brennen
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lurkers-guide


								<h2><a name="OV">Overview</a></h2>


								<blockquote><cite>

								Londo's career is in jeopardy when a beautiful slave seduces him and steals

								a sensitive computer file.  Garibaldi investigates an unauthorized use of

								a restricted communications channel.

								</cite>


								<a href="http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Udenio,+Fabiana">Fabiana Udenio</a> as Adira Tyree.

								<a href="http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Revill,+Clive">Clive Revill</a> as Trakis.

								<a href="http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Phalen,+Robert">Robert Phalen</a> as Andrei Ivanov.

								</blockquote>


								<pre><a href="/lurk/p5/intro.html">P5 Rating</a>: <a href="/lurk/p5/003">6.79</a>


								Production number: 104

								Original air date: February 9, 1994

								<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00006HAZ4/thelurkersguidet">DVD release date</a>: November 5, 2002


								Written by Larry DiTillio

								Directed by Bruce Seth Green

								</pre>


								<p>

								<hr size=3>

								<p>


								<H2><A NAME="BP">Backplot</A></H2>


								<ul>


								<li> <A NAME="BP:1">Trakis: "Do you know why a drunken fool like

								Mollari</A>

									has the power he does?  Because his family has been collecting

									dirt on other families for years, like all the 'noble' houses of

									the Centauri republic."


								<li> <A NAME="BP:2">Londo: "We Centauri live our lives for appearances:</A>

									position, status, title.  These are the things by which we

									define ourselves.  But when I look beneath the mask I am forced

									to wear, I see only emptiness."


								<li> <A NAME="BP:3">Centauri law permits individuals to own Centauri</A>

									slaves.  Owners are legally responsible for the actions of their

									slaves.  This appears to be a slave system of economics rather

									than of caste.  According to Trakis, powerlessness and slavery

									is the fate of all Centauri who don't play the game of blackmail

									and backstabbing.


								</ul>


								<H2><A NAME="UQ">Unanswered Questions</A></H2>


								<ul>


								<li> What was the Euphrates treaty compromise that Sinclair forced Londo

								to accept?


								</ul>


								<H2><A NAME="AN">Analysis</A></H2>


								<ul>


								   <li> <A NAME="AN:1">Londo and G'Kar agree over a drink that females are</A>

								 	the finest of all things in life.  They are much more friendly

									with each other now than when last we saw them (cf:

									<A HREF="001.html#AN:1">"Midnight on the Firing Line"</A>).  The

									Narn must have been very pacifying in the meantime.


								   <li> <A NAME="AN:2">Intense anger from a couple nearby people is enough</A>

									to send Talia away for a breather.


								   <li> <A NAME="AN:3">Londo agrees to Sinclair's compromise on the

								Euphrates</A>

									treaty in exchange for his personal help recovering the purple

									files.  However, this should not be taken as another example of

									Londo putting personal concerns above state concerns.  In a

									profoundly blackmailable culture like the Centauri, power lost

									by one individual or family would always be gained by another.

									But if an outsider were to get hold of a treasure trove like

									Londo's purple files, all of Centauri would be diminished.

									There is an interesting parallel here to the Minbari concern for

									souls (cf: <A HREF="002.html#AN:2:2">"Soul Hunter"</A>).


								   <li> <A NAME="AN:4">Ivanova's brother was killed in the Earth/Minbari

								war,</A>

									her mother committed suicide

									(cf: <A HREF="001.html#BP:6">"Midnight on the Firing Line"</A>),

									and she's been estranged from her father for years.  Thus it's

									unsurprising she's so hard-edged.


								   <li> <A NAME="AN:5">Talia is willing to skirt Psi Corps regulations

									when</A>

									a life is at stake (though she has no concern for Londo's

									career).  The Psi Corps' hold on remote psis appears to be

									pretty weak.


								   <li>@@@884630840 When she was approached about the plan, Talia asked

									Sinclair if Londo was serious about a woman's life being at stake.

									Shouldn't she have sensed Londo's distress?  Strong emotions are

									difficult to block out, she says

									(<a href="006.html">"Mind War,"</a>)

									and with Adira's life and his career at stake, Londo would presumably

									be quite anxious.  Of course, she may have sensed the anxiety but not

									its reason.


								   <li> <A NAME="AN:6">Ivanova is willing to skirt EA regulations for</A>

									personal perks. (cf: <A HREF="007.html">"War Prayer"</A>)


								   <li> <A NAME="AN:7">When G'Kar meets with Trakis to exchange the</A>

									information, Trakis says to him, "You said nothing about a

									telepath."  From this it is clear that G'Kar was the one who

									contacted Trakis.  However, Trakis knew through the bug he

									planted on Londo that Sinclair was onto him.  So, Sinclair must

									have set up G'Kar's call to Trakis in such a way that it

									wouldn't arouse his suspicions.


								   <li> <A NAME="AN:8">Telepath-aided negotiation must make future

								diplomacy</A>

									much different than it is now.  No posturing, tailored versions

									of the situation back home, empty threats, or hidden agendas.

									Parties have the same freedom to make choices for their

									governments, but there are vanishingly few tactics left to gain

									more advantage over one's adversary than one already has.


								</ul>


								<H2><A NAME="NO">Notes</A></H2>


								<ul>


								<li> <a name="NO:purple">The episode's title</a> is a term dating back

									to Roman times, still in use in Britain.  Roman senators in the days

									of the Republic wore purple edged togas as a symbol of royalty,

									since purple dye was very expensive.  Today,

									members of the House of Lords wear purple robes for state occasions.

									When someone is made a peer in the UK they are said to have been

									"raised to the purple."

									Hereditary peers are "born to the purple".  Perhaps

									this implies that the purple files are so named because

									they are what keeps Londo's family in its preeminent position.


								<li> <A NAME="NO:1">G'Kar glances no less than four times at the human</A>

									dancer behind him when he and Sinclair first confront Londo

									about the treaty.


								<li> <A NAME="NO:2">Babylon 5 communications has a priority "Gold

								Channel"</A>

									reserved for emergency communications.  Sinclair's express

									permission is required to use it, and its existence is known

									only to the ambassadors and senior officers.


								<li> <A NAME="NO:3">Londo's family heirloom, from the earliest days of

								the</A>

									Empire, is a stylized eye-and-teardrop.


								<li> <A NAME="NO:4">Universe Today main headline:</A> Homeguard Leader

									Convicted


								<li> <A NAME="NO:5">"Fresh Air" is the finest restaurant on Babylon 5.</A>


								<li> <A NAME="NO:6">Talia used to work for the "Political Bureau".</A>


								<li> <A NAME="NO:7">"I like to know all there is about Babylon 5,"</A>

									Sinclair says, "and Garibaldi's files are very thorough."


								<li> <A NAME="NO:8">Ivanova appears to wear only one earring, though

								it's</A>

									hard to tell since throughout the episode we get no more than a

									glimpse of the right side of her head.


								</ul>


								<H2><A NAME="JS">jms speaks</A></H2>


								<ul>


								<li> We're currently finishing up production on "Born to the Purple,"

								with Clive Revell and Fabiana Udeno.  It's a very offbeat and funny

								story (by Larry DiTillio, natch) which adds a new side to Londo's

								character.  It puts our characters into different situations than we're

								used to, and it's fun seeing how they react to these new conditions.


								<p>

								<li> Trakis, Adira's owner, was not a Centauri, but (and this is something we

								may bring up at some point down the road), was at one point a Centauri slave.


								<p>

								<li> Re: Londo as a romantic character...bless your heart.  You are the

								first to have nailed it absolutely on the head.  If I had to write a

								description of the character, I doubt I could have done any better

								than what you just wrote.  There are a *lot* of episodes that bring

								this out in him, including the next one up, "Born to the Purple,"

								which I suspect will end virtually all of the hair jokes once and

								for all.


								<p>

								Anyway...yes, and thank you, that's it *precisely*.


								<p>

								<li> Let's just say for now that you'll learn something very unusual about

								Centauri "intimacy" in "The Quality of Mercy."


								<p>

								<li> Fabiana didn't shave her head to play Adira; that's a prosthetic head

								piece.  Ditto with all our Centauri women.  (Funnily enough, the one

								time we DID have a bald woman as a background extra, those not in the

								know on stage kept commenting on how fake the bald-cap looked....)


								<p>

								<li> The point you raise is exactly correct; which is why we've set up

								the Psi Corps in such a way as to *prevent* them from becoming a deus

								ex machina all the time.  This is what's always bothered me about the

								way "empaths" are treated on ST; it's a terrible invasion of privacy.

								The Psi Corps has strict rules about who can and can't be scanned,

								and under what conditions.  In "Purple," she couldn't just go scan

								Trakis; she had to be hired, had to be already engaged in a business

								capacity, and had to find it *only* in surface thoughts, no deliberate

								poking.  And this is the ONLY -- repeat, the ONLY -- time this is

								done in the entire season, aside from the accidental run-in with Londo

								in the pilot episode.


								<p>

								We'll get deeper into the rules and regs of the Psi Corps as we go,

								further establishing that there's a lot they're expressly forbidden

								from doing by law.


								<p>

								<li> I confess I don't see the problem.  In real life, some women are

								scientists, and doctors, and atheletes...and some women dance in

								bars, some women hook part- or full-time.  Some men are scholars and

								diplomats and teachers...and some men are gigolos and thieves and

								*also* dance in bars.  Where exactly is the problem in portraying

								both sides of this?  Have we become so concerned with being

								politically correct that we can not show a legitimate part of human

								existence?


								<p>

								B5 has all kinds, and both sides of all kinds.  Male and female,

								equally.  I "chose" exotic dancers for a kind of sleazy, not-entirely

								legitimate operation, a backroom club.  What would one *expect* to

								find there?  Opera singers?  You look at the situation, and you choose

								what is *appropriate to the situation*.


								<p>

								I would also point out that the dancers didn't "eagerly rush forward

								to betray their friend."  Londo was trying to find Adira in hopes of

								helping her.  He didn't say he was going to do anything bad to her,

								and he was probably known to more than a few of them.  He was simply

								trying to find her.  The coin was an added incentive.  Back when I

								was an investigative reporter, I did some research on strip joints

								while I was living in SAn Diego.  Spent a LOT of time talking to nude

								dancers (when they had their clothes on, I hasten to add).  And 99.9%

								of them had a rule: you want to ask questions, you pay.  That simple.

								That's how this stuff *works*.  My job is to keep the B5 reality as

								close as possible to our reality in that respect.


								<p>

								Some of them probably wanted to help, knowing Londo was okay.  Some

								probably didn't care.  And some probably would've betrayed her at the

								tip of a coin.  Life's like that.  So again, where in this is the

								problem?


								<p>

								<li> Re: the club owner recognizing Sinclair (or not)...this is something

								we discussed.  Can Sinclair go places in the station and not be

								recognized?  In some cases, no.  In a place like the Dark Star, maybe

								so; this isn't the kind of place he generally hangs out in.  It's a

								question of how much day-to-day interaction somebody would have with

								him.  Yes, he's an important figure; but I'm not sure if I'd

								immediately recognize L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan at first glance,

								particularly in different style of dress, in an unusual location.

								We're *not* going to do it a lot -- just once this season -- but we

								thought it was a reasonable approach.


								<p>

								<li> This was a bit cut from the script for time; Gold Channels are ONLY

								for official use, they're high-priority channels that can go anywhere

								back on Earth.  Commercial communications are less reliable and only

								have a few channels available; you've got to wait for a call to go

								through.  To use a Gold Channel for personal communications is a

								No-No.


								<p>

								<li> Regarding Ivanova...it's not really an attempt to pull at heart

								strings, as it is to establish that this is someone who's had, and is

								still having, a pretty rough life.  It's a real roller-coaster for

								her, and the way she survives it is to absolutely bottle it up

								inside.  She has had angst throughout her life, and she's in for more.


								<p>

								We start to track that in little ways that probably no one will

								notice, as well as making it the occasional story point.  A little

								way nobody'll notice: after this episode, she starts messing with her

								hair, which we'd deliberately set as extremely tight until now.

								Suddenly she doesn't have someone for whom she has to be a certain

								way, and she has to start finding her *own* identity, and it ain't

								easy.


								<p>

								<li> Larry DiTillio's episodes this season are "Born to the Purple," and

								"Deathwalker."  He's currently working on a third, tentatively

								entitled "TKO."  And yes, he uses blood instead of ink...unfortunately,

								it's mine.


								<p>

								<li> There will be both sex and romance on B5 (sometimes together,

								sometimes not).  It's perversely appropriate that in the B5 series,

								it's not the Commander who gets laid first, or Garibaldi, or G'Kar...

								it's Londo.  And it's a very funny, but very touching and moving

								episode.


								<p>

								<li> It's a standard bed, works fine.  Though we *did* have a thing in

								mind where Londo sits up in bed, having just had wonderful sex, and

								his hair is now hanging limp...but in a sudden burst of sanity we

								decided against it.


								</ul>


								<HR>

								Originally compiled by Matthew Ryan <i>mattryan@pobox.com</i>