"The Quality of Mercy" discussion

[ruuger]

This is the discussion post for the episodes 1X21, "The Quality of Mercy". Spoilers for the whole of the series, including the spin-offs and tie-ins, are allowed here so newbies beware.

Summary:

Talia is helping with the trial of a murderer, while Franklin investigates a healer working in DownBelow.

Extra reading:

The article for "The Quality of Mercy" at Lurker's Guide.

Note! Based on the results of the poll earlier this week, I'm no longer making a 'no spoilers' posts for the episodes as no-one was using them.

Comments

[lazulidragon.livejournal.com]

I...I had a whole comment typed out, and LJ ate it. Ugh. Here we go, from the top:

As others have said, the "death of the personality" concept was never really explored to the fullest extend of its creepiness, which is a shame. Stephen seems to equate death of personality to actual death, and the guy in "Passing Through Gethsemane" also believes it's wrong, but everyone else seems surprisingly normal about it, which I find to be rather squicky. When the Psi Corps reprograms dying people and inserts sleeper personalities into their own, it's universally horrifying, and everyone is suitably horrified. Yet somehow, doing the same thing to murderers is a-okay? It just seems like an odd choice, especially considered the way a lot of normals feel about telepaths in general. I mean, half the reason Psi Corps exists is because non-telepaths are afraid of having their minds violated, right? Because even if you have nothing, nothing else, you still have your thoughts. And yet they have a procedure--no idea how common it actually is, but from the way Talia talks, it certainly isn't uncommon--where a person's thoughts aren't just read, they're eradicated. I guess I don't quite swallow that a people so divided over psi issues thinks this is a good idea.

Also, is there no such thing as an insanity plea anymore?

On a mostly unrelated not, I wonder what happens to the judge/court system after B5 breaks from Earth?

Holy hell that woman is scary when she flips the switch on the machine. I feel like some of her guilt after the fact probably stems from, not that she killed someone, but that she did it with such...verve?

Stephen goes through a lot of women over the course of this show. I guess it stands out against the variety of longer-lived relationships everyone else on the command staff seems to have.

Oh God, Londo saying "touch this" and gesturing to his midsection, I did not catch that before!

I love it when Lennier just wipes the floor with people in fights. He may not be warrior caste, but his self-defense training was obviously pretty vigorous. It also makes his eventual success in the Rangers a lot more believeable.

Hey, the statue of Li has little indentations on the back for the female genitalia! I didn't catch that before, either.

Apparently Minbari count the same way hobbits do? Eleventy-whatever. Huh.

A part of me wonders how Londo managed to pick up cards with that tentacle, but another part just really, really does not want to know.

Despite the weirdness of the A-plot, I actually liked this episode. There were some nice character moments, and of course Londo and Lennier completely stole the show. I think I had more to say, but I've forgotten it all by now.