Jeff: Welcome to Babylon 5 for the first time, not a Star Trek podcast. My name is Jeff Akin and I am the one who was.
Brent: And I'm Brent Allen and I am the one who will be.
Jeff: We're 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 podcasters, but we have decided to watch this 30 year old show for the very first time. But rather than just come together and talk about it, we can't do that. No, because we're a Star Trek podcasters. We like to overanalyze everything. So we are here overanalyzing Babylon, five, while we're at it.
Jeff: and while this is not a podcast about Star Trek, those references are sure to make their way into our conversation. I think specifically in this episode, they most certainly will. So what? To keep us honest, we play the rule of three. That means each one of us gets up to, and no more than three references to Star Trek per episode.
That's it. Three. No substitutions. Exchanges a refund.
Brent: It's kinda like a game, isn't it, Jeff?
Jeff: It is a game. We love games
Brent: We like to smile. It makes us laugh and, and we just see if we can do it. Cuz sometimes it gets really hard in an episode to keep to the three. Well, along with that game, we like other games, we play more than just one game. Sometimes we play two, sometimes we play three. Sometimes we play more. One of the games that we play in every single episode is where we try to predict what next week's episode is gonna be about. Based on title alone. We have not seen it yet. We have not read any show descriptions yet. Hopefully we haven't even seen the thumbnail yet. We're just using what we know.
Our powers of observation of how sci-fi is put together. We look at a story title and we say, this is what we think it's gonna be about. It is time, Jeff, to get your comeuppance and see how close you were last week to predicting this week's episode. Intersections in real time.
Jeff: So I thought that, uh, Both Sheridan and Garibaldi were gonna get interrogated, right? Garibaldi was gonna turn himself in, talk Zack, into not just blasting him like Ivanova ordered. And we were gonna see kind of the difference between how Earth Force and the, uh, liberation fleet treated its prisoners. And then I thought we were gonna get linear kind of coming into plan the escape for Sheridan.
Brent: Do I even give you a point for the Sheridan part cuz it was the only part that was Right,
Jeff: And I don't think you give me a point for it cuz like there's no way that was gonna not happen.
Brent: exactly right. And which I mean, to be fair, Jeff, I'm not sure that I actually get any points for this one either because while I completely nailed it, there was no way, it wasn't going to be this what I said was, huh?
Jeff: Yeah, I was gonna say, yeah, you added a bunch of stuff too.
Brent: well, I mean, I mean, I said this was gonna be babble on fives chain of command, part two.
Sheridan's gonna be in a room with an inquisitor getting tortured. And, uh, they're gonna mess with his mind. I also said that Garabaldi was gonna do some stuff and Gar Baldi was gonna try to come rescue him and it was their dreams from Michael Garabaldi. That part was completely false. Did not happen at all, cuz Gu Baldi didn't even show up in this episode except for an ec clip flashback moment. But the rest of it was absolutely right.
Jeff: I figure if we're grading on a curve, we both got a perfect score.
Brent: You know what, I'll take it for this episode.
Jeff: Yeah. I'm gonna go with that. So this is an episode that a lot happened in and you've probably pieced together some of the key points, but for those of you who haven't watched this one in a while, or if you never have before at all and are just listening to our conversation, just cool. Uh, Brent, why don't you tell us about the, uh, episode intersections in real time.
Brent: Well, just in case you forgot, captain John Sheridan has been captured. He's locked in a dark cell lying on the floor next to the only drain in the center of the room, which is kind of foreboding all on its own when you think about it. Suddenly the door opens and in walks goad. Dread. Okay, not really. This dude's just an earth guy.
He's kind of bald, wears glasses, suit that's a little bit too big. Carries a briefcase, basically. He's a nerd. We'll call him William Sheridan is restrained in a chair and he's given a pain giver that was retrieved from the nans. He's wearing this one around the neck though basically it's a shock collar and it's one that will shock the ever loving snot out of Sheridan if he even gets within three steps of William.
William explains that he is not Sheridan's enemy because in order to be an enemy, You have to care. You have to be invested, and he doesn't care. This is just a job. That's all William proceeds to try all the tricks in the book to break Sheridan. They start by withholding water and food and then William does the thing where he eats food right in front of him knowing that he is been starving for the last three days.
But it's not fancy food. Oh, no, no, no. It's just, it's a, it's a workman's lunch, a nice little sandwich, nasty mustard on a corn beef sandwich. But hey, I guess when you're that hungry, anything will do. Right? Then they try to poison them. They tried the whole thing where they play the Barney theme song at high volumes all night, not letting you sleep.
They screw with this sense of time of day. Even try to get 'em to say what time of day it is and rather than, you know, what time of day it actually is trying to get John in. He knows like, it can't be this time of day because whatever. Anyway, I. And then of course there's that moment when John is supposed to say full lights.
They even try to bring in an innocent drossy who has clearly been tortured and beaten into submission. One who is willing to confess to everything, even though Sheridan's never even seen this particular Drossy. Sheridan tells him to resist. All he needs to be able to do is to say no one more time than they say Yes.
The draws. He is encouraged. He's encouraged enough to stop cooperating, which leads him to being strapped to a table, taken into room 17 and apparently killed. You see, they're trying to get Sheridan to admit that he has actually just been influenced by all those dirty, rotten aliens, especially the Mbar.
Sure, he's gonna stand trial and yeah, he's gonna have to be held accountable for his actions. Both the ones that he actually committed and ones that he didn't at all. But Sheridan was also a war hero. So because he was under the influence, that's gonna bring a little bit of leniency on him. And Clark's gonna get his public confession and an endorsement that's gonna rally the people of Earth against the aliens.
And Sheridan's gonna get to live a nice little comfortable life until they just come quietly kill him one day. This apparently goes on for days and days, probably not weeks, though. Visions of Dalen seem to strengthen John's resolve. He grows a pretty patchy beard that actually looks pretty good on him.
It works. And in the end, with one final chance to sign the confession papers, John spits on them. William says he really wishes that John wouldn't have done that, and they immediately give him the same treatment as the draws he. Sheridan is strapped to a table taken to room 17, which looks remarkably like whatever room he's in now, because, you know, set budgets, there's a hood and f there's a hooded figure.
A man, presumably the executioner who was waiting, they forcibly put him into another chair, one that actually looked just like the one he was in in the other room and, and then they take that table he was sitting on and they convert it back into the table. That was in the other room that William was using.
And a new mysterious man walks in. We'll call him, not William, but he is another nerd. And he walks in like, this is the first time anything's ever happened with Sheridan. And the entire process starts all over again. And oh yeah, that executioner in the hooded robe lowers his hood and it's that mbar from earlier.
Jeff: Zizi.
Brent: And it's that Drazi from earlier. And with that total mind, the episode comes to a close. Jeff, what did you think of intersections in real time,
Jeff: So later on you're gonna rate this, uh, this episode on its messages and how Babylon five, they were delivered. Brent, uh, this episode's about as Babylon five as it gets. Period. Full stop, right? This, uh, this wasn't, I don't think this was as much a ripoff. Uh, this was not a ripoff or a riff. Even on chain of command part two, like there's definite par Yeah, there's parallels you can draw cuz like it's
Brent: was, it was a man getting tortured. That's it. Yeah.
Jeff: This episode has happened in all kinds of series, right? The interrogation, the guy being tortured the proclivity is to be like, oh, it's chain. It's, it's not. This is its own episode.
Brent: Yeah.
Jeff: All those other series though that did this episode, what they didn't do was end the episode with the impression that this is gonna be an endless loop of constant interrogation.
Like there's no hope. This episode ended with no hope at all. Stylistically, dude, this, this was a ballsy episode to make. I mean, two dudes in a room, you know, my dinner with Andre, uh, with worse lighting. This is my big thing though. Um, so this was, this wasn't chain of command, but it was comes the inquisitor without Yeah.
Yeah. As comes the inquisitor without the special effects, uh, without Sheridan making it about the guy, he made it about the issue at hand. A lot of people gave me a really hard time when comes the
Brent: I'm sorry, Jeff. I'm sorry, Jeff, but do you know that it did have, that comes the inquisitor head,
Jeff: Hmm.
Brent: Wayne Alexander.
Jeff: Exa Isn't that powerful?
Brent: He was thessy.
Jeff: Yes. So I was, so I, I I love just that little tip, right? That little tip
of the head of like, eh, eh, eh, like maybe I'm here.
Brent: Sorry if I stepped on your toes. I didn't know if you knew that or not, if you were gonna get there to it, but I was like, wow.
Jeff: that's so cool. They had him for that, but no, so people gave me a hard time with Cums, the Inquisitor because I was really hard on
Brent: and you were wrong.
Jeff: So no, I, and, and in fact, this episode, this episode to me proves I was right,
Brent: Yeah.
Jeff: everybody that gave me that hard a hard time.
I want you to watch comes The Inquisitor, and then watch this episode. I want you to see the difference in how Dalen responded to Sebastian and how Sheridan responded to William. It is Night and Daylen made it about Sebastian Sheridan. Made it about the bigger issue at hand. He understood that while, while William is the worst kind of evil in my mind, he's the kind of evil that just is following along, just doing his job, not asking questions, and doing horrible things willingly and kind of having a good time at it.
I mean, let's, let's give Williams some credit. He's good at his job, um, but like he's a horrible person for just,
Brent: Apparently he's not that good at it.
Jeff: all right. Well man, well, I have, I have some thoughts there for later on, but Sheridan was so good in this episode specifically by not making it about William, that when he was talking that draws he down.
I started to think he was going to convert William, that like, William was gonna start listening and being like, you know, you're right. Sometimes you do have to do that thing. Like, I really saw this path where like, Sheridan was gonna get all these people in this facility to kind of, you know, follow him.
Whereas Dalen just turned it into a conflict between her. If she was in this situation, she would've started like insulting William's kids, you know? And, and I don't understand how your wife can even kiss you or look at you, or blah, blah, blah. But this was, this was high television. Amazing episode.
Powerful. You're not gonna see something like this outside of Babylon five. I lo I, I freaking loved this episode. What about you?
Brent: Top five episode of the season for me, maybe even top three. It's it. It'd be hard to. Put those in a bag, shake 'em up, cuz I'm sure there's gonna be some really good ones. And from what I understanding, I mean, Jeff is just a guess. We got a couple more really good ones left in this season, and I imagine even in season five.
So it's, it's gonna be a tough one. Uh, but so far I, I loved this episode. I loved everything about it. I loved the mind bleep to it. Um, William was just so psychopathic and, and deliberate in everything he did. Every action, whether he was just standing up and walking out of the room, coming in, leaving a door open, shutting a door, leaving it halfway closed, leaving this half of the sandwich on the table, you know, dabbing the, the, the corners of his mouth. Um, Flicking an IV bag at some point.
Like, like everything, the exact words he used when the draws he came in right before the draws, he goes out. Uh, I, I mean, it was, it was a phenomenally well done episode. Um, I don't have notes on this episode, Jeff.
Jeff: yeah,
Brent: There's only one episode we've ever done that I have less notes on than I do on this episode.
And that was that King Arthur episode
Jeff: yeah. Say it's that terrible thing.
Brent: Um, but I mean, it's, I, I, I mean, we opened, shared, I mean, go ahead.
Jeff: I was gonna say, if it's cool, I mean, if you're there, a thing that I do wanna talk about is, is William specifically Ray Burke, who played William,
Brent: Okay.
Jeff: because I think the plight, the plight of a guest actor, you have to come in to an existing universe with a group of people that work with each other, you know, a, a culture and everything that exists here, and you have to go in and go toe to toe with people who live in this place.
I think that Burke had the advantage and that it, he really had to play against box Litner and that was it. That wasn't, you know, with everybody. But I think I talked about this even in comes the inquisitor with, with Wayne Alexander as, as, as Jack the Ripper, but walked in and there was no question that this guy was the real deal.
Like you said, everything was deliberate and perfect. His acting was to a t and believable. Um, just, I, I, I just really wanted to give him credit for portraying this character so very well.
Brent: What it reminds me of, and here's the, I've never heard of Ray Burke before in my life. I could probably look on his imdb. Maybe I've seen a couple things that he's been in, maybe not. I don't know. I don't really care. Remember when David Warner came on the show
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: and he elevated the entire show,
Jeff: Including the
Brent: the plastic thing,
Jeff: pla prosthetic,
Brent: But the people around him acted better when they were there.
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: This was Box Litner and Burke. Who made, whom better? Was it b Is this box litner just, just master acting this, and, and Burke had something to play. Is Burke just that good of an actor himself? Did they both elevate each other? Uh, it could have all been true.
You know, I think if you ask 'em like, oh, they, they worked together. Like, it just, it was a magic that that happened when they came together. Perfectly Castro.
Jeff: well the thing is like a breakdown. William had 80% of the dialogue in this Sheridan. Didn't say a lot.
Brent: No, but his face said everything,
Jeff: Yeah. It was all physically acting, you know, and so when, when I think about that as an acting challenge, like all he had to react off of and work off of were his physical reactions in a dark, poorly, intentionally, poorly lit.
He, he probably couldn't even barely see Fox Lightner, you know? Oh, so good.
Brent: Yeah. So I, I mean, my notes kind of just walk through the episode, just a, just a smidge. I mentioned in a recap, the, the idea that he's laying on the floor next to the drain, which is in the middle of the floor, is fore boating, is all get out. You are in a room with a concrete floor or whatever, and there's a drain right in the middle.
Why is there a drain in the middle of that floor? What have they had to wash out? What did they plan this room for? This is not a shower. What did they plan this room for? Oh, it's exactly what this room is planned for.
Jeff: yeah.
It, it, it's the thing, and this, this seems re it's, it is ridiculous, but it's a question. I, I actually asked this, uh, in an episode of Star Fleet Leadership Academy on a, on a Star Trek thing too, where some people were held prisoner, but like he got sick from the corn beef. I'll come in after they clean the room up.
And then they talked about how he was throwing up all over the place. I imagine he had explosive diarrhea, you know, so at some point they came in, they hose the room down or whatever.
Brent: Changed his clothes for him,
Jeff: That's what I was gonna say. Did they change his clothes? Because they sure looked like the same clothes to me. When
Brent: hose them down and they dried off. I guess I,
Jeff: when he was left in the chair and Williams started, like the thing of you will sign the confession and everything will, you know, just, and played that on loop and we're supposed to imagine that was probably over a period of a couple hours.
Brent: Overnight, I would
Jeff: Yeah. Even did he use the bathroom and just sit there? Like where, you know, the, this is, these are the things I was thinking of. Like he's sitting there in urine soaked pants smelling that, feeling that on top of sitting. It's one thing to think,
could I sit there and listen to
Brent: skin and, and, and bad stuff happens that like infection can set in at that point and things like that. Like Yeah. It's, it's bad. And I, the answer is yes. That's exactly what they would've done
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: is, you know, he's just sitting there in the squishy bottom pants. If he had anything left in his, in his body, you
Jeff: And I think that's a piece that they don't, we don't think about in these things. And I guess, I don't know why, but that was very front of mind for me that it's like with all this stuff going on, the makeup was so good. His lips cracked and
Brent: Oh, oh. Shout out to the makeup department on this one because they did fantastic with box lightner on
Jeff: That light in his face, the camera right up on him. And I mean, whoever did that makeup needs to start doing the lens makeup. It was so good. Like he looked the part and he looked tired and we lost sense of time as the viewer. You know, there was no marker of how long this has been,
Brent: The, the only marker that we had was his beard
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: and I don't know, maybe Sheridan has one of those things, like his beard got so long and then it just stops.
Jeff: Or maybe,
Brent: get longer than that.
Jeff: or maybe his beard grows like yours. And he was in there for like 18 months.
Brent: That's what I mean. Uh, cause your, my beard grows and then it just stops. Like that's, that's, there's a reason Brent does not have a full set of facial hair cuz it
Jeff: Like, here's what you get.
Brent: well. Um, yeah.
Jeff: But yeah, just the whole, the whole state of mind and William doing such a good job of reframing reality, you know, for him on, you know, what time is it? What do you eat? Is it morning? Is it night? I cr I control
Brent: Oh, I saw the light outside. Oh, it's, it's nighttime. What? No, it's morning. I saw the light outside. Oh, really? Oh, let me, oh, look, it's a light out there. Ha ha ha. Oh, look, it's dinnertime. Oh, look, it's lunchtime. I mean, just, just craziness. I think, I think the things we have to talk about here, though, what they're trying to do with Sheridan, they have gotten into this.
They, they, they have this story that they have crafted that Sheridan, a war hero with psychological distress, has gone to the enemy. What, what do you call that? Like Stockholm SY syndrome or something like that. Right?
Jeff: Well, they call it Menari war syndrome, is what
Brent: And very worsen. Right. And he has been, he's, you know, yes. He's an, he's a great man.
We should, we should love him. We should respect him. We should feel sorry for him. He has been manipulated and allowed himself to be, which is awful, but that's why he's doing all this stuff. And that's the storyline that they're trying to force out of him. Truth or not to the point that they wrote his confession for him.
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: Whenever anybody writes your confession for you, that is not a confession.
Jeff: called a red flag. That's a
Brent: Yeah. And you can always tell, always tell. Like, like I've seen real videos of people who are reading confessions like this right before they, unfortunately in real life are decapitated
Jeff: Mm-hmm.
Brent: bad stuff, you know? Uh, but you can, you can tell like this is not something that they're saying that they're confessing to, you
Jeff: But we saw this in the illusion of truth when that, uh, director in a very similar looking place who looked very, you know, ragged read his confession. You know, I mean, so we, we know this is a thing they do and they do very well.
Brent: Yep. Um,
so th there was a super interesting moment. He comes in at the beginning and he says, just so you know, I am not your enemy. In order to be your enemy, you have to be invested in it. You have to care. I don't care. This is my job. This is what I do. I'm not here to help you. I'm not here to harm you. I'm not gonna lie to you.
I'm here to get my job done. Right. Later in the episode, Sheridan spits on the confession, and the man says, William says, I wish you hadn't done that, John. And he even tells us like, I can't help you anymore. You gotta do this, you gotta do this. Okay. In order to wish that you hadn't done that now means that you are vested into the process.
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: Cuz if you don't care, then you don't care whether he does it or not. You are vested now in the process, which now makes you the enemy. And he turned himself into the enemy because he had an opinion. He cared whether or not John did this. He cared that he had to take him to room 17. He cared. And if that's the measure by which it makes an enemy, which I'm not saying it is, I'm just saying that was his measure, then he became the enemy in that moment.
Jeff: I read that differently in that him saying that was more of a last ditch effort to like ramp up cuz he From there. Yeah, from there he went into the same script. Did it with Arazi. Do you understand this is your last chance? I think about,
Brent: loved that on a writing standpoint. He, he used the exact same words.
Jeff: And tone and everything. Like it's just because I think that. I think about so much of what the way he interacted with Sheridan reminds me of how so many parents interact with their kids. And I think about that when you tell a, a tool that I use with my daughter quite a bit is like, I'm not, I'm, I'm not gonna create false consequences, right?
If you do that, I'm gonna do this thing, you know, or whatever. A thing I say quite a bit is just like, if you do that, that's going to be a big mistake. It's gonna be a mistake. Do you wanna make that mistake? And in the times where I don't wanna follow through on it being a mistake, I'm just like, oh, I really wish you hadn't done that.
I, as I'm thinking now, how do I react? Because I want her at that point to be like, well, I meant, and I'm sorry. And let's, uh, you know, like I want, it's like, I, I kind of want to get that, that moment of realization for her. But if, like, I'm just gonna carry through if I'm on my parenting game and I say, if you do that, it's gonna be a mistake.
And then she does it. I just say, okay, and then I do the thing. Boom. It's just another tool. I don't think he was vested at all. I think he was just trying to get his job done, which was getting a signature. I think he was that good. He's so good that he got you think. But you're right. If he was invested, he did become the enemy. Absolutely.
Brent: I, I'm gonna talk more about that when we get to the Star Trek messages part. Um, Jeff, I'm
Jeff: So I think one thing I
Brent: have, I have nothing else in this. I mean, this episode was so engaging every single moment, but it'd be like, yep, there's that torture technique and yep, there's that torture trope and yep, there's that piece and wow, that was really cool when they did this, but, hmm.
Jeff: It's, it's, it's just, it can, it's, it's acknowledging what happened in there. I have two thoughts, um, outside of, of that one. They pulled out the whole, uh, hey, saw your dad. He's just, you know, he has the other building, he's looking good and hey, he gets to go home as soon as you play ball. And we're good.
Cool. That's a good move. What they should have done, or what I would've done is cuz I'm evil, is I would've said, Hey, he'll get to go home as soon as you do the stuff you do. Also, he'll be able to get his medication, uh, once you do what you need to do. Cuz we're not gonna give him his medication. Um, while you're doing this, add some tension to the whole thing.
But instead it's just like, yeah, your dad gets to go free, but in the meantime he's good. Like he's fine. So, but I think the other piece is last week we talked about Ivanova, talking about, uh, the person is expendable, but the job is not. And in this one we saw Sheridan living that Go ahead and kill me.
Fine. That's what needs to happen. That's what needs to happen. But I am not gonna succumb, I'm not going to. Compromise my, my anything
Brent: And I, I love how even the, the prospect of, well look, if you don't do it we'll just cheat it and we'll, we'll, we have your voice prints on file. We can fake the whole thing. It'd be better if you did it in real life, but we can, we'll make it look like this either way.
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: Okay. And I'm like, I'm sitting there whole time, then you're gonna have to do that cuz I'm not doing this.
Jeff: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Just do
Brent: I'm not going to help you with this. It's not if, if that you do that, that's on you. That's not me. I didn't cause you to do that.
Jeff: I'm going to do what I have control of and what I have control of is telling you no. I will die knowing that I said no to the very
Brent: Mm-hmm. I was a little disappointed cuz I was fully expecting the line. A soldier's first duty is to resist and escape. Like I, I was, I was kind of expecting that line. You hear that all the time in these situations, but
Jeff: Well he pulled that out and all alone in the night with Telon, you know, his is like my first job is to escape. So he did that. What I, what I, I think along those lines, what I almost expected at first, I loved the clinical. Um, do you have any allergies or illnesses I should be aware of? They're just so clinical, but what I almost wish
Brent: But by the way, if you're gonna torture somebody, you need to know that.
Jeff: He doesn't want to kill him,
Brent: Yeah. Like, I, I need to know, do you have any of these issues? I'd be like, yes, I have. Um, if you make my heart rate go too fast, it explodes.
Jeff: Yeah. I have an allergy to just discomfort in general. Really? Yeah. I've, I'm an allergy to not having a toilet with a toilet paper.
Brent: I have an allergy to, uh, this metal you've got around my wrist right now. It's a
Jeff: the irritation right
Brent: yeah.
Jeff: It's, I actually have an allergy to bad writing. And you are calling this a pain giver. Um, that, that's really, that's really painful. But what I, what I almost wanted Sheridan do say, do you have any allergies or illness, illnesses? I should be aware of Sheridan John, captain Serial number, like, you know, do that whole thing of just start reciting.
That would've been cool, I think.
Brent: It would've been a trope.
Jeff: Totally.
Brent: Cool. But a trope, I mean, the whole food thing, like go sit and eat in front. Oh gosh. That's what you do. Right. But it, but it's never fancy food. Right. It's always, it's a, it's a, it's a workman's pale lunch. That's what I'm bringing in, right?
Jeff: But I think that's one of the things that made this episode so good is it didn't try and reinvent the wheel, right? It's just like we are doing interrogation. This is what it is. There's no special bent on it, no drugs, no telepathy, no something, just, we are just one person working to manipulate another person in a filthy way.
And to talk about that in more detail. I think, Brent, we've reached the point of this conversation where you. Yeah,
Brent: so soon.
Jeff: I think
Brent: my God, we're, I don't think we're usually like even to the recap until this point of the episode. Geez.
Jeff: We're being very efficient, but I mean, I mean, people want us to recap the, the, you know, the whole plot of everything. You can go watch our reaction videos. They're available on our patony. You can watch Brent's on YouTube or let's get to the good stuff, Brent. And we're gonna look at the messages that come through in this episode.
Maybe there's some morals or a mirror held up to society. You are gonna rate that on a scale of zero to five delta theories as to how powerful the message is and just how Babylon five that was delivered. So, uh, what do you got?
Brent: Well, to go back to what Williams said when he first came in, I'm not your enemy. I don't care. This is just the job. Let me give you the, let me give you the lesson and then we can backtrack it cuz I think it's all just gonna work it, it's gonna flow. You cannot, you cannot let the job be the thing that you hide behind when you are doing wrong and evil. The guy keeps saying he has no interest. This is just his job. But what he is doing is clearly evil.
He is. He acknowledges, this is not your real confession, I just need you to sign it. He's not trying to get to truth, he's not trying to get to any of that stuff. He says he doesn't enjoy it. I think that's, we could talk about whether or not he really does. I think honestly the end of the episode throws it in.
Is he just an actor on some level because they know that this is gonna take a couple iterations. Did he fail in his job or was this just the known outcome of how it usually goes and this, this was all part of the plan, but regardless, he knows the confession is bogus. He knows what he's doing wrong. He knows that he is a phony and he knows that he is wrong.
Whether or not it is the job. That does not excuse
in any way, shape, or form the actions of what you are doing. And he's, he says that throughout, like, I don't care. I don't care. This is not for me. I'm just here doing this thing. But that doesn't make it okay. What he's doing it D it just, I mean, people say, oh listen, I'm just here to do my job man. I'm just here to do my job.
You see that in other things. I'm just here trying to do my job. Well, screw your job. You have a bad job. Go get a new job cuz this is not a good job for you to have. This does, you cannot hide behind this because you have to be responsible. You are responsible for your actions. I think there was an episode, was it last week when Sheridan was talking to Mackey where he is like, Hey, what do you do with the legal orders?
It's your job to disobey illegal orders. Earth Force doesn't want automatons. They want people who are going to think, I believe Star Trek said something very, very
Jeff: Uh huh.
Brent: I don't know, and I suspect the answer is no. That this was an intentional message that j m s was trying to say when he wrote this episode as much as he was just trying to, here's the next plot, and this is a kick ass episode. Oh, by the way, we're about to spend a crap ton of money on these other episodes coming up here at the end of the season, and this episode is cheap.
This is a bottle episode, literally, well figuratively in a bottle like there. This is a room with no lights on the walls. You know what I mean?
Jeff: We got two soft, two soft boxes and a grip mic. That's what we're working with
Brent: And a table. Give me a table, which by the way, was a pretty cool looking table. But, um, that's it. That was the whole episode. All of that to say, Jeff, I still thought that that was an incredible, um, mirror to society because I still, I see that so many people hide behind it's the job. This is, this is what I'm supposed to do, this is why I'm here. And they don't take responsibility for themselves or for their actions. Juxtapose that with what Sheridan was telling, the drowsy, just resist. You don't have to do this. You just have to be able to say no one more time. Then they say, yes, words matter. And the drowsy, we know that it was a farce. But let's just put it into the realm of, no, this really happened.
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: He took courage from that and he is like, look, even if I die, I can still do the thing that is right.
And the thing that is right is not to say this, this is not he unbroke, you know, he unbroke, uh, because words, he wasn't hiding behind anything anymore he was able to do. So. That being said, like I, I don't think this was an intentional message, uh, but Jeff, part of part of the message being done in a uniquely Babylon five way, part of it is still how much did you really enjoy the episode?
I loved this episode. Everything here was done in an, you couldn't, I don't know that you could have done this episode on another nineties sci-fi show at the time. I really like, I don't think Stargate could've done it. I don't think Star Trek could have done it despite chain of command. I don't, I don't think they really could have done it.
Not to this level. I.
Jeff: Well, let's, let's look at that really quick Cuz Chain of command was incredible. It was inspired, right? Amnesty International was involved. Patrick Stewart called for a closed set. He filmed it in the nude, like it was very intentional in what they were trying to accomplish.
Brent: a brazen episode
Jeff: But it was about maybe half of the episode, they had a whole other storyline going on.
Um, I think about Deep Space Nine and Waltz, where it was Cisco and Duco in a cave. For about 60% of the episode, they had a whole other story going on on the
Brent: DS nine and duet.
Jeff: Same. Yeah. No one, no one I can think of would put two people in a dark room with two soft boxes and a grip mic and say, go and create a masterpiece.
Brent: Yeah. Yeah. Touching movie. I just a, a phenomenal episode. And by the way, talk about duet, talk about chain of command. I'm gonna leave Waltz off, if you don't mind. Personally, both Phenomenal episodes. Phenomenal episodes,
Jeff: to keep Waltz at Waltz is an example of two people in a room and not an example of a phenomenal episode.
Brent: right? Intriguing concept. I just don't think it was executed very well, or, you know, uh, but, but Waltz Duet and I, I, or not Walt, I'm sorry. Chain Command part two. Duet. Um, I'm trying to think of other two people in a room talking type episodes. I know they're out there. Um, you know, you know what show does two people in a room talking, they don't do it for an entire episode, but whenever they get two people in a room talking Game of Thrones,
Jeff: Yeah,
Brent: is at its best.
Not with the big sword fights and all this stuff. It's when you get, when you get Tyrion and anyone else in a room to talk or John Snow and anyone else in a or Ned and anyone else in a room to talk like, like I think of, or Ned didn't have to be in a room I think of of, of, um, Sean Bean and, uh, shoot, what was her name?
She played Ccy. Um,
Jeff: I don't remember. She left us a review at one point, but I don't
Brent: she did, she did, um, lead le It's not Lida, maybe it is. Anyway, whatever. Ned and Ccy, they're standing out by a fountain, but they're having a conversation about playing the Game of Thrones pH I mean, phenomenal writing. This is one stuff's at its best. It was just, it was so good. So all that, all of that you say, I am going to give this one based on the unintentionally of it, but really done in a Babylon five way.
It was a good message. Was it the message of the whole episode? No, it wasn't. I'm gonna give this one, two Delta Furies, Jeff.
Jeff: Okay.
Brent: Phenomenal episode. Top five episode of the series for me.
Jeff: I wanna stump a little bit.
Brent: Do it?
Jeff: I think that William just being the guy doing the job and actually being super, super evil as a result of just being that guy was wildly intentional. I think that was one of the lessons we were meant to pull from this episode. That, because I think that, uh, Edgars actually planted this a couple weeks ago.
When he was talking about, you know, how many members of the Nazi party actually were there, or the Communist Party or the Jihad party. It's not the members of the party. It's not the people in control. It's all the people who just follow either because they're stupid or they're afraid. And I think that was a theme that was introduced.
And here we saw in action where, how, I mean, he said Room 17, so there are at least 17 of these rooms that this is going on in. Who knows if there's more? And this is just a thing. They're turning and churning, and all you have is a bunch of people that are just doing their jobs and they're the ones actually tearing apart the fabric of earth's society.
It's not President Clark that's destroying everything. It's the people that are just doing their jobs. I won't name names, but if we turn the clock back a couple years and we look at the, uh, political campaigns that are about to start here in the States, yeah, there are people. Who dead did and said things, but they're not, they're not, they're not the ones that ruined stuff.
It's the people who just showed up and did their jobs or decided to kind of take things into their own hands and do pieces. It's the people, uh, to use Edgar's words that are either stupid or afraid that make these things happen. And that was William at his core somewhere. He's either dumb or he is, or he is afraid, but either way, he's just showing up, hiding behind his job and literally destroying the fabric of Earth's culture in society as a result.
So I think this was super intentional.
Brent: I cosign everything you said. Except for super intentional.
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: I don't think it was that intentional. I think this was phenomenal writing. I think this was a great piece of storytelling. I, I don't think that this was intended to be a, Hey, this is, this is a, a microcosm of what's going on in society. Perhaps it was showing us what was going on in their society.
Jeff: Mm-hmm.
Brent: I don't know that it was like a, Hey, here's a commentary on what's happening right now. In 1997 or 96, whenever he wrote this episode, and maybe it was, I could be wrong. I think this had more to do with telling a fantastic story than it did a message. So,
Jeff: certainly did that.
Brent: but uh, it did. But I will, uh, this is a scale of zero to five Delta, Delta Furies.
Jeff,
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: I'm gonna give this one, two and a half. I'll bump it up and I'll meet it. I'll meet it. Right, right smack dab in the middle. Cause I think it's the phenomenal message of just being.
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: I, I mentioned last week. Sometimes the message is not in the stuff, it's just in how things are. So I'm gonna give this one, uh, I'll go two and a half just for being there and being obvious about it.
Jeff: That works.
Brent: Well, Jeff, while I sit here and had to do Delta furries, it is your turn my friend, to take this episode. Look at all of the episodes we've seen so far in season four, which there have been 18 episodes so far. And you get to place this one in an absolute 100%, completely definitive ranking of the fourth season of Babylon.
Five. Just as a reminder, the folks playing at home, our current top five ranking are into the fire, no surrender, no retreat, the Long night atonement and face of the enemy. Where do you place this one? Does it crack top five? And if so, where? Just remember, you're gonna push out face of the enemy if you do that.
Jeff: It definitely cracks the top five,
Brent: Yes, it should.
Jeff: no question.
Brent: Yes.
Jeff: Um, it cracks the top three.
Brent: Uh, okay.
Jeff: My question is just where in the top three it is. It is not the do it is not the number one episode of this end of the fire. Holy crud. That's so good. So very good. Gosh, there's so many good episodes on this list.
Brent: I'm gonna, I'm going to, I'm going to explain this. I've, I've been thinking about something here lately. I will explain this more next week. My guess is if Into the Fire is gonna get deposed, and number one it's gonna be episode 20.
Jeff: really,
Brent: I will explain why episode 20 next week. So a little teaser. Tune back in next week to make sure you understand why.
But I'll, I, but I know I've not looked ahead. No, I've not seen it.
Jeff: number 20 will be the new number one tune in next week to find out why.
Brent: And then tune in the week after that to find out if I'm right.
Jeff: Right? Yeah. Well, and, and I think that helps. Cause as I think about into the fires, I think about no surrender, no retreat. And the long night specifically. Oh my gosh. They're just, these are, this is just some of the, this is really good tv.
Brent: Good tv man. I wouldn't hate, I'll be, just be honest while you think about it. Let me talk. I would not even hate it if this was number four, because those top three episodes are so good. You know what I mean? Um, but I also wouldn't hate it if this was number two or number three. Like I could make a solid argument for any of those.
Is it better than into the Fire? Probably not, probably not. But this episode is, is. Uh, I mean, think about it. Season, season one of, uh, of DS nine. What is the single best episode of the whole season? Probably duet.
Jeff: Yeah.
Brent: It was not the most flashy of all the episodes,
Jeff: So I, um, I was typing, I was typing while you were talking cause I made my
Brent: Oh, all right. Send it on. Send, send it to us, Jeff.
Jeff: Hey Brett, we just watched, uh, the new number two episode of season four.
Brent: Mm, good.
Jeff: Yeah, number two.
Brent: Yeah. Can't, I can't argue with that. I can't hate it. The only thing I hate is that we lose face of the Enemy, which we just watched last week, so I, I'm kind of sitting here looking at Atonement going, was that episode really that good? Hmm.
Jeff: It really was. I gotta, I, I gotta tell you like we, you know, we, what feels like three days ago, um, but was like three months ago. Um, we did actually more than that, but we did, uh, the season three wrap up, you know, and we talked about how like you've got 21 episodes that you could almost shaken a bag and, and, and see how it came up.
And then one that should never have been on television and people should be ashamed of. We just watched the 18th episode of the fourth season, and not all of them are gonna crack the top three, but every single one of them is an amazing epi. Even the ones that we were kind of ho hum on going in work incredibly necessary to make these other ones work.
This is such a masterfully crafted season so far.
Brent: It, yeah. Yes, yes. And I, I'll be honest, Jeff, my excitement for these last four episodes, I don't think I've ever been more excited for the last four episodes out of any season we've seen so far in Deep Space nine, or,
Jeff: been a long time. It's been
Brent: Oh my gosh, no. Did you hear what I just said?
Jeff: what? No. Oh, you said deep space nine.
Brent: did. I did. Yeah. please. my gosh.
Jeff: That's a cardinal sin my
Brent: Oh my gosh. I know. Here, look, I just, you know, I'm gone.
Jeff: Yeah. Wow. All right, I'm gonna finish this one on my own. Get back in here, Brent. We got a big thing we gotta do because, because that's it for intersections in real time.
Next week we're gonna be watching between the darkness and the light for the first time. We don't look these up. We don't do any sort of research ahead of time. We have this incredibly exciting game where we predict what's gonna happen in the next episode based on the title alone, you know, and everything that we know in the episode's leading up to this moment.
So, based on that, Brent, what do you think between the darkness and the light is going to be about?
Brent: Well, this episode was all about John Sheridan. This episode saved him a lot of money. Great. Uh, this was all about what was going on with Sheridan. Next week has to get back to everybody else. I wouldn't be surprised if we didn't even see Sheridan a whole lot next week's episode, but next week's episode, it's the rescue attempt.
It's on the rescue. This is, this is what it's about. You ready? It's the retrieval of John Sheridan.
Jeff: I love that. I think that tomorrow, tomorrow. Wow. I'm gonna be watching this episode tomorrow. I'll tell you that much. I think next week we're gonna see the other side of what was happening while all this was going on. What? And so what that means is we're gonna see Ivanova off liberating colonies and being very successful.
We're gonna see Ivanova really being in her element, commanding this fleet and just doing
a great
Brent: I'm sorry, can I, can I clarify? You think that they're still worried about the individual colonies rather than just coming straight to Mars? Because that's what I said last week was, was this is gonna accelerate everybody getting to Mars. You think it's still Ivanova is like, Hey look, he's expendable the spot's not, I've gotta keep doing this piece and slow rolling it up there.
Jeff: I do. I think that this episode is going to, Because we get got the Sheridan stuff, this is gonna be the other stuff, and then that's gonna bring us to Mars and then Earth like boom boom. Over the last like, so we got this, the episode and then the last two are Mars and Earth. Gosh, we're so, we're at the end of the season.
It just feels so weird, but I think, so we're gonna see Avan doing that stuff being great. We're gonna see Garrett Baldy, uh, who will convince people, I don't know who on Babylon five to listen to him. And we'll start to see that redemption. Then we're gonna see, I think we're gonna see Dalen and Lanier executing the rescue of Sheridan, and we're gonna find out right here next week.
Thank you all so much for joining us on this incredible discussion of this amazing. Episode, don't forget to subscribe wherever you're watching or listening. Leave us a rating in a review and please share this show with someone who's either already in love with Babylon five, or about to fall in love with it, and they don't even know it yet.
So, Brent, until next
time.
Brent: Jeff.
Jeff: Yeah. What's up?
Brent: I gotta tell you, I know I've said this before, but I, I truly don't know when. I have been more excited to get in and talk about this week's episode, season four, episode 19, between the Lightness and the Dark. I'm, it's time to talk about this episode. Jeff,
Jeff: No, it's uh, it's ac
Brent: it's time to talk about this episode. Hit the intro music.
It is time to talk about this episode.
Jeff: actually time for lunch, Brent.
Brent: No,
Jeff: Yeah, it's lunchtime.
Brent: I'm not doing this.
Jeff: It's, it's, it's time.
Brent: no,
Jeff: All right, let's get 'em. Let's go to room 17. Let's go room 17. Load 'em up.
Brent: no.
Jeff: You are valued and you are needed.
You will be emper as I think you're about to go. Where everyone has gone before the year is 2024. The name of the podcast, Babylon. Five. The first time. First time. Welcome to Babylon five for the first time, where today we're gonna be talking about episode 18 of the fourth season intersections in real time.
My name is Jeff Akin and I am the one who was. I mean…
