The Exercise of Vital Powers

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: And we're watching Babylon 5 for the first time for you. The one who is.

Brent: and I are two veteran Star Trek podcasters watching Babylon five for the very first time. But we're searching for what we call Star Trek like messages. Messages that give you a hope that things are gonna be better in the future. Maybe they even hold up a mirror to society, but we're trying to see how Babylon five is doing it in its own unique way.

Jeff: And because this is a Babylon five podcast, not a Star Trek podcast, we want to keep those references under control. So we play the rule of three. That means each one of us gets up to a no more than three references to Star Trek per episode. That's it. Three. No substitutions. Exchanges are refund. Hey, Brent,

Brent: Hey, Jeff.

Jeff: I wanted to shift gears a little bit this week and talk about a thing we don't talk about very often on this show.

Brent: Okay.

Jeff: Our Patreon.

Brent: Oh yeah. Right. We really don't, I mean, we toss a little thing here and there about it, but we really don't ever talk about it. Sure. Jeff, let's do that this week.

Jeff: Yeah. We've never been people to like, you know, tooth that horn or, or make it a big deal or really try and drive people into it. But we're having a conversation with someone on our discord, which people get access to through the Patreon, and they really made a great point that we put some cool content up there.

People have access to your full unedited raw reaction videos. And I also do unedited full reaction videos to each episode that don't go on YouTube. They're just there exclusive to patrons. And we do other cool stuff. Like we've done, um, trivia, you know, games and, and just other really cool hangs that we do, we we hang out with, with, you know,

Brent: Yeah. Give people behind the scenes looks, uh, even more so than what you get right here.

Jeff: Yeah. And someone was like, by not hyping this, we're actually doing a disservice.

Brent: Mm.

Jeff: To everyone who's not a patron on there. And so this is our, I just wanted to take a short moment and just let you know, like there's a lot of other cool content on the Patron and it's, and it's not limited to Babylon five, right?

Like you're gonna get the Stargate stuff there as well, and

Brent: Mass effect stuff.

Jeff: Yep. The, the, the, the game play throughs and the other projects that we kind of dive into,

Brent: And we've got some plans for future projects if we get to 'em.

Jeff: Exactly. Exactly. And it's really, it's really through the support of our patrons on the patron, our community on there, that we're able to branch out and do more of, uh, of those projects

Brent: Well, and, and you know, for, particularly for the YouTube watchers, I, I think you and I started with a, a certain level of sound quality, and we've maintained that. But for the YouTube watchers, if you go back and watch the early episodes, uh, particularly the Brent watches videos, but even, even these episodes of us, they didn't look the best.

Directly because of what our patrons have invested into this show. You and I have been able to do some upgrades. We've been able to, to get some things we needed to get, and the show looks better because of you guys, the patrons out there. And frankly, the other side of that, Jeff, if I could talk about it, um, the, particularly in the Discord, but not just in the Discord on the Patreon page itself.

Um, there's a whole other community of people involved with this show, and that's a whole different conversation that happens over there than what we get in the public sphere. And like that group of people is a pretty unique group of people. And Jeff, we have hundreds,

Jeff: Yeah.

Brent: hundreds in that group over there.

And they're just, I mean, I, I dare say people are, are, uh, having a blast, becoming friends. You know, it wouldn't surprise me if one day we hear about two people who met through the Patreon of Babylon five and. You know, they got together. Maybe there's a Babylon five baby out there somewhere.

Jeff: I'm sure there's quite a few, actually. Maybe a Babylon five for the first time baby.

Brent: Yeah, that's what I mean. That's what I mean. 

Jeff: we'll get at some

point, but yeah. I 

Brent: anyway, cool. Cool idea, Jeff. I hadn't thought about that.

Jeff: yeah, I just, you know, Hey, it's there. It's, uh, patreon.com/babylon five first, the number five, the word first, the links down below and the notes. So, I mean, check it out and just see all the cool stuff that, uh, we're doing.

And, and to your point, Brent, my gosh, the people that are there in the communities, both on the Patreon page itself and that discord are just the cool, it's, it, it's awesome. Literally, and I think we talked about it in the episode, like that's the community building right

Brent: It really is. It, it 

Jeff: such a great community to be a part of.

Brent: And if, if I could just one more thing that I think is really cool, um, because you and I actually have no idea what happens over there. Uh, in our discord, there is a special page called the Red Sector. Jeff and I are not allowed in that sector because with all the other stuff that Jeff and I have access to, everybody keeps things spoiler free.

Right. But that one, you guys don't have to worry about that. And, and we know that they're talking about us, Jeff, because every once in a while they make memes outta us, us, or gifts out of us, which they've slow, slowly, slowly shared with us over the years and some of that stuff that these people are coming up with as a hoot,

Jeff: So amazing. So incredible. And there's some horrifying stuff that that's where like the trivia games and stuff were born was talking in red sector.

Brent: yep, yep. Good stuff.

Jeff: Yeah,

Brent: Well, Jeff, we love a lot of stuff having to do here with Babylon five. One of the things we love is we love our games and we, with the role of three, that's a game we like to also kind of rate each other on our predictions. And speaking of predictions, this is the spot where we look back on last week's predictions about what we thought this episode was gonna be about before we'd ever seen it.

And it's time to revisit that prediction and just see how close we were. So Jeff, Do you remember what you said the exercise of Vital Powers was gonna be about? And how close were you?

Jeff: So I talked about the definition of the exercise of vital powers, and they said it in the episode.

Brent: Did they, I missed it in this one.

Jeff: What? Yeah,

Brent: I missed it in this one.

Jeff: he brought out, he didn't, he didn't credit it to Aristotle. He said, this is how the Greeks defined, uh, defined happiness. But they said it. But I thought that through the exercise of vital powers, we were gonna see a buildup of forces at Babylon five, and Sheridan was gonna be struggling to kind of coordinate stuff with them that would culminate with Earth.

Attacking Babylon five, um, to kind of test out their, their defenses. And then I thought that we would see Garabaldi on Mars, um, at Edgar's place, or, uh, yeah, but there wouldn't be, um, he would not see him still. Like there'd still be hiding behind stuff. He'd get super frustrated and be, uh, sourpuss, garabaldi that we have come, come to know and maybe not love so much

Brent: I'm gonna give you 0.8 of a star on that one.

Jeff: that is so much more generous than I

Brent: You, you, you called out Gu Baldy, like a boss. You said we're going to Mars and you said Gu Baldy. Jeff, that's what this episode was. It was Gar Baldy on Mars. So, uh, yeah, I'm, I'm gonna give you, I'm, I'm gonna give you 0.8 on that one.

Jeff: All right. Well, what did you think this one was?

Brent: Well, uh, I said that Sheridan, uh, was going to make a decision that was gonna make some of these other new folks into the alliance a little antsy, and it was gonna be a test of his leadership, uh, in the whole situation.

And, uh, yeah, Sheridan, I think had two lines in the entire episode.

Jeff: Yeah, and they were basically, things are going great.

Brent: Hey, what about those telepaths? There you go.

Jeff: Yeah, I'm afraid. Brent, I'm gonna have to give you a goose egg on this one.

Brent: That's fair. That's fair.

Jeff: Well, if any of you are wondering what this episode is about, what we're talking about, if you don't remember it, if it's been a while since you've watched it, or if you haven't ever watched it at all and are still checking this out, regardless.

Brent, why don't you tell us about the exercise of vital powers?

Brent: So to catch you up on what's been happening since the last episode, uh, more colonies that we've never, ever heard about before have been freed and more and more ships are de and more and more ships are defecting to join Sheridan and the newly coined liberation fleet. In fact, at one point, so many are defecting that it gives Sheridan pause cuz seriously, like five defectors before lunch.

Seems like a lot. We'll check back in on this in another episode. Also, Sheridan is continually pestering Franklin about those Teles that were all souped up by the shadows. Franklin can't find a way around the implants, but a von souped up Lida sure can. And sure enough, it works. And Franklin has now, and Franklin now has the means to revive and free the Telepath popsicles.

Franklin finally gets shared and to tell him what this is all about, Franklin's very taken aback by it, saying he's right. This is the only way, but I really wish it wasn't. And even though Franklin gets to know, it's still a secret from us. So I'm sure we're gonna check back in on this one in another episode.

Meanwhile, GU Baldy has returned to Mars to meet with Mr. Eggers. He has some legitimate concerns about Sheridan that Franklin even seems to be chairing by the end of this episode. And he's here to stop Sheridan from attacking his own people and his own government. But before Eggers is gonna tell Gu Baldy much, he has some.

Well, let's just call them test of loyalty to run on him. Garabaldi Passes. Admitted that he doesn't trust Telepaths at all, and didn't admit that he totally still has a thing for lease. Mr. Edgar's wife again, I'm sure we're gonna check back in on this in another episode. Well, Garabaldi has done enough to gain some measure of trust from Eggers who takes this opportunity to explain what's happening.

Edgar says that even though Cycorp is outnumbered 10 to one, they have the power to win the war with information and secrets. He notes that people act out of stupidity and fear and will just let the takeover happen. This is how people have gained power throughout history, not through brute strength, but by getting people to believe that they can settle scores, hit back, punch 'em in the face, and get the people what they want, whether or not they can actually do it in real life.

As long as the people believe in that, then they can conquer. Huh? Checking my notes from 2016 to the present. Interesting. Edgar tells Gar Baldy that Sheridan's actions are going to speed up Clark's response, which in turn will result in him empowering the Telepaths to become a military force. And once that happens, the Telepaths won't seed that power back.

So now they have to stop Sheridan by any means necessary. And as it turns out, GU Baldi knows exactly how to do it. Find Sheridan's dad and use him as bait. And how can they do that? Well, Garabaldi lets it slip that it just so happens that he's on some sort of drug that's not that easy to get, which makes it really easy to track.

And that's where the episode ends with Garabaldi going off, feeling dead inside. And I'm sure we're gonna check back in on this in another episode. Jeff, how did you like this episode? The exercise of Vital Powers?

Jeff: This is my favorite episode of the entire series,

Brent: Is it really? Well, the series

Jeff: entire series.

Brent: More than War Without End,

Jeff: More than more without end. More

Brent: more than Tko o, TKO O.

Jeff: A little more in Tko O I'm, I'll tell you why,

Brent: Okay.

Jeff: because the French snagged power in 2112.

People know where I'm going here, right?

Brent: Is that the Time Warp song?

Jeff: What are you? I got it. I'm out. We're done. We're done here.

Brent: bye Jeff.

Jeff: That's, that's Rush's Opus 2112 from nine, like that's why Rush exists as a band was that song came out in,

Brent: So you guys can check back in on Patreon for our next exclusive content where Brent listens to Rush for the first time.

Jeff: because it's clearly, I mean, you don't say, you don't say the French in 2112, cuz they're Canadian band who have done some French. Well have some French in. Like two songs, but still, um, yeah, that was So on the Nose, it's not really my favorite episode. I just love that they called out 2112. I popped so big when he said that

Brent: Jeff, please let me remind you, this is a family friendly show.

Jeff: I popped like it was a wrestling term. That's a

Brent: Uhhuh? Yeah, sure. Uhhuh. Uhhuh. Uh,

Jeff: This episode felt weird. It felt different. Like it felt more like a political drama almost than like a sci-fi show, or, or with Garib, like the way Garabaldi was doing his voiceovers, almost like political noir. It had a slower pace. They slammed a ton of stuff into it, you know, just packed it with like exposition and context and some stuff.

But I also think it did a lot to raise the stakes of what's going on with Earth and with the telepaths.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: I'm sure we'll talk about this, but Edgar's monologue on corporation's role in government was fascinating to me, like from the horse's mouth as it were. Like he, he believes, and it sounds like the other companies believe that they've been acting in the best interest of humanity this whole time, and you know, they just need a little, little extra time to reign things in.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: But I think that my favorite part of that was him hammering the viewer on the head with the point that this war has not been and will not be fought through traditional means. Welcome to the War of Information and disinformation, which I will also look back at some notes that go back at least maybe 10, 15 years.

But we've talked a lot about the prescient of JM S'S writing in this series, and while this episode felt different from other ones, it also felt like to get a little leap on the Delta Fury conversation later for you, but it felt like this episode was literally written at us. Today,

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: like point for point in so many ways.

But all my last, my last thought, initial thought I had was, why is Sheridan going after all these Popsicle telepaths when he has a freaking superhero in Lida Alexander sitting right there. She flexed hard in this episode.

Brent: is the most powerful we have ever seen leaders. Abilities come out,

Jeff: Yeah,

Brent: like where we can sit back and go, that's power. I've never, never felt her power. I remember her being on the bridge of the white star going after and like being able to do something to a shadow ship and bleeding from the eyes and all that sort of stuff, and going, she really seemed to struggle there, like, you know, like,

Jeff: There was no struggle here.

Brent: no, no, Uhuh, Uhuh, you know, and she's like, it's a lot further.

My range is a lot further than before. So,

Jeff: Yeah. What did you think about this one?

Brent: uh, this is not a complete episode. This episode feels like it is episode two of a seven part story. It had neither beginning nor end. It was just middle, middle, middle, middle, middle, which isn't a bad thing. It just makes this episode really hard to judge on its own merit. Because it depends on its placement and everything else that is around it. That being said, I was very intrigued by this episode. I was drawn in, it held my attention all the way through. I wasn't looking down at my phone, I wasn't texting, I wasn't doing other stuff. And for an A D H D dude who watches tv, usually with other devices in hand, I was in on this episode.

I will watch this one on every single rewatch that I ever do. If I'm flipping through the channels and I come across this one. I'm not changing the channel at the commercial. I'm watching this episode. I liked it. I enjoyed it. It is not a complete episode, and I'm not gonna have much to say. Spoiler alert for the Delta Fury section, although we could probably dive into that a little bit more.

That being said, we met Eggers, we discovered his plan. Which I don't know if you picked up on it, Jeff, and I don't know if he said it directly or if this is Brent, just sort of whatever, um, his plan is genocide of the telepaths. Did you pick up on that? That's,

Jeff: I think it's more nefarious than that. I think it's the threat of genocide to the telepaths while he holds the cure so that Edgar will control the telepaths.

Brent: Oh, see, I didn't even think, I think it's just straight up genocide of the, and that I don't think that that's a cure. I think that's the virus that he's got.

Jeff: I think he's developing both.

Brent: You think so?

Jeff: And testing the ef the efficacy of, of

Brent: Yeah.

Jeff: testing the efficacy of how quickly it can kill. Basically,

Brent: Uh, the other thing is we finally, finally get a real in-depth look into Garibaldis reasoning for what he's been doing. Regardless of him being brainwashed, regardless of whatever Cycore has done to him in his own mind, this is why he's doing what he's doing, which we've not really been privy to.

Like he's talked about it a little bit, but we got his internal monologue and why he's really doing this kind of stuff. And frankly, he kind of has a real point,

Jeff: he does.

Brent: has a legitimate point that I think we actually need to discuss. also found out more about the shadow telepaths, and that's certainly gonna come back to be a thing.

Uh, what's gonna happen when Buster's girlfriend gets thought out, that should also be interesting. That being said, Jeff, where do you wanna dive in on this one?

Jeff: Well, let's talk about the, uh, telepaths and Alita and stuff. First. Let's, let's, let's do that.

Brent: sure. 

Jeff: One thing 

Brent: ladies, her boss and explains why she could do stuff to the shatter ships. All right, what's next?

Jeff: let's talk about how cool Zach is though, really we haven't talked about Zach for a little bit.

Brent: Sure.

Jeff: struggling with the guy, you know, the, talking about the implants are always a step ahead of him and they're gonna whatever, and Zach just is like, sorry dude. You'll figure it out. You always do. I hope that everyone has the opportunity in their lives to work with a Zach.

Brent: Yeah,

Jeff: He's so great.

Brent: he really is. He really is. And just for the record, I still don't know that Lida and Zach are full on with the relationship that you said they were a couple weeks ago.

Jeff: You know, this episode made me wonder that a little bit more just cuz like there wa because if they were there would've been a hand on the back. There would've been some touchy. Touchy. There was not. It's too bad.

Brent: Hmm. He did get a hand on the shoulder though,

Jeff: That's true. So maybe, maybe

Brent: Yeah. Um,

Jeff: we got the, uh, the alien scene again with the, uh, was that the, that we're like operating on, uh, on the, the telepath guy? We got that little flashback again.

Brent: Mm-hmm. Well, that's what he saw when he looked up. Very interesting. When she looked into his mind, she heard the shadows, so whatever's in there. And she wound up, uh, drowning it out, turning it off. I thought it was really interesting the scene where she was doing the thing and Franklin was doing the thing and he's talking us through what's happening,

Jeff: Mm-hmm.

Brent: but like he's doing it for the medical log, but it's basically exposition to tell us what's going on and provide some sort of weird reasoning that I didn't follow very well at all.

And that's okay. Bottom line, dude. Woke up now. He had some Jason Bourne stuff going on there for a moment and lead. Here's what I appreciated. This was so much better than pain. Ah, she just went, it's time to go to sleep. Boom. That was cool.

Jeff: That was so cool. Especially the one, the actor, the for the guy was great. Like he's holding the thing and he is shaking his, his eyes are big. Like he phys, his physical acting was awesome, and she's like, I can't let you do that. Let's go to sleep. Oof. And he's down. I, I was just like, oh my God.

Brent: yep. 

Jeff: Wow. 

Brent: So I gotta talk on Franklin here though. I'm gonna bag on Franklin because Franklin did a Franklin thing and it made me want to slap him.

Jeff: Yeah.

Brent: He's in surgery, he's trying to do his thing. They said, you know, he's gonna lose his life in 30 seconds, one to 20 seconds. That was a quick 10 seconds. He finishes up, he goes to, he's talking to one of the other doctors.

Lida comes in and she does a thing and she's got a connection and she's sitting there going hand to hand with this dude and you know, whatever's happening. And they're all just sitting there like puppet master, super cheesy that the nurse or other doctor he was talking to just drops the clipboard. Like, really?

Come on. But he turns around and he looks at her and he is starting to smile. And you're like, and, and she's clearly in the middle of something and he just goes, Lida and disrupts the whole thing. It's like, dude, shut up. Let her do whatever she's doing. It's clearly working. Stop. You are not the end all. Be all that has to insert yourself into it.

Jeff: But he does, Brent don't, don't you understand?

Brent: That's what he does. I know.

Jeff: greatest. He's the best. And it, I mean, how dare she do that without his guidance and for him to be there

Brent: And he just, she, he just distracted her and, and he didn't even think a thing about it. He just runs after her. Like, Hey, this is great, and come back and I'm not mad at you at all.

Jeff: and do it again, but do it slower and do it at the pace I tell you to do it.

Brent: Right. Like, you know, he, he could have slowly approached her, done, you know, nothing. No, no, no. He, he disrupted her and dude fell out. He could have broken his neck falling down like that for all I know.

Jeff: Yeah,

Brent: Hmm. And then Franklin had a point later in the episode,

Jeff: did.

Brent: he's like, Hey, you gotta tell me what this is about now.

Seriously.

Jeff: I thought one, the scene where he was with Lida and doing that medical exposition piece. Again, another example of Richard Bigs just nailing it as an actor. I mean, that was a mouthful of stuff, and he was just rocking through it.

Brent: right.

Jeff: But at first when he's like, that's it.

Like when, because I think she, didn't Sheridan call him or did he call she, yeah,

Brent: Oh no, no. Sheridan's like, Hey, I've got five minutes of downtime. Cool. Call dude. I need to check in. Transfer me over. He said, transfer me over. I need to talk to him.

Jeff: And so and so Franklin, at first, he is just like, dude, what? He's like, dude, what's up? And I'm like, that's so old school. Franklin just like trying to get in and do stuff. But then I'm like, no, he's got a point. Like he's being asked to do the absolute impossible here and he has an opportunity to maybe do something, but it's a huge stretch.

I need to know what that is. Franklin was right.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: And then I think his reaction was really understandable. Like he's just like, I can't believe that

Brent: How is it understandable? You don't know what it was?

Jeff: no. What I think is understandable was his, his his progress, right? From, I can't believe those words came out of his mouth. Talk, talk, talk. But he's right.

This is the only way that we're gonna get there.

Brent: Yeah.

Jeff: I don't know what that is. Right? And I can only imagine.

Brent: Right.

Jeff: It was that up and down episode for Franklin on balance. I'm gonna say he, he, he was pretty great in also. Did you notice just this is me getting really, uh, superficial. He's got a lot of gray going on up top.

Brent: Franklin or Sheridan.

Jeff: Franklin,

Brent: Oh. Hmm.

Jeff: good. I like that. Going natural.

Brent: Listen, uh, hey, listen, makeup and hair department are on point for this season because she, I mean, Sheridan's Sheridan's looking good this year. Franklin's looking good

Jeff: I think they're like, can everybody look good except Alen? Like they,

Brent: She is looking worse. I feel like every episode, this thing where it connects, I don't know if it's just cause everything's in high def now and we can just see it more, but it's like they keep messing with it and like her skin is growing back over the, the bone.

I'm like, what is going on? That's doesn't look good at all. Yeah.

Jeff: You wanna head to Mars?

Brent: Well I, talk to me real quick about what you think of the new name, the liberation fleet.

Jeff: That's better than the army of

Brent: The, yeah, yeah. Um,

Jeff: thought on that one.

Brent: more colonies have been freed and more people are joining. Um, yeah. Sher so, so Sheridan, they're like, Hey, five people today alone have defected and Sheridan's like, Hmm, what's going on? That's, that's a lot of people defecting. Is this all the plan? What are we doing?

Jeff: Cause there's the version of this where a good chunk of those defectors are implanting themselves, right? They're gonna be embedded and they're gonna somehow mess stuff up. I don't know what if they have any vetting or anything that they're doing. I don't think that's the case though. I feel like this is just, uh, they.

They needed Sheridan to talk about stuff and so let's talk about a good problem to have.

Brent: And he's getting more and more people to come over. You think that? Yeah. I, something feels like it's up. I have no idea what it is. Uh, last thing here for me on this, um, oh, go

Jeff: you go there, I just, I think that with that, the people coming over and defecting over juxtaposes with some statements that Edgar makes later about the Nazi party, the Communist Party, and just like, you know what we talked about last week, where a lot of people, once they're given that opportunity and realize they don't have to follow these orders, that door's open, they're like, oh, thank God.

Someone's talking reasonably here.

Brent: Mm-hmm. Uh, so Sheridan with the Telepaths real quick. he gonna sacrifice them?

Jeff: I think so.

Brent: Is that what's going on? He's gonna sac and I mean, cuz Franklin goes like, he's right, it's the only way, but, ugh, I don't like this.

Jeff: It's so gr, whatever it is, is gross. I can't get away from aga, like I said earlier, but with leeta on the team. Like why are you gonna throw telepaths at stuff when you can just throw Leeta out there and she can give like a universal pain to everybody. Game over.

Brent: Or at least put 'em all to sleep and then just walk in.

Jeff: Yeah. Could be so simple.

Brent: I, yeah, I need, I need to know what's going on. Um, and we'll get there, you know, who else I needed to know what was going on with

Jeff: Who's that?

Brent: Gu Baldy and we got a lot of Gu Baldy in this episode. I was really glad for it. Uh, first of all, I like these voiceovers.

Jeff: I did too.

Brent: I don't usually like voiceovers in film. At all because I, I just, it feels cheap. It's all exposition. This one worked for me. Aldi's voiceover, Sheridan's personal logs, like all that sort of stuff. Ivanova, when she does them, uh, it, it works, it works in this show on a different level. So, uh, I, I really enjoyed it, but I want to talk about first Garabaldi and his motivations behind a lot of this.

Okay. We'll just, we'll, we'll give the caveat. His mind has been messed with. However, does Garabaldi have a legit point? Does Sheridan have some sort of Alexander the Great Messiah Complex?

Jeff: I don't think that he does. I think that a Messiah Complex ends with you on top, with you being Alexander the Great over all these armies and everything, and that's what Garal is afraid of, right? He says, you know, he's gonna try and take control of all of this for himself. I haven't gotten that impression from Sheridan.

What I have gotten from him is that he believes he's the only person who knows what needs to be done to move things towards where he thinks they need to go.

Brent: So here's a question. I, is it a Messiah complex? If you are actually the Messiah, think about it. Sheridan. Fell to his death and was rescued and raised from the dead. Not saying that that makes him the Messiah, okay? But it gives him a different perspective on things. And he was important enough to save. Oh yeah.

By the way, when he was about to be bombed to death and he jumps out of the the cart, KO does something he's never done, come out of his suit, expose himself to everybody to save him. Why? Because it was important that he gets saved. Sheridan has always been here. Sheridan is the one who will be, he is the ultimate of the, of the one that's legit who he is, who he's been told, and he's stepping in and owning that role on some level. Also in his mind, I, I was gonna say like, in his mind anyway, he's not doing this to just go be the savior. He's doing this because it's what needs to be done.

Jeff: Exactly. Yeah. I think that Garabaldi is pointing it as a, you know, this is a self-serving thing that you're trying to take control of. But I think when we talk about Messiah Complex, you think about what is, what is Messiah? What is that? And it's, it's, it's the anointed or the chosen one. Right? And I think if we look at the path of Sheridan, there's all that context you just laid out, right?

He's always been here.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: What humanity has seen as angels has saved him, you know, in front of people. But we also got in his resurrection, him and Lorianne, where Lorianne, who to us as mere mortals, would see as a God figure in many ways. Took him under his wing, tutored him, showed him what was coming and how to get there and groomed him to be, uh, what Franklin called him.

He, he's harder, you know, now he's more harsh. And, and that's very much the work of Lorian bringing him up. I think that if you come up to a high enough level, you can make the argument that Sheridan is in fact a, a messiah.

Brent: The failing of Sheridan in this though is while he may not truly have a Messiah complex, while he truly may have some understandings that these other people don't, while he truly may be doing this to save the people, cuz it's what needs to be done and he really realizes he's the only one who can do it, what he has not done. Is understand how that actually does look to other people and how that can look to other people and work to combat that image, especially with one of his chief lieutenants. You know? And that's a bit of a failure. I mean, Mr. Leadership guy, that's a bit of a failure of leadership

Jeff: it's a huge failure. It's,

Brent: I mean, one, one of his chief lieutenants like left him turned Judas, like,

Jeff: it's about communication. It's about enrolling people into your, into your cause. Because I think, like even if I'm, if, if I'm garabaldi, if I'm Ivanova, uh, if I'm David Corwin, you know, from last week, and all I do is I see, I see Sheridan sitting in the mess hall by himself, laughing to himself and then getting excited and running off and doing a thing on his own, that seems wild and nutso, but it seems to work out in the end.

But I'm never telling anybody. The picture, the whatever. I'm just running around doing these things. Yeah. In the absence of information, we're gonna tell our own stories. And what we know about Garrett Baldi is he's never gonna tell a good story. You know, he's, he's too good at his job as a security person to trust that good things are gonna happen.

And I think that Sheridan, maybe he does have all the answers, maybe he knows what needs to be done and how to do it, but as long as he's doing it by himself, here's the thing too, as long as he is doing it by himself, while he's out physically leading these fleets against massively powerful forces, wow, that's a lot of risk he's taken.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: But you pull Ivanova in, you pull Garabaldi in, Marcus, you enroll them in your, in your plan, in your vision, and then you can go out and lead. And if your ship gets blowed up, You're fine. Somebody will pick up that mantle. Garabaldi called it a cult of personality, you know, a couple weeks ago. And that's exactly what Sheridan his building right now.

We saw that with Marcus and Franklin on Mars. We saw that with uh, Londo getting the Centara to throw in their lot with Sheridan.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: talked last season about, in our prediction for this season about Babylon five becoming the thing. But what we're seeing this far into the season is it's Sheridan becoming the thing, and that is a problem even if underneath it's all great.

If that's what people are seeing, that's a problem.

Brent: So, um, let's talk about Lisa for a minute. She's a gold digger.

Jeff: You know, I'm so disappointed.

Brent: She's a gold digger.

Jeff: Maybe

Brent: I, oh, he, you know, I just, after the whole thing happened with Franz and he came in and he was really nice and, yeah. Okay lady. Listen, love, love is love. Listen, love can span generations. It really can. I'm not, I'm not negating that, but

Jeff: December relationship. It's beautiful.

Brent: completely on the surface least looks like a gold digger. And he went and got himself some beauty queen.

Jeff: I was gonna say trophy wife if anything else. Cuz, cuz we, we postulated back in conflicts of interest that, you know, hey, maybe Gar Ball's gonna go and report to her. Right? Maybe she's some high powered business woman within. The Edgar's Industries thing or whatever. She's this independent, strong, independent person.

She's on the board of directors or Nope. She goes and talks to the help to make sure that dinner is ready and served and that breakfast is there and that people are eating. She's literally, she's literally the liaison to the hired help and that's it. Every line she had was about, oh, I came to let you know dinner was ready.

Oh, sorry for interrupting. I didn't know you were talking about big male business things going on in here, but you know, breakfast is, is all ready for you. I was very disappointed.

Brent: So Jeff Eggers, not Bester.

Jeff: I know

Brent: Eggers is a person.

Jeff: he is.

Brent: What do we.

Jeff: who likes orange juice, just like Sheridan.

Brent: Listen, look, he's got the money. Listen, can I tell you something Jeff? This makes me sick. My wife buys $15 a bottle table salt.

Jeff: Okay.

Brent: I can get a box this big of it for a dollar 95 from the grocery store, but no, no, no, no. She's gotta have this bottle of specially mixed table salt, which has dried rose petals in it.

Jeff: Oh wow.

Brent: But she says it tastes different and it tastes better. And she really likes it. And it lasts for a long time cuz it actually comes in like a grinder and stuff like that, you know? But it's in a bottle about yay big, you know.

Jeff: Yeah.

Brent: I looked at her one day and I went, she, she read the ingredients and we saw the ro.

We didn't know that when we bought it. I saw, I didn't actually know that it was just salt. We thought it was something else. Um, And we, we saw Rosa. I said to her, I was like, baby, we bougie. And she looked at me, she's like, you are not bougie. If you use the word bougie, you know? But still. But still, listen, when you have the ability to pay for something like that and it's a little thing that makes you happy, go for it.

Jeff: Yeah, do

Brent: he likes his orange juice.

Jeff: He does. It reminds him of a simpler time.

Brent: Hmm. A man like that needs to be reminded of a simpler time.

Jeff: He does. It was, it was, it was incredible. Incredible to me the perspective that he brought to the conversation, but also just how dramatically out of touch with reality he was, you know? I mean, just, just, I mean, he made a comment. About how every, everybody knows that he killed Santiago. Like we already knew that that wasn't, you know, a big surprise when Babylon five let it loose or whatever, the way he said that.

But he made a comment in there where he says, only a fool turns away from absolute power. I mean, I get it. I get why Clark was doing that and I'm like, um, hi. Hi. Excuse me. Um, actually a lot of people turn away from absolute power cause uh, we actually watched Kar do it not too long ago. I know of people who have done it.

So, wow. What an interesting perspective on life that you have that you can't even resist that temptation.

Brent: Do you think is gonna be a good villain? Because here's the thing, Marvel movies for the first 22 movies, you know what the big knock on Marvel movies was? They didn't know how to do. Their villains, their heroes were great and it's a good thing because the movies were about the heroes, but their villains were awful.

Y y trying to figure out like, why are they doing this? What are they? It was so shallow, it was not well developed. And again, that's okay. The story's not about the villain. The story is about the hero until we get all the way to Infinity War. An Avengers, infinity War was a movie about the bad guy. It was a movie about Thanos, and when we got there, they developed him.

They showed us what his motivation was, let us see it from his perspective and kind of made you go,

Jeff: Hmm.

Brent: He's got a point. And that's what made him such a great villain was because he had a point. Does Edgar have a point?

Jeff: He has a point. Absolutely. He has a point.

Brent: Is it a point that you kind of look at and you go. Ah, I understand. I

Jeff: think you, I think you do, but I think what he wants to do with the point is that's where he loses, that's where it loses credibility. You know? The point is that we are, we're stupid and we're afraid, and so we can be led around by the nose very simply. That's very true. Hey, so you need somebody good. In front of you.

Yeah, yeah. You need someone good leading who will do about that. So that needs to be me and these other people. It's like, oh, Yik. Yikes. You went a little too far. I mean, at one point when Garabaldi was selling the whole idea of going to get Sheridan before, I think before he was blatant, no, it was after he was blatant about it being Sheridan.

He was like, wow, you'd be indebted. Everybody owe you. In fact you, you'll probably be the next president. And he's like, yeah, maybe like I could do that. It's just like, oh, okay. So you want, you believe that you're taking care of humanity, but really you're just trying to make sure you remain as like a big shot in person in charge.

Okay. That's where you lose credibility as, I mean, that's a good Paint by Numbers villain right there. And he is got a good, I think he's got a justification behind it that you can look at and go, oh wow. Yeah. That's interesting. I'm gonna think about that a little bit.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: But then ultimately it's just a big political power grab guy who's willing, willing to quote humanely kill people as they're suffering, because the universe needs a little more compassion.

But I'm still gonna kill all these telepaths in a very painful way.

Brent: You know, he talked poorly about Clark saying he wanted loyalty tests. He, he demands loyalty and he was putting people to the test for their loyalty. Again, uh, checking my notes from recent. Okay, got it. Interesting. Um, yet that's exactly what he did to Gu Baldi.

Jeff: so,

Brent: He put Gu Baldi through a loyalty test,

Jeff: so what he said was, uh, He's power hungry. He went, he put people through loyalty tests, but tests can be faked. You can't fake out a telepath, and that's what Edges put in place was a loyalty test with a telepath, even though he hates them.

I thought that whole thing was

Brent: but then he killed the telepath at the end. Yeah. He'll set up your, your thing. Oh, no, no, no. We're gonna off You felt bad for her. Felt bad for her.

Jeff: She's just doing her job. She did a good job too. Did we know, did we know that Ramstein was working for Edgars?

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: Because I feel like that was kind of outta nowhere.

Brent: I think we knew that a couple of episodes ago. Yeah. Yeah. I think it, yes. Yes. Because he was, he was in partnership with Lease. He and Lease were on the same page when she came to the station.

Jeff: I, I read that more as like he was the broker who like brought Garal, like he was just putting people together. Like I thought they were connected and they are obviously connected now to Edgars, but I thought they were connected to some, you know, this is gonna be bad for the president. They said to said to Garal, they trying to

Brent: I never thought that they were pro president. I never thought they were per president. I just thought that they were, uh, anti Sheridan for whatever reason that we didn't know. Well, now we know. Um, you know, because whatever, like, it's not even that they're against what Sheridan's trying to do. He's just trying to do it too soon for them.

Jeff: Yeah. Messing up the timetable.

Brent: that's all it is. Like, like Sheridan is collateral damage to them in their corporate plans.

Jeff: Which is huge, right? When you start, like, as I kind of glance at my notes and you say that Sheridan is screwing up the timetable, so what happens to him is collateral damage. The telepaths that they had to kill to figure stuff out, how to kill them faster, their collateral damage. Garabaldi who is running through the ringer to get whatever he needs outta him.

Sheridan ultimately is gonna be collateral damage. Edgars doesn't. He has, he puts in the interest of promoting humanity's best interests.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: He puts no value in human life.

Brent: Exactly. And you know what, what always floors me is people like Wade, people like Gu Baldi. If he's treating them as collateral damage, if he can just off that telepath so cold heartedly. Now I get it. It's a telepath that they don't think they're animals. They're, they're not human, they're something different. He can do that to me in a heartbeat. He can do that to me in a heartbeat. I remember reading a memoir, uh, by someone who shall remain nameless, who was in the employee of somebody else, uh, who, I mean, kind of exactly what Edgar said, demanded a lot of loyalty. Asked specifically for loyalty. And, and, uh, he said he came in to work with this person because he felt a duty to country.

But he also understood that everyone is on a limited timetable with this person. And when and when their use is done, he's done with them. You know, and, and he understood that, and he kind of tracked that over the course of, of his story. Um, I don't understand why people don't realize that they also could turn around to be collateral damage as soon as Wade's not useful to editors anymore.

You think editors is gonna just because he's not a telepath, Edgars is going to let him go? No. Do you think, I mean, same thing with Gu Baldi. Like I, I mean on some, like at some level you gotta look and say, well, we can show because our interests align right now, but this dude would just assume, let me go.

And kill me. Uh, and it probably will kill me because I have information and I know stuff.

Jeff: You're not gonna let him go. What about lease?

Brent: Yeah,

Jeff: We got the whole thing with her, talking about how much she actually loves him and whatever. Does he actually love her?

Brent: Uh,

Jeff: And, and, and what, what to what end is he using her? Right? Because at this point, like we said, she's trophy wife at best. Was there a long game to bring Garabaldi in and that's why she's there? Does she have some other connection that they need to, to bring in? But I think, I feel very confident in saying that Lisa is just a game piece right now for him.

Brent: yeah, it, I think it's possible that he, in his own way, actually has feelings for, for Elise. You know, like he sees her, he thinks she's beautiful, he loves her, uh, and he's gonna put her to use. But I also think that if the chips were down, She would also just be collateral damage for him.

Jeff: When she brought dinner to Garibaldi and they were talking, and Garib Baldi actually admitted that he was a terrible boyfriend. Like after a while, but there was a moment and I was like, they're gonna kiss. And he's gonna kill lease. If they kiss and he's gonna make Garabaldi watch. It's gonna be like one of those sick things.

I'm like, don't do it. Don't do it. And then she left and I'm like, oh, thank God they didn't do it cuz there will not be a good end to that.

Brent: right.

Jeff: I appreciated how he talked about the fact no one takes power. Power is given

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: that was a very powerful statement.

Brent: Sure. A, a very interesting outlook on life in history. I think we can debate whether or not it's true. I think in some instances it really is. Is it true across the board? Maybe. Maybe. Um, spoiler alert, this is not a Star Trek message. This is a philosophical message that is not about hope for the future or how we get better or merit to society as just a, Hey, does that actually have merit?

Um, is a moment, speaking of Lisa and Eggers. Eggers is talking to Lee and she's like, so did he pass? And he's like, yes, he's fine. And he says this, he will make a fine addition. And that was the line. Presumably he'll make a fine addition to the team. But it was so vague that I'm like, what is he gonna make a fine addition to? Is he gonna turn him to stone and he is gonna be a trophy out in his courtyard? Like he's the white witch. Like, what's he doing with this guy? What is he collecting? His soul? Is Edgar really a soul hunter? Like, like there, there seems to be something more in that of like, he's gonna make a fine addition.

Other than to the team

Jeff: Well in, in that statement, he used the word fine like three or four times. How'd he go? Oh, it's fine. He's fine. He'll be a fine, like it felt very intentional and I don't know what that meaning is, but it really hit that word hard.

Brent: Here's a question. Uh, think of the room that Edgar came and Jacked Garabaldi and tossed him into, and there's Ms. Constance sitting in the middle of it. Is Edgar the one who put Garabaldi in the room for brainwashing? Maybe it wasn't Cy. Well, no, we do know it's Cycore because best's involved somehow.

Hmm. Nevermind, take that.

Jeff: is ster in league with Edgars somehow?

Brent: I mean, is Edgar savvy enough to try to do something to the telepath and commit genocide and have one of the chief genocides like in his employee at the same time? Like,

Jeff: I think so.

Brent: uh,

Jeff: because, well,

Brent: be interesting.

Jeff: if he has to develop the stuff and you got this P op over here who's doing experiments on other telepaths like. All you gotta do is tell baster the story that, Hey, here's this disease and this genetic disorder. I found you're in danger. Everybody you know is in danger.

I need your help getting me some tissue and some samples so I can figure out a cure for this thing. Better believe Basters gonna be on board with that.

Brent: Hey, here's a thought, an idea I'm having right now in this moment. You know, those frozen telepaths, the shadow souped up telepaths. Is there something about their biology now that makes them impervious to whatever virus

Jeff: Oh,

Brent: Edgar is trying to unleash? And that's why Sheridan wants them and he's gonna need them because there's some sort of thing going on with the Telepaths, but he needs people who aren't gonna be, you know, susceptible to the virus.

Jeff: I don't know that he knows about the virus though yet that hasn't

Brent: I don't either, but he might. Oh, you're right. We don't know that he, that he does. We don't know that he does, but we don't know that he doesn't at the same

Jeff: Yeah. Fair enough.

Brent: All right. I have one more question out of this whole thing outside of, okay. Garabaldi just handed over Sheridan's dad, can I punch him in the throat now?

Jeff: Yeah.

Brent: That was, I mean,

Jeff: that was dirty.

Brent: dude, that's, I mean, oh, okay. Um, they, sh Franklin said this when Sheridan came back from Zaha Doom, he was the sa Well, I mean, outside there was a couple physiological changes, but he was pretty much the same. What were the physiological changes?

Jeff: I think we were meant to think that 20 year lifespan.

Brent: I feel like there's more to that though, Jeff. I feel like it's gotta be more than just a 20 year, a 20 year thing. There's something physically different about Sheridan now. And I don't know what it is. I don't know if we've just missed it, if we've glossed over it or if they haven't told us yet. But Franklin says there's something physiologically different about Sheridan and I wanna know what that is.

Coming back from Zha,

Jeff: Agreed.

Brent: maybe he is actually dead on the inside. He doesn't have blood pumping through his body, but he's still animated.

Jeff: That's how they knew he was dead. Right? That's exactly what Lori and asked him, do you feel blood pumping through your body right now? He's like, I don't. Oh my gosh. I am dead.

Brent: are you hungry? Do you need sleep? Do you,

Jeff: Have we seen him eat since he's been back?

Brent: you know, we saw him in the cafeteria a couple episodes ago and he was just sitting over in the corner laughing to himself

Jeff: Yeah. He and Dalen were supposed to go out to dinner. We didn't see that dinner.

Brent: No, because he stayed in and fed doodled with her while everybody was outside listening.

Jeff: Yeah. Wow.

Brent: That's a, I'm in, this'll be one of those things. We look back on Babylon five for the second time and be like, of course.

Jeff: There's the whole thing.

Brent: Yeah.

Jeff: Well, Brent, it sounds like we're at that point of the episode where we're gonna boil this all down and see if this episode had any deep morals or messages to it, or it's holding up a mirror to society. Perhaps you're gonna do that by rating this episode on a scale of zero to five delta theories as to how strong the message is and just how Babylon five it was delivered.

So what do you got?

Brent: Well, Jeff, I wanna read you my note here and I want to just preface it by saying, this is not, I, I'm not finished at the end of reading this. Here's my note. Not really. Plot, plot, plot doesn't really resolve anything. We're in the middle of the discussion, so there's not really any messages, which means zero delta furries.

But remember, that doesn't mean we didn't like the episode. Delta Furies are not an indication of how much we like the episode as we often say. There's lots of Star Trek episodes that we get zero deltas and there's still episodes that we like. And that's really where I was kind of coming at this was because everything's still unfinished with this episode.

This episode did not end.

Jeff: No.

Brent: It just, it went to black and we're gonna pick it up next week. So, uh, and that's really where I was. But you said a few things that really kind of got me thinking. If we go to the term of holding up a mirror to society right now, and there are some places where you certainly could see that with the way that J m Jms was writing, that things were really a lot more prescient for today.

They were written 20 years ago now at this point, 25 years ago. Um, Particularly politically, and I, I don't mean, and I have actually zero desire to go down a huge political diatribe here. I, I just don't have it in me to do that tonight. So I'm not going to, but I'm just going to leave it at Yeah. There are some places where this really resembles things that we're seeing happen, uh, in these last bunch of years, and it should be a warning, um, that things aren't necessarily always gonna go right.

Jeff, do you have anything to say before I issue my rating?

Jeff: So when we watched the summoning, when I did the Delta Fury discussion on that one, it was really around that mob mentality that people have, right? They were, they were ready to pounce on Dalen and Lanier because they wanted to go fight the shadows until Sheridan came up and said, Hey, I came back from Zaha do.

And then they're like, yeah, let's go get the shadows. Just kind of going whatever way the wind blew.

Brent: Mm-hmm.

Jeff: Edgars talked about, uh, the, the, what he talked about, I think the quote here was, uh, how many people actually belong to the Nazi party, the Communist Party. The Jihad party, which is a dune reference if it's anything else, but it says a very small number.

But there were plenty of other people who were happy to do the work for them and others afraid enough to let it happen. So I really saw like a lot of what Edgars was talking about in his kind of political ideology being what we talked about in the summoning of most people are just gonna go the way the wind blows.

And the wind untended often blows in not great ways. And so that's what we're dealing with right now and Babylon five oh and also also right here in the world that we live in today, where we have a lot of people who are just happy to go do their jobs. I'll just follow orders and, and do my job. Also, I know there's some stuff going on here that's wrong, but I'm not gonna say anything because I'll get canceled or I'll get blocked or I'll get whatever, and so I'm just gonna kinda let that thing happen.

That was the line in the piece specifically where I was just like, wow, JMS is talking to us right now. Today in 2024. Hit really hard. So offer that.

Brent: There is a bit about writing messages. That is, it's always interesting when it still applies to today when it was written 20, 30 years ago. Always interesting. There is a bit that does have to deal with intentionality. We often talk about, well there's this one thing over here, but I don't think that's really what they were trying to get at.

It is just there, I've, I looked at this, I could dig that out and I feel like that's a little bit of where I am cuz I'm, I still wanna sit back and say the conversations around this aren't over yet. The whole thing about, about what's going on on earth with the Clark presidency and even with Eggers and what his plans are like, we see it.

I wanna know what they're gonna do with it. They haven't discussed it yet. They've just said, here it is, and we can recognize it. So we haven't, we still haven't discussed it, we haven't gotten through it. Like, like one of the things that that Star Trek does so well, particularly in the later stuff, is they don't answer the question. They present a problem, they give you one side of the argument, they give you another side of the argument, and then they cut the episode and leave you as the audience member to figure out where you, where you stand on it. Right? In this one, they presented the problem. There has been no exploration of it one way or the other,

Jeff: Yeah, it's

Brent: you know?

And so with that, that's, that's still not quite the piece. So I'm, I'm still going to give this one a, I'm still inclined to give this zero Delta Furies, Jeff, and I'm gonna stick there, but I want to put an asterisks next to this one because I think it depends on what comes after this.

Jeff: That's fair

Brent: Does that make sense,

Jeff: because I think it definitely holds up a mirror. But that's it.

Brent: Yeah.

Jeff: it. There's no, there's nothing else. It's just Edgar's, Edgar's waxing, you know, politically over here, and he is like, this is how it is. And we're sitting here watching it going. Yeah. Wow.

Brent: It's like where Leonardo DiCaprio, like eating popcorn, watching TV pointing at the screen like, oh, I recognize that, 

Jeff: that's, 

Brent: there's nothing more to it than that.

Jeff: It's happening.

Brent: that. So I'm gonna stick with zero Delta Furies. But Jeff, as we say, Delta furries are not an indication of how good or bad an episode was.

It just has to do with how well it told a message in a uniquely Babylon five way. But you know what is a great indication of how much we like the episode, the ranking, which Jeff is gonna do right now, Jeff, we are putting together our 100% completely accurate, definitive immutable. I gotta stop saying that word cause that's not necessarily true. Fourth season ranking of Babylon. Five. Jeff, the question to you is, where do you place the exercise of vital powers? Our current top five ranking are into the fire, the long night,

Jeff: We didn't update the, I didn't update the note.

Brent: no surrender, no retreat, whatever happened to Mr. Garabaldi in moments of transition? For those of you out there watching the podcast, the reason why I was silent was because all Jeff has to do on the audio feed is like, suck it up. But now that I've talked about it, now he's actually gonna have to go in an edit. So sorry for that, Jeff.

Anyway,

Jeff: seconds. It's

Brent: yes, there you go. Um, that is the top five. Jeff, does this episode crack the top five for you? And if so, where does it go? Or if it doesn't still, where does it go?

Jeff: I've really struggled with this one because as you've said so succinctly, this is not a complete episode. This is a middle part and a very well done middle part. You said it earlier. I'll say it again here. This is a great episode. I enjoyed it. I will watch it again. I like the character of Mr. Edgars. I like Garibaldis role that's happening here.

I think he's filthy and dirty and I hate what he's doing, but I'm enjoying it. The latest stuff is great, but when I look at this ranking on here, it's just really hard to place it. But where I'm drawn, my eyes are drawn right away is based on the conversation we just had is that area of the summoning in the hour of the wolf right there, the number eight or nine,

Brent: Yep.

Jeff: and when I think about where this belongs in the ranking, summoning was a massive episode for this.

That was the, the, the, the, the second coming of Sheridan, right? The return, the resurrection of Sheridan. I think I'm going to put this one right between the summoning an hour of the wolf. Have it be our new number nine.

Brent: Fair enough. I couldn't change it even if I wanted to.

Jeff: Brett, that's it for the exercise of vital powers. Next week, we're watching the Face of the Enemy for the first time. And good news, we don't have to watch the face of the enemy while it sleeps. We're not, we're not trying to fall in love with this thing or anything

Brent: Fair enough.

Jeff: but we don't look up these episodes.

We don't know what they're gonna be about. We don't look up thumbnails or anything. We just know the title alone. So Brent, based on that, what do you think the face of the enemy is going to be about?

Brent: I think my prediction here is gonna be regardless of what the episode title is. ERs and the crew are gonna capture Mr. Sheridan while Garabaldi returns to Sheridan with a message, maybe even pretending to be his friend, maybe even a gruff friend. Like we go to Little History, but could tell you they're, they're doing some bad stuff to your dad, but really it's Garabaldi who's selling him out?

Uh, he's totally going. Judas here. Totally going. Judas. Uh, Sheridan is gonna wind up jeopardizing the entire mission by going after his dad. And you know what? Sheridan's gonna get captured further putting the mission at risk, but it will also serve to accelerate the liberation fleet heading for Mars. It's, it's, it's gonna serve the story purpose of getting everybody to Mars. So some stuff can happen, but it's also gonna throw us into that, uh, Han Solo going into Carbonite move or like, oh, this is bad. What are we gonna do? What do you think?

Jeff: I think we're gonna get more on the shadow ship Telepath plan, like the Popsicle plan. When Lida and Franklin get to Mars, like I have a outstanding question as to is it just gonna be them? Is Franklin going to Mars because he doesn't believe what Sheridan wants him to do? Or is he going to Mars? Because that's part of what Sheridan wants him to do.

But either way, we'll get there and we'll see that plan unfold a little bit. I think Garabaldi and Sheridan are gonna come face to face and we're gonna see Garibaldis programming kick in all the way. Like I think this is gonna be the updated version of Talia's personality, where it doesn't kill the old Garabaldi but just takes over.

And, um, I think, I think that we're just gonna get the Garabaldi Sheridan, um, face off here in this one. And the dad stuff was more of a threat than an actual gonna happen thing.

And we'll find out right here next week. Thank you all so much for joining us. If you haven't already, please subscribe wherever you're watching or listening. Leave us a rating or review. And most importantly, please share this show with someone who loves Babylon. Five, or someone that you've been dying to help fall in love with Babylon.

Five. So Brent, until next

Brent: Hey Jeff.

Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. What's up?

Brent: You know what's been bugging me?

Jeff: What? What's up?

Brent: Well, here we are almost 10 episodes later, and we still haven't once talked about one of those eyeball things on the sonari next. Like we saw that and it's just a, we just haven't done anything with it.

Jeff: Yeah. It's been a long time. You're right. Like I, it was in my predictions for a long time. I thought we would've done something with that by now.

Brent: Yeah, well, I guess we'll just have to catch up with that in another episode,

Jeff: You were just waiting to say that again, weren't you?

Brent: maybe.

Jeff: Oh man. I swear in Valen's name.