100 Reviews: 83
Jan. 11th, 2014 09:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedi_of_urthI’m still in the mood to watch B5, and still in the mood to review it, at least a little bit more. So let’s do it.
Babylon 5: 1x01: Midnight on the Firing Line
This episode has 90s sci-fi written all over it. You’d probably never see an episode like this done nowadays, certainly not as a second pilot. Basically nothing happens because this episode is all about establishing the status quo for the series. This is what the station was set up for; to handle diplomatic disputes over border conflicts happening far away from the station itself, to handle defense within their sphere of influence, a center for trade and a port of call. This episode is a window into the world as it is at this moment for the characters.
And while there’s a fair amount of exposition happening, not all of it naturally coming out, we’re still given this world as if it’s real and normal for the characters. Telepaths, jump-gates, aliens, backstory wars; all of it is just normal for the characters and part of who they are and the world they inhabit. As the audience we are not “introduced” to the world we are just shown it (with sometimes clunky exposition) and brought into it as it is.
I’m not necessarily passing judgment on this element of being 90s sci-fi making it superior, it more a commentary on TV culture as I see it then vs. now. B5 was never a show with a promised long term existence to serve its long term goals (a fact that had huge repercussions later on), but it also had some assurance that having time to have a status quo before the shit hit the fan wouldn’t get them canceled before they could do all that. Now admittedly, a lot of these early episodes are still working to find a voice and how to have it heard in the establishing of the status quo, in some ways the more modern method is more direct in doing so through shit hitting the fan and seeing where the pieces fall after that establishing method. I do wonder how his might read to people just getting into the show today, while the show has had a big impact on how genre shows are made today (in ways a lot of people don’t realize) it’s still not told quite the way stories now are done.
This episode does introduce us to a lot of the characters. And Londo and G’Kar are thrown into a crucible early on to reveal themselves to us. Their mutual patriotism and anger rise quickly to the surface and rather dominate a large chunk of the episode. And in periphery to that we get elements of the other (mostly the humans) revealed to us, but also through their own subplots.
Also if anyone wonders why I won’t write off the Valen comment in 'The Gathering' as obviously just retconning, the next episode tells us about Londo and G’Kar’s death and that’s exactly what will happen down the road. And I’m fairly confident JMS had in mind all along that it wasn’t going to be done in mutual loathing as Londo assumes here; whether or not ALL the specifics were planned out ahead of time, there was probably always going to be more to the story than Londo got out of his dream. Also it’s just a pretty good scene where Londo tells that story, so there’s that.
The plot with the raiders is a very s1 plot, but that’s as it should be. These are the minor threats they face now to allow us time to get to know the universe before it goes to hell. The...H-plot or something with the election is way more important than can possibly be clear outside of hindsight, but in the moment it gives in insight into that there’s politics in this world even if it just kind of touches our crew so far and little chances just for the characters to talk about it.
One thing that kind of bugs me, and I think the show sort of continues it for a while as I recall, is how people of the vid-com lean around when the people they’re talking to move around. If I’m talking to someone on video chat at most I might tilt my head a little if people keep moving around, and that’s as much expression as actual need to change angle of viewing. And I don’t think that’s something the 90s couldn’t have seen coming because when the characters we’re with are on vid-coms they don’t have to act the way the senator in this episode does, they look at the screen where the person is.
Minor diversion out of the way, Ivanova’s pretty awesome this episode. The quotable lines are always good and her closing scene with Talia is...sad. It is one of the scenes where I kind of get why people ship it because Talia does come off a bit as being into Susan, but I care way more about Susan and I could never quite get my head around it from her side precisely because of stuff like this episode. Susan has *deep* issue with Psi Corps and telepaths in general and it would have required a lot more development than they got to make me think they could have worked (attraction I can eventually buy, even a kind of affection in spite of where they come from, but that’s not quite enough for me to actually ship it...at least in this case, I’m sure there are examples in my shipping history that prove my rules are flexible). Anyway, Susan’s life is made of tragedy...like most of the show’s characters in the long run
Next time:
I’ve got something to sink my teeth into for the moment so I ought to stick with it I think.
Still, here’s the suggestion box
Babylon 5: 1x01: Midnight on the Firing Line
This episode has 90s sci-fi written all over it. You’d probably never see an episode like this done nowadays, certainly not as a second pilot. Basically nothing happens because this episode is all about establishing the status quo for the series. This is what the station was set up for; to handle diplomatic disputes over border conflicts happening far away from the station itself, to handle defense within their sphere of influence, a center for trade and a port of call. This episode is a window into the world as it is at this moment for the characters.
And while there’s a fair amount of exposition happening, not all of it naturally coming out, we’re still given this world as if it’s real and normal for the characters. Telepaths, jump-gates, aliens, backstory wars; all of it is just normal for the characters and part of who they are and the world they inhabit. As the audience we are not “introduced” to the world we are just shown it (with sometimes clunky exposition) and brought into it as it is.
I’m not necessarily passing judgment on this element of being 90s sci-fi making it superior, it more a commentary on TV culture as I see it then vs. now. B5 was never a show with a promised long term existence to serve its long term goals (a fact that had huge repercussions later on), but it also had some assurance that having time to have a status quo before the shit hit the fan wouldn’t get them canceled before they could do all that. Now admittedly, a lot of these early episodes are still working to find a voice and how to have it heard in the establishing of the status quo, in some ways the more modern method is more direct in doing so through shit hitting the fan and seeing where the pieces fall after that establishing method. I do wonder how his might read to people just getting into the show today, while the show has had a big impact on how genre shows are made today (in ways a lot of people don’t realize) it’s still not told quite the way stories now are done.
This episode does introduce us to a lot of the characters. And Londo and G’Kar are thrown into a crucible early on to reveal themselves to us. Their mutual patriotism and anger rise quickly to the surface and rather dominate a large chunk of the episode. And in periphery to that we get elements of the other (mostly the humans) revealed to us, but also through their own subplots.
Also if anyone wonders why I won’t write off the Valen comment in 'The Gathering' as obviously just retconning, the next episode tells us about Londo and G’Kar’s death and that’s exactly what will happen down the road. And I’m fairly confident JMS had in mind all along that it wasn’t going to be done in mutual loathing as Londo assumes here; whether or not ALL the specifics were planned out ahead of time, there was probably always going to be more to the story than Londo got out of his dream. Also it’s just a pretty good scene where Londo tells that story, so there’s that.
The plot with the raiders is a very s1 plot, but that’s as it should be. These are the minor threats they face now to allow us time to get to know the universe before it goes to hell. The...H-plot or something with the election is way more important than can possibly be clear outside of hindsight, but in the moment it gives in insight into that there’s politics in this world even if it just kind of touches our crew so far and little chances just for the characters to talk about it.
One thing that kind of bugs me, and I think the show sort of continues it for a while as I recall, is how people of the vid-com lean around when the people they’re talking to move around. If I’m talking to someone on video chat at most I might tilt my head a little if people keep moving around, and that’s as much expression as actual need to change angle of viewing. And I don’t think that’s something the 90s couldn’t have seen coming because when the characters we’re with are on vid-coms they don’t have to act the way the senator in this episode does, they look at the screen where the person is.
Minor diversion out of the way, Ivanova’s pretty awesome this episode. The quotable lines are always good and her closing scene with Talia is...sad. It is one of the scenes where I kind of get why people ship it because Talia does come off a bit as being into Susan, but I care way more about Susan and I could never quite get my head around it from her side precisely because of stuff like this episode. Susan has *deep* issue with Psi Corps and telepaths in general and it would have required a lot more development than they got to make me think they could have worked (attraction I can eventually buy, even a kind of affection in spite of where they come from, but that’s not quite enough for me to actually ship it...at least in this case, I’m sure there are examples in my shipping history that prove my rules are flexible). Anyway, Susan’s life is made of tragedy...like most of the show’s characters in the long run
Next time:
I’ve got something to sink my teeth into for the moment so I ought to stick with it I think.
Still, here’s the suggestion box
