Jeff: Welcome to Babylon 5 for the first time, not a Star Trek podcast. My name is Jeff Akin and I'm the one who
Brent: was, and I'm Brent Allen. And I am the one who will be,
Jeff: and the two of us are watching Babylon Five for the first time For you.
The one who is?
Brent: That's right. Jeff and I are two veteran Star Trek pos. That's right. Jeff and I are two veteran Star Trek podcasters.
Jeff: And that's the show everybody initiating, getting the hell out of here. A minute we're done.
Brent: Oh my gosh. It's too early for this, Jeff. It's too early. Okay, I can bring it back.
Whew. That's right. Jeff and I are two veteran Star Trek podcasters that over two years ago said, Hey, we're thinking about watching this show. Does anybody wanna listen? And lots of people jumped in and said, yes, we would love to listen. And so we hooked up and started watching this show and we said, Hey, let's do the thing we do for Star Trek where we lurk, lurk out.
God, what is wrong with this is how the show's gonna go tonight, folks. Uh, we said, Hey, let's do for this show, the thing we do with Star Trek, where we seek out strange new worlds, oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. We said, Hey, let's do for this show what we do for Star Trek, where we look for those deep moral messages and the things that the show is trying to say.
Let's see what Babylon five is trying to say to
Jeff: us.
We're gonna look for those Babylon five messages. Again, Brent and I are veteran Star Trek podcasters, but this is not a Star Trek podcast. So to keep us on task, we play an exciting game called The Rule of Three, and what this game does is it limits the both of us to no more than three references to Star Trek per episode.
That hits three. One of
Brent: those three no substitutions, exchanges are refund. And should we happen to make one of those references because we're only allowed three total for the entire show. You'll hear this lovely sound
because this is not a Star Trek podcast, and we don't do that. We do
Jeff: not
Brent: Now. That's what we call our game, the rule of three. There's another game we like to play. You guys are well familiar with it. We've done this for 109 episodes, so well 108, I guess this would be 109, right Jeff? We've done this well, 109 because we did the gathering, right?
We've done this for 109 episodes where we get to the end of the show that we're talking about, and we predict what next week's episode is gonna be about, based on title alone, never having seen it before, never having seen a thumbnail as far as we can avoid those and never having read a description and hopefully being completely unspoiled.
And we make a prediction now. We did that last week about this episode, and so this is the spot where it is time to time to pay the piper and we revisit that particular prediction and see just how close we were. So Jeff, what did you say last week? This week was gonna be about
Jeff: Sheridan and Delaine. We're gonna leave, we're gonna get a little insight into Garibaldi at Edgar's Industries and uh, how earth is being a bunch of jerk heads in making things difficult for Mars jerks.
Brent: You got Sheridan and Lynn. Jeff, I'm, you're gonna have to do a little bit of editing here. My a d d kicked in and something happened over here and it completely distracted me from what you're saying, so I do not know what you just said. Please repeat that for my sake. Okay.
Jeff: Hold on. Lemme just make a note.
I'm sorry. It's alright. I'm so sorry. I was just, Hey, you know what? I'm not gonna do the editing, we'll just leave it in here. This the, well no, but for
Brent: the, for the audio piece. You
Jeff: will. Yeah. Yeah, I do. I do a lot of editing for the
Brent: audio piece. This one's no. Yeah, no. See, this is what I talked to you guys about the outtakes.
That's Brent is spaced for a second and went, oh shoot, I forgot what he said. All right. Flashbacks to that teacher. Brent. Brent, do you know the answer to the question? Would you mind repeating? Who are you? Question. What,
Jeff: what am I doing here? Okay.
Brent: Uh, yeah, George Washington, uh, Cross the Delaware with the folks.
Brent, this is geometry Class
Jeff: Circle is the answer. Sorry. Circle. Oh, uh, uh, Sheridan and Delaine are gonna leave the station. We're gonna get some insight into the Garibaldis Edgars industries and how much Earth is still being a bunch of jerk heads to Mars. You
Brent: got two outta three on that one, buddy. Yeah, you got two outta three.
You're gonna get 66%. That's how this works these
Jeff: days. Sweet. Why don't you lay yours out. That's what she said.
Brent: Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. It's that night, Jeff. It's that kind of night. Okay. Uh, objects at rest. Okay. So last week was objects in motion. This week is objects at rest. I love the symmetry of those two episode titles right next to each other.
Um, but I said ultimately, as I kind of talked some things out, This is going to be, uh, Sheridan into the land moving off the station, just like you had said. Uh, because they're the only ones left as we learned, uh, of the crew, D v d cover folk. Right? Um, and then I, I said that what might happen is some sort of a new constitution where they fix some of the holes that have recently happened in the alliance.
Maybe even a comeuppance for the NAR and the uri and the, the drowsy who went into tax and tar prime breaking from the, from the president maybe. But it, I also said it should go out like on a feelgood note, you know? Uh, but really mostly it's just Sheridan Delin leaving the station saying goodbye. Like that's really what it felt like it would be.
Jeff: That's a big part of the first half of the episode, and it did go out on such a feel good note. I sort of, I. Kind of,
Brent: actually, I love the note. It went out on it, and we're gonna talk a lot about it tonight. Yeah.
Jeff: I just don't think it was a feel I, that I call it feel good though. Exactly. Yeah. I wanna give you a 40% on this one.
Fair enough. Yeah.
Brent: Well, Jeff, uh, for those of the folks out there who are going, you know, it's been a while since I've seen this episode. I, I don't remember exactly what happened. I, I heard what you guys said you thought might happen, but exactly what did happen. Jeff, can you help our friends out there by telling them exactly what happened in this week's episode?
Jeff: I'll sure do my best. This episode immediately answers a question that I posed last week about Kars delayed message. He recorded that for Telon. He asks Telon to represent the Narn on Babylon five, and he names him as the new ambassador and other departing personnel are doing the same thing. Dr. Franklin meets with Dr.
Hobbs. That's a name you might remember. See, she's been just kind of hanging out, popping from Med Lab to Med lab since Walkabout. And Franklin's always respected her in the fact that she stands up for what she believes in. So he promotes her to be the new medical chief of staff on the station. And then it's moving time.
Delen and she, Delen and Sheridan are packing up and heading to Minbar. They don't want any fanfare. They just wanna say their goodbyes quietly. And G T F O Sheridan has a very warm and heartfelt moment with his ex-wife and c o of the station Captain Lockley. That is, if you consider talking to a sort of peer, sort of subordinate, like a coworker would as a warm and heartfelt conversation, then that's, that is the way that you would describe that.
God, I. I bet their marriage was a really fun place to be. Anyway, Sheridan Waxes philosophic as he gazes out at the rim saying that beyond that lies the truth. Well, linear pops in. He's got some personal time and wanted to see Delen off. This leads to a super awkward moment between him and Sheridan, but ultimately he agrees to visit them on Minbar and is going to accompany them on their way home.
We check in with Garibaldi, who is now responsible for day-to-day operations, Edgar's Industries. He pulls in all the big troublemakers from the company and in a move that I am going to start recommending to my clients, he appoints them to the board. He says that they'll tell him like it is and asks them to hold him accountable.
I knew I liked Garibaldi on Sheridan in Thelens way to their ship. They're met with a mob of people. Turns out I s N caught wind of their trip and everybody knows about it. Ghislaine says some stirring words about the concept of goodbye, and they're on their way. On their way out. They take one last look at Babylon five, and we see the next series regulars in D V D cover watching them head out en route.
There's a coolant leak. Sheridan tries to pitch in, but gets caught behind a seal door. He and another ranger are going to die unless someone releases the door from the outside. Oh, thank the great maker. Lanier is here and he does nothing. He looks at Sheridan, looks at the release, looks at Sheridan again, and then he runs away.
Panicked and angry. Sheridan gets creative with a Minbar pike and bust through the glass on the door. He's okay, but Lanier who changed his mind and is heading back to save him is embarrassed and ashamed again. He Jakes a fighter and takes off. He later calls Delen to express his deep, deep shame and he wants to apologize.
Tells her that he's leaving and asks her to honor his memory on Minbar. Sheridan records a touching message for his child. He realizes he won't live to see them come of age, and again, waxes philosophical. They're also greeted by a surprise visitor. Emperor Mal II is there. He visits with them, begs them for alcohol, which is non-existent on mid bar, and offers a valuable gift.
It's an urn looking kind of thing that he says holds the water of the river that ran past the door of the original palace on Sari Prime. But as we learn later, there's no water in there. It's a keeper hiding out in there, Londo heads home. And the Dr talked to him, I think through the keeper, telling him that he did a good job.
And because he did a good job, he can enjoy an hour away from them. They also remind him that they are very patient, very, very patient. But Brent, I am not patient at all and I want to hear your thoughts on this one. What did you think of Objects at rest? Jeff, this
Brent: is a real interesting episode to go out on.
Oh yeah. And I'm, I'm, listen, I know there's next week's episode, I'm going to reference this as the finale of season five. Okay. Uh, we really didn't tie up any loose ends. Like the threads that are still hanging out there are just out there, and we just have to live with that. That's fine. Uh, it wasn't the point of this episode.
It's not what j m Ss wanted this episode to be. No problems there. I get it. Sometimes as a creator, you get to the end and you run out of time. You didn't get a chance to do everything you wanted to do. Uh, not just as a creator. Jeff, you've probably experienced this in life, in business, in roles where you have been, when you step out of that role, like Sheridan leaving Babylon five to go do this next thing, there are things you wanted to do, you never got to do.
There are things you leave that you feel are incomplete, you know?
Jeff: Yeah. It's really, that's really what we left behind. I said that too. Sorry. I couldn't not, I couldn't not. I,
Brent: Jeff, I said that in my recap and I went, oh, no.
Anyway.
Uh, in fact, a lot of that goes along with what I'd thought about the opening of this episode with Sheridan and Lockley, as you had referenced earlier, uh, Sheridan saying that now that the end is upon them, you thought you were ready. But it's just hard. And that's how I kind of feel about getting here.
Like, I thought I was ready for the end of this show, and now that I'm here, like it, it's okay. I'm ready. But it's also just kind of hard to like realize what you, what you've got going on here. Yeah. Uh, now as far as what we got in this episode, I both loved this episode and I hated this episode. Wow. Let me explain.
Please do people just hit the roof, I'm sure. Let me explain, uh, first the, the part that I hate, the bummer part of this episode. The hole in thing, the way that he goes out as a tragic character, promising to find forgiveness one day, and, and to Lynn's words of how just one mistake can, let, can, and to Lynn's words of how just one mistake can make you live with a lifetime of regret and shame.
Hello, Londo. I will forever hate this. Lanier loves Delin storyline that popped up in season four, season three, three. Was it, when it first came out, it was it back in season three. I, I hate this storyline. I, this is not the way I want, wanted it to go for linear. Um, and, and I just, you know, you, you want it, you want it all to be wrapped up in a nice little bow, don't you, Jeff?
Yeah. Save your keyboard strokes, folks. I know it doesn't always get wrapped up in a nice little bow, but I, I, uh, you know, I just, oh, oh, I hate that now. While I hate what happened with Lanier and where they took his story. I will say this, they, and by they, I mean j m s, the, the directors, the actors, the whole production crew, they did it in such a masterful way, the writing, the acting, the production, the payoff, even having the need to not wrap up everything.
So while I hate what happened, I have the utmost respect for how they got there. And by they, I mean the production crew and how they handled it. I thought it was, it was beautiful. It was fantastic. It just leaves you with a gut punch that I didn't want, want to have happen. Now that said, I also said I love this episode, Jeff, and here's what I mean, because this episode, Jeff is in one little tiny episode, the entirety.
Of what Babylon five for the first time has been all about since its inception. Yeah. To seek out the messages, morals, meanings, what we started calling the Star Trek esque type messages and the things that Babylon five that this show was trying to say here. We got a solid five minute long monologue by Sheridan laying out every single one of those messages.
Maybe not every single one, but a lot of like the core messages. That was like j m s just going, okay, here I'm at the end. Let me make sure you guys got everything I was trying to teach you over the last five years. Here's this, here's this, here's this, here's this, here's this, here's this. They laid it out.
Jeff, if you and I would've just started with this episode, we would've saved ourselves two and a half years of labor.
Jeff: Done just like that. Yeah.
Brent: Like completely saved all of that and, and we would've like, that would've just been the show. Um. It's, it, it's like j m s took five seasons worth of us digging and scraping, and the, the rollercoaster that this show has been on from the heel turns to the face, turns to the, to the, the, the, the, the other heel turns.
You know what I mean? Like, he took all of that and put it in this nice little box. And then he took the most pristine premium wrapping paper you could find. You know, that kind, that just, it cuts with just a slice and it goes through on a single slice. You know what I mean? Yeah. And he, and he felled it up real nice.
And he, he took this pretty bow, wrapped it around, it, tied it up in such a way, and then he stuck a tag on it and said to Jeff and Brent from Mike or whatever he calls himself like, I, I loved it, Jeff. I loved this episode. I loved it for that reason. And, uh, I, I love, this is how the, the season went out. It, it was, it was, it was so good.
If for no other reason, just for that little final, we said, we've said goodbye to everybody. Mm-hmm. We got, we got that emotional gut punch, which I hated, but I loved how they did it. And then we got the, here's the show. It was satisfying. I loved it. I hated it. I cried. I didn't cry. But, uh, all of that. How did you feel about it, Jeff?
I wonder if we're in the same spot if we're on two different spots.
Jeff: I don't know. We're not in the same spot on this one, but we're not so opposed, like, we're not, we're gonna be in the same solar system. Like I feel like this, like last week, this is an episode that had to happen. You know, it's a necessary one that we got.
But, and, and again, like last week, here's a cobbled together throne, here's a plot thing to move you forward because here's, I'm so with you on this linear thing. I hate everything about it. Yeah. They could have let it lie. Right? That when Delaine was just like, Hey, I didn't hear anything. It's good. Let it go.
That could have been the end and I would not have liked it, but I wouldn't have hated it. I now hate it. Yeah. It is. If I,
Brent: if I, if I could interject a couple weeks ago, we saw Lanier and Delin hanging out on a white start. They got crass, they got, and Lanier did the I love you Delin. And she goes, I know she han soloed them, right?
Mm-hmm. Yep. And then we get to the end and he and she friend zones 'em all over again. If that was the end, fine. Yep. Like, I like fine. Good. When, when, when Lanier show. Well, we'll talk about that more here in a little bit, but like that they did not need to bring it up here except for. The dangling thread of Mor than saying you're gonna betray the endless shock and we'll
Jeff: talk.
Yeah, let's talk about that later. 'cause oh my God, I've got thoughts. Yeah. Uh, I've interrupted your interrupting thoughts. Go ahead. That's cool. I'll just say that ultimately, like in this, and, and I'm gonna think about this. We, we got time till we get to the season five wrap up. Um, and, and I'll have more thoughts on it then.
But I think this whole Lanier thing all the way back to, I think it was ceremonies of light and dark when he first told Marcus that he loved Ghislaine at this point. Now if you take that whole storyline, I think I hate it more than the Byron storyline and all because of the way they pulled it back in this, it was just, it was dumb.
It did, I have a lot of feelings around how they did that.
Brent: I kinda wanna go see your reaction video now. I haven't watched
Jeff: it. That said, that said, yeah. I loved Garibaldi. At, at, I I did you, I. I want that show, man. I want that show. Just like you guys hate it. Oh, you're gonna fire us then, right? No, no. You get a hundred percent increase to your salary.
Uh, let's do this. Like you, you are gonna make the changes that need to happen. And I'm just like, oh my God, this is so good. I love, I loved everything about that. Uh, gosh, what it, it, it let us know station's gonna be fine. Right? Look, we all
station's
Brent: gonna be fine. Yep. All the
Jeff: spots are filled. Mm-hmm. We're good.
It left little breadcrumbs for us that can be picked up to keep the adventure going. Like this was a season and series finale in and of itself. Yep. Like, I think this did a decent job of wrapping up the big, the big things that it needed to wrap up. It left the things dangling so they can pick 'em up if need be.
It's, if this was episode 22, if this was the end of the whole series, it would serve its purpose. Yes. Agreed. Yep. Uh, I, I, I wouldn't have liked it as an end, you know, like, I, I feel like it's a good season finale. I don't think it's good enough or worthy of closing something like Babylon five. But if we just say it closes out season, season five.
Cool. Mm-hmm. Yep. This works. But all in all, um, I'm gonna have a really hard time getting past the linear stuff in this one. Um,
Brent: I really, I really wonder how, knowing where Lanier winds up, how that's gonna affect us on Babylon five for the second time. Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? Like, are you just gonna sit there and just, oh, this is such a play.
I
Jeff: kept waiting. 'cause they, you know, a drum, they kept beating with him from moment one was, I'm with you, Delaine through the light and through the dark, through the storm and through it all. I, I am with you. Yeah. Until, no, I'm not sorry. Actually, actually, I just let my animal base instincts get the best of me.
I don't have the integrity to stand up and take accountability for it, and so I'm out. Yeah, I did not like it, but, and I think too, like now, now you wasted 12 episodes of this season and you're gonna cram all this into like, where's the, the, I don't know. I just,
Brent: let's talk. If, if they would've spread this out over more episodes, I would've been so mad. Like, I, I, the, the, this was the, the perfect amount of time, you know, I. I really would love to know, like from J m Ss, like why he felt the need to put this one in, in this particular spot. Yeah. Was it to, to balance out, to, to give some emotional pathos to this particular episode.
Whereas imagine, 'cause imagine what it would've been otherwise. Sheridan and Delin leave the station, go to Minbar, record a message for his son. Hey, there's this cool little bit from Garibaldi. That really would've been it. There was no, there's no drama otherwise to this episode. Yeah. You know what I mean?
So like, was it we just needed to put it in for that. Is it the, we couldn't let everybody end up in a good spot. Somebody had to be in a jacked up spot maybe. But, you know, know what are gonna game. Are we gonna Game of Thrones it before Game of Thrones
Jeff: was a thing. Yeah. Just proving Game of Thrones. Stole everything from this.
Yeah. But just do what you did last week. I mean, we've used the assassin thing a thousand times. Do do it again. Do it again. It's better than this, you know? Yeah. Like, I, I don't know. And, and honestly, this is your final, final episode. I don't know that you need drama for the whole thing. 'cause I feel like this episode was really two episodes in one.
You had the episode of wrapping up Babylon. Five. The station got Telon. We got Tessa over here doing her job and people are, are happy about it. Lockley saying she's sticking around, Zach's sticking around like everything's good. Cool. Whoop Babylon five's awesome. Now let's go check out them on Minbar and the drama.
They could have stretched out the stuff with Londo thrown in a little more awkward stuff or whatever. Actually followed up on the fact that Ghislaine saw the keeper and never said anything about
Brent: it. Well, I don't know that she fully saw it. I don't know that she fully knew what she was seeing. She saw something, she saw something shimmering there.
And even if she did fully see, I don't know that she knew what it was she was
Jeff: looking at. This is what I know if I know that my husband. Was 17 years in the future at one point and interacted with Emperor Lando mal. And then I see some weird thing on his shoulder sitting outside of his clothes, by the way, which I thought was a little weird, but I see that I'm gonna be like, Hey, John.
Just, I mean, weird question. So I don't know what I saw, but I saw something on, did you see that? Yeah. Did you see, no, I didn't see that at all. Well, did anything come up when you were in war without End? Did you notice anything? Like do that? Yeah, have that fill the time of the linear thing? I just, anything else?
Because I'll tell you, I'm just gonna dive in. If this is him betraying the endless shock, this is the dumbest, weakest, most inconsequential betrayal I have ever experienced in my life. Oh, I, he's, so he's, he's so, he's fine and he not hurt, and he's not gonna hold you accountable. Sheridan said, this will be between us.
It's cool. No big deal. That's your betrayal more
Brent: than it's his own shame that Jeff, that's the thing. It's his own shame that's preventing him from coming back. It's not, it's not from everybody else. It's, he knows Sheridan knows, and more importantly, delin knows that he, but, but this, Jeff, this is where we've been talking about this, this whole series, the redemption of, okay, let's talk about the redemption of Lanier.
You know, and he couldn't accept it. Londo accepted his comeuppance. Mm-hmm. Londo walked bravely into that room, took his clothes off, let the thing attach it, and he's doing what he has to do, biting his time, trying to get to where he needs to get to. Where we'll see eventually happens in war without end.
Lanier is running and hiding and not accepting it. And I, and I just, I hate that for him. You know, like, like you don't solve anything by running away. No. You don't you to, to come back and, and you, you know what fixes this to, to, sorry. I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna stereotypically gendery this, so please me.
Here we go. Buckle up. He's gonna man up. He's gonna come and face she in man to man, and he's gonna say, I did this. I was wrong. I'm sorry. Will you forgive me? And I, and I, I prom, well, I don't wanna say, and I, I think if he were to do that and Sheridan were to extend this hand of forgiveness, one, their relationship would be far stronger than it ever was before.
'cause it, it's an amazing thing when forgiveness is extended, how it, it cements a relationship more than it had been before. Mm-hmm. It doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen quite a bit. Also, I think that whatever spell Dylan has over, uh, Lanier, uh, you would find that broken. Yeah. And Lanier would be able to move on.
But instead of manning up, you know, you know, you know, just using his cajones and coming in and doing what he needs to do, now he's gonna run
Jeff: away. Yep. Yeah. In that moment, if they can connect. 'cause if you notice, like he never called Sheridan, like it was always captain or husband, Mr. President. Mm-hmm.
All these. Yep. Yep. Never. And so in that moment when John and John Sheridan can say, you know, Lanier, that, that, that, that hurt me. Like that really hurt me. I was scared, I was shocked. I couldn't believe it was happening. But I can see you're really sorry. And, and I forgive you in that moment, that opens the door for him to be like, thank you Sheridan.
You know, like to actually connect with him as a human. And that's where the spell gets broken. 'cause I think right now Delaine is married to this phantom monster he's made up. Then Sheridan becomes a human, a person, a being to him. Yeah. It
Brent: changes. Hey, by the way, you know what occurs to me right now as we're talking, this is, this is what addiction looks like.
Yeah. This is how addiction works, is I, I've, I've always defined, not always, but I, I defined addiction as the thing that you do that you don't want to do when you're in your right mind. Yeah. But you just, you, your, your ins, your addiction takes over and makes you do it. Okay. In this case, would Lanier, when he's in his right mind, ever want to, uh, uh, when he's really thinking about it, is he really gonna let Sheridan die?
Of course not.
Jeff: Not at all. Okay. He didn't let Lando Malawi die, the man who was literally dismantling the galaxy back in convictions. He gave, he basically ga sacrificed himself to save Lando. He would never allow Sheridan or the other Ranger to be hurt.
Brent: So, yeah, I, I think he, you know, he had a moment where he made a bad choice. Yeah. And Delin, delin called it out. Dehi said, you can have a lifetime of, of stellar service. And in a single moment, a single moment, you give over to this baser instinct, and now you're living a life of shame over that one moment, despite an entire lifetime of being awesome.
Yeah. And that's kind of, that's kind of a shame. Like that's true. That is how that works. And, and Lanier said, it's like, I can't get over that moment. I can't like, oh man, look how that just. That, that ruined his life. But again, he couldn't come back and, and seek forgiveness, you know? Uh, now I will say this, and I think I, did I text this to you?
Maybe it was my wife. I don't remember
Jeff: who I texted this to. I'm glad that you think of us in the same, same,
Brent: uh, you, I tell you, you two and then Matt are pro and my, my son are like the four people I text the most. Uh, no. When, when Lanier showed up in this episode though. Okay. I want, I want get off the thing when he showed up in this episode and he is like, I had some time off.
I wanted to come and help you move. Yeah. That was wildly awful. Yeah. Like, dude, that, that, for whatever reason, that felt so creepy to me. I'm gonna, I'm gonna come be here again. You are clearly married. And I, and we've had this whole thing and, but I'm just gonna be like, dude, I mean, dude's borderline turn into a stalker at this point.
Big time. Like, like for real. Like, this is, this is not cute anymore. Lanier. This is, he almost walks in
Jeff: love thing. This is you. It's him walking in and being like, I will not be ignored. Delaine. You know, it's like almost a fatal, like, we're getting into that territory. But the thing is like, to your point around like that and Deen's point that one moment he's gonna look, look back and, and, and is gonna let define him.
We can roll the tape back even further. He decided to quit his job as her at attache. Yep. Go become a arrange. If he had stuck around, done what he was called to do, he would've been there helping. The move. Yeah. He would've been there forming a relationship, you know, with, with the, the, with Sheridan a person and Delaine and Sheridan, the couple, and it would've been in such a better place.
But again, and I'm kind of repeating what you said earlier, but he ran once when he decided to become a ranger and then ran again. But that middle part of coming in, it was like, that's creepy. And then that scene, like, he grabs their little family photo, like their photo thing and he just kinda looks at it.
And that second I'm just like, oh, this isn't gonna go. No. Well,
Brent: no. Yeah, yeah. There's, there's something just it, it's just not right. And I, and again, it's like I don't want you, do you remember what Lanier was? Was building a motorcycle with Garibaldi riding through the station. I was just thinking about that.
That's Lanier, you know, remember Lanier and Vera sitting at the bar? Yeah. Having a drink, like that's passing notes back to each other. Yeah. Yeah. You know, that's him
Jeff: and Londo playing cards. And, you know, it's like,
Brent: oh, oh, him and Lado going out to the bar. Yeah. You know? Oh my gosh. Uh, yeah. It, it just, you know what I thought when, when Lanier showed up, I thought Lanier was gonna be the new Maari ambassador of Babylon five.
Oh. Like, I really thought that's what we were gonna go. And that's not wildly all because we're setting up all the new ambassadors. We got Telon, we've, Jeff, you found out who Jaar left the message for. Exactly. That's so excited. You just asked for that last week. Yep. And you found out Exactly. And what
Jeff: a great choice.
It's so cool. It
Brent: couldn't have been anybody else. Yeah. I really thought he was leaving a message for Delin though. But that's like, dude, it was a great message. I loved the, did you see where they kept having the shot of like, here's Jaar and Telon side by side and like Telon came into focus and Jaar faded off.
Yeah, that was, that was, that was a neat directorial choice. I'm not sure what they were implying was happening in real life at that point. But from a visual standpoint, metaphoric like it was a cool
Jeff: choice. Well, I thought it was cool 'cause they had that, but they kept also going back to him at the screen.
So I think it was a thing where reality to lon seeing him on the screen watching the message. Mm-hmm. But for us, we see them and they were setting them up. Jaka even said it, they will receive you as they received me. Yeah. So they had 'em side by side to show look, they're equal. But I think that kind of in and out, like Fadey focusing they did, which was great, was his point around, you know, you need to be balanced Warrior and priest.
I came on strong with too much priests, so now you're gonna come on balance that out with a little bit of war. Like I just feel it was such a great visual language of everything he was saying. Yeah,
Brent: yeah. You gotta be both. I, I did. I really, it was in that moment that I thought, okay, this show is gonna be about legacy.
The leg. The, the what you leave behind. I think that's where I made the, what you leave behind. Yeah. Lockley is gonna be the Captain Talons gonna be the Narran ambassador. Dr. What's her name? Well, I forget her name. Hobbes, uh, what was it? Hobbes. Dr. Hobbes is gonna be the new C m O. Uh, Zach's the new security Chief.
Tess is the new covert intelligence person. Like you said it, this is the, this is the spinoff dv d cover folks right here. Like they're the, they're the ones and that's, I think that's where I went. Oh, Lanier's gonna be the, the Bombardi ambassador. Nope.
Jeff: No, I, on that I thought it was kind of weird that, uh, one in that crew Veer is the only original guy left.
Hmm. Everyone else is new. But isn't it weird that you've got like your station people there and then of the entire interstellar line of Cor Corin was there. Corwin was there too. Yeah, he was there from the beginning, right? Yeah. So we had No, no, he wasn't there, I don't think, I don't think he showed up till season two.
Oh, really? Okay. Because if I, you remember in season one, I forget her name or she ever had, but we always had the lady who was down below looking up, going, looking up. The Jump gate is opening Commander, the Jump Gate is opening, had her and then Corwin replaced her. But yeah, so it was, uh, in order I had it here, uh, Corwin, Tessa Veer Lockley, Zach Telan and Hobbes that were all standing there, veer being the og.
But I just thought it was interesting that we had two ambassadors there. None of no other ambassadors from this big, huge Interstellar Alliance. And also one of those ambassadors isn't even a member of the Interstellar Alliance. It ultimately just shows that there's like the story and the world, and then there's the plot, and those two things aren't necessarily the same.
But
Brent: Babylon Five's not the headquarters of the Interstellar Alliance. Not anymore. No. Yeah. A apparently the deal fell through for them to buy Babylon five from Earth. Babylon Five's gonna continue in its mission. So
Jeff: does, does Telon, do they, does this happen on Minbar now? Like, are those, are all those ambassadors, the Kerri, the Ree, the Gam are, are they gonna go to Min Min,
Brent: I think, well, I think you're gonna have people that go for the, the Alliance.
There's that thing, and then you're gonna have the Galactic Alliance or the Galactic Babylon five,
Jeff: like the commerce
Brent: center and stuff. Yeah. That is, that is different from the Alliance, you know? Okay. Let's put it in Star Trek terms. The Alliance is the United Federation of Planets. Babylon five is where the United Federation of Planets meets with the Rolins, the Klingons, the Kardashians, the uh, uh, what's that find out there by Kardashian.
The PEs, the majors. The majors, uh, you know, the, the blue, the blue dudes, the blue ball dudes, those guys, uh, the Orion's have have an ambassador that goes out there. So you're gonna, you've got the people that represent you at the u a F. You got the people that represent you here. It's two separate things. I think.
I, I get, is it,
Jeff: that's my, I'm is it Nimbus three? Is it the planet of Galactic Freedom and peace? Sure. I mean, David Warner was there, so why not? There you go. That's two. We're there two.
Brent: All right. Hey, listen, this, this is, this is the final one. We gotta go out on all three of 'em, man.
Okay. I, Jeff, I don't know about you. I'm kind of just done talking about linear. Agreed. It was the worst. Let's go. Let's go to something that you are very excited about and I was very interested to get your take. 'cause I don't know that it's actually a good move in real life, though. I love the television aspect of it.
Garibaldi taking over Edgar's Industries. Instituting a new board full of misfits. Yeah.
Jeff: I love it. I love it. It's not functional, right? You can't do that, you know, but you give them a voice. You, you put, you put some of them on there. What, what we used to talk about, and the thing I, I, I talked to some of my clients about is, um, hiring your worst customer.
So an example, I used to manage movie theaters a long time ago. God, a real long time ago. Whew, I need a second to sit in that. It's been been a while. But, um, I remember there was this one lady and 100% of the time that she came in, she would seek me out to complain. And she was always looking for a free pass or a refund.
And I, I would see her sometimes walking across the parking lot and just be like, oh my God, I can't, I can't. So what I did, I'd been coached by someone to hire your worst customer. So I walked up to her as she walked in. Didn't even let her buy a ticket yet. And I was like, oh my gosh, I'm so glad you're here.
Listen, I got a favor. I want to ask of you. Let me buy your ticket to wherever you're going. And so I comped her into the movie. And then I said, listen, you're here quite a bit and you're never afraid to share your feedback with me. Will you do me a favor? And when you come in, just, just ask to see me after a movie.
Just let me know how it went. Just let me know what worked well, what didn't work well, what you'd like to see, whatever. And I'll comp you in from time to time. Like, I'll take care of you. I'll do that. And she did exactly that two times. And then she stopped talking to me and kept showing up. She stopped complaining.
I got, did you giving her
Brent: free tickets or did she start buying them?
Jeff: She bought 'em like literally. So literally what Ha So I, I comped her in the one time she came and told me I comped her the next time. So two free passes and then she paid every other time. I got some valuable feedback about the performance of my team, but also she quit complaining and continued coming.
I made her feel valued and I let her be heard. Listened to.
Brent: Yeah. She was listened to. Yeah, she was listened to, which is probably what she, that's what she really wanted. That's all she
Jeff: was looking for. And so when you take, so I, I have a core belief in, in the workplace that most people want to do a good job.
They don't necessarily wanna do a great job. They don't wanna be an over performer and they don't wanna be a slacker. They wanna do decent, they wanna have pride, you know, they wanna do the job they're
Brent: paid to do. Yep. And have pride in that. Yeah. Yep.
Jeff: That's it. And, and I think that when you approach the work like that, these naysayers that show up generally are gonna fall into one or two categories.
One is you just have actively disengaged people that are sabotaging stuff that's going on. They're bad actors, you get rid of them. Those people generally are loud when it comes to their groups and teams and they are silent in front of leadership. Like, oh, I can actually say a thing. Oh, nevermind, I didn't blah, blah, blah.
I want to operate kind of covertly. The other people are ones who want to do a good job, but they're disenfranchised. They're just like, you don't listen to me. You have stupid processes, your policies, your pro, everything here is counter to what we're talking about. And I have the wherewithal, the talk.
Yeah. And say it. I. That's who Garibaldi brought in. And what I do like, especially in change initiatives. So if you have a big change coming on, or you're gonna do a process improvement, we're gonna do a kaizen event or something like that. Then I, I ask them, who are your naysayers? 'cause you've got two types of people.
Those other people, those actively disengaged people. I call them cave people. They are citizens against virtually everything. I like that. I like that a lot. It doesn't matter what you bring, they're gonna find a way to complain about it. And my advice, stop feeding the cave people. If you've ever worked somewhere, those people are like, this sucks.
I hate it. Everything's bad. And what does management do? They answer all their questions. They give all their attention to these people. And the 80% of people who are just showing up to do their job every day, they're like, oh, they're getting attention. Maybe they're right. Maybe this does suck. So find that line between your cave people.
And the people that wanna do a good job are just disenfranchised and feed those
Brent: people. That, that right there, I've, I've heard something similar to that. That's a neat reminder for me personally right now with some other stuff I got going on. Yeah. To make sure I'm focusing on my 80%, my 90%. Yep. Who are great and cool and not really focusing on the other folks who, folks I think I might have actually been focusing on a little more.
Yeah. That's a good reminder for me right now. Uh, you're welcome. Not, not here, just in other stuff. Uh,
Jeff: but yeah, no, all, all of that to say. Well, and let me break just 'cause you opened the door. Let me break it down. Let me, let me be Starling Leadership Academy, Jeff, for just a second here. So you've got this continuum and there's a lot of nuance to this continuum, but when you lead, you look at it like this, I got 80% of the people just showing up.
They're here for a good time. Do their job, watch the show, whatever it is they're showing up for. You got 10% of the people that are the cave people or the negative people. Right. So that, that splits up. That's the nuance. And it's important, but they're your negative people. Then you got 10% of your people that are cheerleaders, right?
They're excited. Mm-hmm. They're always engaged. They're signing up for this stuff, they're in the conversations, whatever. We tend to take that 10% of cheerleaders for granted. Oh, it's great. They're happy with everything. It's cool. We tend to pay attention to those cave people and that where we give our attention.
Wherever you're at in life, that's you as a manager. If that's you and your family, if that's you in a community, whatever it is where you put your attention, that's where the 80% starts to look. 'cause they're looking for your attention. So look at those, look at those cheerleaders, be excited about them.
Feed them and watch magic happen. Anyway, Garibaldi was awesome in this. I loved
Brent: it. So I, I love, like I said, I love the concept, but I just wanna be clear, this is not a good real life concept to do. It.
Jeff: It, I mean, operationally know the concept is beautiful. Bring your naysayers together. Give them a charge, give them a voice.
Here's, do not give them every seat on your board.
Brent: No, but because here's the thing, he empowered them with such power that if they were to pull together, they could oust Lisa and Garibaldi. Yeah. Now also for, in order for Garibaldi to, to, uh, maintain control, he has to be the biggest snake in the yard with those folks.
He's got to be meaner. He's got to be tougher. Uh, you know, and he, and he, he, he stepped up to do that. I, I, I, I love the idea that works in real life. Nope. Um, but I was, I just on a, if I could be a little critical of the show for just a moment, the dude that was like, so what we're all fired now was one of the worst actors I've seen on this show.
Like, I was just, I was like, that moment right there, I was like, dude, you got paid extra money to say that line. And that's what you gave us. Like, really?
Jeff: I need you to go and ask for a refund from Ari, Ben Zane's acting school. Right?
Brent: Oh, oh my gosh. Um, all right, so Delan and Sheridan, they're all like, listen, we're just gonna sneak outta here.
We're gonna leave real quietly, nothing's gonna happen. And nope, there's no way they're getting off that station quietly, right? No. No. Like, that's not even, not even a possibility. Um, they, they get off, Dylan goes up, uh, they're like, Hey, you probably ought to say a few words. And Sheridan walks out holding Dylan, Lynn's hand.
He looks at her and she just has this beautiful, this eloquent speech about not saying goodbye. We'll see each other again. So forgive me for not saying goodbye. And all Sheridan does is go. Yep. And
Jeff: what'd she say? Walks on. She's the one that I'm
Brent: like, dude, Smart man. Yeah, smart man. Yeah. I had a do the talking,
Jeff: I had a question rolling back a little bit earlier.
So like, you know, he and uh, Lockley are looking out, you know, in the C N C and she's like, you know, what are you looking at there? He's like the rim. Yeah. What he thinks out there, the truth. Is there a part, so like Lori, there's a piece of lorian in him. That's why he gets to live as long as he does. Is there like drawing, is there like a draw for him to that?
I think so. Yeah.
Brent: I think so. I think so. But my, my question here is what is the truth he's talking about? Oh yeah. What is that like, the what's out there? The rim and what is that? The truth. The truth of what? The truth of our existence. The truth of is there, what don't we, what are you talking about? Yeah, like, Again, a question for J m Ss, what did that mean?
Jeff: Yeah, maybe it's his truth, right? Like, 'cause he, 'cause 'cause dude died, right? And what, where he died, what he died for and what brought him back are all out beyond the rim now. Mm-hmm. He's gotta have questions. Yeah. Yeah. So I could see that when Wendell end's given her great speech. Yeah. Which spoiler alert I will be talking about near the end of the episode.
Uhhuh. Um, do you think this was the, oh, I don't want to burn a reference on this. Um, it's the last one, Jeff. Do. I'm not gonna burn it. Do you think this was the scene where you gotta use it? Do you think, do you think all those people were the crew? Oh, I like they've done in other shows
Brent: reference you're talking about.
Yeah. Um, no, no, no. It's a lot. It'd be cool if it was, listen, this is not a reference. Okay. What you're, what you're talking about is, did they get to the end and put, look, there's the producer, there's the writer, there's the, there's a director there, there's a frequent guest actor who's out of makeup right there.
There's the lighting guy, there's the sound guy. There's all that. I don't think they did that. No, I don't think they, I think that was a, uh, unique idea for the show that did that. And, um, I don't, I don't see that being something that happened. It could have, I could be way wrong and if I'm wrong, cool. Yeah,
Jeff: I just don't think it was, I think I was just, I think I was watching it through that idea of the other show and it was just like, oh, that'd be a cool thing.
There's a lot of people here. Yeah, maybe. Yeah. Yeah. And then Londo shows up
Brent: well before that, um, because we have the, uh, we have the whole thing that happens with linear on the white star. Now, we talked a lot about how much we hated the whole linear thing. Well, we gotta talk about at least what happened.
On the White Star and I, I'm simply gonna start with this. Uh, what was Lanier doing? Did he think that if, if like, was this a moment where he's like, Hey, if Sheridan dies, then the way it's clear for me to be with Delin, like I kill that thought.
Jeff: Right? Exactly. This guy's gonna die. Dumb ass thought this guy's gonna die and I can slide in and take over his pregnant wife who's now going to be a widow.
Brent: Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Dude, she's already rejected you. This is not a good idea, dude. And if she ever finds out that you left him there, then it's done ski. Dude, I get it. He was, listen, this is the addict talking here. He wasn't in his right mind. No, that's not, he wasn't thinking it all the way through, you know, and it wasn't till later.
I mean, he went, he went 15 steps around the corner and stopped and had his moment where he is like, I can't, I can't do that. And he just walked back too late. Yeah. And then he stood there freaked out and, and, and whatever. .
So while we're talking about this spot, I do wanna bring up something that I just, it, it stood out to me and I loved it. Bruce Box Lightner, he, uh, he, he uses the pike to bust open the glass door and he's on the floor coughing and whatever, and he rolls over and he looks up and he sees Lanier standing there.
The Dart he was shooting with just his eyes in that moment was, Anger, hatred, bet. Like all of the emotions. And Bruce was just like, he was giving every bit of it in that moment. Like I bought every second and he didn't even say a word, it was just a look he was giving. Oh, I was, I
Jeff: was, it was so good. Last week we got this smile that dispelled the tension with him and Kar this week.
We get that, that look. It was so good. I do wanna talk about that Minbar Pike thing really quick. Yeah. That was so awesome. I loved it. I loved that. Um, at first, so he pops it open and he starts banging on the glass. Yeah. Now the pro wrestler in me who understands this stuff, looked at how he was holding that pike.
And what it showed me was they had clearly built that to be like sugar glass that would break easily when he needed to do the stunt so he couldn't just weigh on it. With the thing. So if you ever watch it again, go back and look at his hand positioning on the pike and how he's got his right was his right hand up.
He's like choking on the pike. There's only a little bit there and he is swinging on it. What that does is it lets him use his shoulders so he can give it the illusion of swinging at it, but there's no actual force. Mm-hmm. Because the way he's holding it chokes it off. You'll see this in pro wrestling chair shots, cane shots, baseball bats.
Yep. Where they hold things in a way where like, especially baseball bat swings, no one's, no one's choking up and holding the thing up and taking a full swing. They've got it held like this and they go so you don't get the whole piece.
Brent: I remember when I thought that was good. You used to, you used to do the sledgehammer.
Was that
Jeff: from Duggan? No, the sledgehammer was, um, The two by four was hacksaw Jim Duncan. Right, right. But
Brent: no, who had the sledgehammer? Somebody had a sledgehammer. Oh my God. Maybe they just used sledgehammers every once. Somebody build it out from under the ring sometimes. But there's dude who had s they would go to hit somebody with a sledgehammer.
They always had their hand on the end of the thing, and they would just hit them with the back of their hand. Yep. Like, and understandably so. Yeah. You know, but it was like, uh,
Jeff: yeah. I was like, wow. Yeah. But the, uh, but then, but then when he stops he's like, hold on. What, what, what am I doing here? And he just pops it open into the thing that was, I loved it.
It was, that whole scene
Brent: was cool. I, I gotta tell you the way I honestly just thought they did was they just put plexiglass in the thing, cut the shot, put the sugar glass in, and then went for the next shot. That's, that's how I thought they did it, but
Jeff: Sure. Yeah. That's money. That, that's budget right there.
There you, that takes a lot. It's a lot easier to tell Sheridan or tell box lightner how to not bust the sugar
Brent: glass. There you go. I like it. I like it. Uh, linear or I'm sorry, I'm not linear. Sheridan and Delin are having a conversation and Delin goes, I, I, I always knew he felt something for me, but I didn't know that it was that.
And I went, bull honky. Right Dude, I just edited myself.
Jeff: You've trained me after last week. I'm very sensitive to that.
Brent: Like, I was like, dude, you were just on a ship with him in a dying moment. And he said, I love you. You knew. You knew.
Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. Whatcha
Brent: talking about Delaine? You are not that stupid. Like, oh my word. Oh. And Sheridan's a good dude. 'cause he is like, look, we can, we can get past this. We can, we can move on.
He's your friend. I'm gonna, you know, like Sheridan wanted to. You, I talked about it last week with Jcar. He, he, he wanted to move toward linear, linear, moved away. Mm-hmm.
Jeff: You know, well, he went on a mini journey there. 'cause at first he was like, if he comes back and he says, I was coming back to save you, not make sure you were dead.
Would you believe him? And he's like, I, I don't know. I don't know. That's
Brent: a truth. I that's a true statement.
Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. And he went from there all the way to look. It's fine. Just he comes back. It's gonna be, you know, I mean, there's, there will be a cost for this. Yep. But it's gonna be between him and me.
It's, it's fine. But
Brent: those, those two things are not mutually exclusive. They're not diametrically opposed. Exactly. No. Yeah. He, he can not trust him, but still let it be okay. Mm-hmm. You know what I mean? Like, like those two things can coexist. Um,
so we go through all of that. They've had that. Let's talk about Londo. Can we talk about Londo? Yeah. Londo Londo shows up. I did not think we were gonna be seeing him again. Same. I was shocked. I was, I did not think at all we would be seeing him again. Um, he comes in, he's being his usual londo self, uh, all sorts of things.
Let's call it what it is. He was there on a mission from the drop to smuggle in a keeper for their child. Yep. To attach to him when he turns 16. Do the math. That's war without end.
Jeff: It's war without end. It's also, it's Sheridan kind of points out here. Around the time Sheridan's gonna die, it's, it's
Brent: within a year or two of Sheridan dying.
Mm-hmm. Now, Sheridan said, you come of age at 21. I'm like, do you? Okay. Maybe in the future.
Jeff: Depends on the state.
Brent: Uh, that was great. I'm sorry. Okay. Sorry. So, so that's what they did. Did this whole thing with this urn and, you know, uh, blah, blah, blah, and, and Londo Bloviate. Uh,
what do you think of Londo after seeing this moment? Oh, man, because I've, I've, I've, I've still have a high bit of respect for Londo out of this moment. Yeah. And I'll tell you why, but
Jeff: go, go. I, I think we're in the same place because dude figured out real fast that alcohol shuts this keeper down and he was begging for it because in my, in my, in my story, in my head, yes.
Get me some avari. Yep. Get me some whiskey. Let me get wasted. I'm gonna tell you what's happening. I want so badly to tell
Brent: you. And they will think that I've just delivered you a thing. Mm-hmm. Yeah. As far as they're concerned, I will have completed my mission, but I will have been able to give you a heads up and
Jeff: shoot.
Yeah. Sheridan being a good dude and respecting their culture is gonna cost them their kid.
Brent: Well, I don't know, maybe Dylan, Dylan said he was okay. Yeah. But I, now I need to know what happened to him. That he was okay from exactly like what was going on. Did, did he, did he get the keeper and they had to have it surgically removed?
I
Jeff: don't know. Did they drop the urn and that little seal came off and they're like, that's not water falling out of there. What the heck?
Brent: Right. Right. But I mean, Londo, Londo couldn't tell them what was up without the, without everything happening. 'cause then people blow up on Sari.
Jeff: But here's my, here's the hole in that.
Yep. So he heads back to his ship and we get kind of that, uh, long twilight struggle. Yep. Uh, you know, window view of him again showing this, this, I, I love
Brent: that. I loved that shot. Yep. Yeah. Great
Jeff: callback. He's just, just as broken in this moment because I mean, that was watching asteroids get tossed by a mass driver.
He just planted a bomb that's gonna take 16 years to go off, but it's gonna be just as devastating if not more. Yeah. And he did it and he knows it, but the drop talks to him like through the keyboard and he is like, good job. Good job. Pet Londo. Like pat him on the head. Good job. You get an hour away from us, Brent, in that hour.
Why didn't he get on the calm Sheridan Dela. Throw the urn away. Good. God, help me. There's a thing attached to myself. Oh God, I can't talk anymore. Where was that? What does that mean to have an hour away from him if he can't write a
Brent: letter? Yeah, I don't. Yeah. Send a text. Tell, tell your, tell your dude. Like, dude, you have to go tell them that that thing was there.
You've got to go tell like Call, call J Car. Yeah. Be like, yo dude J Car. Uh. Speak in some sort of a code if you have to. Yeah. Some, something. Don't let them have the earn go get my urn back. Go, go. Uh, you know, Hey Lando, or Hey Kar, I just wanted to, I gave Sheridan a present, uh, a present from my people.
Right.
Jeff: You know, I just can wait for, I get a present from my people for you to poop on.
Brent: Right. And, and, but Londo iss gonna sit, or Ja car's gonna sit there and be like, Londo doesn't give, like Right. There's nothing like that in Maari society. He must have told me that. So I can go get it. Like, yeah. Like something of that nature.
Mm-hmm. Like that would've been, you know, I, I want, that's the lon. I wanna see Londo playing this game. Yeah. I want, I wanna see like, this is, so we last saw Londo in just the most dire of places. I wanna see Londo playing the chess game now. Yeah. Where he has to play this game, but he's out, he's trying to outmaneuver the drop and, and, but they don't know, like they're not allowed to know.
Yeah. You know, breadcrumbs. Exactly.
Jeff: And between being drunk and between being, you know, positively reinforced with time away from them, that's when you do mm-hmm. The work, because what my
Brent: understanding what he says when the, when the drop are listening. Yeah.
Jeff: You know, so, and my, my understanding now at this point is what that keeper does is it's a connection.
And so they can hear what he says, see what he does, and if he messes up, they blow up the planet. Yeah. And they're not controlling him necessarily
Brent: on only, they only control you when something is going on with their interest. Mm-hmm. So like when Jaar Hass got his hands around Longo's throat, the keeper took over.
Jeff: Yeah. You know, he goes up, his arms shoot up and he starts choking Jaar.
Brent: Yeah. Although I would've thought Jaar would've had a little more, uh, oomph mph at that point than what Londo had. Yeah. Jaar certainly had the, had the angle on him, right? Yeah. Um, so Londo iss talking weird like the region did. Mm-hmm.
Doing all that, all that weird stuff. Uh, yeah. Yeah. I, but I'm with you. I still think Londo Londo was actually trying to do, like Londo was trying to, to walk that line here.
Jeff: Yep. Londo was being a hero in the way he was able to be a hero.
And then Sheridan having trouble sleeping, having existential crisis about everything gets up and records little, uh, little message for who we are guessing is gonna be Baby David. Yep. Yep. That was a cool scene. And do what? That was a cool scene.
Brent: Well, I tell you, Jeff, uh, this particular scene I have declared is the present that j m s wrote to Brent and Jeff.
A hundred percent. That means we have hit the spot of the show because we can't talk about the section without being in our white star discussion, where we're talking about these messages. We're talking about the morals. What is it that Babylon five is trying to tell us here as the viewer? Jeff, you're going to break this all down for us.
You're gonna tell us all this, and you're gonna give this episode a rating of zero to five white stars. And the litmus test you have is how strong is the message and how uniquely was it delivered in a Babylon five way. That's your litmus test. This is not how much do we like the episode? This is, let's talk about the message.
Jeff, what do you got for the message? Let me say the messages. Yeah. Delivered here in objects At rest,
Jeff: there's like two directions I can take on this one. And one of 'em has many, many, many bullet points, um, under it. And you'll see those bullet points if you check out my notes on our Patreon. And that's the first path where I just go down Sheridan's monologue, right?
He's talking to his kid and does exactly what Brent said. Packages up everything in Babylon. Five. So let's go down these bullets, shall we? Hey, find a mentor, right? An ally like he has in Delaine. Find someone that's not gonna judge you that you can talk to. And la too su for support. Second, you're gonna make mistakes.
I. It will happen. Some will be big, some will be little. What's important is not the mistakes, but what you learn from them. I loved what he said. As long as you get back up and you're two inches taller, then then it's all good. It's all good. I mean, that
Brent: didn't mean anything to anybody, especially coming off a linear thing.
Exactly, dude.
Jeff: Just be better. Be better. And I don't know how many centimeters that is, but, but he basically said for our non-United States based people is, as long as you're taller than you were before then, then you're good. 30 says home is not a place, it's where your passion takes you. Yeah. Right. Oh man.
To me, that means it's a place, it's people, it's experiences that's home. It's where you're living, your purpose. Yeah. Friends come and go. Lovers will come and they will go enjoy them for who they are. Enjoy them for what they are when you are with them. Fight for what you believe
Brent: in. I'm sorry, let back up.
'cause there's some other words he had there. Yeah. So they will change. You will change. And from time to time your way may split and that's okay. And it's okay. Do what then? Do what you just said. Yeah. Yep.
Jeff: And fight for what you believe in. Always, always, always. And never start a fight, but always finish it.
I could dive into all these, right? Like we have talked for hours, literally about all of these bullet points. About two years.
Brent: We've talked for these about two years. Yeah.
Jeff: It's, it's, it's, it's well packaged. It's beautiful. The way he says it. It's so emotional the way he's laying it out for his kid. It's just, it's, it's so, it's awesome.
Love everything about it. But I wanna talk about the other direction. I could take this and by the way, I'm taking this both directions 'cause I can, but the other direction is Delen speech. There is no Menari word for goodbye. I love this. My grandpa and God, he rest in God's holy light or whatever. He's dead.
I love him. It's great hope he's good. But he refused to say goodbye all the way to the end. And if you, and if you did say goodbye to him, you either get a lecture or a backhand. Okay. Complicated relationship with my grandparents, but to him, goodbye was final, just like it is for Delaine. And even as he was dying, he didn't see that as final, right?
There's no goodbye. It's not forever. For him, it was, I'll be seeing you, and I just, that has stuck with me my entire life. The message on that to me is that we're all. Connected. It all comes together, right? And that we are all connected as one. It's almost the mbar faith that we're all just manifestations of the universe trying to figure stuff out, right?
We come into people's lives, we go outta people's lives, but we always leave a piece of ourselves with them and they with us, our souls, like they said, our souls become a part of the places and the people we inhabit and interact with. Once we can acknowledge this and know this, we are all better. It's a beautiful message.
Strong. It's one that resonates through these last two episodes strongly, and the entire series of Babylon five. So it's five white stars, right? Well, before we get there, I also have to see, as you said, if this was delivered in a uniquely Babylon five way, and it was not. This might upset some people, what I'm about to say.
But we got two great speeches. We got Delan in front of a whole bunch of people. We got John Sheridan as a monologue. They were beautiful. They were great. In our experience with Babylon, five enriches them. It gives us real examples from the show to make those better. But Brent's speeches could have been plopped into almost any show, any movie, and worked.
They were great speeches. They were awesome, but they were not uniquely Babylon. Five. So in this penultimate episode of the series, four and a Half White Stars, oh, come on, come on. Just doing my job, man. Just doing my job. That is
Brent: ridiculous. That is more ridiculous than Michael York
Jeff: playing. No. No, that hurts that this is a five white star episode.
Through it, through all the
Brent: way. Whatcha you talking about? I'm gonna put those speeches
Jeff: anywhere. I don't care anywhere.
Brent: This is this the, these speeches wrap up all of Babylon five. This is the
Jeff: message of Babylon five. And they delivered it in a not Babylon. Five. Well, okay, here, here's where you can, you can sway me.
The speeches could go anywhere in anything and be awesome, but it's all the 108 episodes, 109 counting this one and the stories behind them. Like I said, our, in our experience with Babylon five enriches those speeches. But I'm gonna let you stump that. It's our experience with Babylon five that actually
Brent: makes those speeches.
'cause here's the thing, those speeches would've been cookie cutter, fortune cookie type messages. If you just plop them into any episode or any other series, what gives those lessons oomph is the 108 episodes that came before it, because we have seen these particular messages played out time and time again.
How many times in Babylon five has someone said goodbye and then we saw them come back? Yeah. Right. Let, let's, let's not think about Kimer or the Great Egg Folk, but
Jeff: there's still another episode for the Great Egg People. Still another episode. One
Brent: more, but, but thi But think about how Off Lease freaking came back couple times.
A si a, a character who was on a screen in season one. Sinclair came back,
Jeff: Anna Sheridan came back. Anna
Brent: Sheridan came back, much to my chagrin, but she came back. Morden came back after being there and having his head put up on a pike. Vere went to Minbar as an, as an ambassador and kept coming back. Lanier.
We couldn't get rid of his butt. He kept coming back. Yeah. It was always, it, it,
that message has been replete throughout. Okay, let me, let me look down the list 'cause I have a list of these as well, because sometimes you'll make huge mistakes. There's nothing wrong with falling down as long as you end up two inches taller when you stand up again. How often, even in this episode, Jeff, before we got to this spot, were we talking about the idea of redemption?
The idea of it's okay to make a mistake. The idea of asking for forgiveness. How does that, that sentence land any weight without the 108 episodes that come behind it? You know what I mean? Home is not a place, it's wherever your passion takes you. A gray empty shell of a space station is not a home. What made it home?
The people remember Londo walking back with Jaar, having visited Centara Prime saying, you know, This place is my home now. Yeah. This is more home than Tati Prime. That's a good point. That it's stuff like that that gives this, that sort of, that sort of way along the way. You're gonna make friends, your friends will change from time to time.
Your way may split as we've just seen. Just watched it. Yeah. And that's okay. And what, what did he say? What was the lesson? Enjoy your time with them. Let them change you. Let them be a part of your life for that period. These guys were a part of our life for this period. And it's okay. It's okay that they're moving on to the next phase of their life.
As you, as your ways have now split. Things work out sooner or later. The road was never meant to be easy. Sheridan came in, split Babylon five from earth gov to stand up for what he believed in was wrong with what President Clark was doing. It was not easy. It was it, but he stayed true to what he believed, even when he was about to be declared by a, as a traitor by President Chenko.
Mm-hmm. And he, and he resigns his commission. And then, oh, yeah, I'm gonna turn out to be a president myself. Here we go. Let's, let's rock. It worked out. It worked out all of the, all of the crap he's been going through, through season five, trying to get this alliance up and running and doing stuff. And now it's worked out.
They're still here. They're still here. Be willing to fight for what you believe in Jeff. The, it, it's not, the message of this episode is not contained in these, uh, little quirky sayings. The message is contained in 108 episodes that precede this, this episode. Those define those 108 episodes. Can I read you?
Dare I dare you to do that with
Jeff: Star Trek. Can I read you my note just for fun here? 'cause this has been great. You've done a good job, stumping. I'm giving it four and a half white stars. Parentheses. It's really five. Make Brent convince you. Oh my God. You did not.
Brent: You did not.
Jeff: Oh my God. You did not. I did.
Oh my God. Jeff. Yep. Go look. Un Patreon reached to the computer
Brent: screen. I was like, there's no way. There's no way. This isn't a five star rating. Oh my word. That and that in your notes. So everybody who's read your notes from our Patreon page has just been laughing, has been
Jeff: watching this whole thing unfold.
Oh my. Yep.
Brent: Oh my God. Ah.
Jeff: Did a great job. Well played five, five white stars through and through. Yes. Okay. Now, uh, now that I've opened myself up for potential, uh, blowback, Brent, it's your turn.
We have been working to develop the definitive objectively correct set in stone ranking of the episodes in fifth season of Babylon five. You get to rank this one, our current top five, and I swear to the great maker that this top five, it better be changing, uh, in the top spot, the very long night of Londo mal number two, the fall of Sari Prime.
Three, all my dreams torn his under then movements of fire and shadow, and in the fifth spot, no compromises. Brent, where do we put objects at rest?
Brent: Here's the thing. The very long night of Lando MAL has held the top spot since it debuted as the second episode of the season. Yeah,
Jeff: that may be the longest in all of the seasons.
Brent: No compromises. Has been in the top five since the beginning of the season. Yeah.
Very long light of Lao mal though, Jeff, that episode was so poignant, so masterful. It is not untouchable. It's perfect. It would not surprise me if we did a ranking of all the episodes. That very long night of Lao mal is in the top five
Jeff: or three, maybe
Brent: even. Yes, I was being generous. Like immediately. I'm thinking long twilight struggle.
Um, uh, the one that wrapped up the shadow war, that was that fall of night. Was that it? Um, and then, yeah, very long night. Alana Malar. I, I mean, yeah, top three. Like, and those are just the ones that come to the top of my mind without thinking about the rest of 'em. Oh, t k o Of course, of
Jeff: course. I mean, that's, I can't forget about that one.
Honorary. It's, it's number zero. It's so high.
Brent: Right, right. Um, that being said, uh, fall of Sari Prime, which is our current number two, uh, was also poignant. And it was masterful, but it is not hard to touch. And this one for me, tops that this is my new number two.
Jeff: Brett, that is the correct answer. Absolutely.
100%. This, this was, uh, amazing. I, I still find that it had some massive flaws. We'll just go ahead and call those flaws linear, but as soon as you take the that out, this, this is an amazing episode. And even that linear stuff
Brent: served a purpose. It served a purpose. But I would also argue that the linear stuff from a, a writing, storytelling, dramatic production way, Yeah, we're amazing.
I just hate what happened. I hate more the content of what happened than how it happened
Jeff: personally. Well, now we get to lay to rest objects at rest. And before we get to a moment that I literally have like butterflies and goosebumps about Brent in two weeks time, Uhhuh, we're gonna look back at the entirety of season five.
We're gonna be wrapping up the fifth season of Babylon Five. And a thing that has become a tradition for us where we go back and talk about cool things in the season. We talk about, uh, our ranking that we just, uh, just discussed, and we do a giveaway. If you're watching the video, you are stunned by, uh, I guess it'd be Charlie's Angels, but here we'll call him John's Angels.
John's Angel, which would make you a lon really right now. Brent's got some great poses going on. He is, He's holding the, the prizes our giveaway this time. This is
Brent: so amazing. This looks like some, uh, frankly, frankly, this looks like something that you went to the toy store and pulled out of packaging this.
This is not just something that somebody like whipped off a home three D printer, although that's actually exactly what it is. This looks like something that was, um,
Jeff: uh, uh,
Brent: bought in a toy store. I'll take it a step further. It feels like something that was bought in a toy store.
Jeff: So, Brent, so what Brent's holding right now is, uh, from our good friend Wash, he created a P p g some PPGs for us.
He's holding it up on the video. Brent, will you do me a favor? Bring it in on that little gray. So it's, it's gray at the top. I mean, it's just like the p pg, it's got a black handle. It's textured. Yeah. And you can see in the little gray thing there. Oh, very feel it. Yeah. Yeah. All the, it's got the five, the Babylon five.
Brent: Oh yeah. Right here in the, uh, in the handle.
Jeff: Yeah. So this isn't something you get a toy store. This is the thing you would buy at a comic-Con. Like this is, uh, it looks
Brent: that good right down here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's got detail's, spikes on it, you know, like right down the, right down the line that, that actually work.
It's, it, it's so good, man. It's so good.
Jeff: Incredible replica of A P P G by our buddy wash. And we're gonna give a couple of these away in our season five wrap up. And all you have to do to enter is be a patron. Go to patreon.com/babylon five first, it's the number five and the word first doesn't matter what tier you come in at, doesn't matter what date you came in at couple days before the wrap up, I'm gonna pull all those names into a spreadsheet.
I've got a macro that gives me a random one. And that person we're gonna say your name or a couple of you on that season five wrapup. You reach out to us and get with a proud owner of one of these incredible PPGs, and that's happening in two weeks.
Next week. Next week we're watching Brent, the series finale of Babylon five. Okay. Sleeping in light. Sleeping in light. Sleeping in light. Okay. Brent and I know two things about this. We know that it was filmed as the close to season four, when they thought that was gonna be the end, and we know they didn't make any, uh, changes to, oh, wait.
We also know that, uh, it's supposed to make you cry. Apparently, uh,
Brent: supposedly they didn't make any changes. I don't know if that, I don't know. I can't confirm that that's true or not. I just feel like I've heard. Have you heard that somewhere? I feel like I've heard that somewhere before.
Jeff: I've heard that too.
Okay. So that's what we know. We know nothing else. We have avoided. I know I've avoided thumbnails on this thing. Screenshots that I'm aware came from this. We know nothing. And one of people's favorite parts of our entire show is where we look at the title alone of the next episode. This is the last time we're gonna be doing this, Brent, for We're gonna
Brent: predict for all the work that we put into this show, the recaps, the ending bits, the, the, the discussion, the analysis, the white stars, the rankings for the, the, all of this stuff.
The single thing we hear from people out there that they love about this show is the predictions. When we get 'em right, when we get 'em wrong and everything
Jeff: in between. I can almost guarantee, uh, I'll be getting this one wrong. Um, as you'll find out in a minute, Brent, you get to go first. Why don't you predict?
Yeah. Lucky you predict what's gonna happen in sleeping in light.
Brent: Okay, so I, I'm, I'm trying to put myself back in season four. I. Right. Like I, I'm gonna try to logic this one out. You ready? Um, I'm gonna put myself back in season four. We just saw Rising Star, right? Uh, so what does j m Ss now do to pull out a finale?
Um, but it's also gotta be clean enough to just lift it and throw it at the end of season five. Like nothing ever happened. It's, it's that clean, it's amazing. Um, so I'm thi and then, and then in its place we got deconstruction of a falling star, right? Where in the deconstruction of a falling star, we went a million years into the future where we saw human, human, human hooman, uh, evolve and go become angels.
Vons affected pretty much, yeah, they ascended in, into whatever. And what we saw over the course of that time is how exalted. Sheridan and the Alliance was, and how over the course of time they just like, they became like nothing. Mm-hmm. People distorted What really happened. They, I implied motives. They criticized it more than what it actually deserved and bad things happened.
All right.
It is possible, Jeff, that future is not the one to come.
Jeff: Okay. That's right. That's what they taught us in signs importance
Brent: back in season one. Right. It, it is possible that what this episode is, is what really happened. Not the, oh, that's bad. This is the good, so. I have something that I've been working on in my brain for a while, Jeff.
Okay. I think I've mentioned it once or twice. I don't know if I've said it on the show. I think I've said it to you. I'm actually positive. I've said it to you a few times. Okay. And I, I need you to confirm that I'm not just pulling this out right now. This is an idea I've had for a while. Alright. Uh, so we're gonna see events into the future.
The alliance has been successful. Uh, mankind is evolving into those energy-based life forms. I think, I think we're gonna see that same deconstruction, falling star. Uh, the disasters that we saw in deconstruction have been averted because of the work Sheridan has done over the course of season five. Okay.
And at the end, the human that evolves is Sheridan turning into Kosh. Neuronic a. And he will time travel all the way back to the gathering and start the whole thing over again. And we finally get the answer, Jeff, to why Deslin said to Kosh, you know why you have to go save him? Kosh is Sheridan, God in the future, a long time from now.
That's my prediction.
Jeff: We have a cool announcement. I'll just, they're not gonna make here, you'll, you'll get it when it's time. But we have a special thing we're doing around the reaction video for this coming thing. All I'm gonna say is, if you're right, I'm thinking back to a very, uh, two very pivotal reactions I did.
Um, I'm thinking about when we learned about Vallen, when we learned about Anna, uh, Sheridan, and how I kind of lost my, uh, little mind, uh, in those reactions. I'm gonna expect the same from you. It might happen with me if it, if it, if this is the story. Yeah. Like, oh my
Brent: gosh, you know why I love this? Because I think when you go back and you look at what j m s had originally planned for the show, I, that, that's gotta be a question.
Okay. J m s here was your original plan over the run of the show. Things happened through your plan into, into Awry, and here's how you got around it. Was it Sinclair that was always planned to be valent or was, or was it Sinclair that was planned to caught or maybe Sinclair wasn't plan? Maybe the whole thing about Vallen this, that story about Vallen was actually planned for the series finale.
Hmm. We weren't supposed to get it in war without, and we were supposed to get it like now. You know, um, so you, you shunt Sinclair off to the side. We get that early. Now what do you do with Sheridan, the guy who's come in to replace him? Well, if he can't go be Vallen, he could be osh. Yeah. He could do the, and, and frankly that makes way more sense to me, to the idea of the one who was the one who is, and now Sheridan has become the one who will be the,
Jeff: the will be is Kosh who is in the future and then will come back to the past making the one have to be That's a big loop.
Yeah. Was, is and will be. Yeah. Dude, that, that's a bold prediction and I want it to happen. It'd be so awesome. And you have, you've mentioned it. I think you may have mentioned it here before. If not, you and I have talked about it. I know that for sure. Mm-hmm. I,
Brent: yeah. I'm not just making this up for the first time here.
I've, I've had this in my head for a while. Yeah. So I'm, I'm speaking it into existence. I'm sending this back 30 some odd years into the past. Making it happen.
Jeff: Self-actualization of the whole thing. I have no idea on this one, and I've had a little bit of time to think about it. Um, not as long as you've spent thinking about this one.
I, I honestly haven't thought about this episode very much until the last couple days. Um, and my prediction is, is going to be very selfish. There are things, there are answers that I want out, out of this show, and so I'm gonna construct my prediction to answer those two big questions. I think that this is gonna be a jump forward in time.
I'm thinking two or three years, just a, a little bit. And it's important that it's two or three years. 'cause you remember what's gonna happen in two years. Lee's gonna come back to Garibaldi Oh. And expect all that anti cyco stuff to be set up, which is gonna launch the, the Telepath war. And
Brent: so I think you're gonna, you're saying is not the thing with Byron.
That was not the Telepath
Jeff: war. Correct. That was the precursor that gave us, remember Byron, it enabled everything to make the telepath war. Gotcha. We're not gonna see the Telepath war. We're gonna come in at the very end. Sleeping in light is gonna come in at the tail end of the telepath war, which will be what you and I talked about.
Garibaldi giving it to Bester. Lee's gonna take that neuro block out. He's gonna go, but at the same time, we're gonna have the launch. Thera could been very patient at this point, and so, uh, I, I think that we're going to get a subversion from the war without end piece on this. Or maybe we get two jumps in time.
I don't know. But we're gonna get Thera War and Thera War is going to be very short because Ghislaine mentioned a thing in war without End that I still don't fully understand. And that is John. We built a thing that will last a thousand years, but the sacrifice, the sacrifice, we had to, we're gonna find out what that sacrifice was.
They're going to immediately make a sacrifice of some kind that will bring a quick and decisive end to the drop, and then leave the mess on Sari Prime for Lando and all that stuff that's coming up. So, uh, yeah, so I think selfishly, I think it's just gonna answer literally just the two questions that I still have hanging that I think are pretty darn big.
Okay.
Brent: I, I would, I I, I really don't want Cory's mother, Cory's father to be best's last episode. I'll be furious. Real as, as pivotal as he has been. I, I really like how everybody talks. He's the best villain of the show. He's, he's his own thing. He's, he's whatever, like, he's not done. He's, he can't be complete.
Like, there's just no way. Although I have already come to accept that storyline is done.
Jeff: I can't because Sheridan is Kosh. Let's go. We'll find out. Hey, we're gonna find out right here next week. Next week, we're wrapping this thing. We're, we're not wrapping it up. Next week, we're watching the last episode of this series.
Thank you for being here today. Make sure you're here next week as well. Make sure you've subscribed wherever you're watching, wherever you're listening, leave us a rating and review and share this podcast and share it now so people can be here with us for sleeping in light. So, until next time. Hey, Jeff.
Yeah, man,
Brent: what's up? So, you know, usually at this point of the show, we try to do this quippy little joke that has something to do with the episode before, but since we're here at the end of the show, um, we've ended on a great note. I, I have a real question for you. Okay. What is the best piece of advice your father ever gave you?
Jeff: Wow. My dad gave me a lot of really good advice. What comes to mind for me is he talked about like, people are gonna have their stuff and you're gonna have your stuff. Let them have their stuff. Don't judge 'em for that stuff and just be there for 'em, right? Like if they need help, if they need, uh, an ear, if they need whatever, be there for 'em.
But don't solve their problems. Don't get involved and just let them be them. Kind of what we got in the lesson here, you know, from Sheridan. Like, just appreciate people for who they are, where they're at, and be there for 'em is, uh, advice that's really served me well. What about you? Uh, what's the best advice you ever got from your dad?
Brent: Don't eat the yellow snow. Seriously,
Jeff: man. Get the hell outta here.
