Episode 2.18: Confessions and Lamentations
Two Star Trek episodes in a row! But this one represents a huge step forward compared to B5’s previous Trek-like outings, because while it is 100% disconnected from the mytharc (even KNIVES had the Londo stuff to kind of tie it in a little bit to the ongoing story), it still manages to feel like a part of the mytharc in a way that the previous episodes never did. This is because—going back to my rant about IN THE SHADOW OF Z’HA’DUM—it cares very deeply about its characters, and it’s using the plot to explore those characters rather than the other way around.
The result is an admittedly odd mix for an episode so late in Season 2: I felt a little impatient watching it, because I wanted to see more of the mytharc and I felt like we were wasting time on a detour, but at the same time I was totally into the story and eager to see what the characters would do. If it had come in the early half of Season 2 I suspect this would have been one of my favorite episodes. Here in the back half it’s still very good, but suffers greatly from “Come on just get to the mytharc already” syndrome.
There’s no A-plot/B-plot nonsense going on here, or at least anything that looks like a B-plot gets dropped after the first ten minutes because the A-plot is too big to ignore: one of the minor alien species, called the Markab, comes down with a devastating plague that is “100% lethal, and 100% contagious.” It’s also completely invisible: no boils or lesions or other physicals signs of infection—and has a long gestational period in which there are no symptoms yet the host is still fully contagious. In other words, it’s a plague perfectly engineered for a TV show, and indeed it ends up killing just about every Markab in the galaxy. The even bigger fear comes when it seems to jump to a new species, meaning that it might end up killing every other species as well. No half measures on B5, folks. At the last minute, the Markab doctor who initially tried to cover up the epidemic basically gives his life by becoming infected himself and allowing Franklin to study the plague’s progress, enabling him to find a cure, which saves everyone else but comes too late for the Markab. Sad face.
Interspersed in here we have a bunch of little vignettes that show us some of the character’s trajectories, both short- and long-term. Keffer is apparently taking trips into the Warp, trying to find more hints of the ship he saw several episodes ago, which serves as a nice reminder that this plate is still spinning, and sooner or later it’s going to fall. Ivanova tells him to knock it off, giving him both barrels of that good ol’ Ivanova authority, which serves as a nice reminder that Ivanova is one of the best characters on the show and they are woefully underusing her. Garibaldi gets to beat up some anti-Markab thugs, and then—in a key shot that’s perfectly framed—take the beaten Markab by the hand and pick him up, just to hit home that Garibaldi is a good man who’s always going to stick up for the little guy, even if it means getting the plague.
One of the best little snippets comes with Franklin; this is mostly a Franklin episode already, and he does some incredible work, but they make sure to throw in a scene where he's taking a bunch of stims to stay awake, and the Markab doctor warns him that this is dangerous. By itself this wouldn't be much, but this is the second or third episode where we see Franklin taking too many stims, and there's no way that's not going somewhere. This is either building toward a big collapse in the climax of Season 2, where Franklin needs to do something but can't because he crashes from too many stims, or it's building toward an ongoing subplot in Season 3 where Franklin is a straight-up stim addict. I'm down for either one, especially because Franklin continues to be my favorite character among the main cast, and I can see him hitting it out of the park in either version of the story.
Last of all we have Delenn and Lennier, in an even bigger show of selflessless than Garibaldi, who lock themselves inside the Markab quarantine zone to provide aid and comfort without regard for their own lives. The speech Delenn gives while pleading for permission to do this is wonderful, and might be the first time in two whole seasons that I’ve really, truly liked Delenn. She’s always so aloof and/or bizarre, doing and saying things that I either don’t understand or don’t agree with, but watching her rush into danger—not because she can stop the danger, but because helping is the right thing to do—really turned her around for me.
And then there’s the love story? I have super mixed feelings about this. One of the early scenes, before the plague goes public, shows Sheridan eating a traditional Minbari meal with Delenn and Lennier, which is mostly played for laughs because of the ludicrous amount of ritual and ceremony stacked on top of the process. This is a follow-up to a scene several episodes ago in which Sheridan introduced Delenn to Earth food, and okay that’s fine, but apparently—and I know this is ridiculous but bear with me—apparently we were supposed to read these scenes as the early stages of a romantic relationship? Because when Delenn goes into the Markab quarantine, she gives Sheridan an overtly romantic goodbye, and he responds in kind, and I guess there’s a love story here. Oy. For starters, these two actors have less than zero chemistry with each other. Like, to the point where I wonder if the actors even liked each other. The romance comes out of nowhere, and I have huge doubts than even on a rewatch, viewing the previous episodes with knowledge that this was coming, you could even see hints of it in the way they treat each other. And I'm kind of speaking from experience there: a friend told me, several episodes ago, that in my analysis of an episode I had "missed" a love triangle. So ever since I've been watching with that in mind, trying to spot hints of a love triangle, or even just a love stick, and aside from some stuff with Talia there is nothing. Of the potential relationships I had identified as possibilities, Sheridan/Delenn wasn't even on the list--though Delenn/Lennier was, and this episode strengthened that one even more, so maybe that's the triangle my friend was talking about? Sheridan/Delenn/Lennier? I don't know, man. This seems like a huge stretch.
One of my biggest problems with Sheridan/Delenn is that I did see plenty of hints about a potential romance between Delenn and Sinclair back in Season 1, which kind of makes this new thing seem a) intrusive on a ship I'd already become attached to, and b) forced into a relationship where it doesn't belong, simply because the series outline demands a romance between Delenn and the captain no matter who the captain currently is. You can't have Delenn and Sheridan fall in love based on the foundation of Delenn and Sinclair. That's not how romance works. Like, if Sheridan had to leave as well, would the new captain also end up with Delenn?
And I know that the comments, both here and on Twitter/Facebook, are going to be filled with people telling me I'm wrong, and the signs were there the whole time, and I should really go back and watch those other episodes to see how clearly and obviously these hints were foreshadowed, and blah blah blah whatever. You're all ridiculous. May I remind you that I was actively searching for this, and still couldn't find it? If you can, it's because you knew it was coming and filled in the blanks with foreknowledge. And also, regardless of whether or not it was hinted at in the past, may I further remind you that the relationship is completely unbelievable even now, because the actors have about as much chemistry as, say, Ivanova and Keffer, and please remember when I draw this comparison that Keffer has the charisma of a bulkhead. That's how much chemistry Sheridan and Delenn have with each other. It's like watching an automated door slide closed: yes, they're touching, but only because someone is standing off screen pushing them.
Now: to be fair to Sheridan and Delenn, their abrupt realization of feelings for each other seems as much a surprise to them as it does to us. That part, at least, was played really well. When Delenn says her goodbye and touches his face and walks away to be quarantined, Sheridan stops her and says "next time call me John," and it was perfect. He seemed lost and confused and frankly I feel you, buddy: we all feel that way in the face of this plotline. If they're able to maintain that kind of fear and out-of-our-depth wonder, this relationship might work. I have my doubts (boy do I have my doubts), but time will tell.
Whatever. Four episodes left, so I figure the mytharc has to kick in sooner or later. I close this analysis pretty much the same way I did last time, but with more optimism: we need the story to kick into gear, and we need some good stuff for Ivanova, and I have faith that it's going to come and it's going to be awesome. The character bits seeded throughout this episode show that (with the obvious romantic exception) these writers understand their characters intimately, and excel at revealing their personalities when they want to. Fingers crossed.
The result is an admittedly odd mix for an episode so late in Season 2: I felt a little impatient watching it, because I wanted to see more of the mytharc and I felt like we were wasting time on a detour, but at the same time I was totally into the story and eager to see what the characters would do. If it had come in the early half of Season 2 I suspect this would have been one of my favorite episodes. Here in the back half it’s still very good, but suffers greatly from “Come on just get to the mytharc already” syndrome.
There’s no A-plot/B-plot nonsense going on here, or at least anything that looks like a B-plot gets dropped after the first ten minutes because the A-plot is too big to ignore: one of the minor alien species, called the Markab, comes down with a devastating plague that is “100% lethal, and 100% contagious.” It’s also completely invisible: no boils or lesions or other physicals signs of infection—and has a long gestational period in which there are no symptoms yet the host is still fully contagious. In other words, it’s a plague perfectly engineered for a TV show, and indeed it ends up killing just about every Markab in the galaxy. The even bigger fear comes when it seems to jump to a new species, meaning that it might end up killing every other species as well. No half measures on B5, folks. At the last minute, the Markab doctor who initially tried to cover up the epidemic basically gives his life by becoming infected himself and allowing Franklin to study the plague’s progress, enabling him to find a cure, which saves everyone else but comes too late for the Markab. Sad face.
Interspersed in here we have a bunch of little vignettes that show us some of the character’s trajectories, both short- and long-term. Keffer is apparently taking trips into the Warp, trying to find more hints of the ship he saw several episodes ago, which serves as a nice reminder that this plate is still spinning, and sooner or later it’s going to fall. Ivanova tells him to knock it off, giving him both barrels of that good ol’ Ivanova authority, which serves as a nice reminder that Ivanova is one of the best characters on the show and they are woefully underusing her. Garibaldi gets to beat up some anti-Markab thugs, and then—in a key shot that’s perfectly framed—take the beaten Markab by the hand and pick him up, just to hit home that Garibaldi is a good man who’s always going to stick up for the little guy, even if it means getting the plague.
One of the best little snippets comes with Franklin; this is mostly a Franklin episode already, and he does some incredible work, but they make sure to throw in a scene where he's taking a bunch of stims to stay awake, and the Markab doctor warns him that this is dangerous. By itself this wouldn't be much, but this is the second or third episode where we see Franklin taking too many stims, and there's no way that's not going somewhere. This is either building toward a big collapse in the climax of Season 2, where Franklin needs to do something but can't because he crashes from too many stims, or it's building toward an ongoing subplot in Season 3 where Franklin is a straight-up stim addict. I'm down for either one, especially because Franklin continues to be my favorite character among the main cast, and I can see him hitting it out of the park in either version of the story.
Last of all we have Delenn and Lennier, in an even bigger show of selflessless than Garibaldi, who lock themselves inside the Markab quarantine zone to provide aid and comfort without regard for their own lives. The speech Delenn gives while pleading for permission to do this is wonderful, and might be the first time in two whole seasons that I’ve really, truly liked Delenn. She’s always so aloof and/or bizarre, doing and saying things that I either don’t understand or don’t agree with, but watching her rush into danger—not because she can stop the danger, but because helping is the right thing to do—really turned her around for me.
And then there’s the love story? I have super mixed feelings about this. One of the early scenes, before the plague goes public, shows Sheridan eating a traditional Minbari meal with Delenn and Lennier, which is mostly played for laughs because of the ludicrous amount of ritual and ceremony stacked on top of the process. This is a follow-up to a scene several episodes ago in which Sheridan introduced Delenn to Earth food, and okay that’s fine, but apparently—and I know this is ridiculous but bear with me—apparently we were supposed to read these scenes as the early stages of a romantic relationship? Because when Delenn goes into the Markab quarantine, she gives Sheridan an overtly romantic goodbye, and he responds in kind, and I guess there’s a love story here. Oy. For starters, these two actors have less than zero chemistry with each other. Like, to the point where I wonder if the actors even liked each other. The romance comes out of nowhere, and I have huge doubts than even on a rewatch, viewing the previous episodes with knowledge that this was coming, you could even see hints of it in the way they treat each other. And I'm kind of speaking from experience there: a friend told me, several episodes ago, that in my analysis of an episode I had "missed" a love triangle. So ever since I've been watching with that in mind, trying to spot hints of a love triangle, or even just a love stick, and aside from some stuff with Talia there is nothing. Of the potential relationships I had identified as possibilities, Sheridan/Delenn wasn't even on the list--though Delenn/Lennier was, and this episode strengthened that one even more, so maybe that's the triangle my friend was talking about? Sheridan/Delenn/Lennier? I don't know, man. This seems like a huge stretch.
One of my biggest problems with Sheridan/Delenn is that I did see plenty of hints about a potential romance between Delenn and Sinclair back in Season 1, which kind of makes this new thing seem a) intrusive on a ship I'd already become attached to, and b) forced into a relationship where it doesn't belong, simply because the series outline demands a romance between Delenn and the captain no matter who the captain currently is. You can't have Delenn and Sheridan fall in love based on the foundation of Delenn and Sinclair. That's not how romance works. Like, if Sheridan had to leave as well, would the new captain also end up with Delenn?
And I know that the comments, both here and on Twitter/Facebook, are going to be filled with people telling me I'm wrong, and the signs were there the whole time, and I should really go back and watch those other episodes to see how clearly and obviously these hints were foreshadowed, and blah blah blah whatever. You're all ridiculous. May I remind you that I was actively searching for this, and still couldn't find it? If you can, it's because you knew it was coming and filled in the blanks with foreknowledge. And also, regardless of whether or not it was hinted at in the past, may I further remind you that the relationship is completely unbelievable even now, because the actors have about as much chemistry as, say, Ivanova and Keffer, and please remember when I draw this comparison that Keffer has the charisma of a bulkhead. That's how much chemistry Sheridan and Delenn have with each other. It's like watching an automated door slide closed: yes, they're touching, but only because someone is standing off screen pushing them.
Now: to be fair to Sheridan and Delenn, their abrupt realization of feelings for each other seems as much a surprise to them as it does to us. That part, at least, was played really well. When Delenn says her goodbye and touches his face and walks away to be quarantined, Sheridan stops her and says "next time call me John," and it was perfect. He seemed lost and confused and frankly I feel you, buddy: we all feel that way in the face of this plotline. If they're able to maintain that kind of fear and out-of-our-depth wonder, this relationship might work. I have my doubts (boy do I have my doubts), but time will tell.
Whatever. Four episodes left, so I figure the mytharc has to kick in sooner or later. I close this analysis pretty much the same way I did last time, but with more optimism: we need the story to kick into gear, and we need some good stuff for Ivanova, and I have faith that it's going to come and it's going to be awesome. The character bits seeded throughout this episode show that (with the obvious romantic exception) these writers understand their characters intimately, and excel at revealing their personalities when they want to. Fingers crossed.
Sometimes, after writing up by blog responses, I go over to the Lurker's Guide to see what people talked about back in the day when the episode first came out. I expected this one to be all about the love story, but apparently there was a huge controversy over the religious/political nature of the plague, with a storm of parallels being drawn or imagined that compared it to AIDS or Scientology or on and on and on. Interesting. I think JMS's main point, that politicizing a disease is always bad, shines through strongly, and I agree wholeheartedly.
ReplyDeleteThe thing I wanted to point out, though, was a comment from JMS about how they'd gone to such a huge extent to build up the Markab over two years, and develop their culture, and make us love them, and THEN kill them. I have watched every episode of this show, in order, over the last three months, and the episode immediately before this one is the first time I have ever been aware of the Markab's existence. I genuinely thought they were created for this episode, one and done, but that they had some prosthetics finished early and tossed one into the previous episode for fun. Have they really appeared before? Do they stand out in any way? That's one area where Star Trek, I think, is far superior: each alien species is distinct and notable. You can see a Ferengi, for example, even just one time, and still understand exactly who they are and why you're supposed to care. Babylon 5's strength is in the opposite side of the spectrum: the three main alien species (Minbari, Narn, Centauri) are complex and layered, with a lot going on in a lot of different ways, which is something Star Trek has only really achieved a couple of times, and it took them much longer to do it. All of the lesser B5 species, though, have been complete cyphers. None of them have ever been presented as anything more than "Alien Species X, which needs to do this thing to make this plot work." And I don't know why I'm writing this huge thing about this, except that I was just so surprised to read that. JMS talked as if he'd just killed off the Klingons or something. Readers: did you know who the Markab were? Did you care? Could you, then or now, tell me anything about them culturally? I don't know if I've ever been more aware of the vast gulf between audience awareness and creator awareness. I'm going to need some time to process this.
They were largely in the background, and referenced a few times. The dead guy with the energy-alien from the temporal flux in the last episode was a Markab. But largely they were background characters. It's like having a disease that wiped out all the ensigns but Wesley Crusher aboard the Enterprise... you might realize, "Oh, yeah, I guess there was that actor at the helm two or three times, and now he's not on the show anymore." But I honestly can't think of any speaking parts the Markab had before this one. Probably because they all sounded like they were stuffed up because they had prosthetics covering their noses. They just stood around with the other ambassadors from the League of Non-Aligned Worlds and had animated whispered discussions.
DeleteI think this is very unlike trek. Don’t get me wrong the setup and scenario is trek 101 but I feel this is one of the best examples of what made b5 stabd apart from the trek at the time in trek the cure would have been found to save the Markab and everything could reset ready for next episode. The failure and near miss the pain and loss is what separates b5 its not a perfect universe even 200 years on and it doesn’t always result in happy ending. I’ve always liked this episode as it also shows the uncaring bigotted reaction of some humans after which shows it will take more than 200 years to fix all the ills of society.
ReplyDeletePeople failed in Star Trek all the time, especially in TOS and DS9. I mean, I can see where you're going with this, but painting Star Trek as "the series with nothing but happy endings" ignores a massive percentage of the stories Trek tells.
DeleteYou're right about the bigots, though: Trek never shied away from showing prejudice, but it almost never came from inside the Federation, just from less enlightened groups out in other places.
I imagine what Stephen is actually talking about is a question of impact. Yes, Star Trek had many failures in terms of extinction level events but most were one off races. We never see Sarjenka or her people look up Data and the Enterprise crew after having a nice tea time debate as to help their people or let them die out. The Markab while a background race were still a noted background race. Imagine if the Andorians or Tellerite were suddenly extinct as a race. While no major characters until Enterprise were either race it would still be a big deal. In fact this is used to the stakes with the Federation during the Typhon Pact series of novels. The Markab were always in the background and if there was one point was that they should have been event more prominent in the background as the defacto powerhouse of the League, much like the Drazi become later on.
DeleteI'd agree with that comment more if I could remember ever seeing a Markab in any episode prior to KNIVES :)
Delete"It's like watching an automated door slide closed: yes, they're touching, but only because someone is standing off screen pushing them."
ReplyDeleteSavage. That's a wonderful description.