The Shadows may be gone but their allies remain, someone is not who they seem to be, and we’ve got our Bester friend back into the fold. Welcome my friends. This is the story of the last of the Babylon stations. The year is 2261. The place: Babylon 5.
Spoilers ahead.
1. Buck Tarlson on ISN
I was a bit worried last time that we wouldn’t have a clear direction for the show now that the Shadow War had ended. Well, it seems like my worries were unfounded because there was at least one big, glaring issue yet to be dealt with: Clark’s Earth. While most of “Epiphanies” focuses on the Psi-corps side of things, we do get a small glimpse into what’s going on on Earth and how the ongoing tensions between B5 and Earth Gov is framed via the newly propagandized ISN.
Now, last time I talked about ISN at length, I briefly discussed the history of CNN & 24 news in America and then made an oblique reference to Fox News again when ISN returned as a 100% propaganda network. Well, ISN is back and I felt the need to spend an entire thought on it because I continue to be curious what this would have looked like 5 or even 10 years into the future.
For example, if ISN were not a CNN analog and rather a Fox analog, would we have even had the “storming of the gates” and the one-month shut-down or would the hosts have quietly changed their stances and any who did not would have gotten pushed out? Would these newscasts have retained the veneer of objectivity despite being bald-faced propaganda or would it have gone full Tucker Carlson and just made shit up to get people angry? What would the criticisms have been before the drastic and dramatic fall and what would it look like after?
I keep thinking about this because when I wrote about ISN’s return in September 2020, I hadn’t considered what it might look like as an independent but complicit actor. If it was motivated not by telling the news, flawed as it may have been, but by what was most profitable in pushing its ideological sphere. When I first wrote about ISN, we had yet to have a network completely launder an impeachment in conjunction with the administration. By the second time, that had happened and we were four years into having what was effectively state-media and had yet to even (seriously) consider that a second impeachment might happen, the impetus for which would be over something that a network almost certainly had a hand in fomenting (and continues to foment with false, misleading, and non-existent claims of widespread voter fraud.
What I’m trying to get at, beyond processing *gestures broadly*, is how the ISN broadcast somehow feels quaint today despite being a very accurate understanding of both what a traditional Propaganda TV station looks like and how even our regular news media institutions emulate aspects of ISN, especially when they are deprived of the resources to chase down leads and dig past the surface of press releases. It’s a complicated feeling. More at 11.
2. I’m a Sleeper. You’re A Sleeper. Everyone’s a Sleeper
So, despite being 100% wrong about nearly everything related to Garibaldi in “The Summoning”, I did correctly clock that he is a sleeper agent! Just…not for the Shadows.
Psi-Corps seems to have wanted someone on the inside causing chaos and undermining things on the station and, if I’m reading things right, they picked up Garibaldi after getting lost in space. That would track with all the secrecy and death and why they kept asking him questions. Hell, the questions may have been a way to keep him from opening up about his capture by making him paranoid about what is real and what is not. If we’re dealing with the Psi Corps then nothing is off the table with regards to mind games.
Speaking of mind games, Garibaldi retiring suddenly after just having been itching to get back to work raises every red flag in the book. He wouldn’t suddenly make that decision unless either A) something was wrong or B) something was really wrong. I suspect the others will start to pick up on this. My guess is that the Psi Corps programming made him do this in order to weaken the internal structure of B5 rather than for him to act as a spy, reporting back to the Corps. Why else remove your mole from the center of things?
Continued belowI also love how Doyle changed his demeanor ever so slightly to indicate that something was off when he came in to retire. It felt odd, it seemed odd, and it is odd. I hope this means that someone else will clock it for what it is, before he does anything they’ll all regret.
3. Thank You. Thank You Very Much.
I love me a good gag, especially when the punchline is a complete non-sequitur, and Straczynski absolutely delivered with the tried-and-true “well things can’t get any weirder.” Zach Allen training a bunch of new recruits how to work the customs check-in at the space gate was already a fun scene when Londo arrived and made Zach’s day just that little bit more miserable; it helped that Londo got to be his old, biting self rather than the pensive, nervous wreck he was back on Centauri Prime. It was made even better when Bester came on board asking for his special room in the bring, which we already knew was going to happen just like with Londo, as we’d previously had a groundwork laying scene for each of them. But then came the kicker. Zach leaves only for this trio to arrive.
Yup. A trio of Elvises just kinda…wander onto the station. I laughed so hard despite it not even really being that funny of a reveal. It’s just so weird and out there! I love it. I missed this kind of levity from Babylon 5 and I didn’t even know it.
4. Bester is More of A Psycho Pass Fan Than an Akira Fan
Bester’s relationship to the B5 crew continues to be one of the most complex and interesting of the recurring baddies. He’s often aligned with the crew against…someone else but is always working his own angles. He’s got the double, triple, quadruple cross all ready to deploy at a moment’s notice, as evidenced by the absolutely chilling speech he makes at the end. He may love the woman trapped in cryo but he remains a cruel person and Walter Koenig sells every second of it. What’s even more fascinating is that the speech is prompted by the loss of whatever tech was on Z’Ha’Dum that could’ve saved her, which in turn only happened because Lyta picks up on his cruelty and detonates the planet with her super special Vorlon-enhanced psychic powers.
I love both Lyta & Besters arcs this week, as we get to see them both as complicated humans that in one moment we can sympathize with and in another we fear. Lyta getting chewed out by Sheridan makes me worry that Lyta’s trust in the crew will be worn away. That was rough what he did! It’s in character, and she should have briefed you so that the ship wasn’t caught off guard, but damn Sheridan, did you have to basically threaten her? But then we get Zach making good on his pizza promise from earlier and it seems like that’s less likely to happen.
And hey, she’s got stuff again! Plus she got to psychically slap Bester. That’s always so satisfying to watch.
5. The Curtains Must Be Fuschia or Heads Will Roll
My favorite Centauri, the Minister Milo Virini, is finally getting the respect he deserves! After Londo goes back to B5 to hide, essentially, Virini is made regent until such a time as a new Emperor can be placed on the throne. We don’t see a lot of it but I’m so glad he’s getting to stick around. His nervous disposition and over-the-top…well, everything, is such a joy to watch and I can’t think of anyone better to be a figurehead than him.
Well, that is until he gets the control alien stuck on his neck by one of the “Allies” Morden yelled about last time. Poor Virini. I guess we are still on the timeline that leads to Londo on the throne, sad, overlooking a burnt out Centauri Prime. And here I was, deluding myself into thinking that because we missed it last time, it wasn’t going to happen at all. I should know better by now.
Continued belowThat about does it for now. Join me again in a week for ISN doing a hit piece on B5, the hope and promise of fairness, and maybe something more sinister on the station where everything changed in the year of destruction and rebirth.
This is Elias. Signing out.
Best Line of the Night:
Bester: “The Corps is mother. The Corps is father.”
Lyta: “In that case, I’m an Orphan.”
