B5:C Returning fire Sir ! (1999/09/16)

B5:C Returning fire Sir !

Posted by Philip Ayres on 1999/09/16 16:37

What about a Video night for Racing the Night, the Memory of War and Each
night I dream of home ?

Is there any end to this war?
Yes, when my enemies are destroyed and their seed is no more.

Watch it - I've summoned reinforcements to back up my pt of view. Where
are you Sean ?

S

P

O

I

L

E

R

A

L

E

R

T

!

I have seen about 2/3 of them; the ones I remember are: > the first

episode. War Zone > The one with the "I forget you" monster. Path of
Sorrows > The graveyard in hyperspace. Well of Forever > The other planet
hit by the virus. I think you mean Patterns of the Soul (The ones with the
genetically enhance humans and Dureena's race)

X-file pi$$ take. Visitors from down the street

The last episode. Each night I dream of home

The crew taken over by a strange alien. Appearances and other deceits

Policing a conference on earth. . Mars - how could it be on Earth ?

Ruling from the tomb. > ..and a couple of other which don't spring to mind
at the moment. > The pilot film.

Which leaves .....

The Long Road - The Edward Woodward Technomage ep.... (incidentally EW is
in the New Professionals starting Sunday on Sky. I don't hold out much
hope.)

The Rules of the Game Excaliber goes to b5
Racing the Night JMS's Pilot ep that Crusade rejected and is one of the
better eps.
The Memory of War - The best ep - Galen is awesome. These 2 are the eps
where the rangers appear and the apocalypse box sticks it's oar in.
The Needs of Earth - The alien flogging the knowledge ep

Yes, the B5 staff did have their secret, but they shared the important

stuff - in fact that was a big theme in B5.

There is no real reason why there should be a high level of secrectly in

Crusade. I found the way characters kept

things to themselves very annoying and unbelievable.

This appears to be a big diffrence between the two of us. I look at the
B5 characters and see them concealing more than the Crusade
characteres..... You see it the other way round.

Maybe the 4 or 5 I missed are the good ones!

Several of them are, yes.

Your right about it being a crew of experts, but this is what ST does, a

few important character and lots of people in

red shirts. In B5, every now and again one of the red shirts will do

some thing surprising.

Ah you mean like Trace in Ruling from the Tomb ?

Also they are not neutral characters, they have definates biases (i.e.

pro-earth, nightwatch, psi-corp, pro-mars).

As have B5:C's characters.... Nothing as yet though that's decidedly anti
main thrust of the show and certainly very little to cause strife between
them....

This give B5 a "real" feel to its background and moved it beyond the ST

type situation - where any new character on

the bridge was dead-meat; Crusade was a step backwards to this type of

situation. You may give example

otherwise - but these where exception to the way the series worked

generally.

15 eps is not enough to make a broad generalisation like that. 15 Eps
wasn't enought to establish the main cast properly (read the Mag article on
the subject)

Philip...... And there's more petrol where this came from !

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B5:C Returning fire Sir !

Posted by Asan Tu on 1999/09/16 16:46

errr the last time I organised a B5 video night, there was no interest in
it unfortunately. Having said that, there may be more interest in a
crusade night, although, considering the pasting it's been getting from
the critics, I'm not too sure.

What do the committee members think?

cheers
asan

On Thu, 16 Sep 1999 Philip.Ayres@ wrote:

What about a Video night for Racing the Night, the Memory of War and Each
night I dream of home ?

Is there any end to this war?
Yes, when my enemies are destroyed and their seed is no more.

Watch it - I've summoned reinforcements to back up my pt of view. Where
are you Sean ?

S

P

O

I

L

E

R

A

L

E

R

T

!

I have seen about 2/3 of them; the ones I remember are: > the first

episode. War Zone > The one with the "I forget you" monster. Path of
Sorrows > The graveyard in hyperspace. Well of Forever > The other planet
hit by the virus. I think you mean Patterns of the Soul (The ones with the
genetically enhance humans and Dureena's race)

X-file pi$$ take. Visitors from down the street

The last episode. Each night I dream of home

The crew taken over by a strange alien. Appearances and other deceits

Policing a conference on earth. . Mars - how could it be on Earth ?

Ruling from the tomb. > ..and a couple of other which don't spring to mind
at the moment. > The pilot film.

Which leaves .....

The Long Road - The Edward Woodward Technomage ep.... (incidentally EW is
in the New Professionals starting Sunday on Sky. I don't hold out much
hope.)

The Rules of the Game Excaliber goes to b5
Racing the Night JMS's Pilot ep that Crusade rejected and is one of the
better eps.
The Memory of War - The best ep - Galen is awesome. These 2 are the eps
where the rangers appear and the apocalypse box sticks it's oar in.
The Needs of Earth - The alien flogging the knowledge ep

Yes, the B5 staff did have their secret, but they shared the important

stuff - in fact that was a big theme in B5.

There is no real reason why there should be a high level of secrectly in

Crusade. I found the way characters kept

things to themselves very annoying and unbelievable.

This appears to be a big diffrence between the two of us. I look at the
B5 characters and see them concealing more than the Crusade
characteres..... You see it the other way round.

Maybe the 4 or 5 I missed are the good ones!

Several of them are, yes.

Your right about it being a crew of experts, but this is what ST does, a

few important character and lots of people in

red shirts. In B5, every now and again one of the red shirts will do

some thing surprising.

Ah you mean like Trace in Ruling from the Tomb ?

Also they are not neutral characters, they have definates biases (i.e.

pro-earth, nightwatch, psi-corp, pro-mars).

As have B5:C's characters.... Nothing as yet though that's decidedly anti
main thrust of the show and certainly very little to cause strife between
them....

This give B5 a "real" feel to its background and moved it beyond the ST

type situation - where any new character on

the bridge was dead-meat; Crusade was a step backwards to this type of

situation. You may give example

otherwise - but these where exception to the way the series worked

generally.

15 eps is not enough to make a broad generalisation like that. 15 Eps
wasn't enought to establish the main cast properly (read the Mag article on
the subject)

Philip...... And there's more petrol where this came from !

______________________________________________________________________

If this email contains an attachment, please note the following paragraph:

This material has been checked by us for computer viruses and although none
has been found by us, we cannot guarantee that it is completely free from
such problems and we do not accept any liability for loss or damage which
may be caused. Please therefore check any attachments for viruses before
using them on your own equipment. If you do find a computer virus please
inform us immediately so that we may take appropriate action.

This communication is intended solely for the addressee and is
confidential.

If you are not the intended recipient, any disclosure, copying,
distribution or any action taken or omitted to be taken in reliance on it,
is prohibited and may be unlawful.

===========================================================
Asach Tu
elterwater@
http://www.cs.rhbnc.ac.uk/~asach
0956 151 141
===========================================================

B5:C Returning fire Sir !

Posted by Daniel Celano on 1999/09/16 17:17

I couldn't turn up for a B5:C night - but despite the pasting I'm giving
it, it's still better than ST:V or ST:DS9; and it's
worth making up your own minds...

Daniel

B5:C Returning fire Sir !

Posted by Sean Scaplehorn on 1999/09/19 10:20

What about a Video night for Racing the Night, the Memory of War and Each
night I dream of home ?

Is there any end to this war?
Yes, when my enemies are destroyed and their seed is no more.

Watch it - I've summoned reinforcements to back up my pt of view. Where
are you Sean ?

Ta da! Here I am. Wherever there is injustice, I'll be around eventually.

--8<-- Large amounts of arguing snipped --8<--

The Long Road - The Edward Woodward Technomage ep.... (incidentally EW

is

in the New Professionals starting Sunday on Sky. I don't hold out much
hope.)

The New Professionals will be poo because they no longer drive Ford Capris.
But Edward Woodward will be good. Incidentally, if you remove the D's
from his name, you get an excellent Star Wars name.

--8<-- More snipping --8<--

Right, B5:Crusade. Is it any good?

PRO
---
1. It's the continuation of B5, which can only be a good thing.

2. It has a wealth of characters to pick from as guest stars. We got to
see Lochley and Dr. Franklin, the Drakh, and as Phil was keen to point out
the guy who was with the Nightwatch (hope you paid attention to the spoiler
space). We could easily have had Sheridan and Delenn, a script apparently
exists for Mr. Bester, and I'm sure it wouldn't be hard to work in Londo,
G'Kar, Lyta, Ivanova and Garibaldi (he owns a company with medical
resources)

3. Most importantly, in the search for a cure they could come across
something which would allow the re-introduction of God himself. I am of
course talking about Marcus, who should have been at the helm in Crusade
anyway, if you ask me.

4. It's nice to see a different take on the Star Trek theme, seeking out
old life and civilizations, to boldly go where several people have been
before, but died quite a while ago, usually fairly painfully, perhaps
involving sharp implements.

5. If Marcus is god, then his second in command must surely be Galen. OK,
so he's a bit of an annoying know-it-all, but he is a Technomage, and
that's what they're like. The way he reassures Gideon with a simple thumbs
up signal is brilliant, and so condescending it's untrue.

CON
---
1. Too many of the characters didn't have a big enough part to play. The
Teep second in command who's name I've forgotten only used his psychic
powers about twice, and then it was hardly worth it. Dr. Chambers got a
bit more to do eventually, but it took a while. The pilot guy who used to
be a priest was hardly mentioned either, then again, this was probably for
the best, as he wasn't that interesting.

2. The order in which the episodes were shown was awful. The biggest
mistake being when the used the vaccine to stop themselves getting the
virus before they had even discovered it. D'oh!

3. The Excalibur itself isn't the best looking ship in the world, and could
have been so much better.

4. Given the fact that the Earth only has 5 years before everyone snuffs
it, there were several episodes which didn't really have the required sense
of urgency of finding a cure. In particular the one where they had to go
to the conference on Mars, which would have wasted about a week or so.
Even with jump points and hyperspace, getting around the galaxy is a slow
task and they can't afford to waste time.

Conclusion
----------
All in all a promising programme, which if it had had the chance could
easily have improved to be very good indeed. Most series take a while to
get going, and unfortunately Crusade didn't have that chance. It had it's
faults, but I'm sure with time (and total control) JMS would have been able
to fix them.