Babylon 5: Deathwalker

[Darth Wedgius]

As a note, with this, Star Treks III and IV, and the TNG two-parter Gambit all having been reviewed, this may be Robin Curtis's last appearance on SF Debris.
I had a bit of a crush on her Saavik. Less so on ambassador fin-head.

[Linkara]

One thing I never really understood was if the immortality serum needed a member of that person's race, or if any person worked. Either a slaughter of their own species for immortality, or a genocidal kidnapping of other races for the necessary ingredient.

Hence why Chuck's joke about animals still working. More iffy about the clone thing, but since we already kill animals for food, this really isn't all that different. She probably should have been more specific about the ingredients for her immortality drug. XD

[Archanubis]

As a note, with this, Star Treks III and IV, and the TNG two-parter Gambit all having been reviewed, this may be Robin Curtis's last appearance on SF Debris.
I had a bit of a crush on her Saavik. Less so on ambassador fin-head.

Did not realize that was Saavik II.

One thing I never really understood was if the immortality serum needed a member of that person's race, or if any person worked. Either a slaughter of their own species for immortality, or a genocidal kidnapping of other races for the necessary ingredient.

Hence why Chuck's joke about animals still working. More iffy about the clone thing, but since we already kill animals for food, this really isn't all that different. She probably should have been more specific about the ingredients for her immortality drug. XD

Probably why JMS dropped it.

[CharlesPhipps]

One thing I never really understood was if the immortality serum needed a member of that person's race, or if any person worked. Either a slaughter of their own species for immortality, or a genocidal kidnapping of other races for the necessary ingredient.

Well life-force exists in this universe.

[ORCACommander]

iirc jms always had trap doors in the plot in case an actor had to leave, it would not surprise me if he wrote in back doors if they became available again

[CareerKnight]

The Dilgar never 'made their own sun go nova', they started trying to conquer other worlds in order to find a suitable new home because their sun was going nova. In one of the Babylon 5 tabletop rpg's and some of the fan stuff they apparently succeeded even though they lost the war, there is one remaining hidden Dilgar colony.

I couldn't find what I was referring to and even as I saw your comment was wondering if had been something else entirely (like they chose to dive their ships into the exploding star rather than trying to flee the system). I did find that apparently the colony predates the war (and apparently stayed out of it) and that their sun going nova wasn't natural and that none of the younger races were responsible. I'm betting the Shadows and suspect that it was the price of failure (the actions actually sort of brought the other races together which is counter to their goals) which would make the Dilgar the equivalent of the bug race (can't remember the spelling) in Mass Effect who the Reapers sent out to weaken the other races.

One thing I never really understood was if the immortality serum needed a member of that person's race, or if any person worked. Either a slaughter of their own species for immortality, or a genocidal kidnapping of other races for the necessary ingredient.

Hence why Chuck's joke about animals still working. More iffy about the clone thing, but since we already kill animals for food, this really isn't all that different. She probably should have been more specific about the ingredients for her immortality drug. XD

Well life-force exists in this universe.

I think it actually does work in universe since unlike the real world evolution does have an end goal (at least for sentient life), namely ascending to beings like the Vorlons and the other Old Ones. Therefore it can be assumed that the serum requires a species far enough along on this path so animals (and probably brain dead clones since it seems to have a mental component as well) wouldn't cut it.

btw Linkara, while trying to find where I had heard about the fate of the Dilgar before I stumbled upon this snippet of a JMS quote on the Lurker's Guide and was immediately reminded of one of your reviews of another JMS work. "Fine tune your attention to the frequency of misery and inhumanity".

[G-Man]

The Dilgar never 'made their own sun go nova', they started trying to conquer other worlds in order to find a suitable new home because their sun was going nova.

I don't think why their sun went nova, or why they tried to conquer other races, was ever made canon. That they were expanding because they knew their sun was going to explode is explicitly stated in the fan fiction "The Dilgar War," which I think is where most people get their head canon of what happened from, but nothing as far as I can tell has ever been explicitly canonically revealed.

[Darth Wedgius]

My head-canon is that the immortality cure worked off something that could only be generated by a living, conscious, sapient being -- mojo.
Without it, well, a being might technically be alive, but would be pretty much confined to places serving soy lattes.

[SlackerinDeNile]

My head-canon is that the immortality cure worked off something that could only be generated by a living, conscious, sapient being -- mojo.
Without it, well, a being might technically be alive, but would be pretty much confined to places serving soy lattes.

I'm not CONFINED to those places, I just prefer to slouch off in them. They're cosy.

[CharlesPhipps]

1. It should be noted JMS has control over all media for his Expanded Universe and declared it all canon while making sure it never contradicted his own stuff.

2. Evolution doesn't have a goal in Babylon 5, because the original evolved race was immortal. It's just that Vorlons and other energy based psychics "seeded" and grew races after that point. It's less like "The Chase" though because they seeded individual traits into pre-existing evolutionary races versus actually controlling evolution.

I.e. Psychic Powers.