S3E14 - Gone Full Borg - podcast episode cover

S3E14 - Gone Full Borg

Feb 22, 202338 minEp. 66
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Episode description

Join Laura and Xhafer, two internet strangers as they get to know each other while making jokes about one of their favorite TV shows from their childhood, Babylon 5.

Xhafer wants to play some disc golf. Bester returns to B5 to propose an alliance while he pursues a ship full of missing telepaths in Babylon 5, Season 3 Episode 14: Ship of Tears.

Transcript

Laura

Hello and welcome to, who Are You? It's a Babylon five watch cast by a couple of former strangers, now friends who are continuing to get to know each other over one of their favorite shows from their childhood, Babylon. Five. I'm Laura,

Xhafer

and I'm.

Laura

and today I get to ask Ja Fare. What do you want?

Xhafer

Well right now I'm really looking forward to some warmer weather.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

it was 18 here in Michigan, last week in, in the southeast Michigan area. It happens to be warmer than that right now. It's above freezing. It was actually raining instead of snowing earlier

Laura

Oh, nice. Yeah.

Xhafer

And it's supposed to be 40 for a couple of days to my understanding of things this week. And I'm really looking forward to that because the disc golf season is upon us. And I don't know if I've talked about disc golf. I don't think I've maybe mentioned it maybe once or twice on pod. But I do disc golf as a hobby. I'm.

Laura

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer

But I enjoy it. It, it's guided hiking. And I do follow like the professional scene. Like I'll sit down and I'll watch pro disc golf.

Laura

So what is the Pro Disc golf season?

Xhafer

the pro disc golf season is gonna start, I think, officially with the Las Vegas Open in like a month. And so we are in the pre-season zone right now, which is when all of the pros are changing their contracts around and stuff.

Laura

They have contracts. Nice. Good for

Xhafer

are at least two players with million dollar a year contracts to play

Laura

Wow. Okay.

Xhafer

And some of them make significantly more than that based off of disk sales. So how pro disk golf works, there's not really teams, right? It's an individual sport, but a lot of the big disk manufacturers are sponsoring players.

Laura

Makes.

Xhafer

And so I have a, like brand or two of disk that I tend to throw. I tend to prefer that lineup. For a couple of reasons. I won't get into the minutiae of it, but I throw MVP in Axiom mostly if you happen to be involved in no Disc golf. Part of that is they're local for me,

Laura

Uhhuh

Xhafer

they're a nationalist golf company that happens to be based out of around my area. And then also they do a couple different things with their DISC technology. uh, Helps I think new players specifically really. And then so that's kind of what I gravitated to. And then also a lot of, like when I was first getting started, none of the like, things about disks made sense to me.

and they were the only manufacturer that had like a, this is what it looks like when you throw it from an overhead view like chart of all of the disks. And that visual representation just clicked with my brain. And so I'm like, oh, so I want one of these and one of these and one of these for these types of shots, right? And so I got started with them because of that, and I have just stuck with it now.

But we're in that timeframe where the pro disk golfers are, if they are going to change their contracts for the year, they do it before the season starts. So one of my favorite disc golfers just changed over to throwing the manufacturer that I throw and being sponsored by my favorite manufacturer. So I'm like all hype up here about it. So I did my uh, pre-season purchasing and I bought five discs the other day, which is like a hundred bucks.

The cool thing about disc golf that you don't get in a lot of other sports is everyone at every level is using the same equipment.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

Like there is no like magic $500 thousand dollars disc that the pros throw that make them better. They're throwing the same $20 pieces of plastic that everyone else is,

Laura

Right

Xhafer

They're just better at. And then a lot of the disk golfers, the prodi golfers' income and their ability to tour comes from releasing disks with their name on it. They'll have like a tour, almost every sponsored player for one of the major companies has a tour disc, which is just their favorite disk with their name on it, or maybe a special little like logo or something. And then the like super high end, like a handful of like the super elite disc golf scene guys will have, and.

Will have their own line of diss that they help design with the companies that they're sponsored by.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

And so at the start of the season, I have a couple dis golfers that I'm a big fan of. I'll usually buy a couple of their diss because it actually is like the, those sales are what enables them to actually go out on tour. Cuz most dis golfers make enough to get by and, you know, support their family and stuff. but only a couple are driving nice cars like

Laura

Yeah. Yeah. Everybody else has a Camry, right?

Xhafer

Yeah, pretty, there's a lot of that. And a lot of cohabitating on tour and stuff to reduce costs. So I do try to make a point of throwing a couple bucks in my favorite player's pockets by buying their diss in the preseason, and that was this time of year I just made that purchase that I make at the start of every season. So I'm real anxious to go out and. And I watched a lot of videos about my form and stuff, and I, I found a thing.

I found I, I made a slight change to my practicing my uh, driving form that I haven't been able to actually go out and implement with an actual disc in my hand. But I can already tell, it just feels so much smoother. I'm really excited to just get out to like the park down the street and just throw like 30 discs in a row and just get a feel for it.

Laura

we have a big city park that's very close to us and it has a big disc golf course, and I always feel very sorry for anyone who is. Dis golfing in Oklahoma City because of our wind situation. I can't imagine that that is a very fulfilling hobby here. oh my gosh.

Xhafer

There are a couple places even out that way. Like Emporia, Kansas is a really big disc golf town.

Laura

Yeah, I could see that being another windy place. Windy problem.

Xhafer

notoriously windy place.

Laura

Yeah. If you ever come visit, you're gonna have to, we're gonna have to go out there and give it a shot, cuz I'm very curious as to what your opinion would be.

Xhafer

That is something that I like to do when I travel,

Laura

Yeah, of course. Try out all the disc golf courses.

Xhafer

yeah. Well, when we were in Vegas, I was gonna. But we ended up unable to get to a disc golf shop to buy like a used disc to be able to go, and we didn't bring any.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

But I went and played when I was in Hawaii. I played when I was in Scotland. You know, I've, I, I like to bring, I have like a small travel bag of discs of like, I'll, I'll bring like three or four with me to a

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

You know, I was in Baltimore a couple months ago. We went and played. Then I've got like my big bag for like local stuff, which has like more dis than I'm ever gonna throw at the course. But some are better, some are better in wind, some are better for weird angles and stuff. Like, like I, I justify each of their places in my bag, I also just took out like six because I never throw them.

So I do that a lot too, where I'll try to pair down and cycle through stuff, grab something I haven't thrown in a while off the storage rack.

Laura

Bring at least one of the windy ones when you come here.

Xhafer

Yeah, for sure.

Laura

At least one. Oh hey, speaking of discs, Our episode today opens up with a shot of Babylon five and we got some of those saucer disc kind of ships out front.

Xhafer

Yeah. We've got various alien species protecting the station uh, at the start of season three, episode 14, ship of tears. So yeah, we see the Babylon treaty is in effect now. Has the station defense is no longer just some star furries and a couple Minbar cruisers.

Laura

Yeah. I guess these saucers are the ri, I had to google

Xhafer

Mm-hmm.

Laura

but the, the RI must be one of the non-aligned worlds. Yes.

Xhafer

Yeah, so before this we see a few, or after this rather, we see a few members of the senior staff watch i s n come back online.

Laura

yeah.

Xhafer

They are initially hopeful and that this is a sign that Earth might be returning to normalcy because free speech might be back.

Laura

Yeah, no, Franklin is way too optimistic. He's kind of the Pollyanna leading the, the optimism, and it's too much my man.

Xhafer

Too much. Yeah, this is quickly broken. As everyone sees that this isn't news, this is bullshit, and they turn it off just like everyone does in real life. When they're presented with a news broadcast that gives them fake news, they just know it's bullshit and they just turn it off. No one buys that. This is a completely believable scene. That didn't make me upset about real life at all.

Laura

Yeah. I think that we gotta revisit that one in the reboot, right? and uh, yeah, this lady. She is just so peppy about her bullshit lines and she has a super nineties haircut that I was just like, wow, this this is an interesting show We're watching. I s n is not the same.

Xhafer

Oh yeah. Well, they're just talking about the super popular martial law and decree E. Everyone loves it. Yep.

Laura

She may not have said super, but she definitely said popular

Xhafer

Mm-hmm.

Laura

in reference to martial law. That is just wild. Just wild. Sheridan is out testing the new star theories that they got from one of the ships that didn't make it outside of the Battle of Babylon. Five, the Churchill. That's it. And while they're out there, we find out that these ones can go in atmosphere, which I suspect we're being told because it's going to be important later.

Xhafer

Yes, it will be

Laura

Feels very important.

Xhafer

it will be important that the same episode, something else that happens in this episode is very important for.

Laura

Yeah. Yeah.

Xhafer

and I can confirm at this point, this was the episode I missed in my original viewing as like a young adult child out from the times I watched Babylon five growing up. This, I never saw this one.

Laura

that's crazy.

Xhafer

there's a couple huge plot points in this episode that are so important,

Laura

And it, it, you know, it at the end we get this cliffhanger that kicks off a whole bunch of stuff,

Xhafer

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, most of that, most of the stuff that's super important is like followed up on in the next episode, There's a couple of pop points that are just left in this episode for next season,

Laura

mm-hmm.

Xhafer

I just had no idea what was going on at one point.

Laura

I'm so sorry. my condolences.

Xhafer

it is. Anyways, children's out getting his flight time and they get a distress signal from Baster.

Laura

dun, dun dun Sheridan recognizes the ship as a black Omega ship.

Xhafer

Yeah. He knows this is Cycore.

Laura

the big thing on the star fury, and he knows exactly how to deal with a black omega ship. You get out of its line of sight,

Xhafer

Mm-hmm. if they can't see you, they can't scan you.

Laura

He gets close enough to find out who it is, and turns out it's our old pal Buster

Xhafer

Sheridan's, like, just give me one reason to blow you up. Please, please give me a reason to blow you up. I'd really like to blow you up. Just, just, just say something a little hostile. Just please anything. investors I like, aren't you curious? And he's just like, damn it.

Laura

Well, now I am

Xhafer

Right? So they bring him back to the station and as they're escorting it back to the station, obviously they signal Babylon five. Ivan is freaking. Rightfully so. And, uh, she runs into Ja car after missing a meeting with him earlier, and he's tired of getting dodged and left out of the alliance that he knows is forming behind his back right now.

Laura

Yeah, they just sort of put a pin in that and it's been a pin and it's not got anywhere. Uh, We get bester arriving on the station to some armed guards and at this point I was wondering like, shouldn't we be scrambling arm imbar telepaths? Surely there is still some around like

Xhafer

You would think?

Laura

but at least we got the SWAT team. I guess that's the best we could do.

Xhafer

Senior staff meets to go over best's arrival. Franklin brings up the good point. Like last time he was here, we had like a ton of stuff. We were hiding the resistance. Any plans for independence The stuff with President Clark, like that's all done now. It's all out in the open. Like, who gives a fuck if he re scans us? Like, what's he gonna find out? Nirvana was like uh,

Laura

We could still have other secrets, dude.

Xhafer

Garibaldi takes a moment to remind everyone that he's always just been in business for himself and that him being there is not necessarily a sign of Earth Force, but also is not necessarily a welcome.

Laura

Right,

Xhafer

Sheridan asked Siva to be the first to see him since she will know if he scans her. She's hesitant, but Sheridan promises that if he finds out that she's late in Telepath, they will just lock him up and throw away the key. So she'll reluctantly agrees.

Laura

Yeah, I mean he, I hate that he asks her to do this, but at the same time, he has a great point. Like if he's out here, you know, we are independent and he's alone. He came in a single star fury, like what's he gonna do? He can have an accident in his cell,

Xhafer

I'm surprised she, he's even like, we'll just lock him up. It's all like, you're just gonna lock him up. You're just gonna shoot his ass. Cuz you really wanted to blow him up about 10 minutes

Laura

Right. .It's a euphemism. We'll just lock him up.

Xhafer

Oh, okay. GE Baldy style.

Laura

right?

Xhafer

the commander goes to see ster and he's like immediately the worst.

Laura

Oh my God, yes.

Xhafer

Talking about like, oh, you've got your mother's eyes and stuff. So she just slaps him and he moves on with why he's there. He knows that the shadows are controlling. President Clark investors real upfront here, he lays out his ambition. Eventually the telepaths are gonna run Earth, they're gonna run humanity. But these shadows have other plans for the teps and for Cyco. And so the enemy of my enemy is my friend. We need to work together to get rid of the shadow.

Laura

Yeah, this is the first time I had ever heard this saying I, I don't know why I remember it so vividly, but I do, maybe because it comes up again, I think in the Enders game series, you know, the book series and uh, it really struck me out that. It came from Ster first in my mind. I know it's much older than that. But yeah, when he's giving her the speech here about, you know, we are the next phase of human evolution, I'm just sitting there going, oh, he didn't read Dark Genesis

Xhafer

Bester needs to join our book club.

Laura

Yeah. Yeah. Cuz in Dark Genesis, we. it was um, some creative evolution. It was influenced evolution.

Xhafer

Well, and he would, he would probably actually be aware of this from the, from the book. Yeah. Because isn't he, what's his name's

Laura

He is what's his name's kid, but I don't know. We're gonna have to read the next book, I guess to find out if he gets any like hints about that.

Xhafer

Yeah, that book club is in less than 10 episodes. We,

Laura

We do need to start reading that book.

Xhafer

need to start reading that book. I said I need to finish the first one. Stone

Laura

Get on it. Jafa.

Xhafer

I will try. Anyways, after this Len and Sheridan meet up and they own up to being shitty to Ja Car.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

being shitty to Olive Narn.

Laura

they're facing the music that like, they're gonna have to tell him if he really wants in on this, he's gonna have to know the truth. And that's gonna suck and it's gonna be uncomfortable.

Xhafer

And so Dalen owns it. She's like, look, I was part of the Great Council. This was also a Minbar government decision.

Laura

Huh.

Xhafer

I'll talk to him.

Laura

Yeah. She doesn't want to

Xhafer

no, no. Sheridan didn't have the authority to act on behalf of Earth. You know, Dalen had the authority to act on behalf of Minbar,

Laura

Yeah. It sucks.

Xhafer

Ster reveals he knows of a wet shipment meant for the shadows to say weapons components. A

Laura

Yeah. Yeah. We talk about weapons a lot and we know in this point of the series, we've, we've seen that, I can't remember what episode it, it was, but you know, a human being merged with a shadow ship was gonna be a thing.

Xhafer

Yes.

Laura

I mean

Xhafer

yeah. Anything implied is made explicit soon enough.

Laura

yeah

Xhafer

anyways beter also reveals that it's possible for high level Telepaths to be able to find ships in hyperspace by listening to the voices of the people on the ship.

Laura

what a wild idea, right?

Xhafer

I guess hyperspace amplifies the abilities. I'm guessing it's just so quiet or the distance is different or

Laura

Yeah. Yeah. I could see it being like a distance folded thing or something, you know? Yeah. But while they can do this, the military has not been informed because Cycore values, telepath lives too highly to just put them on ships, military ships, to find people.

Xhafer

Yeah. Yeah. We don't want a p cop on every fucking heavy frigate having to lit us some normies.

Laura

Yeah. And he, he makes the, it's the economy stupid argument. That it takes a lot of work to breed one of us. But you guys breed like rabbits, so

Xhafer

Len starts meeting with Kar here. I've read an anecdote from JMS that he left absolutely no notes for Mira and Andreas for

Laura

They didn't need

Xhafer

No, they didn't. He was like, here's your lines. You guys understand the weight of everything that you're saying. Go act the hell out of it.

Laura

Yeah. These are two people who understand how to have a difficult conversation and how a difficult conversation goes.

Xhafer

Yeah. So this starts, but before it gets really into it we cut to Bester, Lanier, Sheridan, and Ivanova on a white star.

Laura

Yeah, it's real dangerous taking the enemy of your enemy on the white star, but I guess you

Xhafer

those are still a secret, but we've also seen them out on patrol around Babylon five. So maybe it's not so much of a secret anymore.

Laura

Yeah. Still, I don't know if I want a P cop on there, but they probably have some Imbar Telepaths to keep him in line on that white star. That's what I

Xhafer

Probably. Yeah, I would think so. Uh, Bester sits in the chair. Fun little bit.

Laura

Yeah. We all had a good laugh there. Even Owen was like, that was funny.

Xhafer

Yeah. Walter Connick finally gets to sit in the captain's chair and then gets thrown out immediately.

Laura

But he starts to sense the ship out there in hyperspace. He, he picks something up pretty quickly.

Xhafer

We see a bunch of the little fighters, but none of the big scary shadow ships escorting this thing around.

Laura

back at the station. Dylan is breaking the bad news. She tells Jaar, you know, the, the gray council ordered me silent. I, I tried, but you know, as a result, the Sonari got shadow help and they destroyed your world.

Xhafer

Yep.

Laura

She makes the argument that, this probably saved some narn lives because the shadows were still cloaked and so they didn't scorch the, the whole planet. They didn't scorch the earth with this thing.

Xhafer

Yeah. She uses the phrase millions instead of billion.

Laura

yeah, she says there's still billions of people alive on narn, which seems, I don't know, seems kind of hard to believe after the mass drivers.

Xhafer

Yeah.

Laura

Yeah. But you kind of expect this to go similar to how Jaar treated Veer when he tried to apologize for everything. When Jaar sliced his hand and the dripping

Xhafer

da. da.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

Yeah.

Laura

But I believe when that happened, he hadn't yet been touched by the VO lawn. Right.

Xhafer

Yes,

Laura

So now we have Jaar who's been touched by a Orlon, and he takes it much more gracefully.

Xhafer

for sure. He even says that if he had found this out during the invasion, His anger would've led to him killing Dalen.

Laura

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Xhafer

But you know, that's that's not him anymore. And he recognizes that he talks about his vision and kashas words, even though he doesn't know they're kashas words ringing to him that the sacrifice that was going to be required was actually speaking about the past and was not prophecy about the future necessarily,

Laura

Yeah, it could be both Yeah. He ends the conversation saying he doesn't forgive her even though he understands so, but there's no violence.

Xhafer

the white star, takes out the shadow fighters and they capture the freighter very quickly. when the crab ship appears and then fucks off immediately,

Laura

Yeah. So weird.

Xhafer

it's just like shimmers in, oh shit. Shimmers out.

Laura

Yeah, the mothership showed up, but then she, she left. She was not interested in the transport anymore, and everyone notes this. We note that this should have been a firefight and it's not. What's the deal?

Xhafer

Mm-hmm.

Laura

So we go back to the station.

Xhafer

yep. And we find that the weapon components are actually cryogenically frozen humans. with Cyco iconography all over it.

Laura

Yeah. They've got like Wires in their heads. We found out that the alien that was piloting the transport, we don't know what it is and he apparently killed himself rather than be captured.

Xhafer

And with a ton of acid, apparently

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

like, I'm going to melt me. You will not be able to identify me

Laura

yeah, he is unrecognizable and uh, that seems pretty ominous in and of itself.

Xhafer

Yeah the cargo tubes are brought on board and one is being slowly unthawed to determine what happened, and probably too soon given Franklin's response, they wake up screaming

Laura

Oh my God, Franklin is such a dipshit for doing this, like waking this telepath up without another telepath present because we've seen like, Telepaths have freakouts on this show before you

Xhafer

mind. Quakes. They're such a thing in the war. There's a name for them.

Laura

Yeah. I mean, I know we don't super tres fester. Maybe we find Lida or get some of the mbar,

Xhafer

Yeah. Alita is off station for this.

Laura

yeah.

Xhafer

Because she has to be off station next episode as well,

Laura

Ah, Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. But I mean, I know we don't super trust ster, but at this point I would almost rather best her be there,

Xhafer

yeah.

Laura

at least if I'm Franklin.

Xhafer

Mm-hmm. they take the bracelet to ster who tells a bit of backstory before identifying who this is, and then insisting to see her. The sleeping tape has terrible nightmares. Then we cut back to the reality and med lab is under lockdown as this TE has begun to integrate themselves with the technology around them.

Laura

She's gone full Borg.

Xhafer

It's crazy. Just I don't know if anyone else is an IT nerd in here. There's a lot of just like random cables and cords and stuff, but right by her head is what would be it's, they're not used now, but is the old like hard drive and disc drive power connector, like little four pin white thing. And I just saw that and I'm all like, I know that's not Molex. I can't remember the name of it, but I was just like, I know that cord.

Laura

Do we have any IT nerds listening to our Babylon five podcast? Who knows Yeah. I think they did a pretty good job for what they had at the time, you know?

Xhafer

Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's uh, the shots here are all very dynamic. It felt a lot like aliens to me.

Laura

Yeah, for real. All, all foggy and

Xhafer

Yeah, it was good. So she's freaking out. She recognizes ster and then shoots some lightning and then garabaldi pieces together that she's instinctively attacking the Cyco emblem.

Laura

Yeah, cuz she seemed to talk friendly to ster, like she seemed fond or at least, you know, familiar and not terrified of ster, but something else freaked her out. Yeah, she called him Al. Yeah.

Xhafer

Yeah. Franklin is able to drug her as she shares her pain and visions with ster and we learned exactly why the telepaths are considered weapons components. They are the shadow ship pilots.

Laura

Yeah, so back in Sheridan's office. We've given bester a cup of hot cocoa in this wild looking coffee cup. It's not even the standard future coffee cup.

Xhafer

yeah. Oh, the, the metal, the stainless steel one with the handle. Yeah.

Laura

the, the flared base at the bottom? Yeah, that's the

Xhafer

Gino Cups.

Laura

yeah. The standard Future Cup

Xhafer

We've got one in the house actually.

Laura

This one is even more elaborate than that. I, I laughed at this coffee cap, but you know, we got him some hot cocoa cuz he's obviously been rattled by

Xhafer

Yeah. Bester needs his hot cocoa.

Laura

Yeah. He bears his soul and apparently he, he's been in love with this woman. She's supposedly pregnant with his child, which I feel like Franklin should have noticed in his like examination

Xhafer

Um, I, I was under the assumption that she was no longer pregnant.

Laura

Yeah. I mean, beter talks about it in the present tense, like

Xhafer

Yeah, well, she's only been missing for four weeks.

Laura

yeah.

Xhafer

we do get a little bit of a timestamp on it. But given everything that she was through in those four weeks,

Laura

Right. Can you cry or suspend a pregnancy like. I don't know,

Xhafer

I don't if you're those weird aliens and ortho shadows, I don't think You try.

Laura

Yeah, right. That's not what they need her for. Right. So yeah, I, I think Beter might be in for a disappointment here. Um, But yeah, they've stumbled onto the telepath pilots that were taken. Bester tells us. This lady was a blip. Right? That's his word for a telepath that tried to escape.

Xhafer

Mm-hmm. Someone who went on the run, refused the meds, refused to join the.

Laura

Right. And he met her, I think when she was in a reeducation camp,

Xhafer

Yes. They say that the one on Mars that Gar balding totally doesn't know exists.

Laura

right? yeah. Yeah. So, The implication here, I guess, is that Cyco is not sending, you know, its loyal telepath. They're sending the expendable ones, the ones that didn't want to be in Cycore, and so we are just gonna go ahead and send them off to become ships.

Xhafer

Someone did.

Laura

Yeah. Baster didn't like that.

Xhafer

No, he is not happy. He states that their war against the shadows is now his war against the shadows.

Laura

Yeah, I think it's not just this woman, but the idea that, you know, any of his superiorly evolved brethren would be subjected to this even if they didn't wanna join the core. As long as they're, you

Xhafer

the heirs, you know, they, they will still rule the earth, so

Laura

As long as they're here, we can fix them. Right. We can make them love cyco. We can make them love their fellow telepath.

Xhafer

Yeah, they've, they've been brainwashed to some kind. How hard can it be to do it twice now? Right.

Laura

Right? Right? But these shadow aliens, taking them away to become weapons components

Xhafer

Mm,

Laura

is beneath, beneath their dignity. Yeah.

Xhafer

Move over to Dylan and Shakar as they head to the War Council and we get the new War room set.

Laura

We must have just finished this set,

Xhafer

They did? Yes. This is the first episode it's in. Does it feel familiar to you?

Laura

Oh, you know, I Don't know.

Xhafer

This is actually a redress of the casino.

Laura

Oh, we fancied up the casino. Huh?

Xhafer

Yep. When you like look at it now and you see the like angle that they come in and there's like that double stairwell when they come in, you'll, you'll feel the casino vibes, like it has some of the same spots, like some of the structure of it is the same as the casino room, and you'll like, especially think back to the big brawl that happened in this.

Laura

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Xhafer

and you'll like instantly all start to click together for you. You'll see the whole room.

Laura

Well, it is a very spacious room when they're walking in. Then they really highlight that about how much space is in there. And so that makes sense. That's probably the most spacious set we've had has been the casino set

Xhafer

Yeah. It's one of the biggest, and they were, they're done with it. You know, they're not, we're not having fun times with Lando and Linear in the casino anymore,

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

Garabaldi goes to Jakarta's book of Jaquan

Laura

yeah.

Xhafer

and he's like, he, like, he wakes up in the middle of the night or something. He's like, there's this passage, right? He like, he remembers a thing and he has to find it, and he finds something about the mind walkers. So he gets the war council together to reveal his findings. The telepaths are the key to driving off the shadows.

Laura

Yeah. This is. Do not thump the book of Jaquan moment. Yeah. I, I'm sure that that, uh, Garabaldi stumped on his share of Bibles. I ironically, not so much like, seriously, you know, it's not a Bible thumper, but yeah.

Xhafer

Mm-hmm. So there's one little bit here and. Which is the shadows, attack precarious space openly, thus beginning the Great War.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

And that's the episode.

Laura

why do you think that they attack the becu openly now?

Xhafer

I think that they can't, they don't feel they can wait anymore because of the telepaths. It's that shadow ship felt fester. It was all like, oh, fuck They, they figured it out. We've fought these things three times now and they've never had a telepath like this on board, and now now we've got a problem.

Laura

And they stole our ship of

Xhafer

Yeah. Yeah. The hundred pilots, a hundred crab, less crab ships running around. That might have been. ,they might have been able to handle the telepathic assault because that's what they think they want the telepaths for.

Laura

Mm-hmm. .Basically, we've adapted this technology that was used against us to help defend ourselves.

Xhafer

Yep. Now we know that Telepaths can mess with the connection between a shadow ship and its pilot. When, and this one just fucks off when it sends Bester, who is a P 12?

Laura

Pretty strong. Yeah.

Xhafer

I read a very interesting theory about the first time a white star fights a shadow ship, which is Ivanova was on the ship, right,

Laura

Oh, she was,

Xhafer

and they weren't able to hit the ship. They fired a bunch at it, but they never hit the white star. In their next encounter, Ivanova not on the ship, they were able to hit the white star. So the fan theory is that her latent telepathy was just enough to confuse the pilot and kind of make the ship very hard to hit for them.

Laura

That is an interesting theory because we don't know if ster actually actively did anything to that shadow ship. It. It seemed like if he, if he was doing something that the story would've told us, like he would've said, I did something. He didn't. Indicated anything because at the end he's not really holding back from the Babylon five command staff anymore. He's, he wants the shadows gone out of his telepaths

Xhafer

Yeah.

Laura

and uh, if he had done something, he probably would've said so. He he's not a modest man.

Xhafer

No. No. If, if the senior staff owed their lives to him, he would make sure they knew it.

Laura

right. So if just the presence of the telepath is enough and just even a not fully developed telepath, like Ivanova was able to disrupt the shadows in some way. That's a big thing. That's big.

Xhafer

Yeah. So Js actually spoke on this and was like uh, quit incidents, not really what I was going for.

Laura

Yeah. Okay.

Xhafer

But it does check out. But the, I think he mostly was saying this so that there was not any like, well, AFA means they can't hit the white star like the telepath. Having a telepath on a ship means it's invincible because that removes all the stakes.

Laura

it. It does. Yeah. Yeah.

Xhafer

So I feel like that's the reason why and it kind of checks out, but also if the, the shadow ship was unaware, it kinda, it fits nice, you know?

Laura

Yeah, it is a nice like idea,

Xhafer

Mm-hmm.

Laura

even if it is just coincidence,

Xhafer

All right, Laura, on a scale of Babylon's one to five, how'd you feel about this episode?

Laura

man, I, I have no complaints about this episode. I have nothing that I would change. I know I just gave a really silly episode of Babylon five, but. I kind of think this is another five for me.

Xhafer

this is a really good app.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

I do feel like it felt rushed, not, not like the pacing, not the production. It felt very like, here's the thing, here's the thing. Here's the thing, here's the thing, here's the thing, here's the thing, here's the thing, here's the thing. Credits to me, and when I see an episode like that, especially on a show that is capable of slowing down and doing it well, like this show is shown, it makes me kind of wish this was a two-parter.

Laura

Yeah. Well, and it, it feels like we are leaving it on a cliffhanger, so why not stretch that a little differently, you know?

Xhafer

Yeah. I mean, if we could like get rid of, I don't know, exogenesis and had a two-parter here instead,

Laura

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer

I'd like this more.

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

But it's a great app. I put it at a four outta five.

Laura

Yeah. I, I wondered when this episode ended. because I don't really remember getting more than like one ster episode at a time. But you almost feel like he's not left yet, like he should be in the next episode.

Xhafer

Mm.

Laura

I haven't watched the next episode yet, so I'm like, I don't, I don't think he is. Yeah. Yeah. But you're right. That's, that's one of those things that feels a little rushed. we get a dramatic statement from Veer, but we don't get a dramatic exit from Veer.

Xhafer

Yeah, he just kind of leaves quickly and on his own terms,

Laura

Yeah.

Xhafer

But he's not in the next episode. But next episode is season three, episode 15, interludes and Examinations. The Shadows Punish Lando. Franklin's drug dependence affects his job performance. The death of an ally Marsh Sheridan's momentary victory over the shadows.

Laura

Whoa. That sounds like another, a lot of things.

Xhafer

It Is, it is maybe the most important episode of season three. In terms of story

Laura

Oh boy.

Xhafer

on the list for sure. It's a good one.

Laura

I mean, there's a lot of them.

Xhafer

It's one of those jms, like innocuous title, false sense of security,

Laura

Uhhuh

Xhafer

but we'll talk about that more next week. Until then, we'd like to thank Jeremy Siegel. Thank you for our lovely theme music. Jeremy, you can find more of Jeremy's work at Jeremy Siegel 42 dot Bandcamp. Do.

Laura

And also thank you to Angry Deck Time Machine on Instagram for our podcast artwork,

Xhafer

Thanks to our editor, Aaron, for enabling our podcast to be listened. Uh, We really appreciate it. And all the work you put in

Laura

And thank you to you, the listener, for being here. If you wanna hang out with us, you can come join the Discord. We have a Discord group. You can get that by emailing. Who are you? B five gmail.com.

Xhafer

Mm-hmm. Or on the Facebook where we'll answer you quickly. And the Twitter, which I check once a week just to see if someone's lit. The League of Not Aligned Podcast Signal

Laura

Yeah. we'll answer you eventually on Twitter,

Xhafer

All right, well have a good week. Internet.

Laura

right. Bye.

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