Episode 2.11: All Alone in the Night
It feels very strange, this far into Babylon 5, to suddenly get a Star Trek episode, though to be fair this is only half of a Star Trek episode. I kind of suspect that the writers were sitting around in the writers’ room, looking at the season outline, and realizing that an entire hour of Minbari politicans solemnly intoning things at each other would be boring, so they decided to jazz it up with an “Enemy Mine” homage. And that plotline is not really bad, but Babylon 5 has built up such a strong head of steam that even a kidnapping and a fight to the death feels like a step backward. It’s not a good sign when “our Captain is missing and forced to fight for his life” has lower stakes than “a bunch of bald aliens are mean to an alien with hair.”
The A-plot here—or maybe the B-plot, I don’t know which is which—shows Ivanova finding reports of mysterious attacks, and Sheridan bored out of his gourd deciding to go out in a Starfury and see them for himself. Already we’re pretty sure this is going to go wrong, but when they add in a redshirt fighter pilot with just enough intro to give him a personality, we know it’s going to go disastrously wrong. Plus you’ll notice that neither of the two pilots in this Starfury episode are Warren Keffer, who was brought onto the show SPECIFICALLY TO BE THE PILOT IN THE STARFURY EPISODES. And Sheridan gets captured, and the redshirt dies, and a Sheridan makes friends with a Narn, and whatever, man, I don’t care. There is zero sign that these aliens will ever come back again, and zero suggestion that this entire subplot will ever matter, and that’s fine for an episodic show but you promised me so much more, B5. There’s a frigging war going on, for crying out loud, and this is two episodes in row where you’ve refused to show it.
But really, like I said in the beginning, this whole subplot is just here to kill time and keep the energy up while the real story happens back on Minbari Prime or whatever their planet is called. Minbariton? The Minbarihood? Delenn is called back to talk to the people in her Minbarihood, and it turns out that the Grey Council are some people in her Minbarihood—she thinks she’s being consulted for something, but really they're worried that Delenn has given up some essential part of her Minbari identity, and can no longer be trusted. She loses her title, and most of her remaining prestige, and when she asks who’s going to replace her on the Grey Council everyone in the audience yells “Neroon!” because of course it’s going to be Neroon: he’s one of the only Minbari we know by name, and his position on the Council will ruin EVERYTHING, so yeah, that was a foregone conclusion. And watching him try to take that hood off over his spiky bone makeup is, as always, an absolute delight. He’s the wrong caste, though—a Warrior taking a Religious slot—which we know is bad news even before we find out that there’s actually a third caste, called Workers, which I guess is important now. And I’m making a lot of jokes but honestly this whole storyline was fantastic, full of import and tension and the political machinations that Babylon 5 does best. We also get a fantastic performance from Lennier, which is especially impressive given that all he does is pledge allegiance to Delenn. I’ve talked about it before, but Bill Mumy has found his character this season in a way that he hadn’t yet in season 1, and he is gentle and passive and somehow absolutely riveting. I keep looking for a better term to decribe him than “warrior monk,” but it’s just so perfect: he’s calm, and centered, and manages to suggest incredible competence without any outward posturing. Huge kudos to Mumy. Plus, you know, huge kudos to the show for finally getting this Delenn story into high gear. We’ve been waiting for a payoff since CHRYSALIS, and it looks like we’re finally getting it.
But, back to Sheridan. I want to give a prize to whoever designed the alien abductors, because I’ve never seen a wider disparity between how cool a ship looks and how lame the species that built it looks. Maybe they were compensating for their boring round heads by building the galaxy’s freakiest asymmetrical pirate ship?
Seriously, though, there are two things we have to talk about here, because they might (I hope) actually be super important. First is the Narn dude who Sheridan befriends while they’re both captives. I don’t know if that Narn dude is coming back—he doesn’t even have a name—but I sure hope so, because he and Sheridan really did get close. And it sounds weird to say that, because the Narn was too injured to have a deep conversation, but they fought for each other, and Sheridan can only say “don’t die on me now, buddy, we’ll get through this together” so many times before I headcanon them into BFFs and want to see him become a regular on the show. The writers did a good job, honestly, in making us like and feel for Ramirez, the redshirt pilot, but this Narn is an even more impressive achievement in creating a cool side character with so few words and so little screen time.
Second: in the middle of his kidnapping ordeal, Sheridan has a bizarre dream/vision thing, that a) was obviously intended for Sinclair, and b) includes Kosh stepping in for a classic Kosh one-liner. "You have always been here" is freaky enough, but when Sheridan sees Kosh again back on the station and he says it AGAIN that's a hall of famer right there. There doesn't seem to be, like I said, any evidence that these aliens will ever return, or that the vision is related to them in any way--Sheridan just had it while on their ship--but the vision was pretty impressive despite not really telling us anything. Except that maybe Kosh and Sheridan are mentally connected, I guess? Cool.
Okay. I've saved the best for last, because even the good parts of this episode (ie, the Kosh vision and the Minbari politics) felt like pointless water-treading compared to how awesome the last five minutes were. General Hague has returned to the station for the least secret meeting of all time--he doesn't want anyone to make a big deal of his arrival, but he doesn't hide himself either, which only serves to draw attention to the fact that Something Is Up. It's not as bad as the Ranger and Garibaldi talking about their secret army in full view in a crowded docking bay, but it's up there. Anyway, it turns out that Hague is part of a low-key resistance movement in the Earth government, loyal to former president Santiago, who sent Sheridan to B5 to suss out the loyalties of the B5 command staff. He reports that they're all good people and loyal to Earth, and Hague tells him what we've all suspected for ages now: that Santiago was assassinated by the Veep, as masterminded by the Psi-Corp, as part of a coup of Earth. He tells Sheridan to bring Ivanova, Garibaldi, and Franklin in on it, and he does, and the whole audience stands up and yells "WHY DID YOU SHOW US A TEN-MINUTE LEAD-PIPE FIGHT WHEN YOU COULD HAVE BEEN SHOWING US THIS AWESOME STUFF?" And the lead-pipe fight didn't even have the cool Captain Kirk music. But yeah: the mysteries we've been watching percolate in the background are finally coming into the foreground, and there's now not just a war but a psychic coup and no less than two secret armies (and Garibaldi's on both of them!). The future looks grim and filled with strife and drama, and I for one can't wait.
The A-plot here—or maybe the B-plot, I don’t know which is which—shows Ivanova finding reports of mysterious attacks, and Sheridan bored out of his gourd deciding to go out in a Starfury and see them for himself. Already we’re pretty sure this is going to go wrong, but when they add in a redshirt fighter pilot with just enough intro to give him a personality, we know it’s going to go disastrously wrong. Plus you’ll notice that neither of the two pilots in this Starfury episode are Warren Keffer, who was brought onto the show SPECIFICALLY TO BE THE PILOT IN THE STARFURY EPISODES. And Sheridan gets captured, and the redshirt dies, and a Sheridan makes friends with a Narn, and whatever, man, I don’t care. There is zero sign that these aliens will ever come back again, and zero suggestion that this entire subplot will ever matter, and that’s fine for an episodic show but you promised me so much more, B5. There’s a frigging war going on, for crying out loud, and this is two episodes in row where you’ve refused to show it.
But really, like I said in the beginning, this whole subplot is just here to kill time and keep the energy up while the real story happens back on Minbari Prime or whatever their planet is called. Minbariton? The Minbarihood? Delenn is called back to talk to the people in her Minbarihood, and it turns out that the Grey Council are some people in her Minbarihood—she thinks she’s being consulted for something, but really they're worried that Delenn has given up some essential part of her Minbari identity, and can no longer be trusted. She loses her title, and most of her remaining prestige, and when she asks who’s going to replace her on the Grey Council everyone in the audience yells “Neroon!” because of course it’s going to be Neroon: he’s one of the only Minbari we know by name, and his position on the Council will ruin EVERYTHING, so yeah, that was a foregone conclusion. And watching him try to take that hood off over his spiky bone makeup is, as always, an absolute delight. He’s the wrong caste, though—a Warrior taking a Religious slot—which we know is bad news even before we find out that there’s actually a third caste, called Workers, which I guess is important now. And I’m making a lot of jokes but honestly this whole storyline was fantastic, full of import and tension and the political machinations that Babylon 5 does best. We also get a fantastic performance from Lennier, which is especially impressive given that all he does is pledge allegiance to Delenn. I’ve talked about it before, but Bill Mumy has found his character this season in a way that he hadn’t yet in season 1, and he is gentle and passive and somehow absolutely riveting. I keep looking for a better term to decribe him than “warrior monk,” but it’s just so perfect: he’s calm, and centered, and manages to suggest incredible competence without any outward posturing. Huge kudos to Mumy. Plus, you know, huge kudos to the show for finally getting this Delenn story into high gear. We’ve been waiting for a payoff since CHRYSALIS, and it looks like we’re finally getting it.
But, back to Sheridan. I want to give a prize to whoever designed the alien abductors, because I’ve never seen a wider disparity between how cool a ship looks and how lame the species that built it looks. Maybe they were compensating for their boring round heads by building the galaxy’s freakiest asymmetrical pirate ship?
Seriously, though, there are two things we have to talk about here, because they might (I hope) actually be super important. First is the Narn dude who Sheridan befriends while they’re both captives. I don’t know if that Narn dude is coming back—he doesn’t even have a name—but I sure hope so, because he and Sheridan really did get close. And it sounds weird to say that, because the Narn was too injured to have a deep conversation, but they fought for each other, and Sheridan can only say “don’t die on me now, buddy, we’ll get through this together” so many times before I headcanon them into BFFs and want to see him become a regular on the show. The writers did a good job, honestly, in making us like and feel for Ramirez, the redshirt pilot, but this Narn is an even more impressive achievement in creating a cool side character with so few words and so little screen time.
Second: in the middle of his kidnapping ordeal, Sheridan has a bizarre dream/vision thing, that a) was obviously intended for Sinclair, and b) includes Kosh stepping in for a classic Kosh one-liner. "You have always been here" is freaky enough, but when Sheridan sees Kosh again back on the station and he says it AGAIN that's a hall of famer right there. There doesn't seem to be, like I said, any evidence that these aliens will ever return, or that the vision is related to them in any way--Sheridan just had it while on their ship--but the vision was pretty impressive despite not really telling us anything. Except that maybe Kosh and Sheridan are mentally connected, I guess? Cool.
Okay. I've saved the best for last, because even the good parts of this episode (ie, the Kosh vision and the Minbari politics) felt like pointless water-treading compared to how awesome the last five minutes were. General Hague has returned to the station for the least secret meeting of all time--he doesn't want anyone to make a big deal of his arrival, but he doesn't hide himself either, which only serves to draw attention to the fact that Something Is Up. It's not as bad as the Ranger and Garibaldi talking about their secret army in full view in a crowded docking bay, but it's up there. Anyway, it turns out that Hague is part of a low-key resistance movement in the Earth government, loyal to former president Santiago, who sent Sheridan to B5 to suss out the loyalties of the B5 command staff. He reports that they're all good people and loyal to Earth, and Hague tells him what we've all suspected for ages now: that Santiago was assassinated by the Veep, as masterminded by the Psi-Corp, as part of a coup of Earth. He tells Sheridan to bring Ivanova, Garibaldi, and Franklin in on it, and he does, and the whole audience stands up and yells "WHY DID YOU SHOW US A TEN-MINUTE LEAD-PIPE FIGHT WHEN YOU COULD HAVE BEEN SHOWING US THIS AWESOME STUFF?" And the lead-pipe fight didn't even have the cool Captain Kirk music. But yeah: the mysteries we've been watching percolate in the background are finally coming into the foreground, and there's now not just a war but a psychic coup and no less than two secret armies (and Garibaldi's on both of them!). The future looks grim and filled with strife and drama, and I for one can't wait.
Minbar. The Minbari homework is just Minbar.
ReplyDeleteAlso Narn dude is played by Marshall Teague who was the guy who got "infected" in Infection.
Since you've mentioned it a couple of times, I'd like to note that B5 didn't really have a writers' room as such. Well, sure, JMS had an office on the set, but technically that's a writer's room, which is clearly a different thing. The way the show worked was that JMS had his outline of the five year arc, and he found little chunks of it to assign to writers, along with a general idea of what part of the bigger story said episode was telling, and what it needed to accomplish.
ReplyDeleteWhat he found out as the arc really kicked into high gear was that it was getting tougher and tougher to find those little chunks to give to other writers, because the episodes needed to serve a whole bunch of masters. That's why he ended up writing 92 of the 110 episodes plus all the movies himself, while also being very hands on with everything from the casting to the editing to the sound mixing and everything in-between. He damn near killed himself in the process. Remember that when you run into the worst episode of the entire series in a couple of weeks or so; even JMS has trouble remembering how that thing came to be.
As I recall, the reason for not having a bunch of writers on staff was purely budgetary. B5 was made for no money at all, about half the budget of DS9 per episode. So they kinda had to make cuts wherever they could. JMS still wanted to give other writers a chance to play in his universe (and to earn a paycheck; he gave the writers full credit for residual purposes, even though he had to touch up the scripts here and there), so that's why there was even an attempt at giving out assignments.
I think the weirdest part about the whole "captain gets kidnapped by aliens star trek style" sub plot is that Delenn is like "oh yeah those jerks, they do this sometimes, let's go kick their butts."
ReplyDeleteThere was that one ep in season 1 with the courtroom on B5 where they showed a human trying to sue a little grey man because his great-grandfather was abducted by the grey's great grandfather which was pointless other than being HILARIOUS. This feels similarly pointless, like - sorry, just one of the things we deal with being a spacefaring race, sometimes jerk-aliens come out of nowhere and abduct you for experiments."