Finally watched the episode, and don't really have anything much to add. It's already been covered in the main blog and comments.
Yes, the establishing shot with the two Starfuries underneath a rim-lit B5 is gorgeous. So is the POV shot of EAS Pournelle (shout out to SF writer Jerry Pournelle) blowing the crap out of Horn over Phobos - the 90's CG couldn't handle all the needed reflections/refractions, but the artist did a great job suggesting the glass being blown out into space, and it is pretty horrifying. Abel's Cyberhand is a pretty good makeup job.
But, yeah, conspiracy theory being "cool" is very 90's. I wonder if pop culture PUSHING so many conspiracy theories for storytelling in that decade helped prime people to fall off the deep end a decade later?
I don't think this is as terrible an episode as the prior two, but, yeah, it's mediocre. It doesn't help the BTS decision to not use the B13 name again makes that group feel like a one-off.
SPOILERS
Abel might be an early experiment with Shadow Tech? Shadow pilots have a lot of captured humans with implants, and we have the Techno-Mages... Also Abbut, the "Vicker" from season 1 shows cybertech implanted in a human mind... Who made Vickers?
This episode does do interesting things with the Garibaldi, Ivanova, Talia triangle. Talia seems, by the end of the episode, to not find Garibaldi a creep, while Ivanova says Talia can be trusted.
Now, Talia holding back her vision of the Psi-Cop in Abel's mind, but looking her up at the end - how much of that is Talia, how much the sleeper personality? In absence of further follow up I can only assume the Babylon 5 "Control" Agent mentioned is Talia's sleeper personality. It would be ironic and suitably 90's conspiracy if B13 didn't know Talia's sleeper was Control and that one of their assets was trying to eliminate one of their other assets. Only speculation, but it adds a layer of interest to a fairly dull story.
I thought maybe it was this season when Talia leaves; I remember what happens but not when. I did think Zach Allan sounded familiar though.
Man, I miss the 90s. Now I suspect if I were to introduce myself to someone and say something like "I love conspiracies! Black projects, secrets, everything!" they'd look at me funny and walk away slowly.
Yeah, that shift is really odd, and not something I’d considered until watching this episode.
In the 90s I loved conspiracies! X-Files, the Deus Ex games, Area 51, Independence Day, Men In Black. I read all sorts of books about alien abductions, mythical animals.
I mean, the entire concept behind the classic game Deus Ex was “what if all the conspiracies were true?”
And I thought that was a great idea! What fun.
All of that was predicated on the understanding that we knew none of it was real. Or if some of it was, it was a tiny, tiny percentage,, and the challenge was actually to sort through all the silliness to find the actual reality that was left.
The internet (or, perhaps, social media, to be more specific) seems to have flipped all that. Media literacy has bottomed out and actual grown-ups have been taking this stuff really seriously for at least a decade. Belief in conspiracies has had a direct impact on all sorts of real world things.
Which rather stops it from being a fun theme to explore in fiction.
I'm not sure exactly which interviews were in those volumes, but note that "Bureau 13" was supposed to return under that name, but, after production, the production staff discovered the TTRPG "Bureau 13: Stalking the Night Fantastic" (Tri-Tac Games. I happen to own the game). So they dropped the B13 name. Assume B13 was a splinter of the main related conspiracy and that particular cell was dissolved in the aftermath of the Abel Horn incident.
Spoilers:
Horn does thematically tie into past (Ikarran War Machine) and future (revelation of what's piloting Shadow vessels) plot points. Horn is obviously an experiment based on Shadow tech control systems - but only in retrospect.
As Simon noted, in some ways it seems like the writers aren't talking, and Simon's likely right. JMS was VERY tight lipped about his major arc points, which lead to inconsistencies whenever other writers were brought in (TV show, comics, novels). Eventually JMS would release DiTillio as script editor, and take over all writing duties. After season 2, only Neil Gaiman will have a non-JMS screenplay, while Harlan Ellison will share one story credit with JMS. For better or for worse Joe will write everything.
Which is quite possibly for the better. Seasons 3 and 4 are the peak of the show. S5 will suffer in comparison by 1) needing to stretch to compensate for 6 episodes cut from s4, 2) introduce a major new character, 3) a reduced budget, 4) moving from a six day shoot schedule to five.
On a related tangent early s2 has a bit of the same problem, since we're having to re-establish our new lead, and Sheridan is more or less coming off as a nice goober who likes oranges and conspiracy theories and smiles a lot - until "All Alone in the Night" re-contexualizes him with one scene... ("I don't like spying on my own people!")
Simon, I suggest re-reading this blog post just before watching "A Race Through Dark Places." You've dropped some Talia comments this week, and "Race" has one of the most major Talia beats of the entire series...
Finally watched the episode, and don't really have anything much to add. It's already been covered in the main blog and comments.
Yes, the establishing shot with the two Starfuries underneath a rim-lit B5 is gorgeous. So is the POV shot of EAS Pournelle (shout out to SF writer Jerry Pournelle) blowing the crap out of Horn over Phobos - the 90's CG couldn't handle all the needed reflections/refractions, but the artist did a great job suggesting the glass being blown out into space, and it is pretty horrifying. Abel's Cyberhand is a pretty good makeup job.
But, yeah, conspiracy theory being "cool" is very 90's. I wonder if pop culture PUSHING so many conspiracy theories for storytelling in that decade helped prime people to fall off the deep end a decade later?
I don't think this is as terrible an episode as the prior two, but, yeah, it's mediocre. It doesn't help the BTS decision to not use the B13 name again makes that group feel like a one-off.
SPOILERS
Abel might be an early experiment with Shadow Tech? Shadow pilots have a lot of captured humans with implants, and we have the Techno-Mages... Also Abbut, the "Vicker" from season 1 shows cybertech implanted in a human mind... Who made Vickers?
This episode does do interesting things with the Garibaldi, Ivanova, Talia triangle. Talia seems, by the end of the episode, to not find Garibaldi a creep, while Ivanova says Talia can be trusted.
Now, Talia holding back her vision of the Psi-Cop in Abel's mind, but looking her up at the end - how much of that is Talia, how much the sleeper personality? In absence of further follow up I can only assume the Babylon 5 "Control" Agent mentioned is Talia's sleeper personality. It would be ironic and suitably 90's conspiracy if B13 didn't know Talia's sleeper was Control and that one of their assets was trying to eliminate one of their other assets. Only speculation, but it adds a layer of interest to a fairly dull story.
I thought maybe it was this season when Talia leaves; I remember what happens but not when. I did think Zach Allan sounded familiar though.
Man, I miss the 90s. Now I suspect if I were to introduce myself to someone and say something like "I love conspiracies! Black projects, secrets, everything!" they'd look at me funny and walk away slowly.
Yeah, that shift is really odd, and not something I’d considered until watching this episode.
In the 90s I loved conspiracies! X-Files, the Deus Ex games, Area 51, Independence Day, Men In Black. I read all sorts of books about alien abductions, mythical animals.
I mean, the entire concept behind the classic game Deus Ex was “what if all the conspiracies were true?”
And I thought that was a great idea! What fun.
All of that was predicated on the understanding that we knew none of it was real. Or if some of it was, it was a tiny, tiny percentage,, and the challenge was actually to sort through all the silliness to find the actual reality that was left.
The internet (or, perhaps, social media, to be more specific) seems to have flipped all that. Media literacy has bottomed out and actual grown-ups have been taking this stuff really seriously for at least a decade. Belief in conspiracies has had a direct impact on all sorts of real world things.
Which rather stops it from being a fun theme to explore in fiction.
Non Spoiler:
I'm not sure exactly which interviews were in those volumes, but note that "Bureau 13" was supposed to return under that name, but, after production, the production staff discovered the TTRPG "Bureau 13: Stalking the Night Fantastic" (Tri-Tac Games. I happen to own the game). So they dropped the B13 name. Assume B13 was a splinter of the main related conspiracy and that particular cell was dissolved in the aftermath of the Abel Horn incident.
Spoilers:
Horn does thematically tie into past (Ikarran War Machine) and future (revelation of what's piloting Shadow vessels) plot points. Horn is obviously an experiment based on Shadow tech control systems - but only in retrospect.
As Simon noted, in some ways it seems like the writers aren't talking, and Simon's likely right. JMS was VERY tight lipped about his major arc points, which lead to inconsistencies whenever other writers were brought in (TV show, comics, novels). Eventually JMS would release DiTillio as script editor, and take over all writing duties. After season 2, only Neil Gaiman will have a non-JMS screenplay, while Harlan Ellison will share one story credit with JMS. For better or for worse Joe will write everything.
Which is quite possibly for the better. Seasons 3 and 4 are the peak of the show. S5 will suffer in comparison by 1) needing to stretch to compensate for 6 episodes cut from s4, 2) introduce a major new character, 3) a reduced budget, 4) moving from a six day shoot schedule to five.
On a related tangent early s2 has a bit of the same problem, since we're having to re-establish our new lead, and Sheridan is more or less coming off as a nice goober who likes oranges and conspiracy theories and smiles a lot - until "All Alone in the Night" re-contexualizes him with one scene... ("I don't like spying on my own people!")
Simon, I suggest re-reading this blog post just before watching "A Race Through Dark Places." You've dropped some Talia comments this week, and "Race" has one of the most major Talia beats of the entire series...
Gotta say it:
IKAAAAAARAAAAAAA!