B5, S02E10-13
Feb. 9th, 2012 09:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sabotabbyZooming right ahead!
Gropos: 25,000 space marines crash B5’s party, led by Dr. Franklin’s father, General Douchebag. (It is probably safe to assume that all generals on this show will be nicknamed Douchebag by me.) They’re being told that they’re reinforcements for the base on Io; in reality, they’re headed to intervene in a civil war on a planet that’s strategically located near Narn and Centauri space. General Douchebag was told that the mission would be a cakewalk, but Sheridan actually knows the planet in question and tells him that there’s no way he can take it without heavy casualties.
The space marines are rowdy and numerous and need to be billeted with people. They also can’t go two seconds without starting a brawl. And their drill sergeant just stepped out of Full Metal Jacket. Nevertheless, we get to know a few of them: Dodger, who kicks ass in a fight and is looking for some last-minute sexytiemz with Garibaldi, and two guys who room with Keffer.
Franklin makes attempts to reconcile with his father, who does not approve of his son’s career choice or apparent pacifism. They work it out with awkward hugs. General Douchebag survives the invasion; none of the other space marines we meet do. Garibaldi, you really should have slept with Dodger; she was way cooler than your last girlfriend and now she’s dead.
In exchange for being temporarily inconvenienced, B5 now has serious firepower courtesy of EarthForce. Sheridan and Ivanova are understandably squeamish at the thought that their station can take out a warship; General Douchebag makes it clear that Earth’s, and by extension B5’s, neutrality is a temporary thing given the circumstances.
Pretty decent episode; it shows the repercussions of the Narn-Centauri war, which has a ripple effect throughout the galaxy. The closing shots were incredibly gory and bleak, and I admire the decision to avoid the usual bloodless killing and go right for the War Is Hell approach.
All Alone In the Night: This one is pretty mediocre filler about Sheridan getting abducted by aliens (seriously) and Delenn being turfed by the Grey Council, but it makes up for it in the last ten minutes or so with an Earth conspiracy. Hague, a general who is not a douchebag drops a whole bunch of cool shit, including:
- A number of people back on Earth don’t buy that President No-Chin’s death was an accident and believe that Vice President Too Many Chins was behind the assassination.
- Clark (that’s Too Many Chins) had Sheridan appointed to B5 because on paper, he’s a hawk and easy to control; Hague has reason to believe that this isn’t the case.
- PsyCorps is pulling the strings, with an assist from the Home Guard.
- Hague’s faction is ready to expose the conspiracy and Sheridan now has to choose whether to bring his command staff in on the plan.
Sheridan is a jerk and wakes them all up. Despite this, they agree to go along with it. I love political intrigue more than anything and this pleases me greatly.
Other nice bits:
- Delenn getting to be badass on her way home from the Grey Council.
- Neroon! I thought he was a one-off character; good to see him again.
- While I am still not into Delenn’s arc or space elves in general, Lennier’s loyalty to her was utterly adorable.
- When Sheridan dreams, he dreams of Kosh. So do I, Sheridan, so do I! Only in his case, it actually isn’t a dream.
The stupid bit:
- The guy who dies of radiation poisoning in med lab and Garibaldi is sad about it because they were friends? Garibaldi should be mad at Franklin and Sheridan for not using the Alien Plot Device that magically heals people. Or does it only magically heal people who appear in the opening credits?
So the Minbari have a worker caste too? I hope they revolt.
Acts of Sacrifice has a lot to make me happy—more Narn-Centauri war (and hamfisted Palestinian-Israeli allegory!), and a B-plot that actually succeeds in being funny.
So the Narns are getting their asses kicked, unsurprisingly. The Centauri, also unsurprisingly, are not sparing the civilian population and accusing the Narns of using human shields. Well, Narn shields, I guess. They’re killing a bunch of innocent people is what I’m saying. And this is basically breaking G’Kar. Kudos to the actor, by the way, who hits the ball out of the park on every scene he’s in this episode, despite having to emote from under a ridiculous amount of makeup and armor.
Sheridan and Delenn are both being condescending and evasive when it comes to G’Kar’s pleas for intervention, and it’s making me hate them both a little. Certainly, there are good arguments for staying out of the war (and presumably they are only vaguely aware of the Shadow angle, which seems a very good argument for staying out of the war), but you’d think they could be a little more sensitive. I guess G’Kar isn’t quite desperate enough to ask Kosh for help, or maybe really cryptic haikus aren’t his thing.
Londo has problems of his own, and also acts the hell out of all his scenes. Now that he’s started a genocide, all of the Centauri want to be his friend. By which I mean they want to exploit his sudden influence in order to get stuff. He tries to confess his sorrows to Garibaldi, but Garibaldi actually has work to do and is decent enough to call Londo out for being an asshole. Yay Garibaldi!
Obviously, the war is having local repercussions too—the thuggish frat boy elements of both the Centauri and Narn populations want to brawl. This results in one of the human security guards getting caught in the middle of a fight and having to shoot a Narn, which leads the Narns to kidnap the Centauri who started the fight and kill him, and G’Kar has to be the grown-up and tell them to cool it. Except no one listens, so really awkward fisticuffs ensue, and order restored. Also Na’Toth is badass. I love Na’Toth.
The B-plot is that there’s a new race, the Lumati (get it?), and Earth definitely wants to get an alliance going with these guys. Sheridan is up to his ears in Narn-Centauri crap, so Ivanova gets the fun job of showing the Lumati around the station and trying to convince them to be friends with Earth.
Unfortunately, the Lumati are basically space Nazi perverts. The Lumati representative is heavily into social Darwinism, seems to have some sort of slave creature that speaks for him when in the company of inferior races (IVANOVA IS NOT INFERIOR; YOU TAKE THAT BACK RIGHT NOW, SPACE NAZI!), and, in an extremely creepy move, steals part of Ivanova’s nightie. Wait, is Ivanova still a Drazi leader? Can’t she get them to kill this guy? I guess not. I’m pretty sure that Franklin might also be willing to kill him after listening to the Lumati talk for a few minutes.
So then the Lumati insist on seeing the less-nice parts of the station, and Ivanova reluctantly takes him Down Below, where 80s punk rockers are eating lizard shish kebab. (Actual lizards, not sentient lizard-aliens, in case you were concerned.) Rather than being horrified, the Lumati is delighted at the idea of class division, and gives the most uncomfortable We’re Not So Different speech of all time, then agrees that an alliance with Earth is awesomecakes.
I would say that this is the most hilarious part of an otherwise quite sad episode, but what follows is even better: According to another horrible Lumati tradition, deals are sealed with sex. Ivanova is not best pleased. But then she realizes that the Lumati know nothing about human anatomy or mating practices, so:
I WANT TO HAVE SEX WITH IVANOVA EVERY NIGHT YOU GUYS.
Because that’s too much of a high note to end the episode on, Earth refuses Sheridan’s request to send aid to Narn. Sheridan and Delenn concoct a plan to smuggle food and medical supplies in and refugees out, and are all excited about this. G’Kar is all, “Well actually we were hoping for war ships,” but is gracious about it, and then goes and cries.
You guys, the number of sad reptile pictures is not going to be equal to the amount of sad I feel about G’Kar crying. I’m going to have to start drawing them or something.
On an unrelated note, can we talk about Ivanova’s quarters and how she has the best taste in décor in addition to everything else that is great about her? I mean, Londo has pretty good taste—his quarters look like an opium den—but Ivanova’s are the best.
Hunter, Prey: Kosh is awesome. Kosh’s ship is awesome. Sheridan having a hard-on for Kosh’s ship and thus wanting to spend more quality time with Kosh is awesome. Garibaldi, Ivanova, and Franklin all get to be awesome.
Pretty simple plot this time around: A certain kindly old doctor, Jacobs, is on the run from Earth Force Intelligence. It so happens that he was Vice President Too Many Chins’ personal physician, which means that he can conclusively prove that the VP was not, in fact, off sick the day that President No Chin’s spaceship exploded. Earth Force—meaning VP Too Many Chins—accordingly wants him dead or alive. They give Sheridan a bullshit story, and Garibaldi gets the whole security team off looking for Jabobs, but just as they’re getting going, a woman approaches Sheridan from a message from Hague (the general who doesn’t suck and wants to expose the truth about the president’s assassination). So the command staff have to find Jacobs before Earth Force or Garibaldi’s security team do. In the end, he’s saved by Kosh Ex Machina, which I have no problem with because of the aforementioned awesomeness.
Other things I like:
- Garibaldi needs to always wear that hat. It’s a good look for him.
- Garibaldi’s secret message to Franklin is freaking adorable.
- The made-up “Downtown” area of the ship was cute.
- Lots of fun call-backs.
- Hilarious 90s CGI on Kosh’s ship.
You know what I miss, though? Mantis-guy. Whatever happened to him? He used to be the go-to character for expensive illegal things. The human equivalent is nowhere near as fun.
Gropos: 25,000 space marines crash B5’s party, led by Dr. Franklin’s father, General Douchebag. (It is probably safe to assume that all generals on this show will be nicknamed Douchebag by me.) They’re being told that they’re reinforcements for the base on Io; in reality, they’re headed to intervene in a civil war on a planet that’s strategically located near Narn and Centauri space. General Douchebag was told that the mission would be a cakewalk, but Sheridan actually knows the planet in question and tells him that there’s no way he can take it without heavy casualties.
The space marines are rowdy and numerous and need to be billeted with people. They also can’t go two seconds without starting a brawl. And their drill sergeant just stepped out of Full Metal Jacket. Nevertheless, we get to know a few of them: Dodger, who kicks ass in a fight and is looking for some last-minute sexytiemz with Garibaldi, and two guys who room with Keffer.
Franklin makes attempts to reconcile with his father, who does not approve of his son’s career choice or apparent pacifism. They work it out with awkward hugs. General Douchebag survives the invasion; none of the other space marines we meet do. Garibaldi, you really should have slept with Dodger; she was way cooler than your last girlfriend and now she’s dead.
In exchange for being temporarily inconvenienced, B5 now has serious firepower courtesy of EarthForce. Sheridan and Ivanova are understandably squeamish at the thought that their station can take out a warship; General Douchebag makes it clear that Earth’s, and by extension B5’s, neutrality is a temporary thing given the circumstances.
Pretty decent episode; it shows the repercussions of the Narn-Centauri war, which has a ripple effect throughout the galaxy. The closing shots were incredibly gory and bleak, and I admire the decision to avoid the usual bloodless killing and go right for the War Is Hell approach.
All Alone In the Night: This one is pretty mediocre filler about Sheridan getting abducted by aliens (seriously) and Delenn being turfed by the Grey Council, but it makes up for it in the last ten minutes or so with an Earth conspiracy. Hague, a general who is not a douchebag drops a whole bunch of cool shit, including:
- A number of people back on Earth don’t buy that President No-Chin’s death was an accident and believe that Vice President Too Many Chins was behind the assassination.
- Clark (that’s Too Many Chins) had Sheridan appointed to B5 because on paper, he’s a hawk and easy to control; Hague has reason to believe that this isn’t the case.
- PsyCorps is pulling the strings, with an assist from the Home Guard.
- Hague’s faction is ready to expose the conspiracy and Sheridan now has to choose whether to bring his command staff in on the plan.
Sheridan is a jerk and wakes them all up. Despite this, they agree to go along with it. I love political intrigue more than anything and this pleases me greatly.
Other nice bits:
- Delenn getting to be badass on her way home from the Grey Council.
- Neroon! I thought he was a one-off character; good to see him again.
- While I am still not into Delenn’s arc or space elves in general, Lennier’s loyalty to her was utterly adorable.
- When Sheridan dreams, he dreams of Kosh. So do I, Sheridan, so do I! Only in his case, it actually isn’t a dream.
The stupid bit:
- The guy who dies of radiation poisoning in med lab and Garibaldi is sad about it because they were friends? Garibaldi should be mad at Franklin and Sheridan for not using the Alien Plot Device that magically heals people. Or does it only magically heal people who appear in the opening credits?
So the Minbari have a worker caste too? I hope they revolt.
Acts of Sacrifice has a lot to make me happy—more Narn-Centauri war (and hamfisted Palestinian-Israeli allegory!), and a B-plot that actually succeeds in being funny.
So the Narns are getting their asses kicked, unsurprisingly. The Centauri, also unsurprisingly, are not sparing the civilian population and accusing the Narns of using human shields. Well, Narn shields, I guess. They’re killing a bunch of innocent people is what I’m saying. And this is basically breaking G’Kar. Kudos to the actor, by the way, who hits the ball out of the park on every scene he’s in this episode, despite having to emote from under a ridiculous amount of makeup and armor.
Sheridan and Delenn are both being condescending and evasive when it comes to G’Kar’s pleas for intervention, and it’s making me hate them both a little. Certainly, there are good arguments for staying out of the war (and presumably they are only vaguely aware of the Shadow angle, which seems a very good argument for staying out of the war), but you’d think they could be a little more sensitive. I guess G’Kar isn’t quite desperate enough to ask Kosh for help, or maybe really cryptic haikus aren’t his thing.
Londo has problems of his own, and also acts the hell out of all his scenes. Now that he’s started a genocide, all of the Centauri want to be his friend. By which I mean they want to exploit his sudden influence in order to get stuff. He tries to confess his sorrows to Garibaldi, but Garibaldi actually has work to do and is decent enough to call Londo out for being an asshole. Yay Garibaldi!
Obviously, the war is having local repercussions too—the thuggish frat boy elements of both the Centauri and Narn populations want to brawl. This results in one of the human security guards getting caught in the middle of a fight and having to shoot a Narn, which leads the Narns to kidnap the Centauri who started the fight and kill him, and G’Kar has to be the grown-up and tell them to cool it. Except no one listens, so really awkward fisticuffs ensue, and order restored. Also Na’Toth is badass. I love Na’Toth.
The B-plot is that there’s a new race, the Lumati (get it?), and Earth definitely wants to get an alliance going with these guys. Sheridan is up to his ears in Narn-Centauri crap, so Ivanova gets the fun job of showing the Lumati around the station and trying to convince them to be friends with Earth.
Unfortunately, the Lumati are basically space Nazi perverts. The Lumati representative is heavily into social Darwinism, seems to have some sort of slave creature that speaks for him when in the company of inferior races (IVANOVA IS NOT INFERIOR; YOU TAKE THAT BACK RIGHT NOW, SPACE NAZI!), and, in an extremely creepy move, steals part of Ivanova’s nightie. Wait, is Ivanova still a Drazi leader? Can’t she get them to kill this guy? I guess not. I’m pretty sure that Franklin might also be willing to kill him after listening to the Lumati talk for a few minutes.
So then the Lumati insist on seeing the less-nice parts of the station, and Ivanova reluctantly takes him Down Below, where 80s punk rockers are eating lizard shish kebab. (Actual lizards, not sentient lizard-aliens, in case you were concerned.) Rather than being horrified, the Lumati is delighted at the idea of class division, and gives the most uncomfortable We’re Not So Different speech of all time, then agrees that an alliance with Earth is awesomecakes.
I would say that this is the most hilarious part of an otherwise quite sad episode, but what follows is even better: According to another horrible Lumati tradition, deals are sealed with sex. Ivanova is not best pleased. But then she realizes that the Lumati know nothing about human anatomy or mating practices, so:
I WANT TO HAVE SEX WITH IVANOVA EVERY NIGHT YOU GUYS.
Because that’s too much of a high note to end the episode on, Earth refuses Sheridan’s request to send aid to Narn. Sheridan and Delenn concoct a plan to smuggle food and medical supplies in and refugees out, and are all excited about this. G’Kar is all, “Well actually we were hoping for war ships,” but is gracious about it, and then goes and cries.
You guys, the number of sad reptile pictures is not going to be equal to the amount of sad I feel about G’Kar crying. I’m going to have to start drawing them or something.
On an unrelated note, can we talk about Ivanova’s quarters and how she has the best taste in décor in addition to everything else that is great about her? I mean, Londo has pretty good taste—his quarters look like an opium den—but Ivanova’s are the best.
Hunter, Prey: Kosh is awesome. Kosh’s ship is awesome. Sheridan having a hard-on for Kosh’s ship and thus wanting to spend more quality time with Kosh is awesome. Garibaldi, Ivanova, and Franklin all get to be awesome.
Pretty simple plot this time around: A certain kindly old doctor, Jacobs, is on the run from Earth Force Intelligence. It so happens that he was Vice President Too Many Chins’ personal physician, which means that he can conclusively prove that the VP was not, in fact, off sick the day that President No Chin’s spaceship exploded. Earth Force—meaning VP Too Many Chins—accordingly wants him dead or alive. They give Sheridan a bullshit story, and Garibaldi gets the whole security team off looking for Jabobs, but just as they’re getting going, a woman approaches Sheridan from a message from Hague (the general who doesn’t suck and wants to expose the truth about the president’s assassination). So the command staff have to find Jacobs before Earth Force or Garibaldi’s security team do. In the end, he’s saved by Kosh Ex Machina, which I have no problem with because of the aforementioned awesomeness.
Other things I like:
- Garibaldi needs to always wear that hat. It’s a good look for him.
- Garibaldi’s secret message to Franklin is freaking adorable.
- The made-up “Downtown” area of the ship was cute.
- Lots of fun call-backs.
- Hilarious 90s CGI on Kosh’s ship.
You know what I miss, though? Mantis-guy. Whatever happened to him? He used to be the go-to character for expensive illegal things. The human equivalent is nowhere near as fun.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 02:14 am (UTC)To quote Sean, "You have NO idea!"
no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 02:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-11 12:50 am (UTC)I like that the diplomatic incidents vary widely in severity from trivial and childish pissing contests to serious shit. It makes for a nice contrast and even plays "boy who cried wolf" with the viewers. By now, you have discovered that the comic relief aliens have some very grim history behind them and even worse ahead.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-11 03:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 02:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 02:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 02:38 am (UTC)Oh BTW, apparently JMS and the producers noticed that the extras were eating with people in the same costumes so they decided to make a Narn extra into a Centauri extra. It took him three days to switch lunch buddies. Three very uncomfortable days.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 03:12 am (UTC)By the way, I was looking for the beginning of this discussion and I saw your post on Hitchens. I would seriously recommend Arguably. I just finished reading it and it is Hitchens at his best (some crazy stuff but not as much as you would expect) and I loved how he dedicated it to an Egyptian, a Libyan and a Syrian - all of whom were killed in Arab Spring (my old roommate is a Libyan and his family is in Benghazi so I was much more vocal about my support for the rebels and the U.S. actions in Libya because of it.)
no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 04:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 09:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 11:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-11 12:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-12 10:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 04:53 am (UTC)Things will continue getting better for you for quite a while,
no subject
Date: 2012-02-11 12:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-11 03:17 am (UTC)God, you're going to convince me to go start rewatching. It's inevitable.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-11 12:23 am (UTC)I liked how fake Mantis Guy looked! I always prefer puppets to CGI.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 05:11 am (UTC)Hahaha my favorite quote of the entry: "When Sheridan dreams, he dreams of Kosh. So do I, Sheridan, so do I!"
Also all of the sad reptile pics XD XD XD
And I forgot just how amazing that Ivanova clip was.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-10 09:12 am (UTC)Also, note that we have visited the notion that G'Kar and Londo will strangle each other to death in 20 years twice - different assumption of context both times.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-11 12:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-11 12:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-13 04:47 am (UTC)I'd like to see that :)
The story I heard was that Garibaldi was supposed to get laid by Dodger, but the actress they cast turned out to be an old girlfriend of Doyle's, and Doyle was involved with Andrea Thompson at the time so he got uncomfortable about it and JMS rewrote the scene.
Neroooooon...
Give up on the Alien Plot Device or else you'll be annoyed for many episodes to come.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-16 06:39 am (UTC)Okay, so I have an excuse for the Alien Machine! When Garibaldi was in dire straights, he was in a coma but not actually dying. Radiation guy died pretty quickly when they brought him back, so they didn't have time to hook him up to a machine to transfer life magics. They also didn't have time to go "okay, who volunteers part of their life magics for this guy who isn't in the opening credits?" RAMIREEEZ! Anyway, I didn't think they broke the Plot Device rules there. Still seems legit!
And now that I have defended it, I have probably lost my chance to do it with you Ivanova style.
You guys, the number of sad reptile pictures is not going to be equal to the amount of sad I feel about G’Kar crying.
G'Kar could really use a good round of Ivanova style.
Also, I know this is from a previous post, but Spy. Bester. If it's fucked up for you to think Bester is sexy, then well. I don't even know. A lot of things about the show are transforming for me since the first viewing was as a kid and this second viewing is as an adult. The long and the short of it is that I would go totally gay for Bester.
Oh, interesting thing about Kosh episode! Not a spoiler because I noticed it for the first time from my first time watching this part (which is now). When Sheridan asks "what do you want?!" Kosh gets angry for once and says "NEVER ASK THAT QUESTION." I seem to remember a creepy motherfucker who went around asking that question in season 1! Which I saw this year for the first time.
I missed the chance to send you a Valentine's present that is a horseshoe or samovar or other mysterious object along with the note "next time, my way." Oh well. Now I can only do it when you forget about this conversation.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-29 04:29 am (UTC)You see my FB post about the sets?