"Walkabout" discussion

[ruuger]

This is the discussion post for the episode 3X18 "Walkabout". Spoilers for the whole of the series, including the spin-offs and tie-ins, are allowed here so newbies beware.

Summary:
Kosh' replacement arrives on B5, Sheridan and Lyta test Shadows' weakness, and Franklin tries to find himself on a walkabout in Downbelow.

Extra reading:
The article for "Walkabout" at Lurker's Guide.

Comments

[ruuger]

This has been bothering me all morning, and both Lurker's Guide and JMSNews fail me, but hasn't JMS said that Franklin's walkabout was based on his own experiences? Or am I just thinking about the mugging in "The Face of the Enemy"?

[phoenix-silaqui.livejournal.com]

No, I definitely remember him talking about that at some time. That sometimes, you just need to walk away from stuff for awhile and put things in perspective.

It could be in commentary, something he said off the cuff on the old fan club website, or in a documentary/dvd extra.

He could have been talking about both episodes stemming from the same experience also.

[algeh]

JMS talks about this starting on page 44 of volume 7 of the script books. Since he keeps on talking about it until page 48 of the book, that seems like too much to reasonably reproduce here and keep it under "fair use" even in the context of a review, but an brief summary would be that he talks about how his time with a cult ended badly, and he considers himself to have been going on Walkabout himself in some pretty bad neighborhoods after that much like Franklin did, leading to getting badly injured in a mugging. If you're really interested I suggest getting your hands on a copy of the book somehow, because he (obviously) goes into a lot more detail than I just did.