![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
who are you; what do you want
Having started this write-up literally a minute after finishing the show (with the tears still drying on my cheeks, I kid you not) I am ... perhaps not best equipped to give a sane and nuanced Show Is Awesome post. Nevertheless.
So there's this show. It ran on and off from 1993 to 1998, which makes me roughly as behind the curve in reporting my love for it as I was with due South. It almost got canceled quite a lot, and definitely almost got canceled between seasons four and five, which makes season four incredibly packed and season five incredibly not. It had fairly revolutionary effects for its time, being one of the first shows to rely a lot on CGI; the technology holds up abysmally, but I am given to believe that, aside from obligatory sound in space and your usual handwavey hyperspace travel, the physics holds up fairly well. The cast, including some of the main credit cast, has a tendency to get shuffled around a bit, with characters getting written out more or less gracefully. There is apparently a prank script where one of my OTPs got textually written; there are approximately a billion actual scripts where my other OTP was text for real.
Sometimes the things this show says make me uncomfortable; more often, the things it says and the way it articulates those things overjoys me. Sometimes the show kills its lesbians; more often, it passes the Bechdel test every time I've paid enough attention to test it out. Sometimes the show has characters or plotlines that bore me; much more often, I'm glued to the screen and will mainline six episodes a day because I desperately need to know what's going to happen.
The name of the show is Babylon 5, and I'm here to tell you why it's so awesome. Hopefully I can accomplish that without too many major spoilers, because I deeply enjoyed navigating the show blind.
As I said, the show isn't without its problems, but it's also a show that is tailored astonishingly towards hitting every narrative kink I have. It has awesome women! It has redemptive (and heartbreakingly irredemptive) arcs! It has some of the most well-done time travel plots I have had the pleasure to witness anywhere! It has a beautiful ability to look at all sides of literally any conflict, so that while not everyone is sympathetic to equal degrees, nothing and no one is just evil for the sake of it. It even, and this is kind of ridiculous, reminds me lots of Lord of the Rings -- aesthetically, but also in references, from the blatant-if-you-know-what-to-look-for (there's a group of warriors called the Rangers who, I can't even deal with it, wear green stone pins; a race of aliens called the Shadows have a home planet called Za'ha'dum) to the beautifully subtle (dying as going to the metaphorical Sea). Best of all, though, I love basically all of the major characters.
This brings us to the picspam portion of our evening!
First, we have the human command staff of the diplomatic space station Babylon 5.
From the left, we have, top row, Commander Jeffrey Sinclair, Commander Susan Ivanova, and Security Chief Michael Garibaldi; bottom row, Captain John Sheridan, Dr. Stephen Franklin, and Garibaldi's second-in-command Zack Allen.
Let me tell you a bit about them.
Sinclair has about a day's worth of memories missing from his life. This is, as you might imagine, a source of constant frustration and intrigue. Sinclair is a rampant idealist who is completely unqualified to run a diplomatic station. (On the other hand, virtually no one in the entire cast should be trusted with any sort of political power, and yet they all have it, which is one of the charming, hilarious, alarming things about the show.) Sinclair's actor, bless him, isn't really very good at it -- although he improves a bit in third season -- and he has a tendency to tread on other people's lines, but he's kind of endearing, and he is in possession of what me and a couple of my friends like to refer to as A Hero Voice. I'm quite fond of him.
Ivanova is my space girlfriend. End of story. She's a Russian Jew with a mildly tragic past, a tendency to bury her emotions under her work, and a strange penchant for getting invited to all the best alien parties and staggering out hours later covered in confetti. She's smart, she's sharp, she doesn't take shit from anyone, and at one point she announces a recitation of the Ivanova Is God mantra. Ivanova's actress starts out a little shaky, but she really comes through and in the process I fell madly in love with her.
Garibaldi is a character I sort of go back and forth on. He's consistent, and interesting, and sympathetic; he's a recovering alcoholic, hugely paranoid about everything, and likes to collect Daffy Duck memorabilia. Depending on my mood and on the season, I sometimes ship him with Sinclair, Franklin, Zack, or, to my horror, Londo, so he is kind of one of my little black dresses for this show. But a lot of the time, I have to watch Garibaldi through my hands, because he does a lot of stupid stuff that isn't quite painfully tragic enough for it to break my narrative kink barrier and go from "so stupid I want to shake him" to "so stupid I can't even see the screen through my tears of horror and joy." (Uh, I can say this definitively because this show also contains Londo, who is the ultimate litmus test in that second kind.)
Sheridan is my space boyfriend. The picture I have of him up there doesn't do him justice, because the man has this infectious, beaming grin, and I loved him in about five seconds flat. Unfortunately the narrative itself is also hugely in love with him, so he gets weird amounts of special treatment from the story, and the one time someone is properly skeeved by this, it turns out they're under mind control at the time. Nevertheless, Sheridan is pretty aces; he finds himself having to deal with a crazy situation that he's only sort of equipped to deal with, and he rises to the occasion quite well. Plus he has this thing about only being able to sleep while nervous if he can hear the sound of rain on a rooftop, which deeply endears him to me.
Franklin is probably my least favourite of the command staff, if only because his character is somewhat inconsistently written. The later the season, the more I like him, I think. Most of the good things I can say about him are character-arc spoilers, but I can tell you that he has a good bedside manner, and that I occasionally ship him like burning with Garibaldi, because they're usually good at making one another better, smarter people.
Zack is one of those sneaky side-characters who slowly becomes a major player. He's sweet, well-meaning, and definitely not as dumb as he first seems. His character-arc is also spoilery, but I love it every step of the way. Mostly I just want to give Zack a hug and lots of cookies.
Our remaining major human players are telepaths.
Telepaths: they're creepy.
From the left, we've got Lyta Alexander, Talia Winters, and Al Bester.
Lyta and Talia's actresses sort of ... learn how to act as the show goes on. Both of their characters have some fairly unfortunate and skeevy implications; I feel a bit squodgy and uncomfortable around most of the telepath-related plotlines, actually, and though I know that we the audience are supposed to feel uncomfortable, a lot of the time those plotlines -- and this is the exception rather than the rule with this show for me -- miss good-storytelling-uncomfortable and go right to "uhh please get this off my screen."
Bester, on the other hand, has all the good telepath plotlines, and he's absolutely amazing. Bester is almost entirely abhorrent -- he visibly gets off on the power he has, he personifies the telepath mentality that telepaths are in all ways above 'mundanes', he has a mildly tragic past that he is genuinely upset about but also knowingly uses as an angle -- but he's smart and awful and he makes me laugh. Bester is probably one of my favourite characters, but it's unsurprising, because I adore a good villain.
Next, we leave the human characters, go on to the alien ones, and, in coming to the three ambassadors from the major alien powers, we get to my three favourite characters on the show. Possibly they are some of my favourite characters ever, in fact. Brace yourselves for radioactive levels of sheer affection.
From the left: Delenn, of the Minbari Federation; G'Kar, of the Narn Regime; and Londo Mollari, of the Centauri Republic. Sweet mother of god I love these crazy kids.
Delenn is more badass than you. She is more badass than you will ever hope to be. She is more badass than Chuck Norris. She is mildly nuts; she's sometimes a zealot; she will win your fucking war for you. She's also beautiful, occasionally uses sexiness as a weapon to melt my brain, is endlessly kind and idealistic and nonjudgmental, has a subtle, wicked sense of humor, and can talk circles around nearly anyone. She's deeply flawed and utterly, utterly amazing. I wish I could say that she's my space girlfriend, but I will never be good enough for her. The show is worth watching for Delenn alone -- but I'm about to say that about G'Kar and Londo, too.
G'Kar starts the series embittered, militant, and foolish. His people and Londo's people hate one another; the Centauri have kept the Narn enslaved for some hundred years, and, new to freedom, G'Kar has some ... issues to work out. He blusters; he sometimes says incredibly smart, eloquent things; he will do anything to help his people, though he doesn't always go about it in the best way. I immediately liked him, because he had a sort of rough charm under the uncouthness and the (extremely understandable) anger. I'm still trying to avoid character-arc spoilers, but let me say that G'Kar does not end the series as any of the things he started it as, and that his arc fills me with glowing joy and occasionally happy tears. I love him. I absolutely adore him, and the show is worth watching for G'Kar alone.
Londo ... Londo breaks my heart into a million pieces. Repeatedly. He starts the series as a drunk buffoon in a joke of an ambassadorial position that no other Centauri wanted. His shoes are too tight, and he has forgotten how to dance, he says sometime in first season, and this holds, even when he starts to get power, ceases to be a joke, and slowly digs himself deeper and deeper into a place where redemption is nearly impossible. His character arc is a lot like what the Master from Doctor Who's is inside my head: every time he's presented with a choice that might save him, he believes it's already too late and goes deeper, usually while I yell at the screen in despair. This isn't to say he isn't also hilarious, and wicked smart, and loved, and redeemable. He's all those things. I could probably write reams and reams of meta about Londo. I've embarrassingly cried quite a lot over this show, and at least two thirds of my tears are over Londo's story. The show is worth watching for him alone.
(Incidentally, the friend who introduced me to B5 told me that the fandom ships G'Kar/Londo something fierce. "I get it, I get it, they're enemies, of course that's going to happen, don't ever say anything that will make me picture Londo naked again," was basically my response. But I think I was operating without character-growth assumptions at the time. I am here to tell you that, especially in fourth season and after, I ship G'Kar/Londo with great passion. It's perfect. I'd watch a whole show just about them.
Also, the joke script that the showrunner wrote once is apparently full of G'Kar/Londo. I wonder how hard it is to get a transcript of that.)
In any case, those are my three favourite alien ambassadors in ever. They even come with aides! I don't love their aides with quite the same passion, but I'm pretty damn fond of them.
From the left, we have Lennier, Na'Toth, and Vir Cotto.
Lennier is very quiet and controlled and earnest. He cultivates polite but sincere friendships with everyone from Garibaldi (they build an antique motorcycle together) to Londo (Londo takes him out gambling in, one presumes, a misguided attempt to get Lennier out of his Minbari groove) to Vir (he and Lennier semi-regularly meet up at a bar to awkwardly not look at one another and exchange resigned stories about their respective ambassadors). Lennier is also madly in love with Delenn. Since I am too, I can sympathize with him on this; unfortunately, since they live in the same universe, it's a bit harder on him. I love Lennier, but with reservations. I'm always worried that at any moment he's going to snap.
Na'Toth is a total BAMF, which is why it's a damn shame that her actress couldn't deal with the prosthetics. Neither could the actress who replaced her, or maybe they realized that the second Na'Toth just wasn't as much of a BAMF. All I do know is that she's only around for a season and a bit, but that she nevertheless made an impression on me; she basically has her fierceness and awesomeness turned up to eleven at all times, and is deeply loyal to G'Kar at a time when he really needs it. I'm sad we couldn't have her for longer; I would've loved to see how the inclusion of Na'Toth would have influnced G'Kar's arc and its surrounding plotline.
Vir is probably my favourite of the aides, if only because he loves Londo unconditionally. Lennier loves Delenn unconditionally also, I'll grant you, but Delenn is easy to love; Londo, on the other hand, is often horrible. Vir can't completely save Londo -- there are times when I'll be yelling at the screen "There's another way! Turn back!" and Vir will actually turn up to say exactly the same thing, at which point Londo almost always ignores him -- but I think Londo makes it through the series with his soul as intact as it is because of Vir. Vir is absolutely culpable to some of Londo's atrocities, but he also tries to make things better in whatever small ways he can, and he slowly grows a spine, and by the time you see where his character journey has taken him, you believe it. Oh Vir. <3
Last in the picspam, I've got three more characters (why three? mostly, it worked out that way in a nice, elegant fashion) and they don't really fit in any of the other categories.
These handsome fellows are, from the left, Marcus Cole of the Rangers, Mr. Morden, and the Vorlon Ambassador Kosh.
Marcus is British, or at least his ancestors were, since he comes from a space colony. He too hails with a tragic backstory, one of the blessed few that does not feature a fridged woman. He is quite sarcastic, spiritual in spite of himself, excellent at Minbari combat techniques, and prone to doing awesome things like sing Modern Major General or think it's hilarious when he suddenly ends up in a Pretend to Be Married to Your Male Buddy plot. (This actually happens. I think I fell off something in shocked joy.) I still think Marcus' face looks funny, but then, something important is broken in my brain, because I find G'Kar kind of sexy. Anyway, moving on.
Mr. Morden is an associate of the Shadows, one of the more upsetting and epic-plot-arc-y aliens in the show. I love Morden. He smiles all the time. He always calls the Shadows "my associates" in a particular sort of calm, ominous voice. He's pleasant, and diplomatic, and he will RUIN YOUR LIFE, but he will make perfect motivational sense while doing so. Yay Morden!
Finally, we have Kosh. Kosh is hilarious. He always stays in his sparkly-carpet encounter suit. He smiles enigmatically by dilating the eyepiece in the suit. He sometimes glows mysteriously. Nothing he says quite makes sense to begin with; I believe everything he says is known as Koshisms, stuff like Paint on the brush does not guarantee art from the bristles and Understanding is a three-edged sword. It's pretty fabulous, and to my surprise, I grew to be immensely fond of Kosh and his absurd inscrutability.
I'm leaving out some fairly awesome secondary characters (a kickass lady resistance leader on Mars, a Narn warrior who becomes G'Kar's bodyguard, the BUGFUCK INSANE but strangely attractive Centauri emperor, some secondary love interests, &c) and even a fifth season regular, who I never felt I really got to properly know, but that's the main body of the cast.
The last thing I need to note about the cast is that, with a few exceptions, they're all truly excellent characters. In viewing mode, it just makes for great telly; in fannish mode, it means I ship everything. I don't know whether this is necessarily a selling point for everyone, but it made my watching just that much more awesome.
And, like I said, the show is great. It is not 100% great all the time, and depending on how the fandom is, I might [a] stay joyful forever about it, a la due South, or [b] start deconstructing its fails, of which it has quite a few, a la Doctor Who. In either case, while it isn't perfect, it's fucking fantastic, and especially if you think/know you share narrative kinks with me, you should run, not walk, to see it. It is a show of my heart.
dfljkdsjhsd time to pack for WisCon.
So there's this show. It ran on and off from 1993 to 1998, which makes me roughly as behind the curve in reporting my love for it as I was with due South. It almost got canceled quite a lot, and definitely almost got canceled between seasons four and five, which makes season four incredibly packed and season five incredibly not. It had fairly revolutionary effects for its time, being one of the first shows to rely a lot on CGI; the technology holds up abysmally, but I am given to believe that, aside from obligatory sound in space and your usual handwavey hyperspace travel, the physics holds up fairly well. The cast, including some of the main credit cast, has a tendency to get shuffled around a bit, with characters getting written out more or less gracefully. There is apparently a prank script where one of my OTPs got textually written; there are approximately a billion actual scripts where my other OTP was text for real.
Sometimes the things this show says make me uncomfortable; more often, the things it says and the way it articulates those things overjoys me. Sometimes the show kills its lesbians; more often, it passes the Bechdel test every time I've paid enough attention to test it out. Sometimes the show has characters or plotlines that bore me; much more often, I'm glued to the screen and will mainline six episodes a day because I desperately need to know what's going to happen.
The name of the show is Babylon 5, and I'm here to tell you why it's so awesome. Hopefully I can accomplish that without too many major spoilers, because I deeply enjoyed navigating the show blind.
As I said, the show isn't without its problems, but it's also a show that is tailored astonishingly towards hitting every narrative kink I have. It has awesome women! It has redemptive (and heartbreakingly irredemptive) arcs! It has some of the most well-done time travel plots I have had the pleasure to witness anywhere! It has a beautiful ability to look at all sides of literally any conflict, so that while not everyone is sympathetic to equal degrees, nothing and no one is just evil for the sake of it. It even, and this is kind of ridiculous, reminds me lots of Lord of the Rings -- aesthetically, but also in references, from the blatant-if-you-know-what-to-look-for (there's a group of warriors called the Rangers who, I can't even deal with it, wear green stone pins; a race of aliens called the Shadows have a home planet called Za'ha'dum) to the beautifully subtle (dying as going to the metaphorical Sea). Best of all, though, I love basically all of the major characters.
This brings us to the picspam portion of our evening!
First, we have the human command staff of the diplomatic space station Babylon 5.
From the left, we have, top row, Commander Jeffrey Sinclair, Commander Susan Ivanova, and Security Chief Michael Garibaldi; bottom row, Captain John Sheridan, Dr. Stephen Franklin, and Garibaldi's second-in-command Zack Allen.
Let me tell you a bit about them.
Sinclair has about a day's worth of memories missing from his life. This is, as you might imagine, a source of constant frustration and intrigue. Sinclair is a rampant idealist who is completely unqualified to run a diplomatic station. (On the other hand, virtually no one in the entire cast should be trusted with any sort of political power, and yet they all have it, which is one of the charming, hilarious, alarming things about the show.) Sinclair's actor, bless him, isn't really very good at it -- although he improves a bit in third season -- and he has a tendency to tread on other people's lines, but he's kind of endearing, and he is in possession of what me and a couple of my friends like to refer to as A Hero Voice. I'm quite fond of him.
Ivanova is my space girlfriend. End of story. She's a Russian Jew with a mildly tragic past, a tendency to bury her emotions under her work, and a strange penchant for getting invited to all the best alien parties and staggering out hours later covered in confetti. She's smart, she's sharp, she doesn't take shit from anyone, and at one point she announces a recitation of the Ivanova Is God mantra. Ivanova's actress starts out a little shaky, but she really comes through and in the process I fell madly in love with her.
Garibaldi is a character I sort of go back and forth on. He's consistent, and interesting, and sympathetic; he's a recovering alcoholic, hugely paranoid about everything, and likes to collect Daffy Duck memorabilia. Depending on my mood and on the season, I sometimes ship him with Sinclair, Franklin, Zack, or, to my horror, Londo, so he is kind of one of my little black dresses for this show. But a lot of the time, I have to watch Garibaldi through my hands, because he does a lot of stupid stuff that isn't quite painfully tragic enough for it to break my narrative kink barrier and go from "so stupid I want to shake him" to "so stupid I can't even see the screen through my tears of horror and joy." (Uh, I can say this definitively because this show also contains Londo, who is the ultimate litmus test in that second kind.)
Sheridan is my space boyfriend. The picture I have of him up there doesn't do him justice, because the man has this infectious, beaming grin, and I loved him in about five seconds flat. Unfortunately the narrative itself is also hugely in love with him, so he gets weird amounts of special treatment from the story, and the one time someone is properly skeeved by this, it turns out they're under mind control at the time. Nevertheless, Sheridan is pretty aces; he finds himself having to deal with a crazy situation that he's only sort of equipped to deal with, and he rises to the occasion quite well. Plus he has this thing about only being able to sleep while nervous if he can hear the sound of rain on a rooftop, which deeply endears him to me.
Franklin is probably my least favourite of the command staff, if only because his character is somewhat inconsistently written. The later the season, the more I like him, I think. Most of the good things I can say about him are character-arc spoilers, but I can tell you that he has a good bedside manner, and that I occasionally ship him like burning with Garibaldi, because they're usually good at making one another better, smarter people.
Zack is one of those sneaky side-characters who slowly becomes a major player. He's sweet, well-meaning, and definitely not as dumb as he first seems. His character-arc is also spoilery, but I love it every step of the way. Mostly I just want to give Zack a hug and lots of cookies.
Our remaining major human players are telepaths.
Telepaths: they're creepy.
From the left, we've got Lyta Alexander, Talia Winters, and Al Bester.
Lyta and Talia's actresses sort of ... learn how to act as the show goes on. Both of their characters have some fairly unfortunate and skeevy implications; I feel a bit squodgy and uncomfortable around most of the telepath-related plotlines, actually, and though I know that we the audience are supposed to feel uncomfortable, a lot of the time those plotlines -- and this is the exception rather than the rule with this show for me -- miss good-storytelling-uncomfortable and go right to "uhh please get this off my screen."
Bester, on the other hand, has all the good telepath plotlines, and he's absolutely amazing. Bester is almost entirely abhorrent -- he visibly gets off on the power he has, he personifies the telepath mentality that telepaths are in all ways above 'mundanes', he has a mildly tragic past that he is genuinely upset about but also knowingly uses as an angle -- but he's smart and awful and he makes me laugh. Bester is probably one of my favourite characters, but it's unsurprising, because I adore a good villain.
Next, we leave the human characters, go on to the alien ones, and, in coming to the three ambassadors from the major alien powers, we get to my three favourite characters on the show. Possibly they are some of my favourite characters ever, in fact. Brace yourselves for radioactive levels of sheer affection.
From the left: Delenn, of the Minbari Federation; G'Kar, of the Narn Regime; and Londo Mollari, of the Centauri Republic. Sweet mother of god I love these crazy kids.
Delenn is more badass than you. She is more badass than you will ever hope to be. She is more badass than Chuck Norris. She is mildly nuts; she's sometimes a zealot; she will win your fucking war for you. She's also beautiful, occasionally uses sexiness as a weapon to melt my brain, is endlessly kind and idealistic and nonjudgmental, has a subtle, wicked sense of humor, and can talk circles around nearly anyone. She's deeply flawed and utterly, utterly amazing. I wish I could say that she's my space girlfriend, but I will never be good enough for her. The show is worth watching for Delenn alone -- but I'm about to say that about G'Kar and Londo, too.
G'Kar starts the series embittered, militant, and foolish. His people and Londo's people hate one another; the Centauri have kept the Narn enslaved for some hundred years, and, new to freedom, G'Kar has some ... issues to work out. He blusters; he sometimes says incredibly smart, eloquent things; he will do anything to help his people, though he doesn't always go about it in the best way. I immediately liked him, because he had a sort of rough charm under the uncouthness and the (extremely understandable) anger. I'm still trying to avoid character-arc spoilers, but let me say that G'Kar does not end the series as any of the things he started it as, and that his arc fills me with glowing joy and occasionally happy tears. I love him. I absolutely adore him, and the show is worth watching for G'Kar alone.
Londo ... Londo breaks my heart into a million pieces. Repeatedly. He starts the series as a drunk buffoon in a joke of an ambassadorial position that no other Centauri wanted. His shoes are too tight, and he has forgotten how to dance, he says sometime in first season, and this holds, even when he starts to get power, ceases to be a joke, and slowly digs himself deeper and deeper into a place where redemption is nearly impossible. His character arc is a lot like what the Master from Doctor Who's is inside my head: every time he's presented with a choice that might save him, he believes it's already too late and goes deeper, usually while I yell at the screen in despair. This isn't to say he isn't also hilarious, and wicked smart, and loved, and redeemable. He's all those things. I could probably write reams and reams of meta about Londo. I've embarrassingly cried quite a lot over this show, and at least two thirds of my tears are over Londo's story. The show is worth watching for him alone.
(Incidentally, the friend who introduced me to B5 told me that the fandom ships G'Kar/Londo something fierce. "I get it, I get it, they're enemies, of course that's going to happen, don't ever say anything that will make me picture Londo naked again," was basically my response. But I think I was operating without character-growth assumptions at the time. I am here to tell you that, especially in fourth season and after, I ship G'Kar/Londo with great passion. It's perfect. I'd watch a whole show just about them.
Also, the joke script that the showrunner wrote once is apparently full of G'Kar/Londo. I wonder how hard it is to get a transcript of that.)
In any case, those are my three favourite alien ambassadors in ever. They even come with aides! I don't love their aides with quite the same passion, but I'm pretty damn fond of them.
From the left, we have Lennier, Na'Toth, and Vir Cotto.
Lennier is very quiet and controlled and earnest. He cultivates polite but sincere friendships with everyone from Garibaldi (they build an antique motorcycle together) to Londo (Londo takes him out gambling in, one presumes, a misguided attempt to get Lennier out of his Minbari groove) to Vir (he and Lennier semi-regularly meet up at a bar to awkwardly not look at one another and exchange resigned stories about their respective ambassadors). Lennier is also madly in love with Delenn. Since I am too, I can sympathize with him on this; unfortunately, since they live in the same universe, it's a bit harder on him. I love Lennier, but with reservations. I'm always worried that at any moment he's going to snap.
Na'Toth is a total BAMF, which is why it's a damn shame that her actress couldn't deal with the prosthetics. Neither could the actress who replaced her, or maybe they realized that the second Na'Toth just wasn't as much of a BAMF. All I do know is that she's only around for a season and a bit, but that she nevertheless made an impression on me; she basically has her fierceness and awesomeness turned up to eleven at all times, and is deeply loyal to G'Kar at a time when he really needs it. I'm sad we couldn't have her for longer; I would've loved to see how the inclusion of Na'Toth would have influnced G'Kar's arc and its surrounding plotline.
Vir is probably my favourite of the aides, if only because he loves Londo unconditionally. Lennier loves Delenn unconditionally also, I'll grant you, but Delenn is easy to love; Londo, on the other hand, is often horrible. Vir can't completely save Londo -- there are times when I'll be yelling at the screen "There's another way! Turn back!" and Vir will actually turn up to say exactly the same thing, at which point Londo almost always ignores him -- but I think Londo makes it through the series with his soul as intact as it is because of Vir. Vir is absolutely culpable to some of Londo's atrocities, but he also tries to make things better in whatever small ways he can, and he slowly grows a spine, and by the time you see where his character journey has taken him, you believe it. Oh Vir. <3
Last in the picspam, I've got three more characters (why three? mostly, it worked out that way in a nice, elegant fashion) and they don't really fit in any of the other categories.
These handsome fellows are, from the left, Marcus Cole of the Rangers, Mr. Morden, and the Vorlon Ambassador Kosh.
Marcus is British, or at least his ancestors were, since he comes from a space colony. He too hails with a tragic backstory, one of the blessed few that does not feature a fridged woman. He is quite sarcastic, spiritual in spite of himself, excellent at Minbari combat techniques, and prone to doing awesome things like sing Modern Major General or think it's hilarious when he suddenly ends up in a Pretend to Be Married to Your Male Buddy plot. (This actually happens. I think I fell off something in shocked joy.) I still think Marcus' face looks funny, but then, something important is broken in my brain, because I find G'Kar kind of sexy. Anyway, moving on.
Mr. Morden is an associate of the Shadows, one of the more upsetting and epic-plot-arc-y aliens in the show. I love Morden. He smiles all the time. He always calls the Shadows "my associates" in a particular sort of calm, ominous voice. He's pleasant, and diplomatic, and he will RUIN YOUR LIFE, but he will make perfect motivational sense while doing so. Yay Morden!
Finally, we have Kosh. Kosh is hilarious. He always stays in his sparkly-carpet encounter suit. He smiles enigmatically by dilating the eyepiece in the suit. He sometimes glows mysteriously. Nothing he says quite makes sense to begin with; I believe everything he says is known as Koshisms, stuff like Paint on the brush does not guarantee art from the bristles and Understanding is a three-edged sword. It's pretty fabulous, and to my surprise, I grew to be immensely fond of Kosh and his absurd inscrutability.
I'm leaving out some fairly awesome secondary characters (a kickass lady resistance leader on Mars, a Narn warrior who becomes G'Kar's bodyguard, the BUGFUCK INSANE but strangely attractive Centauri emperor, some secondary love interests, &c) and even a fifth season regular, who I never felt I really got to properly know, but that's the main body of the cast.
The last thing I need to note about the cast is that, with a few exceptions, they're all truly excellent characters. In viewing mode, it just makes for great telly; in fannish mode, it means I ship everything. I don't know whether this is necessarily a selling point for everyone, but it made my watching just that much more awesome.
And, like I said, the show is great. It is not 100% great all the time, and depending on how the fandom is, I might [a] stay joyful forever about it, a la due South, or [b] start deconstructing its fails, of which it has quite a few, a la Doctor Who. In either case, while it isn't perfect, it's fucking fantastic, and especially if you think/know you share narrative kinks with me, you should run, not walk, to see it. It is a show of my heart.
dfljkdsjhsd time to pack for WisCon.
no subject
no subject
no subject
Do you think captcha is trying to tell me something? my words are "crichton right" lol.
no subject
And YES, Ivanova/Marcus ftw! Actually, one of the things I love about B5 is that, while my shipping is skewed slightly in a slashy direction just because of the male-to-female character ratio, it isn't at all skewed by finding the male characters more full of depth, so there's also plenty of het. And occasionally canonical problematic femslash! Yaaay.
no subject
I wish they'd been able to keep Talya and Lyta up to the end of the Shadow War. I missed Talya, and I loved Lyta. Season 5 was rubbish, except for the Lyta bits, I thought. It suffered from a lack of Ivanova.
I'm delighted by your delight!
no subject
I know! I missed me some Talia, and then of course I also missed me some Ivanova. I wouldn't say that season five was entirely rubbish -- pretty much all of the G'Kar and Londo stuff had me, um, in tears, because that's how I roll -- but it was a lot more rubbish than seasons 2-4 were, definitely. Ah well.
*shares the delight!*
no subject
This. It's fairly obvious that the whole telepath plotline for season five was meant to be bounced of Ivanova; it falls utterly flat without her. But Sleeping in Light is incredible.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
I was always amazed by how seasons 3 and 4 just got great and never let up. I was compelled to keep watching in a way I haven't felt in a long time. Unfortunately, life intervened and I got marooned a few episodes into Season 5. I'm still only past the one from the point of view of the two maintenance workers. But I'm going to fix it! I've heard that the finale, Sleeping in Light, is one of the best things ever aired on television. I believe it.
I love every single character on that show. I can barely even pick favorites, because I keep thinking of others. I loved Marcus Cole, Delenn, and Sheridan a great deal, but I think that I'm going to have to go with Londo and G'Kar.
Wow this comment is way longer than I ever intended. One last thing, I wanted to make sure you knew about the following website: http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/ The episodes section has commentary on every single episode by J. Michael Straczynski. It's really good to read after watching each episode (maybe a future rewatch for you) and is good for newcomers because the commentary was done as each episode was aired - no spoilers for future episodes. Fun fact from that site: if Peter Jurasik ever had problems getting into character as Londo, all he had to do was say "MIster GariBALdi" and he was there.
Long comment from a stranger is long. Hope it wasn't too crazy. And I really did love your post. I've got it bookmarked for the next time I try to coerce a friend into watching. It's really hard to get friends to watch, but I think this post could make a difference.
no subject
You absolutely need to finish the show at some point! You have to slog through the telepath plotline for a little while, which is possibly one of the only tedious plotlines in the show's entire run, but Sleeping in Light is worth everything; just you mentioning it made me get a little teary. Plus, especially if your favourites are Londo and G'Kar, the second half of season five is mostly about them, and completely, heartbreakingly wonderful.
That link is awesome! Thanks so much for it; there goes even more of my free time, and I sacrifice it happily. :D
I hope that you can convert friends to watching the show with this post! And seriously, thanks for commenting. :)
no subject
Anyway, that was another long ramble from me. It's late and I'm emotionally drained, so it probably wasn't coherent, but I wanted to tell you that I finished the series. I'm not sure if you should be flattered or creeped out. :)
no subject
Please feel free to link this post! I'm all for you introducing this show to your friends, and if I can help out with that introduction, all the better. :)
no subject
no subject
I'm not sure it's actually possible to love characters more than I do a lot of the B5 ones. I can't even choose a favourite.
no subject
I've noticed that when I post about it (I posted episode reactions as I watched last spring/summer), people will come out of the woodwork and go "B5! Yay!", but there aren't that many fanworks being produced right now. Still, there's a not-zero number coming out;
(I've written a lot--well, a lot for me--of fic for it in the past year, mostly for my totally non-canon OTP of Ivanova/Garibaldi.)
I'm curious as to whether your site-wide search picked up anything awesome?
I did find a link to this awesome B5/Farscape mashup vid, but, uh, a lot of it seemed to be my voluminous ramblings. Plus several people making offhand references when they were talking about Doctor Who.
I'm not sure it's actually possible to love characters more than I do a lot of the B5 ones. I can't even choose a favourite.
Yeah, I can't think of any main/mainish character I don't love. (Exception: BYRON.) But Susan was my favorite when I was twelve, and she's still my favorite now. I just, I...she's so awesome.
no subject
YES. :D (And Byron doesn't count. FOR ANYTHING EVER.) I think my very favourite is Londo, because I imprinted on him in the pilot and then I could never not like him, and then he made me cry for two solid seasons, and I ... like it when fictional characters do that. But Susan is absolutely my space girlfriend and tied for very close second place with quite a few other characters.
no subject
:D They're all tagged here and at my LJ. I'm not entirely sure how much sense they make to someone not living in my head, but you're welcome to them.
You're welcome for the link! From what I can tell,
And Byron doesn't count. FOR ANYTHING EVER.
Oh, God. When I was suffering through his episodes, I kept yelling "Die in a fire, Byron!" at my computer. And lo and behold, he DID! That was the only time I ever liked him.
no subject
When I was suffering through his episodes, I kept yelling "Die in a fire, Byron!" at my computer. And lo and behold, he DID!
fsdklsdkfkds that was LITERALLY my experience with Byron, including it being almost word-for-word when I recount my experience to people. I wanted him to die in a fire, and then he DID! XD
no subject
I look forward to it, because I'm currently going through a bit of a B5 renaissance as I work on fic, and because I recently (like yesterday) pimped it out to
(Last year, I rewatched all of due South and did episode-by-episode meta. I am hugely tempted to do this for Babylon 5 also, but thankfully I don't have my hands on the DVDs right now, so I'm saving myself from that madness.)
I'd read it.
I just finished grad school, and am currently unemployed (I hope not for long), so I'm very, very tempted to watch the whole series again. Which one can do for free online, just so you know.
fsdklsdkfkds that was LITERALLY my experience with Byron, including it being almost word-for-word when I recount my experience to people. I wanted him to die in a fire, and then he DID! XD
Wasn't that fire amazing? That season had some good stuff in it, but I think it might actually have been my favorite moment. :D
no subject
no subject
You're in my network, and why do I have no B5 icons right now?
And
CaligulaCartagia. Way to go, Wortham Krimmer.What about Zathras? "Zathras is used to being beast of burden for other people's needs."
OMG! YOU CAN WATCH IT ONLINE???
Re: You're in my network, and why do I have no B5 icons right now?
Apparently you can watch it online! Way to go, WB website.
no subject
no subject
no subject
Your post makes me want to re-watch the whole thing over again. The show wasn't perfect, but it had so, so much good stuff to it, and so many good characters, with actual development and arcs and...basically, everything you've said here. YES.
Re the special effects, I remember when I got my DVDs I was horrified. I'd remembered the effects as being MUCH better when the shows were broadcast, and I couldn't believe my memory had been that bad. I found out later that they were better in broadcast format than on DVD. There's some technical info, for anyone interested in that kind of thing, here.
no subject
It is so incredibly rewatchable! ...So much that I am already doing a rewatch. *facepalm*
Huh! Well, I got used to the awful special effects, so it's not so bad. Besides, I regularly watch old school Doctor Who; I think I can handle it. :D
no subject
And thinking G'Kar is sexy does not indicate you're broken. It indicates good taste. Same of Delenn. ;)
no subject
I feel like finding any of the major alien characters sexy indicates good taste, but it is weird to explain that to people who have not yet come to know them. :D