Join Laura and Xhafer, two internet strangers as they get to know each other while making jokes about one of their favorite TV shows from their childhood, Babylon 5.

Pop quiz hotshot! A mysterious probe arrives at B5 with a bomb in it. If humanity's collective IQ is too low, it explodes. What do you do? Find out in Babylon 5 Season 3 Episode 3, A Day in the Strife.

and welcome to who are you?

A Babylon five watch cast hosted by two friends who have gotten to know each

other while rewatching a favorite show of the childhood Babylon five I'm Dre.

And I'm Laura.

And today, Laura, I get to ask you.

What do you want?

want to show you the cool things I got today.

Yay.

So in case you didn't realize listener, we are

going to do more plot poker.

Where we use the Babylon five collectible card game to make up a story about

LeBel and And the previous packs we had Jeffer, you ordered those.

So you could probably tell me.

They were from the premiere revised set.

Okay.

So that was like the base.

It's the base game.

It was the second edition of the base game that they put out pretty rapidly.

There was a handful of like spelling errors and

Oh, no.

the first one.

Because they rushed it.

And so that's, that's the big difference is they did like a single printing.

It had these spelling And then they put out the next set and

then they went back and reprinted.

The first set again.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So we had the base set and that was very season one slash season two.

Right.

And.

I don't even know if there was much season one in it.

It was very seasoned too, is what I feel like it was.

A lot of the season, one stuff was in the starter decks

that we did not bother with.

Yeah.

So there's a handful of cards.

The last card in each pack of that set was a random card from the starter decks.

Okay.

But that's where you're like Llanos and Dellenbaugh.

And captains and Claire's were.

Those were all locked to the starter decks.

It would be nice to have a captain Sinclair.

Wouldn't it.

Oh, well, Or commander

an earth starter deck.

And get one.

Yeah, well, so we went ahead and we ordered.

The great war.

So I got my box of great war.

I think.

Oh,

maybe it was last week.

Yeah.

And you already have one.

I was a little bit behind on the eBay ordering, so I got my great war.

I think we paid $40 for great war.

Yeah, 30, 40 bucks for a box.

Yeah, it was the buy it now.

So, you know, we didn't have to do the whole bid thing.

But I think you opened yours and you weren't sure it seemed a little bit like

there was some season 40 stuff in there.

Season four.

Yeah.

So I opened mine up.

I've had mine for a couple of weeks now.

And I do like opening packs of cards

I mean who

doesn't.

Yeah, it's a good feeling.

And so uh, in a moment of weakness after a couple.

Bad hours of work.

I opened up a couple of packs.

And just looked at some of the cards and then I shoved them back in the

pack and put it randomly in there.

I don't even remember what I pulled But I'll find out.

So I'll reopen those when we get to them.

But as very late season three, early season four stuff.

Yeah.

And so I went ahead and when I was ordering my great war, I saw that

the shadows was also out there.

And it's got a nice Mr.

Morton on the cover.

I'll I'll post a picture of this on our Facebook and send it to the discord But I

was looking at it, you know, I don't know a lot about the collectible card game.

You might know more.

It looks like these came out in the same year.

In 1998, the shadows in the great So, I don't know if this

is gonna, I don't know what this is going to have in store for us.

It is a bit more season two, season three.

Late season two, early season three.

So the shadows expansion.

Ads and shadow factions to the game.

Okay.

Okay.

But we just went with the shadows marketing.

Yeah.

Um, Well, I don't know if they had their own starter decks or what?

I don't think they did.

Cause there's part of the whole thing in the cards was the shadow marks and the

Varo on marks for like destiny and stuff.

And it's, so it leans into that a lot.

I don't know if you can actually play as the Varroa ones or the shadows

to be perfectly honest, but it adds a lot of those cards to the game.

And it is a bit more about the buildup to the war than the war itself.

Which is what the great war expansion is.

Yeah.

Okay.

So this is going to be great.

And we got two boxes of the shadows in our eBay.

So this was uh, this was one where we actually were bidding on it

and we wound it up with two boxes of the shadows for $50 total.

So that seemed like a great deal.

Like.

Yeah, the, the season one, the first set boxes, I think I paid 35 for

Yeah.

So about in there.

I really expected somebody to have a bot that was

going to swoop in and outfit.

I said at the last

I will say of like looked ahead a bit to there's.

Three more expansions for us, There's shattered dreams, which

is like the end of season four.

Okay.

Okay.

And then there is a real fire, which is just season five.

Because that one was out limited.

There were started making the game.

Season five was starting to air.

So there's nothing from season five until that set.

And then there is a Sycor expansion after the show was done.

Now that looked expensive on eBay.

The wheel of fire boxes are like 1 20, 1 30, a pop.

And the side core boxes are also quite expensive.

Yeah.

we saw a site core that was up.

And I think, I don't know, maybe it was still up for bid,

but I think it was around 200.

Yeah.

Even the shattered dreams, boxes are like

Yeah, that's crazy.

Yeah, there isn't one for crusade or a legend of the

Rangers or any of that stuff.

Oh, there isn't, that's disappointing.

I'll have to check.

I know the star wars CCG has a fan community that continued

to make cards for it after the.

Business had lost the license.

Oh, okay.

So there might be some diehards out there that made

crusade cards 15 years ago for the

Yeah, that'd be fun.

I just like to see the, whatever they came up with.

You know, I don't need actual cards.

You can just send me a PDF or something.

That'd be fun.

But I was wondering if I should open any of the shadows today, if you would want.

To

Yeah, open a pack.

a pack and see what's

Open a pack.

See what we get, see what's in there.

All right.

Let's see what Mr.

Morton has in store for me.

This wa this box says.

Each pack contains card suitable for any race?

It doesn't say there's a rare card.

Like the other box

Yeah.

Lame.

So you'll see this when you get yours, but it's got a nice, like, Shadowy.

Kind of guy on the foil, on the package.

gold foiling looks

Yeah.

So this 12 card booster pack.

These are 2 75 per pack where the regular, the great war.

They're two 50.

There's no Mel.

A non character.

Who's an agent of the car re I think this might be someone we're going to meet.

That name doesn't

Well, the CA the Kyrie aren't around anymore.

Oh, yeah, you're right.

So.

This had to be somebody we already met and.

That's funny is the picture on the card.

You can't really see, but that big barn there that's Jakarta and the

Mel must be on the screen behind

He's the guy who tells Jakarta the assassin is coming for

What that scene is.

I remember that.

Yeah.

All right.

We have to predictable, which just looks like some sort of a scenario between.

Jakarta and Mondo.

Yelling at each other in the council room.

Predictable.

Build infrastructure.

And it's a Dzhokhar talking to another NARKN in his quarters.

It looks like.

So probably trying to.

Build things.

With the non resistance, maybe.

Ooh, we've got heavy resistance and this picture is Garibaldi

in that riot gear we saw in.

Oh, yeah.

From the dream sequence.

Yes.

When we were at on Babylon for, and things kept happening.

Yeah.

think, yeah.

Looking ahead.

We've got this war council room that I don't think we seen yet.

Fighters.

We have a card about destiny with Dylann on it.

A refit fleet enhancement, modern refit.

So this Mo this might be inspired by the um, When we refitted the station.

And season two with those special cannons

Got it, all that extra firepower.

Yeah.

Aiding the shadows.

And we've got that iconic shot of Londo on Centauri prime, looking up

and seeing the shadows in the sky.

Hmm.

We've got a support fleet, Centauri support fleet.

We know who they're supporting at this point in the.

The series.

Repairs and impasse.

So I didn't even get, I got one character.

That we don't really remember.

So,

Hm.

Well, look forward to opening more of those.

Yeah, I think.

When we go forward, I condensed all of my piles that I had.

I had like piles down to like 15 or something of like each card type.

I took it down to like the top four or five of each category that I

thought would be fun from that set.

So that way we've got a little bit of space.

It's a little random when we opened the new stuff, but not as.

Much stuff from the old cards.

Super general with the old guards.

Okay.

Well, I'm looking forward to that.

We're probably going to do plat poker here in a few episodes.

So we'll have more of those open then.

And we'll get to make up some episodes with new stuff.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it.

That's one of my favorite segments to do because I like opening

packs and I like improv and it's combining two of those things.

So.

All right.

Well, what do we have today?

We have a scripted episode of Babylon, five to talk about.

We do a . Season three episode three a day in the strife,

which is like a day in the life.

But, but, but bad

I see you cha.

JMS.

We open on the pilot's Guild after a note that they are conducting

weapons inspections on all ships.

Ivanova notes that they can raise the docking fees and hire more

inspectors to decrease the increased wait these weapons inspections.

But they all hate that.

Oh, yeah.

We don't want more fees.

If it means better service.

Exactly.

That's the American way.

One guy out in the crowd is like

That's a very good.

For some reason, we let this gentleman into the meeting, holding a giant crowbar.

Right.

I don't get it.

And he's very upset.

And he's all like, oh, you can't take our weapons.

And it's all like, dude, this station has single-handedly

destroyed a centaury heavy cruiser.

Like they could just blow you the fuck up.

There's nothing on your ship.

That is going to be a threat to the station.

The station is run by the military.

Side note, second amendment bros.

If you think you can actually overthrow the us government, you are delusional.

I'm just going to throw that out there into the ether right

Yeah.

I got no problem.

If we want to talk about the second amendment, we can talk

about the second amendment.

I have probably a different opinion than most people expect me to have on this one.

To be perfectly

honest.

Um, So, but.

The idea that the second amendment is there.

So that the us citizens can overthrow the government.

In the drone age.

Is absolutely absurd.

It is, it is the single greatest logical fallacy in any pro-second

amendment argument I've ever heard, because it's just absolutely insane.

I mean.

It got insane.

And the nuclear weapons there, I think, but yeah.

Neither here

yeah.

Yeah, no, it's been.

I would say it's been a bad argument for a long time, but.

it has not become a better argument over time and it continues

to just to become a worse.

And worse argument.

Anyways Guy carrying space, crowbar doesn't care.

He challenged his, share it into a fight.

This is when Indiana Jones would just stand up and shoot the guy.

But Sheridan grabs a guard's gun.

Sticks it in the dude's pocket and takes the crowbar.

The dude backs down Ivanova adjourns, the meeting then gives shared

in the requisite amount of shit.

And then it's revealed that he actually unloaded the gun

before he handed it to the guy.

So he was never concerned.

Yeah.

I love that little bit that he just palmed the energy cap.

And of course the guy's not paying enough attention to notice that that

happened or that, you know, this thing doesn't weigh the right amount.

He probably hasn't used a PBG

Yeah.

he doesn't really know, but.

Yeah.

I mean, as far as I know, they are only military issue.

and I'm sure there's a great variance in the types of guns that are running around.

So, unless you happen to have experience with that particular pistol and also

who knows how much those caps way.

They're not traditional bullets.

It, it might be like the weight of a AA battery.

Like we might not be talking about a significant amount of weight

to detect from one's pocket.

True.

But this kind of shoots a hole in our theory that we had, I think back in

season one where we were like, Hmm, Can you fire somebody else's PPG.

Is there maybe a.

Oh, yeah.

Fingerprint thing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But if he felt

is the word I was looking for.

Yeah.

If he felt like he had to Palm that energy cap, I think

Question answered.

And another question is immediately answered is what's going on with

the non seat on the council?

Has counselor no far.

Arrives at introduces himself as Dzhokhar's replacement for the council.

Yeah, no far.

I showed up and, and you know, he kind of feels that Dzhokhar's presence.

Perhaps is.

For minting, some resistance.

They know something's up with Dzhokhar.

And that it's just making things worse back So he's ready to take over.

But Sheridan refuses to give up that sanctuary that he granted

car back at the end of season two.

And the far stays near Sheridan in his office.

You know, explaining that he wants to take over the leadership of the

local NARKN population as well, to try and stop some of the uh, Seditious

ax Chikara is fermenting back home.

Yeah.

Over at Earhart's.

We have exhausted Franklin working triples.

And Garibaldi can finds in Ivanova that he trusts shared in to

get him through the coming war.

You know, read his personnel file and it's all like, if there's anyone who

could do it, it's this This is what he does is he takes inferior defensive

forces and wins wars with them somehow.

Ivana was a little, a fronted that Garibaldi has read this personnel

file and I'm like, he's security.

He

should.

He should have some access to this sort of thing.

He needs to know if somebody is a security risk.

Yeah.

I was not a fronted at all.

Yeah.

After this Franklin runs out of the club bathroom with a sudden burst of energy.

Like bro rule number one is don't do blow in the club bathroom.

Yeah.

You broke the rule.

Yeah, I was going to equate it to meth, but they're very similar.

I think.

I call it space, blow for the rest of the episodes.

So.

blow.

Yeah, that's fine.

We can interject space method.

You know,

sometimes.

So, yeah, gear up all these immediately suspicious Garibaldi

knows what certain things look like.

Certain behaviors.

Not only is he security, but it's also a little personal.

As we find out later.

Yeah, and we can kind of see that he is automatically suspicious that.

Franklin is somehow ready to dance when he was only gonna get like

two hours of sleep or something.

Yeah.

I mean, he's definitely concerned.

Yeah.

It's D.

It's concern that suspicion, I feel.

Okay.

I get maybe suspicions, a little dark word, but he's knows something's up.

Yeah.

Nevara goes to talk to Londo.

Who's thinking of visiting the non-home world

since.

You know, he didn't get a good look at it.

Last time he was there.

He was a little far away.

And the fire is just like, dude.

He's such an asshole in this scene.

Aye.

I espouse it.

This is Lando at its absolute

Yes.

Yes.

this is, this is him at his worst in the entire I can't re

there, there may be another moment.

That is, he is worse.

And even when he was like actively genocide ING, He was at least.

Conscious about it.

Yeah, he was a little horrified.

We saw his expression.

Yeah, he's reveling in it here.

Yes, it is gross and uncomfortable.

And it's very strange compared to the Londa we saw in that last episode, that

was very tenderly standing over a linear.

And wanting to.

Talk to him and keep him awake.

Or, you know, help him wake up.

And here he's just so gross.

He's so

Yeah.

He, I mean, he, he tries to make his reasoning clear.

He, he, you know, he's like, if we don't break their pride, then this is just

going to happen again in a hundred years.

But he is just disgusting

Yeah, I've veer immediately.

Once Navarro has walked out of the room calls Londo on this bullshit and says

something like, was that necessary?

Yeah.

Which is a very, very valid way for veer to try to question him since

veer is an underling, you know, he can't just be like, dude, you are gross.

But.

We can tell here that veer is Starting to grow some spine that he doesn't

want to put up with this anymore.

He doesn't want to stand idly by and watch Londo.

Do and say these things.

And I have to wonder if.

This whole scene is just story fodder for being upset at VIR.

Yeah.

and, and wanting to be rid of fear.

Yeah.

Because that's coming a little bit later in the episode.

And that was not a story choice.

Oh, really?

Do

We'll talk about it when we get there.

Yeah.

mostly because it's on a different page of my physical handwritten

notes and I can't read it all right

So.

We'll get there.

But.

Cutting away from that scene.

We go to CNC.

And we have, I guess, a B plot.

Introduction.

We do have it.

It's the B plot.

Yeah, this is not the a pod for sure.

Well as Lieutenant Corwin.

I detect some kind of approaching alien probe that we don't know.

We have not met this alien probe before.

Yeah, it's first contact

and it's going to take the computer time to decode the message that's being sent.

It's a very complicated lengthy message that's being sent.

very interesting.

So put a pin in that.

Yup.

Meanwhile Londo goes to DLN.

Asking to return the favor of piloting the shuttle down to Epsilon three.

By placing veer as the Suntory ambassador to member.

I mean, he is right when he describes this as there is

no one better for this job.

Veer is absolutely perfect for this job.

A hundred percent.

I don't think there's a better Suntory in the Republic.

To be a better ambassador to minbar then veer a hundred percent.

He's respectful.

He's quiet.

He, he already is linear as a friend.

Like he he's, he's a Suntory who has friends who Outside

of necessarily work stuff.

It feels like he wouldn't even spy on you.

He'd consider it rude.

So good.

Yeah.

And he's so curious, you know, veer has, has shown us his curiosity

for other alien races before.

And he has a curiosity.

This certainly Londo does not.

So

I

Dylan sees through this bullshit

though.

Dylan's all like you don't want.

Him there for him.

Like maybe a little, but what's actually going on,

like don't

really in it for you, right?

And she calls him out.

It's like, you know, he says veers going to get in the way of

the work that needs to be done.

And Like you just don't want him to be around because he makes you feel guilty.

Yeah, he's been your conscience lately and he's, he's actually reminded

you that you do have choices every time you've said you don't have a choice.

And you're tired of hearing that and.

You know, she, she calls it out, but.

You know, Dylan ultimately says, she'll think about it.

Because ultimately he is right.

The best Centauri for the job is vere.

After this Garibaldi is Franklin over for dinner as a friend to talk

about addiction, both his and Franklins.

Yeah.

I think he goes about this, the correct way.

I know Franklin gets very defensive and it doesn't go well.

But I think acknowledging your fault and then aligning it with a

troubling pattern you see in a friend.

Is the right way to broach this topic.

Yeah, I think that's.

The only way I think there's no good way.

I don't think.

the odds of anyone getting a good reception from someone who

is actively in an addiction.

Is very high.

I don't think that.

Your odds of getting a good response are very good at all.

But.

If you have to do it.

I think that's a good way to go about it.

Right.

I don't know what my, a lot of my knowledge on that sort of subject just

comes from shows like intervention.

Yeah.

So, you know, I think, and I think they do have experts that

try to frame these things right.

For Sort of setting.

And that's a good way to go about it is, you know, I am flawed.

And.

I'm telling you I'm flawed and here's something that worries me.

So, but yeah, it was never going to go well with Franklin Franklin.

Says, no, I don't have a problem with the space below.

You know Garibaldi.

Calls him out directly about doing it in the bathroom.

Yeah.

And, you know, here's the problem though, you know, Franklin is a doctor.

And.

It's legal.

If a doctor prescribes it right.

Yeah, and I mean, Franklin gets the kind of defensive.

That is an admittance of feeling I don't believe that getting this type

of defensive is an admittance of guilt.

To be absolutely clear.

But it is, but he definitely feels guilty.

I don't think he thinks he's done wrong.

But he clearly is thinking about his actions a bit more

Yeah, definitely.

Like he.

Has more emotional reaction to it than he would, if he felt

perfectly About what he was doing.

You know, we don't get in this episode that I would've really liked.

That would have been a very Babylon five thing to

What's that.

And maybe it's coming later because there's more of this storyline

down the road and I've just forgotten.

But a letter from that doctor who lost her license from over stemming.

From season one with the alien healing machine.

Just like a little like him getting a letter from her, asking about

the healing machine or something.

I think.

In the background, just like a little one or two lines would

have been a really nice touch.

Yeah.

If, if there was some kind of communication, especially since he

was so interested in her daughter, You know, if she just came back as

some sort of reoccurring character had mentioned her mother every now and again.

Or had some sort of communication from her mother.

It's just a little something.

And she's not the only doctor we've seen that problem because we had

the president's doctor show up and he had been overusing stems a lot in his escape.

So, I mean, that was another moment that shadowed towards.

This can be a problem in this particular.

Workplace

Yeah.

Meanwhile, we get to remind you that, Hey.

We know that non hiding in the background.

Yeah, I didn't.

I needed to remind her.

I did not clock it on my own.

They make a point of kind of hiding them back there.

For all, but the first scene we see I knew because of my research.

Um, it's brought up in the episode guide.

That they got them back.

But yeah, it's the it's the guy that shared him was on the stream ship

with the guy that he like threw over his shoulders Fought off daft punk.

Yeah, they got to escape together.

He has a name, his name is so apparently, you know, he was, was he not on NARKN

or had he just come back to non.

I think he was on NARKN in a hospital healing for a

while, is what he had said.

He had

Okay.

Yeah.

He had been pretty banged up by the street.

I think he missed the war.

Right.

He was not fighting in the war.

And now he's in service to Navarre basically as a body guard.

And he's still very appreciative of what Sheridan did for him.

There.

He wants to take care of Sheridan.

We get back to our B plot.

And it's this probe has dropped an IQ test on the station.

And if they fail, it will explode and vaporize the station.

I thought I had some bad testing experiences in college.

Yikes.

Yeah, this thing wants to know about physics, quantum

mechanics, biology, genetics, whole bunch of stuff, and it's offering.

A reward.

It's not just all stick.

There's some carrot here too.

And

Yeah, a cure for all diseases.

And.

Technological advances beyond your wildest dreams.

you know, if you, if you can answer these, you're going to get Some good stuff.

And I guess they have to do it within 24 hours.

We have one day.

Yeah, there's a time limit.

I didn't write down the time limit, but there's that there was a time limit.

Yeah, there's a ticking clock.

We have to have a ticking clock in an episode like this.

Like this probe is not just going to hang here forever.

Yeah.

Like, oh yeah, just take 50 years to get the answers to these.

It's cool.

I'm a pro I don't give a shit.

Right.

That would make a lot of sense actually.

I've been floating through hyperspace for who knows how long?

Because no, it wasn't even come out the jump

gate.

So it's just been

floating around space.

Yeah.

So who knows how old this thing is or what it's been doing?

Don't give a shit.

It's a probe.

The thing that really bothers me about this people at, and I'll go

ahead and just throw this in here, even though I'm going to probably

come back to it at our ratings.

Is that we don't ask a single ambassador about this damn probe.

The first thing I am doing is sending a picture

of this damn thing to Dylan.

We're cautious.

I

Right.

It kind of looks for a Lonnie.

Uh, Huh.

Hey cautious.

One of yours.

Right, I'm like, We have all of these aliens and representatives.

And ambassadors on this station and we're not going to ask a single

one of them to help us out here.

Now I do think the reason for that, and this is not a good reason to

be absolutely clear, but I think the reason for that is because it's promised.

This super advanced technology.

Oh, so it'd be like proprietary to earth.

Like we don't

Yeah, they don't want to share it.

Um, Also like, because none of their peers, none of the other races have

this, it's kind of an admittance of them not finding the probe.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, I guess you could logic it that way, but if that

was the case, just give us two fucking throwaway lines of dialogue

to say it.

Yeah.

It needs something here, because that was the first thought I had was bull shit.

Why aren't we asking somebody about this?

Well, and see the thing too, going back Lawns is that

they might have those things.

We don't really know cause we don't know enough about the four laws.

So is it for one.

It would be worth it to ask.

I think.

Yep.

There is actually a very interesting inspiration for this plot

Do you tell.

We'll get to it at the end.

Cause that's when it comes

Just fair.

Why do you keep doing

Because my notes are spread out over four pages because that's

the size of my pages of my notebook.

I'll buy a bigger notebook next time.

Okay.

Okay, well, keep us hanging.

We'll we'll stay.

We got to make sure everyone stays listening for a reason.

I mean, I got to

stay at this podcast

Otherwise, how will you know who we think.

Navarro talks to your car who is done with this shit.

But Navarro has bad news Jakarta.

Doesn't go home.

Then the families of the non remaining on beef.

We'll become targets for the occupiers.

Yeah.

I really see both the far and Dzhokhar's points of view.

I really do like, you I guess we're in a forest kind of coming from is.

We need some time to get our shit together.

You're formenting this resistance right now.

People are dying.

People have died.

We need some time to recover.

Get back on our feet.

And then we can think about resisting, but right now we got

to stop the people dying Dzhokhar.

And I think that's a very valid point to, you know, Dzhokhar's

point is that, you know, we've, we should be fighting for our freedom.

And Navarro is just kind of arguing for, we need to be doing it differently

and they both can't, they don't agree on a point of view about that.

Yup.

We cut to MetaLab and Franklin is just frustrated as all.

Hell.

But he doesn't stem.

He looks at them.

Closes the drawer.

Yeah, he he's gonna get through this.

The right way.

He's going to try.

Yeah.

After this Londo tells veer, he's going to memoir and he's not happy Now.

This is where it's at in my notes.

The real reason for this with Steven first was cast on the

sitcom misery loves company.

Okay.

I know nothing about this sitcom.

I've know the name, I guess.

It ran for four episodes.

They filmed eight.

I know that Christopher Maloney of, I think it's law and order

fame or SVU or CSI, one of those.

He was in the principal cast.

And Dennis Rodman was in the first episode.

That's all I found out about this show.

Uh, Steven first is not even like when you Google the show and you

see like the top eight cast members, you don't even see Steven first.

Okay.

But he'd been cast on the show.

They wanted to keep him on But still let him go do this thing that

was going to pay him more and be better for his career and stuff.

So they kind of were just like, oh, you can be around when you can be

around when, you know, You've got a couple of weeks in your schedule,

a couple of weeks in advance.

Let us know.

We'll put veer in the episode.

Yeah.

know, like we'll make it work with you.

I mean, this show needs fear.

Fear is

very important and I appreciate that they did that.

And I think it's very funny that he's the second Casperson

we've written off to minbar.

It's a good place because it's a place we

Yeah.

Well, we do, but by the time we get

But it is kind of a utopian ideal sort of sounding place with

all its crystals and whatever.

So it's

Yeah, minbar, everything's perfect.

Yeah,

except for.

earth is saying.

It is.

Right, right.

So it's nice that it's nice that he gets to go there.

Meanwhile, the local Northern population to be five, get ready to

jump into far because fuck that guy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I see their point of view too.

Do you have the episode pulled up?

I can.

Oh, you don't need it.

I can describe it.

But if you're, if you have the episode in front of you listener.

With a 1320 left in the episode.

One of these NARKN has brass knuckles that shoot laser beams.

Laser targeted brass knuckles.

It's like brass knuckle gun, laser What.

We, we never see anything like this again.

When it's completely out of the blue and I it's just so bizarre and so

weird, it's looked like someone glued a Lego brick with like four knobs

on it to a pair of brass knuckles.

And then we get like a weird little glowing, special

effect as it shoots stuff.

Man, these Naren are always jumping their leaders in hallways.

Right.

These NARKN don't know how to respect authority.

I had a whole thing about taser knocks, but the threat is gone.

This is a real thing.

Taser nuts.

You know what listener get on the discord and ask Ben to tell

the story about laser taser Knox.

There we go.

Just get under discord.

If you never make it to the end of the episode, we've got

a discord get on our discord.

Go there.

Ask Ben for the story about taser knocks, he'll be thrilled.

It's one of his great regrets in life is not buying those taser knocks.

Oh man.

That does sound like a regret.

Anyways, checar breaks that shit up and is like, fine.

Let's just get this over with, I'll go to Homeworld and they'll

fucking kill If that's what we got to do, we're going to fucking do it.

Yeah, he's, he's ready to lay down his life for other

people to stop dying, which

I think, you know, is a noble, noble sentiment at least.

It's very Dzhokhar as he's come into the character that he is.

Yes.

For sure.

back in CNC Ivanova is checking for spelling errors for the probe.

Which if it's running through a translator to their language anyways,

Yeah, I mean,

But whatever Sheridan.

Wants to power on the weapons very slowly so that the probe doesn't notice.

Uh, We got a little bit about scheduling the shitty meeting for after the station.

Explodes,

Yeah.

That's that's definitely shared and that's our guy.

Yeah.

Before some shade that Ivanova.

Does not handle well.

Uh, I don't think it's particularly, well-deserved

Yeah, I don't think so either.

Garibaldi goes to CJ car who is packing.

Did he tries to talk him out of going and is genuinely kind of touched by it

and Tracy acts the hell out of the scene.

And he asked the hell out of every scene.

Because it's in trays,

Yes.

Yeah, no, he's, he's touched.

He doesn't, you know, Garibaldi doesn't want him to go.

Yeah.

And they've just sort of had this burgeoning friendship,

you know, where we found out that Garibaldi really respected your car.

And he's.

Once more time.

And he doesn't want another person in his life to die.

You know, he says that.

Modeling thing.

But Dzhokhar is a person of faith and he's okay with his fate being in the hands

of So he, he doesn't change his mind, even though Garibaldi is this nice plea.

Franklin is a complete asshole.

And I'm guessing the implication here.

They don't say it is that he's going through stim, withdrawal.

Oh, yeah.

I thought it was just general stress is how I read it.

But no, that is a good call that, you know, he put that vial away earlier.

And now he's acting like a cranky jerk.

Yeah.

I mean, he's kind of sweaty and stuff too.

There's a little bit more to it than just him being upset.

Um, which is what makes me think that it's more than just stress

and that it's a withdrawal.

But it's never set.

I don't know how you would get away with saying it besides maybe a note

from him saying it like, oh, I think I'm going through stem withdrawal

and lake his log or something.

But that would be acknowledging that he has a problem, which he's

also not ready to do.

So, I don't think you can say it.

Logically in the story.

I don't think there's a way to, cause if anyone sees him going

through withdrawals, they're going to call him out on the bullshit

and the storyline ends real quick.

Yeah.

So.

I do think he is right to be a little cranky with this

doctor because, you Surely when they sent all these questions.

To earth to help answer them.

They

said,

was explained.

I hope.

But there's a 500,000 mega ton explosion that will go off if

we don't answer these questions.

And she tells him that there's two, that they haven't gotten answered because

there's only one scientist we know that can answer them and he's on vacation

and we can't bother him on vacation.

And it's like,

Mother fucker.

Yeah, I.

him.

That is a feeble, excuse you get him on the pager and you get

him to look at these now because people's lives are on the line.

I, I think that Franklin has a right to be a little bit bitchy about it.

He finally gives in though.

And

Yeah.

another stem here?

The Naren on the station gather for a soap box speech by an afar.

And then we cut back up to CNC.

We're Sheridan cancels the transmit to the probe.

Fearing it's an attack.

And he's

He's he's very suspicious.

He has a bad feeling about this whole thing.

He calls it a Terminator A couple of times.

and then uh, he proves this point by the drone starts to fly away.

So they have one of their little security bots go and transmit the stuff, and

then it explodes off in the distance.

Yeah.

Now.

This is actually the official position of the U S government.

And how to handle this situation.

Oh, really?

So the inspiration for this plot was JMS was doing research

into the congressional committee that would eventually form SETI.

Okay.

And when this credit and threshold committee was like, okay, we're going

to look for extra terrestrial life.

Well, before we do this, we need a set of rules for how the

government is going to handle.

Anything we find out there.

Sure.

We got to have rules for

everything.

Right.

So.

So we have to go through and set up all these protocols for how we're going

to handle first contact with aliens.

Should it happen?

Because we don't know what this is.

We're turning on the satellites and looking for stuff, or Brent

will broadcasting at first.

And then they stopped broadcasting because they realized that was a bad

idea and started looking for stuff.

So there came up with all these things and one of the things was like, okay, so

we get a contact from an alien and they.

Like we find a message and it's this list of super advanced

science questions and stuff.

How do we handle that?

And they're like, okay, well, if they're asking these they're checking, not just

to see a society, but they're checking to see its technological development.

Right.

Where are you?

Which means they're not inherently altruistic.

And because of that, they feared that any answer to these that was sufficient

would show that the planet was a threat.

And would be treated as such and wiped out before they had a chance to counter

attack or find out who they were talking

Yeah, it's a very easy logical leap, right from we're asking all

these questions and the offer, the probe makes us suspicious.

Like, we're going to give you all these things.

If you can answer these questions, it's like, well, if we can answer

those questions, how close are we to these things on our own, like,

yeah, it, it is a very devious little test.

Yep.

So that's where this plot came from, was JMS reading.

And hearing listening about documentation from a congressional committee in

the seventies about extra terrestrial

Who would have thought that something useful would

have come out of that?

Wonderful.

Dzhokhar gets stopped on his way to space TSA.

And they prevent him from going.

Freedom is more important and all of their families understand that he has to

stay and continue weeding the resistance.

Yeah, several nine step in his way with the final one being to Juan.

To Juan has.

Presumably flipped from being nefarious body guard.

And wants to join the effort on the station

At the end here, Franklin lays to Garibaldi about not

using stems during the episode.

Yeah, what's up with that Franklin.

Not cool.

Yeah, that's.

Because it wasn't even like Garibaldi Garibaldi didn't ask him if

he used stems during this ridiculous crisis, they just went through.

He just said that he didn't.

Yeah, he just out now it made this claim.

Which is not something, a person who didn't feel guilty about it would do.

For and then the episode.

Fades to black as veer departs from embargoed space TSA with Londo looking on.

Yeah, by fear.

Enjoyment bar.

We know

he

will

for four episodes.

All right.

Well, how'd you feel about this

So.

not sure I can call this average.

I really like the plot about J car.

But it does kind of wrap up in a weird way for me.

Like there's no Defining moment that changes Dakar's mind.

Mind other than these people ask him not to go.

but he'd already, you know, committed to.

I would rather save lives than continue this resistance right now.

So that's that turn for me, wasn't quite as earned as it could have been.

And then the whole alien probe B plot.

Just does not work for me.

I kind of gave that away earlier in the episode when I

Yeah.

Uh, this doesn't.

Why, why aren't we talking to anybody else about this?

That's fair.

So.

I don't think.

I don't know if I want to go with two.

But for me, it didn't hit average Babylon five level.

It's better than bad, but it does seem a little things are rushed.

Things aren't fully explained.

I think we would have been better off, honestly, without

the alien probe plot in this one.

I know that that kind of changes your title entirely because the thing that

we were going for here was we have one day and here's the crazy things

that are happening in this one day.

Yeah.

We kind of already did that for me back in season two.

When we had the And now for a word episode.

ISN episode.

Right.

So.

I don't know this, this seems to me to be trying to do the

same thing as that episode.

Just in a regular episode style and not as

I also wrote down two and a half for this one.

It's pretty middle of the road.

It's not bad.

It's not great.

I consider it a little bit below average because I had multiple points

where I thought just a single line of dialogue would improve the episode.

Right,

And that is not something that I commonly feel

about Babylon five as a show.

And I feel that about a lot of media very often.

Yeah.

like one of my number one complaints is all like, you could

just thrown in a line of dialogue here that would have handled that issue.

Or, you know, it would have made this whole, you know, like one room in 1984.

Skip's all over the place.

Just throwing a line about kids, wishing it was Christmas and then new

year's and then July 4th or something.

And it makes the plot instantly more tolerable because it's very incoherent.

And so if you just lean into that and make it incoherent on purpose

with a single line of dialogue, it's instantly a better movie.

Yeah.

And so I don't often say that about Babylon five, maybe one, every

couple of episodes, but to have multiple points in an episode where I thought a

single line of dialogue would improve it.

He tells me that it was not as carefully As most

Yeah, I think almost every single plot.

And this one has a spot where it's like, oh, if you just said this to you, Then

I would feel better, but you didn't.

And so I don't.

So, yeah.

Well, that's the episode.

Next up, we have season three, episode four, passing through jus enemy.

We'll leave.

The Alexander returns has cautious aid.

Uh, monk onboard the station experiences, terrifying visions.

Yeah, I think this'll be a markedly different episode.

I love this next episode.

It is memorable for sure.

It was.

Before every watched It was on my top five episodes in the series.

I have already done my rewatch for next episode.

So I will not spoil my current feelings on it, which are admittedly a lot

more nuance than my normal watch.

There's a Babylon five.

But I'm real excited to talk about this next episode.

Me too.

A very good

But before we're going to do that.

We're going to go ahead and shout out some thank Thank you, Jeremy Siegel

for our lovely theme music, you can find more of his work at Jeremy Siegel.

40 two.bandcamp.com.

And thank you to angry deck time machine on Instagram

for our podcast artwork.

And once again, discord hit us up on there.

We've got a wonderful community memes and conversations.

There's a lot of talk about the reboot lately, which has been really fun.

And then, you know, just, it's a cool place to be.

Shoot us an email.

Who are you?

five@gmail.com.

We do mailbag segments.

We're going to do one next Uh, so it will be too late by the time

this airs to get on that one, but send us mail for the next Yep.

We'll see you next week, internet.