Eyes

Jeff: Welcome to Babylon five for the first time, not a star Trek podcast. My name is Jeff Akin and I'm watching Babylon 5 for the first time

Brent: and I'm Brent Allen. And I'm also watching Babybel on five for the first time. Jeff and I are two veteran star Trek podcasters watching Babbel on five for the very first time.

Searching for star Trek, like messages in the series and trying to decide if we should have watched this one sooner.

Jeff: Do you think we could call ourselves veteran Babylon five podcasters at this point? I think we gotta at

Brent: least get through the first season first season. Yeah, maybe the first watch you guys out there listening.

You can email us, you can tweet at us and you can comment on our YouTube page and let us know. At what point you become a veteran Babylon five podcaster. Is it like the NFL where you get one season? All of a sudden you're a veteran, right? Which is very weird to me. Um, but Jeff. People can do that. They can email us, tweet us, comment, all that sort of

Jeff: stuff.

Right. And you know what else they can do. They can hop over to apple podcasts and they can leave us a review. And Brent, we have a five star review. Yes. I didn't even know this. We do this from, wait,

Brent: wait, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I was just talking over whatever sound effect you played. I don't know what that was.

Jeff: This is our five star review sound clip. Oh yes. Nice. Yeah. And if you want to hear that more like you should, I'd love that sound clip, pop over to apple podcast. Click the little lever review five stars will get you. Oh yes. Just like it's gonna do for jazz. 4 89, jazz 4 89 says the show is right in my wheelhouse as a major star Trek fan, who also loves Babylon five.

Also the fact that the hosts genuinely know nothing about the show adds to the enjoyment as they make predictions and react. The format works great. I particularly like when they guess the plot of the next episode, based on the title though, I'm not sure they've ever been right. Highly recommend thanks, jazz, jazz.

Brent: Um, we too love star Trek, despite our, uh, pre episode chatter. We really love star Trek. We are really falling in love with Babbel on five and you're absolutely right. I promise you, Jeff and I genuinely know nothing about this series other than what we've learned in the first, what is it now? Jeff 16 episodes or so

Jeff: 16.

We're almost to the end of the first season. Like that's, we're really close. Yeah. And, uh, as an aside for another topic, we gotta start talking about what that's gonna look like for us between like, are we gonna do something or yeah, I think we

Brent: should do a end of season. . Yeah. Yeah. And I'm gonna go ahead and plug it.

Those of you out there listening those of you out there watching on YouTube. If you have ideas for what an end of season recap could be email us tweet at us, comment on the video and let us know Jeff, and I will see it. Maybe we'll incorporate it. Maybe we won't, but you never know until you try.

Jeff: And a great example of what that looks like.

We have a website and you can visit that website. It's Babylon five first.com. The number five and the word first.com and Daniel R sent us an email that couldn't have timed better with what you just said. And with the review from jazz, Daniel says first off I'm thoroughly enjoying the podcast, but I'd guess you've already considered a different reference sound effect, like communicator, enterprise door transporter, photon, torpedo, something like that for when we reach our references.

Then he says, why limit of a number of references? Not sure why that's even a thing also, just because someone appeared in a star Trek episode, doesn't seem like a reference drop the guest the next episode bit. I'm not sure why you're doing it. It's not funny. It's not clever and you're never correct. Or ignore me, keep doing what you're doing and I'll keep listening because it's a great podcast, nonetheless, by the way, you've caught up to me so I can start watching more episodes and put that HBO subscription to work.

I love it.

Brent: Well, thank you, Dan. And we may take some of your suggestions into accounts but you know what? He referenced there. Jeff was the silly limited number of references. Well, this is a game because Jeff and I figured way early that we should either. Never ever talk about star Trek, or just talk about it to our heart's content.

And we met in the middle and we said, let's make a game out of it. It's more fun than anything. Mm-hmm we are limiting ourselves to three star Trek references per episode, the fun part being what happens once you use them all, and then you're not allowed to use them anymore. Uh, but we are limiting that.

And if one of us uses a star Trek reference, you're gonna hear this sound. Okay. Apparently we did not take Dan's advice on changing up the noise. No

Jeff: good advice, but yes, but yeah, we'll

Brent: and when we hit three, that's it we're donesky no more NA

Jeff: nothing else. . I got one more comment. I wanna share. I cracked up so much at this one.

It came in a little bit late. This is from YouTube. Okay. In our, in our death Walker episodes, this one's going back ways, but this is from Peter Evans and Peter you're a regular viewer on YouTube and it always in there commenting. And I love being able to quote this one. This was brilliant. What's up?

Peter Peter Evans lists NATO's list of Sean Carr, blood oaths one death Walker, two movie talker, three line cutter four. And this is one of ours show spoiler and five bad tipper from her particularly violent waitressing back, back in, uh, back on home world. oh, I love that

Brent: one, Peter. That is fantastic. So good fan freaking.

Jeff: Brent, you mentioned our game with the reference of threes. We have other games we like to play, and this one was referenced by both jazz and, and Daniel in there. But we like to guess what the following episode is gonna be based on the title alone. We're about to talk about eyes. Mm Brent. Um, well, I'll share, um, I'll share mine first.

I thought that eyes was going to be a spy story espionage and the eyes that are watching you. So swing animus. Brent, what did, what did you think it was gonna

Brent: be about? Oh man, I, I nailed this one and it fouled off over the first base dugout. I said that this was gonna be a love story. That wasn't really a love story.

Yeah. But that it had to do with somebody like oversight, like, like reaching in or something like that. If you stretch it just a little bit, I kind of got that one. Yeah. But, uh, I really leaned heavy into the love story part and yeah, some, some little kid up in the third row got that ball and he's going home with it.

Jeff: yeah, it's the fun we missed the mark sometimes, but now we get to find out what it was really about. So for those of you that it might have been a while since you've seen this, like, oh, I don't know, like 30 years or so, or if you're watching along with us or just listening or watching for fun. Brent, what was eyes about?

Brent: Well, it's a normal ordinary day on Babylon. Five. Aldi is enjoying some personal time in his quarters where right in the middle of his living room, he's assembling a 1992 Kawasaki crotch rocket from scavenged parts. Sinclair is moody and earth force is interfering at the station. They've sent Colonel Ari Benza and Harriman gray from earth force, internal security that's eyes for short, nevermind.

The fact that you can't pull the word eyes from earth force, internal security at all, but whatever. And they are there to conduct an investigation into everything that has been happening on the station since we started this podcast. And that includes being scanned by Mr. Gray, who is a member of Sycor predictably.

Everyone has a problem with this, and most especially Ava, who's having nightmares right now about her time. About the time when her mom got injected with those drugs, which basically fried her brain, Ava even tries to resign her commission to prevent being scanned, eventually revealing that she and her mother sort.

Mine melded. And it was a pretty special thing to feel your own. Mother's love for you. And ain't no one gonna mess around with it, but don't worry Sinclairs to the rescue because Sinclairs to the rescue. And once again, he takes the very novel approach of reading the rules, which says that no size scans are permitted unless charges have actually been filed.

And since this is just an investigation and no Charles have act, no charges have actually been filed well, all Mr. Gray has to take a hike. Ben Zane wants to go through all of Sinclair's actions, episode by episode, except for the one in which the kids whose parents murdered him in cold blood. But when Clair has had enough, Ben Zane announces formal charges against Sinclair, which then means that he does have to submit to a scan and oh yeah.

Ben Zane is now in command of babble on five. Which, as it turns out, that's what this has been of actually about the whole time Colonel Benza was on the short list to get command of Babylon five when he was passed over by the Mbar, I might add to select Sinclair, and this is his shot at claiming the command post, which he felt was rightfully his and oh yeah.

Our old friend, ster, AKA checkoff is the guy behind it all, but he forgot one thing. There's a telepath in the room and this telepath actually has some morals. He has scanned the kernel and found him to be full of rage and lies. And when Ben Zane hits gray drops, Ben Zane with a single thought pain and Ben Zane crumples, like he got the Crucis curse put on him.

And while he's down, Sinclair takes back command. Well, alls, well that ends well. Oh, yeah. You remember that motorcycle in Aldi's quarters? Well, that's got the attention of linear, you know, the lens TACHE who then takes it upon himself to learn Japanese, read the entire instruction, manual scavenge, the rest of the parts, modify it to accept him.

Inbar power source because there's no gasoline on Babel on five in the future and complete the entire project much to which Garabaldi was like, part of the fun was putting it together, man. But Hey, that doesn't stop him from taking it for a spin through babble on five because sure. That's a perfectly safe thing to do the end.

Jeff: Let's give you the one

I gotta tell ya. My initial thought on this one was Benza in the membrane Benza brain. . Yeah, no, that wasn't my thought at all. In fact, my thought on this one was, oh my God. When is it gonna be over? I, yeah, I, um, I loved the Garabaldi and linear stuff. I was really critical of linear here recently. Uh, I really love, I really liked him in, in this one.

Mm-hmm I liked the Yvan stuff. Like it wasn't fun or pleasant, but it added some depth and some really great needed context for her mm-hmm but oh my God. Um, Ben Zane has to be the, like, I want the most arch bad guy, also the worst actor, and I want them in one body for this. It was UN unwatchable, but what saved?

It was a young. Jeffrey Combs. Yes, sir. Yes. Yes, sir. And I'm not gonna count this one as a reference. This is a fact Jeffrey Combs was babble on five before he literally became star Trek. This predates his star Trek debut by a, almost a year,

maybe nine months. Is it? I was.

Brent: No. Is it more than that?

Jeff: It was a while. It might

Brent: yo. Yeah, it doesn't matter cuz okay. One, he looks so young here, but he so far outshine whoever this Yahoo is that was playing Pinza. Um, if I, I, 100% agree with you on everything through, although I wasn't necessarily waiting for it to be over, but I think it's cuz when I was doing the reaction video, I was making fun of benze and sin.

Because you guys know I've, I'm, I'm not on the Sinclair train. Like, and, and I, I think it's not so much Sinclair. I have a problem with as much as it is Michael O'Hare. Yeah. The actor, like, I don't like the way he's playing this character at all. And I really am hoping that like, he gets better in coming seasons.

Jeff: I think he's getting worse. Um, I think he is. Yeah. So I, I, I think he is, and I haven't jumped on that train with you yet, but this one kind of got me there.

Brent: Oh my. I mean the, the scene where those two are, like in each other's faces nose to nose yelling at each other. It was cringeworthy. Yeah. So bad. Okay.

So let me fix it. I can't do anything to fix Michael O'Hare, but I can fix our villain of the episode. Okay. Simply re-casting him. to carry Ellis.

Jeff: Yes.

Brent: Wesley. Oh my gosh. Dread pirate Roberts. Yeah. If it's him. This is amazing. You put him next to Jeffrey comb as the bad guys in this episode. Oh, my word.

Jeff: That's incredible. Yeah. Jeffrey comb was so good. Like, we'll talk about that more, but he was, I mean, so, so good in this, and this was the, I think this is gonna go down as the episode where Jeff got on the Michael O'Hare, isn't the guy for this role train. Yeah. And be, and it's because I'll talk about it later, but again, we got lawyer Sinclair mm-hmm , but there's there's lawyer Sinclair who reads you the rule and tells you what the rule is.

And then there's lawyer Picard who stirs your soul. It makes you care about the law and the application of that law. And it, just, to me, it was so night and day and this one, I, I couldn't, what, what were your, what other thoughts did

Brent: you have on? Yeah, so I, I mean, This one to me felt like the very first time we have seen the coming together of everything that has happened so far, Jeff we've been promised this by the fandom outer that this is gonna happen, that nothing is wasted, that it's gonna come.

It's all gonna come back together. And this feels like the first time where those threads are starting to bundle, you know, and we know that this whole first season we've only got what four or five, six episodes left of it. Um, we know that that each season is like a chapter mm-hmm in a book or something like that.

So this has to start coalescing in coming back together. I thought this was gonna be a clip show real quick. Oh, when they started talking about everything that happened, like I thought that's where it was gonna go. And I was like really a clip show in bevel and five. It wasn't. Um, but the way that they brought this back around setting the acting portion aside.

The story of this, I very much adored. I, I really did. And, um, the, the biggest come away that I, that I had with this, the biggest takeaway is I need a spinoff show. That is just the side kicks . I need path. I need Lanier in a buddy cop show or something. Add in VE Coto. And I don't know who is gonna represent earth.

I don't know if it's Mbar if it's, uh, Ivanova or I'm sorry, Ivanova or Gar Baldi, one of those two, you know, but like this group, I want this group and their own show because Lanier, let me tell you what, this week I got on the Lanier train. I am all about this character. Like I thought he was just gonna be somebody who slides in and out and.

yeah, he happens to have that famous background as an actor from lost in space. He's that kid mm-hmm, , I'm really hoping linear has a much bigger role going forward. He's got his name in the opening credits for a reason. Yeah. Uh, and I need to talk to have a bigger role coming forward, but I fell in love with with him.

Jeff: He was, he was great. I mean, like when, um, in Grale, you know, I talked a lot about how he was just like almost psycho frantically and, and, and obsessed with, uh, with the grail hunter, with David Warner. Mm-hmm and, but then in this one, I, I, I, it made more sense to me it's cuz he's, he's brilliant. Yeah. You know, and, but the scene, like the moment that did it for me was when he goes to Garibaldi and asks to help out and he's like, oh no.

Before that, when he's watching the video right. About the motorcycle and he. Sexual pros I was like, okay, all right, there we go.

Brent: There's I gotta tell you when I heard him say that, I thought we would for sure. See, uh, line, come out with a black leather Jack in a, in a do rag around his head and whatever that head piece thing is that he has, and he'd be tatted up.

And he, I mean, this guy would turn into a full on biker. Of course that's a different kind of bike than what they were putting together. Yeah. But I don't care. Like I fully thought that's the route he was gonna go. And I don't know what he was gonna do with the sexual prowess side of that. no, I was all foresee him.

Do something, cuz that was

Jeff: gonna be funny. Yeah. He got super excited about that and this was a symbol of masculinity and he was all like I'm in . I was like, but the, the here, so here's kind of a deep cut on the motorcycle piece. When he was watching the video, they said that the last gas pow gasoline powered bike was made in 2035.

Yep. Current president Joe Biden signed an executive order that says the federal government will stop buying gasoline powered vehicles by 2035. Really? Yeah. So here's my question is Joe Biden. a deep cut Babel on five fan. He's gonna make this prophecy come true. If

Brent: that's where that number came from.

That would be fantastic.

Jeff: Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, I felt like it was, there was, you know, obviously the clear message about the environment, you know? Well, we couldn't do gasoline. Your people learned that was bad, but I think that they made that bold move too, of being like, and we're gonna stop making these things, you know, in the early mid nineties.

I mean, there were there weren't electric vehicles, you know, running around. That's a

Brent: pretty bold claim. No, but that, I mean, if I remember right back in the nineties, that's when they really first started talking about the hole in the ozone layer. Mm-hmm and they're like, if we could didn't you at the current rate, we're gonna run out of sun by 2050.

Yeah. Right. You know, and I'm like, eh, are we really, um, but you know, I don't know. It's been a really hot summer.

Jeff: sure. A little bit, you know, I like to think though, I'm really thankful that so many of our leaders have assured us that climate change isn't real. Um, it really gives me a lot of, uh, makes me feel good because honestly, if it was real.

And this stuff was going on. Uh, we should be terrified right now, but it's cool. It's probably fine. It's probably fine.

Brent: Jeff. I'm terrified. Yeah, but let's move on. yeah. Okay. Can we talk about something that I just have to absolutely make fun of a little bit? Actually, I've got, I've got a couple things, but this one I'm gonna, okay.

I don't know why it jumped out to me in this particular episode, cuz I know I've heard it before, but earth force.

Jeff: Yeah. Earth

Brent: force. Like we have, I know we have the air force air force sounds awesome. We had a president that tried to start and I guess it's still going mm-hmm the space

Jeff: force. Yep. That's a thing which

Brent: is a thing should have been called star fleet, just saying.

Buzz me if you want. I don't care.

Jeff: I, I think it's, I'm gonna call that one. A fact. That's not a reference. That's just what it should

Brent: be you. I mean, but now we, and I know this was well before space force, but I mean, space force sounds so goofy. It sounds so like didn't, didn't

Steve Carll, didn't he make a show called space force on Netflix and like completely making fun of it. Uhhuh. And here we have earth force, like it's the

Jeff: earth force

Brent: yeah. Like, I don't know. It just, it sounds so goofy to me and I like mm-hmm.

Jeff: Yeah. When they reach out, um, when through earth force on the Bacom, we get really excited about some of the, the names they have earth forest is about as good as

Brent: Bacom I'm telling you.

Um, okay. I do want to talk about, uh, uh, Jeffrey Holmes. Okay. Just as a Testament to how good of an actor he is. We hate Cyco mm-hmm are we agreed? Yep. Cyco is bad. That guy PCO is evil. Yep. Like through and through. There's nothing good about Cyco right. Except har and gray, except for har and gray, because this guy has a conscience and this guy had me feeling for his part of the story of he just wanted to serve.

And all of a sudden this thing manifested right as he was going to, to, to basic or whatever. And he got booted and he just, you know, his whole life was just crushed because this thing he couldn't even control happened and he's not allowed to be there, you know? And, uh, like he gave some pathos. And even towards the end of the episode, when they're like, dude, you need to scan your boss.

Like, forget me, scan him. I wanna talk about that scan. I Don wanna save it for the end because Jeff, I lost it. I utterly

Jeff: lost it. I can't imagine why

Brent: oh my God. Like I cackled for five minutes, probably just at how B okay. Now I'm gonna talk about it. Now. There you go. Yeah. When we got to the, the, the Jeff, this was the CLIMA scene of the episode

Jeff: peak, the whole thing everything's

Brent: building to this moment and it ended, ended in Colonel pain.

he just, he just fell over. He's like Colonel pain and Colonel goes,

Jeff: what? Well, honestly, even like the camera, it was like pain. Like it was that total, like mid eighties, you know, like I'm losing my brain doingand

Brent: pain. I was like, no, you cannot end this. And the whole thing on Colonel. Pain. Yeah. And then he goes, ah, he made that noise.

I don't know if that was the actual noise or not, but that's what I heard. I was so bad. It was so bad.

Jeff: Jeff. Well, sometimes and Jeffrey Combs knows this. You can only work with what you're given. And, uh, he did

Brent: what he could listen. Jeffrey Combs nailed his part

Jeff: if you took his, so the whole dynamic, right.

Was that he was trying to, I don't think he was trying, he was, he was trying to make a VVA understand that like he was gonna be respectful to her. Like, look, I understand you don't want this. I'm not gonna go crazy. I'm gonna be respectful. He had the best of intention. She heard it as you're just trying to butter me up.

This is yeah. You know, whatever, if you put those words into almost any other actor's mouth, I would've felt the same way of Ava felt sure. But immediately I I'm like he's. He's being legit either. He's like this incredible con artist who's super evil and whatever, or like he legitimately doesn't want to be doing the job he's doing.

Brent: And, you know, I had, I had that same thought and here's what, what made it so great. I didn't know if he was legitimately good or if he was

Jeff: a con artist until he dropped the pain until he dropped.

Brent: Right. Like I, in, in my head, I'm like, I'm really feeling for this guy, but I also know that this could just be an act mm-hmm at the same time.

And I didn't know, like, and that is the power that is Jeffrey comb, because as much as Babylon five hires, really bad actors looking at you, Michael O'Hare and whoever played benzene. Who was that girl from the episode survivors? Yeah. You really did not like her. No, I did not like her at all. And the guy who cut her, her number one, dude.

And as much as they have bad actors, you also get Jeffrey Combs. You get, uh, uh, David Warner, Doyle, David Warner. Yeah, the, the name, I should learn her name, the name of the girl who plays Ivanova lawn Kar, um, fantastic scene chewing actors who are amazing. Yeah. So as much as I make fun of these others, it's not a blanket statement because Alon five got, has some good people as well.

Jeff: Really good people. I, I wanna talk about one of the really bad ones though. And I wanna talk about Ben, Zane. Yeah. Do it. And, and you, you, he

Brent: will call him. Should have been Carrie Ellis. Go ahead.

Jeff: yeah, no, I don't think so. And here's why. Oh, I think that the episode itself was written, well, I'm gonna talk, we'll talk about that in the closing, but the lines they put into his mouth for the most part were garbage.

I don't even think that Carrie always could have made the mm-hmm and there're little things like this Garabaldi bust. He comes in and is talking to, to har and gray and the quarters and, and he's looking nervous, right. Is, oh my God, Ben Zane comes in and he is like, that's okay. I got a ball there. I know you intimately.

Can I get you a drink? What I, how

Brent: I straight up thought he just hit on him. like, I really did. Like, or he did something unspeakable to Garabaldi against his will, or even against his knowledge. Like I legitimately thought that's where he was going with that. Yeah. I just,

Jeff: I, I couldn't, I couldn't. And then, you know, we I've talked about this before.

I usually watch the episodes twice, but, and the second time I watched this episode, I was just like, You're nobody to me, you have no credibility as a villain. Mm-hmm everything you're doing is, is, is garbage. At this point. It was Jeff.

Brent: Are you, are you telling me that his weirdly put on accent, didn't give him all the credibility.

Cause all, all you need is a British accent to be a villain in a TV and the scar. Yeah, the, okay. All it was was a scar and is some of the worst makeup I've ever seen in my life. I know. Yeah,

Jeff: it was so bad. I mean, you take that versus, and this is great makeup, but like death Walker and her, and it's like, this is she amazing?

You're, you're capable

Brent: of so many, this,

Jeff: this is what you come up with. The other thing that really just, mm, got me was, so he gets all high and mighty and you know, I'm gonna arrest you Sinclair, and I'm gonna charge you with these things. And then he goes to walk off and he turns around and he is like, and that's not.

You're also confined to court, like, and you're gonna go to your room and you don't talk to anybody, but what does Sinclair immediately do? Walks

Brent: down walks. Yeah. He walks with Carou.

Jeff: He never goes to his room. He goes to, oh my God. It's yeah, there are some wild inconsistencies that happen. It's one that just, oh, so not good.

Selects.

Brent: Just juxtapose that with some of my new favorite lines of the whole series so far. Okay. all right. GU Baldy talking about linear. Yeah. Said to himself goes, if I killed him, I would start a war. that was great.

Jeff: Did you catch what he said to Zane? What did he say to Zane? So Zane, like dismisses him, go get some, go get some sack time.

We're gonna be doing this. He's like, oh, well, if I knew who God was, I'd thank her.

Brent: Right, right. right. I got that one. Um, Sinclair. And this is what makes me think the character is not written poorly. It's just acted poorly. He has this line earth force may have its problems, but it won't be solved by trampoline on human dignity.

Yeah. Oh my gosh. We're gonna come back to that one later. Yes we are. I promise you but that was a fantastic line. And then I'm gonna give you my new 100% favorite line of the whole show. It used to be, I'm gonna turn your bones into flutes for my children. Yeah. Is this one from Ivanova? I will twist your head off and use it for a chamber pot.

Jeff: That is awesome. That is hardcore. is awesome. So hard. I had two, just quick things that I liked. I wanted to pull out on this one and then, and then I wanted to talk about the Yvanova stuff. I think that's kind of a deeper dive. Yeah. Yeah. But, um, I really liked that this kind of started and was predicated on the shawl Mayan coming back to Babylon five.

Yeah.

Brent: We didn't see her at all. Not at all. I mentioned her, but she wasn't a part of this

Jeff: at all. I think it was just set up to kind of, um, you know, kind of create a little bit of that early tension. But to me it said a lot about them Inbar and it said a lot about SHA Mayan specifically that, I mean, she was almost murdered.

She

Brent: had, she got branded,

Jeff: right? Yep. Yeah. And chose to keep it chose to keep it on there. And she's still gonna come back to Babybel on five. I think that says a lot about that culture and her as a person. And we talk about that terrorism and that stuff going on. So we've got, um, home guard that we've seen quite a bit from.

And then today in this episode we heard about free Mars. So another terrorist group and all these arms dealings going on care of all the did a really good job. Um, just breaking down how earth and all of Earth's allies are just falling apart in a huge way. Yeah. But free Mars was the one where I'm like, okay, that's that's home guard, free Mars.

We're getting, we're getting groups named in here now.

And then there's a VVA. Yeah. Brent, Brent, do you hear the birds? That was an intense scene. Her,

Brent: yeah. Um, I, I was going back to game of throne vibes again. Mm-hmm yeah. In that scene for sure. Uh, I knew. I knew when, when lady dropped her head, she was gonna come up and it was gonna be a VVA. Yeah. Again, like I, I called that straight out, but, um,

that was gut wrenching. You knew it was a dream the whole time the, the dry ice spoke all over the place was just a bit over the top. Yeah. Um, but

watching that moment, and then I know it wasn't this moment, but to have that in your mind, when you hear her talking about that she and her mother shared a, a connection and she got to experience her own mother's love for her. And that was so precious to. She wasn't gonna let anybody touch it. Mm-hmm nobody was gonna touch it.

Speaking of good lines, she had this fantastic line about having to scan her psychologically, scan her to prove her loyalty. She said, that's an invasion of my privacy and it's an invasion of my honor. Yeah. And I went, wow. And she would rather resign her post than let somebody do that to her. That is morals.

That is principles. That is, um, integrity, integrity. Thank you. Yeah. Uh, and like, and obviously Sinclair was not gonna accept it and he was gonna find a way around it, but I mean, oh my gosh, Avan was going through some stuff. And this goes all the way back to midnight on the firing line. When we first heard about this conversation between her and, uh, Talia yeah.

Where they were going through that. Um, and in the middle of that, I'm gonna say it again. I dunno about you, Jeff. I completely ship Kara Baldi and Ivanova I,

Jeff: no, I don't.

Brent: I absolutely do watching them in this episode. Yeah. So that's not just friends. I, I think it is I'm for it.

Jeff: I don't know. I just, I don't think we have to, I don't think everybody has to.

She,

Brent: not everybody has to, but these two should, oh, I don't know. Not everybody has to these

Jeff: two should. It was in born to the purple, right? When she watched her dad die. Um, and, and got to, got to talk to him. I think it was born to the purple. Sure. And you know, Garabaldi called her on it and whatever, but on his way out, he was like, Hey, you want to get a.

And she took a rain check. I loved that. They called that. They brought it back. Yeah. And she's like, I need that drink right now. Which led to one of the most badass scenes in the whole thing where Ivan took down the whole bar, like single handedly. I, I, I loved that whole, that whole scene with her. I loved

Brent: Aldi's response when she came in and she's like, you want some?

And he is like, no, I'd like to wake up tomorrow. Yeah.

Jeff: but I think that's why they're great. Like super amazing, great friends is they, they can joke with each other like that. He can deescalate her with that joke. Right. I mean, that's buddies, that's, you know, that's really good friends. I don't, I don't think there has to be, if there's a relationship, there's that extra something that's in there that I, I don't know.

I just think it, I think it Solls the, their friendship to, to force them into something physical. Yeah. I don't know. That's just me. I'm also pretty anti-ship in general. So which might be more a

Brent: reflection I'm I feel ashamed of myself that I actually just used that word. I gotta be honest

with

Jeff: you. I'm a little ashamed of you too.

Yes, that's okay. That's good. in her dream, going back to the dream sequence though. Yeah. I was struck like, they seemed to really make a point out of, so when she and Talia, Ivan and Talia were talking in mid down of the firing line, it was about that, you know, drugs, prison, or Cycorp are the options and the drugs kind of quieted everything down, cooled everything out, whatever this didn't silence, the voices, it made them sing like birds and they hit that point a couple of times.

I just wanted to call it out here because I feel like that's something that's gonna come back somehow. It's gotta be,

Brent: yeah, it's gotta be. Yeah. I felt like they were trying to say something that was a callback to something that we had already heard. But I don't think it was,

Jeff: I, I don't think

Brent: so. Yeah. Like I think this is, which means the way they hit that.

Cuz you're right. Like that's either a callback to something we've heard or that's a setup for something to come mm-hmm , that's, that's furthering the story down the line, cuz we're definitely not done with Avan and Sycor no, no,

Jeff: not at all. You know? And now that you've said this, that when, um, when Karen Gray was sitting with her in, in the, when she was eating lunch and he picked, I don't know, Talia winters, you were just thinking her so strong.

I wasn't scanning. I just picked it up. Her seeing herself as her mom and then her developing, uh, professional relationship with winters. I think that's, there's more to come there is like that's another one Ivanova and Talia specifically.

Brent: Yeah. I'm for that too. Yeah. Yeah. I'm absolutely for that. Cuz I was actually just thinking like in an episode that features Sycor we don't have our.

Resident psychic in the episode. Yeah.

Jeff: It's a little weird, but mentioned, still mentioned. Mentioned. Yeah,

Brent: there you go. There you go. Um, was this a VVA or was this GU Baldi speaking of great lines. Cause I think it was in, it was in that scene. You're just talking about right where they said, uh, they're trying to convince Harriman to actually scan Ben Zane mm-hmm as well.

And he says the intent of a question is sometimes as important as the answer and it was, it was just so good. And I was like, dude, that is fantastic. Yeah. Why you are asking the question is everybody as important as to what the answer of whoever's gonna give it to you is

Jeff: um, yeah, I don't remember who said that, but if it was GU Baldy, that would make

sense

Brent: to me.

I think it, it was either GU Baldy or, or Ivanova because, like I said, they were in that scene. Mm-hmm that you were just referencing.

Jeff: It would make sense. I mean, that's, that's a way an investigator would think, right? Like, Hm. Why are you asking me this question that tells me more and that I should now be asking you about this thing.

Brent: Did you got a investor? We got a investor. We did. We gotta talk about, I, I mean, I don't know how much to talk about him, but he's behind the whole thing and, okay. So is he gonna become a ma a main guy? Do you like, I I'm just asking you Jeff. Yeah, we are both UNS spoiled. Are we gonna see him? Maybe not super frequently, but like, is he coming back a few times?

And is he a guy? I

Jeff: think so. I, well, okay. So I think so, but I I'm totally biased in that because I want more of him. Yeah. So I, somebody had mentioned in, on Twitter or on YouTube. That in and the sky full of stars, the nights mm-hmm right. So the night that was in the brain space and in the thing with Sinclair that was originally meant for Walter Kanig, but really he, he apparently had a heart attack.

Oh. And yeah. And, uh, wasn't able, like the scheduling didn't work. And so they twisted it JMS really wanted him to be a part of it. And so thus came Bester I gotta think like, this is just me, you know, armchair quarterbacking here, but that night, I think it was night. Two was gonna persist as Walter Kanig, but because it didn't, they fried his brain and whatever now, because he's Bester, I think baster is gonna be an ongoing concern and gosh, I mean, they mentioned they name dropped him like three or four times.

Oh yeah.

Brent: Yeah. Oh, I mean they connected this guy, like directly.

Jeff: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, I wonder mm-hmm is, I don't remember the order of these things, but were the nights are the nights connected to Bester. Somehow like, is that why? Cuz we never got, who sent

Brent: them? Yeah. I, I mean Bester is Cyco they come from Cyco so one would think, but how big is Cyco and how big is ster in CCO?

I, I don't know the idea that he, that Bester sent these guys out here almost as a revenge mm-hmm , you know, uh, and it's him and Ben, Zane both had a common enemy, so they hooked up.

Jeff: Yeah. You, yeah, I think we'll definitely be seen more of ster

Brent: and I'm okay with that. Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Jeff, I have a question for you.

All right. Specific to your skill.

Ben Zane calls, Sinclair, a hot shot who was brought up through the ranks without any real leadership ability

star fleet leadership academy, podcaster.

Jeff: I don't disagree with him. Um, so as a leader, develops, as a manager develops, you start out as like, I'm gonna be shift lead, you know, here, and I'm gonna run the shift and then I'm gonna run this crew and then I'm gonna run this, uh, restaurant, and then I'm gonna run this dis like there's, there is a natural progression and that progression is important.

You don't walk into your first management or leadership job as a regional manager. Right. You start as assistant to the regional manager. , assistant regional manager assistant to the regional, but you start about that later. Yeah. It's whole of it, but the whole, um, but there's a progression to that. And what we know is that Sinclair literally went from running a squad of fighters to commanding Babylon five.

There's a scene in here where, um, har, uh, gray and Zane are on, and they're asking questions, you know, around the thing, gear of all these, bringing it to Sinclair's attention. and they're like, oh, they're from whatever contractor. They probably just want a bid. And St. Clair's response is, Hey, walk softly. The last thing we need is a corporate lawsuit.

Mm-hmm when that line was dropped to me, that showed his lack of skill as his non qualification to be a leader at that level, because a leader at that level corporate lawsuits are part of the day union, labor disputes are part of your day. These just what happens and you kind of roll with it, but instead he's like, oh, uh, we, there might be a C chill out, dude.

No. Yeah. Zane and, and they, they hammered this a number of times in the episode about how like, yeah, Ben Zane was in the top 10 for this. Oh yeah. Well, uh, you Sinclair were way down below that. And then when we found out about the whole minbar yeah, you were way like they've hit that nail on the head a couple of times.

Yeah. I, I don't disagree with Zane on that at all. I agree. I think Sinclair is a good human, a good person. And I think he cares and has compassion. We've seen that. Uh, but as a manager of a station of two and a half million people on there, mm-hmm yeah,

Brent: no, he's, he's, he's out of his league, he's there for a reason that is not to command the station and we have yet to find out what that is.

Yeah. And we're, we're, hopefully I'm assuming we will find that out eventually. Maybe not in the season, maybe in the next season or a couple seasons down the road. Hopefully he's a better actor by then. Jeff. I have one closing thought, I think before we get to our final pieces or whatever you have left.

Okay. Uh, and I kind of referenced since a little bit up the top, uh, linear. He's my new favorite sidekick. Whoa. Really? Yeah. He's taken over in a Toth spot for. He's my new favorite sidekick. I like him a lot. Wow. He, his, him doing his like little prayer and it's like, oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to, to, to, you know, take this over for me.

Like he's putting together that as soon as I saw that bike all the way together and I went, oh, no, like the fun is in putting it together. Not in having it, you know, like, yeah. Like I, I think I compared it to my kid, like building a Lego, like if he's building a Lego, I could just walk in and do it all for him.

When he comes home from school, it's there done. Like the Lego's fun to have once it's all put together, but the real fun is putting it together. Yeah. And you know, I was glad Aldi called it out and he is like, he didn't sweat it too much. He was like, oh, well, let's go take it for a ride.

Jeff: Awesome. Yeah. First, especially once he was like, I can, I can drive this thing.

right, right. That was great. Yeah. My last thought on the whole thing was, did you get gear of all these's password?

Brent: Not 1,

Jeff: 2, 3, 4, 5. No, it's not the password an idiot would have on their luggage. No, its uh, peek Cabo.

Brent: There you go. Peek, CBO. Wait, was that actually the password or was he, was it just like a reference to something? Cuz I like, I heard it and I was like, oh that's wait. Maybe it's not, maybe it is. I'm pretty sure it

Jeff: was.

And I think the way, and I don't know, like there's gotta be something to it, but I just know that that kind of came up. We're talking about lawn's password back in the day. Yeah. People are, you see gear of all these and I'm like, what's PBO. What, what sold it for me is how like the computer asked him passcode please.

And he's like PBO mm-hmm like, yeah, this is what it is.

Brent: That's like, that's like when you have to, as an adult and somebody's like, Hey, what's your email address? But you still use your email address from college. you're like, all right, I gotta spell it for you.

Jeff: Yeah. Sun surf 67. Yeah. I caught myself, right.

at Hotmail

yeah.

Brent: All right, Jeff. So I think we've reached that part of the show where it is time to boil it down and see if this has any of that star Trek quality to it. We're not comparing it to star Trek. We're just analyzing it with the lens that we have as star Trek, podcasters, and asking the question. Does this give us a hope for the future?

Does it hold up a mirror to society? Does it show us how to be better? And should we have watched this one before? We're gonna do that by rating it on deltas zero to five deltas. Jeff, I'm gonna throw it to you first. How do you rate this episode?

Jeff: Well, I, uh, I wanted to like this one I wanted to, I, I, I didn't very much, I watched it twice.

That is a, that is a plenty, that is a plenty for me. I did appreciate that Sinclair, um, kind of got held accountable for some of his leadership decisions and not because they were bad decisions, but they were outside the box. Right. Thinking that's the thing that happens. And I thought that was good. Uh, so should I watch this one sooner?

Well, yeah, if I didn't wanna watch the first half of the first season, I could have watched this one and it wrapped up a, you know, couple of the points for it, but I think I'd rather watch the first half of the first season to me, those, we look at deltas for this one, really thinking about this one, it felt like the drum.

It starts with a person and a fairly reasonable question, right? Like, you know, Hey, we're gonna, we need to check your loyalty. These things are going on, but it escalates really, really quickly and gets way outta hand. But where Picard uses this to talk about racism, to talk about fear mongering and the dangerous momentum that we pick up is a mob that leads to witch hunts.

Yep. This episode was about a ridiculously jealous guy and a slighted baster. So I, I think the star Trek moment, though, for me, was when Garabaldi Sinclair were talking, you referenced this a little bit. Garib all these listing out all the ways earth Alliance is falling apart. And that guys like Zane thrive in these situations and Sinclair responded that that's why somebody has to stand up to.

The problems can't be solved. This was you referenced by trampoline on human dignity. And from there, Sinclair, lawyer, Zane tries to stand up, but a seed that he planted in gray eventually pains off . I feel like after this one that, um, it was a, it was a very star Trek way of solving this problem. And it was a problem based on his strong star Trek theme around human dignity, Sinclair, to me, not Michael O'Hare Sinclair feels like a mix of Kirk and Picard through these things.

So even though this detoured a little bit from the drum head and where I kind of started thinking on this one, I think this was a surprisingly star Trek episode, and I'm gonna give it four deltas. What about you?

Brent: I think it is a fantastic comparison. To compare this to the drumhead except in this case, drumhead did way better, way better.

Just did it way better. Yeah. Um, but I am in full agreement. I can't say that I loved this episode. This is an episode I would, this is a laundry episode. Like if it, if it was on TV and I was hanging out, I probably wouldn't change the channel, you know, but I would have it on, in the background while I'm doing other things and not really pay very much attention to it.

Um, there's some really highlighted spots about this episode. There's some really low light spots really surrounding the hero and the villain of the episode. But, um, there were so many lines to pick out of the one you just said, we don't solve our problems by trampoline on human dignity, a VVA saying.

Scanning her is questioning her loyalty, uh, or questioning her loyalty by scanning her is an invasion of her privacy and an invasion of her honor, you know, um,

even the one where they said the intent of a question is just as important as an answer. Now that felt very Turkish to me, you know? Yeah. So like you, I found a surprisingly high correlation to star Trek. Like this one was trying to say something this episode, even though it wasn't the greatest episode felt like it was trying to say something, but it didn't really know what it was trying to say.

It felt, it felt very much like instead of a, a. A cannon shot to the heart, which is what drumhead was mm-hmm right. Like what you're gonna just left with a big old hole in your chest. This one's like, they picked up a couple of rocks and they started throwing rocks at you. And you just got like a mark here and a mark there and a mark there.

That's that's the difference.

And frankly, that's the way a lot of star Trek episodes are . Yeah. Like it's not the can shot sometimes. It's just, we're gonna throw these few things at you. And so like you, I found this a, a high level star Trek, uh, with those messages. Mm-hmm, , you know, with those types of messages. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna stick with you and I'm gonna give it four deltas because it definitely had that vibe.

It definitely had that feel. You put this, you put this episode at the hands of like a Ronald D. Moore. Uh, and I, Stephen bear, Renee aria, those guys, they will mind that. Yeah. For something. And do it way better and they're gonna cast carry all list to come in and play the bad guy. is exactly what's going to to happen.

So yeah, I give it four deltas.

Jeff: Nice. Well, that's it for eyes now, next week we are gonna be watching. Well, you know, I'll give you the title here in a second, but like we said before, we have a game we like to play and that's, we don't know anything about this. We don't look at pictures, recaps anything, and we are begging all of you to not tell us anything.

about what's coming up. No spoilers, no hints. No. Anything just laugh at

Brent: us. Yeah. That's all we want you to do is laugh at us and our horribly bad

Jeff: predictions. I love that. We're so bad at this. it's great, but we're gonna guess what we think the next episode's gonna be about based on the name. Only the next episode we're watching is legacies.

Brent, what do you think legacies is gonna be about?

Brent: I think this one has to be about

Sinclair and the Mbar and whatever they found, like is this the episode we found out what's going on in his brain? Oh, it's the, like the legacy that was left from Sinclair, like maybe Sinclair is really important to the Mumbar. Like it's, it's not just what they did to him, but maybe there's something about Sinclair himself.

That is really important to the Mbar and oh, whoa.

Sinclair. I'm going, I'm going total, Cisco and OTO on you here. Okay. Sinclair is part Mumbar.

That's it, that's it right there. And it's a legacy. That's why, that's why the whole thing's been happening with him. Sinclair's part, I mean like you remember Cisco and like he's all part profit or like OTO and like, he's like, my people are the dominion. Oh my gosh. Like, yeah. Sinclair's part. Oh my gosh. Or, or star, Lord and Marvel, you know, like he's part, whatever part, God, that's, that's, that's where I'm going.

And then he's gonna find out what his legacy is it legacy or legacies.

Jeff: Legacies.

Brent: Okay. So that's gonna be one of 'em and then who knows what the other ones are? I have no idea. Yeah, but that's, that's my big thing.

Jeff: So mine was really selfish and what I was thinking that's that's profound. Mine was just, it's been a long time since we've had a Jaar in Londo episode.

Oh, please, please. So, yeah. So I'm gonna guess that a great leader from the Nan regime or, or maybe the centar one or the other, they're going to do something filthy and dirty to secure their family's legacy. But to do that, they're gonna have to compromise either Kar or lawn's legacy, and then it's gonna give them that moment to like either do the right thing or, you know, help the person secure their legacy.

We're gonna find out next week right here on babble on five for the first time. Thank you so much for joining us. We love having you here. Don't forget to subscribe wherever you're listening or watching and wherever you are. Couldn't leave us some stars. Leave us a review. As you saw and heard at the beginning of the episode, you leave us a review on apple podcast or anywhere else, if it doesn't, if we don't hear about it, right.

Screenshot it, send it to us, make sure we know we will read it right here on the podcast. So until next time,

Brent: Jeff, just get outta here.

Jeff: Za Ba Ga Bee

Za Ba Ga Bee. All right, Jeff. You know

Brent: what Jeff, if, if you do that, you just put a little more beat to it, sing it a little more up. You can end every show like that from now on I'm with it.