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.

Laura and Xhafer recast the mysterious representatives of the Shadows and Vorlons before jumping into the Babylon Five-verse to discuss the first trailer for the B5 animated film. Meanwhile, the Shadow War comes to an end as Sheridan finally convinces the elder races to move into that big retirement community in the sky on Babylon 5 - Season 4 Episode 6: Into the Fire.

Hello and welcome to Who Are You?

This is the Babylon five watch cast hosted by two former strangers,

now, friends who have gotten to each other while we're watching a favorite

show from the childhood, Babylon.

Five.

I'm Jair.

and I'm Laura.

We're gonna do a quick little recast because it's really the last time

I feel like we can and then we're gonna talk about the trailer for the road home.

So,

exciting.

Who are we gonna recast?

Today we're gonna recast Kash and Mr.

Morton.

All right.

Who do you wanna do first?

I think Kosh is probably gonna be the most fun.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Kosh is fun and technically Kosh is already gone, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

We see a von that looks exactly like Kosh at the tail end of this

episode, but it is, it is not Kosh.

Yeah.

We only have two Kosh costumes.

That's the issue, I think.

why there's only two war ones at any given time.

Yep.

We only made two.

It's a lot of shoulder pads, so I I understand the expense.

It is a 80 suit pants worth of shoulder pads.

It is crazy.

so for Kosh, honestly Think, I mean, you can get away with a voice actor for Kosh.

You can get away with like two people playing Kosh, right?

Yeah, for sure.

can, you can pick someone who is older and might not be

interested in wearing the body suit and just does doing voice work.

And that is a hundred percent where I'm pointing with this uh, because I

think that this is the perfect role to bring back a legacy cast member for.

Oh, and who would that be?

I think the best choice would probably be Walter Koenig,

Okay.

knowing that he can only do the voice work and stuff.

But I think the most fun choice, and what I'm actually going to put

forth is my pick is Bruce Slager,

Okay.

because

voice,

As

we distort it.

Okay?

Because it's too perfect that way, like having, having him lead the

new Sheridan along the path and be the mentor figure and stuff, it's too good.

It'd be like Mark AML playing Yoda.

It's, it's perfect.

Like just, we don't need to fuck with it.

It's great.

Leave it

Yeah, I like that there is a nice symmetry in it.

We keep our, our boy Bruce working, you know?

Yeah.

I like it.

What's your pick for Kash?

Okay.

So I was kind of on the same, same track as you in that like you can

do anything to the voice, right?

Because.

It's supposed to be distorted, it's supposed to be a little bit electronically

manipulated, like whatever, you know.

So I kind of thought, well, you know, he needs to be rather tall.

I think we need kind of a tall, imposing

Mm-hmm.

body in there.

And then I was like, well, okay, I'm just, who, who are actors over six feet tall?

I feel like we need to minimum six feet.

On that.

And then from there, all right.

You know what's amusing to me?

And I settled on Samuel L.

Jackson because he kind of got into his like wise mentor kind of

thing in the Star Wars franchise, you know, with Mace Windoo.

That a bit too.

Yeah.

Yes.

So we could bring back the purple suit you know, maybe, maybe rock that a little bit.

And he could just have some fun with it.

And then we can, we can do whatever we need to the voice, you know, if

the voice isn't working, it's not quite right, it just stirs some

filters on it and we'll be fine.

Right.

All right.

No,

So that was, that was my pick.

For morden, I'm looking for unhinged, yet charming.

That can take a turn for downright terrifying.

Okay.

Yeah,

And when I think of that role and actors currently doing their stuff,

two names immediately pop into mind.

That's Tom Hiddleston and Sarah Paulson.

that's funny.

I definitely thought about Tom Hiddleston.

Yeah,

Sarah Paulson, though.

That's the name I'm gonna have to Google real quick.

I see some credits in American Horror Story, which is not a thing that I watch.

I haven't seen that.

I know her most recently from the OJ season of American Crime Story or

I see she's got the credit for ratchet too.

Yeah.

Okay.

I could see unhinged there, perhaps.

You know, I wasn't thinking unhinged as much with my pick, but I was thinking

like, can have a, a smirky face,

Yeah,

gotta have a good smirky

gotta have a good smirky face.

Number one, quality of Mr.

Morton.

Yeah.

And you know, there's that classic sort of trope of at least in America, of bad guys

having British accents, you know, we go back to our roots, make them the villains.

So I was thinking maybe Benedict Cumber batch.

Okay.

Because he does have, you know, he, he is got some great hero credits,

but he's also got some little bit more villainous turns that he's done.

So I thought he might make a fine morden.

Yeah, I could totally see that.

Yeah, that's a vaguely British name too.

For sure.

Okay.

Well that was our quick recasting.

let's talk about this trailer.

We have not discussed this trailer yet.

That's true, like you and I personally have not had

a chance to talk about it.

Yeah.

So I'm excited to talk about it cuz I haven't really nerded

out with anyone about it yet.

So let's, let's go.

it.

So uh, let's refrain from any spoilers past this

point, past this episode,

Yeah.

Okay.

easy to do.

I think so

especially because so much of this trailer is like alternate

universe or alternate timeline.

Yeah, we got the alternate timeline universe thing that was.

I think we did.

We either knew that or that was a theory posited based off the casting list that it

Yeah, I think it was, I think that we, we posited that and then

it became confirmed pretty quick.

Okay.

I have the official blurb up if you want me to read it.

Please do.

So the official about blurb when you just Google Babylon five,

the road Home says John Sheridan unexpectedly, finds himself transported

through multiple timelines and alternate realities along the way.

He re reunites with some familiar faces and discovers cosmic new

revelations about the history, purpose, and meaning of the universe.

Okay.

there's a lot there.

There is a lot there.

Life, the universe, and everything.

yeah, it, the trailer starts off with, John Sheridan

after he has left Babylon five which takes place in the future.

This is all post season five stuff.

So him leaving the station and going to Mbar and the Mumbai have this thing

that runs off of Tachyons and he's

No.

No.

to it and he's just like, tachyons.

Oh shit.

Having been warned by Zaris, if he's ever exposed to Tachyons

again, that it's gonna be fucky.

And so he gets exposed to Tachyons again and starts traversing

time, space, and realities

Yeah.

trying to find his way home.

There's a lot of fun, alternate realities here.

Mm-hmm.

I want to know what led to, there's one where they lost the

shadow war, and Lando and Ivana are like having drinks in lawn chairs.

Yeah, and I'm, I'm assuming they're on earth.

Perhaps not Totally clear.

Yeah.

why would Londo be on Earth?

Don't know.

Curious how he got there.

Why are Ivana and alando of any character pairing

Yeah.

Yeah.

The whole thing reminds me a lot of into the spider verse, so I'm hoping that

we see the universe where everybody is.

Pigs like spider ham.

Yeah, there's just all kinds of like random shit.

It looks like the shadows attack Babylon five in season one.

In one of these,

Yeah.

Okay.

in the old uniform and they're like shooting with Garal and stuff,

and they're shooting up shadows and like down below or something.

Yeah, that's probably reminiscent of that vision that Garibaldi had.

Right?

I

That's, and I always wanted to know more about that.

So I'm really hoping that we get some more detail on like how it transpired.

Yeah, there's a lot of little stuff like that in this trailer.

It looks real good.

There is some end of the series spoilers at the very beginning, so if you are

going through the show right now, And if not finished it and you're going

through with us, I'm sorry in advance for that I would say it's probably

safe to watch once we hit the start of season five is my gut feeling right now.

Yeah.

Okay.

But it's hard to say exactly.

We'll know more when we get to watch it in uh, well, I'll get

to see it in about a month.

I know.

That's so exciting.

Do tell.

Well, I'm going to San Diego Comic-Con.

Yeah.

I got a phone call a couple of weeks ago from my old college roommate

who has started a board game company and they're like, Hey, we need people to go to

Comic-Con and work the convention floor.

You know, we've got a booth by, you know, like Marvel and shit

or wherever, like on the floor.

I haven't seen the map yet.

I don't know what we're actually next to, but that's the area we're going to be in.

And just like we need people to demo our new board game all day for five days.

And I'm all like, I need like three hours off to go see the new Babylon five movie.

But besides that, I'm in, so I'm going to Comic-Con.

It doesn't feel real, even though my flights are all booked

and everything at this point.

Um,

Is so exciting.

yeah,

what day would you be going to that premiere?

Do you know yet?

it, they haven't.

Put out the calendar of when its stuff is

Oh, okay.

Okay.

But it is the weekend of like the 20th through the 23rd,

Okay, so I know approximately what days I need to be sitting

here stewing in jealousy, right?

yeah.

Yeah.

I'm sure my, my, my, like my personal Facebook will be lit up with photos.

I'll, if anything super cool happens, I'll put it on the Discord too.

Yeah.

Do please do.

I have all those Babylon five VHSs from Ben's father-in-law

right now in my basement.

And I'm thinking I might try and get JMS to autograph a couple of them.

That would be cool.

Yeah, that'd be just a cool piece to have if like, I

could get him to autograph my VHS of the gathering or something.

I feel like that's, that'd be cool to have.

be great.

And you, that's a like a, you can shadow box that you know.

Yeah, for

Get that, get that out on display.

Mm-hmm.

Well, for the rest of us that don't get to go to ComicCon and

see the premiere the release date has been set for August 15th, 2023.

Just about my birthday.

Yeah.

And I think you can pre-order it at this point, right?

You totally can pre-ordered on this point.

At this point, I think on iTunes and Voodoo and a couple other things.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Probably on Amazon.

It's getting a 4K Blu-ray release, the whole deal.

Yeah, that's, I did see that on the end of the trailer.

I was like, wow, we're putting it out on physical media.

That's cool.

I like it.

I'm gonna, I like all of my other stuff is on voodoo.

I own very little physical and honestly the way all of Babylon five

has been treated with this on and off and all this streaming service crap.

I'm probably just gonna buy the 4K Blu-ray.

Yeah.

Be pretty cool.

yeah,

And I, I would imagine that pre-orders for this is a good thing.

Like the more pre-orders that are out there, the better.

a hundred percent.

I'm sure this will be a, a sign as to whether or not we

get a remaster re-release.

If this does well, I'm sure we will get a physical media Blu-ray set of the series.

Yeah, and it can only help our chances for reboot someday, I would think.

Yeah.

And we can only hope they've got those animated menus that Yum Yu is so fond of.

Indeed.

All right,

well, with all that said, we have season four episode six into the Fire Big app.

Yeah.

One of the biggest of the series, Shirley.

Yep.

Jms, I think I've said this at the end of last episode two had said that if

the season five thing hadn't happened, if they thought if they, if he knew

season five was gonna happen at this point, the only difference would've been

that this would've been a two-parter.

Yeah.

Otherwise it would've been in the exact same spot.

Uh, He wanted to.

He's like, you know, in real life big things don't happen on, you

know, like the end of the year.

Like, that doesn't make sense.

Why

Yeah, that's true.

So,

You know, it, things happen.

You know, big stuff happens in the middle of other things.

That's part of what makes them big things.

So he wanted it to end kind of abruptly, kind of mid season, and he

wanted it to be jarring on purpose.

Yeah, and I think that he's also hinted in dialogue in a few

previous episodes that just because the big thing is gonna happen

doesn't mean the story's over.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We've had a handful of characters say that now.

Unlike storytelling up until this point where it's kind of like, oh, we

fought the big battle and everyone's good and it's happily ever after.

Uh, he doesn't wanna tell the story that way.

No, he does not.

So we open up on a antsy ivanova wanting to rejoin the fleet when Lorianne is like,

no, this is the last of the first ones.

We've just gotta wait.

Mm-hmm.

And then uh, Lorian describes Sheridan's plan, not as like in that

terms of tactics or anything, but as a crucible to find the truth.

Hmm.

Interesting.

Mm-hmm.

Then like a space whale shows up.

Yeah,

I know that's not the actual ship, but Yeah.

I thought it was like a wooden ship.

It looks very wooden to me.

Yeah, it, this is a weird little thing, but it's

not supposed to make sense.

yeah.

These uh, first ones are all very like, impossible looking ships,

Yeah, except for the one that's clearly an homage to close

encounters of the third kind.

Sure.

Yeah.

We're not supposed to really be able to comprehend them.

They're supposed to be mysterious and unexplainable.

So uh, Could we cut to the white star fleet?

And they are attacking a Roan observation post.

The white stars successfully blow it up so that they can move the rest of

the fleet past without being noticed.

And man, this fleet is massive.

We get a couple shots that really lend the scale to how many

ships they've put together here.

And the different types.

Yeah.

We get a.

Some lip service.

It's over a thousand ships from more than two dozen races.

Yeah.

Impressive.

It is a huge fleet.

Yeah.

Sheridan is very pleased to command Lanier to take us into the episode

Yep.

and go to theme.

I kind of wish that the white star fleet wasn't just numbers.

If

to say that in the last one.

Yeah.

I don't think that's very Mumbai, but maybe, I don't know.

They've got a name for their one ship.

Maybe that.

Maybe that's the only one that has one.

Yeah.

I guess in, you know, we don't know enough about like Minbar mythology to

have any attachment to names, but it'd be cool if there were like some that

were named like human things and some that were named minbar things to show the

I'm

melding of the two.

Yeah.

You name them all after, well, what would you do?

What if you, you're your tel, are your Ranger one, what do you decide they're

naming all the white stars after?

Make it a theme like all, all the good spaceship runs when you've

got a bunch of the same ship.

They've all got a naming convention of some variety.

Usually,

Mm-hmm.

you know, like a big thing in the Star Trek universe is when

you've got a class of ship, a lot of the classes of ship share.

Naming convention, like all the Luna class ships are named after moons.

What is uh, there's all of the Vesta class ships are named after hills.

The California classes are named after cities,

Yeah.

the U ss, west Covina, you know,

Yeah.

And you know, you get a lot of um, named after people sometimes in naming ships,

but that doesn't seem like a very maari thing to do necessarily, unless maybe

it's like artists and scientists and something, but not, necessarily military

I could see them going for like famous peacemakers,

uhhuh.

you know, like naming a ship, the Gandhi or something, you

know, like stuff along those lines.

I could see that fitting in with the, the Ranger theme as well.

Sure.

Yeah.

Yeah.

After this Elita is all like, so why are we defending here and not

Centre Prime, which is clearly the more important world in storyline.

Yeah.

And Marcus is like, well, cor sticks is choice

as many people living on it.

It's just numbers,

Yeah, it's 6 billion versus 3 billion.

Like the Centura ideally can handle themselves.

Carry on.

Six cannot.

So

we're

here.

So.

He just hopes that uh, sari Prime can get rid of all their shadow influence

on their own, which is a nice place to cut to Wado who's trying to do just that.

He's got 12 hours to go and is just running around

trying to get this handled.

Yeah.

He's getting, uh, minister Verini all in a tizzy about how fast he wants things done.

But I think maybe Minister Verini is just always in a tizzy.

Yes.

I would believe so.

Status quo for this man.

Delen passes along Yvanova's status and Sheridan

confirms for her to come out.

Delen is all like, Hey, did you wanna like have her hang back just in case

Sheridan's like, I made a promise.

Well, if deland had made the point, which would be a very valid point, that

if something should happen to herself, I.

And Sheridan being on the same ship.

Perhaps we might need Ivanova to be in a more secure location.

I think that's a valid point.

that's why Zack's back at B five

Zack is gonna take over.

Well, Garibaldi too.

President.

Yeah.

Well,

We don't know where Garibaldis at, right?

He's not

Aldi's back on the station.

I'm

pretty sure.

I think we, I think we find out what's going on with him now.

Next episode.

Yeah.

Okay.

Anyways Ivanova and Lorianne talk as she preps at Babylon five

before heading out, and she's like, I'm kind of skeptical about

this whole first sentient thing,

Mm-hmm.

And man, he's just like, he says she's leading

with her mind and not her heart.

Uh Huh.

She reports that she's not on speaking terms with her heart.

Yeah, and he's like, I noticed.

Right.

He tells us that his race is naturally immortal,

but they can be killed.

Right.

But it sounds like they decided that immortality

wasn't all as cracked up to be.

So they made their later generations not immortal.

So he says, he tries to explain to her that the shortness of life is a gift.

And only races who are not immortal can believe that love is eternal.

Like if you are immortal, you know it's not.

right.

He's like, it's the greatest gift, gift your race has received.

The ability to believe that love is eternal way to be a fucking downer.

Men would rather live forever to dull their emotions away

slowly, like a rock in a river.

Rather than go to therapy

Nice.

Nailed it.

So true.

So true.

over on Cent Prime, Lando meets with Minister Ano, who's

the head of Centuri Intelligence.

This dude looks exactly like I thought you would tell me the head

of Centura intelligence looks like.

Yeah.

Yep.

Just, I don't know.

I couldn't have drawn it, but when I saw it, I knew it.

He's the guy with all the secrets and he looks very worn

out about them, in my opinion.

He's just like, Ugh, back on this bullshit again.

Like old news.

but,

BT dubs REFA.

Didn't kill Tira.

It was Morden.

yeah.

Which was painfully obvious to everyone, but you.

And Wanda reacts accordingly to this big revelation.

Yeah.

Peter acts the hell out of this scene and destroys all of the crew's.

Lovely.

Set work.

Yeah.

How many of these shots do you think you'd get?

You really kinda have it one go at it, right?

Or you gotta just keep destroying props and set.

I gotta imagine on Babylon five, this is a one shot.

You don't get to retake this.

You don't have a dozen VAEs sitting in the back waiting to be destroyed.

Nope.

Ivanova has let her do lingo streak go.

But she's still basically a native speaker.

Mumbar guy's promise.

She learns all hell is Mumbai for continuous fire,

yeah.

She's just shooting at nothing into hyperspace.

right?

This seems like it would be a problem for most humans, right?

These, uh, rangers who are in command of these ships, the human rangers they've

gotta show some incredible restraint.

In my opinion.

I would probably be shouting a hell all the time.

Ugh, Lorianne uh, is like, look, you're gonna have to un

understand your way to winning this war, not fight your way to winning it.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

We learned Sheridan has hid nukes and a bunch of asteroids again.

There's just no problem.

A nuke won't solve for Sheridan.

Right.

So,

This is the exact same tactic he used to defeat the

one Mumbar cruiser in the Earth.

Mumbar war.

Like if it ain't broke, don't fix it, I guess.

But there is, I mean, he does solve a problem without a nuke

in this episode, so I can't quite give him the broken record wrap.

Uh, This isn't Walter White and Thermite, but.

Know, it's, it's getting there.

Yeah.

I mean, you would think if you're other races, you might uh, Look

for a way to look for hidden nukes at this point, right?

Oh, we're fighting John Sheridan, the guy who hides in nukes and asteroids.

Better not fly near asteroids.

Morton is brought before Orlando.

All healed up.

They didn't make 'em put any loon for this scene, which was nice.

Yeah.

We need to see this face, right?

For reasons

Yeah.

Yeah.

Morden refuses to remove the ships.

Londo has morden's, shadow keepers killed.

Yeah.

Nice move.

I didn't know that this was possible.

Yeah, and I, I mean, if I'm one of these sari guards and

I'm given instructions to just fire into the air next to the

guy, I'm gonna have fun with That

There's dudes behind him too.

There's guards in the four corners.

So like you're effectively asking me if I don't know, the invisible thing is

there, I'm firing at the other guard.

Oh, good point.

Right?

It's like mind bending, like.

Okay, boss, like you're in charge and I thought you were gonna be

better than Cartage, but here we are.

Maybe it's just so status quo for them at this point.

Yeah, for the, the lower centa, we just follow orders blindly and we

don't have any independent thought.

This is just how it is.

This is what we do.

He asked Morden again.

Morden refuses again.

Then Alando plays his hand.

Blowing up the entire island of Saini.

Yeah.

you catch, so they show us the island blowing up.

Did it look familiar to you?

I've seen this island on a map, perhaps?

I did not.

I'm letting my geography, whack of knowledge show, but

It, it's Sicily.

Okay.

I kind of wonder cuz you know, the name Sini is very similar to Sicily,

so I always kind of thought, Hmm.

I wonder if that

You know, and Rome and

Italy and stuff, right?

And then you look at, it, look literally looks like Italy and Sicily.

Like if you freeze frame it and like warp the image a little, like

it's, it's like drawn out in places.

It's like they pulled two corners and stretched it out a bit,

but it's literally just Italy and Sicily.

That's, that's a nice symmetry.

I like that.

Yeah.

Morton is thrown back into a cell after this

Yeah.

There's something special for

oh, oh, yeah.

Yeah.

He's got, he's, something's gonna happen.

Ivanovo makes it back to the fleet.

Just in time.

The shadows and the VLANs arrive at the same time, Sheridan sends

up the new steroids, getting both forces to attack Lorianne and Marcus

kind of hectically trade places.

Lita tries reaching out to the VLANs and we cut back to Centre Prime in

what is probably one of the most iconic shots of this entire show.

Indeed we finally get a nice thing for Vere.

yep.

Vere gets summoned by Londo.

There's a gift waiting for him in the gardens.

He walks out.

Looks up.

Then we get a cut back to, was it season, end of season one, start of

season two, where Veer talked to Mr.

Morden about what he wanted.

He finally answered Mr.

Morden's question, and he's like, I, I wanna wave at your head on a pike

like this, as it's in the Centri Gardens to warn future generations

of the price of power being too high.

And he looks up, he smiles and he waves just as

Just like it.

Yeah.

This is just Chef's Kiss, one of my favorite scenes in all of this show.

now we get the flashback.

Mm-hmm.

And I feel like the flashback is important in the

non streaming era of television,

cuz we're calling a very specific mannerism from a scene.

Three seasons ago is a bit much.

Yeah,

But in streaming, do you think that this flashback exists?

I don't think you need it in streaming.

Yeah.

I mean, maybe there's something else like in the set pieces or in the

costuming or expression on his face.

That reminds you of that original scene or maybe even like blocking, like where,

where he is in relation to the pike.

But I don't think you need the whole flashback in streaming land,

but for non streaming land, it's been, you know, years, right?

It's been a couple of years since we saw this scene,

Yeah.

Oh,

so

makes sense.

At the big battle, Sheridan calls on the first ones to take out the

Rolon Planet Killer before it can strike.

Londo then meets up with Vere in the Gardens who has sent Word to the LANs

with the proof that they have removed all the shadows touched from their

world and vere's like almost all of it.

You are still here, Londo.

Yeah.

Londo is very blind to his own part in all of this at this

moment.

the rish thing.

So the VLANs arrive in orbit, they block out the sun, and Londo is

immediately like, veer, you have to kill me and tell the VLANs like, just,

here's a gun, shoot me right now.

And veer is like, well, we don't know.

Maybe, maybe you get a pa.

And we know because of the other scene.

That the VLANs having just suffered the destruction of their planet

killer, have called for reinforcements.

Mm-hmm.

They don't know this but the planet killer gets up and leaves

but not because Londo got a weekend pass for his shadow interactions.

Yeah, so they've got a unfortunate Idea that they're

okay and maybe, maybe not so much.

After this, Lita gets all funky being taken over by

both the LANs and the shadows.

She takes Sheridan and Delen elsewhere.

Elsewhere, of course, being the gray council set

We only have so many sets.

right, you've got one big empty room with a couple

overhead lights installed.

It's all you really need.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Sheridan yells at Frozen Lady Rolon while Delen gets Shadow.

Friends.

Okay.

So what's the deal with Frozen Lady vlan?

I think it's supposed to be one of the Centura prophetess

Okay, that's, I thought that that's what it reminded me of at least.

I just didn't know, like why,

Yeah, she does that.

Interact with like lady who was the Gel Barrett, lady Marella.

Remembering that, right.

Something.

Yes, lady Marella.

All right.

Got it in one.

I don't understand it though, like, Sheridan doesn't interact

with this character at all.

And you've already got like, Kosh, right?

Well, maybe it's not a Centa prophetess necessarily, cuz the

cent also have the lady Telepaths.

Right?

And we know they would've been seated by the LANs.

Why?

Why sinta?

I don't quite know.

Like maybe it's symbolic of their.

Slipping away from the LANs.

It's a good question that I haven't seen answered anywhere.

Maybe I missed it.

Yeah, it's one of those things maybe.

Maybe it's out there.

let us know.

Sheridan asked the VLANs why they never attacked.

Za had doom.

They're like, you wouldn't understand.

And he's like, bullshit.

I nuked that bitch.

Just like, come on.

Delen gets read the dust jacket of the fountain head by Lanier, and she tells him

to fuck off with that reductive bullshit.

Delen brings up that the shadows and Rolan refuse to destroy each other because then

the other will never know who was right.

boy, I.

This is the worst couple ever, like the worst couple you've ever met.

That's,

Yeah.

Yeah.

The ones who should just get divorced already,

well, the, they're like the couple that's dating that are

perfectly miserable with each other,

Uhhuh,

like the, the two worst people you've ever met dating, you

know, like that's what this is.

I definitely can picture at least one of these.

Yeah.

Sheridan, Delen tell the older races that they're gonna

take their ball and go home.

The shadow planet Killer Cloud envelops the fleet as both the

VLANs and the shadows appear on the bridge of the white star.

Lorianne tells them their next words will decide their fate,

and to choose them carefully.

Sheridan makes them do our cold open, but they didn't prep,

so they just sit in silence.

Yeah, I know that feeling.

Had to improvise that one more than once.

Yeah, exactly.

the Lens Lake.

How can you expect us to answer when you've forgotten the game is over?

They refuse to accept this.

They're like, Hey, you can't get everyone to give up on our game if you're blown up.

And the fleet surrounds them showing all races are in agreement.

A handful of ships sacrificed themselves to save the white star, to let this

continue going from various races.

And then Sheridan tells them to get the hell outta our galaxy.

Best line ever.

Well, there's a, there's a lot of good lines in this show.

This is a very good one that I enjoy.

Yeah.

Lorianne is like, look, I guided and then step aside, it's

time for you to do the same.

Y'all need to leave the galaxy to the younger raises now.

Yeah, let's go somewhere

else.

they go out past the rim.

Yeah, they just do it.

They're tired.

yep.

Lorianne,

shown up.

all the first one.

Ships that stayed behind and then all the shadows and four lawns.

Lorianne tells them they now have stewardship of the galaxy and they

must guide their younger races than step aside, as they have.

Thus begins the third age of mankind has promised since the beginning of

our opening credits in season one, the dawn of the third age, and John goes a

little bit into the different ages, but there's actually a bit more of this.

Okay.

Do tell.

all right, so.

There is a source book that Mongoose did called Darkness and

Light, the VLAN and Shadow Fact book, where all this comes from.

This is from the Babylon five rpg that we should still figure

out a way to play sometime.

Yeah.

So the first age is uh, just you're on your planet and if you don't

make it past the first age, it's because you never left your planet right.

So like the zone that we hear the cent talk about Neanderthals

would be an example of a first age species on earth here.

The second age begins when you start exploring the stars and the universe.

So space fairing races, second age races.

So mankind has been in its second age.

The second age is marked by the race falling under the influence

of older, more powerful species.

This process is unavoidable.

It's very much like a child growing up, depended on its parents, like the

parents teach and shape their child.

The young race inheritance is cultural and technological

characteristics of its elder.

The Mumbai inherited from the VLANs, the DR learned much

from the shadows, et cetera.

Okay.

The second race evolves and learns a great deal through

its elder, but there's a catch.

A child grows and must learn, defend for itself without its

parents, so must the younger races.

If a race grows too dependent on its elder, it loses the

capacity to evolve on its own.

When that happens, the race may permanently ruin its chance to mature into

something more than a shadow of its elder.

Hmm.

Okay.

In the third age, a race has rejected its elders further,

further guidance and influence, and stands on its own actions.

This is becoming a young adult, going out on your own, moving

outta your parents' house.

During the third age, the race goes through a tech technological boost.

Since it's no longer bound to its elders rules this new freedom returns

the danger of self-destruction.

A third age race could exterminate itself with its new technological discoveries.

There's a couple exist examples of this on here.

It gives the mark cap as an example actually, and the Del Gar.

For race to survive its third age, it must redefine itself.

Like young adult aging, the race must keep learning and going through deep change.

So deep.

It practically severs its primitive roots becoming an entirely different species.

The culture evolution is so hard that most races retreat from it.

The fourth age is the last step for a race to become a full grown elder in its

own right following the cultural change.

The race has passed beyond its third age.

See, oh, that's that's not spoilers.

It gives the example of the Nars heating, kars warning and moving

beyond their hate for the cent.

If they're able to make this cultural change, they could possibly

pass through their third age.

Okay.

Following the cultural change, the race has arrived in its fourth age.

It is a fully grown adult species, free, wise, and powerful enough to

shape the universe as it sees fit and walk among the stars like a giant.

The Walkers of Sigma 9 54 are an example as the rest of the first ones.

The fourth age is to many the last step of a race since they're now like gods.

Fourth age race is powerful enough to fight any outside

threat and wise enough to avoid killing itself with its own power.

However, it could still kill itself culturally, if not physically.

Should the cultural change of the th third age have not been strong enough,

or should the races transformation not be deep seated and complete enough,

then it will simply begin to fade when race can f fulfill all of its dreams

it had when it was young and has nothing more to search and achieve,

it stagnates and begins to die off.

So did Lori's race self-destruct itself in the fourth age?

If he's the only one left.

well, he says that the rest of them left.

And so I would say that's the, that's the fifth age race is after you've

done the whole guide, a younger race thing, your fifth age is you are Let's

see, a fifth age during the fifth.

Oh, fifth age races are V lines and shadows.

And Lori Ann's race, A race becomes the parent of the galaxy and the

guardian of the younger races.

And then the sixth age is out there beyond the rim.

When you leave.

Okay.

That's a lot more ages than I was thinking.

To be honest.

I was thinking we'd have 1, 2, 3, 4.

Hmm.

I like that though.

That's nice and comprehensive.

All right.

So those are the ages.

So humanity has now entered its third age.

Finally, it only took us three point.

Two, five seasons.

Back on Centre Prime.

London refuses to be happy with their survival in the end of the war unless

the universe conspire against him.

I mean, I understand you don't wanna be too happy cuz you're

gonna draw somebody's attention.

For sure.

And he doesn't wanna draw anyone's attention, which is why he's heading

back to B five, even though he's prime Minister of the Centara.

Yeah, he's just gonna do that from far away.

just in case.

Uh, There are people who think that, you know, maybe Yolanda

just overthrew the monarchy.

Maybe.

Maybe that's not a great feel, not a great place to have.

Not the best rep.

Yeah.

It's puts a target on your back in a race like the Sari.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

Minister Durran is gonna start hearing a lot of things.

The white star fleet heads back to Babylon five and

they discuss the future and.

The first ones are gone and they need to make their own magic now.

Their own legends.

Yeah.

As per the age guide that we just read.

Shadow Wars over y'all.

Dun, dun, dun.

It lasted 12 episodes.

I must say in non streaming land, it did feel longer.

Yeah.

Well, you had a

break in between seasons and like

weekly.

Yeah.

We had time to mentally stew upon it as we waited

each week for more in info.

But in streaming land, it does feel terribly

short.

quick.

Yeah.

I want it to be longer if we live in streaming land for a reboot.

And even if the who knows, there may not even be a shadow war in a reboot.

Uh, but if it was, I want it to be a little longer, but I have a feeling that

we're gonna get some more war anyway.

Oh yeah.

But before we get to that war,

we gotta ask how you feel about this episode on a scale

of Babylons one to five.

Well, if we're going with your criteria from last time about what

would I change aside from things like, for some reason, I don't know if it's

iTunes or whatever, the audio quality is not great in parts of this episode.

For me, that's just technical stuff.

You know, we obviously have better CGI now.

But like plot wise, I wouldn't change anything.

So I guess it has to be a five out of five.

It's the peak of the show, really.

Like this is it, like this is, this is the, the big story that we've

been building to the whole time.

Everything else is aftermath of this and other stuff that's happened

in the series at this point.

Um, which is not to say that nothing important happens from here on, tons of

important stuff happens from here on.

Right.

But yeah, this was, it's a huge episode.

It's, it's Babylon five at its beak.

It's five out of five for me.

No doubt.

Yeah,

And

I love this episode.

It's got great quotables.

Mm-hmm.

It's got that chef's kiss of a scene with, you know, Morden and his

head on the pike and Veer finally gets

Gets to wave.

Yep.

Mm.

So good.

just I love that stuff.

It's great.

All right.

Well, after this, we've got season four, episode seven, epiphanies.

Earth prepares to shut down Babylon.

Five

Ster wants Sheridan to return to the shadow home world.

And Garibaldi

resigns.

Oh.

Buster's back, huh?

That's kind of a lot Buster's back, baby.

Sters back?

I'm looking forward to that.

It's not gonna, we're not gonna have a nice little, we get to

rest on our laurels episode,

Nope.

which is what we were hinted at.

So here's the payoff.

Speaking of payoff we've, we, we haven't paid him, but we

would've liked to thank Jeremy Siegel for our lovely theme music.

Indeed,

If we ever

made money.

I mean, it'd be one thing.

Yeah, you can find more of Jeremy Siegel's work at Jeremy Siegel

40 two.bandcamp.com or on Spotify and iTunes and all the streaming

stuff as nuclear Jaguar where he is doing an album a month for 2023.

Hey, angry duck time machine on Instagram.

Thank you for our podcast, art.

We really appreciate it.

Indeed and thank you to Erin for editing our podcast.

You're really the, the rock of this whole thing.

It would not come out without you.

Very true.

And thank you listener for tuning in and spending your time with Laura

and I as we talk about Babylon five.

It's greatly appreciated.

Who are you?

B five gmail.com is our email address that I always forget about.

We have a Twitter that I never check, but it exists.

and uh, di Discord is where most of the conversation happens.

Oh, we have a Facebook too.

Yeah.

We do have Facebook and we are pretty prompt about responding over on Facebook.

well it's cuz that that sends notifications to my phone.

So

it's easy.

Twitter, I don't have installed anymore

Yeah.

since Musk took over.

Yeah, that's been weird.

So, but the Discord is a very lively place to be, and it also

has notifications on my phone.

It's true.

Yep.

And people are talking about the trailer there and all kinds of stuff.

Or Discord is a blast.

Join up there.

And hang out with other fans of the show and us.

There's a whole channel just for memes if you're into the memes.

All right, well, we'll see you next weekend.

Internet.

All right.