Babylon 5: 4x15-4x20
Jun. 6th, 2015 01:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
schneefinkFinally we found time for more Bab5! It's been a while since last time (almost two months!), so I was even more glad than usual for my episode reviews to refresh my memory.
No Surrender, No Retreat: Sheridan nullifies the treaties the League worlds have with Earth? What gives him that right? If he'd said he asks them, or even demands that they break those treaties in exchange for protection, fine. But Sheridan doesn't have the right to break those treaties for them, wtf. The power did go to his head, and he doesn't notice, almost nobody does.
I really liked Londo and G'kar here. Londo trying to make a gesture and trying very hard to find some common ground with G'Kar, Londo trying to atone for some of his mistakes by securing support for Sheridan against EarthForce. G'Kar isn't at a point yet where he can accept Londo's gesture, but he does agree to help support Sheridan. Londo and G'Kar's relationship is so great.
They freed Proxima 3, yay! And some Earth ships defected, after Sheridan reminds them of what to do about illegal orders. I like that in some cases the crew acts, because they most likely didn't have a choice about their assignment but they can still think for themselves, it's nice that that's remembered. Btw, of the four surviving ship captains two are women, one is Asian and one is black. I had so many bad experiences with shows populated overwhelmingly with white guys that I really like these moments where Bab5 doesn't do that, and there are surprisingly many of them. Sure, the show isn't perfect, but still.
And yes, LK and I did make "Never Give Up, Never Surrender" jokes. Which AV didn't get because he still hasn't seen "Galaxy Quest." Terrible, we have to fix that asap.
The Exercise of Vital Powers: Franklin, you want Lyta to help you? Why don't you hire her instead of expecting her to work for free, because things like this are her actual job? Especially since she was so broke that she had to go back to being a PsiCorps member, despite the fact that she saved all of your asses in the Shadow War? Yes, I'm still pissed. Apparently I'm very protective of Lyta. Zach still finds jobs for her, good guy.
We finally meet Edgars. Heh, all of Sheridan's speeches about proving good faith by giving power back to the people, and here Edgars states as a fact that all the power lies with four or five big corporations. And they're not even that concerned about Clark, they only worry about telepaths taking over.
Yet Edgars hires one, because they're practical. But the telepath lies to Edgars about what she sees in Garibaldi's mind – probably because she realizes that he was influences by PsiCops and that the Corps wouldn't want Edgars to know. Afterwards Wade kills her, apparently completely unconcerned about consequences. They must have dozens, probably hundreds of telepaths for their experiments – where did they get them? Aren't all telepaths monitored by the PsiCorps? Maybe they faked their deaths, but still, it must be a huge operation.
At first I was unhappy about the potential love triangle angle, but to my surprise I liked the conversation between Lise and Garibaldi, where she says that she still cares for him but she loves Edgars and she deserves someone who's there for her.
The Face of the Enemy: Garibaldi betrays Sheridan. Ouch. After several people warned Sheridan, but he said Garibaldi wouldn't do that. And using his father to get to him, smart. The way they filmed Sheridan being captured was unnecessarily dramatic and drawn out, imo, almost like an extra minute on top just to mess with Garibaldi.
At least Garibaldi finally finds out the plan – and fuck, what a plan. Infect the telepaths with a virus, if they don't get the antidote every two weeks they die horribly. Because before telepaths wipe out humans, as they think will happen, they want to make the telepaths a slave race, as Garibaldi aptly puts it. And I'm sure after a while there'll be an accident at a manufacturing plant, or a problem in transport, and it's not their fault if suddenly many telepaths die… (I'm not even completely convinced their plan would work. A couple of Psi Cops could do a hell of a lot in two weeks, very likely including figuring out how to create the antidote, and if they don't have anything to lose they'll find a way to get control of a factory too.)
Lise hears it too and is horrified, and rightly so. I wonder if she'll show up again.
We finally find out what happened to Garibaldi! It was Bester, of course it was Bester. So they didn't reprogram him completely, just amplified certain characteristics and planted some suggestions, that makes sense. And it worked out wonderfully for them. Bester doesn't regret it at all, because he'll say if he hadn't done it Edgars would have succeeded. And Edgars, if given the opportunity, would say he started his plan because the PsiCorps is doing things like what they did to Garibaldi. Catch 22. AV pointed out the X-Men parallels.
In the same episode we find out about other horrible things the PsiCops did, when Lyta tells Franklin: when one of their own was killed and no mundane authorities did anything, they found the murderer using unauthorized dangerous brain scans, and then punished him by basically driving him insane. No wonder Lyta wanted out, and no wonder she's so careful about consent.
Also, yes Franklin you definitely should have notified Number One in advance, you idiot. This is her planet, her resistance movement, and she can't afford anything screwing it up. I like Number One.
Poor Garibaldi! Everybody thinks he's a traitor, and he knows exactly what he was used for. Bester is just sentimental enough to let him live, but I bet he's going to regret it.
Intersections in Real Time: The torture episode. Ouch. I was watching this one with a lot more detachment than usual, because torture. The interrogator did a good job. The last torture fic I read had very physical torture scenes and I unfortunately kept remembering them, that made it even harder to watch. Of course Sheridan won't give in, he wouldn't forgive himself. But he seems extremely naïve. Does he seriously think they'll let the Drazi go if he refuses to comply, instead of torturing him some more and/or killing him? Maybe he's already not thinking clearly.
Apparently this episode was originally meant to be the season finale for season 4, now that would be a cliffhanger.
Between the Darkness and the Light: Yess, Franklin being willing to listen to Garibaldi! And trying to confirm his story, after all Lyta is right there. And of course Lyta is strong enough to get through Bester's blocks <3 With her eyes black. Projecting to Number One could have backfired if Number One's people had thought Lyta had tried to influence her, but fortunately it worked.
So of course the first thing Garibaldi does is free Sheridan (and get injured in the process.) Lyta being annoyed about being called a good liar *g* Btw I like how Mars, not Sheridan, is always Number One's priority so she can't spare many people to help them. But it still works. I'm disappointed we didn't really get any scene between Garibaldi and Sheridan, but I'm sure it'll come later.
Londo (and G'Kar) persuading the League to help Sheridan is great. Centauri and Narn working together to support the humans, nice :)
Ivanova in control of the fleet! Together with Marcus, they make a good team. He gets her to rest, by threatening to annoy her, and she remembers his compliment, aww. (I think this is the first time we hear about her having eidetic memory. I call bullshit, otherwise she'd have learned Minbari much faster. She probably just didn't want to admit that she remembered his sentence so well.)
Of course she decides to spring the ambush. Wow, pretty dramatic battle speech. "I am Susan Ivanova. Commander. Daughter of Andrey and Sofie Ivanov. I am the right hand of vengeance, and the boot that is going to kick your sorry ass all the way back to Earth, sweetheart. I am death incarnate, and the last living thing that you are ever going to see. God sent me." It's almost a bit over the top, I like her "Ivanova is god" speech better. Still. She won against advanced Shadow-tech-augmented EarthForce ships that outnumbered her forces, because she's just that good.
And was fatally injured in the process :( Nooo, Susan. At least she meets Sheridan again and sees that he was rescued, and Marcus and Delenn and Lennier are also there. (They told her that Garibaldi was innocent, right? Right?)
Endgame: Wow, they freed Mars and Earth in one episode! It's pretty obvious that the plot was rushed.
So that's what they used the telepaths for… involuntary suicide bombers. As Franklin said, they most likely wouldn't be able to save them and these thirty lives sacrificed will probably save thousands, but it's still hard.
Lyta helps them win another war! She better get a paid job after this, just saying.
I assume they probably rescued Sheridan's father during this.
Attack on Earth, and Clark kills himself. Convenient. But Senator Crosby (why yes as a big #87 fan that made me grin) was on her way to arrest him anyway. Weird message – why like this? This, and turning the defense grid on Earth, turns him from "power-hungry dictator" to "crazy". We didn't ever really see him, did we? Interesting, I wonder how much we'll find out about what was behind this.
In a way it's convenient for Sheridan: saving Earth from the defense grid proves pretty conclusively that he's here in good faith, and being willing to sacrifice himself and his ship makes him a hero. That'll make it easier for him to be able to get back to Babylon 5 (also the alien governments will probably demand it.)
Sidenote, Sheridan constantly says that as soon as Clark is gone they'll let the people vote and abide by their decision, because the military serves the people. But there can be many cases where it's more important to follow a moral principle than the will of the majority; actually that's implicit in our understanding of democracy, "protection of the minority", even though it's not often mentioned. It's something that even Sheridan brings up often, when he talks about the moral obligation to disobey lawful but illegal because immoral orders. But politically of course "we'll abide by the will of the people, unless their will is immoral" isn't something he can say.
They remember the healing device! I was wondering if they would, because I thought of it pretty much immediately. I understand that Sheridan etc. didn't want Marcus to use it because it would likely kill him, but otoh if that's his decision… Part of me was thinking "I knew they weren't going to kill Ivanova", but Marcus :( I like him. He was funny, and interesting, and so cute with Susan. I didn't expect him to die! I guess technically there's still a chance he could be saved, but I'm not holding out much hope… Poor Susan.
(Yet at the same time the part of me that really loves self-sacrifice stories was almost jumping with joy.)
There are still two episodes left in the season, which is one more than I expected, so I'm curious. Open plot threads are the Psi Corps situation, and the psychic parasites, but I'm sure they came up with something else for the unexpected fifth season.
No spoilers whatsoever please!
No Surrender, No Retreat: Sheridan nullifies the treaties the League worlds have with Earth? What gives him that right? If he'd said he asks them, or even demands that they break those treaties in exchange for protection, fine. But Sheridan doesn't have the right to break those treaties for them, wtf. The power did go to his head, and he doesn't notice, almost nobody does.
I really liked Londo and G'kar here. Londo trying to make a gesture and trying very hard to find some common ground with G'Kar, Londo trying to atone for some of his mistakes by securing support for Sheridan against EarthForce. G'Kar isn't at a point yet where he can accept Londo's gesture, but he does agree to help support Sheridan. Londo and G'Kar's relationship is so great.
They freed Proxima 3, yay! And some Earth ships defected, after Sheridan reminds them of what to do about illegal orders. I like that in some cases the crew acts, because they most likely didn't have a choice about their assignment but they can still think for themselves, it's nice that that's remembered. Btw, of the four surviving ship captains two are women, one is Asian and one is black. I had so many bad experiences with shows populated overwhelmingly with white guys that I really like these moments where Bab5 doesn't do that, and there are surprisingly many of them. Sure, the show isn't perfect, but still.
And yes, LK and I did make "Never Give Up, Never Surrender" jokes. Which AV didn't get because he still hasn't seen "Galaxy Quest." Terrible, we have to fix that asap.
The Exercise of Vital Powers: Franklin, you want Lyta to help you? Why don't you hire her instead of expecting her to work for free, because things like this are her actual job? Especially since she was so broke that she had to go back to being a PsiCorps member, despite the fact that she saved all of your asses in the Shadow War? Yes, I'm still pissed. Apparently I'm very protective of Lyta. Zach still finds jobs for her, good guy.
We finally meet Edgars. Heh, all of Sheridan's speeches about proving good faith by giving power back to the people, and here Edgars states as a fact that all the power lies with four or five big corporations. And they're not even that concerned about Clark, they only worry about telepaths taking over.
Yet Edgars hires one, because they're practical. But the telepath lies to Edgars about what she sees in Garibaldi's mind – probably because she realizes that he was influences by PsiCops and that the Corps wouldn't want Edgars to know. Afterwards Wade kills her, apparently completely unconcerned about consequences. They must have dozens, probably hundreds of telepaths for their experiments – where did they get them? Aren't all telepaths monitored by the PsiCorps? Maybe they faked their deaths, but still, it must be a huge operation.
At first I was unhappy about the potential love triangle angle, but to my surprise I liked the conversation between Lise and Garibaldi, where she says that she still cares for him but she loves Edgars and she deserves someone who's there for her.
The Face of the Enemy: Garibaldi betrays Sheridan. Ouch. After several people warned Sheridan, but he said Garibaldi wouldn't do that. And using his father to get to him, smart. The way they filmed Sheridan being captured was unnecessarily dramatic and drawn out, imo, almost like an extra minute on top just to mess with Garibaldi.
At least Garibaldi finally finds out the plan – and fuck, what a plan. Infect the telepaths with a virus, if they don't get the antidote every two weeks they die horribly. Because before telepaths wipe out humans, as they think will happen, they want to make the telepaths a slave race, as Garibaldi aptly puts it. And I'm sure after a while there'll be an accident at a manufacturing plant, or a problem in transport, and it's not their fault if suddenly many telepaths die… (I'm not even completely convinced their plan would work. A couple of Psi Cops could do a hell of a lot in two weeks, very likely including figuring out how to create the antidote, and if they don't have anything to lose they'll find a way to get control of a factory too.)
Lise hears it too and is horrified, and rightly so. I wonder if she'll show up again.
We finally find out what happened to Garibaldi! It was Bester, of course it was Bester. So they didn't reprogram him completely, just amplified certain characteristics and planted some suggestions, that makes sense. And it worked out wonderfully for them. Bester doesn't regret it at all, because he'll say if he hadn't done it Edgars would have succeeded. And Edgars, if given the opportunity, would say he started his plan because the PsiCorps is doing things like what they did to Garibaldi. Catch 22. AV pointed out the X-Men parallels.
In the same episode we find out about other horrible things the PsiCops did, when Lyta tells Franklin: when one of their own was killed and no mundane authorities did anything, they found the murderer using unauthorized dangerous brain scans, and then punished him by basically driving him insane. No wonder Lyta wanted out, and no wonder she's so careful about consent.
Also, yes Franklin you definitely should have notified Number One in advance, you idiot. This is her planet, her resistance movement, and she can't afford anything screwing it up. I like Number One.
Poor Garibaldi! Everybody thinks he's a traitor, and he knows exactly what he was used for. Bester is just sentimental enough to let him live, but I bet he's going to regret it.
Intersections in Real Time: The torture episode. Ouch. I was watching this one with a lot more detachment than usual, because torture. The interrogator did a good job. The last torture fic I read had very physical torture scenes and I unfortunately kept remembering them, that made it even harder to watch. Of course Sheridan won't give in, he wouldn't forgive himself. But he seems extremely naïve. Does he seriously think they'll let the Drazi go if he refuses to comply, instead of torturing him some more and/or killing him? Maybe he's already not thinking clearly.
Apparently this episode was originally meant to be the season finale for season 4, now that would be a cliffhanger.
Between the Darkness and the Light: Yess, Franklin being willing to listen to Garibaldi! And trying to confirm his story, after all Lyta is right there. And of course Lyta is strong enough to get through Bester's blocks <3 With her eyes black. Projecting to Number One could have backfired if Number One's people had thought Lyta had tried to influence her, but fortunately it worked.
So of course the first thing Garibaldi does is free Sheridan (and get injured in the process.) Lyta being annoyed about being called a good liar *g* Btw I like how Mars, not Sheridan, is always Number One's priority so she can't spare many people to help them. But it still works. I'm disappointed we didn't really get any scene between Garibaldi and Sheridan, but I'm sure it'll come later.
Londo (and G'Kar) persuading the League to help Sheridan is great. Centauri and Narn working together to support the humans, nice :)
Ivanova in control of the fleet! Together with Marcus, they make a good team. He gets her to rest, by threatening to annoy her, and she remembers his compliment, aww. (I think this is the first time we hear about her having eidetic memory. I call bullshit, otherwise she'd have learned Minbari much faster. She probably just didn't want to admit that she remembered his sentence so well.)
Of course she decides to spring the ambush. Wow, pretty dramatic battle speech. "I am Susan Ivanova. Commander. Daughter of Andrey and Sofie Ivanov. I am the right hand of vengeance, and the boot that is going to kick your sorry ass all the way back to Earth, sweetheart. I am death incarnate, and the last living thing that you are ever going to see. God sent me." It's almost a bit over the top, I like her "Ivanova is god" speech better. Still. She won against advanced Shadow-tech-augmented EarthForce ships that outnumbered her forces, because she's just that good.
And was fatally injured in the process :( Nooo, Susan. At least she meets Sheridan again and sees that he was rescued, and Marcus and Delenn and Lennier are also there. (They told her that Garibaldi was innocent, right? Right?)
Endgame: Wow, they freed Mars and Earth in one episode! It's pretty obvious that the plot was rushed.
So that's what they used the telepaths for… involuntary suicide bombers. As Franklin said, they most likely wouldn't be able to save them and these thirty lives sacrificed will probably save thousands, but it's still hard.
Lyta helps them win another war! She better get a paid job after this, just saying.
I assume they probably rescued Sheridan's father during this.
Attack on Earth, and Clark kills himself. Convenient. But Senator Crosby (why yes as a big #87 fan that made me grin) was on her way to arrest him anyway. Weird message – why like this? This, and turning the defense grid on Earth, turns him from "power-hungry dictator" to "crazy". We didn't ever really see him, did we? Interesting, I wonder how much we'll find out about what was behind this.
In a way it's convenient for Sheridan: saving Earth from the defense grid proves pretty conclusively that he's here in good faith, and being willing to sacrifice himself and his ship makes him a hero. That'll make it easier for him to be able to get back to Babylon 5 (also the alien governments will probably demand it.)
Sidenote, Sheridan constantly says that as soon as Clark is gone they'll let the people vote and abide by their decision, because the military serves the people. But there can be many cases where it's more important to follow a moral principle than the will of the majority; actually that's implicit in our understanding of democracy, "protection of the minority", even though it's not often mentioned. It's something that even Sheridan brings up often, when he talks about the moral obligation to disobey lawful but illegal because immoral orders. But politically of course "we'll abide by the will of the people, unless their will is immoral" isn't something he can say.
They remember the healing device! I was wondering if they would, because I thought of it pretty much immediately. I understand that Sheridan etc. didn't want Marcus to use it because it would likely kill him, but otoh if that's his decision… Part of me was thinking "I knew they weren't going to kill Ivanova", but Marcus :( I like him. He was funny, and interesting, and so cute with Susan. I didn't expect him to die! I guess technically there's still a chance he could be saved, but I'm not holding out much hope… Poor Susan.
(Yet at the same time the part of me that really loves self-sacrifice stories was almost jumping with joy.)
There are still two episodes left in the season, which is one more than I expected, so I'm curious. Open plot threads are the Psi Corps situation, and the psychic parasites, but I'm sure they came up with something else for the unexpected fifth season.
No spoilers whatsoever please!
no subject
Date: 2015-06-06 06:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-06-06 07:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-06-07 05:29 pm (UTC)You know, the PsiCorps is vile. But every so often you look at what they face, and I completely get why they are the way they are. Like you said, catch 22.
Ivanova Is God is one of the best moments in the series.
no subject
Date: 2015-06-07 10:10 pm (UTC)Did Lyta at least get treated well by fandom? I want long Talia&Lyta friendship fic but I'm not optimistic it exists.
The PsiCorps is kind of like Magneto, facing very real prejudice and oppression and responding in radical ways. Or not even, they don't have any plans to kill all mundanes (that I know of so far.) It would be interesting to see more examples of how other races treat their telepaths. The Minbari use the honor system, of course; what about the Centauri? Or others?
no subject
Date: 2015-06-08 02:59 am (UTC)I don't think the PsiCorps ever had a plan to kill all mundanes.
The Centauri ... we don't see much of. You have the Emperor's four white-veiled telepaths (that Cartagia killed), you have the telepath Refa uses to get the information out of Vir, nothing formal. And the Narn don't have them because they killed theirs off, iirc.
BTW. JMS wrote a short story about what happened to Marcus in the end. It is called "Space, Time, and the Incurable Romantic" and was published in a magazine. DO NOT TRACK THIS DOWN AND READ IT. It's terrible and creepy and ooc. This is a PSA in case anyone mentions it. REALLY GROSS, OKAY, DON'T EVEN GO THERE.
no subject
Date: 2015-06-08 09:07 pm (UTC)I'm looking forward to looking for Bab5 fic. Unfortunately the show is old enough that there's a high likelihood many sites and stories will have disappeared.
no subject
Date: 2015-06-10 04:02 am (UTC)And yeah, a lot of the old sites have disappeared, or are just creeeeeaky and hard to use.
no subject
Date: 2015-06-10 11:18 am (UTC)