"Movements of Fire and Shadow" discussion

[ruuger]

This is the discussion post for the episode 5x17, "Movements of Fire and Shadow". Spoilers for the whole of the series, including the spin-offs and tie-ins, are allowed here so newbies beware.

Summary:
The hostilities between the Centauri and the Alliance continue. Lyta and Franklin conduct their own investigations on the Drazi homeworld.

Extra reading:
The article for "Movements of Fire and Shadow" at The Lurker's Guide.

Comments

[selenak.livejournal.com]

And the beautiful heartbreak continues. But before speaking about the Centauri Prime scenes: let's hear it for Vir! Who may not have as much screentime this season as in previous ones, but is as brave and smart and compassionate as ever.

No matter my lack of fondness for the Byron plot, Bester scenes aside, I do like where it leaves Lyta, because there is a symmetry here, a cycle completed. You know from the moment she refuses to do any more free favours (as opposed to s4 or even early s5 when Garibaldi asked her to go to the telepaths) that she really has moved to a different emotional place, and when she forces the Drazi to shoot himself AFTER he and the others have been incapacitated, simply because she can and because he attacked her and Franklin earlier, it's completely a Bester thing to do. Note she's entirely clad in black leather by now. The irony of Lyta becoming basically Bester's mirror image (not completely; hence her accepting G'Kar's offer in the end) has always appealed to me.

Now: Centauri Prime. I so love that even in this dark time, basically five minutes before the tragedy of Londo's life comes to its climax, JMS allows Londo and G'Kar to be both funny and tragic. (Though the later Farscape makes the vomit scene look tame.*g*) The emotional continuity - Londo muttering Adira's name when anaesthesized - and Damien Hirst as the Regent, here and at the start of the next episode, making a character who started out as a bit part and comic relief heartbreaking in his own right - and Londo finally facing his worst nightmare, death and destruction reigning on his home world: it's all so incredibly well done. In that gut wrenching kind of way tragedies are.

We're coming full circle here with the Narn and Drazi attack on Centauri Prime of course, not only with the Centauri conquest of the Narn Homeworld but earlier than that, the two bookends of season 1, the Narn attacking a Centauri civilian outpost at the start of s1 and the Shadows at the request of Londo attacking a Narn outpost at the end. It also shows how unstable the new Alliance yet is (and, err, makes a case for those historians in The Deconstruction of Falling Stars re: Sheridan's abilities as President at least early on). Not unrealistic and not surprising, but does push that new age promised in various credit narrations a bit further into the future yet.

[alexcat.livejournal.com]

More of the end coming.

Londo and G'kar make us laugh one more time though. It is rather ironic that Londo finds the only person he can trust is G'kar but that has actually been true for a very long time. Londo is a patriot and it shows here in this episode most of all, I think.

The Drazi are simply annoying as hell to me. If the Shadows had not chosen the Cantauri and instruments of their evil the Drazi certainly had to be the next in line. What an ugly world they live in too.

Franklin and Lyta - I like Franklin even when he's aggravating and I really enjoyed him in this episode. He might be a doctor but he is no wallflower when it comes to being tough when he has to be even though he was taken aback by Lyta and her powers. I knew they should have shot her a long time ago... But we all know how much I like Teeps.

Vir is great with his simple goodness. He knows what should be done and does it, while still being loyal to Londo though maybe not the government on Centauri Prime so much.

Lennier's slide into darkness is pushed farther along when Sheridan sends Delenn on such a dangerous mission... of course we know what happens. I am not crazy over Lennier at this pioint anyway because he seems to have actually changed too much to be beleivable by this time though I suppose it can bhe argued that one can see it coming gradually if you know what to look for all through the last two seasons.

[dragonladyk.livejournal.com]

I knew they should have shot her a long time ago...

I love Lyta to pieces, but I freely admit it's in spite of the fact she can be incredibly, incredibly stupid.

Susan's the only teep in the show with a fully-functional brain. And she's barely a telepath.

DragonLady

[widsidh.livejournal.com]

I've had to do some catching up and have watched the latest two episodes back to back (a few days ago), so apologies if they merge in my mind a bit.

Most of the pertinent things have been said by now - asusual, thanks to both of you, so here are some small obseravtions:

I like the little alien abduction scene with Londo. I uses all the cliches so deftly and I am still not entirely sure if it really happens.
But I am sure it is no coincidence that at the satrt of the sequence he asks "Who are you - what do you want?"
Unfortunately, the drakh makeup is so much less scary than the special effect originally used (although apparently that had been used to cover up an even more questionale design...).

It has only just occurred to me from reading alexcat's comment, but Vir and Lennier actually somehow seem to counterpoint each other. Vir has always been the slightly awkward naive Everyman who is not quite sure why he ended up where he is, while Lennier was busy presenting an admirable and efficient image of (near-)perfection in his role. Now both are being put under considerable stress and away from their mentors, their roles flip. Vir copes admirably, sees clearly, and finally becomes the man he was destined to be, while Lennier cracks and loses his way.
(says something about JMS)

One note on last week's ep and discussion: I think Garibaldi's role in this season (as in the previous one) is to be the weak link. In S4 it was not his fault, but now it is not clear. Is it his fault, or is the personal fallout from back then too much for anyone to handle? If the latter, why is he in office? (which then brings us to Sheridan's shortcomings as a politician...on which see selenak's post).

[selenak.livejournal.com]

re: Garibaldi - I actually like his storyline this season, or rather, I think Garibaldi is one of the best portraits of an alcoholic in genre tv, and also this storyline makes up for the s1 episode "Survivors" where he falls off the wagon and gets back on it in record time, just one episode, and that's how alcoholism all too often is dealt with. Whereas with Garibaldi you can see it's a struggle (and the fact that Garibaldi first befriends drinks-like-a-fish Londo and then also-not-an-abstinent G'Kar is fascinating in that regard as well) to stay sober, it ties with his paranoia and general control issues which are character traits, and that he finally falls off the wagon again not directly after the s4 events (he didn't take to drink then) but after finding out that there is seemingly no way he can get revenge, that in some way he's still under Bester's control - that really made sense and worked for me. Precisely because it also came in combination of Garibaldi NOT gtting his old job back (which Zack has now), something he's familiar and comfortable with, but a new one with far wider responsibilities and apparantly no balancing or checking mechanism. Recipe for disaster, there we have it.

Otoh that Sheridan gave him that job - well, presumably Sheridan thought that if he could go from commanding a space station and being a military leader in a war situation to being a peace time president of a multi-planet alliance, why shouldn't Garibaldi make it to galactic spymaster as well? Which, well. (On a Doylist level this is JMS' problem of writing an essentially conservative narrative - the hero becomes king, the people rejoice, only villains are against him - as a story with political systems that are supposedly at least parliamentarian and where leaders are politicians who should face being questioned and doubted, and being a good battle commander by no means qualifies you to be a good democratic leader or gives you administrative talents.) More seriously, though, given that Sheridan goes from being tortured to being fine and dandy again with seemingly no interruptions, it's no wonder it doesn't occur to him that Garibaldi, someone with a history of substance abuse who just was through a horrifying experience of having his mind under control, should get therapy, not unchecked responsibility.

[widsidh.livejournal.com]

Thank you, well put.
This analysis deserves (appreciative) comment, but nothing interlligent comes to mind :-)

The hero to king ting is of course archetypal, thus going even beyond conservative storytelling. This is part of what makes B5 at interesting: the way its various arcs manage to mix mythology and political narrative, largely successfully. Which in turn underlines your point about (archetypal) Sheridan not anticipating the road that (human) Garibaldi is about to take.
As for real life war-leaders who are not peace-time politicians compare Churchill...