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Data Graham posted:In episode 12, "By Any Means Necessary", holy poo poo has the writing come on by leaps and bounds since the first episode. Remember how I was grousing about clumsy partial/interrupted lines? This time that whole scene between the union boss lady and Sinclair/Garibaldi is just full of lines where they talk over each other and yell to cut each other off while the one who was interrupted keeps on going for a good five or six words that sputter out like a dying dirtbike. It's way more engrossing. That's one of the episodes that makes skipping S1 a bad idea. It's also the first really well directed episode.
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Sep 15, 2016 02:43
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Count me in ! I haven't been this excited since I got a Jeff Conway autograph on his card from the B5 CCG.
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Oct 19, 2016 16:05
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Neddy Seagoon posted:I love the way that one gets resolved; You want me to read the riot act? Such a big, beautiful gently caress You to authoritarianism. As I recall, that's the episode JMS' wife wrote. It's certainly a standout, standalone episode for S1.
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Feb 22, 2017 15:45
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Neddy Seagoon posted:How the hell did you get that? The whole point of the Babylon Project was a place for diplomacy and free trade. Hell, it's mentioned in the first two season's opening credits. Well yeah, but... The Earth Alliance hadn't just added a defense grid, they just upgraded a defense grid. B5 was already armed. The station saw off a minor race cruiser handily in S1, with an upgrade punking a Centauri warship isn't at all out of its capabilities.
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Feb 27, 2017 08:17
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Neddy Seagoon posted:You're forgetting one of the best scenes was made that way through improv though (G'Kar and Londo trapped in a lift). Those two had their characters down better than JMS did, of course he didn't stop them.
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Jun 28, 2017 02:51
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Narsham posted:Big case of miscasting, IMO, perhaps worsened by the directors and the fans missing what JMS had in mind for the character (and JMS doing nothing to course correct). I also suspect the character would have worked better as Ivanova's love interest. Remember the Underground Railroad for telepaths episode ? My contention is that the spokesman for the railroad, the man with a lisp and some physical issues, should have been Byron. In fact, I propose that the whole Telepath arc in season 5 would have been gold if he'd been re-used instead of a new character.
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Jul 10, 2017 05:01
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Milky Moor posted: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. 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.
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Jul 13, 2017 07:36
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I'm doing a slow re-watch on a lunch break or two a week. Last night I skipped ahead to The Coming of Shadows. Oh god that was the good stuff.
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Oct 5, 2017 04:19
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Bieeardo posted:I'll never forget that dream sequence where Kosh is saying his goodbyes through Sheridan's memory of his father. Yeah, when B5 was at its best it was as good or better than anything else.
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Nov 27, 2017 07:33
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The more streamlined Call to Arms game is much faster playing, you can actually get through a fleet action. There's an SFB version of that too. I was in on the playtest for Fleet Action, and boy was that a hot mess. I do seriously love the Fleet scale miniatures, the B5W one were just too drat big.
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Dec 20, 2017 20:23
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ConfusedUs posted:You should be noticing an uptick in quality starting any time now. It just ramps up from there. Episode 9 should be your turning point.
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Feb 11, 2018 00:09
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Recurring characters we love... the lead telepath from A Race Through Dark Places. He showed up earlier as the only person who'd talk to Garibaldi when his buddy/informant got killed at the end of Season One. I wish they'd brought him back in place of the Byron character; give him literally the same lines and plot beats and nobody would be bitching about the telepath plotline in S5.
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Feb 24, 2018 23:02
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I've been re-watching the series at lunch, and amusing myself by looking up the guest stars on IMDB. For example, Londo's wife, Timov, was played by Jane Carr who played every upper class English woman ever to appear in a comedy. The doctor with the alien Today I got to COnfessions and Lamentations, and I looked up the Markab doctor. Turns out he played Bishop Brennan on Father Ted, and I cracked up. Which, unfortunately ruined the mood of the episode entirely. He also was Ombudsman Wellington in a few episodes. Highlights from Father Ted: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlfcdtGSUZA
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Mar 7, 2018 21:55
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Orv posted:It's now available on Prime, aside from S3 which I assume is some sort of back end oversight. S3 confirmed as available !
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Jun 2, 2018 00:52
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turn left hillary!! noo posted:In The Beginning, yes, which should definitely not be watched in the beginning unless you 100% do not care about spoilers at all. B5 telegraphs a lot of stuff so that's not as big of a concern as with some shows, though. Spoilers aside, In The Beginning is a great introduction to the show. It fills in backstory and introduces a lot of the characters. As a bonus, it's a decent movie in its own right, so it's not two hours wasted if this is how you introduce someone to B5. LOL. I looked on Amazon. They have the movies, but they aren't part of Prime, $7.99 each. Except for Lost Tales, which is $1.99. That'd funnier if Legend of the Rangers wasn't full price.
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Jun 12, 2018 05:47
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Doctor Zero posted:Ehhh I think it’s safe to say that some big end game events are mentioned so early on on in the series that just knowing they are coming isn’t a spoiler because how they get there is the real fun. It’s never what it seems on the surface. That's why I suggest In The Beginning to hook new folks on the show. Its CGI is as good as B5 gets, you meet all the characters, and get a taste of most of the plotlines.
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Jun 29, 2018 03:38
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Neddy Seagoon posted:If it was France, the elite would've died by guillotine. As opposed to "Oh poo poo, that's a lot of Narn. Where's the exit ?" ?
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Jul 4, 2018 05:44
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Doctor Zero posted:This is your chance. This isn’t sci-fi it’s high drama. Try the "this show is why Game of Thrones was able to be made" angle.
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Jul 5, 2018 04:43
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Darth Freddy posted:Strong is a understatement. With all the camera time they gave the little girl you would normally think they were going to save her. The moment where the girl loses her balance is one of the most heartbreaking moments in TV history. Mira Furlan sells her part beautifully.
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Jul 17, 2018 02:59
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dudeness posted:My favorite one off character was Londo's wife, her voice was super over the top and I was slightly disappointed she didn't return. Londo's wife was played by Jane Carr, she's an English character actor who's been in tons of things; I wish they'd brought her back to - great character, great actress. Daggair was played by former Miss Chicago 1948 Lois Nettleton and she's had a long and distinguished career as well. The notable guest you missed was in The Quality of Mercy. The doctor with the alien device was none other than June Lockhart, making her the second actor to appear on both Babylon 5 and Lost in Space. Oh hey, Peter David wrote Soul Mates. No wonder it has some of the best dialogue in the whole season, if not show. mllaneza fucked around with this message at 05:16 on Sep 8, 2018 |
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Sep 8, 2018 05:13
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SlothfulCobra posted:In a couple decades people will be erecting statues of Clark to do anti-alien rallies around. Then some space-rednecks need to be made to send their kids to John Brown Middle School.
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Sep 19, 2018 06:49
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Doctor Zero posted:I also said if she could get to the 3rd episode of S2 and not be hooked it wouldn’t be for her probably. I tell people to skip the pilot, start with all of Season 1, and if they get stuck, to skip ahead to Coming of Shadows.
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Oct 26, 2018 00:20
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SlothfulCobra posted:I think Londo's wife is one of the big dropped threads of the show. I don't think she ever shows up after he divorces the other two. It's a drat shame, Jane Carr did a great job as Timov. She was fairly busy for the next few years after Soul Mates, they might just not have been able to get her scheduled for another appearance. But more likely they did just let her go. There's a really great imaginary S5 in which Timov is a major player in the Centauri arc and, probably, dies horribly.
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Oct 27, 2018 22:02
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Antifa Turkeesian posted:I just finished season two, and I have to say that I’m pretty impressed with the cg overall for something from 94/95, especially given how ambitious it must have been to do a show all in cg back then. The CG holds up as well as it does because the animation direction is amazingly good. One of my favorite shots of the whole series is a space battle in the second half of S3. The shot has stuff going on in the foreground, middle, and background. It doesn't matter about the bit depth of the textures, or the number of polygons on screen, it's a well-composed scene that conveys a lot of information about what is going on in the conflict. There's also the Starfury shot in one of the opening credit sequences, also S3 I think. The fighter is maneuvering, the camera tracks it and shifts the framing. Just a pretty shot of a zooming spaceship, but there's so much motion and space encompassed in a short clip. And all of that because they had hardware they could animate and compose with freely. The guest stars are consistently good, and they good a few bigger names than you'd expect. I've posted a lot about the guests, so I'll name a new one: William Dennis Hunt. He's one of the actors who has appeared on both B5 (a Centauri noble in Knives) and Star Trek (DS9, Way of the Warrior, as Huraga). Hunt is notable because his acting career got its start as Emperor Wang in <drum roll> Flesh Gordon. Not because of the 1974 original, the 1990 sequel is what did it. After that 16 year gap, he's still working this year. Flesh Gordon is a classic. It's not a bad movie, it's a decent space opera with some nudity. Where it shines is the effects work. There are people in that crew who went on to win Oscars and Emmys. Star Trek fans will recognize Bjo Trimble, who was on makeup, and several other people with long involvement with. Rick Baker did the makeup and effects on the Thriller music video, while clocking 7 Oscars and an Emmy. Dennis Muren has a star on the Walk of Fame, six Oscars, and an Emmy. Just a long list of people who had stellar careers in special effects of all kinds. Plus, Craig T Nelson ad-libbed the dialogue for the big monster at the end of the movie. And yeah, the second Draal actor is awesome.
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Nov 25, 2018 23:46
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MrL_JaKiri posted:We've just been talking about Flesh Gordon (due to the Knives connection originally, but then more generally) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068595/characters/nm0005266 The video clip on YouTube was taken down or I'd link that.
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Nov 29, 2018 22:27
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Sedgr posted:I had some extra time today and decided to mess around further with some B5 models and Unity. So now I've got a Starfury that I can fly around a bit and fire at things. The only thing to shoot at is the station right now, but it works. Jet style movement isn't really right, but for something quick it does the job. Nifty ! Not to steal your thunder, but some people may not know that there is a complete space sim based on flying Starfurys. Free (legal) download http://babylon.hard-light.net Trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTFj4AuokaQ
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Dec 18, 2018 06:11
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Yeah, there's clearly an attempt to do I, Centauri showing through quite clearly. JMS pulled it off too, the Centauri plots were some of the very best parts of the show.
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Dec 20, 2018 05:58
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Zorak of Michigan posted:Anyone talking about tertiary characters needs to wait until the series is over and then talk to me about Neroon. Oh Neroon, you magnificent bastard. I scanned your ship. Admittedly, in his last scene the director should have slapped JMS with a rolled up copy of the script until they got a version that wasn't... aggressively theatrical. Neroon is still a great character.
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Dec 20, 2018 09:09
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I just finished S03E08 on Friday and I can confirm that that episode is still creepy two decades later.
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Jan 14, 2019 07:49
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Kashia posted:Halfway through season 4 now, just finished the 'Racing Mars' episode, and...did this show from 1997 casually refer to marriage equality as a thing nobody bats an eyelash at in the future? Wow. I wonder how much further the portrayal of the Ivanova/Talia relationship would have gone if Andrea Thompson had stayed on the show. Yeah quote:Also Garibaldi noooooo One of the biggest noooooos in television history.
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Feb 1, 2019 07:28
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Goddamnit. Got me in the first scene. The sun's coming up.
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Feb 12, 2019 08:42
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Blindeye posted:She can barely stand it because "Picard is just too competent." She's a good candidate for being a fan of The Orville. Captain Mercer is certainly no Picard, but it hits all the TNG notes.
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Feb 27, 2019 08:18
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MrL_JaKiri posted:Passing Through Gethsemane An excellent episode. By Any Means Necessary has a good, self-contained story. A Race Through Dark Places or Mind War because Bester episodes always have something to love.
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Feb 28, 2019 03:48
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Absurd Alhazred posted:You know, I'm continuing to watch Season 2, just watched A Distant Star, and I just realized something more deeply than I had in previous viewings: Santiago chose the absolute worst replacement for Sinclair he could possibly find. Clark absolutely did not have Sheridan in mind, that was yet another lie. Sheridan, someone the Minbari not only did not approve of but actively hated for his actions in the war, someone who, as his former mentor Maynard notes, has nothing in his record to suggest that he would be anything other than a disaster in a desk job. They wanted B5 to collapse, it's a failure of theirs that they misjudged him so. Another uncanny bit of foresight. That's just like the exact wrong person being put in charge of the EPA or FDA.
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Mar 8, 2019 08:00
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Milkfred E. Moore posted:I assume you mixed up the two Presidents there? I"m just quoting. Maybe.
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Mar 8, 2019 09:00
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We get enough people coming to the show for the first time that I think it's the decent thing to do.
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Mar 10, 2019 19:16
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Confirmed ! Season 2 is where you stop skipping episodes.
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Mar 10, 2019 21:14
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Just hit Sic Transit Vir in my re-watch. Best filler episode ever. "Hey ! You wanna watch a romantic comedy ? gently caress that, check this poo poo out. We have a genocidal innocent right here." And that's even more disturbingly true in today's reality than even the Nightwatch stuff.
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Mar 13, 2019 05:45
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1994 Toyota Celica posted:my rewatch just got to Vir making good on his promised wave I just got to the one about his arranged marriage (and Sheridan's terrible, terrible flarn). Oh Lyndisty. So lovely and yet so murderous. ^^ Reading up on the extended canon was the mistake there, trust me, like many others, I went down that path and can never unwalk it.
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Mar 15, 2019 03:21
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SlothfulCobra posted:I do wonder how many similarities were later driven by things like cultural zeitgeist, current events, or industry trends. I think there were a lot of dystopias in the 90s. The weird part is that all the way into the middle of each show's run, both shows had a storyline about a military coup and takeover. Featuring the same recurring guest star. With episodes shooting at the same time, so much so that B5 had to kill off a character offscreen because the actor was going to be shooting for DS9 that week. Clarke's takeover was always going to be a major arc for B5, a highly similar plot happening on DS9 is very suggestive. Sure, they played out very differently on each show, but that's an amazing congruity if the wasn't some B5 influence handed down from the executive suite.
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Apr 15, 2019 07:18
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