Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Post
  • Reply
Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Luigi Thirty posted:

IIRC they got as far as makeup tests for Mira before realizing the prosthetics would be ugly as sin and the voice effect technology wasn't there yet.

She also hated it. I remember reading that she was really upset about wearing the make-up and having her voice altered, like she wasn't actually playing the role.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Kibayasu posted:

Maybe he's better at VA but Boxlietner did some really good voice acting recently-ish in Spec Ops: The Line which was really, really far away from an action hero role. Spoiler I guess but the fact that his final scene still works with replacing the game's models with Team Fortress 2 models speaks to the strength of the performance (and the rigging of the TF2 models) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjdDyvGE8gE

He also voiced Tron again in the Tron: Legacy animation and while that is definitely more of an action role it managed to fit in a fair bit of character work for him to do in a single season of 30 minute episodes where Tron wasn't even the main character.

He probably got better since B5 of course.

I don't think Boxleitner was ever a bad actor but he's also not great. I like him a lot. But a big draw of him is his voice, it's really quite cool and distinctive. So, it doesn't surprise me that he can do better VA work than straight acting. I had no idea he was in Spec Ops, I should play it!

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

pentyne posted:

Franklin was arguably the best actor in the shows history. Not even taking into account his deafness he nailed emotion and passion like no other actor. When he went all in with anger or rage it almost became a physical presence in its own right. Everyone loves Londo and G'Kar but their biggest strength was the casual back and forth banter and serious talk. Franklin was the master of the angry dialogue.

Absolutely. When he got that righteous fury going, Biggs was really a great presence.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Baka-nin posted:

Finally cracked open my DVD collection and started rewatching. S1 is pretty good, I don't know if its me knowing how much of this will payoff later or the DVD format letting watch several episodes in one go. If anything I'm getting more frustrated with mid to late S2 now that the plot has finally got going. Every time an episode looks standalone or filler I think "get back the Narn-Centari war" or "show me more Shadows being mysterious and evil dammit!"


I forgot just how callous Bester was, I thought he was a telepath supremacist but in his second appearance he murders three psychics and thinks he gunned down a dozen more and isn't affected at all.

Bester is a telepath supremacist in the sense that he'd always save a telepath over a mundane, all things being equal.

However, Bester is a very law-abiding individual. To him, a rogue telepath might be worth more than a mundane but they have acted against Psi Corps (and, therefore, the organisation that will best protect and guide telepaths) and Bester is the personification of Psi Corps. He cut out his own heart to do what is best for the Corps a long time ago because he thinks it is the best thing for telepaths. All telepaths are his people but he won't abide rogues because they turn what should be, in his mind, normals against telepaths to telepaths against telepaths.

Loyal Telepaths > Rogue Telepaths > Normals

The Psi Corps trilogy really examines Bester's mindset. Good books but I lost my copies a few years ago.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Bieeardo posted:

I grew up watching him in things like TRON and Scarecrow and Mrs. King, and B5 when it aired in my early twenties. I'm hopelessly biased in favour of the man, regardless of what his actual acting chops may be.

Me too.

He's so dreamy! :swoon:

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
The big difference between Londo and Gaius is just exactly that, yeah. Londo knows what he is doing is wrong but does it willingly and accepts his complicity in everything. Baltar often attempts to place the blame on others and never really accepts his own sense of agency. When Baltar says, "I don't have a choice", it's an excuse to make himself look better. When Londo says it, and Vir points this out to him, Londo is knowingly lying to himself to try and make himself feel better.

I think it happens twice in the series where Londo argues that he has no choice. Once with Vir, who basically goes 'yes you do!' and I think the prophetess who says that people only say they have no choice when they're already made up their mind.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
Stephen Furst has passed away. :smith:

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Neddy Seagoon posted:

It's fascinating in that you can kinda see what the original version was like from the scripted lines, with G'Kar just quietly (or threateningly) enjoying getting to watch Londo die, but it is so much more G'Kar that he sees it all as a grand cosmic joke. He doesn't have to kill Londo, he doesn't have to do anything and he still gets to watch him die :munch:.

And also the way he goes from fury ("FIVE HUNDRED NARNS!") to laughing at it all. And Londo's reaction to G'kar's rage.

Amazing scene.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

The Unlife Aquatic posted:

I'm watching B5 for the first time and I think that's actually perfect. He's an ignorant man who thinks himself very cultured and intelligent. So he just collects random shiny objects and calls it "eclecticism". He's a fuckin magpie. I've known people who decorate like Londo.

He also wants to be seen as important and part of a Republic that isn't declining so, yeah, garish and weird and 'eclectic' fits him so well.

Hearing that Boxleitner was in Spec Ops is what made me buy the game. Dude is fantastic in that scene.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

The Unlife Aquatic posted:

Honestly I'm disappointed this man hasn't been in more. He has such an excellent voice, like a rough-hewn knife - sharp yet earthy and rough.

He also has a particular cadence when he's dressing people down. When I worked in customer service, I used to affect it when someone was getting aggressive.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Neo Rasa posted:

Was that The Lost Tales movie they did in like 2007 any good?

Not really. As Narsham says, it's so obvious the budget was not even shoestring. It is nice to see Sheridan again, and to see more updated/modern B5 sets, but it's just not great as a whole. I do like the two stories, though. One about finding a literal demon that deals with faith in the face of space opera stuff and the other that is basically 'Would you kill Hitler if you had the chance?'

It had a very nice intro sequence, though.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

monster on a stick posted:

What did Infection set up?

A few things. Off the top my head...

Bad things happening a thousand years ago.

Organic technology being a really powerful thing.

Defeating a powerful enemy by exposing the hypocrisy of their logic.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

pentyne posted:

:aaaaa:

I always thought it was some sort of Nazi reference with the whole purity issue.

I was going to mention that. But it's also not specifically related to the Ikarrans. I'm pretty sure just about every major faction in B5 wrestles with that. Minbari and Humans, especially. But it's definitely one of the more explicit cases.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
Yeah, Bester is quite old. By the time of Mind War, he'd had quite the full life. I think by the time he dies he's just about one hundred or thereabouts (he dies a day or two after Sheridan does, peacefully in his sleep, with a statue erected in his honor).

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Neddy Seagoon posted:

Not quite. iirc It's all one last final joke for Bester at everyone's expense by pure accident, because the baby in the statue raised against PsiCorps is wee babby Bester.

Yeah, I know, but that's the thing. The statue is honoring his mom and dad and their infant child as the ideal of the new post-Psi Corp order -- Bester was that child. He's the only one who knows and gets to die getting the last laugh.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Bieeardo posted:

Sinclair: Well, after all, no one knows exactly what you look like. That makes some people a little nervous.
Kosh: Good.

One of Kosh's best moments. I also liked his other chat with Sinclair where it's like:

Sinclair: Those are images from my world. If I may ask, what are you...
Kosh: I am studying.
Sinclair: Studying what?
*Kosh shuts down his encounter suit and waits for Sinclair to leave*

Pick posted:

Yeah, Sheridan doesn't quite work as a balanced character who "may or may not be in the right". He's presented as in the right basically all the time. It's arguable a few times in text, or in what he's actually doing, but the show doesn't do a good job as selling it as morally grey. Might just be how Boxleitner plays it.

True. There's a lot of times where the people attacking him have valid points (Did he really die? How does anyone but him and the mysterious alien who is with him know that? He's leading an insurrection against the government he swore an oath to support, but the government is Super Hitler, etc. etc.) but Sheridan's always portrayed as heroic moral sort doing the right thing for the right reasons. B5's guiding principle is probably that it is a good thing to stand up for what you believe is right, no matter the cost, and that is what Sheridan does.

It's like how the show tends to make noise about Sheridan blowing up the Roanoke and killing thousands of people and, yeah, that sucks, but the show never really explores any consequences.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

mojo1701a posted:

Not quite. Didn't Sheridan tell him to shut down the underground railroad to keep the PsiCorps away?

As for the second thing, yeah that always bothered me, too. Still, it's obviously post-hoc rationalization by people who were just being good li'l soldiers and following orders.

(Though I'd still love to know how you can enforce a planetary curfew).

The jumpgates. Only big military ships seem to have jump drives (White Star is the notable exception). So, sure, civilians can maybe get off Proxima 3 in a shuttle or freighter or something -- but where are they going to go?

And all the civilian freight traffic is going to come through the gate, too.

One of my favorite small things in S4 is the EAS Furies, one of the Proxima blockade ships, ends up rejoining the loyalist forces. It might just be a CGI goof but a few episodes after No Surrender, No Retreat, the Furies is fighting on the side of Clarke again.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
Everything about Kosh 2 is more intimidating. He's all hard angular lines with two big horns looming over everything. Kosh 1 had this warm, pleasant green and brown tones with a pleasant voice. Kosh 2 is purple and red and his voice sounds like a sneering buzzsaw.

"Respect? From whom?"

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
Very little is mentioned about the Vorlon leadership on screen.

JMS had said some things though on his newsgroup:

"I wouldn't call them friends. They had a certain respect for one another, but Ulkesh always thought Kosh was soft, and Kosh always worried that Ulkesh was dangerous. In their own ways, both were right."

"...It wasn't so much a case of Ulkesh turning against the effort, but finally hitting the end of his patience with the humans, and his predecessor's decision to let the 'natives' get out of control."

"...Ulkesh was the more military of the two, very isolationist, while Kosh was the curious one, interested in the younger races, and more willing to extend himself (with sometimes unfortunate results). Kosh always worried what Ulkesh would do without his moderating presence...and ultimately had to be the one to take him down to allow the younger races to step forward."

"[Kosh and Ulkesh] are not that far apart in age, but yes, Kosh would be a bit older..."

He also said that Naranek was a title. I'm pretty sure there's another post where he says that Kosh had enough clout in the Vorlon leadership that he was basically holding Ulkesh's majority sect back and when he was killed the Vorlons basically went "See? SEE?"

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

pentyne posted:

Can we all take a minute to appreciate just how incredible it was that there were actually interesting moments in Crusade? I mean holy poo poo even by 1998/9 standards it was completely terrible. What happened to JMS after Thirdspace that he ok'd anything and everything that was a waste of the IP?

Crusade seems like it was one half flawed idea, one half studio meddling. TNT did nothing good to it but I don't think it was really that great in the first place. I always thought the Excalibur was an ugly design; its sets were definitely uglier than B5's. The music was terrible compared to Franke. The story, by the sounds of things, seemed like it would've become very similar to B5 (The plague would've been cured early and then the crew would've been fighting an EA conspiracy based around shadowtech). More technomages, the guys who were maybe the worst part of B5 and yet became increasingly prominent as time went on. And an approach to things that was a bit more... magical than B5's hardness. A box that mind controls people, a magical sword, etc. etc.

It barely felt like a Babylon 5 thing at all. It felt like a Star Trek knock-off.

I think JMS might've just tapped his creative well dry after B5.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

mojo1701a posted:

Did he ever reveal more info about Crusade? That is, what the cure was going to be, the conspiracy angle (never heard that until just now), the truth behind the box?

I don't think so.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

monster on a stick posted:

I remember reading that this was the case; there was going to be someone like Sheridan sent to B5 because Sinclair wasn't really trusted by Earth/Clarke.

TBQH, I'm not sure about this. B5 seemed to be well on track to Babylon Prime before Sinclair left. I think bringing Sheridan in was a considerable change in direction to the show.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

mllaneza posted:

It would have hit most of the same beats: war against the Shadows, Earth Civil War, the telepath thing, the Centauri get hosed over. Can't you hear Sinclair yelling "get out of my galaxy !" ?

You'd probably lose the dying at Za'ha'dum thing, that's Sheridan's story. But Valen is going to need the practice beating up on the Shadows, even with B4's help so Sinclair will be a major war leader. Maybe you end with Sinclair stealing B4 instead of sticking it in the middle.

It really wouldn't have. With some small exceptions, B5 S1 is virtually exactly as the original treatment wanted it (literally the only difference is a complete absence of any reference to Bester or Psi Corps). But every episode after that, from S2 onwards, diverges in huge ways with huge plot points becoming tiny elements and the biggest plots -- Earth Civil War, Vorlon/Shadow war, telepath thing, etc -- coming out of nowhere. All the time flashes, flashbacks and such in S1 also match to the treatment much more neatly than the sometimes awkward stuff in later seasons about visions of shifting possible timelines. Consider, for example, the scene between Delenn and Old Sinclair at the end of Babylon Squared (and that episode as a whole).

edit: And further, you can see it on some of JMS' archived postings. Prior to Sinclair leaving, he talks in very oblique terms about what we can see in the treatment that's floating around. By the time Sheridan is on the scene, he's talking very differently. Consider that War Without End actively altered some Babylon Squared scenes, too.

edit 2: For example, in the original treatment, Valen never existed and that whole thing is missing entirely. Also for example, it appears that Catherine Sakai was to be an Anna Sheridan analogue, but also vastly different. Her arc seems to be 'find out about the Walkers' as per the show, and then start following up rumors and stuff, end up on the homeworld of the Shadows, get mentally altered, return to B5 and become a spy. This was split into Anna Sheridan and the stuff with Talia and Lyta.

edit 3: Checking out old JMS internet posts, you can even find posts where he basically says that shuffling Sinclair 'to the side' allowed for them to do newer, different things.

Milkfred E. Moore fucked around with this message at 10:01 on Jul 13, 2017

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Grand Fromage posted:

But that's part of it. He knew the realities of making a TV show and had a planned out and way around for every character in case the actor left.

The plan was revised quite a bit as the show went, but all those years of planning showed.

Absolutely. I think it's more of a credit to JMS that he was able to deal with losing his protagonist and still being able to write such a great story. Perhaps one that is better than his original plan.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

e X posted:

If it was Michael O'Hare's departure that derailed the whole Babylon prime idea, than it really was a blessing in disguise, because the whole thing sounds horribly convoluted in my ears. Babylon 5's politics were its strongest part and as it sounds, a lot of that would have been lost in favor of time travel shenanigans and more mystic stuff, that was always pretty much hit and miss.

To echo a line from B5, I think JMS saw it as an opportunity and not a burden. The original B5 outline contained just about nothing that people came to remember B5 for. Things like the Babylonian order/chaos dichotomy, the EA Civil War, even small character things like G'Kar's whole arc, the fact that it had a bit more 90s grit than Star Trek ever had...

I watched Season 1 recently with the original outline in mind and there's a ton of things that make more sense with it in mind (basically anything to do with the Minbari, for example). They still work in the context of the series, because JMS was absurdly good at essentially rethreading his story when Sheridan took over from Sinclair, but without getting too far into it -- and watching the first Season again to be accurate -- the first season has a very different feel.

edit: And it's a credit to JMS that, when faced with a new protagonist, he didn't just awkwardly mash Sinclair's story onto a new character. He shuffled the stuff that Sinclair was to be very involved with to the background and seemed to write a new character who would handle an expansion of things in the original plotline that were basically set dressing (the Vorlon and Shadow conflict, for example, and corruption on Earth).

Milkfred E. Moore fucked around with this message at 14:40 on Jul 13, 2017

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
It helps that they had that small regular cast of extras who would also often be playing the same roles.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

turn left hillary!! noo posted:

And there goes Byron. My wife and daughters really picked up on how creepy and manipulative he is despite saying a lot of the right things. Correct me if I'm wrong, it's been a long time since I watched it with commentaries, but I seem to recall JMS using his time spent in a cult to inform Byron's character and the rogue telepath colony.

Yup. I think the song was even one from the cult directly, maybe.

Also, those first four words made me think the actor had died. That's discussing the B5 cast for you.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

neongrey posted:

That order's fine but really don't feel compelled to watch any of the side non-show content, honestly. The only good movie is In The Beginning.

This.

Thirdspace is okay, too. But River of Souls, A Call To Arms, and (especially) Legend of the Rangers, are probably missable.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Lycus posted:

Was Kosh not an energy being when the Gathering was written?

Technically the Vorlons aren't energy beings (that is to say, non-corporeal). The Vorlons have physical forms.

I want to say there are JMS posts where he says they're silicon-based or crystalline-based or something like that.

Kosh put out his 'hand' and the assassin hit him with a poison that'd work on his physiology.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Jedit posted:

No, he didn't. That's how Lyta's mind interpreted Kosh's memory of the event, but Kosh himself had to have been poisoned through his encounter suit. It's the big unexplained plot hole of the pilot.

My preferred explanation is that it was actually the encounter suit that was poisoned. Kosh was affected because he was connected to it in the same way as he connected to his ship.

I haven't seen The Gathering in a very long time but isn't the sequence of events...

Kosh comes out of his ship. The security cameras are turned off under specific instructions from the Vorlon government.
Kosh sees 'Sinclair', whom he knows is Valen. Why Kosh doesn't have any awareness of the Minbari under the Net is a question.
Kosh extends a hand/tentacle/whatever in greeting.
'Sinclair' applies poison to hand/tentacle/whatever.
Kosh collapses.
Later, Lyta interprets as a hand because she has a human mind -- also, Kosh was aware of her on some level (the encounter suit opens before she touches it).

Why would Kosh have to have been poisoned through the suit when we plainly see him extending a limb? How is it a plot hole? We've seen plenty of times that Kosh can open up his encounter suit to no ill-effect, because the encounter suit is a disguise and not actually a life-support mechanism.

edit: I mean, I can find heaps of things where people are saying "JMS, how did Kosh get poisoned if he's wearing a suit?" and responses like "It's not a plot hole but a plot point", it wasn't "faked" by Kosh, and even a "It didn't have to get past the encounter suit; he was distinctly shown extending a portion of himself *outside* the suit."

Milkfred E. Moore fucked around with this message at 08:53 on Sep 20, 2017

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Dirty posted:

I'm not sure "plot hole" is the right term, but it's certainly inconsistent/strange. Throughout the series, Vorlons fiercely hide their identity until the time is right. It's a big point that no one has ever seen a Vorlon. Then Kosh sees Sinclair and goes in for a human-style handshake? I get that Sinclair is going to be important, but you don't see Kosh ever trying this again. Sinclair visits him plenty of times in his quarters, and Kosh is always in his suit, except for that time when he's a ball of light behind a screen, and makes a point of whizzing into his suit when Sinclair isn't looking.

Sinclair is Valen.

Kosh being deliberately enigmatic on numerous occasions (rushing into his suit, basically laughing about the Feeder, giving Sinclair the cold shoulder by shutting down his suit at one point) isn't really an argument against Kosh recognising Valen.

Arguing that Kosh wouldn't handshake is weird, particularly in any context involving the actual messiah figure Valen. As mentioned, even the Vorlon government knew that something was going to happen between Kosh and Sinclair that required absolute secrecy -- maybe something identity related (why request the cameras be turned off otherwise?)

quote:

Yes, in The Gathering Kosh could easily have been literally shaking Sinclair's hand, but it's a familiar and very human gesture for a species that builds an identity around being aloof, indirect and guarded. Kosh simply isn't the handshaking type, except for this one time when the plot requires it. So either they aren't shaking hands, in which case what actually is happening, or they are shaking hands and it's totally out of character. Considering that the Vorlons seem generally out of character in The Gathering, I'm assuming the latter. It's a pilot. It happens.

This one time 'when the plot requires it' is an incredibly weird 'one time'. It isn't like Kosh was getting his mail.

quote:

Also worth noting that they actually added in the line where's Kosh is all like "yo, Valen" when he goes for a handshake for the special edition, presumably to justify this familiarity and try make it seem less out of character. That in itself is pretty odd, as well as a big spoiler. Also it makes Kosh seem like he doesn't understand what's going on. Lucky Sinclair wasn't like "Wait... I'm Valen?? Holy crap, this changes everything..."

You are overthinking this and imagining possible problems instead of engaging with the text as-is.

For example, why do you assume Sinclair would have any idea what Kosh meant, or even interpret it as anything other than a greeting? It's a big leap to assume that he, Sinclair, is also Valen. How could Sinclair possibly figure it out? For all he knows, it's a weird Vorlon ritual.

There's a big thread running through B5, albeit one that gets dropped and picked up seemingly at random, that the Vorlons knew exactly what was going on. For example, an earlier version of Severed Dreams had the Vorlons riding in to protect B5 instead of the Minbari.

But if you want to argue the evolving production side of things, that's a whole different conversation. In that case, Gathering-Sinclair isn't Valen at all. But also, JMS has said that the Valen remark is Kosh's internal thoughts, so...

Milkfred E. Moore fucked around with this message at 10:47 on Sep 20, 2017

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
I had a job interview at a school. I introduced myself with a handshake to the man doing my interview. When I came to start my first day, I didn't handshake him again. Is my behavior inconsistent?

I can't argue against something you feel. But there's a difference between feeling something is inconsistent and something actually being inconsistent.

quote:

that kind of implies that the Minbari agent knew Kosh was going to do that. Which raises some questions.

This is definitely more of a weird thing that doesn't make much sense.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Neddy Seagoon posted:

Considering Kosh was also surgically operated on in the The Gathering, the real takeaway from it is "it's the series pilot and things changed". Especially when it aired a full year before the series got underway.

Vorlons have physical forms.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

bobkatt013 posted:

Yes as energy

Incorrect.

A lot of noise is made about the Vorlons being 'energy beings', like they're ghosts, but it's inaccurate. The Vorlons have physicality. They have a physical form that can be poisoned and ripped apart (and you'd assume Lyta is being pretty accurate!) Again, you have to go to JMS' comments on this, but I think even The Gathering mentions that Kosh's physical form is weird and crystalline (hence why the poison worked on Kosh in the first place).

Look at the far-future human in Deconstruction. He has a physical form and can also take on properties of light and energy (turning into a ball). The Vorlons have physicality -- Kosh can be poisoned on his hand, Kosh can catch Sheridan, Kosh can be ripped apart by Shadows, Kosh can get tired and require rest -- but can also render themselves somewhat insubstantial (Kosh and Kosh 2 flying through Babylon 5's decks). Essentially, the Vorlons can incarnate. And, if they can do that, it's not a stretch to assume that taking a physical form can make them vulnerable.

Shadows have fallen to PPG fire before, after all. And they are older than the Vorlons.

Dirty posted:

Well that depends. Was the man doing an interview actually not really him, but an agent from a different school trying to kill you. Once everything had been sorted out, on your first real meeting, did you then go for that handshake, or politely refuse because you'd already shook hands with someone who looked like him?

Hah, good point. Got me there.

Milkfred E. Moore fucked around with this message at 12:17 on Sep 20, 2017

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Neddy Seagoon posted:

The problem is you're still relying on The Gathering's events as the crux of your argument and;

When talking about a text should I not rely on the text-as-presented?

My evidence comes directly from the text. I'm arguing what is there, what we were told and what we were shown. I'm not here to talk headcanons built from 'feelings' about the text.

For example, here is something else we were shown that supports my argument -- that is, an energy being taking a corporeal form to physically affect the world around him: Lorien.

Neddy Seagoon posted:

I stand corrected then on that one :cripes:

The Changling Net is also mentioned a few times throughout the series proper.

Lyta's whole arc is based off the events of The Gathering, too. It's not exactly brushed over.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
but seriously what happened to lorien's ship

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
I think one of the most interesting things about Babylon 5 is the Earth Alliance and EarthGov. The twist to Clarke's autocracy really wasn't that hard to do and isn't that unexpected. It's just this weird thing in the show where everyone thinks it was great. The EA wasn't this bastion of benevolence under Santiago, Clarke just brought it all into the light.

Milkfred E. Moore fucked around with this message at 04:34 on Oct 20, 2017

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'
There were also 'rules of engagement' which the Vorlons broke first by creating telepaths and altering people so they saw angels and such. It seems like the cycle was supposed to be something of a proxy war, too, hence the Shadow killing of Kosh in retaliation for the Vorlons getting involved with fleet assets. So, I guess the Shadows were okay with playing the bad guys until the Vorlons started playing to win, so to speak, which led to the Shadows getting more aggressive and responding in kind.

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Shbobdb posted:

Dark Distorted Mirror basically addressed this in the best way possible.

Now that I'm older I can see the sources it's stealing from but in middle school it was loving amazing. I reread it a decade ago and it was still very satisfying, despite recognizing the parts that are derivative.

Is that the B5 fic that grew out of something like 'what if the Minbari killed Sinclair at the Battle of the Line?'

I never finished it (I think I got through most of the 4th Volume). But I think it started really well and there are bits of it I remember fondly.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Milkfred E. Moore
Aug 27, 2006

'It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.'

Duck and Cover posted:

I don't recall clicking on this thread. I mean I have Enterprise running in a tab so maybe my brain is deteriorating.

I've had threads that I've never clicked on show up in my bookmarks before.

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • Post
  • Reply