I’ve always said that this isn’t the worst episode of B5 (IMO, ‘TKO’ takes that prize), but it’s certainly down the bottom.
- We see the first appearance of the ‘Archaeology will doom us all!’ plot.
- They make a big deal about the artefacts being in perfect condition, that ‘they could have been made yesterday’. Shame the prop department didn’t get the memo, and made them all look rusty and worn…
- As a couple of people have already mentioned, the IPX here doesn’t particularly resemble the IPX of later seasons. It doesn’t even make much sense here alone – if they’re the respectable front for a weapons lab, why can’t Dr. Franklin get any information on them? Either have a front or keep a low profile, don’t do both.
- The mentions of Ikara VII being invaded and destroyed a thousand years ago could be the first oblique reference to the Shadow War.
- Good thing the Ikarans went to the effort of programming one of their scientist’s minds into their weapons… imagine how long it’d take them to program a true AI capable of the complicated decision-making skills the weapon demonstrates! Blundering around, bellowing ‘PROTECT’ and destroying anything in your path – that’s the sort of intelligent behaviour you need an organic mind to produce!
- I’m not entirely convinced the analogy with racial purity really holds when you’re dealing with alien species. Granted, there’s a lot of genetic diversity within humanity, but it should be child’s play to create a definition of ‘pure human’ that includes all of h. sapiens and excludes every Minbari, Narn, Centauri and other products of completely alien evolutionary trees… It’s just nowhere near as absurd as trying to define a ‘pure’ form of an ethnic group within a species. (Well, alright, there might be issues with Minbari - but nobody knows that right now!)
- Franklin gets hit by the Ikaran weapon, and gets knocked out for a few hours. A couple of lurkers get hit, and are reduced to a pile of ash. Sinclair gets hit and just gets right up again. I can generally tolerate and ignore limited main character shielding, but this is a particularly blatant example.
- I think this is the only mention that Garibaldi was in the Minbari War, yes? Was he just stationed on a base somewhere, or did he actually see action?
- Monroe’s still one of the iconic figures of popular culture in the twenty-third century?
- Hey, it’s the floating cameras from ‘The Gathering’! Do they ever reappear?
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2009-02-16 04:07 am (UTC)- We see the first appearance of the ‘Archaeology will doom us all!’ plot.
- They make a big deal about the artefacts being in perfect condition, that ‘they could have been made yesterday’. Shame the prop department didn’t get the memo, and made them all look rusty and worn…
- As a couple of people have already mentioned, the IPX here doesn’t particularly resemble the IPX of later seasons. It doesn’t even make much sense here alone – if they’re the respectable front for a weapons lab, why can’t Dr. Franklin get any information on them? Either have a front or keep a low profile, don’t do both.
- The mentions of Ikara VII being invaded and destroyed a thousand years ago could be the first oblique reference to the Shadow War.
- Good thing the Ikarans went to the effort of programming one of their scientist’s minds into their weapons… imagine how long it’d take them to program a true AI capable of the complicated decision-making skills the weapon demonstrates! Blundering around, bellowing ‘PROTECT’ and destroying anything in your path – that’s the sort of intelligent behaviour you need an organic mind to produce!
- I’m not entirely convinced the analogy with racial purity really holds when you’re dealing with alien species. Granted, there’s a lot of genetic diversity within humanity, but it should be child’s play to create a definition of ‘pure human’ that includes all of h. sapiens and excludes every Minbari, Narn, Centauri and other products of completely alien evolutionary trees… It’s just nowhere near as absurd as trying to define a ‘pure’ form of an ethnic group within a species.
(Well, alright, there might be issues with Minbari - but nobody knows that right now!)
- Franklin gets hit by the Ikaran weapon, and gets knocked out for a few hours. A couple of lurkers get hit, and are reduced to a pile of ash. Sinclair gets hit and just gets right up again. I can generally tolerate and ignore limited main character shielding, but this is a particularly blatant example.
- I think this is the only mention that Garibaldi was in the Minbari War, yes? Was he just stationed on a base somewhere, or did he actually see action?
- Monroe’s still one of the iconic figures of popular culture in the twenty-third century?
- Hey, it’s the floating cameras from ‘The Gathering’! Do they ever reappear?