Episode 4.1: The Hour of the Wolf
Wow. If this episode is any indication, this season is going to be amazing.
The opening episode of season 4 clicked with me in a way that no other B5 season-opener ever has. It was pure setup, with no actual story, but at the same time it FELT like there was no setup at all: it's a natural and perfect continuation of what's come before, rolling out a host of new questions, new configurations that fit the old characters like a glove, and even a new villain that I am absolutely thrilled by. We've heard so much about the Mad Emperor Cartagia, I honestly didn't think that meeting him in person was going to live up to the hype, but it totally does. The guy is completely nuts yet completely believable, with motivations that make him unique and interesting and more than just a pawn of Krang and Shredder; he thinks he's using them, not the other way around, which is a nice change after so many of our previous villains (like President Clarke) seem content to just follow the Shadows lead for no real reason at all. In some ways this episode felt like even more of a culmination than the finale of season 3 did: it's very much a "we only told you that story so we could tell you this one" kind of vibe, and after three seasons of not feeling quite comfortable with itself, the series suddenly does, in a way I can't quite put my finger on. Three seasons of careful pruning and cultivation have finally brought us to the real story, and every character and scene has a sense of rightness about it. This is what we've been waiting for. I honestly don't know if that feeling is going to continue throughout the season, but for now I'm loving it. I finished the episode and thought "Okay, I get it now. This is the show people have been talking about for twenty-five years." Three seasons of prologue to enable one season of exactly what I wanted.
We begin with a G'Kar voiceover, neatly describing the situation and everyone's reaction to it as he records his thoughts in what I can only assume will essentially be a religious text called The Book of G'Kar. But if he's describing the series, does that mean the show itself is The Book of G'Kar? Do hardcore fans think of it that way but never say it out loud because it's a spoiler? I'M SO PARANOID NOW. WHAT ELSE AREN'T YOU TELLING ME?
After the voiceover bit we go straight into the opening credits, which are the best the show has ever had. Instead of one person's monologue we get a bunch of different voices, and a very different tone and mood, and I like it a lot. Plus everyone's little action shot is them doing one of the coolest things they've ever done: Lennier disabling Marcus, Vir waving at Morden, etc. It's glorious.
Sheridan and Garibaldi are still missing, but the characters describe them missing in completely different terms, almost as if they know that one of them is kidnapped and one of them is blown up. A slight misstep, perhaps, in the translation from outline to script. Details come out that couldn't possibly be known by anyone--Vir, for example, relays a report from Londo's Shadow contacts saying that Sheridan blew up the city with two 500-megaton bombs, and was seen jumping into a hole just before the explosion. Who could have possibly seen him do this and lived through 1000 megatons of nuclear explosion to tell about it is never explained, though it may have been Morden, who shows up on Centauri Prime in full-body burn makeup. How did he manage to treat 1000 megatons as if it were a house fire? Because he was "slightly farther away from the blast than some of the others." As much as I liked the episode, there'd better eventually be a better explanation for this than "We liked the actor and didn't want to lose him."
Vir also reports that the hole Sheridan jumped into was two miles deep, which is a) silly and b) not remotely far enough to escape even the initial blast, let alone the subsequent fallout. But we see him at the end, huddled around a campfire in a cave somewhere, so he was clearly whisked away at the last second to some kind of safe place, either technologically or magically. Given the appearance of a mysterious weirdo who shows up to share his fire, I'm kind of guessing that Sheridan is literally dead and sitting in some kind of Star Trek purgatory, talking to the B5 version of Q, but there's no evidence of anything yet so I'm reserving final judgment. All we know for sure is that the script keeps hammering on the depth of the pit and the Obi-Wan Kosh-nobi voice telling him to jump into it, so those are bound to be important eventually.
But: back to the Shadows. It seems that the Shadows have cut a deal with Emperor Cartagia, using House Fire Morden as their perennial intermediary. They need a place to set up shop, because Z'ha'dum is a crater, and Cartagia needs to become an immortal deity, because he is a spoiled, all-powerful lunatic, and it's a match made in Heaven. There is literally nothing about this entire plotline that I don't love: moving the Shadows to Centauri Prime gives them a stronger link to the rest of the story, and using Cartagia as the "face" of Shadow expansion lets us interact with them more directly and entertainingly; on the other hand, Cartagia's obvious mania elevates him a step or two above the typical Shadow collaborator, setting him up as a "faction" of his own, obviously connected to Krang and Shredder while still having his own contrary agenda. Even Morden's new burn makeup, assuming it sticks around, gives him a totally different vibe that works perfectly for the new status quo: we no longer need the Shadows to be the subtle shoulder-devils they used to be, putting on a clean and cheerful face while offering help, so it works perfectly to turn him into a creepy overseer hiding in the darkness and forcing Londo to do things he doesn't want to do. I especially loved the butler-guy's speech about keeping your head down and towing the line, because Cartagia's a wild-eyed butcher ready to murder anyone who opposes him. Painting the entire Centauri upper crust as hopeless thralls to a power-mad dictator is beautiful, and so much more interesting than just one more group of Shadow collaborators. I have to say, though, that I thought the scene with the severed heads on the table kind of ruined the image for me; that's one element that was so much more effective as a story than as a confirmed truth.
Back on the station, Lyta and New-Kosh Ulkesh have a meeting with Delenn, and the vibe of that meeting and the subsequent scene in Ulkesh's quarters really paint him as an a-hole. JMS has been hinting for a long time that we need to not trust the Vorlons, even though they've mostly been fully on our side, and I think the pieces are finally being put into place to show their more fascist tendencies. I suppose it could still go either way--maybe Ulkesh being a jerk is just a way of showing that even good guys can be jerks--but I suspect that we're building toward a point where the younger races have to break from the Old Ones and do this on their own.
Delenn and Lyta grab Ivanova--who's taking the missing Sheridan super hard--and sneak off in the White Star without a single word about how the White Star was totally blown to smithereens and this is presumably a new ship given the same name. Lyta has a plan to go to Z'ha'dum, cloak the ship with her psychic powers, and try to find evidence that Sheridan is still alive. They don't, but they do have a psychic battle with some Shadows, and the scene is mostly interesting because it's a showcase of strong women in positions of power. This show has advanced SO FAR from its early nonsense, like how it could never do an episode about Talia without putting her into some kind of very creepy compromised position. Seeing the three women leading the ship, without ever putting too fine a point on it, was fantastic. Good on ya, Babylon 5.
We also get a very strange scene between G'Kar and Zack, in which G'Kar has apparently resolved to head of on some kind of spiritual journey to search for Garibaldi. Okay? I'm glad somebody's looking for him, because everyone else seems so focused on Sheridan, but using G'Kar feels off. They never had a super close relationship or anything, so why drop everything and dedicate your life to this? It's almost like everyone else had a story except G'Kar and Garibaldi, so they stuck them together just to tie up the loose end. I'm curious to see where that thread goes, and how long it will matter. In fact, I'm very curious to see how long either of the missing characters will stay missing: Sheridan gets one and a half scenes (really barely one and a quarter--he shuffles through a cave), and Garibaldi gets nothing at all.
Overall, a super solid episode that makes me excited for the season. Bring it on!
The opening episode of season 4 clicked with me in a way that no other B5 season-opener ever has. It was pure setup, with no actual story, but at the same time it FELT like there was no setup at all: it's a natural and perfect continuation of what's come before, rolling out a host of new questions, new configurations that fit the old characters like a glove, and even a new villain that I am absolutely thrilled by. We've heard so much about the Mad Emperor Cartagia, I honestly didn't think that meeting him in person was going to live up to the hype, but it totally does. The guy is completely nuts yet completely believable, with motivations that make him unique and interesting and more than just a pawn of Krang and Shredder; he thinks he's using them, not the other way around, which is a nice change after so many of our previous villains (like President Clarke) seem content to just follow the Shadows lead for no real reason at all. In some ways this episode felt like even more of a culmination than the finale of season 3 did: it's very much a "we only told you that story so we could tell you this one" kind of vibe, and after three seasons of not feeling quite comfortable with itself, the series suddenly does, in a way I can't quite put my finger on. Three seasons of careful pruning and cultivation have finally brought us to the real story, and every character and scene has a sense of rightness about it. This is what we've been waiting for. I honestly don't know if that feeling is going to continue throughout the season, but for now I'm loving it. I finished the episode and thought "Okay, I get it now. This is the show people have been talking about for twenty-five years." Three seasons of prologue to enable one season of exactly what I wanted.
We begin with a G'Kar voiceover, neatly describing the situation and everyone's reaction to it as he records his thoughts in what I can only assume will essentially be a religious text called The Book of G'Kar. But if he's describing the series, does that mean the show itself is The Book of G'Kar? Do hardcore fans think of it that way but never say it out loud because it's a spoiler? I'M SO PARANOID NOW. WHAT ELSE AREN'T YOU TELLING ME?
After the voiceover bit we go straight into the opening credits, which are the best the show has ever had. Instead of one person's monologue we get a bunch of different voices, and a very different tone and mood, and I like it a lot. Plus everyone's little action shot is them doing one of the coolest things they've ever done: Lennier disabling Marcus, Vir waving at Morden, etc. It's glorious.
Sheridan and Garibaldi are still missing, but the characters describe them missing in completely different terms, almost as if they know that one of them is kidnapped and one of them is blown up. A slight misstep, perhaps, in the translation from outline to script. Details come out that couldn't possibly be known by anyone--Vir, for example, relays a report from Londo's Shadow contacts saying that Sheridan blew up the city with two 500-megaton bombs, and was seen jumping into a hole just before the explosion. Who could have possibly seen him do this and lived through 1000 megatons of nuclear explosion to tell about it is never explained, though it may have been Morden, who shows up on Centauri Prime in full-body burn makeup. How did he manage to treat 1000 megatons as if it were a house fire? Because he was "slightly farther away from the blast than some of the others." As much as I liked the episode, there'd better eventually be a better explanation for this than "We liked the actor and didn't want to lose him."
Vir also reports that the hole Sheridan jumped into was two miles deep, which is a) silly and b) not remotely far enough to escape even the initial blast, let alone the subsequent fallout. But we see him at the end, huddled around a campfire in a cave somewhere, so he was clearly whisked away at the last second to some kind of safe place, either technologically or magically. Given the appearance of a mysterious weirdo who shows up to share his fire, I'm kind of guessing that Sheridan is literally dead and sitting in some kind of Star Trek purgatory, talking to the B5 version of Q, but there's no evidence of anything yet so I'm reserving final judgment. All we know for sure is that the script keeps hammering on the depth of the pit and the Obi-Wan Kosh-nobi voice telling him to jump into it, so those are bound to be important eventually.
But: back to the Shadows. It seems that the Shadows have cut a deal with Emperor Cartagia, using House Fire Morden as their perennial intermediary. They need a place to set up shop, because Z'ha'dum is a crater, and Cartagia needs to become an immortal deity, because he is a spoiled, all-powerful lunatic, and it's a match made in Heaven. There is literally nothing about this entire plotline that I don't love: moving the Shadows to Centauri Prime gives them a stronger link to the rest of the story, and using Cartagia as the "face" of Shadow expansion lets us interact with them more directly and entertainingly; on the other hand, Cartagia's obvious mania elevates him a step or two above the typical Shadow collaborator, setting him up as a "faction" of his own, obviously connected to Krang and Shredder while still having his own contrary agenda. Even Morden's new burn makeup, assuming it sticks around, gives him a totally different vibe that works perfectly for the new status quo: we no longer need the Shadows to be the subtle shoulder-devils they used to be, putting on a clean and cheerful face while offering help, so it works perfectly to turn him into a creepy overseer hiding in the darkness and forcing Londo to do things he doesn't want to do. I especially loved the butler-guy's speech about keeping your head down and towing the line, because Cartagia's a wild-eyed butcher ready to murder anyone who opposes him. Painting the entire Centauri upper crust as hopeless thralls to a power-mad dictator is beautiful, and so much more interesting than just one more group of Shadow collaborators. I have to say, though, that I thought the scene with the severed heads on the table kind of ruined the image for me; that's one element that was so much more effective as a story than as a confirmed truth.
Back on the station, Lyta and New-Kosh Ulkesh have a meeting with Delenn, and the vibe of that meeting and the subsequent scene in Ulkesh's quarters really paint him as an a-hole. JMS has been hinting for a long time that we need to not trust the Vorlons, even though they've mostly been fully on our side, and I think the pieces are finally being put into place to show their more fascist tendencies. I suppose it could still go either way--maybe Ulkesh being a jerk is just a way of showing that even good guys can be jerks--but I suspect that we're building toward a point where the younger races have to break from the Old Ones and do this on their own.
Delenn and Lyta grab Ivanova--who's taking the missing Sheridan super hard--and sneak off in the White Star without a single word about how the White Star was totally blown to smithereens and this is presumably a new ship given the same name. Lyta has a plan to go to Z'ha'dum, cloak the ship with her psychic powers, and try to find evidence that Sheridan is still alive. They don't, but they do have a psychic battle with some Shadows, and the scene is mostly interesting because it's a showcase of strong women in positions of power. This show has advanced SO FAR from its early nonsense, like how it could never do an episode about Talia without putting her into some kind of very creepy compromised position. Seeing the three women leading the ship, without ever putting too fine a point on it, was fantastic. Good on ya, Babylon 5.
We also get a very strange scene between G'Kar and Zack, in which G'Kar has apparently resolved to head of on some kind of spiritual journey to search for Garibaldi. Okay? I'm glad somebody's looking for him, because everyone else seems so focused on Sheridan, but using G'Kar feels off. They never had a super close relationship or anything, so why drop everything and dedicate your life to this? It's almost like everyone else had a story except G'Kar and Garibaldi, so they stuck them together just to tie up the loose end. I'm curious to see where that thread goes, and how long it will matter. In fact, I'm very curious to see how long either of the missing characters will stay missing: Sheridan gets one and a half scenes (really barely one and a quarter--he shuffles through a cave), and Garibaldi gets nothing at all.
Overall, a super solid episode that makes me excited for the season. Bring it on!
FYI Babylon 5 Q is played by Wayne Alexander aka "Sebastian" from Comes the Inquisitor
ReplyDelete