Favorite B5 character moments
- Thread starter RoJoHen
- Start date
If you can get your hands on the "Space, Time and the Incurable Romantic" short story, I'd be interested in your reaction to that.
Jan
My favorite moment is one that hasn't been mentioned yet. It's in A Late Delivery From Avalon. It's set up earlier in the episode. Arthur has come across "Old Mother" who is crying over the loss of her husband's picture at the hands of thieves. He, with Sir G'Kar, fight the bad guys and get the stuff back.
The moment I call my favorite is a very simple scene ... The old mother is sleeping, and Arthur brings her husband's picture back, silently returning what's rightfully hers.
No words are spoken, they don't need to be.
I don't know if it's because I've worked with the elderly and have seen things like that happen, or what, but that scene packs a punch for me.
The moment I call my favorite is a very simple scene ... The old mother is sleeping, and Arthur brings her husband's picture back, silently returning what's rightfully hers.
No words are spoken, they don't need to be.
I don't know if it's because I've worked with the elderly and have seen things like that happen, or what, but that scene packs a punch for me.
Marcus, not a character I really liked that much, but I loved these lines;
And I KNOW you love the scene where Lyta tells G'Kar about her lack of a pleasure threshold.
Lyta really is the abused puppy of Babylon 5. She was mistreated by the Psi Corp, mistreated by the Vorlons and lets be honest, mistreated by the command staff. I mean after serving in the Shadow AND Earth Civil Wars, would it have KILLED them to pay her a retainer as the Station's "ISA Licenced" telepath? Given her a job on Minbar? Something?? Anything???
Let's not talk about the command staff's treatment of Lyta. There are plenty of moments on Babylon 5 where the characters' decisions are upsetting to me, but few where I watch them and cannot figure an explanation beyond Straczynski having to position the characters in order to further his story. When it comes to the telepaths, starting with Sheridan's treatment of Lyta after the Shadow War and ending with the Byron situation, things fall apart a little bit in my viewing.
There's no doubt that the station personnel treated Lyta with less than we'd like to have seen from them. For all their high ideals, it sure didn't seem as if that extended to her very much. However, in their defense, after all we'd seen it became more understandable why she was kept at a distance at best.
We learn more and more of her adjustment by the Vorlons, and anything associated with them is going to be naturally distrusted after the so-called Shadow War. Lyta goes far beyond her own rights in triggering the destruction of Z'ha'dum. That event alone makes me a bit more sympathetic to Sheridan's treatment. It simply was not her decision to make. Regardless of what it does to Bester or what he'd done.
The further we get into S5, the more uneasy it becomes to completely trust Lyta. She rejoins the Corps, albeit for reasons that can be retraced to her lack of funds. But she still rejoins an organization that has been proven to be a threat to the station, the Earth Alliance and more. Whatever the reasons for her going back, could you really completely trust her then? It'd be pretty hard. Then we have the incidents with Byron's group. Her aiding and abetting their activities and contributing to the discord afterwards. On top of that, we find out the extent of the Vorlons adjustments - she's that infamous "doomsday weapon".
She does invite some of the pain she's experienced, so in essence she is partly to blame for her own situation. Still, it can't be denied that odds are much of that could have been averted had Sheridan and Co. done more to take care of her, to show her she was appreciated.
We learn more and more of her adjustment by the Vorlons, and anything associated with them is going to be naturally distrusted after the so-called Shadow War. Lyta goes far beyond her own rights in triggering the destruction of Z'ha'dum. That event alone makes me a bit more sympathetic to Sheridan's treatment. It simply was not her decision to make. Regardless of what it does to Bester or what he'd done.
The further we get into S5, the more uneasy it becomes to completely trust Lyta. She rejoins the Corps, albeit for reasons that can be retraced to her lack of funds. But she still rejoins an organization that has been proven to be a threat to the station, the Earth Alliance and more. Whatever the reasons for her going back, could you really completely trust her then? It'd be pretty hard. Then we have the incidents with Byron's group. Her aiding and abetting their activities and contributing to the discord afterwards. On top of that, we find out the extent of the Vorlons adjustments - she's that infamous "doomsday weapon".
She does invite some of the pain she's experienced, so in essence she is partly to blame for her own situation. Still, it can't be denied that odds are much of that could have been averted had Sheridan and Co. done more to take care of her, to show her she was appreciated.
There's no doubt that JMS was pushing Lyta closer and closer to the point where she'd rebel in time but I did think that the behavior of the command staff was believable as a kind of unconscious bigotry. They thought of her and her talent as a tool to be used as needed, not as a civilian volunteer. Same thing with the teep colony later on; the idea was more to have some telepaths on their side when the time came, not to do what was right for the rogue teeps.
Jan
Jan
I think that Sheridan can be forgiven a bit moreso, since he did earlier express some concern over Lyta's life and how she was getting along. Then again that was before so many of the revelations came out, as well as her her own questionable behavior. Plus, he did try to treat Byron's colony with some kindness, only to have them turn on him.
I didn't say that was his only thought or priority, nor that it was the way he always treated Lyta and telepaths in general. but recall earlier in I think S4, maybe S3, he expressed real concern for her. Later on as the story unfolds, that changes ...in part as she changes and as HE changes. What you've quoted is a very good point to make, but it's not the only resource. There is at least one other occasion in S5 where he honestly expresses concern and compassion for them.
That's not to say that the telepaths weren't at least partially justified in their feelings, because that quote by Sheridan underscores their concern very well. That Sheridan somewhat thought of them as more people to be used. Even so, you can go back to "Rising Star" to see how he struggled in deciding which of the telepaths in stasis to load upon the EF ships before the battle with Earth.
That's not to say that the telepaths weren't at least partially justified in their feelings, because that quote by Sheridan underscores their concern very well. That Sheridan somewhat thought of them as more people to be used. Even so, you can go back to "Rising Star" to see how he struggled in deciding which of the telepaths in stasis to load upon the EF ships before the battle with Earth.
