11 thoughts on “Earhart’s: “Falling Toward Apotheosis” Spoiler Space”
The Show-cut effect is quite showing here: absent episodes, two or three, and perhaps its because the missing characters are back. Sheridan has taken over security quite quickly. I think Zack was in Garibaldi’s floor cleaners? If so, he’d have to be ‘left out of the loop’ too. Presumably a takeover of Security by SherLoridan would have been shown. I mean, it does take some thought to getting rid of a Vorlon.
My feeling is Garibaldi might well have been missing an extra episode. JMS fantastically gives us empathy with Garibaldi, (“did Sheridan get the third degree?”)(though yous put up a good defense for why this isn’t the case), but extra ‘Missing Chief’ episode/s would cushion the viewer against Ivanova’s queries (does Mr. Garibaldi seem crankier?”), and have us guessing for in ourselves.
Franklin found ‘Lorien things’ in the big guy’s bloodstream. ‘Some biochemical energies, repairing and sustaining. He’s never seen anything like it.’ So it’s alien then and this positions Sheridan as a hybrid. Chyrsalis 2: Biochemical Electric boogaloo. This offers up a range of interpretations for a #DelennWatch not considered.
But look, there’s much worse. The teaser shows us the dangers of biochemical floor polish and zooms right past its links to the underworld of Babylon 5. We cut straight to the monster and she’s sqaulling, sqaulling! Swimming on tiles. Her screams seem to be attracting feet. When we do get to see the floor, its less grabby than expected, but sticky. We never get to learn its name is Apotheosis. We don’t know if it’s from Grey 17 or Shadow tech. We never have the time to enjoy the foreshadowing that this floor was ‘triggered’ by Mack and Bo. I wouldn’t put it up there with Greatest Sheridan Top 80. I didn’t like the way she was following him around with that look like she was going to take him out back and offer him porn favours…well, that’s how it looked to me. Pardon my vulgarity. If the actress does anything (at all), it’s to set up the Sheridan groupie thing with a …loud sqaulling.
Highlight of this podcast was the noun ‘Cartagianist’ and Erika’s brilliant first person Catragia psych-commentary.
I listened to most of the podcasts: It was very entertaining and nice to hear fans still argueing and showing love for the show afters all these years. Congrats to the hosts of the audioguide, great work!
So now let’s jump into discussion, to talk about something, that always went through my mind, watching the early 4th season: Why didn’t Sheridan, Ivanova and the others check on Garibaldi and investigating his disappearance more thoroughly.
I mean, it’s not like they found him by accident somewhere in the streets of a planet with no clues how he got there. G-Kar, Marcus and Zack were investigating an actual conspiracy of people who supposedly found him, to cover up the circumstances of his disappearence and how he was found. Zack follows a transport ship, who’s supposed to have Garibaldis Starfury and it explodes after some light fire without reason and ejects a lifepod with Garibaldi in it. He claims not to remember anything, but starts to act weird. Isn’t that enough reason to consider, that something was done to him? (By the way: I always asked myself: Did they actually found Garibaldi in the state we see him last inside the lifepod – weirdly wrapped up in plastic foil? Because, that would give even more reasons, to be suspicious.) After all, he disappeared, when the station was surrounded by Shadow Vessels. And all they do is letting Franklin check him for implants and after he didn’t find any, they go back to normal? Sheridan could at least aks Lyta to scann him, like Talia did, when he got shot in the back…
The Vorlons’ target selection still seems strange to me here. If they’re wiping the board of Shadow allies, if anything, they ought to be targeting Earth because of the Shadow infestation in the form of Clarke and Psicorp. Strangely, however, Earth gets a special exemption from this phase of the war and later portions of the canon very weirdly pretend that Earth was against the Shadows instead of their enthusiastic supporters.
Also with regard to the Vorlons, I’ve long wondered why the killing of Kosh 2.0 didn’t result in a few thousand Vorlon warships turning B5 into a pile of scrap a few hours after news of the killing made it back to the Vorlon capital. Killing an ambassador ought to be much easier than surviving the retribution that could follow.
#DelennWatch — she was notably missing from the decision making process that lead to the killing of Kosh 2.0 only to re-appear as a damsel in distress during the execution itself. Instead of Delenn needing to be rescued again, it would have been interesting to use some of that wasted screen time to get her thoughts about killing a Vorlon that’s guided her culture for however many thousands of years and that she’s worked for/with, on some level, since the E-M war.
Because of their differential lifespans, Sheridan and Delenn were doomed even before the twenty year limit. Even if Sheridan didn’t die young, Minbari must age more slowly than Humans and that would have eventually resulted in their relationship taking on somewhat creepy (creepier) undertones when Sheridan became decrepit with age while Delenn retained her strength. Sheridan’s twenty means their relationship ends while they’re still of compatible apparent ages.
Regarding Ivanova — I think Claudia Christian’s decision to leave the series after the end of S4 saved the character’s reputation. If Ivanova became Byron’s love interest (and, presumably, a traitor) then there’s no way whatsoever that she’d be remembered as fondly by the fandom as she is. As much as much of the fandom missed Ivanova in season 5, given what was planned for her, CC’s departure was for the best.
The Byron arc would have been a little different, I think. Lyta was still going to be a follower of Byron, so elements of her plotline would have stayed with her. Ivanova was going to have the specifically romantic element, but as she was also going to be occupying the Lochley role, I suspect that her relationship with Byron would not have led to her being a “traitor” – going all the way over to Byron’s side would have stayed with Lyta as part of her storyline.
But certainly, I think a romantic relationship with Byron or, in fact, any association with the Byron arc at all would not have raised Ivanova’s standing with the fanbase 🙂
(I don’t actually mind the Byron arc myself as much as most people seem to.)
I can’t speak for all fandom, of course, but the eyeroll-inducing Byron arc did not dampen my love for Lyta, so I doubt it would have dampened my love for Ivanova. I just wait for it to be over so that we can get to Lyta being awesome.
Speaking of Lyta, our hosts talked about how bad she (Lyta, not PT) was at acting. Possible connection to her trip to Mars in episode 14? “I don’t like what I’m hearing here. I’m not a great liar! I’m a terrible liar!”
My assumption regarding the Vorlons is that they were going methodically through this corner of the galaxy based on location. They probably would have gotten to Earth after they hit Centauri Prime. They started with the League worlds first, were about to hit the Centauri when the war ended, and we know that the Centauri territory is relatively close to Earth. It just happened that they started elsewhere.
Of course, story wise it’s because JMS wanted to have a separate ending to the Earth conflict. But it also gave us Marcus’s gem of a quote, “I’m a war hero and nobody knows about it!”
This is a really awkward topic, and I’m going to use the most delicate language that I can manage. But I think Claudia Christian’s departure can only be discussed with extreme care. I don’t think that it’s something where one can assume that the versions (themselves not entirely in accord, of course) in the contemporary statements quoted in the Lurker’s Guide are adequate bases for understanding what happened. (Including e.g. the teleprompter bit.)
As I understand it, Claudia Christian has given a version of her experiences in her memoir that includes details of behavior that, unfortunately, cannot be regarded as other than very problematic. (I haven’t read the memoir myself, but I have no reason to believe that the different accounts of its contents that I have read are inaccurate.) It is, I am afraid, one of those things where if you believe that certain things are true, then some parties behaved very badly, but if you do not believe that those things are true, then someone else did in making the allegations.
I’ve read statements from JMS and CC, both validating their own strong feelings and have come to the conclusion it’s a bit like when Johnny Marr broke up The Smiths: except he didn’t, he just took a well-deserved vacation, and other people accelerated the gap. In the various reunions on Youtube, JMS and CC talk with friendship and mutual respect, worth checking when you’ve downtime. And Jason Carter handles it all with Marcus’s annoying optimism.
It seems clear JMS’s plan was to address the theme of grief in Series 5. Claudia’s opening scene in 4×21 was terrifyingly brilliant. This might have taken us along a thematic bridge, linked with the Sheridan mortality here, Londo’s inner ponderings in Long Night, dovetailing with the Byron sacrifice and Lennier’s grief over Marcus leading to his final act.
Did Sheridan’s lifespan of 20 remaining years start when he was brought back following his fall at Z’Ha’Dum or in this episode after healing him from his encounter with Kosh 2.0? I also had a similar thought about why the Vorlons didn’t burn B5 into stardust after Kosh 2.0 was attacked and killed. My thoughts are that either it was because what was left of Kosh 1.0 actually did the deed or, more likely, they were pre-occupied with their galactic rampage and may have only gotten to attacking B5 had the war not ended.
The Show-cut effect is quite showing here: absent episodes, two or three, and perhaps its because the missing characters are back. Sheridan has taken over security quite quickly. I think Zack was in Garibaldi’s floor cleaners? If so, he’d have to be ‘left out of the loop’ too. Presumably a takeover of Security by SherLoridan would have been shown. I mean, it does take some thought to getting rid of a Vorlon.
My feeling is Garibaldi might well have been missing an extra episode. JMS fantastically gives us empathy with Garibaldi, (“did Sheridan get the third degree?”)(though yous put up a good defense for why this isn’t the case), but extra ‘Missing Chief’ episode/s would cushion the viewer against Ivanova’s queries (does Mr. Garibaldi seem crankier?”), and have us guessing for in ourselves.
Franklin found ‘Lorien things’ in the big guy’s bloodstream. ‘Some biochemical energies, repairing and sustaining. He’s never seen anything like it.’ So it’s alien then and this positions Sheridan as a hybrid. Chyrsalis 2: Biochemical Electric boogaloo. This offers up a range of interpretations for a #DelennWatch not considered.
But look, there’s much worse. The teaser shows us the dangers of biochemical floor polish and zooms right past its links to the underworld of Babylon 5. We cut straight to the monster and she’s sqaulling, sqaulling! Swimming on tiles. Her screams seem to be attracting feet. When we do get to see the floor, its less grabby than expected, but sticky. We never get to learn its name is Apotheosis. We don’t know if it’s from Grey 17 or Shadow tech. We never have the time to enjoy the foreshadowing that this floor was ‘triggered’ by Mack and Bo. I wouldn’t put it up there with Greatest Sheridan Top 80. I didn’t like the way she was following him around with that look like she was going to take him out back and offer him porn favours…well, that’s how it looked to me. Pardon my vulgarity. If the actress does anything (at all), it’s to set up the Sheridan groupie thing with a …loud sqaulling.
Highlight of this podcast was the noun ‘Cartagianist’ and Erika’s brilliant first person Catragia psych-commentary.
I listened to most of the podcasts: It was very entertaining and nice to hear fans still argueing and showing love for the show afters all these years. Congrats to the hosts of the audioguide, great work!
So now let’s jump into discussion, to talk about something, that always went through my mind, watching the early 4th season: Why didn’t Sheridan, Ivanova and the others check on Garibaldi and investigating his disappearance more thoroughly.
I mean, it’s not like they found him by accident somewhere in the streets of a planet with no clues how he got there. G-Kar, Marcus and Zack were investigating an actual conspiracy of people who supposedly found him, to cover up the circumstances of his disappearence and how he was found. Zack follows a transport ship, who’s supposed to have Garibaldis Starfury and it explodes after some light fire without reason and ejects a lifepod with Garibaldi in it. He claims not to remember anything, but starts to act weird. Isn’t that enough reason to consider, that something was done to him? (By the way: I always asked myself: Did they actually found Garibaldi in the state we see him last inside the lifepod – weirdly wrapped up in plastic foil? Because, that would give even more reasons, to be suspicious.) After all, he disappeared, when the station was surrounded by Shadow Vessels. And all they do is letting Franklin check him for implants and after he didn’t find any, they go back to normal? Sheridan could at least aks Lyta to scann him, like Talia did, when he got shot in the back…
The Vorlons’ target selection still seems strange to me here. If they’re wiping the board of Shadow allies, if anything, they ought to be targeting Earth because of the Shadow infestation in the form of Clarke and Psicorp. Strangely, however, Earth gets a special exemption from this phase of the war and later portions of the canon very weirdly pretend that Earth was against the Shadows instead of their enthusiastic supporters.
Also with regard to the Vorlons, I’ve long wondered why the killing of Kosh 2.0 didn’t result in a few thousand Vorlon warships turning B5 into a pile of scrap a few hours after news of the killing made it back to the Vorlon capital. Killing an ambassador ought to be much easier than surviving the retribution that could follow.
#DelennWatch — she was notably missing from the decision making process that lead to the killing of Kosh 2.0 only to re-appear as a damsel in distress during the execution itself. Instead of Delenn needing to be rescued again, it would have been interesting to use some of that wasted screen time to get her thoughts about killing a Vorlon that’s guided her culture for however many thousands of years and that she’s worked for/with, on some level, since the E-M war.
Because of their differential lifespans, Sheridan and Delenn were doomed even before the twenty year limit. Even if Sheridan didn’t die young, Minbari must age more slowly than Humans and that would have eventually resulted in their relationship taking on somewhat creepy (creepier) undertones when Sheridan became decrepit with age while Delenn retained her strength. Sheridan’s twenty means their relationship ends while they’re still of compatible apparent ages.
Regarding Ivanova — I think Claudia Christian’s decision to leave the series after the end of S4 saved the character’s reputation. If Ivanova became Byron’s love interest (and, presumably, a traitor) then there’s no way whatsoever that she’d be remembered as fondly by the fandom as she is. As much as much of the fandom missed Ivanova in season 5, given what was planned for her, CC’s departure was for the best.
The Byron arc would have been a little different, I think. Lyta was still going to be a follower of Byron, so elements of her plotline would have stayed with her. Ivanova was going to have the specifically romantic element, but as she was also going to be occupying the Lochley role, I suspect that her relationship with Byron would not have led to her being a “traitor” – going all the way over to Byron’s side would have stayed with Lyta as part of her storyline.
But certainly, I think a romantic relationship with Byron or, in fact, any association with the Byron arc at all would not have raised Ivanova’s standing with the fanbase 🙂
(I don’t actually mind the Byron arc myself as much as most people seem to.)
I can’t speak for all fandom, of course, but the eyeroll-inducing Byron arc did not dampen my love for Lyta, so I doubt it would have dampened my love for Ivanova. I just wait for it to be over so that we can get to Lyta being awesome.
Speaking of Lyta, our hosts talked about how bad she (Lyta, not PT) was at acting. Possible connection to her trip to Mars in episode 14? “I don’t like what I’m hearing here. I’m not a great liar! I’m a terrible liar!”
My assumption regarding the Vorlons is that they were going methodically through this corner of the galaxy based on location. They probably would have gotten to Earth after they hit Centauri Prime. They started with the League worlds first, were about to hit the Centauri when the war ended, and we know that the Centauri territory is relatively close to Earth. It just happened that they started elsewhere.
Of course, story wise it’s because JMS wanted to have a separate ending to the Earth conflict. But it also gave us Marcus’s gem of a quote, “I’m a war hero and nobody knows about it!”
That was my assumption as well. Even the Vorlons can’t kill *everybody* at once.
Having listened to the podcast:-
This is a really awkward topic, and I’m going to use the most delicate language that I can manage. But I think Claudia Christian’s departure can only be discussed with extreme care. I don’t think that it’s something where one can assume that the versions (themselves not entirely in accord, of course) in the contemporary statements quoted in the Lurker’s Guide are adequate bases for understanding what happened. (Including e.g. the teleprompter bit.)
As I understand it, Claudia Christian has given a version of her experiences in her memoir that includes details of behavior that, unfortunately, cannot be regarded as other than very problematic. (I haven’t read the memoir myself, but I have no reason to believe that the different accounts of its contents that I have read are inaccurate.) It is, I am afraid, one of those things where if you believe that certain things are true, then some parties behaved very badly, but if you do not believe that those things are true, then someone else did in making the allegations.
I’ve read statements from JMS and CC, both validating their own strong feelings and have come to the conclusion it’s a bit like when Johnny Marr broke up The Smiths: except he didn’t, he just took a well-deserved vacation, and other people accelerated the gap. In the various reunions on Youtube, JMS and CC talk with friendship and mutual respect, worth checking when you’ve downtime. And Jason Carter handles it all with Marcus’s annoying optimism.
It seems clear JMS’s plan was to address the theme of grief in Series 5. Claudia’s opening scene in 4×21 was terrifyingly brilliant. This might have taken us along a thematic bridge, linked with the Sheridan mortality here, Londo’s inner ponderings in Long Night, dovetailing with the Byron sacrifice and Lennier’s grief over Marcus leading to his final act.
Did Sheridan’s lifespan of 20 remaining years start when he was brought back following his fall at Z’Ha’Dum or in this episode after healing him from his encounter with Kosh 2.0? I also had a similar thought about why the Vorlons didn’t burn B5 into stardust after Kosh 2.0 was attacked and killed. My thoughts are that either it was because what was left of Kosh 1.0 actually did the deed or, more likely, they were pre-occupied with their galactic rampage and may have only gotten to attacking B5 had the war not ended.