A Niner Watches Babylon 5 (NO spoilers, please)
- Thread starter TheGodBen
- Start date
Anyone who was on Star Trek is played by Scott Bakula. Read the thread.
The one thing I would have liked "Deathwalker" to address is functional genocide. I mean, killing her would be effectively terminating the Dilgar race, she being the last of her kind and all that. You think that'd at least come up in conversation as a talking point but nobody gives it a second thought. The method of Dilgar extermination is also insanely conveinent - our heroes didn't do it, the universe took one for the team and annihilated them herself, to wrap the plot in the same tidy bow the Vorlons provide later on. You'd think there would have been enough Dilgar offworld for the continued existence of more than simply one of them, but I guess not.
The Scott Bakula joke may become more obscure because GodBen seems to be using it for everybody who's previously worked on Trek.
Oh, definitely. Just like Sinclair's 'marriage' to Delenn in "Parliament of Dreams" - or "Deathwalker" and its Talia subplot, it's just one of many hints in the first season that are basically loose ends that weren't wrapped in a bow. This is one of the very few that seems to flatly contradict what comes later, though. For a series that can be astonishingly tidy with its arcs, upsets like this do bug me.
Actually it's Jem'Hadar. Given that this is a Star Trek board I'd submit it's not an obscure joke at all - I'd guess the vast majority of posters here would know what a Jem'Hadar is. It's not exactly the Letheans (a playable race for Star Trek Online. My initial reaction to this is, 'Who the hell are the Letheans?' Turns out they appeared in all of two DS9 episodes, but I disgress.)
The Scott Bakula joke may become more obscure because GodBen seems to be using it for everybody who's previously worked on Trek.
Yes, but it was guest-written by Scott Bakula.
Don't worry, nobody understands it, not even me.It's obviously some kind of an inside joke which I fail to understand!
It's like a penguin on a television set; we can either investigate where it came from and attempt to return it to its rightful owner, or we can have a conversation about whether the zoo stamps the animals "PROPERTY OF THE ZOO" and wait for the penguin to explode.
Back during season 1 of Enterprise there was a scene where Archer and T'Pol are tied up together and in their attempt to escape they both fall down and Archer gets a face-ful of Vulcan boobies. I insulted the scene and criticised episode co-writer Mike Sussman without any evidence that he was responsible for it. Upon learning that Mike Sussman has an account on this board I panicked and gave all his episodes fake 5 star reviews, all of which ended with: "Good work, Mike!
" It became a recurring joke, and with each fake review the things I said became more absurd, at one point it devolved into a list of things you'd commonly see during the conveyor belt section of The Generation Game.But when I finished up my final Enterprise review Mike Sussman, or someone using his account, actually posted in the thread, and now there's a possibility that in some future production he's involved in there'll be a character called Ben who will be tortured on a weekly basis until his painful death in the series finale.
So what may seem to the untrained eye to be a completely random joke about Scott Bakula is actually a carefully planned trap to get Scott Bakula to post here so that he can explain to me exactly what happened in the final episode of Quantum Leap. That has confused the hell out of me since I was 7.
Scott Bakula?!: 3
I wouldn't worry about that. I doubt that clown's ever going to work in writing again.But when I finished up my final Enterprise review Mike Sussman, or someone using his account, actually posted in the thread, and now there's a possibility that in some future production he's involved in there'll be a character called Ben who will be tortured on a weekly basis until his painful death in the series finale.
Legend of what...?
It was God all along wasn't it? You of all people should recognise God.
How many Scott Bakulas does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
I fully expect another Scott Bakula guest star reference for the episode "Eyes".
By the time they tell Sheridan, things have changed. Jenimer is now the Chosen One of the Grey Council, Sinclair has his memories back and in fact HAS been told about Valen's soul as has President Clark. They told Clark because they felt they had to, trusting that the Earth government were as good at keeping secrets as they were, which of course they were plus they're not about to tell ISN the only reason there's still a human race is because of Minbari metaphysics. They'd much rather keep the BS party line that they surrendered because Earth's defences were too intimidating. The last thing they'd want is to advertise the fact that there's NOTHING they could do to protect Earth if a more advanced race was in the mood for a little genocide.
What precipitated telling them was of course the appearance of the Trigati. The Grey Council knew that if it attempted to restart the war then it was best that the EA knew at least some of the truth and so they could co-operate in bringing them down.
Sheridan was told because as Lennier said, "changes are coming." Later, Sinclair and later Delenn vouched for Sheridan and so he was kept in the loop, such as it was.
Timing is the critical factor here. Even Delenn wasn't sure how close things were until 'Chrysalis' when Kosh confirmed the Shadows were indeed back. Even after that point there were members of the council (mostly warrior caste it appears) that still didn't really believe what was staring them in the face.
The Minbari leadership were terrified of a mass panic at a critical point, so if it was a choice between killing one human or letting a single human live to spill the beans then you bet they believed it necessary to kill him.
What precipitated telling them was of course the appearance of the Trigati. The Grey Council knew that if it attempted to restart the war then it was best that the EA knew at least some of the truth and so they could co-operate in bringing them down.
Sheridan was told because as Lennier said, "changes are coming." Later, Sinclair and later Delenn vouched for Sheridan and so he was kept in the loop, such as it was.
Timing is the critical factor here. Even Delenn wasn't sure how close things were until 'Chrysalis' when Kosh confirmed the Shadows were indeed back. Even after that point there were members of the council (mostly warrior caste it appears) that still didn't really believe what was staring them in the face.
The Minbari leadership were terrified of a mass panic at a critical point, so if it was a choice between killing one human or letting a single human live to spill the beans then you bet they believed it necessary to kill him.
That's actually not a bad idea. Though you're fine discussing it here, the subject has legs enough to sustain its own thread.Anything else to say and we'd better start a new thread.
Hi everyone, I'm Scott Bakula. Today is Godfrey's (AKA TheGodBen) birthday so he asked me to log into his account and write this review for him so that he could "get locked", whatever that means. Since I'm a big fan of Babylon 5 for giving me work for many years I was happy to oblige.
Believers (****)
Yup, 8 out of 10, Godfrey's favourite episode of the show thus far, he is indeed completely mad. Part of this is down to very low expectations, when he first saw the religious couple he felt he was in for a bumpy ride and was expecting a 3/10 episode, and when he realised that this episode was going to be a moral dilemma of crazy religious fanatics vs medical science he feared it was just going to tread old ground. And it did tread old ground, but every ten to fifteen minutes it shook things up by going in a new direction. In the first part of the episode it seems like it is going to be a battle of religious tolerance between Franklin and the other doctor, then things shake up by having Franklin get pissed off with the parents and letting them know what idiots they are, then the political element is introduced, then Franklin decided to perform the surjery without permission, then the parents kill their kid. The episode isn't complacent, it focuses on each of these elements just long enough and then moved on before he got bored.
Godfrey's biggest problem with this episode is the portrayal of the parents, he said that they weren't given any personality beyond their religious beliefs. Godfrey had no problem with the insane level of fanaticism displayed by the parents because he remembered a story he once heard about a Jehovah's Witness couple that abandoned their child after it received a blood transfusion, so this level of insane religious behaviour does exist in the world. Godfrey also found it silly that Franklin didn't look into this culture's beliefs about surgery until after he had performed it, making Sinclair's line "You had know way of knowing what would happen" particularly egregious.
There was also a b-plot about Ivanova escorting a ship, but this was so pointless that Godfrey decided it doesn't affect his impression of the episode.
I don't agree with Godfrey's criticisms of this episode, because I wrote it, but I'm glad that he found it mostly enjoyable. I found working on it very difficult since I'm normally not a writer, and I admit that I stumbled in places, much like a young gazelle learning its footing. I was upset that he didn't like the portrayal of the religious couple since I played both of them and I think I did a great job. I had great chemistry with myself and I think I made a very believable couple, and you can just tell that underneath that religious exterior these two are absolute demons in the sack. Damn, I'm sexy.
Me: 7
By the way folks, I know that many of you think this picture is a 'shop:
But it's not, I posed this way for Godfrey several weeks ago while he was visiting me at my private ranch. That's right, I have no legs, but you don't need legs when your chest is that perfect, and I can assure you that my man parts are fully functional.
Oh, and the ending of Quantum Leap was easy to understand, Godfrey's just an idiot.
Today is Godfrey's (AKA TheGodBen) birthday so he asked me to log into his account and write this review for him so that he could "get locked", whatever that means. Since I'm a big fan of Babylon 5 for giving me work for many years I was happy to oblige.Believers (****)
Yup, 8 out of 10, Godfrey's favourite episode of the show thus far, he is indeed completely mad. Part of this is down to very low expectations, when he first saw the religious couple he felt he was in for a bumpy ride and was expecting a 3/10 episode, and when he realised that this episode was going to be a moral dilemma of crazy religious fanatics vs medical science he feared it was just going to tread old ground. And it did tread old ground, but every ten to fifteen minutes it shook things up by going in a new direction. In the first part of the episode it seems like it is going to be a battle of religious tolerance between Franklin and the other doctor, then things shake up by having Franklin get pissed off with the parents and letting them know what idiots they are, then the political element is introduced, then Franklin decided to perform the surjery without permission, then the parents kill their kid. The episode isn't complacent, it focuses on each of these elements just long enough and then moved on before he got bored.
Godfrey's biggest problem with this episode is the portrayal of the parents, he said that they weren't given any personality beyond their religious beliefs. Godfrey had no problem with the insane level of fanaticism displayed by the parents because he remembered a story he once heard about a Jehovah's Witness couple that abandoned their child after it received a blood transfusion, so this level of insane religious behaviour does exist in the world. Godfrey also found it silly that Franklin didn't look into this culture's beliefs about surgery until after he had performed it, making Sinclair's line "You had know way of knowing what would happen" particularly egregious.
There was also a b-plot about Ivanova escorting a ship, but this was so pointless that Godfrey decided it doesn't affect his impression of the episode.
I don't agree with Godfrey's criticisms of this episode, because I wrote it, but I'm glad that he found it mostly enjoyable. I found working on it very difficult since I'm normally not a writer, and I admit that I stumbled in places, much like a young gazelle learning its footing. I was upset that he didn't like the portrayal of the religious couple since I played both of them and I think I did a great job. I had great chemistry with myself and I think I made a very believable couple, and you can just tell that underneath that religious exterior these two are absolute demons in the sack. Damn, I'm sexy.
Me: 7
By the way folks, I know that many of you think this picture is a 'shop:
But it's not, I posed this way for Godfrey several weeks ago while he was visiting me at my private ranch. That's right, I have no legs, but you don't need legs when your chest is that perfect, and I can assure you that my man parts are fully functional.
Oh, and the ending of Quantum Leap was easy to understand, Godfrey's just an idiot.
Oh boy!
Anything else to say and we'd better start a new thread.
A good point. So I'll be brief:
The Minbari don't need to tell Clarke or anyone else the real reason for ending the war to capture the Trigati. On a need to know basis, all the Earth Alliance needs is a good reason to help them in not igniting a second war; the knowledge that they would probably lose - which they already have - is enough. It's taking an insanely unnecessary gamble which is even more insane if they were willing to kill Valen earlier. Things may have changed, but both scenes - Lennier telling Sheridan and the Minbari threatening the need to kill Sinclair - do not make sense when put together, simply put.
Yes. That is my idea of brief. Pray you never see my idea of overlong.
If memory serves, they didn't have that information on file since this was such a minor and relatively secretive race, and they weren't given the information until after Franklin had performed the surgery - and since he had to perform it at a certain time, yeah, he literally had know way of knowing, barring the parents actually telling him.
Granted, that's a plot contrivance of the highest order, but it's an internally consistent plot contrivance. The best kind!
And yeah, "Believers" was the first episode of B5 I liked as well. It's the first altogether solid hour of the series and the twists on the expected moral dilemma are rather welcome.
Believers... I dunno. It always struck me as a blatant 'anti-Trek' episode. Mind, the reason for this is due to higher-ups always demanding nice, safe endings for TV sci-fi so the audience can come away feeling good after the show ends, hence the stagnant state of most Trek. Apparently it was a minor miracle this was even green-lit, at least the way JMS describes it at Lurker's.
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