Babylonia!

Patrick

Patrick is a mid-40 year old geek with an undergraduate degree in mathematics and a master's degree in Information Systems. Nothing he says here has anything to do with the official position of his employer or any other institution.

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5 Responses

  1. Jaybird says:

    This episode drove me nuts. The Drazi thing was silly. I mean, it wasn’t even a criticism of humanity silly.

    The only interesting thing about the technomages came in the last few minutes when the one guy actually took a minute to talk to Londo and, by what he said, established that he was someone that Londo would have wanted to talk to at the beginning… but there was a lot more telling than showing in this episode.Report

    • Reformed Republican in reply to Jaybird says:

      I thought the Drazi thing was amusing, but it does not hold up under scrutiny. So many ways to pick it apart, and I am not the kind of guy that likes to try to pick my fiction apart. I want to accept the world that creators provide to me. However, when things just jump at me, it leaves me annoyed.

      The Technomages are a neat idea. I do not remember if they come up again in the series or not. I believe they feature in some of the novels. I liked Vir’s interaction with them, chanting his Mantra in the face of the monster.Report

    • Patrick in reply to Jaybird says:

      The Drazi thing was silly. I mean, it wasn’t even a criticism of humanity silly.

      Yeah, it’s bashing team-bashing in a way that is so blatantly obvious it doesn’t really have anything interesting to say. Sort of a cinematic reducto.

      One critique of the show is that occasionally they throw these silly side mechanics up in order to prop up some character arc. Ivanova is getting promoted, she needs to take on more diplomatic responsibilities, but it’s already well established that she’s no diplomat, so here’s a gimme. Ultimately unsatisfying; basically very poor writing all around.

      The whole episode could have been given over to the Technomages and we would have had a better time with them (plus, you could have worked in both the Garibaldi and Ivanova plotlines into that part of the story).

      Sometimes they’re a little too infatuated with the “we run two stories at once” schtick. It works much more often than not, but when it doesn’t work they have a tendency to do it anyway.Report

    • James K in reply to Jaybird says:

      That sad thing is that it’s not silly at all:

      In the time of the Roman Empire, civic life was divided between the Blue and Green factions. The Blues and the Greens murdered each other in single combats, in ambushes, in group battles, in riots. Procopius said of the warring factions: “So there grows up in them against their fellow men a hostility which has no cause, and at no time does it cease or disappear, for it gives place neither to the ties of marriage nor of relationship nor of friendship, and the case is the same even though those who differ with respect to these colors be brothers or any other kin.” Edward Gibbon wrote: “The support of a faction became necessary to every candidate for civil or ecclesiastical honors.”

      Who were the Blues and the Greens? They were sports fans—the partisans of the blue and green chariot-racing teams.

      Report

  2. Damon says:

    I always liked this show. Mainly for the antics of Londo trying to get the Technomage’s favor and the Technomages themselves.

    Sneaky Londo when not getting his way, tries to manipulate Sheridan into helping him-which backfires nicely.

    God I love the Technomages and really was starting to enjoy Crusade, the B5 Spinoff that featured a technomage prominently. The Technomage nicely blends technology and conventional magic–something that is actually within the realm of feasibility to our current world…Report