How can I say such a thing? Because Babylon Squared has a flashback to Garibaldi and Lise on Mars. With Babylon Squared BEFORE Voice in the Wilderness said flashback becomes a touch of mystery to resolve. Coming AFTER Voice - who cares? We know who she is, we know she's married.
I'm not a big fan of Lise when all is said and done. She's (season 1)married to Fritz. Within two to two-and-a-half years Fritz is gone, and she's married to William Edgers, who is certainly old enough to be her father, if not grandfather. Lise jumps from man to man and any opportunity, and we're never given enough backstory to justify her decisions. I can imagine several situations which could drive her to her actions, but, without any support from scripted backstory she kinda comes across a a young woman marrying old rich men for money. Ugh.
Louis Turene is wonderful as Draal. He was recovering from a heart attack in season 2, hence the recast as John Shuck. Shuck is also a fine actor, but no way in hell is he a younger Turene.
But we get to see Turene again as good old Brother Theo, so there's that.
I suspect Sinclair being willing to fire on allied ships would have been another of those things which pissed off the brass, but, with cast changes moving into season 2, we'll never know. Certainly if Michael O'Hare had been the lead for season 3 we know damn well Sinclair would have fought just as hard as Sheridan come "Severed Dreams" I'd actually forgotten about Sinclair's threat in this episode. Even Laura - not a B5 fan (I married her, despite this glaring red flag), who was in the room as I was watching, glanced up from the email she was composing and said, "Huh. Not good." at that moment. Which proves it's effectiveness.
The Great Machine becomes a plot thread shifted around by production realities. It's pretty obvious in retrospect the events of War Without End were originally meant for Season 5, shifted to Season 3 to give Michael O'Hare work at a point when his struggles with his mental illness were going well and he could work. Unfortunately it does mean Epsilon 3 hangs around for a couple seasons being ignored, other than one reference to asking if Draal might aid with station defense, and one borrowing of its com systems... Ok, ok, Ivanova gets plugged in for one scene, as well, but again, I suspect that was also originally intended for later.
Anyone wanna guess why Zathras, Zathras, Zathras, or any of the other Zathri couldn't have been plugged into the Great Machine? As it is, I picture Zathras, Zathras and Zathras talking with Zathras offscreen...
Zathras: Great Machine - without heart, will soon explode.
Zathras: Tsk tsk tsk, With explosion of machine, Zathras, Zathras, Zathras, and Zathras all die, along with Zathras, Zathras, Zath-
Zathras (interrupting): Yes, sad for all Zathri. Still, Zathri have hard life. At least Zathri have quick death.
Zathras: Zathras should have listened to Zathras...
Now that the setup is out of the way, we can get on with it.
As the alien ship pulls Earthforce Language Files people like me who freeze frame such things will notice several Easter Eggs: the language database is "rev 42," and the language banks contain the words "Skynet" and "ORAC." If Hitchhiker's Guide, Terminator and Blake's 7 aren't enough sci-fi drops for you, the tactical display later in the episode reveals one of Hyperion's fighters is "THX-1138."
The battle has interesting staging. Besides the alien mothership seperating into multiple segments of attack ship we get our first real look at interceptor tactics - several of Hyperion's interceptors are shown disrupting incoming fire. Yet, aside from one hit on the B5 cobra bays, until the Great Machine gets involved we don't see any fire land.
One shot of the battle shows Hyperion has Starfury "Heavies" The Heavy is a Starfury variant with a rear gunner, and, coming out of a commercial break a Heavy is front and center in-frame with the rear cannons facing camera. The Heavy fires RCS to spin left on its vertical access and clockwise on its forward access. It may be the only time one is shown on-screen. My geeky self, knowing the designation from other sources - fan wiki and RPG games, caught it on this viewing, and I had to back up and freeze frame to confirm the sighting. It's there. See image link.
Otherwise, MY pick for "line of the episode" is "Landing thrusters, landing thrusters... If I was a landing thruster, which one of these would I be?" Still, I guess "Boom. Boom boom boom. Boom." is easier to type.
At the time JMS said online we'd never see the Hyperion-class cruiser again. Not so much. The VFX teams correctly continue using the model.
Otherwise, as Simon said, it's a good trick bringing the episode to a satisfying close without actually addressing most of the questions set up. Good trick, if you can pull it off.
Spoilerific Sentences.
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The "Master List" is wrong.
How can I say such a thing? Because Babylon Squared has a flashback to Garibaldi and Lise on Mars. With Babylon Squared BEFORE Voice in the Wilderness said flashback becomes a touch of mystery to resolve. Coming AFTER Voice - who cares? We know who she is, we know she's married.
I'm not a big fan of Lise when all is said and done. She's (season 1)married to Fritz. Within two to two-and-a-half years Fritz is gone, and she's married to William Edgers, who is certainly old enough to be her father, if not grandfather. Lise jumps from man to man and any opportunity, and we're never given enough backstory to justify her decisions. I can imagine several situations which could drive her to her actions, but, without any support from scripted backstory she kinda comes across a a young woman marrying old rich men for money. Ugh.
Louis Turene is wonderful as Draal. He was recovering from a heart attack in season 2, hence the recast as John Shuck. Shuck is also a fine actor, but no way in hell is he a younger Turene.
But we get to see Turene again as good old Brother Theo, so there's that.
I suspect Sinclair being willing to fire on allied ships would have been another of those things which pissed off the brass, but, with cast changes moving into season 2, we'll never know. Certainly if Michael O'Hare had been the lead for season 3 we know damn well Sinclair would have fought just as hard as Sheridan come "Severed Dreams" I'd actually forgotten about Sinclair's threat in this episode. Even Laura - not a B5 fan (I married her, despite this glaring red flag), who was in the room as I was watching, glanced up from the email she was composing and said, "Huh. Not good." at that moment. Which proves it's effectiveness.
The Great Machine becomes a plot thread shifted around by production realities. It's pretty obvious in retrospect the events of War Without End were originally meant for Season 5, shifted to Season 3 to give Michael O'Hare work at a point when his struggles with his mental illness were going well and he could work. Unfortunately it does mean Epsilon 3 hangs around for a couple seasons being ignored, other than one reference to asking if Draal might aid with station defense, and one borrowing of its com systems... Ok, ok, Ivanova gets plugged in for one scene, as well, but again, I suspect that was also originally intended for later.
Anyone wanna guess why Zathras, Zathras, Zathras, or any of the other Zathri couldn't have been plugged into the Great Machine? As it is, I picture Zathras, Zathras and Zathras talking with Zathras offscreen...
Zathras: Great Machine - without heart, will soon explode.
Zathras: Tsk tsk tsk, With explosion of machine, Zathras, Zathras, Zathras, and Zathras all die, along with Zathras, Zathras, Zath-
Zathras (interrupting): Yes, sad for all Zathri. Still, Zathri have hard life. At least Zathri have quick death.
Zathras: Zathras should have listened to Zathras...
Zathras: No one listens to Zathras.
Non spoiler Stuff.
Now that the setup is out of the way, we can get on with it.
As the alien ship pulls Earthforce Language Files people like me who freeze frame such things will notice several Easter Eggs: the language database is "rev 42," and the language banks contain the words "Skynet" and "ORAC." If Hitchhiker's Guide, Terminator and Blake's 7 aren't enough sci-fi drops for you, the tactical display later in the episode reveals one of Hyperion's fighters is "THX-1138."
The battle has interesting staging. Besides the alien mothership seperating into multiple segments of attack ship we get our first real look at interceptor tactics - several of Hyperion's interceptors are shown disrupting incoming fire. Yet, aside from one hit on the B5 cobra bays, until the Great Machine gets involved we don't see any fire land.
One shot of the battle shows Hyperion has Starfury "Heavies" The Heavy is a Starfury variant with a rear gunner, and, coming out of a commercial break a Heavy is front and center in-frame with the rear cannons facing camera. The Heavy fires RCS to spin left on its vertical access and clockwise on its forward access. It may be the only time one is shown on-screen. My geeky self, knowing the designation from other sources - fan wiki and RPG games, caught it on this viewing, and I had to back up and freeze frame to confirm the sighting. It's there. See image link.
https://babylon5.fandom.com/wiki/Heavy_Starfury?file=Heavy_Fury_3.jpg
Otherwise, MY pick for "line of the episode" is "Landing thrusters, landing thrusters... If I was a landing thruster, which one of these would I be?" Still, I guess "Boom. Boom boom boom. Boom." is easier to type.
At the time JMS said online we'd never see the Hyperion-class cruiser again. Not so much. The VFX teams correctly continue using the model.
Otherwise, as Simon said, it's a good trick bringing the episode to a satisfying close without actually addressing most of the questions set up. Good trick, if you can pull it off.