Episode 3.9: Point of No Return
I think I’ve figured out why I don’t like the Nightwatch stories: because the Nightwatch is a strawman. The concept behind the Nightwatch itself is sound—the creeping rise of fascism is a good story to tell, and sadly even more relevant today than it was thirty years ago. But the Nightwatch stuff on B5 has always frustrated me, and I don’t think it’s the kind of frustration they were going for. We’re supposed to chafe against it, and we’re supposed to think it’s wrong, and I understand that, but I’m not enjoying it in the same way that I enjoy other stories about the evils of fascism. THE MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE, while it eventually goes off the rails, begins with a depiction of a fascist state that I found enthralling—I hated the bad guys but I loved to hate the bad guys, if that makes sense. I don’t get that with the Nightwatch. And I think this episode has finally crystallized why: because we never see it from their side. The blonde dude who takes over the Nightwatch in this and the previous episode doesn’t even have a name—he’s listed in the credits as Security Guard #1. We don’t know why he’s doing what he’s doing, or how he feels about it, or anything else, and I don’t want those answers because I want to sympathize with him, I want those answers because I want to believe it. I want to know that there is a real and sincere motivation behind his actions, or the actions of anyone else int he Nightwatch. As it stands now, the Nightwatch is presented as a unilateral evil: everything they do is coded as wrong, right from the beginning; there is no redeeming side, no moral undercurrent, no sense of (albeit misguided) patriotism. All that’s left, then, is mustache-twirling. The people who go along with the Nightwatch are flatly evil characters because there is never any other explanation given or implied.
Yes, Blondie gives a speech here about taking back their government—he didn’t come right out and say “Make America Great Again,” but how awesome would that have been? One speech, though, especially at the last minute, is not enough to make this work. The only sympathetic member of the entire Nightwatch is Zack, and Zack is an idiot. His entire role in the series—his entire character profile—is “be the guy too dumb to not get tangled up in the Nightwatch.” He doesn't believe anything he's doing; he joined up because it was a good way to earn some extra cash. And I loved that bit, because it was a believable motivation, but a) it was the only motivation we ever got, and far from a noble one, and b) they never went any further. Our sole POV inside of the Nightwatch has chafed against it since the very beginning, and then everything it's done has been bad. How awesome would it have been, instead, to slowly build up to that? Their second appearance in the show they were stomping around trying to rough people up for thought crimes--what if we'd seen them breaking up bar fights and roughing up drug dealers? What if we'd gotten a scene with Garibaldi saying "I don't like them, but crime is down 5% since they started keeping an eye on things." We'd see believable motivations, and positive outcomes, at that would make it not only rational but tragic that so many of them stayed loyal to the group even when it turned into Martial Law and a full mutiny. How much more interesting would Zack be if he finally felt good about something in his stupid life, realizing that he'd become a part of something that was really helping people and making a difference, and then watching that same organization slide into fascism until finally at the end he couldn't stomach it anymore. Alternately, if there really were no good sides to the organization, we at least could have seen the POV of a true believer--maybe Blondie, for example, with a real name and a background and everything. He's not evil, but he sees that there are real problems and he sees that people are doubting and working against a president that he believes in, and he wants to do something about it.
I don't believe that most people, or even very many people at all, are evil. I think a lot of people are misguided--right now in America I think probably most of us are misguided--but our hearts are in the right place. We're trying to do what we think is right, based on a poor understanding of incomplete information. I don't get any of that from the Nightwatch. The organization is painted as fundamentally wrong, from its actions, to the leads' reactions to it, to the iconography of the black armbands. It is both said and suggested, at every turn, that it is Evil. And that just makes the people who go along with it look evil as well, which I simply don't believe. So instead of hating the Nightwatch as a villain, I end up hating it as a story device, and that's almost certainly not what they were going for.
Anyway. That giant rant almost certainly makes you think that I hated this episode, and I didn't--I liked it a lot. But I didn't like it as much as I wanted to, because the core elements kept ringing false to me. Let me show you another example: this episode picks up more or less at the exact moment the previous one ended, with the announcement of Martial Law and the ship trying to figure out how to respond. Sheridan and co. are worried that this will end up ruining their secret conspiracy and revealing them as traitors, which is both true and not really the point. Why are they purely defensive on this? Why aren't they fighting back? Their conspiracy has two purposes: to fight the shadows, and to restore the legitimacy of Earth government after President Whatsisname stole it in a secret coup. Now General Hague--the guy who told them about the coup in the first place and recruited them to join his resistance--is fighting an open war against that corrupt government, and everyone at B5 is just sitting on their hands. When the order comes to hand over security to the Nightwatch, why do they go along with it? This is a civil war, you idiots: get your loyal soldiers and fight back. Hop in your Minbari/Vorlon supership and go help General Hague. They are part of a literal rebellion movement, and that rebellion just started, and not a single one of them can think of anything more productive to do than Garibaldi uselessly flipping tables while Sheridan wrings his hands. To quote John Adams from 1776: "It's a revolution, damn it, we're going to have to offend somebody." They're all so concerned about not getting caught that they fail to actually do anything worth catching. I fully expect General Hague to show up in the next episode and ask where the hell Sheridan was when he was out getting his butt kicked by the illegitimate government he specifically asked Sheridan to help him bring down.
The episode ends with a weird callback to Sinclair, and his Cheat Codes To The Universe. Sheridan finds a loophole in the orders that allows him to fight back legally instead of in open sedition, and that's awesome, and I totally cheered when the Nightwatch thugs got trapped and verbally face-punched, but I still didn't understand why. This was a Sinclair ending--a "things look bad but I can solve them all without repercussions" ending--and that was fine in Season 1 but this Season 3. The episode is literally called POINT OF NO RETURN. Why is Sheridan so bound and determined to solve his problems without getting his hands dirty, instead of joining the resistance that he's already joined? It was a moral victory over the Nightwatch, certainly--it was an absolute joy to watch him tell the Nightwatch that their orders were illegal and they were now considered mutineers--but it felt like the story had to ignore a lot of more pressing plot points in order to deliver that ending.
This all sounds like I hated the episode, and I didn't: I actually enjoyed it quite a bit, for the most part. The A-plot was fun but kept ringing false; the really good stuff was in the B- and C-plots, with Londo and Vir and G'Kar. G'Kar gets let out of prison, which seems poorly justified but okay, and he ends up talking with Ta'Lon and eventually joining the Super Best Friends Club with Sheridan and co. This is delightful, because G'Kar is awesome and Plots Are Moving, but it was a relatively minor part of the episode and served mostly to put some pieces into place for the future. The much bigger deal is Londo and Vir: Vir is visiting from Minbar to deliver a report, and his visit happens to coincide with not only the Martial Law fiasco but the arrival of Lwaxana Troi: Majel Barrett herself plays yet another psychic alien, this time Lady Morella, the wife of the late Centauri emperor. Londo brought her here on the pretense of showing her the station, but really he just wants her to tell him his future, and when she finally does it's a doozy. He has already missed two chances to redeem himself and avoid damnation, she says, but he has three left: "save the eye that cannot see," "do not kill the one who is already dead," and "surrender to your greatest fear, knowing that it will destroy you." She closes by saying that he will definitely become Emperor--it is "unavoidable"--but so will Vir. One of them will be emperor after the other is dead. It is sad but totally in-character that Londo immediately begins to distrust Vir, despite the fact that a) Vir is the most purely good person in this entire universe, and b) even if Vir were to betray him and kill him, he obviously can't do it until after Londo is already the Emperor, so you're safe for now dude.
The episode ends with Morella--who continues the tradition of "super important Centauri who wander around on the station without security"--getting into an elevator with Ta'Lon. They stare at each other, knowing that something will happen, but we don't get to see what it is. Maybe it's super important? Maybe it's nothing? The Narn are providing security on the station while the Nightwatch is under arrest, so maybe he was just the designated elevator guard and the scene meant nothing at all.
I have heard from a number of people, after posting my review of the previous episode, that this run of 8, 9, and 10 are considered some of the best episodes in the series. Obviously I disagree. Big stuff is happening, sure, but usually in ways I don't believe. Episode 10 is supposed to be the best of the bunch, though, so maybe I'll love it? I don't know. There are parts of this show that are some of the greatest things I've ever seen on television, and there are parts that just don't click with me at all. The events that came to a head at the end of Season 2 were the very definition of "Surprising but Inevitable," and I felt thrilled and shocked and satisfied all at once; there was no other way it could have gone, and everything felt Right. The current burst of payoffs and developments feels forced and weird in comparison. Really, though, that comparison is unfair, because we're only halfway through the season and most of what's going on is probably setup for the second half. Fingers crossed.
Yes, Blondie gives a speech here about taking back their government—he didn’t come right out and say “Make America Great Again,” but how awesome would that have been? One speech, though, especially at the last minute, is not enough to make this work. The only sympathetic member of the entire Nightwatch is Zack, and Zack is an idiot. His entire role in the series—his entire character profile—is “be the guy too dumb to not get tangled up in the Nightwatch.” He doesn't believe anything he's doing; he joined up because it was a good way to earn some extra cash. And I loved that bit, because it was a believable motivation, but a) it was the only motivation we ever got, and far from a noble one, and b) they never went any further. Our sole POV inside of the Nightwatch has chafed against it since the very beginning, and then everything it's done has been bad. How awesome would it have been, instead, to slowly build up to that? Their second appearance in the show they were stomping around trying to rough people up for thought crimes--what if we'd seen them breaking up bar fights and roughing up drug dealers? What if we'd gotten a scene with Garibaldi saying "I don't like them, but crime is down 5% since they started keeping an eye on things." We'd see believable motivations, and positive outcomes, at that would make it not only rational but tragic that so many of them stayed loyal to the group even when it turned into Martial Law and a full mutiny. How much more interesting would Zack be if he finally felt good about something in his stupid life, realizing that he'd become a part of something that was really helping people and making a difference, and then watching that same organization slide into fascism until finally at the end he couldn't stomach it anymore. Alternately, if there really were no good sides to the organization, we at least could have seen the POV of a true believer--maybe Blondie, for example, with a real name and a background and everything. He's not evil, but he sees that there are real problems and he sees that people are doubting and working against a president that he believes in, and he wants to do something about it.
I don't believe that most people, or even very many people at all, are evil. I think a lot of people are misguided--right now in America I think probably most of us are misguided--but our hearts are in the right place. We're trying to do what we think is right, based on a poor understanding of incomplete information. I don't get any of that from the Nightwatch. The organization is painted as fundamentally wrong, from its actions, to the leads' reactions to it, to the iconography of the black armbands. It is both said and suggested, at every turn, that it is Evil. And that just makes the people who go along with it look evil as well, which I simply don't believe. So instead of hating the Nightwatch as a villain, I end up hating it as a story device, and that's almost certainly not what they were going for.
Anyway. That giant rant almost certainly makes you think that I hated this episode, and I didn't--I liked it a lot. But I didn't like it as much as I wanted to, because the core elements kept ringing false to me. Let me show you another example: this episode picks up more or less at the exact moment the previous one ended, with the announcement of Martial Law and the ship trying to figure out how to respond. Sheridan and co. are worried that this will end up ruining their secret conspiracy and revealing them as traitors, which is both true and not really the point. Why are they purely defensive on this? Why aren't they fighting back? Their conspiracy has two purposes: to fight the shadows, and to restore the legitimacy of Earth government after President Whatsisname stole it in a secret coup. Now General Hague--the guy who told them about the coup in the first place and recruited them to join his resistance--is fighting an open war against that corrupt government, and everyone at B5 is just sitting on their hands. When the order comes to hand over security to the Nightwatch, why do they go along with it? This is a civil war, you idiots: get your loyal soldiers and fight back. Hop in your Minbari/Vorlon supership and go help General Hague. They are part of a literal rebellion movement, and that rebellion just started, and not a single one of them can think of anything more productive to do than Garibaldi uselessly flipping tables while Sheridan wrings his hands. To quote John Adams from 1776: "It's a revolution, damn it, we're going to have to offend somebody." They're all so concerned about not getting caught that they fail to actually do anything worth catching. I fully expect General Hague to show up in the next episode and ask where the hell Sheridan was when he was out getting his butt kicked by the illegitimate government he specifically asked Sheridan to help him bring down.
The episode ends with a weird callback to Sinclair, and his Cheat Codes To The Universe. Sheridan finds a loophole in the orders that allows him to fight back legally instead of in open sedition, and that's awesome, and I totally cheered when the Nightwatch thugs got trapped and verbally face-punched, but I still didn't understand why. This was a Sinclair ending--a "things look bad but I can solve them all without repercussions" ending--and that was fine in Season 1 but this Season 3. The episode is literally called POINT OF NO RETURN. Why is Sheridan so bound and determined to solve his problems without getting his hands dirty, instead of joining the resistance that he's already joined? It was a moral victory over the Nightwatch, certainly--it was an absolute joy to watch him tell the Nightwatch that their orders were illegal and they were now considered mutineers--but it felt like the story had to ignore a lot of more pressing plot points in order to deliver that ending.
This all sounds like I hated the episode, and I didn't: I actually enjoyed it quite a bit, for the most part. The A-plot was fun but kept ringing false; the really good stuff was in the B- and C-plots, with Londo and Vir and G'Kar. G'Kar gets let out of prison, which seems poorly justified but okay, and he ends up talking with Ta'Lon and eventually joining the Super Best Friends Club with Sheridan and co. This is delightful, because G'Kar is awesome and Plots Are Moving, but it was a relatively minor part of the episode and served mostly to put some pieces into place for the future. The much bigger deal is Londo and Vir: Vir is visiting from Minbar to deliver a report, and his visit happens to coincide with not only the Martial Law fiasco but the arrival of Lwaxana Troi: Majel Barrett herself plays yet another psychic alien, this time Lady Morella, the wife of the late Centauri emperor. Londo brought her here on the pretense of showing her the station, but really he just wants her to tell him his future, and when she finally does it's a doozy. He has already missed two chances to redeem himself and avoid damnation, she says, but he has three left: "save the eye that cannot see," "do not kill the one who is already dead," and "surrender to your greatest fear, knowing that it will destroy you." She closes by saying that he will definitely become Emperor--it is "unavoidable"--but so will Vir. One of them will be emperor after the other is dead. It is sad but totally in-character that Londo immediately begins to distrust Vir, despite the fact that a) Vir is the most purely good person in this entire universe, and b) even if Vir were to betray him and kill him, he obviously can't do it until after Londo is already the Emperor, so you're safe for now dude.
The episode ends with Morella--who continues the tradition of "super important Centauri who wander around on the station without security"--getting into an elevator with Ta'Lon. They stare at each other, knowing that something will happen, but we don't get to see what it is. Maybe it's super important? Maybe it's nothing? The Narn are providing security on the station while the Nightwatch is under arrest, so maybe he was just the designated elevator guard and the scene meant nothing at all.
I have heard from a number of people, after posting my review of the previous episode, that this run of 8, 9, and 10 are considered some of the best episodes in the series. Obviously I disagree. Big stuff is happening, sure, but usually in ways I don't believe. Episode 10 is supposed to be the best of the bunch, though, so maybe I'll love it? I don't know. There are parts of this show that are some of the greatest things I've ever seen on television, and there are parts that just don't click with me at all. The events that came to a head at the end of Season 2 were the very definition of "Surprising but Inevitable," and I felt thrilled and shocked and satisfied all at once; there was no other way it could have gone, and everything felt Right. The current burst of payoffs and developments feels forced and weird in comparison. Really, though, that comparison is unfair, because we're only halfway through the season and most of what's going on is probably setup for the second half. Fingers crossed.
Re Nightwatch: if I was watching the show for the first time now, I might well feel the same way. I guess at the time there was so much weight of context in SF TV that Earth is always the good guy (mostly from the Federation in Trek) that it was kind of a revelation to see how far they could push the idea of Earth as the bad guy. Nowadays it's easy to see that Sheridan etc should fight back more proactively, but back then just the idea that they might have to fight their own government at all seemed huge.
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