A Niner Watches Babylon 5 (NO spoilers, please)

[Reverend]

Oh I can buy the dance as foreplay (surely that could be hypothetically anything, and there could be species who do not use the concept). But not as sex. Which apparently Ivanova is selling it as.

I think you're confusing a sex act with mating. Not necessarily the same thing for all forms of life. It really depends on your definition. For all the Lumati knew about human anatomy, when she held his hand, it counted as third base (or 5th if you're a Centauri.)
Either way it's probably best not to over think this. Besides, I rather think the dance was meant to be silly, not necessarily funny.

 

[stonester1]

It was never that.

First, it was whether or not they sometimes take precautions.

And second, that they take precautions.

That's different. Stuff like researching what it is you're going to do and what the consequences to you could be, and, of course, how to do it right.

And my point was, for whatever reason, sometimes people don't give a shit about any of that.

 

[Myasishchev]

And on "transferrence" or other mechanics, he didn't care about "transferrence" or biology. He just wanted to have sex. Most humans don't care about "transferrence" or biology when they want to have sex, either.

Believe me, many humans consider the transferrence thing sort of important. Getting pregnant is no laughing matter (for women, anyway).

But more than that, most of us basically understand how it works more or less and that it involves physical contact and excretion of something. Ivanova's plan basically only works because the writer says it did.

Which is ignoring the important thing: It's as painfully unfunny as Rebo and Zooty.

Indeed. Although I bet she could've gotten away with a blowjob.

 

[Jan]

As for the plausibility of the ruse...well since we have no clue how alien sex rituals compare (nor do I really want to, especially if a pak'ma'ra is involved) I suppose it's as plausible as anything else.

pak'ma'ra (no caps) reproductive methods: pak'ma'ra hav no males or females; all pak'ma'ra are the same 'gender'. Reproduction is via a form of pathogenesis...

Oops, sorry....you *didn't* want to know!

Jan

 

[Lindley]

I think this is mostly true. Maybe a tad harsh but generally right.

The "humorous" scenes on Babylon 5 are truly cringe-worthy. The "sex" scene is a particularly egregious example, but there are a fair amount of other "cute" funny scenes which are mind-bogglingly un-funny.

What really annoys me is when a scene is on its way to being hilarious, but they keep the joke going too long and too intricately, and just suck all the funny out of it.

 

[sidious618]

Londo and the bug is one of my favorite humorous moments in the show.

 

[Hyperspace05]

B5's humor certainly is hit and miss. Mostly hits for me, though.

But I have to admit that I just cannot rewatch the Ivanova 'sex scene'. It falls flat for me. But hey - that's ok.

 

[Reverend]

Well technically all comedy is hit and miss, from a certain point of view. Something can only be funny or not depending on who's watching.

Case in point...

Spoiler: Season 5

...Lochley's reaction to Rebo & Zooty. One of the old magazines had an interview with Neil Gaiman who said the intent when writing was to mirror his experience as a Brit abroad observing American humour and being left wondering what everyone was laughing to hard at. If I recall he was confused as anyone as to why they hired Penn & Teller.

Regardless, JMS isn't a comedy writer, that's a whole other profession. So the fact he and/or the actors occasionally get in a funny moment is just a bonus. As for the other times...well that's just mathematics.

As for the plausibility of the ruse...well since we have no clue how alien sex rituals compare (nor do I really want to, especially if a pak'ma'ra is involved) I suppose it's as plausible as anything else.

pak'ma'ra (no caps) reproductive methods: pak'ma'ra hav no males or females; all pak'ma'ra are the same 'gender'. Reproduction is via a form of pathogenesis...

Oops, sorry....you *didn't* want to know!

Jan

Yeah, great thanks, just when I'd purged the image of what's under that "not really a hump."

[Edit] though it did remind me I needed to finish up the section on pak'ma'ra biology from the wika. Joy.

 

[TheGodBen]

In regards to the comedy, so far I would say that it's 50/50; there are times when the show is genuinely funny and there are times when it seems to be trying too hard. Comedy can be a fine line, and JMS can't please everyone all the time, so as long as he pleases me some of the time I'm okay with it. My favourite comedic scene so far was the zipper scene between Garibaldi and Sinclair on the way to B4, that was the sort of awkward/stupid conversation I enjoy having. I'm sure a dozen other people here hated it.

Hunter, Prey (**½)

Also known as: Mind War 2: Less Interesting Boogaloo.

I suppose that's my biggest problem with this episode, I feel like I've seen it before; some guy knows a dark secret about Earth organisations so he comes to Babylon 5 to get away (which is where one of his students happens to be) and Earth sends some officials to find him while the station commander tries to help him escape. Sadly, Dr Jacobs is less interesting than Jason Ironheart because Dr Jacobs is a frail old man and not a dangerously-engineered super-entity. This episode also lacks Bester, his role is filled by Cranston, whom is played by the most wooden guest actor Deep Space Nine ever had, Scott Bakula.

We do get to learn more about the Vorlons though. Well, not really, just just learn that their ships are organic and heavily pixelated when viewed up close. We do get some confirmation that President Clark was probably in on the plan to assassinate Santiago, and we get to see the senior staff in on the counter-conspiracy against Clark, but was that really worth such an uninspired story? I'm sure that things mentioned in this episode will be important later, particularly the things relating to the Vorlons, but the episode itself wasn't that interesting.

I did like the scene where Garibaldi and Franklin discuss the future, but other than that... meh.

Scott Bakula: 30

 

[Kegg]

Also known as: Mind War 2: Less Interesting Boogaloo.

I'd never considered it as similar to Mind War, but you're right.

but was that really worth such an uninspired story?

Nope.

Not that it isn't or is important, but the story wasn't worth it.

Spoiler: No, I am your father

Ultimately the payoff of this episode is what, a single line down the road about the medical report? It's the evidence Ivanova gets via Epsilon III that is the only really important arc relevant material. This episode episode, feh.

 

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

Well technically all comedy is hit and miss, from a certain point of view. Something can only be funny or not depending on who's watching.

Case in point...

Spoiler: Season 5

...Lochley's reaction to Rebo & Zooty. One of the old magazines had an interview with Neil Gaiman who said the intent when writing was to mirror his experience as a Brit abroad observing American humour and being left wondering what everyone was laughing to hard at. If I recall he was confused as anyone as to why they hired Penn & Teller.

Spoiler: Rebo & Zooty

IIRC, Gaiman was ecstatic that Penn and Teller were hired since he is a fan of the magic/comedy duo.

 

[Sykonee]

We do get to learn more about the Vorlons though. Well, not really, just just learn that their ships are organic and heavily pixelated when viewed up close. We do get some confirmation that President Clark was probably in on the plan to assassinate Santiago, and we get to see the senior staff in on the counter-conspiracy against Clark, but was that really worth such an uninspired story? I'm sure that things mentioned in this episode will be important later, particularly the things relating to the Vorlons, but the episode itself wasn't that interesting.

I blame most of the guest actors for this, and not just Cas- Bakula. Most of them were quite poor in this episode. I swear the woman informant had to be a robot!

 

[Neroon]

To each their own. I'll agree with you on Bernie Casey, but Wanda de Jesus was fine for me. Intriguing to look at, she had a military demeanor that can come off as stiff. It seemed to me as being more authoritative and almost intimidating.

 

[Sykonee]

I have to admit, however, that I quite liked Boxleitner in this episode. He was great in coming off like a by-the-book hard-line Earth Gov administrator, all the while working to impede The Bad Guys' efforts in the process.

 

[CorporalClegg]

I always like a good conveniently contrived work-around. This one ranks right up there with the Empire commander not shooting the escape pod with no "life signs."

 

[Can]

Hunter , Prey is a hit and miss for me...Learning Vorlon technology , especially their organic ships was interesting....I quite liked woman informant you mentioned. He was quite sarcastic ( "I Don't have any easy answers Captain ) But the Max the Abductor character was awful....Not only bady written but horribly acted...There was no air of menace on him. He might just be a comedian...

 

[TheGodBen]

I half expected Max to shout "OH YEEEAAAAAAAAAAAH!" whenever he was on screen.

 

[TheGodBen]

There All the Honour Lies (***)

This is another difficult episode to judge. Ever since the first episode of this season I was hoping that more would be done with the Sheridan/Minbari situation, but most of the time it didn't even register. Now it's back, but once again the story feels a little too routine; Sheridan killed a Minbari in self defence and he must prove that it wasn't murder or be kicked off the station. We learn more about Minbari culture and their clan system, and Lennier was more interesting in this one episode than he has been at any time before, but the episode still isn't that great.

Then there's the b-story about turning B5 into a deep space franchise. I can see what they were going for, some of the merchandising that goes with sci-fi franchises such as Star Trek is insane, but it broke the fourth wall in a way that undermined the more serious stories. I mean, why would someone make a doll of Londo? Who would buy one? (Other than G'Kar, of course. I imagine he could have some fun with it.) There was a few moments I liked, such as the Drazi wearing a human mask, but otherwise I found it distracting.

There's a c-story about Vir being replaced, which could only end one way considering how it was set up. Of course Londo was going to back Vir up, this is a television show and that's how these things work. Much like Lennier, this was Vir's best episode so far, but that's not saying much.

I guess there was a d-story (or was it a subset of the a-story?) where Kosh takes Sheridan as a student. What did we learn about the Vorlons from this story? We learned that they set up a monastic Jawa choir in a crawl-space they couldn't possibly fit into in their encounter suits. Yes, this is what I wanted to learn about the Vorlons.

The actress that played Na'Toth Prime (as opposed to nuNa'Toth) showed up again and that actress is... Scott Bakula. He always did look good in a skirt. I must not have noticed him when he played Na'Toth due to the make-up.

Scott Bakula: 31

 

[Reverend]

We do get to learn more about the Vorlons though. Well, not really, just just learn that their ships are organic and heavily pixelated when viewed up close.

They also have a habit of spelling out the name of one of the effects people. Strange that.

Spoiler: Vorlons

This might sound odd, but this episode led be to wonder if the secret behind the Vorlons and their encounter suits was actually that the ship was the real Vorlon while the thing in the encounter suit was a remote controlled bio-engineered/cybernetic avatar or servitor. I have to admit I was a little disappointed when the idea turned out to be wrong. I really liked that idea at the time.

I think what lead me down that path was the bit mentioned above when the ship displays a message, then Kosh bows his head and leaves, as if it was giving him instructions.

 

[stonester1]

. My favourite comedic scene so far was the zipper scene between Garibaldi and Sinclair on the way to B4, that was the sort of awkward/stupid conversation I enjoy having. I'm sure a dozen other people here hated it.

Me, again, I loved it. It revealed more about the characters (always good) AND it showed them thinking about something besides the "job" and the "big picture stuff". A very human moment.

Science fiction especially needs stuff like this. Because it's easy to get distanced from the human in that genre.