jedi_of_urth (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
jedi_of_urth) wrote2015-06-04 07:38 pm
jedi_of_urth) wrote2015-06-04 07:38 pm
B5rewatch: Infection
So, things have come up the last couple weeks; I was on vacation visiting family for a week, I’m still in the new fandom phase of my Mr. Selfridge fanning so I end up wanting to write fic and make vids and stuff (and nothing is quite working out so far), and I was maybe just a little brain fried when it came to B5. But I’m back now, and I’ll try and pick up the pace a bit. For now, let’s buckle down and watch Infection, which may or may not be the worst episode of the series, but definitely isn’t all that good.
1x04: Infection
In the vein of start-as-you-mean-to-go-on, the promo is very generic sci-fi action piece. As such it may be the best preview so far and quite an accurate picture of the episode we’re in for. We’re in for an episode that is a pretty standard fare for TV sci-fi at least until the mid 00’s and far from unheard of since then.
In fact, before I even start watching I’m going to say that I think this episode’s reputation as an awful one is not exactly deserved. It’s not very good, and on a good day it never escapes my bottom ten episodes of the show, and usually not my bottom five; but that’s because the show is so much better than this and as a returnee I know that. I have seen in recent years that this episode actually seems to go over pretty well with newbies though, I think largely because its main plot is so average and standard; and what’s more, as I think that’s what it was designed to do, it could be said that it succeeds at its mission. It was meant to appeal to viewers familiar with the tropes of sci-fi – especially TV sci-fi – at the time, to bring them into this world they didn’t yet know with the kind of story they were already comfortable with and build their relationship with the world and characters from there. It set low goals for itself, especially by B5 standards, and it barely passed those; it’s *incredibly* rough around the edges and it’s mostly edges; and it isn’t exactly required viewing in terms of the show; but when I watch it I usually end up thinking the old guard has gotten it into our collective heads that this one just flat sucks and that’s...not entirely true.
That said, I will probably find a lot to pick apart here...or have very little to say at all, it can’t go very many other ways.
So by the time I get to the opening credits I do have to say, the acting in this episode is not good. I do think the writing is part of the problem, it’s expository dialog is not well integrated and is calling for some weird setups for the actions and lines, but a quick check of the Lurker’s Guide (I may have to start abbreviating that) says this is the same director as MOTFL in addition to being the first episode produced so I think there’s plenty of circumstances contributing to the awkwardness we’re seeing here.
Watching the opening credits this time around gives me an idea; the writing change from Ko’dath to Na’toth had to happen between the production of Born to the Purple and Parliament of Dreams which would have clearly been after Infection was produced; couldn’t JMS have retconned that Ko’dath died during the events of Infection instead of creating a mysterious airlock accident that never gets mentioned at any other point? Sure we’d turn around and say that it should have been mentioned in Infection if an ambassadorial aide died in the conflict, but I think that could have been papered over more easily than the airlock incident.
You know, if this show was produced today there would totally be side webisodes or something focusing on the techs in C&C. Corwin would have been the breakout star who got promoted to actual cast member (nothing against Tech Techington, who was the initial go-between between the big show and this hypothetical sub-show, but she wasn’t the breakout character either).
While I think I can fanwank that this is a research area of medlab rather than an actual patient area; taken at face value, there is no one else in there this episode is there? Stephen’s job doesn’t seem all that taxing, pronounce a guy dead occasionally (he’s dead, Jeff), might have been tasked to see to some first aid at the end of the story, but nothing too demanding; certainly nothing that would drive a guy to stims just to get by.
I’m fairly conflicted about how to feel when it comes to Stephen’s treatment of Vance and IPX and corporations in general. B5 is not particularly corporation friendly, but even with B5 Stephen’s views seem really naïve and simple and I’m not sure if we’re supposed to agree with him or not. I can’t entirely disagree with him that going out and just grabbing technology we don’t invent or understand is maybe not the greatest idea, I had that feeling a lot when I was watching Stargate (that the humans would say the goa’uld were parasites who didn’t invent anything just built an empire on tech they found and used to their advantage when the Earthers were doing *the exact same thing* and no one commented on it). But at the same time, in a galaxy where there are races at all kind of levels of technology, is Franklin condemning any advancement humans don’t make on their own? Like say, jumpgates? And if it’s the corporate aspect he objects to, what’s his alternative? I think there is an argument to be made about the dangers of going out and digging up old civilizations (*cough*the Icarus*cough*) and that in humanity’s rush to find out all that’s out there that we haven’t found yet – being the newcomers to space that we are here – we could be making mistakes we’d come to regret and we should be careful about who we give power to in these circumstance, but I think it’s badly presented here.
Also, at no other point in B5 is IPX some super secret black ops corporation. It may, and probably does, have its black ops division, but it’s a public company that Franklin shouldn’t have any trouble finding basic information about.
Wow is CC’s Ivanova performance off here, she hasn’t even figured out how to deliver a good snack down yet. Not that it (her line to Cramer) was one of her best one-liners, and it’s not helped by the staging (her having to rush across the set to get in position), but it’s just our Susan yet.
Point the first: the way they’re able to hack the bioweapon’s history files is stupid and makes no sense. In a better and later episode this information could have come from say, the Minbari with Franklin and Vance maybe able to get a little bit about the programing of this unit from the artifacts themselves. And the speed at which they’re able to hack that completely alien tech (and understand what they find) is not the way things usually work in this verse; especially when you consider say the frozen/altered telepaths that as far as we know are never saved because no one understands the Shadow tech.
Point the second: if a race was concerned with invasion from aliens, why program the weapons to work on anything but biology? I know JMS is making a point and a metaphor and trying to draw parallels with the growing anti-alien sentiment among humans and how that eventually turns on itself, but it still seems like shoddy craftsmanship by the Ikarans.
Continuing that point with Jeff’s talk-down to the weapon, and also kind of playing on my earlier point about Stephen; I think there is a better point that might have been made through this. Jeff’s “When you become obsessed with the enemy, you become the enemy” is actually really central to the grand scope of the show: the question of what do we become in our efforts to fight our enemies? (And...if I’m going to give this way more credit than it deserves, may actually explain Delenn’s mostly unreasonable reaction when John suggests thinking like the Shadows to defeat them; Valen’s teachings after all would have been in line with Sinclair’s beliefs on such matters so she may have the idea that thinking like the enemy turns you into them.) It’s just not delivered well here, but if you tilt your head to the side and squint it’s connected to the bigger themes of the show.
So, reaching the end I don’t have a lot left to say. I didn’t even have anything to say about the more important closing scenes as I was watching them. It’s not a good episode, but it’s not as bad as a lot of people make it out to be. It’s a monster of the week story that could have easily been part of the larger tapestry of the story (and prevailing fan theory has long seemed to be that it is connected to the previous Shadow War) but it’s never confirmed in universe if it is, possibly because JMS notoriously disliked the episode too. It has moments are manage to rise above the presentation, and others that could have soared if the people involved were more seasoned with the project. I’m not going to say it doesn’t deserve to be at or near the bottom of people’s rankings, and certainly it deserves to have its flaws remarked on, but I don’t think it deserves our hatred exactly. It doesn’t offend me in any way and it’s early days so we can give it time to grow; it is only the dawn to the third age after all.
Next up: The Parliament of Dreams
1x04: Infection
In the vein of start-as-you-mean-to-go-on, the promo is very generic sci-fi action piece. As such it may be the best preview so far and quite an accurate picture of the episode we’re in for. We’re in for an episode that is a pretty standard fare for TV sci-fi at least until the mid 00’s and far from unheard of since then.
In fact, before I even start watching I’m going to say that I think this episode’s reputation as an awful one is not exactly deserved. It’s not very good, and on a good day it never escapes my bottom ten episodes of the show, and usually not my bottom five; but that’s because the show is so much better than this and as a returnee I know that. I have seen in recent years that this episode actually seems to go over pretty well with newbies though, I think largely because its main plot is so average and standard; and what’s more, as I think that’s what it was designed to do, it could be said that it succeeds at its mission. It was meant to appeal to viewers familiar with the tropes of sci-fi – especially TV sci-fi – at the time, to bring them into this world they didn’t yet know with the kind of story they were already comfortable with and build their relationship with the world and characters from there. It set low goals for itself, especially by B5 standards, and it barely passed those; it’s *incredibly* rough around the edges and it’s mostly edges; and it isn’t exactly required viewing in terms of the show; but when I watch it I usually end up thinking the old guard has gotten it into our collective heads that this one just flat sucks and that’s...not entirely true.
That said, I will probably find a lot to pick apart here...or have very little to say at all, it can’t go very many other ways.
So by the time I get to the opening credits I do have to say, the acting in this episode is not good. I do think the writing is part of the problem, it’s expository dialog is not well integrated and is calling for some weird setups for the actions and lines, but a quick check of the Lurker’s Guide (I may have to start abbreviating that) says this is the same director as MOTFL in addition to being the first episode produced so I think there’s plenty of circumstances contributing to the awkwardness we’re seeing here.
Watching the opening credits this time around gives me an idea; the writing change from Ko’dath to Na’toth had to happen between the production of Born to the Purple and Parliament of Dreams which would have clearly been after Infection was produced; couldn’t JMS have retconned that Ko’dath died during the events of Infection instead of creating a mysterious airlock accident that never gets mentioned at any other point? Sure we’d turn around and say that it should have been mentioned in Infection if an ambassadorial aide died in the conflict, but I think that could have been papered over more easily than the airlock incident.
You know, if this show was produced today there would totally be side webisodes or something focusing on the techs in C&C. Corwin would have been the breakout star who got promoted to actual cast member (nothing against Tech Techington, who was the initial go-between between the big show and this hypothetical sub-show, but she wasn’t the breakout character either).
While I think I can fanwank that this is a research area of medlab rather than an actual patient area; taken at face value, there is no one else in there this episode is there? Stephen’s job doesn’t seem all that taxing, pronounce a guy dead occasionally (he’s dead, Jeff), might have been tasked to see to some first aid at the end of the story, but nothing too demanding; certainly nothing that would drive a guy to stims just to get by.
I’m fairly conflicted about how to feel when it comes to Stephen’s treatment of Vance and IPX and corporations in general. B5 is not particularly corporation friendly, but even with B5 Stephen’s views seem really naïve and simple and I’m not sure if we’re supposed to agree with him or not. I can’t entirely disagree with him that going out and just grabbing technology we don’t invent or understand is maybe not the greatest idea, I had that feeling a lot when I was watching Stargate (that the humans would say the goa’uld were parasites who didn’t invent anything just built an empire on tech they found and used to their advantage when the Earthers were doing *the exact same thing* and no one commented on it). But at the same time, in a galaxy where there are races at all kind of levels of technology, is Franklin condemning any advancement humans don’t make on their own? Like say, jumpgates? And if it’s the corporate aspect he objects to, what’s his alternative? I think there is an argument to be made about the dangers of going out and digging up old civilizations (*cough*the Icarus*cough*) and that in humanity’s rush to find out all that’s out there that we haven’t found yet – being the newcomers to space that we are here – we could be making mistakes we’d come to regret and we should be careful about who we give power to in these circumstance, but I think it’s badly presented here.
Also, at no other point in B5 is IPX some super secret black ops corporation. It may, and probably does, have its black ops division, but it’s a public company that Franklin shouldn’t have any trouble finding basic information about.
Wow is CC’s Ivanova performance off here, she hasn’t even figured out how to deliver a good snack down yet. Not that it (her line to Cramer) was one of her best one-liners, and it’s not helped by the staging (her having to rush across the set to get in position), but it’s just our Susan yet.
Point the first: the way they’re able to hack the bioweapon’s history files is stupid and makes no sense. In a better and later episode this information could have come from say, the Minbari with Franklin and Vance maybe able to get a little bit about the programing of this unit from the artifacts themselves. And the speed at which they’re able to hack that completely alien tech (and understand what they find) is not the way things usually work in this verse; especially when you consider say the frozen/altered telepaths that as far as we know are never saved because no one understands the Shadow tech.
Point the second: if a race was concerned with invasion from aliens, why program the weapons to work on anything but biology? I know JMS is making a point and a metaphor and trying to draw parallels with the growing anti-alien sentiment among humans and how that eventually turns on itself, but it still seems like shoddy craftsmanship by the Ikarans.
Continuing that point with Jeff’s talk-down to the weapon, and also kind of playing on my earlier point about Stephen; I think there is a better point that might have been made through this. Jeff’s “When you become obsessed with the enemy, you become the enemy” is actually really central to the grand scope of the show: the question of what do we become in our efforts to fight our enemies? (And...if I’m going to give this way more credit than it deserves, may actually explain Delenn’s mostly unreasonable reaction when John suggests thinking like the Shadows to defeat them; Valen’s teachings after all would have been in line with Sinclair’s beliefs on such matters so she may have the idea that thinking like the enemy turns you into them.) It’s just not delivered well here, but if you tilt your head to the side and squint it’s connected to the bigger themes of the show.
So, reaching the end I don’t have a lot left to say. I didn’t even have anything to say about the more important closing scenes as I was watching them. It’s not a good episode, but it’s not as bad as a lot of people make it out to be. It’s a monster of the week story that could have easily been part of the larger tapestry of the story (and prevailing fan theory has long seemed to be that it is connected to the previous Shadow War) but it’s never confirmed in universe if it is, possibly because JMS notoriously disliked the episode too. It has moments are manage to rise above the presentation, and others that could have soared if the people involved were more seasoned with the project. I’m not going to say it doesn’t deserve to be at or near the bottom of people’s rankings, and certainly it deserves to have its flaws remarked on, but I don’t think it deserves our hatred exactly. It doesn’t offend me in any way and it’s early days so we can give it time to grow; it is only the dawn to the third age after all.
Next up: The Parliament of Dreams