Episode 2.19: Divided Loyalties
Remember back in Season 1 when I said that Ivanova was totally a telepath? And remember, also in Season 1, when I predicted that Talia was going to end up as a psychic sleeper agent with an implanted personality? Yeah. I’m feeling pretty smart right now.
This was a fantastic episode, and not just because I was right about two long-term predictions. Some of the stuff I loved in this episode are things I never would have predicted, like for example a charming scene between Sheridan and Delenn that actually makes me believe in their attraction for each other. After my giant rant last episode about their total lack of chemistry, you know that I didn’t see this coming at all. The scene was great, though, and a huge part of the credit for that goes to Mira Furlan, who’s playing Delenn as slightly more and more human every episode. She’s doing it so subtly that I didn’t even see it at first, but the gradual humanization of Delenn is so obvious in hindsight that I feel like I want to give her a round of applause. She’s still Delenn, but she’s a different Delenn, and it’s really a highlight of the show.
And Lyta coming back? I really loved Lyta in the pilot, much more than I ever really liked Talia (until this episode, but we’ll get to that later), and while I never expected her to return it was certianly great to see her again. Now that it looks like Talia is gone—I assume not for good, but she’ll be a villain when she shows up again—I hope they find a way to bring Lyta back into the show more permanently.
Lyta, if you don’t remember, was the telepath in the pilot, who scanned Kosh and was immediately whisked away by the Earth government and, more specifically, Psi-Corps. She’s since managed to escape, and works with the resistance, and shows up now at Babylon 5 with grave news: the “implanted psychic personality” gun that was placed on the mantel way back in the THE QUALITY OF MERCY has returned, and Lyta has reason to believe that someone on B5, probably in the command staff, is a sleeper agent and doesn’t even know it. We get some good paranoia stuff, as Lyta uses the telepathic activation password on every member of the crew they can find, one after another, with some pretty effective red herrings thrown out here and there to make us suspect various people, most notably Ivanova. I never beleived that it would be anyone other than Talia, though I don’t know if that’s because the show tipped its hand early or if I just loved my own prediction so much that I couldn’t see past it; I think that a more casual viewer who hadn’t pulled a Talia thing out of his butt 20 episodes ago probably would have suspected Ivanova the whole time, and then been shocked at the sudden reversal.
That’s a funny word: butt. Butt butt butt butt. I butt, you butt, he or she butts....
The number one thing I didn’t see coming, though, more than Lyta and more than Sheridan/Delenn, was Ivanova/Talia. And I’m super sad that it ended so quickly, because that was the best and most believable relationship on this show. They had chemistry, they had sexual tension, they had backstories that actually make me believe they would get together. 1995 was not really a time when you could get away with an openly lesbian relationship on prime time TV, especially not on what the studio still considered to be a family-friendly Star Trek clone, so I can see why they were so careful to never show them being overtly romantic together—the one scene where they were super obviously going to kiss, for example, ended without a kiss—but that classic “roll over in bed and reach out and realize the other person is gone” scene makes it pretty dang clear what was actually going on. And then, of course, their final conversation hints at the nature of their relationship about as strongly as possible without coming right out and saying “romantically involved.” It’s a progressive move for the show, but it’s also completely key to this plot in this episode: it wouldn’t have worked as well without it. And it’s especially sad for Ivanova, because her last romantic relationship also turned out to be secretly evil. Poor lady can never catch a break.
One final thing that I totally didn't see coming: apparently they still use paper newspapers in the future? And they're instantly recycled and printed on-demand with personalized information, but they're still on paper? Ah, 1990s, such a quaint period of history you were.
Anyway. Great episode. Talia turns into an awesome character just in time to disappear, Lyta shows up just in time to replace her, Delenn and Sheridan are somehow impossibly adorable together, and the story is tense and exciting and well-told, start to finish. This is what I want to see more of. It took longer to get here than I expected, but the slam-bang finale to Season 2 appears to have finally arrived. I'm loving it.
This was a fantastic episode, and not just because I was right about two long-term predictions. Some of the stuff I loved in this episode are things I never would have predicted, like for example a charming scene between Sheridan and Delenn that actually makes me believe in their attraction for each other. After my giant rant last episode about their total lack of chemistry, you know that I didn’t see this coming at all. The scene was great, though, and a huge part of the credit for that goes to Mira Furlan, who’s playing Delenn as slightly more and more human every episode. She’s doing it so subtly that I didn’t even see it at first, but the gradual humanization of Delenn is so obvious in hindsight that I feel like I want to give her a round of applause. She’s still Delenn, but she’s a different Delenn, and it’s really a highlight of the show.
And Lyta coming back? I really loved Lyta in the pilot, much more than I ever really liked Talia (until this episode, but we’ll get to that later), and while I never expected her to return it was certianly great to see her again. Now that it looks like Talia is gone—I assume not for good, but she’ll be a villain when she shows up again—I hope they find a way to bring Lyta back into the show more permanently.
Lyta, if you don’t remember, was the telepath in the pilot, who scanned Kosh and was immediately whisked away by the Earth government and, more specifically, Psi-Corps. She’s since managed to escape, and works with the resistance, and shows up now at Babylon 5 with grave news: the “implanted psychic personality” gun that was placed on the mantel way back in the THE QUALITY OF MERCY has returned, and Lyta has reason to believe that someone on B5, probably in the command staff, is a sleeper agent and doesn’t even know it. We get some good paranoia stuff, as Lyta uses the telepathic activation password on every member of the crew they can find, one after another, with some pretty effective red herrings thrown out here and there to make us suspect various people, most notably Ivanova. I never beleived that it would be anyone other than Talia, though I don’t know if that’s because the show tipped its hand early or if I just loved my own prediction so much that I couldn’t see past it; I think that a more casual viewer who hadn’t pulled a Talia thing out of his butt 20 episodes ago probably would have suspected Ivanova the whole time, and then been shocked at the sudden reversal.
That’s a funny word: butt. Butt butt butt butt. I butt, you butt, he or she butts....
The number one thing I didn’t see coming, though, more than Lyta and more than Sheridan/Delenn, was Ivanova/Talia. And I’m super sad that it ended so quickly, because that was the best and most believable relationship on this show. They had chemistry, they had sexual tension, they had backstories that actually make me believe they would get together. 1995 was not really a time when you could get away with an openly lesbian relationship on prime time TV, especially not on what the studio still considered to be a family-friendly Star Trek clone, so I can see why they were so careful to never show them being overtly romantic together—the one scene where they were super obviously going to kiss, for example, ended without a kiss—but that classic “roll over in bed and reach out and realize the other person is gone” scene makes it pretty dang clear what was actually going on. And then, of course, their final conversation hints at the nature of their relationship about as strongly as possible without coming right out and saying “romantically involved.” It’s a progressive move for the show, but it’s also completely key to this plot in this episode: it wouldn’t have worked as well without it. And it’s especially sad for Ivanova, because her last romantic relationship also turned out to be secretly evil. Poor lady can never catch a break.
One final thing that I totally didn't see coming: apparently they still use paper newspapers in the future? And they're instantly recycled and printed on-demand with personalized information, but they're still on paper? Ah, 1990s, such a quaint period of history you were.
Anyway. Great episode. Talia turns into an awesome character just in time to disappear, Lyta shows up just in time to replace her, Delenn and Sheridan are somehow impossibly adorable together, and the story is tense and exciting and well-told, start to finish. This is what I want to see more of. It took longer to get here than I expected, but the slam-bang finale to Season 2 appears to have finally arrived. I'm loving it.
I'm pretty sure a lot of us following along have been waiting for this episode so we could finally stop avoiding telling you how you had nailed those two predictions. This has never been a particular favourite of mine, but with the context of following your rewatch it now has moved up the list for a lot of the reasons you talk about.
ReplyDeleteYes, you were right. (“Yeah, you’re real smart. Now shut up.”)
ReplyDeleteI did always like Lyta better. She is eventually permanent. We never see Talia again. When does Marcus show up? He’s awesome.
Talia had to turn out to be a villain because she's a Moon blonde, instead of a Sun blonde
ReplyDelete