b5_revisited | The Gathering

The Gathering

The Gathering recap and discussion from last rewatch is here. It will give you the basic plot along with some quotes and a few screencaps. You can read it to refresh your memory if you didn’t get a chance to rewatch this episode.

I came to B5 after it was done. A friend recced it and even sent homemade video tapes of Season 1 because I’m not sure that videos were even available at that time. She sent me Season 1 with a photocopied version of the book “Signs and Portents” with an episode by episode guide (https://www.fantasticfiction.com/k/jane-killick/signs-and-portents.htm). The rest of the series was being shown every night at 7pm on Scifi (as it was called then). After only a few episodes, I was hooked – that was about 20 years ago.

I’m still hooked.

How different would it have been with the pilot cast? The standout to me of the lost ones was Dr. Kyle, though he did seem kind of strange in retrospect. I love Pat Tallman, but I never liked Lyta (or any telepath) to be honest. Laurel Takashima was such a small blip on my radar that I never noticed that she was there, or not there. To find out later that she was supposed to be the inside man was rather odd (Or even to see hints that Susan Ivanova was a spy later). The there’s Carolyn who even seems to know Delenn quite well.

Did you all notice that there were more alien ‘looking’ aliens in the pilot? Not just G’kar and Delenn, but all over the station, there were more aliens. One can assume that the reason there were less after is money. What other differences popped out at you right away? Another thing I noticed was the C&C was dark in The Gathering but was bright in the rest of the show.

What signs and portents did you catch in this first episode? I swear I never noticed Kosh calling Sinclair “Ent’il’zah Valen’ before! Maybe I just never actually understood what he said…

Anything else you want to bring up, feel free to do so. We are adults and unless the discussion gets ugly or personal, I see no reason to limit topics as long as they pertain to Babylon 5.

This is the original version of the beginning:

"babylon 5 "the gathering" intro (original)" (Watch on YouTube)

This is the ‘special edition’ intro:

"Babylon 5 gathering Londo intro TNT special edition" (Watch on YouTube)

Some photos of the cast who we never saw again:
Dr. Kyle:

Carolyn:

Laurel Takashima:

Lyta:

And really alien G’kar:

And Delenn:

Your turn!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Kosh calling Sinclair "Valen" was added in the recut version, rather controversially.

I did not know that and am glad yo pointed it out.

Carolyn Sykes was never my jam - she was good, but didn't stand-out for me. But maybe that's just because I wound up liking Catherine Sakai so much. I did like that their relationship felt unfinished and on the closed side by the end of the pilot: "I'll wait, but I won't wait forever," she says. It makes a really graceful exit for the actress (who never came back).

Laurel Takashima, on the other hand, I absolutely would have wanted more of. I love Ivanova too, I just. Want them both lol. To have someone be the turncoat all along and score an eleventh hour betrayal is something I really adore, though, so I'm on board from the trope alone.

I adored Gathering!Lyta <3 wish we could've had her Gathering hairstyle back but I also love her later-seasons hair too. I think I recall a convo with

janetcarter who mentioned (with all their dark canon knowledge) that Pat Tallman had been the intended telepath actress all along but had been dropped at the studio/executive level, and it all played out during a weekend while JMS was away. Very sneaky.

I liked Dr Kyle, but Franklin made a far better doctor character imo. It was like the difference between Erick Avari vs Sendhil Ramamurthy in Heroes - I know the original was supposed to be the wise old man but the younger more hotheaded character was such a fantastic fit, it's hard to imagine the original. The role of the ship's head of medical staff wouldn't've been quite the same with Kyle. I feel like he would've gotten help for his habit earlier than Too Proud To Ask For Help Franklin did.

One thing about Delenn's more alien makeup is that it seems so close to G'Kar's - chin, eyebrow, cheekbone prosthetics. I could grow to like it, and I like how very alien it makes her look wrt the Season 2 makeup - that would make a significant change and from a worldbuilding standpoint I can see how the Minbari would've been disturbed whereas as it stood, the change from S1 to S2 was like, she didn't change all that much, she just has hair now.

G'Kar is G'Kar, his role didn't change at all :'D but I did love his early seasons backstabbery potential. It makes his later arc that much stronger.

The original music though.... I'm really glad Christopher Franke took over.

Spoilers are fine... I assume that we're all B5 veteran fans by now.

I always did like Franklin. I know some fans sort of considered him the pretty boy or something though I liked his character. It's kinda tropey with him being an officer's peace-nik son but he was a good voice of conscience for the show sometimes.

I loved Sinclair though he did always come off a bit stiff.

I always thought the whole story fo B5 was really all about Londo and G'kar and their changes from beginning to end and the consistent theme of their love and commitment to the good of their people and perhaps ultimately, what they were willing sacrifice for those people.

[]that Pat Tallman had been the intended telepath actress all along but had been dropped at the studio/executive level, and it all played out during a weekend while JMS was away. Very sneaky.

That's interesting, I had heard that Pat Tallman was unavailable because she was pregnant, which happened during that unexpected 2 year delay between the pilot and season 1 getting picked up. But there was a lot of executive meddling going on with casting as well.

I too came very late to B5. I binge-watched most of it on Netflix around 2011, but they took it off of streaming before I finished season 5. They didn't have any of the movies, so I wound up watching them much later and completely out of order. It's kind of interesting to come back to the pilot, but it's never going to be my favorite installment and I don't have many strong feelings on it.

I do wish we had seen more of Takashima, though. Her actress got screwed over by executive meddling from the start. The producers found her delivery too cold or hard, and so made her redub her lines to make them 'softer', then they decided they couldn't take her seriously as a military officer, so she got replaced by Ivanvoa. There's some interesting kernels of characterization there, her "It's been a long time since I've broken the rules" speech when she just got done telling Kyle about her illicit coffee plants had a lot of potential. In some ways she seems more like a proto-Lochley than a proto-Ivanova.

Garibaldi is the only human character to make it from the pilot through all 5 seasons.

G'Kar and Londo at least are very much themselves right off the bat.

It is very interesting that you called Takashima a proto-Lochley, but accurate, I think. I'd never thought about her that way.

I don't think I saw The Gathering until much later either. It's kind of odd, even Londo's voice is a bit tinnier or something in the lead-in.

The Gathering - The Pilot

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(i'm assuming we can talk spoilers, but let me know if not and I'll edit my comment)

Re: (i'm assuming we can talk spoilers, but let me know if not and I'll edit my comment)

Re: (i'm assuming we can talk spoilers, but let me know if not and I'll edit my comment)

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