played a fictional characters in the 1997 movie, he also played real life passenger Lawrence Beasly in 1979's SOS TITANIC.

Three times IIRC. I'm pretty sure he was also in 'A Night to Remember'!

Remind me not to take a cruise with David Warner!

 

[Reverend]

Remind me not to take a cruise with David Warner!

Or you could look at it this way: anyone who has been able to be on-board for two doomed voyages and yet is still around to be on a *third* is someone you might want to stick very close to. I mean, he must be doing something right, no?

 

[Greg Cox]

Remind me not to take a cruise with David Warner!

Or you could look at it this way: anyone who has been able to be on-board for two doomed voyages and yet is still around to be on a *third* is someone you might want to stick very close to. I mean, he must be doing something right, no?

But did he actually survive in the movies?

 

[Reverend]

Almost certainly not, but I wouldn't let little things like *logic* or *rational thought* get in the way of a good idea.

 

[Distorted Humor]

Must say, with him liking Infection and TKO (which I put as the 2nd and 3ed weakest episodes in Seasons 1-4) I think he is in very good shape to enjoy Babylon 5

 

[kirk55555]

Legacies (Babylon 5) - This was an enjoyable episode. I liked the parts with the telepath. I guessed early on she'd be the one who would discover what happened to the body. The parts with the warriors was kind of predictable, but still interesting. Overal, an entertaining episode.

 

[Reverend]

While that girl's "acting" hits me like nails on a chalkboard, I do like this episode as it gives us our first glimpse at the intricacies of Minbari society. Up until his point all we've had to go on are Delenn & Lennier, both of whom are religious caste and now we get to see the buggers who nearly wiped humans off the face of the galaxy. I think the caste system was mentioned but this is the first time we see that they're not a homogenised culture, but instead have some very distinct contrasts.

It's just a shame that we never really got to see much of the worker caste (I think only one had a speaking role in the whole series!) From reading the 'To Dream in the City of Sorrows' novel one gets the sense that they're so much more down-to-earth and easy going that either of the religious or warrior castes, who are each very uptight in their own ways.

 

[Lindley]

they're so much more down-to-earth and easy going

Down-to-Minbar?

 

[Reverend]

^That too.