Babylon 5 Reviews J

Years ago I did what you might call “reviews” of Star Trek episodes. I mostly just briefly noted what progressive politics were involved and sometimes used that as an excuse to talk about similar situations in reality.

Last year I finally watched all five seasons of Babylon 5, another sci-fi show, one I had thought of watching once in a while stretching back a couple decades. It isn’t as political or as progressive as ST but there’s some good stuff there- in fact, on one issue, a progressive take on the working-class and/or labor movement, B5 is better than ST. Because there is so little progressive material, I’m going to do one post for every four episodes reviewed, and only mention the episodes that have some progressive political stuff. I might ignore some of the more minor and/or less unique stuff about conflict resolution because from what I remember, it’s very common in this series. Also, although less so than is the case with Star Trek, multiculturalism is a big part of Babylon Five and I will also only be commenting on that when it goes further than usual. There are issues raised about telepaths- I’m going to completely ignore stuff about telepaths when reviewing these episodes. I also will probably say nothing about the conflict with the evil race the Shadows- sure, I could say Trump is as evil as they are or compare them to Nazi Germany, but that’s kind of silly (I’m sure there is nothing political about the Shadows, they’re just evil, like the Borg or the Empire). And I might skip most of the stuff about the conflict between B5 and the Earth government- I don’t remember it involving stuff like a strong capitalist agenda or racism or something.


**Season 4, Episode 12 “Conflicts of Interest”** See this for a plot summary.

We learn a little bit more about Mars and it indicates something that I had kind of missed earlier. I still believe that the Earth-Mars conflict (before the Civil War) is comparable to the conflict between London and the original 13 American colonies. I am suddenly unsure if there was bigotry towards the colonists and if I should have known (from an earlier episode) there was hostility towards people born on Mars that might be considered racial. We learn in this episode that judges on Mars are appointed from Earth and are biased against those born on Mars. There was a weaker indication of this kind of stuff earlier, but I decided that it was a mistake by the writers, or that it was POLITICAL (not racial (or "planetary?")) bias and I ignored it.


**Season 4, Episode 13 “Rumors, Bargains, and Lies”** See this for a plot summary.

About 25 episodes earlier, the Minbari government, the Grey Council (GC), was dissolved. Without it, conflicts have arisen between the religious and warrior castes (there is also the workers caste but they weren’t mentioned in this episode). Delenn’s aide says that the GC suppressed the conflicts between the three castes but couldn’t erase them.

Delenn heads for Minbar and meets a leader of the warrior caste. She appeals to him for a solution where neither caste is the victor, believing that if one of them won it would break the delicate balance of Minbari society. But it turns out that the warrior caste isn’t as interested in dialogue and compromise as they pretended to be.


**Season 4, Episode 14 “Moments of Transition”** See this for a plot summary.

This episode is the conclusion of the conflict over power on Minbar. There is one issue that comes up and has little to do with the how the conflict is resolved.

That is the question of when is it acceptable to go to war. Although I am generally against war and assume it is horrible for everyone involved, I believe that sometimes it is justified and/or helpful and/or necessary. The leader of the Warrior Caste (Shakiri) says that wars should only be fought for practical gains, not for religious reasons or other principles.

I am sticking with my earlier impression that the Religious Caste is not as religious or (anywhere near) as right-wing as, for example, the Taliban, so I’m open-minded about what they might call a holy war. I might assume it would be less offensive to me than campaigns in reality that might be called holy wars- in general the Crusades would be examples, and so would Cromwell’s war in Ireland, etc.).

As far as wars for practical gains, I wouldn’t be surprised if the vast majority of such wars would be offensive to me- they would probably be clearly imperialist wars (i.e. Indian Wars here, or the Indonesian occupation of East Timor).

I am open-minded about supporting wars that are for progressive principles. Of course one obstacle is the fact that people who might be called neo-imperialists can and will spin what they’re doing as principled. A recent example of that I believe was the Persian Gulf War (the 1991 conflict). Ones that I would have supported would be WWII (it was far from totally invulnerable to criticism, but I believe it was overall a pretty good cause and 99% of the time the Allies fought honorably), and perhaps the two conflicts the US was involved with in the former Yugoslavia.

Going back to the episode, it turns out that the junior leader of the Warrior Caste who seemed to double-cross Delenn at the end of the last episode actually WAS cooperating with her to some degree. Shortly after that, with Minbari cities being destroyed because of the war, Delenn (who has become possibly THE leader of the Religious Caste) surrenders.

As the Warrior Caste are formalizing the surrender, Delenn says something about how their surrender doesn’t mean they are giving up the right to participate in Minbari politics. Although I like her very next move, I’m not sure what to think about that statement by her. The Religious Caste was in a very weakened position. I don’t know if the anti-fascist side in the Spanish Civil War demanded such a right after they were defeated. And the ANC seemed to RELUCTANTLY agree to a limited and very brief period of sharing power with what I think would be called a post-Apartheid, overwhelmingly white party.

In any case, she basically challenges Shakiri to settle the conflict the way inter-caste conflicts were settled before the Grey Council by standing in some kind of heat beam. The first leader to leave the beam and live loses (this was developed partly because Minbari felt that leaders should risk death in conflict just as much as their soldiers did). Delenn enters the beam but Shakiri is hesitant until a junior leader calls him a hypocrite for refusing to risk his own life. Shakiri enters, then leaves. Delenn is then carried out by the junior leader.

The very best part of this episode is at the end. Traditionally the Grey Council has nine members- three from each of the three castes- worker, religious, and warrior. Forming a new GC Delenn gives two seats to the religious caste and two to the warrior caste, and FIVE to the workers caste. Although I think it’s a little flawed, for the most part her little speech justifying that is worth quoting. She seems to be speaking mostly to the other two castes:

“You had forgotten the Worker caste, hadn’t you? When our two sides fight, they are the ones caught in the middle, forgotten until it is their time to serve, to build and to die. They build the temples we pray in, the ships you fight it. They look to us to guide their hands. But prayers are fleeting and wars forgotten. What is built endures. They do not wish to conquer or convert, only to build the future. And now they will have that chance. The Religious caste and the Warrior caste will advise and counsel. We will serve, as is proper. Religion and war must act in the service of the people- not the other way around.”

My favorite parts are underlined.


**Season 4, Episode 15 “No Surrender, No Retreat”** See this for a plot sumamry.

At the end of the previous episode it was learned that Earth Alliance forces massacred civilian passengers of a space ship, killing thousands. Sheridan decides that enough is enough.

First, though, he needs to secure defensive forces for B5. He talks about the mutual support treaties that members of the League of Non-Aligned Worlds have with Earth and says that in exchange for the security Sheridan’s forces have been providing for those worlds, the treaties must be torn up and those planets must each provide one large military vessel for the defense of B5. He also, on a more ethical note, reminds them that the President of Earth is a xenophobe promoting mistrust of aliens.

While trying to get the Narn leader G’Kar to sign a joint statement about both races supporting Sherdian, the Centauri ambassador Mollari describes them both as patriots. Although he played a role in ENDING his race’s near genocidal occupation of Narn worlds, he also played a role in BEGINNING and SUSTAINING it for about a year. G’Kar was a leader, in exile, of the resistance on Narn. They might both be patriots, but there is a huge difference between them when you look just a little deeper.

The vast majority of the episode is about Sheridan going on the offensive in what would probably be seen as an important and medium-sized space battle between Sheridan’s fleet and six Earth Force ships that might be compared to battleships. One enemy ship is destroyed, one leaves the battle rather than fight for a corrupt government, one leaves without plans to take orders from Earth anymore, another stays to defend the planet they were earlier laying siege to, and two fully defect to Sheridan’s command. I find this sort of thing inspiring. Even if we look throughout human history and all over the world, I’m MUCH more an opponent of the military than a fan, but some times they do good, and the idea of senior officers defecting to support the re-instatement of freedom and/or democracy in their nation is great. I am not real familiar with this, but I know that in the mid-1970s elements of the Portuguese military overthrew a fascist dictatorship and, within a small number of years a democracy was created.