B5: And The Sky Full of Stars

[J!!]

Well, we don't actually know how the Earth Alliance's government works, so we can't really say whether or not endorsing the vice-president is weird.

What probably is weird though I'd having a government agency officially back a specific candidate. That has conflict of interest written all over it.

And if that wasn't word enough; the PsyCorps a widely disliked and distrusted agency, so if think that any endorsement from them would be a liability, rather than a help.

If I had to rationalize this, I'd say that they didn't really say any such thing. More likely someone high up made some unofficial comment that's being taken out of context or exaggerated by a unscrupulous reporter.

[Durandal_1707]

What was the original answer to this mystery going to be? Did that ever get leaked?

There is a synopsis floating the internet of where JMS' thought process was while developing season 1, but its different enough from what we got a lot of things probably would have changed anyway as the series moved along, regardless of if Ohare stayed on. (Though some things like Garibaldi becoming a drunk in season 4 were already in place.)

https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/synopsi ... ers.53739/

As for Sincalir specifically, the secret behind Sinclair & the Battle of the Line is not that he becomes Valen (Valen is never mentioned in this outline... and he actually isn't mentioned until really late in season 1), but that he is the person who has been prophesied to save the Minbari from dying off. In order to fulfill the prophesy, Delenn must transform to become human and mate with Sinclair. Their son will be some kind of chosen one who will save the Minbari race from extinction(???). Some of the Minbari (warrior caste?) interpret prophesy differently, and think that Sinclair will actually lead the Minbari to doom.

The Minbari warrior caste overthrows the Grey Council, and orders the resumption of hostilities with Earth. They also want Sinclair and Delenn dead. The series ends with the Minbari attacking B5 and destroying it. Sinclair & Delenn escape with their newborn baby. Everyone in the galaxy is after them for one reason or another....including Earth, which has been given info which makes them believe Sinclair is a traitor.

It then leads into Babylon Prime.

Where they still go back in time to steal B4... but to take it to the future to continue the fight instead, rather than the past. The time traveling causes Sinclair, Delenn, and their baby to age rapidly. David grows all the way to adulthood within a few years.

B Prime and the Army of Light defeat the Shadows (but there's nothing about the Shadows leaving the galaxy). No mention of what happens to the Vorlons. Earth defeats the Minbari, and Sinclair's name is cleared. Delenn leaves Sinclair, in order to return to the Grey Council. David becomes the leader of a new interstellar alliance. Final scene is Sinclair, retired, alone on an otherwise uninhabited world....fishing.



(Personally I always assumed the original ending had the series actually taking decades to get to a naturally older Sinclair, but it seems like the accelerated aging was always part of the plan.)

This sounds kinda familiar, now that you bring it up; I may have seen this long ago, and forgotten it. That explains why some of the Minbari would want to kill Sinclair, which is what I was wondering. Thanks!

[goodperson25]

The newspaper article on the Psi Corps endorsing Clark for the Vice Presidency. Why would they tip their hand for that? This was an American based show. The US Vice President has virtually no inherent authority until he has all of it when the President goes toes up. Most viewers would probably assume the same of EarthGov. So why publically endorse Clark without endorsing anyone else?

Politics. I'm not certain about what Psi Corps plans were or how exactly it went down but I think it can be explained by that in someway regardless.

For more specific thoughts I think they could be playing the long game with an endorsement (or appearing to in the case of a sudden promotion) for the purposes of upcoming elections (or less lofty goals) and as for the article maybe it's dubious enough that it can be explained away. (wether they leaked it that way or if it was statements/actions taken out of context and/or exaggerated)

[Beastro]

What was the original answer to this mystery going to be? Did that ever get leaked?

There is a synopsis floating the internet of where JMS' thought process was while developing season 1, but its different enough from what we got a lot of things probably would have changed anyway as the series moved along, regardless of if Ohare stayed on. (Though some things like Garibaldi becoming a drunk in season 4 were already in place.)

https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/synopsi ... ers.53739/

As for Sincalir specifically, the secret behind Sinclair & the Battle of the Line is not that he becomes Valen (Valen is never mentioned in this outline... and he actually isn't mentioned until really late in season 1), but that he is the person who has been prophesied to save the Minbari from dying off. In order to fulfill the prophesy, Delenn must transform to become human and mate with Sinclair. Their son will be some kind of chosen one who will save the Minbari race from extinction(???). Some of the Minbari (warrior caste?) interpret prophesy differently, and think that Sinclair will actually lead the Minbari to doom.

The Minbari warrior caste overthrows the Grey Council, and orders the resumption of hostilities with Earth. They also want Sinclair and Delenn dead. The series ends with the Minbari attacking B5 and destroying it. Sinclair & Delenn escape with their newborn baby. Everyone in the galaxy is after them for one reason or another....including Earth, which has been given info which makes them believe Sinclair is a traitor.

It then leads into Babylon Prime.

Where they still go back in time to steal B4... but to take it to the future to continue the fight instead, rather than the past. The time traveling causes Sinclair, Delenn, and their baby to age rapidly. David grows all the way to adulthood within a few years.

B Prime and the Army of Light defeat the Shadows (but there's nothing about the Shadows leaving the galaxy). No mention of what happens to the Vorlons. Earth defeats the Minbari, and Sinclair's name is cleared. Delenn leaves Sinclair, in order to return to the Grey Council. David becomes the leader of a new interstellar alliance. Final scene is Sinclair, retired, alone on an otherwise uninhabited world....fishing.



(Personally I always assumed the original ending had the series actually taking decades to get to a naturally older Sinclair, but it seems like the accelerated aging was always part of the plan.)

I actually like all those ideas and how it paints less of a idealistic picture at the end with what we got.

[TheLibrarian]

Did they ever explain 1) who Knight 1 and 2 work for? Any particular faction? and 2) did they explain why they didn't just hire a telepath to poke around in Sinclairs head? Especially if they think that some kind of memory tampering has happened? OK, they're not fans of aliens and getting a rogue human telepath would be problematic (psi-core have scruples, OK, they're meant to have scruples), but it'd probably be easier to pull off.

Larry DiTillio (story editor for B5 seasons 1 and 2) has said he envisioned them working for Bureau 13, a PsiCorps skunkworks/black ops department featured in his season 2 episode "A Spider in the Web". I don't think JMS ever made this canon though. (They learned after the fact Bureau 13 was also the name of a tabletop RPG, so JMS decided to just never use the name again, and folded their operations into larger PsiCorps shenanigans.)

In retrospect, it does seem silly they just wouldn't use a telepath to poke around. But if you wanted to come up with a reason, maybe PsiCorps used two non-telepaths so the Knights couldn't be traced back to PsiCorps at all. Or maybe standard telepathic probing was tried on Sinclair during his debriefing after the war ended, but turned up nothing. The Knights' machine is some kind of memory-scanning device that's supposed to be stronger than normal telepathy.

[thevirtualjim]

I always forget how much I love 'The Humpty Dance' until I hear it again

[Anacronian]

In retrospect, it does seem silly they just wouldn't use a telepath to poke around. But if you wanted to come up with a reason, maybe PsiCorps used two non-telepaths so the Knights couldn't be traced back to PsiCorps at all. Or maybe standard telepathic probing was tried on Sinclair during his debriefing after the war ended, but turned up nothing. The Knights' machine is some kind of memory-scanning device that's supposed to be stronger than normal telepathy.

Also, the machine probably record the "experience" so it would be usable in a court of law, After all, Sinclair is a ranking officer of Earth Force and I think the plan was to take him down publicly as a collaborator with the Minbari in order to support Clark's anti-Alien platform.

(yay first post)

[SlackerinDeNile]

What was the original answer to this mystery going to be? Did that ever get leaked?

There is a synopsis floating the internet of where JMS' thought process was while developing season 1, but its different enough from what we got a lot of things probably would have changed anyway as the series moved along, regardless of if Ohare stayed on. (Though some things like Garibaldi becoming a drunk in season 4 were already in place.)

https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/synopsi ... ers.53739/

As for Sincalir specifically, the secret behind Sinclair & the Battle of the Line is not that he becomes Valen (Valen is never mentioned in this outline... and he actually isn't mentioned until really late in season 1), but that he is the person who has been prophesied to save the Minbari from dying off. In order to fulfill the prophesy, Delenn must transform to become human and mate with Sinclair. Their son will be some kind of chosen one who will save the Minbari race from extinction(???). Some of the Minbari (warrior caste?) interpret prophesy differently, and think that Sinclair will actually lead the Minbari to doom.

The Minbari warrior caste overthrows the Grey Council, and orders the resumption of hostilities with Earth. They also want Sinclair and Delenn dead. The series ends with the Minbari attacking B5 and destroying it. Sinclair & Delenn escape with their newborn baby. Everyone in the galaxy is after them for one reason or another....including Earth, which has been given info which makes them believe Sinclair is a traitor.

It then leads into Babylon Prime.

Where they still go back in time to steal B4... but to take it to the future to continue the fight instead, rather than the past. The time traveling causes Sinclair, Delenn, and their baby to age rapidly. David grows all the way to adulthood within a few years.

B Prime and the Army of Light defeat the Shadows (but there's nothing about the Shadows leaving the galaxy). No mention of what happens to the Vorlons. Earth defeats the Minbari, and Sinclair's name is cleared. Delenn leaves Sinclair, in order to return to the Grey Council. David becomes the leader of a new interstellar alliance. Final scene is Sinclair, retired, alone on an otherwise uninhabited world....fishing.



(Personally I always assumed the original ending had the series actually taking decades to get to a naturally older Sinclair, but it seems like the accelerated aging was always part of the plan.)

I actually like all those ideas and how it paints less of a idealistic picture at the end with what we got.

I've been aware of the 'Babylon Prime' version of the myth arc for years and you brought up some plot points even I didn't know about.
I like some of those ideas too, I'm not a huge fan of Sheridan as a character, I liked Sinclaire's flaws, his depression and suicidal tendencies.
I always felt that both Sheridan's and Garibaldi's character arcs were a little too clean and contrived, it felt a bit silly having Garibaldi and his ex-ex-wife become billionaires overnight, they never mentioned anything about her being on par with Quark's 'Moogie' from DS9 in terms of her wits, intellect and business sense.
Sheridan basically becoming the near undisputed ruler of the known galaxy was also a bit over the top, sure there were some conflicts and assassination attempts here and there, but it was a little too straight forward for my tastes. Even Sisko went through years of trouble and dispute with the Bajorans before the majority of them finally accepted him as the Emissary to the Prophets.

Plus the eventual fates of Delenn and Sinclaire in that version of the story actually tie into what Jack\Sebastien claimed would happen to them whether or not they defeated the Shadows.

As for this episode? I really liked it, I like the dark tone and the eventual reveal that Sinclaire is being exploited by the Minbari. It's interesting how well he takes it throughout the rest of the show. I also agree that it's a 'Must See' episode, Chuck has a funny idea of what constitutes an important arc episode in a TV show and what doesn't.

[G-Man]

Also, the machine probably record the "experience" so it would be usable in a court of law, After all, Sinclair is a ranking officer of Earth Force and I think the plan was to take him down publicly as a collaborator with the Minbari in order to support Clark's anti-Alien platform.(yay first post)

It's dubious that recordings taken against a man's will in a black ops operation would be admissible in a court of law. The reason people cannot just use a telepath to scan are, as I recall, about privacy more than about the untrustworthiness of telepaths.

Of course, the court of public opinion is a different matter.

[Anacronian]

It's dubious that recordings taken against a man's will in a black ops operation would be admissible in a court of law. The reason people cannot just use a telepath to scan are, as I recall, about privacy more than about the untrustworthiness of telepaths.

Of course, the court of public opinion is a different matter.

Good point, It seems likely that they would have made the recordings public and then pointed fingers and said "see even ranking Earthforce officers are colluding with dubious aliens (Dubious is important, it doesn't mean anything but it frightens people).