You can not select more than 25 topics
Topics must start with a letter or number, can include dashes ('-') and can be up to 35 characters long.
336 lines
19 KiB
336 lines
19 KiB
|
|
[1][ISMAP]-[2][Home]
|
|
|
|
### GUIDE ### [3][Background] [4][Synopsis] [5][Credits] [6][Episode
|
|
List] [7][Previous] [8][Next]
|
|
|
|
_Contents:_ [9]Overview - [10]Backplot - [11]Questions - [12]Analysis
|
|
- [13]Notes - [14]JMS
|
|
|
|
_________________________________________________________________
|
|
|
|
Overview
|
|
|
|
Garibaldi is captured by the Mars Resistance. Ivanova's fleet
|
|
clashes with Clark's forces. A plan to free Sheridan is launched.
|
|
[15]Marjorie Monaghan as Number One.
|
|
|
|
[16]P5 Rating: [17]8.84
|
|
|
|
Production number: 419
|
|
Original air week: October 6, 1997
|
|
|
|
Written by J. Michael Straczynski
|
|
Directed by David Eagle
|
|
|
|
_________________________________________________________________
|
|
|
|
Plot Points
|
|
|
|
* With the help of a deep scan by Lyta, who is able to break past
|
|
blocks put in place by P12 telepaths, Garibaldi has convinced
|
|
Franklin and the others that Bester manipulated him into betraying
|
|
his fellow officers.
|
|
* Garibaldi, Franklin, and Lyta have freed Sheridan.
|
|
* Londo and G'Kar have convinced the League of Non-Aligned Worlds to
|
|
join the fight against Clark and help Sheridan, who came to their
|
|
aid against the Shadows. Sheridan's fleet now contains Narn and
|
|
Centauri warships, among others.
|
|
* Not all the so-called defectors to the rebel fleet have really
|
|
betrayed Earth; there are some spies who have been feeding
|
|
information about fleet movement back to Earth.
|
|
* Earth has been adapting Shadow technology for use in its own
|
|
ships. The resulting vessels are capable of putting up a strong
|
|
fight against White Star-class ships.
|
|
* Ivanova was mortally injured during a clash with a fleet of
|
|
Shadow-enhanced Earth ships. Minbari physicians estimate she has
|
|
no more than a week left.
|
|
* At Ivanova's request, Sheridan has assumed command of the
|
|
Agamemnon once again.
|
|
|
|
Unanswered Questions
|
|
|
|
* What other Shadow technology has Earth adapted?
|
|
* What impact has Sheridan's interrogation had on his psyche?
|
|
* How badly was the White Star fleet damaged by the battle?
|
|
* Did Garibaldi and the others leave Mars with Sheridan?
|
|
|
|
Analysis
|
|
|
|
* G'Kar's feeling of debt to Sheridan is obvious: Sheridan gave him
|
|
sanctuary ([18]"The Long, Twilight Struggle") and aided the Narn
|
|
during their war with the Centauri ([19]"Acts of Sacrifice" and
|
|
[20]"The Fall of Night," among others.) It's less clear why Londo
|
|
would be willing to put his people on the line to the same extent.
|
|
Londo, at least from his perspective, took care of the Centauri
|
|
Republic's Shadow "problem" on his own, without Sheridan's
|
|
intervention ([21]"Into the Fire.") While he may since have
|
|
learned of Sheridan's role in sparing Centauri Prime from
|
|
destruction by the Vorlon planet-killer, he never worked closely
|
|
with Sheridan as G'Kar did.
|
|
One possibility is that Londo feels he has to repay Sheridan for
|
|
telling him of the approach of the Vorlons ([22]"Falling Toward
|
|
Apotheosis.") Londo did tell Sheridan he owed him a favor in
|
|
return.
|
|
Or it may be a simple matter of redemption: Londo certainly
|
|
realizes that he helped the Shadows, and he may feel he needs to
|
|
make up for his past misdeeds. In [23]"No Surrender, No Retreat,"
|
|
Londo told G'Kar that he wanted to help the humans because they'd
|
|
been friends, and he'd been ignoring his friends too long.
|
|
* G'Kar praised humanity as a bridge that has allowed the other
|
|
races to work together. That's the same argument Londo made to him
|
|
in [24]"No Surrender, No Retreat." Delenn has expressed the same
|
|
sentiment as well, e.g. in [25]"And Now For a Word" with her
|
|
closing remark about humans building communities.
|
|
* The League's unanimous vote ran counter to Sheridan's request that
|
|
they stay out of Earth's civil war ([26]"No Surrender, No
|
|
Retreat.") Upon his return, however, he didn't seem to object to
|
|
the presence of the alien vessels; has he changed his mind about
|
|
the need to credibly deny that his campaign is due to alien
|
|
influence?
|
|
* Just how powerful is Lyta? She has set off planetary defense
|
|
systems from light-years away ([27]"Epiphanies,") is able to
|
|
easily slide past defenses put in place by the Psi Corps' most
|
|
talented members, and can project detailed memories into the minds
|
|
of others. There must be limits to her ability; Kosh was able to
|
|
block her out ([28]"Falling Toward Apotheosis.") But she appears
|
|
to be light-years ahead of any other human telepath since Jason
|
|
Ironheart ([29]"Mind War.")
|
|
* Lyta appeared startled when Garibaldi mentioned the conspiracy
|
|
against the Psi Corps. Did she pull the details out of his mind,
|
|
and if so, is the knowledge useful to her in any way?
|
|
* Why did Number One believe the images Lyta sent to her? Given
|
|
Number One's distrust of telepaths, wouldn't she suspect that Lyta
|
|
was feeding her fictitious images? Of course, it's possible she
|
|
believed it because Lyta also transmitted the belief that the
|
|
images were legitimate.
|
|
On the other hand, it's strange that Number One's people were also
|
|
convinced immediately; given the resistance's innate distrust of
|
|
telepaths, why weren't they suspicious of her immediate reversal
|
|
of attitude after Lyta apparently did something to her mind?
|
|
* How much does Ivanova know about Marcus' feelings for her? When he
|
|
walked into the sleeping chamber, he didn't think she suspected --
|
|
hence his "You will never know" comment -- but clearly she
|
|
suspects _something_ now that she knows what he said to her
|
|
earlier ([30]"Shadow Dancing.")
|
|
* How was Earth able to adapt Shadow technology so quickly, given
|
|
that it's millions of years more advanced and apparently has a
|
|
completely dissimilar basis (living matter as opposed to steel and
|
|
wires?) Did Clark's people, or maybe the Psi Corps, receive
|
|
technical assistance from the Shadows at some point?
|
|
Earth's weapons researchers weren't completely new to the concept
|
|
of living weapons; the confiscated Ikarran artifact in
|
|
[31]"Infection" was in their hands for nearly four years. It's
|
|
possible that studying that artifact, which presumably was a less
|
|
advanced form of organic technology than that used by the Shadows,
|
|
gave them the context they needed to begin to understand Shadow
|
|
artifacts. The ships on Mars and Ganymede ([32]"Messages from
|
|
Earth") would have provided chances for experimentation, if brief
|
|
ones.
|
|
* Was Sheridan's father freed too, or is he still being held? The
|
|
interrogator implied that Clark's forces still had him. Even
|
|
without Garibaldi's help, Sheridan's father can presumably still
|
|
be used as leverage against Sheridan.
|
|
* Sheridan was in a rather confused mental state when he was
|
|
rescued. Will his interrogation have any lasting effect on his
|
|
psyche? Many people would be scarred for life from such an
|
|
experience. On the other hand, Sheridan has already been through a
|
|
rough time -- death -- and after that, the rest may seem minor in
|
|
comparison.
|
|
* Why did Ivanova ask Sheridan to lead the final battle from the
|
|
bridge of the Agamemnon? Symbolism, most likely, since she
|
|
expressed concern about it earlier. But clearly, he'd be safer on
|
|
the bridge of one of the White Star ships, Ivanova's injury
|
|
notwithstanding. She must be aware that her request puts the
|
|
integrity of the fleet -- which depends on Sheridan himself as a
|
|
symbol, every bit as much as it depends on the participation of
|
|
Earth ships -- in greater jeopardy.
|
|
The symbolism aspect is the most likely explanation; a fleet led
|
|
by an Earth warship will be harder for Clark to explain away as
|
|
mere alien interference.
|
|
It's also possible, given the discovery that not all the defecting
|
|
ships are loyal to Sheridan, that Ivanova wanted Sheridan on the
|
|
bridge of the Agamemnon to ensure that its captain couldn't betray
|
|
the rebel cause.
|
|
* Sheridan's use of the Agamemnon after Ivanova's fall has symbolic
|
|
meaning on another level: Agamemnon was the commander of the Greek
|
|
forces during the Trojan War, and he sacrificed his daughter
|
|
Iphigenia to ensure fair wind for his ships. Ivanova, while
|
|
obviously not Sheridan's daughter, sacrificed herself to ensure
|
|
that the fleet would make it to Mars.
|
|
In Euripides' version of the Greek myth, Iphigenia was switched
|
|
with a hind (a deer) at the last minute by Artemis, who among
|
|
other things was the goddess of virgins. Iphigenia lived
|
|
thereafter in a distant country as the high priestess in one of
|
|
Artemis' temples. The [33]"Endgame" page has more on that.
|
|
* Garibaldi doesn't have very good luck with his back, between the
|
|
knifing in this episode and the gunshot in [34]"Chrysalis." An
|
|
additional irony is that he was stabbed in the back while helping
|
|
rescue Sheridan, who he stabbed in the back in a metaphorical
|
|
sense.
|
|
|
|
Notes
|
|
|
|
* Earthforce is expanding the underground Mars tunnel system,
|
|
leading to instability in the existing tunnels.
|
|
* Ivanova has eidetic memory (photographic memory or perfect recall,
|
|
as it's more commonly known.)
|
|
* The VR machine used to interrogate Sheridan is similar to the
|
|
machine used to interrogate Sinclair in [35]"And the Sky Full of
|
|
Stars."
|
|
* After Franklin finishes sewing up Garibaldi's wound, the team
|
|
proceeds down the tunnel. Part of a discarded newspaper is visible
|
|
in the background, including the headline "TIAGO" and "TED" on the
|
|
next line. The headline is probably "Santiago Elected," the same
|
|
newspaper headline visible in [36]"Grey 17 Is Missing."
|
|
* The Damocles, which Ivanova's fleet fought at the beginning of the
|
|
episode, is named after a figure in Greek mythology. As told by
|
|
Cicero, Damocles was a courtier under Dionysius of Syracuse, who
|
|
had risen to power by violence. He envied what he imagined to be
|
|
his ruler's pampered and carefree life, so Dionysius decided to
|
|
let Damocles experience what his life was really like. In the
|
|
midst of a sumptuous banquet, Damocles discovered that a sword was
|
|
suspended by a horsehair over his head, ready to drop at any
|
|
moment. Dionysius said he felt the same anxiety every day,
|
|
surrounded by enemies waiting to take his life at the first sign
|
|
of weakness.
|
|
* The title most likely refers to the mantra recited by Delenn and
|
|
others upon entering the Grey Council: "I am Grey. I stand between
|
|
the candle and the star. We are Grey. We stand between the
|
|
darkness and the light." ([37]"Babylon Squared," among others.) It
|
|
may also refer to a transition from darkness to light; Sheridan's
|
|
return certainly qualifies.
|
|
|
|
jms speaks
|
|
|
|
* It's a nice, quiet little episode.
|
|
Well, at least, in comparison to what's coming....
|
|
* _Was this episode filmed after Claudia Christian decided to leave?_
|
|
Negative. We'd finished all S4 shooting at the time this occured.
|
|
_Were new scenes shot and edited in?_
|
|
Negative.
|
|
* _Was there a scene missing between Sheridan shooting the guard and
|
|
his arrival on the Minbari ship?_
|
|
Yes, there was a small scene that got cut for time.
|
|
Good catch.
|
|
* The Garibaldi material through the map sequence with Number One
|
|
was originally in "Intersections." It got shunted over to 419 when
|
|
418 ran 7-8 minutes long, and 419 ran 8 minutes short.
|
|
* _During the interrogation, the female interrogator said, "Put a
|
|
bullet in his head." But Earth uses PPGs now, not bullets._
|
|
Nope. We've established (in Grey 17 is Missing, for instance) that
|
|
guns are still used on Earth and elsewhere; but in a space
|
|
station, you don't want a slug-thrower because it tends to a)
|
|
ricochet a lot off metal walls, or b) cut through something vital
|
|
that would breach the hull potentially.
|
|
* _About Ivanova's eidetic memory_
|
|
She's a latent telepath. About a P1. As has been established on
|
|
the show in the past. That gives her a slight edge in many areas.
|
|
Also, an eidetic memory does not equal facility with language. I
|
|
have a somewhat eidetic memory. I can usually remember visuals and
|
|
things said to me with extreme clarity. (Unless I'm in convention
|
|
mode at the time, at which point all bets are off.) But I have a
|
|
real problem with learning languages, which involves not just
|
|
memorization, but *translation,* which is a skill, a knack that
|
|
some others have and some don't. (Spanish rolled off me, but for
|
|
some reason I have a knack for German, though my vocabulary's gone
|
|
all to hell.)
|
|
* "These new EA ships with Shadow tech...Are they susceptible to
|
|
telepaths like the shadow vessels were?"
|
|
Negative...they don't have living beings as CPUs, they're still
|
|
working at adapting the basic tech, the other stuff is still a bit
|
|
advanced.
|
|
"By the way, the EA adaptation to the shadow tech is accurately
|
|
done. Keep the basic Omega design and modify where needed."
|
|
Got it in one.
|
|
* The Advanced destroyer group was still somewhat in the works when
|
|
they hauled it out to go after the fleet. They'd been expecting
|
|
mainly to go after other Earth ships (as was noted in the
|
|
episode), and didn't count on exclusively being confronted by
|
|
Whitestars. Still, there were a lot of them here, and they did a
|
|
lot of damage by sheer force of numbers.
|
|
Corwin would be running the station in everyone's absence.
|
|
* _About Ivanova's speech_
|
|
Yeah, it was a bit over the top, deliberately so.
|
|
I put it in the category of a boxer who's going up against an
|
|
opponent who may be well matched...and wants to psych the other
|
|
person out.
|
|
If you look at "Give me liberty or give me death!" or similar
|
|
statements, made to rally support or make a point, they're
|
|
generally bigger than life, a bit over the top. That's so we can
|
|
know where the top is so we can climb up there ourselves.
|
|
* "If we want to be logical here, it really seems improbable that a
|
|
White Star could run into a piece of debris. Ok, the pilot
|
|
(Marcus) wasn't paying attention, they were at high speeds and
|
|
visability was poor."
|
|
Well, if you want to go back and listen to what's being said in
|
|
the episode, Marcus calls out that the navigational system was
|
|
damaged, and they were trying to repair when the big chunk of
|
|
debris hit them. They couldn't get out of the way for that reason.
|
|
* Some have complained about the rescue, arguing that they wanted to
|
|
see a big battle. (To which answer #1 is wait 7 days.) They wanted
|
|
to see the fleet smack Mars and free him in a big battle.
|
|
Well, if you do that, you can kiss goodbye any chance of the fleet
|
|
then doing what it's SUPPOSED to be doing, which is the liberation
|
|
of Earth. While they're tied up and planetbound (on one side) at
|
|
Mars, Earth swoops in and knocks them out. You also lose any
|
|
possible aspect of surprise.
|
|
It *had* to be done quickly, through the back door, rather than
|
|
the fleet that some might have been expecting, so it'd look like a
|
|
Resistance job, not a Fleet job.
|
|
* "Why were there no cameras monitoring Sheridan?"
|
|
Torturers rarely videotape their work, thus assuring that it can
|
|
never be used against them should things not go their way all the
|
|
time. This is kinda pro forma in South America, for instance.
|
|
|
|
|
|
[43][Next]
|
|
|
|
[44]Last update: December 2, 1997
|
|
|
|
References
|
|
|
|
1. file://localhost/cgi-bin/imagemap/titlebar
|
|
2. LYNXIMGMAP:file://localhost/lurk/maps/maps.html#titlebar
|
|
3. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/background/085.shtml
|
|
4. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/synops/085.html
|
|
5. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/credits/085.html
|
|
6. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/episodes.php
|
|
7. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/084.html
|
|
8. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/086.html
|
|
9. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/085.html#OV
|
|
10. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/085.html#BP
|
|
11. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/085.html#UQ
|
|
12. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/085.html#AN
|
|
13. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/085.html#NO
|
|
14. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/085.html#JS
|
|
15. http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Monaghan,+Marjorie
|
|
16. file://localhost/lurk/p5/intro.html
|
|
17. file://localhost/lurk/p5/085
|
|
18. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/042.html
|
|
19. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/034.html
|
|
20. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/044.html
|
|
21. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/072.html
|
|
22. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/070.html
|
|
23. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/081.html
|
|
24. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/081.html
|
|
25. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/037.html
|
|
26. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/081.html
|
|
27. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/073.html
|
|
28. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/070.html
|
|
29. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/006.html
|
|
30. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/065.html
|
|
31. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/004.html
|
|
32. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/052.html
|
|
33. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/086.html#AN.iphigenia
|
|
34. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/022.html
|
|
35. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/008.html
|
|
36. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/063.html#NO.paper
|
|
37. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/020.html
|
|
38. file://localhost/lurk/lurker.html
|
|
39. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/085.html#TOP
|
|
40. file://localhost/cgi-bin/uncgi/lgmail
|
|
41. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/episodes.php
|
|
42. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/084.html
|
|
43. file://localhost/home/woodstock/hyperion/docs/lurk/guide/086.html
|
|
44. file://localhost/lurk/lastmod.html
|