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Huh, just realized Chuck is doing an episode of B5 every day this week! He's going to fully finish off season one!

And the first episode of season 2? I figured the "meet John Sheriden" video pretty much covered the first chunk of season 2, but I guess it's pretty clear at this point one of his patrons is trying to get him through the entire series. In order. Which is neat and crazy.

Oh yeah, this is the episode where they had to do product placement for a Kawasaki franchise dealership because they were so desperate for cash. The Garibaldi-Lennier scenes are kinda cute, and Ivanova is always fierce, but other than that the best we can say is that this episode is one which exists. Yup, this episode exists.

Maybe this would have been more significant if Michael O'Hare hadn't had to leave, it would have provided more foundation for Sinclair breaking from Earth; which would be far more impactful, I feel, than Sheridan's breakaway. Sheridan was always a bit more cavalier than Sinclair, so his breakaway was always more inline with the action hero motif he had. Anyway, O'Hare's health didn't permit that so this just sort of occupies a space in the schedule.

RobbyB1982 wrote: ↑Wed Nov 07, 2018 9:30 pm Huh, just realized Chuck is doing an episode of B5 every day this week! He's going to fully finish off season one!

Yeah, I had noticed that after watching "The Reckoning" review. If he wants to finish off Season 1 so he doesn't have to deal with it anymore, more power to him (though he'll still have Season 5 to slog through).

RobbyB1982 wrote: ↑Wed Nov 07, 2018 9:30 pmAnd the first episode of season 2? I figured the "meet John Sheriden" video pretty much covered the first chunk of season 2, but I guess it's pretty clear at this point one of his patrons is trying to get him through the entire series. In order. Which is neat and crazy.

I had forgotten "Points of Departure" was a Season 2 episode. Tells you how long its been since I watched the entire series. But I for one had hoped Chuck would do a more extensive review of the episodes covered in "Meet John Sheridan," particularly "Distant Star" (the one with the explorer ship Cortez on it's "five year mission").

As for this episode... yeah, it was never really one of my particular favorites, but I did find it at least watchable. More than I can say for for the later episodes of the Mirror Universe on DS9 and ENT...

This episode is ok but I usually skip it (like a good chunk of season one) when going through the series again.

A few thoughts:

(1) This was the last first season episode produced (P#122) (fun fact: Chrysalis was actually produced (P#112) prior to Signs and Portents (P#116)). So presumably O'Hare's health issues would be at their worst in this episode.

(2) "Eyes" actually is a reference to the letters (Internal Investigations) although it uses the spelling of the organs. Larry Ditillo tended to write episodes with slangy titles.

(3) Bill Mumy's band is Barnes and Barnes, best known for the song "Fish Heads"

CrypticMirror wrote: ↑Wed Nov 07, 2018 11:06 pm Oh yeah, this is the episode where they had to do product placement for a Kawasaki franchise dealership because they were so desperate for cash.

lol, oh so that's why that's here. Yeah that would explain an otherwise pretty odd premise.

Archanubis wrote: ↑Thu Nov 08, 2018 12:28 am If he wants to finish off Season 1 so he doesn't have to deal with it anymore, more power to him (though he'll still have Season 5 to slog through).

"Now I don't have to hit my fingers with a hammer any more I can look forward to breaking both legs!"

Season 1 is just warmed over early TNG with added shock value. Season 5 is 21 episodes of offensively awful character assassination.

Archanubis wrote: ↑Thu Nov 08, 2018 12:28 am I had forgotten "Points of Departure" was a Season 2 episode. Tells you how long its been since I watched the entire series. But I for one had hoped Chuck would do a more extensive review of the episodes covered in "Meet John Sheridan," particularly "Distant Star" (the one with the explorer ship Cortez on it's "five year mission").

Yeah, I'm fine with Chuck doing those episodes in more detail. Just for the sake of expediency and actually getting it all done as a whole for years I sort of assumed those would hold as "good enough".

Cassandra wrote: ↑Thu Nov 08, 2018 8:26 am

Archanubis wrote: ↑Thu Nov 08, 2018 12:28 am If he wants to finish off Season 1 so he doesn't have to deal with it anymore, more power to him (though he'll still have Season 5 to slog through).

"Now I don't have to hit my fingers with a hammer any more I can look forward to breaking both legs!"

Season 1 is just warmed over early TNG with added shock value. Season 5 is 21 episodes of offensively awful character assassination.

Season 5 wasn't that bad. It almost entirely suffered from them rushing the ending into season 4, and for Claudia leaving the show. JMS has said he wouldn't have killed Marcus if he'd known she was going to leave. So not only is the show down by two lead characters, but suddenly Lyta is carrying the weight of the whole Byron arc. Ivanava was supposed to be the one that really got into him, and that would have been the culmination of her hating telepaths arc and dealt with having lost Marcus and realizing she'd missed her one true chance... its the reason Byron had long hair, to remind of Marcus) while Lyta watched from afar.... and once you know that was the concept, even in broad outline form, that entire arc makes a lot more sense for the characters and narratively.

Lochley was fine as a character, but like Ezri Dax, she was a replacement during the final season who just couldn't compare to the cast we'd had years to get attached to and had no real time to develop. Not her fault, just the timing.

The second half of the season with Londo and Gkar was actually good solid stuff. Their payoffs and growth were fantastic.

Sheriden and Delenn... just didn't have anything to do, both their arcs had culminated with the rushing of season 4. Garibaldi and Franklin, much the same, all of them were mostly just killing time until they got to their end of series re-locations.

lennier... well... we really really needed to see the actual follow up war that he redeemed himself and died in, it was an extremely hollow final note.

Basically, the season suffered from rushing to finish the series with season 4. JMS says that the events of season 5 were always part of the plan, and that the speed up only accelerated things by a couple episodes... and I absolutely believe that. But all the same you can feel that the start of the season is lacking in agency and momentum. Season 5 might have fared better if the end of the earth war carried the early episodes... and Ivonova was still a figure in it. Basically if that 21 episode stretch of "we've got nothing to do really, we're just wrapping up our lives", had been closer to 12 or 15 episodes, it probably would have felt much better overall.

RobbyB1982 wrote: ↑Thu Nov 08, 2018 1:26 pmJMS says that the events of season 5 were always part of the plan, and that the speed up only accelerated things by a couple episodes... and I absolutely believe that. But all the same you can feel that the start of the season is lacking in agency and momentum. Season 5 might have fared better if the end of the earth war carried the early episodes... and Ivonova was still a figure in it. Basically if that 21 episode stretch of "we've got nothing to do really, we're just wrapping up our lives", had been closer to 12 or 15 episodes, it probably would have felt much better overall.

They may have been part of the plan, but they weren't meant to be as prominent as they were. JMS said at some point that his note cards got thrown away by overzealous housekeeping staff at a hotel while he was at a convention, and that the Byron arc was the only one of them he could remember, so what would have been a small recurring plot ended up becoming the main thing.