Babylon 5

[JD]

I don't know how anybody can think the boxing episode of NuBSG was a filler. I don't remember a ton, but from what I do remember that was a huge episode that filled in a ton of the questions about what happened during the recent time jump . The boxing matches were also a way for some of the characters to resolve conflicts that had been building up during the episodes before it. It was probably one of the most important episodes of that season.
It might not have moved the overall plot of the show forward much, but it was a massive character based episode.

 

[David cgc]

An infodump isn't character development nor is it good writing. I don't know but I expect the writers' room smelt a bit funny after they came up with that one.

"Guys, guys, I'm so fucking blazed right now. What if... what if... what if we answered some of the questions we raised earlier in the story? Because it's almost the end, right? And we can't answer questions at the beginning, because we haven't asked them yet. And we can't answer them later, because the show will be over, and we can't make more episodes when the show is over. So it seems, like, like the time to resolve the mysteries and ambiguities we've been teasing is now, right before the ending, so everyone knows where everything stands during the culminating showdown of the series and it's not just a bunch of incoherent, obtuse shouting. Now watch me shotgun this Mountain Dew."

This is a thread about Babylon-freaking-5, for God's sake. If you're frustrated by a show being intentionally ambiguous to string the audience along about stuff characters already knew before finally laying everything out on the table, or expositional flashbacks filling in blanks, and you think "filling in the gaps" is synonymous with "filler," why even click on this thread? Everything BSG did, Babylon 5 did first, but with more bluffing during behind-the-scenes interviews about the five-year-plan.

 

[JD]

B5 had a movie that was one giant flashback, and did nothing but fill in gaps in the backstory.

 

[StarCruiser]

In this day and age? Are ya' kidding?

Misinformation is the name of the game in business and politics baby!

Besides - I don't consider bad things being said about NuBSG as misinformation. I never liked it. Tried the miniseries and wasn't particularly impressed by the depressing and dreary presentation. Had some vague connection to the old show but, lacked anything like a sense of humor.

Tried on rare occasion after that and usually just changed the channel.

This is part of why I really can't stand pretty much all NuTrek either. Too much negativity - and what few positive waves get through tend to get buried real quick...

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[DonIago]

I tried to get into NuBSG and ended up falling asleep.

In its defense, I was on a plane at the time, so hardly ideal circumstances.

Still, I've never gone back, and hearing that the finale flubbed the dismount was...discouraging.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

I liked nuBSG quite a lot to begin with but I thought it crawled up its own arse in the end due to its apparent lack of planning - unlike B5. However, I suspect that given the premise, there was no possible satisfactory conclusion. Perhaps the alternative would have been some sort of BSG80 redux with the fleet finding modern Earth - also pants. The depressingly downbeat, grey nature of it all and lack of space discos was understandable given that the Cylons had committed genocide on the 12 colonies.

But, yes, let us not discuss other sci-fi series for the sake of comparison. Let us limit ourselves to Babylon 5.

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I don't agree with this viewpoint but really it's just a TV show.

 

[Kraig]

But, yes, let us not discuss other sci-fi series for the sake of comparison. Let us limit ourselves to Babylon 5.

I agree.

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[BlueStuff]

"Grail"

A bifurcated episode that was kinda fun in places, but mostly pretty stupid. The reason for the split largely hinged on the guest stars which ranged from good to absolutely dreadful - and I'm sure you all know who I'm talking about here.

Yes, the actor playing Jinxo was comfortably one of the worst actors I've ever seen in my life. The writing for him wasn't great, but why did he constantly look like he was on the verge of bursting into laughter? Essentially every scene focusing on him fell flat, and it wasn't a strong plot to begin with.

David Warner (Gul Madred!) did his best to bring dignity to the silly role of the Holy Grail-seeker (won't be looking up the name) and I rather enjoyed William Sanderson (known to me as Deadwood's EB Farnum) playing station gangster Deuce.

In terms of the effects, the brainfeeder alien actually looked reasonably good. Too bad about the awful squeaky voice. I'll admit to being genuinely taken aback by "won't you, Ambassador Kosh?" in the opening scene and I was thinking this could finally be a real Vorlon-focused episode. Instead I got Jinxo and it wasn't long before I figured out that this couldn't possibly be the real Kosh (and I perhaps should've figured it out right away).

Since some of guest stars were fun to watch, and since the episode held my attention despite the silliness, I'll consider it above bottom-of-the-barrel. I'm still deciding whether I liked it more than TKO. I will say that Londo did what he could to lend some sense of gravity to the threat of the brainfeeder alien, but ultimately it was hard to buy it as the feared threat that they were selling it as.

Rating: **

-I'm finding myself strangely attracted to Delenn. Normal?
-It was interesting to see trials on B5. The case of the guy wanting compensation for his ancestor being abducted was amusing.

 

[JD]

You picture isn't coming up.

 

[BlueStuff]

You picture isn't coming up.

On your phone? It's not very important, it's just a shot of Deuce.

 

[David cgc]

On your phone? It's not very important, it's just a shot of Deuce.

It doesn't show up anywhere, the Babylon 5 wiki seems to have an anti-hotlinking feature, though it shows up if you right-click and open in a new tab. In any case, it's against the board rules (and generally poor manners) to embed images from a site you don't own.

 

[BlueStuff]

It doesn't show up anywhere, the Babylon 5 wiki seems to have an anti-hotlinking feature, though it shows up if you right-click and open in a new tab. In any case, it's against the board rules (and generally poor manners) to embed images from a site you don't own.

Alright, I've removed it. I had no idea it was against board rules (but "poor manners?" That's absurd).

Any comments on "Grail"?

 

[David cgc]

(but "poor manners?" That's absurd).

Embedding an image on a different website means people are loading stuff off someone's server without visiting their site. Bandwidth and hosting costs money, embedding an image from a low-traffic server on a high-traffic page could conceivably cost someone thousands of dollars in overages, and the extra traffic isn't being exposed to any ads or anything else on their page that might boost their income enough to make up the difference.

This was more of an issue back in the day, but that's why forums have rules against hotlinking, and servers are set up to counteract it.

Any comments on "Grail"?

I think someone around here once mentioned the guy who played Jinxo also worked as an acting teacher. I appreciate that they went to the trouble of building a cheap (but still pretty accurate) version of Kosh's suit rather than just reusing the real one for the imposter.

 

[Kraig]

Alright, I've removed it. I had no idea it was against board rules (but "poor manners?" That's absurd).

Any comments on "Grail"?

Jinxo / Thomas worked in construction on all five Babylon stations. Babylon 1-3 were destroyed and Babylon 4 disappeared when he wasn't aboard or left the stations. At the end of the episode he is leaving Babylon 5 on the liner "Marie Celeste."

At the opening Ombudsman courtroom scene. Mr. Flynn (his real name is actually John C. Flinn, III - the Director of Photography his screen credit appears the same time he does) is suing the Grey alien's great grandson for damages for the alien's great grandfather abducting his great grandfather.

 

[Reverend]

IIRC Flinn ended up doing all the actual directing for this episode too, since the assigned director had just been fired from the production and elected to spend the whole shoot sat in the corner, fuming and ignoring everyone else. Needless to say that set did not have a good vibe, though from most reports, the rest of the crew made the best of it. Warner handled it like a pro, not surprisingly.

 

[Farscape One]

True. He went on to direct 2 episodes a season from then on, a couple of them really key ones, like "THE LONG, TWILIGHT STRUGGLE".

 

[JirinPanthosa]

The only episodes of NuBSG you could really call filler are some of the middle ones. Where it's obvious they knew what happened at the start, knew what happened at the end, but still needed to fill out 22 episodes in the middle.

Like the black market one, and the one where they found the old pilot friend of Adama's escaped from the cylons who he felt guilty leaving behind. But 80% of the episodes were either directly related to the main story, or they established a crucial bit of world building.

 

[Kraig]

The assigned director Richard Compton was fired before the shooting started for the episode, but they had him direct the episode Grail before he left. Being angry, all Compton did on the set was sit in the director's chair fuming. The actors did much of their own directing and Flinn tried to fill in the gaps.

I guess Flinn didn't want the directing credit for the episode, since for the most part there was no direction. Flinn's first Babylon 5 directing episode credit is for TKO the episode before Grail, but not for Grail. Also the reason you noted that ...

Yes, the actor playing Jinxo was comfortably one of the worst actors I've ever seen in my life. The writing for him wasn't great, but why did he constantly look like he was on the verge of bursting into laughter? Essentially every scene focusing on him fell flat, and it wasn't a strong plot to begin with.

...no direction shows.

 

[JD]

The only episodes of NuBSG you could really call filler are some of the middle ones. Where it's obvious they knew what happened at the start, knew what happened at the end, but still needed to fill out 22 episodes in the middle.

Like the black market one, and the one where they found the old pilot friend of Adama's escaped from the cylons who he felt guilty leaving behind. But 80% of the episodes were either directly related to the main story, or they established a crucial bit of world building.

That black market episode is my least favorite episode of the series, it was just not good.

 

[David cgc]

That black market episode is my least favorite episode of the series, it was just not good.

You know it's a bad one when the producer's commentary released the same day begins with an apology.