The Deconstruction of Falling Stars | For the Second Time

[0:52] Welcome to Babylon 5 for the second time. My name is Brent Allen. And my name is Jeff Akin. Brent and I used to be Star Trek podcasters, but then we watched Babylon 5 for the first time and everything changed. Now we're watching this incredible series for the second time, because Babylon 5 is a series that you get to watch for the first time twice. voice. But don't worry. We are still searching for those sci-fi messages that we find in this series. And oh boy, this one's going to have a few. I can guarantee you. We're looking for things that hold up a mirror to society. Give us hope. This might be my favorite one. And it's the one I find we actually find the least of. Give us hope that things can be better in the future. Right. You know, or they just tell us how to be better human beings to one another. Now, that being said to everyone out there who was within the sound of my voice, if you have not watch Babylon five all the way through, not just to this episode, but all the way through for yourself, this is your time to press pause on this particular episode and go finish the series and then come back. If you want a full spoiler free, you can go back to Babylon five for the first time. Just scroll up in the feed. Jeff and I have a whole thing there. That's completely spoiler free because you don't want to be spoiled because from this point forward, Jeff and I have full permission and we can and will talk about anything from any point in the timeline, be it.

[2:14] Canon, extra canon, in-universe, out-of-universe, no matter where we got it from, we are at full liberty to discuss everything having to do with this episode. That's what the second time really is all about. So if you have not seen this.

[2:31] And you continue from this point on, then just understand And you have been warned. My warning is sincere. Ignore it at your own peril. Brent, this week we're closing out the fourth season of Babylon 5 by watching the deconstruction of falling stars. When we watched this series for the first time, like you just talked about, we played a game where we would predict what the next episode was going to be about based only on the title. What did you predict this was going to be about?

[3:00] I thought basically it was going to be like a clip show because what we knew, was they had filmed Sleeping in Light. They took it and just said, we're going to put this on the shelf for a year. And they had to very quickly come up with a new episode because of the whole P10 went out of business and then they got picked up by Turner. So basically I thought this was going to be a deconstruction of the show. Partly going over to Turner, you're going to be on a new network.

[3:31] So that's kind of what I thought it would be. It's just basically a clip show of the show, just deconstructing the whole show, showing it for what it is. So a clip show that's going to have clips in it. A clip show that is a clip show is what I said. How about you, Jeff? What'd you say? I figured this was going to be like the last episode of Caprica where they were like, Hey, so we had all these cool ideas and you're not going to let us finish the series. So here's a taste of what was to come. Not quite. Not quite. Either one of us. But just put them together. Well, my, it was a clip show, just not of what happened, but of what will happen. It's we've had clip shows that aren't clip shows. This is a clip show that is a clip show of the future. Of stuff that hasn't happened, right? It's all new stuff. There are no normal clip shows in Babylon 5. No, no, there's really not. Are you curious to see what we actually thought of this episode the first time around? I really am. All right, let's check it out. All right. Previously on Babylon 5 for the first time. The Deconstruction of Falling Stars.

[4:33] I love so many parts of this episode. You remember Infection? That episode finally really paid off. One day the sun will stop shining and everything will be gone. Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley. Unless we went to the stars, everything we did on Earth would be for nothing. None of it will matter unless we go to the stars. And what I love about this episode is we went to the stars, the sun blew up, and now our legacy is going to last well beyond a million years. Sinclair called this an infection. Love that. I'm going to read you my note exactly as I wrote it.

[5:15] WTF was this episode. Talk about pissing all over the previous episode. Coming off of last week's episode, like, that should have just been the end. I just ultimately don't understand why this episode exists. Like, that's like, why wasn't Rising Star the last episode of the season? It just doesn't make any sense to me. I wonder if there's a real world reason for why this happened. I have no idea where they go from here to kick off a whole new season. And I don't, wow, this sounds worse than I mean it, but I'm having a really hard time getting excited about it. Oh, Jeff. Oh, this is going to make me a villain. Oh, but I'm going to say it anyway because it's my job here. I'm at a spot where I don't know that I care about the fifth season. Wow. Okay. Like, I do because it's part of canon and I want to see more Babylon 5. Yeah. But I kind of like... I don't care. Like.

[6:20] The stakes don't feel there. I have a morbid curiosity. It's what it is now. It's just like, what do you got? Like, what do you do from here? I don't know. What do we have to look forward to here in season five? Yeah, yeah. And with that, season four comes to a close. Wow, we had no idea what was going on. I could have sworn we went into this understanding the real world situation and, As to why this episode exists. I remember that also. Well, I don't understand. So, okay. Our own Mandela effect right there. Right. You know, but I kind of agree with me. Actually, I still agree with me. Season five, I kind of don't care. Now, as a person who's seen it before, and I know what comes, especially once the whole Byron gig is done.

[7:17] I know how incredible season five turns out to be. I know because of crusade, how much you and I grow to love Lockley. And we're so glad that she becomes a part of the cast. Although I don't think there's a single person that had been like, if we could have kept Claudia for, for the fifth season, we would have done that. Right. Much rather had that. And, and that's no shame or no shade at Tracy, Tracy Scoggins. That's no shade at Tracy at all. We just would have all preferred to stay with, with Ivanova. But we're really glad that we, that we got her. It's almost like season five is like a one season spinoff of Babylon five, like Babylon five proper is like seasons one through four. And then you have season five, which is because the story wrapped like that. And that's what I'm saying. Like there's the story is done. He had to restart the story and then bring it to a close all in one season. So really season five does very and Stephen five feels very substantively different. Um i feel like i can i it would you agree with that does season five feel substantive will be different than the first four episodes it really does and i think there's a lot of reasons why you know i mean the production world stuff the story stuff what's interesting normally i save the stuff that we hear from the great maker himself till the episode, but this kind of blew my mind when i read this one thing okay this episode was always part of the plan.

[8:41] This was supposed to be the first episode of season five. Okay, now hold on. Pause. Because the last episode of season four was supposed to be intersections in real time.

[8:51] So we were supposed to go from intersections in real time season break. And then this episode apparently. Whoa. So they didn't just cobble this episode together at the last minute. This was, he at least had a, he might not have had a script written for it, but he, he at least had the idea, the idea, the synopsis, right? That the episode beats planned out. He says, uh, okay. He says that, so the plan was to close out, you know, 422, and then this was going to be 501. He says to make the change, to shift and everything, and to get it in the story beats it needed to be in. Normally, they have like three months or so between seasons to get everything put together. But he had six weeks in this case. They had to edit the last four seasons, or edit the last four episodes of season four. They had to edit the first two movies, oversee the CGI final mixes on all those. And he had to write no less than four episodes all in six weeks. And those are episodes that he lost his notes for. Yep. Had to recreate them. Wow.

[9:55] At the time, he was a guest of honor at WonderCon, and he wasn't scheduled for any panels. So even though he was the guest of honor, he spent the entire time in his hotel room writing. But why don't we go watch this episode? Let's do it. That's what we're going to do right now is watch the episode. We're going to bring it up, watch it. Brent and I will comment on it, react to it, pull out messages in real time with you standing right alongside us. It's going to be fantastic. If you're watching us on YouTube, you're going to see the edited version of that, kind of the reaction video style of editing. The full and unedited version is available for you on our Patreon page, which is at patreon.com slash bad nerds. And if you're joining us on the audio podcast, no worries. You're going to get all of it in its glory. We have not forgotten you. You'll catch all the conversations that happen. During all the pauses that Jeff and I will do throughout the course of this episode, and then obviously you'll get all the conversations that we have on the backside. So, Jeff, let's take a watch for the second time on the deconstruction of falling stars. Let's go. Accessing file.

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