A Distant Star

Jeff: Welcome to Babylon five for the first time, not a star Trek podcast. My name is Jeff Akin and I'm watching Babylon five for the first time. Brent. We're uh, we're going. Hey. Hi. Oh, hi. Are we? Yeah, we started, I

Brent: was just doing my rub cube

Jeff: dude. Well, that sounds pretty exciting.

Brent: Way more exciting than what we have to talk about today.

My name is Brent Allen and I am also watching Babbel on five for the very first time. We are two veteran star Trek, podcasters watching Babbel on five for the very first time. We've never seen it 30 years too, late

Jeff: Jeff, 30 years too, late, a couple dollars short, but we're here now. Yes, Brent, we are, this is not a star Trek podcast, but we are star Trek podcasters.

So those references are gonna come and you have laid down the gauntlet more than once. Here's the deal. We get three a piece. That's it. No more. If you, if you start laying more down, I'm just gonna,

that's gonna be like eight minutes of the podcast of this it's like, no, no but we get three. That's it. That's all we get to stick to. Now we can barter. We can trade. We can talk about using other ones, but there's gonna be no more than references.

Brent: Can we borrow from future episodes? Wow. Why can we put it on credit?

Jeff: Right. Set up an interest thing.

Brent: I will gladly pay you two starter track references tomorrow for the one

Jeff: today, right? Oh man. We, I don't think I can keep, I have a hard time keeping track of the references in the episode we're

Brent: in you know, if, if only the banks worked like that, like yeah. You just can't keep track of how much I owe.

So let's just call it even right. We're good. Right, right. I'm gonna hit it pretty close. Pretty close. Yeah. Yeah. So that's, that's gonna be especially hard because what we do. Here is we try to search for those star Trek, like messages within the epi. That's not a reference we're searching for those like messages, not comparing it to star Trek, but using that analytical lens to apply it to Babylon five and trying to decide how much we've liked this series.

Jeff, Brent, I am very eager to hear from some of the folks out there, how they're doing. Cause I know you have some stuff I'm very

Jeff: eager and we have a five star review. Yes. This one is I can't say this name, um, ends forwe auto parts. It ends in auto parts. So I can en info Weta auto parts on apple podcast.

Five star review says this has been a lot of fun to listen to. I had the great fortune to find B five during the first run of the first season. And it's really nice to listen to Jeff and Brent having that experience since I can't have it again. Thanks. And was the auto parts?

Brent: You're very welcome because you know, here's a, I remember what that's like, there is a podcast that, that a very good friend of mine, what he was taking somebody, it was one of those, like there was the expert and then the new guy and like, like it was that podcast.

I sat there like, oh, if I would've thought about it, I would've done that one first. Mm. But that was the thing is it was, this person was experiencing that thing for the very first time. And it was like reliving it. Like, I totally get what you're talking about in Questa auto parts. So, Hey, I'm glad for, I'm glad for you guys to be discovering it and rediscovering that first time view because Jeff and I don't know what the heck we're talking about when it comes to the show, except for what we've already seen.

Mm-hmm , which

Jeff: is not a lot of it. Like we're not even almost halfway there yet. No, but we are over a fifth of way, which is crazy, which is pretty huge. We have a website, Babylon five first.com. It's the number five, the word first. And we've got a little contact form on there. And may cross Shafer has sent quite a few emails in and I wanted to share part of one that they sent.

It's very kind, very generous. Makes me feel good. I like to read it, but they say, love your podcast. Keep up the excellent work. Now it starts coming and fast. I'm gonna say that part again. Now it starts coming and fast. It'll be great to see how you react. Oh, by the way, I give you six out of six deltas on the show.

Whoa. Yeah. Like that doesn't even

Brent: exist. And we that's amazing high five. Jeff would say you're on that side. High five, Jeff

Jeff: high five and white guys. never goes well, the people

Brent: on the podcast group be like, what?

Jeff: Right? Like PI what, what exactly here? All right now. They now they've got it too.

Brent: It works great for an audio podcast.

Yeah. it's like this only, there was a YouTube version where people could go watch us be absolutely ridiculous fools. Jeff. Wouldn't that be cool

Jeff: for us to do? Amazing. Maybe we should get on YouTube. You know what we are. We already are.

Brent: We're there. Hey, you guys check us out. Join us on YouTube. YouTube. Our, do we have our own thing yet?

Like, is it youtube.com/babylon

Jeff: Babylon five first? Yeah. Yeah.

Brent: Is that it? Same have it. Mm-hmm yep. Nice. So you go to youtube.com/babylon five first, the number five, the word first, and you guys can check out. You can check out the full unedited version of Jeff and I recording this show. Uh, you can check out my first time responses, watching them as long as WB.

Doesn't shut it down with a copyright claim. Um, you can watch highlights. You can watch upcoming previews at like sneak peaks at our next episodes coming up. All sorts of cool stuff that we have happening over at YouTube. And when you're there, like subscribe, because that's what

Jeff: we do on YouTube. That's the YouTube thing.

Got one more, more got one. Oh yeah. And this one, this one actually is a discussion point for us. Percy's owner Percy's owner is a regular interactor with us, both, uh, quite a few places. And so always, always good to hear from Percy's owner, but they offer this, they say, I don't think you need to buzz for actors or writers or directors that have been on star Trek.

Sci-fi is a small world. There's a lot of crossover in this case, an actor director writer being in both shows is a fact not a reference. Basically, if it's on IMDB it's fair game. I

Brent: agree up to a certain point. Yeah. I think if we're, if we are simply stating a. of, Hey, this person was also X, Y, Z. I don't think that's necessarily a reference.

I think a references is when we're like comparing it, like, oh yeah. Like that one time on that show over there when this happened. Yeah. That's clearly a reference. That's a, but uh, you like my buzzer, that was good. Like, Jeff, you have to be here every week because if these people out there have to listen to me just going, like, it's not gonna

Jeff: work.

It's gonna get rough. Well, it's kinda like, uh, it's kinda like back in, oh, well, gosh, one of my favorite episodes, so far TKO when rabbi Kassoff came on, he was wharf's dad in the next generation. That's a fact he played that guy, but if we start saying things about how well, you know, as wharf's dad, he would have blah, blah, blah.

Yeah, totally. Totally.

Brent: Yeah. Yeah. So I think, I think that should be the, uh, the rule now, Jeff, that's actually gonna fall mostly on your shoulders cuz you got the buzzer button over there and you're just gonna have to determine in real time. Is it a fact or is it a buzzer? And, uh, you know, that's on

Jeff: you, my friend.

Yeah. And those real time decisions are gonna show why I don't pilot an aircraft or a star fury, for example. No. Hey,

Brent: you wanna know another reason why people need to go to our YouTube channel? What's that? So they can see your awesome star fury

Jeff: shirt.

Brent: Thing's pretty cool. Huh? I am loving the shirt. I wish they made one my size.

Jeff: They got, they got 'em on Etsy. Got this on Etsy. It was great. Uh, if I think about it, I'll link it in the, in the notes cuz the store's awesome. They got a lot of really cool stuff in there. You should do that. Yeah. Let's give 'em some love. Yeah, totally. Maybe they'll send us like a quarter for every shirt they sell.

Oh yeah. Be that's or just shirts. I'd be fine with more shirts.

Brent: That'd be cool too. Yeah. Hey, uh, Jeff, you know what we really like here along with our comments and stuff from people out there, we like our games, we like our games. Yep. We like our games. And one of the games that we like is where we get to the end of the episode.

And we guess what the next episode is gonna be about having absolutely zero knowledge of it, except for the title that we just learned then and there, the second half of that game is in the next episode, at this moment right here, where we try to remember what we said last week, this episode was gonna be about and we'll see how right we were or how utterly wrong we are, the vast majority of the time.

Except I think I'm bating like a thousand so

Jeff: far, or maybe like 300, but that's still great.

Brent: That's great. Maybe like eight 50, maybe like eight 50. Sure.

Jeff: sure. Jeff, do you 0 8 50

Brent: Jeff, do you remember what you said? You thought this episode, a distant star. What was it gonna be about? I

Jeff: do. I thought it was gonna be about like where the shadows come from and kind what's their makeup and mm-hmm what does it look like on that distant star that they're coming from?

And, well, there were kind of shadows in this one sorta, so I'm gonna give myself a 0.1 credit on this one.

Brent: I'm gonna give myself zero credit on this one, because I don't even know what I said. It was something ridiculous. And it had nothing to do with what this episode wound up being about when you, I wish I could tell you more.

I just remember, I remember even thinking it last week, like I had no idea.

Jeff: Right. That's kind of how I I'm gonna feel about the end of this one, by the way. Spoiler alert.

Brent: oh, I don't even, I don't, I don't know what the next episode's called yet. That's all right. We'll find out when we get that we'll find out.

Um, but yeah, basically I, I did not guess what this episode was gonna be about

Jeff: at all. But now we're gonna find out what this episode was about for those of you who haven't watched this in a long time. If you're not watching it all, or if you're watching along with us, Brent, why don't you tell us about this second season masterpiece of a distant star?

There's a little bit of sarcasm in that lead in, by the way.

Brent: well, Hey, who's ready for a new ship that we've never ever seen before. Those could be kind of cool. It's the EASs that I'm guessing that's earth force Alliance, ship Cortez, which is an Explorer ship kind of, sort of looks like a miniature Babylon five without most of the whole plating.

Just sort of a skeletal B on five is what it reminded me of.

And if you ask me, uh, it is coming to Babylon five, for what I shall say is, um, I don't know if this is a reference, cuz it's literally what they said a five year mission, what it

Jeff: was yeah, that's a fact.

Brent: It's captain is Jack Maynard. Who's a snarky old friend of Sheridan's who calls him a swamp rat. Now Maynard is shocked to learn that Sheridan is gonna settle for a desk job.

Hmm. That conversation also sounds familiar. And honestly, so is Sheridan and just four episodes in it has him rethinking if he really wants this job. And those things that we would normally say is like good leadership moments by Sheridan that we see throughout the episode. Well, really, it's just him being moody now and kind of a jerk more on that later.

What's really important here is that we have more news coming in from the rim. Maynard says that they basically saw a ghost ship out there, but only for a second, somehow they get to talking about spending time in hyperspace, which I guess is a thing in babble on vibe that you just spend time in hyperspace.

You don't just pop in and out and nothing can live in hyperspace. Right, right. Or can it okay. Well, while we think on that, let's check in with a couple of the B plots, just so we kind of know what's going on over there. Number one, the Menari are beginning to question. If the line is still minbar bar, the whole question's kind of left unsettled by the end of the episode, but we do get this awesome line from delin where she says that she is now more men Barry than she has ever been before.

I'm sure we'll get back to that in a future episode. The other B plot has Dr. Franklin putting the entire gang on the DVD cover, or at least the ones who show up in this episode anyway, on a diet that is until GU Baldi gives him some sob story about making really unhealthy food as a way to honor his dead father.

And Franklin's like, okay, just this once. And by the way, I'm coming with you because it sounds absolutely delicious. And I want dessert as well. Okay. All that's outta the way back to the Cortez, they finished their resupply and they're about to take off and wouldn't, you know, it they're out traveling in hyperspace.

Like we just learned that they do, and in explosion, rockets the ship and disables it, setting them a drift in hyperspace again, cuz you can just stay adrift in hyperspace and not fall out of it. Sure. Apparently there's some sort of hyperspace beacon out there and the Cortez is just drifting away from it.

Unable to find it. So Sheridan sends out a whole squadron of star theories who will act as a relay chain from the beacon to the Cortez. It works, but in doing so that ghost ship, which looks an awful, like, which looks an awful lot, like those ships that we're assuming are the shadows are causing a few of those star theories to be damaged.

The Cortez is forced to leave them behind. Upon hearing the news. Sheridan just begins sulking, and he goes over to the garden because he's lost the star Furies and their pilots and to Lynn meets him there and comforts him. Not in that way, guys. It's, it's all innocent. I promise. And in the end she reassures Sheridan that he is in fact in the right place.

He doesn't need to be going off anywhere else. Just stay right here. And right then one of the star theories with our new guy, Keer on board. Comes out of the jump gate, having regained control of his ship and dawning, uh, all the plot armor that he can muster he's saved and everyone on board is all excited and they're cheering.

And they're so excited that Ava named Keffer, the new leader of Zeta wing. So he now has a name and a job to justify him being in the opening credits and on the DVD cover, which I guess means we're just gonna be seeing more of him in the future. Well, that's pretty much it for the episode. It just ends with Garabaldi and Franklin Franklin.

It just ends with Garabaldi and Franklin indulging in that diet. And Sheridan's in much better spirits. And Keer saying he wants to track down that ship in the hyperspace corridor and it just ends sort of right there.

Why do you make me do these episodes?

Jeff: It's because I care that's it

Brent: really? I just thought it's cuz you

Jeff: don't wanna that. I didn't say what I cared about. did you know? So, uh, captain Maynard is played by Russ talin. Okay.

Brent: Did you please tell me I'm sorry, stop. Please tell me Russ Tamblin played like every tele right?

And star Trek ever.

Jeff: No, it's you're right. Sorry. I'm

Brent: just cause he looks like a teller, right? Just like he looks like a picky teller. Right? Does he not?

Jeff: He is like the prototype of that I? Okay. So dude, Russ tain. So let me set the stage. I'm watching this episode in preparation to come here and talk to you and all of our incredible viewers and listeners about it.

Mm-hmm I'm sitting next to my best friend, the love of my life, my wife, and she says. I thought the acting was supposed to get better in the second season. yeah, I'm thinking the same thing. So Russ talin was nominated for an academy award shut up. Yeah, no, he was not for best supporting actor in Peyton place in 1956 and won a golden globe for the most promising male newcomer.

Uh, the year before that. Well, I think he won the, or it was, nominat only for the Oscar in 57 and won the golden globe in 56. He's a golden, he's the most DEC one of the most decorated, if not the most decorated actor to Ben, Alabama, but he take like

Brent: 30 years off in between and tried to come back and he was like, I don't know, MJ coming back to baseball or whatever.

Well,

Jeff: he was also, uh, the kind of, so he was also on twin peaks and I think he was the doctor. Okay. Kind of the psychiatrist guy on twin peaks. Perfect role for this guy. I literally, I don't know anything about, about Babylon five or whatever. Uh, I thought to myself, wow, this guy's terrible. Is this JMS pulling, you know, like a, you know, Astan Lee kind of a thing, you know, or he's gonna be in the, oh no, this is an actual act.

Oh my God, this is an actor with a really, really long film. Oh my God. He's an award winning actor. Wow.

Brent: So, you know, I actually had that same thought cuz I was like, wow, are we still back in season one? All right. Cause let's just, let's say what it is Jeff season. Two's not off to a great start. No, it's not.

I, that first episode was really good. The second episode was kind of like, okay, fine. We're resetting stuff. I get it. Last week's episode was blah, this week's episode was block. Yeah. And if next week's episode is block. I'll just watch the next week's as well, but I, Ugh,

Jeff: but I won't be as happy about it. No, I

Brent: I'm mad at you.

I'm mad at you people out there right now. Cuz you told me it gets better and it's not. Sheridan's

Jeff: great. Sheridan's a, Sheridan is a breath of fresh air, but everything else around it, I'm just like, and they desperately, desperately want us to like Franklin. Like they are shoving him into everybody scene.

This episode

Brent: gave me hate him even more.

Jeff: This can I, well, I wanna read you my note on this one. I said Uhhuh, uh, gosh, where is it here? This is the moment that if I'm Sheridan, I go back and read the notes and I fire Franklin for the believers incident. Like this is the thing that pushes me over the edge.

Yeah.

Brent: well, I'm all. And look, here's the thing. I'm all four doctors, you know, trying to put their patients on diets and stuff. He did it to one guy and then started like. Exploding out with it. Like, dude just went on power trip and he just, you know, it, wasn't funny. I will, you know, what was funny? It actually made me laugh the scene where they're all sitting at the bar facing the camera mm-hmm and they're switching the things and Franklin comes by and they gotta switch the, I keep saying the things, they switch their plates, like to the food that each one wants mm-hmm , you know?

Yeah. And then Franklin comes by and says something and they all switch back and Sheridan takes a bite and he's just got lettuce leaves hanging out his mouth. That's great. It's hilarious. Comedy gold. That one moment. But the, yeah, I just, I, I'm not, I'm not for Franklin at all. I do wanted to go back to cuz this ties into the season four is not good so far.

And neither was these episode episode. That's what I meant. Episode four, season two, you go. Yeah, neither was this episode. Um, I did wonder at some point, if this guest actor, was it the guest actor or was it the writing of the script? Because I don't know that the script was helping them at all. Either DC font, maybe it's the script DC Fontana wrote this episode.

Shut up. No, she did not. She did. That is false. I refuse to believe that the great DC Fontana wrote this I'm crummy of an

Jeff: episode. I'm gonna play some hold music. And I want you to go online and look

Brent: Avalon five.

Jeff: Let's pull it up here.

Brent: Oh, shut up, dad. Gummit. Yeah. Right. Dad gummit. I'm like, you know what though? That's just because she was given an outline by JMS and she did the best she could. Maybe imagine how bad it would've been. If it wasn't DC Fontana. Yeah. That's a

Jeff: good point. I just, oh, I, um, yeah. It's like, you got a golden globe award winning Oscar nominated actor.

You've got DC Fontana and the most exciting thing about this whole episode is Bonna Kada. Is that what Vanya Kuda?

Brent: Well, I've never heard of that

Jeff: before in my life. I wanna try it. I'm not gonna lie.

Brent: I, yeah, it's

Jeff: fondue. Yeah. I'm not, absolutely. I'm not an anchovy guy. Like I've never been into that. This made me question that I'm like maybe, maybe I am an anchovy

Brent: guy and I just don't know.

I can, it, I can go without him. Yeah. Just make it without 'em. It's fine.

Jeff: Well then it's just literally butter and garlic, which, and oil that's the problem. Yeah. I guess you're right. What is the problem? half a, what is a half a gallon of butter or something like that? He said, that sounds

Brent: amazing. You know, just, uh, reasons are what they

Jeff: are a cool thing though.

Like with the, with the, um, I don't know, just like the whole setup, like the outline of this was I liked that introduction of the Explorer ship in that concept of like these, these little mini Babylon stations or whatever, go out, look at stuff. They build jump gates. And then the survey ships come like, oh, okay.

So that's how they discover the universe. I thought that was some pretty cool universe building.

Brent: I, I thought it, I thought the ship looked really cool. I, I was really excited when I saw the ship at the beginning of the episode, because I was like, Hey, we saw the Intrada come and drop off Sheridan a few episodes back mm-hmm I don't know if we're getting a new cast member or what, but the idea that we're with ships as they come in and out, not just dropping off passengers, but we're, you know, seeing what's happening with that.

Like, that's a really intriguing idea to me as we go out, that's not just star theories, right.

Jeff: That it expands the, the world, right? Like there's other shit. And we're getting doing other

Brent: things. We're getting to know more, uh, earth force Alliance people other than just our captain and, and garal and Ivan here.

So. I thought that was really cool. And then they barely did anything with it.

Jeff: Well, they just showed us it's a piece of garbage. Like it makes a hyperspace jump and it blows up.

Brent: Okay. Can we please talk about this? Yeah. Okay. Are we getting brand new rules of how hyperspace travel works from babble on five in, in this universe and what we've gotten in any other sci-fi show ever?

Jeff: I think some of the seeds were planted for this. So in, um, were they, yeah, so in, I think it was in, in points of departure when, um, Sheridan sent the laser little communication into hyperspace to get them in Barri, to come out and take out the ship. Right. You know, that mm-hmm, the whole thing where it cut off the engines or whatever he said.

He's like, yeah. I, I think they've been waiting in hyperspace for us. There was, oh, he did say that didn't he? And I think back in season one, there was something about, I think it was a Orlon ship. Um, but somebody, they had mentioned waiting in hyperspace, but, huh. So I think like this just expanded on that, right?

You go in there and it really, like, I was, I was a navigator on a, on a submarine in, in the Navy. So I get having like weird points of, you know, of reference to be able to, to locate yourself. This really made me think of like pre Magellan sailors, you know, going off, you know, DBC monsters here and stuff where they had very primitive navigation.

They could use the stars essentially, which, which is fine, but it's, I mean, it's not very exact, that's kind of what hyperspace is. We're at that point where I'm sure hyper space. Well, and also like, Hey, nothing can live in hyperspace, right? Which totally means things are things are living in hyperspace.

Yeah. That's gonna be an episode in the future. Here's the thing that lives in hyperspace, but there's this whole other world of hyperspace out there that has its own rules. And all we know are the beacons that we've set up on jump gates to kind of triangulate positions for,

Brent: because see, here's the thing, like the way I understand jump gates to work is they fold space.

Mm-hmm so when you take phase, you, you fold it and then you go through one and you come out on the other side. It's not really a corridor as much as you're folding space. So the, there there's nothing to live in. You don't stay in hyperspace. I'm not traveling through hyperspace. It's it's, it's there versus a wormhole.

Mm-hmm a wormhole, which actually is a tube is a corridor that creates now maybe somebody out there is commenting right now, but in Babylon five, the jump gates create a wormhole between them. Okay, cool. What happens when the wormhole is. Dee

Jeff: established, right? Yeah. You know what I mean? Mm-hmm

Brent: we shut off the jump gate, you know what I mean?

That's where, yeah. I don't, where were like, is this a whole other dimension?

Jeff: That's what I think it is. People live in. So there's folding space, which is how they travel in Doune, which literally is like bringing space together and just like, there's no travel that happens. You're here. And then you're here and that right.

Brent: That's the way it works in battle star Galactica

Jeff: too, by the way, right. With the jumps, right? Yeah. Yep. Boom. They just they're right there in, uh, in star wars. I used to think forever that hyperspace was a speed. I remember being a kid and play with my millennium, Falcon and being, you know, being like, I'm gonna go to hyperspace six because, right, right, right.

You know, and, and, but no, it's just hyperspace. And as I was doing a little, like going down my rust Hamlin rabbit hole I looked up hyperspace on Wikipedia on the star wars, Wiki, Wikipedia. Yeah. You didn't know that. I've

Brent: never heard of that before. I can, honestly, I don't think I've ever looked up star star wars and Wikipedia.

Jeff: Oh, wow. Yeah. I, I spent a lot of time there. Okay, cool. It's called. It's

Brent: called Wikipedia. It makes all the sense of the

Jeff: world. Yeah, exactly. It's great. Yeah. But hyperspace in that world is also another dimension that they, they enter and it's just a Bloss, like things move at a different rate. You know, geography is not quite the same.

And so I think Babylon five is similar to jump gate, opens a door to this other dimension, this hyperspace dimension.

Brent: Oh, you're you're like living in the Meial network. Yeah,

Jeff: exactly. Without the instantaneous for you have to, you have to actually travel through hyperspace.

Brent: See that just, I don't, I don't like that.

I, it just, it just, I accepted that. That's the way it works in this world, but on a. Okay, great. I'm gonna apply physics and science and stuff to, to how this works. Like I just, that breaks every rule of how I understand hyperspace and, and gate travel and whatever to work like fine. I mean, or, or are they just dropping into fluidic space?

Right.

Jeff: You're just going,

Brent: this is I'm I'm it's, it's either, it's either fluidic space and this is species 8, 4 7 2, or this is where it is from.

Jeff: Wow. Yeah. Cuz down here, everything floats. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. I'm glad you got that reference. Yeah, the, uh, I I've heard a lot of people on YouTube and even on Twitter, talk about one of JMS kind of guiding principles and putting babble on five together was that we weren't going to solve problems with techno B.

Right. It's things that we're gonna solve problems by doing things. And we're not gonna like throw all this weird mumbo jumbo, even if it's rooted in reality science stuff at things. Well, okay. I present to you in direct, direct, contrary, you know, direct opposition to that statement, a distant star. Like this is, yeah, this is the most convoluted techno blah, blah, blah, of how stuff, like, I think I can piece the stuff together in my head of it, but right.

I'm making stuff up here to make it make any sense to me.

Brent: Yeah. Yeah. I, yeah. You either have to explain, like, that's the thing, you've got to explain how the rules of your world work or stick with the rules that are established elsewhere. Yeah. You know, like it take time. Anybody goes into any kind of time travel episode.

What do you know? You can't interact with your past self. You can't go in and change the past or else that could have paradoxical effects. You, you, we know all of this, right? Like those are the rules, unless you can. Yeah. And you're changing the rules of how time travel works for the story. And you just explain that to us, right?

Like you, you need to do that. Okay. Jeff, I don't wanna sit here and bore all the listeners with me just going on. I don't like how he did this. This is how it works in Babylon five hyperspace is a thing where things can exist at and B. So let's talk about, from a story perspective, cuz really that I think as far as forwarding the story, like that's the thing we learned is something is living in hyperspace.

We assume it's whatever the SHA again, I'm leaning towards the shadows are an organization, not this weird. Conglomeration of just bad stuff that's about to happen. Right. Mm-hmm like, I, I think that's kind of where we both are. They were not on the rim. And then all of a sudden they are on the rim. So maybe they've been living in hyperspace for a while and maybe that's why they get fuzzy or so I don't, I don't entirely know, but apparently that's where something is.

How do we feel about that? That there are just hanging out in hyperspace, shooting people as they go by. Like, I

Jeff: don't know, you know what I mean? Like, I, I, I don't have any feelings like, to me, this literally just presented two facts that hyperspace works sort of the way it does and what we assume are the shadows also use it.

Like, that's it. Yeah. It's just like, I don't have a feeling about that. It's like, okay, apparently that's a thing.

Brent: And it honestly, like, I, it kind of just makes me angry. Like I'm like.

Jeff: Well, I think between the last episode and the tech, like, and literally just kind of being like, Hey, here's some stuff and nothing.

And then this one being like, well, there's not even really stuff, but also nothing. it's like, what, what, what is happening here? I, I don't think I don't. So I, maybe the shadows went into hiding or whatever in hyperspace. I think there's some other, something in hyperspace.

Brent: It's it? It'ss sleeping. It's been sleeping and now it's

Jeff: awake.

Penny wise is coming, coming back. There it is. It's been a couple hundred years now, maybe Sheridan, right? He's he's a descendant of those kids. This is a direct tie. This is a direct, there you

Brent: go. Hit. There you go. I like it. This that's that's the theory of the show right there, right? Yeah. It all, it's better be the highlight for the week.

Sheridan is a descendant of the kids from it. I like it. Literally

Jeff: the, the series ends with JMS shaking, Stephen King's hand, like that's the end. there you go.

Brent: There you go. So, I mean that basically like that's the oomph of this episode. Yeah. Okay. So something's there. Awesome. Okay. There's you go in hyperspace too?

Well, I don't wanna get back into all that.

Jeff: Yeah. I think those were the jump gates, but yeah.

Brent: So you have to like, I mean, are these like fireplaces on the flu network? Like you gotta travel to a certain one and pop out at that one,

Jeff: unless you have the capability of making your own. Cause that's what I think you

Brent: don't connect between two specific jump gates. You go into a weird thing and then like, there's the room spinning?

Uh, let's go through that one over

Jeff: there. Yeah. Almost out. Is that like, I, I, the way I understood the Cortez talking about just the random, huge explosion that was massive and almost killed everybody that, right. Like what the, I kept waiting for like some home guard, you know, or, or. Terrorist attack thing that, Nope, just a, just a crappy ship falling apart.

like, wow.

Brent: But I mean, it's an old ship it's been out there on a five year mission.

Jeff: You know what I mean? It just got replenished and looked at like, it should be in decent shape, but either way. So that happens. And what I understood is that first Maynard was like, well, let's just open a gate and get outta here.

Like let's just leave. And they're like, we can't, we don't have the power to do it. We don't have the power to maintain our position. I don't know. I don't know. But I do, I do wanna talk about Sheridan and what Sheridan went through. Cuz I, I thought that

Brent: was I'm sorry. Can I interrupt you real quick? Yeah, because I actually had a note from last week's episode about Sheridan that I wanted to share and I completely forgot, but it comes back around in this episode.

Okay. Yeah. Do it, do it. So in the last episode, Sheridan meets up with his sister. Right. And his, his sister says was that two episodes ago now? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So that's when it was, so this was two episodes ago. and she says to him, oh, you've gained weight. And his response is like, well, you know, when I got here, I looked at the hydroponics farm and uh, just couldn't know myself and I'm going, and they said it in this episode, cuz Sheridan's getting his physical mm-hmm and, and dude's like, yeah, you've gained 10 pounds to Sheridan.

And I'm like, dude, if Sheridan gained 10 pounds, that's a good thing. Right. For that cat . Cause he was too thin. He needed some muscle. Like, because you don't come in and go get stuff outta the hydroponics farm and gained 10 pounds. That's not the stuff you're getting. He went in and he liked the mangoes and the oranges.

Yeah. And that stuff. And that's what you're arguing about. Right. No.

Jeff: yeah, the most weight I ever lost in my life healthily was eating nothing but raw fruits and vegetables for a month. Like, you're gonna shed weight doing that. And that's what he is been doing. He's been eating this incredible healthy food

Brent: and somehow he gains 10 pounds.

That means he was under fed. Yeah. He was

Jeff: scurvy. He was scurvy bound, right?

Brent: yes. Maybe I should try just raw fruits and vegetables. That's

Jeff: all you ate. Yeah, it's called the raw food diet. It's uh, there's a lot of rules around it as there often are, but they're pretty simple. You don't cook anything. It's raw fruits, raw vegetables, raw nuts.

It's not easy, but the cool thing with it is you can literally eat all that you want there. It's not possible to fill up on it or to, to over overdo it. You'll just use the bathroom more. Okay.

Brent: Interesting. Do you get like salad, dressings

Jeff: and stuff? You can make salad dressings. Um, you can't get anything cuz like they'll have, you know, cooked eggs in them or whatever.

So you'd have to make like pestos and um, Okay, different green things that you could, you know, blend up a little bit to dress. I did, I did a lot of salsa. Like I'd do up these really fun salsas and then, oh yeah, I chip, instead of that would, would be, instead of chips, I'd eat 'em with either, uh, sliced cucumber or celery sticks worked pretty well.

Interesting. I, that was the best thing I ever did. It was really hard to stick with though, but I lost almost 20 pounds in a month. I felt better. I was sleeping like by the end of the month, I was only sleeping like five or six hours a night and I felt incredible, incredible. Like, it was awesome.

Brent: I wish I had the willpower.

Why did I ever go off of that? Yeah. Right. That's that's the, you gotta stick with it thing, right? Yeah, exactly. But you feel great. You feel great. All right. Anyway, back to this, um, you were saying about that's that's all. That was my thing. I had to point out about sharing. Like he gained 10 pounds.

Jeff: Really it's it's a good thing.

Like let the dude, let the dude have a little bit and Franklin again, just needs to lay telling Ivanova to put weight on

Brent: dude who, okay. Listen, this dude went Dr. Bashier cringe big. I dunno how, I don't know how many I'm up to right now, but I don't care. He went Dr. Basher cringe. She's like she says this line.

It was actually fun. It turns out I am the, the expanding Russian frontier and he goes, yeah, but with very nice borders.

Jeff: Yeah. That was I'm like uncool dude. cool.

Brent: Great pickup line. If you are actually trying to engage her and she hasn't just completely rebuffed you and said no, like, like, or if you're already in a relationship with her, like

Yeah, but outside of that, like,

Jeff: dude really wouldn't season one of VVA though. Like bite his head off for that.

Brent: Oh, she would've ripped his skull off and used it for a chamber pot.

Jeff: Exactly. Like, again, I, I, she was more herself in this one than she has been, but again, like, it's, there's just a real change in her.

And I don't know if that's, uh, yeah.

Brent: Quick question. Why was she with a cane? I completely forget. She

Jeff: broke her foot in the draw fight. Oh, that's right. That's

Brent: right. That's right. Okay. Oh, cool. To see them carrying that over. Yeah. You were gonna talk about Sheridan. I keep interrupting you. I'm gonna stop.

Jeff: That's fine. It's good stuff though. I, I, I liked the questioning of stuff. I thought that was an important like character moment for him with Sinclair. It made some sense, you know, like they really explained why he was put into that position for Sheridan kind of wasn't no, it's the president wants him there.

Okay. And he's been talking every, like, when he talked to his. when he talked to, um, uh, stinky as they called him, you know, he's like, no things are great here. Every day is a new, like he's trying to justify and convince himself. He likes this job. And I, and I thought that was cool. Having, having taken jobs in my life that were not what I thought they were gonna be.

That's a real, that's a real thing you go through and just kind of arguing with yourself a little bit. Like, is this really what I want, do I want, is this good for my career,

Brent: but okay. I wanna come back to this just real quick. I just got an alert. I noticed am I all blurry and fuzzy to you?

Jeff: You are all blurry and fuzzy.

Okay.

Brent: My apologies to you folks out there at YouTube audio people won't care, but you guys do, and I care about you, Jeff. I'm going to refresh my screen because I think that's gonna fix it and I will be right back. And I wanna pick up exactly where you left off of talking about, um, Sheridan and not sure he's where he wants to be.

Perfect.

Jeff: We'll see you short.

Oh, my goodness. Now it's just you and me. How you doing YouTube? I have really been enjoying our conversations about cover tunes. So let's those happened a while ago. They keep popping up. Let's keep that going. Hey, you look a lot better.

Brent: Better. Okay. Lot. Sorry about that guys. Uh, like I said, I care about you guys and I, I, as soon as I realized that that was, I, hopefully that wasn't happening for too long.

It's always hard

Jeff: to tell too, cuz like we don't like, you know what I see isn't necessarily reality. Yeah. It's yeah, yeah,

Brent: exactly. Anyway, it's video stuff, but what it is, I, what, it, you, you see yourself as perfectly clear all the time as do I mm-hmm but if you go fuzzy, I'll see it, but you won't. Yeah. And if I go fuzzy, you see it, but I don't.

So, um, but you are

Jeff: fuzzy again. Am I fuzzy again? Yeah. And actually worse than you were,

Brent: is it really?

I'm sorry, YouTube. Like we're literally in the middle of the show and this is not. What is my Internet's weird today. Internet is weird. I've got one more possible fix. Okay. Give me just a second.

Jeff: We can look at all. Brent's cool stuff back there. Hey, he's still got the baby on five thing there. Hasn't sent that to wash that's

or not to watch, but to TK, uh, watch the guy who made it. Oh my gosh. Hm. Yeah. Well, look at that. Interesting. Gotcha. Got ya. I have a cool reference. I want to get in here. I'm gonna share it with you YouTube. Just in case we don't get to it, but, uh, it's the guy who played, um, Orwell, Orwell, the guy who, um, smuggled in the Bo Bonko stuff.

Anybody on YouTube. See the movie Johana, man. It's okay. You can raise your hand. You can tell me, I worked at the movie theater when that movie came out. So I had to see it. And I was one of about six people that saw that thing. But I knew, I recognized that guy from somewhere,

he kind of reminded me of, um, and he red dwarf red dwarf fans out there. That's a fun, that's a really fun show in fact back. Oh man, it would've been just a little while after this episode aired. So like in 96 ish, I think I was in this, um, Rock band, just kind of a rock band outta San Diego were called full stop.

It was really cool. But when we recorded our record, we recorded this really cool studio in Escondido, but we watched a ton of red dwarf during that time. But when I was watching that episode, I'm like, see, he just really, I don't know if it's that, but then I went and looked him up. I'm like, oh my gosh, he's from that movie.

So go ahead, raise your hand. If you're a Giana man, viewer or a red dwarf fan,

and now I have Brent back and I think he might be frozen. This is fun. It's a fun thing.

Oh, you're not seeing this. So we have a little control. There's three of you. There's two of you. One of me. I got you down on the bottom there twice. Yeah.

Brent: That'll that happens. Okay. Is this better? That is better. Okay. Hopefully it stays this way and doesn't think out on. Should be okay

Jeff: so far so good. Hey, real quick note.

Notice you still have the babble on five station back there on the bookshelf. You need to get that in the mail. I need an address. He hasn't sent it not yet. Oh, okay. Okay. Not yet. Fair enough. Yeah. Fair enough. Fair enough.

Brent: I will get it in the mail soon as, uh, the person who won it, send I forget who it was at this point.

Cool, cool. It's been a few weeks.

Jeff: I'll ping

Brent: him. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, that being said, um, again, YouTube, my apologies. This is not the sort of show I prefer to send out there, but whatever. Maybe we'll edit this. Maybe we'll edit this particular video. you know what,

Jeff: though? This, this really shows your dedication, right?

How much

Brent: you care? I do. I care. I care. I care. Cuz I don't want you to sit there and look at somebody fuzzy all day long. You're fuzzy again. There's it's gotta be upstream on my internet. Yeah. That that's that's that's all that it can be. I've I've done everything I can on this side to, uh, crank it down.

Um, like I'm hard. I'm, you know, I'm hardwired in I'm I'm everything

Jeff: it'll work. It'll work. We can do what we almost did before and just slap a technical difficulties thing up over you. Yeah, we

Brent: could, it should be back to normal now though. Oh, maybe not. Maybe. I don't know.

Yeah, I guys, we're just gonna have to continue the show and please accept my apologies. You tried hard. When that came. I tried, I very much tried. Sheridan Sheridan, what were we saying? Were we saying about

Jeff: it was great? You know, it's good to question, right? I've had those jobs where you question is this the right thing for me?

Should I stick around?

Brent: Right. So I was a little torn on this storyline for Sheridan because we're four episodes in and he's already going, oh, should I stay? Or shouldn't I, oh, should I go? Or shouldn't I, and there's one point where you're kind of like, okay, he's still early. He hasn't really settled in yet.

And he's met somebody and he's been questioning, or he's starting to question whether I should, like, I get that from a logistical, real life standpoint, from an entertainment standpoint, I don't want my brand new show, lead questioning this four episodes in. If he's gonna question, he needs to question like episode.

Maybe episode three, you know what I mean? Yeah. Like in those early, early, early episodes, that's where I want my question again. This far in this should be a settled deal for him, or this is something that gets brought up in season three or four or five right down the road where he is like, exactly, exactly.

So I just, this particular storyline just didn't do much for me. Like, but in a way it kind of annoyed me, which was really this episode

Jeff: in a way though, isn't this kind of the third episode, like points of departure and was what was the next one? Geometry of shadows was, or I think revelations was the second one revolutions.

Yeah. Like there were kind of one, like there were two parts of the same episode, which were second parts to Chrysalis, you know? Yeah.

Brent: I mean, if you wanna get technical about it, like he needed to have this conversation while he was having the conversation about his wife. Okay. You know what I mean? Like it just I'm I'm as a viewer, I'm not interested in Sheridan going through this right now.

Jeff: I liked what it did for IVA though. Like she called him out, right. She's like, yeah. President puts you here. Cool. If I'm your XO, if there's a problem, you tell me right here right now. And I like, I've been talking about how she hasn't she's been different or whatever that was Ivanova right there. You know, hair's a problem.

I'm gonna confront it head on.

Brent: And I had, I, I, the note I actually had about that was right now, Avan us seems like a better co than Sheridan does. Wow. Well, yeah, because I mean, because of that, like, look, I need to know if you can do this great. If not fine, I'm gonna get somebody and move in, you know? But like Sheridan's going through and, and he's talking to Aldi, Aldi's like, look, you wanted to be kept informal.

What's going on at the station. He's like, yeah, but not that mm-hmm which on a leadership level, there's a Y yes, I do wanna know what's going on, but I want you to handle your stuff first and just tell me in the debrief. I don't need a minute, my minute update of the minutia. Right? Like I get that. But the way he handled it, who's just moody.

Yeah. And you know, I was like, ah, I, I just didn't appreciate those pieces too much. The

Jeff: first time, first time I watched the episode first, while that was happening, I was like, yeah, like totally define those things you need to be updated on. Right. What, what, what do you need to be informed about what do you need to be, you know, brought into the decision making.

Yeah, that's great. And then when he just kinda like shut Gary Baldy down, I was like, whoa, like, where'd this come from? But then the second time I watched it and had the bigger context, I was that, that, that scene, wasn't there to show that he was a trusting hands off manager. That scene was there to show, stop bugging me with this petty stuff that you know, this or the delegations that don't want to have their rooms next to each other, man.

So I, I think it was all just meant to build that frustration that he's been experiencing. I think that they damaged him as a leader a little bit in doing that, in my opinion. I did love though, Bruce box Lightner, you know, the actor, his acting when Keer at the end, came through the jump gate. Like that was sheer, pure unadulterated joy on yeah.

You know? Yes. Like I, I get it. He's led crews. He's lost people. That's a thing that he knows, but there's, he's in a weird head space and this is a dangerous mission and all this stuff. So he is, you know, he is taken the loss of the star fur, uh, pilots hard. So when Keer came through, I, I, I, I loved that scene.

Like that moment was just like, yeah, that's cool.

Brent: I, I really like that moment, except frankly, with Keer I have almost no connection to this cat yet.

Jeff: I, I have nothing now is a commander. Apparently

Brent: I, well, he was like second in command of a particular wing. Z. Is this the new wing that the president delivered way back in that one episode a while ago?

Is that what Zeta wing is? Okay. did he show up with that wing? And we just met him or like, I need something on this guy, cuz he just shows up he's in the opening credits and he's having dinner with the people on the DVD cover, like who is this guy? Like? And, and, and like, yes, I thought that moment was well acted that you talked about Jeff, but I didn't share in that joy because I was like, I wasn't concerned for him.

Like he could have died and I would've been just fine from a viewer standpoint. Mm-hmm cause he's not a guy that I'm following. He's a red shirt.

Jeff: Well, he, he was, um,

you're over

Brent: I'm using your I'm still, I'm not even bargaining, not even just stealing yours now just taking

Jeff: them. But no, I, I don't think he cared that it was Keer like in my head it was just somebody made it back. Right.

Brent: It's a guy under my command and I care about the people under my command, even if I don't know who they are.

Yeah. Cool. I get that. But as a viewer, knowing that this guy is supposed to be a thing, and this is the episode, you know, Ivanova says to him afterwards, like, Hey, I've decided to name you the leader of Zeta wing. Mm-hmm cool. What about alpha beta gamma. Delta EPON yeah. Before you get to Zeta yeah. Zeta's like the sixth letter in the alphabet

Jeff: and the other guy, Galles gales, they call it was commander.

Is, is it the same level of commander or is it like flight wing commander or? I thought I had a handle on the ranks until today. You know, I'm just like what? Yeah,

Brent: I don't know. So, but I mean, apparently this guy's gonna be a thing. Yeah. He's a guy. Okay. I guess. Sure. I just, I need to connect with him if they want me to care about him, I need, and they need to make me care about him.

The only other thing I really had out of this episode, Jeff, that I want to discuss personally is delin. Yeah. Now she had all of two and a half minutes in this entire episode, but I thought they were probably the most intriguing two and a half minutes of the entire episode. We see her talking to one of the other Sati.

One of

Jeff: yeah. Tyran, I think is she said his name

Brent: was yeah. One of the gray council and you know, and he just tells her, and I don't even know if it was great council as much as just somebody who's on the station. Um, but he is like the people here on the station, the men bar in the station are asking if you are still men Barri.

Yeah. Is it appropriate for you to still be the ambassador of men bar? Because you might not be one of us and her line is I'm more Mumbar now than I ever was before.

Jeff: Yeah. I'm more one of us. Yeah. Yeah.

Brent: What is, does that mean? Yeah, what I that's, I wanna explore that. I don't know that we have enough information to do it, but that's a cool line.

Jeff: It's a cool line, but it makes no sense. I was so on Toron side, you can't just go through this thing, lie to everybody and say, you did it with the blessing of your government. When people know you did not do it with the blessing of your government. Right. And then just walk around, like, like it's not a big deal.

What, what she did is supposed to be a really big deal of some kind, but I don't know anything about. What I know is that, um, I, I don't like her look when she was minbar Dalen, the makeup gave her like this mystique, this something now Uhhuh, she looks like a defiant petant teenager who like sticks her chin out and is just kind of arrogant about I'm more this than you could.

What is that? Even who

Brent: are you and her head? Who are you her head piece instead of looking attached to her? Cause we've always debated, like, is that a part of their physiology or is it like a thing this really just like, it just looks like a thing that she's wrapped around the back of her head. Well, I, I was looking at, which I know is what it is in real life, but still like, I'm like, how did she

Jeff: brush her hair?

Like, clearly it starts at the top of her head and as long and goes down, how did she brush it with that thing? I just, cause it clearly looks brushed. It's

Brent: very well styled. I I'm not even joking about that. Like it clearly looks brushed

Jeff: really? Yeah. But yeah, I, I was totally on Turon side and I feel like.

I mean, it's still only the fourth episode and only the second one that she, or, or the, the, yeah, the third one where she's been out of the cocoon, but mm-hmm, I, at this point don't care that she's changed. All it has done is made her less, uh, interesting to me and, and made her not, um, she doesn't have that air of wisdom anymore.

Now she has an air of arrogance that I just don't

Brent: like, and I think you're right. It's cause we don't know what's going on with her. Yeah. And I get it. Mm-hmm there's people out there. That's how it's supposed to be. You're gonna figure that out. Okay, cool. But right now my experience is, eh, yeah. And

Jeff: also we're gonna figure it out if I'm the great council.

The lens already on my bad side. Right. We still haven't decided if we're gonna not only kick her out of the gray council, but if we're gonna let her stay as part of Menari society, you know, I mean, that's where she got left in that whole thing. Then she goes and does this whole thing, how, how is she still acting in any official capacity?

Yeah, she's

Brent: got like, you, you take her out, even if you just say it's just temporary till we figure some stuff out, you pull her out, you, you let lair take the lead or you put somebody else in there. That's fine. And you let her sort through her stuff. Mm-hmm cause she's had a big thing going on,

Jeff: but she's wanting to talk about like some sector, 19 stuff or whatever, and like, just get back to work and do business.

It's like, no, look at you. You've changed the entire game of who you are and potentially what's happening in the galaxy. You don't get to just call a council meeting after

Brent: we told you not. Exactly. Yeah. Explicitly. Yeah. Now there's another line that I think goes back to this, that I think it was Sheridan and Sinclair or not Sinclair.

Um, Ivanova maybe, but they said, uh, talking about delin, they said, uh, you know, all that we know about what's happened to delin is what she's told us. And, you know, the Imbar like with their truth, like they tell us what they tell us, but it's never the whole truth. So my question is, is what is the's whole truth?

Because she says I'm more one of us now than I've ever been before. I think what that means. I, I think what we're too interpret is she has gone full, like Halfman bar half human, which

Jeff: she sees as Fullman she's yeah. She's Fullman bar now, like that's the.

Brent: or, or that both Mumbar and humans are evolving together to become this thing.

Mm-hmm and she is literally, I am more one of us cuz I am everything. Yeah. More than you guys are like, I'm more advanced than you. I'm a little ascended and you haven't like, like that's what I kind of feel. And they haven't told us that yet, but that is the intriguing part of this whole piece

Jeff: to me. Yeah.

It's keeping, um, it's keeping us on the line. Right? Like I'm interested. I still wanna know. I just, my, my problem with the outside of like, I don't like the makeup. I don't like the way it carries her now, but for me, just, just from a how stuff works thing again, it, it, it's ridiculous that she's still able to keep her job through this.

Like that's just, that is of everything that we talked about with hyperspace and everything else. That's the thing in this episode that I'm like, all right, I'm out. Nope. It takes you out. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not buying this at all. Yeah.

Brent: Well with all of that,

Jeff: Jeff. Well, even before that, cuz she had the other piece with Sharon and at the end right where she talked.

Oh yeah, yeah. I know we're star stuff. Right? That's cool. I thought that was neat. I liked her take on it that we're the universe trying to figure itself out. Like I thought that was cool, but this was word for word. Not only Carl Sagan in his book cosmos mm-hmm two weeks in a row. I'm so excited. I get to quote another rush song here because Neil PT said it even better.

He says I am made from the dust of the stars and the oceans flow in my veins. I look down into a million houses and wonder what you're doing tonight. That's from Presto, beautiful song. But great. Here I am trying to make, and maybe this is me like coloring it because I don't, I don't like the way they're portraying her right now.

But look how. Wise, I am talking about the stars and star stuff. Yeah. That book came out in like, what was like 1979 or 19 eight people know about Carl. Sagans this isn't new wisdom you're dropping to like right. Rush. Wrote a song about it. We're there it happened. I don't know. It was cool. It was neat. It was interesting.

Also a little ridiculous.

Brent: Oh, can I talk about a little ridiculous? little ridiculous on you, Jeff. This will be my final one. Get your buzzer ready. This is final one.

Jeff: This is my final one because this, I think that this is it. This is number six. So I'll

Brent: here you go. You're right. I've just used em, all. I don't care.

All here we go. Um, the blo with a dude trying to go out and find all the little parts for the oh yeah. Alava whatever thing it is. I'm sitting there going, this is a fantastic episode for the NOJ consortium. Yes.

Jeff: I have a little bit of trivia on that guy. Also, I was talking to the YouTube crew about it.

While you were fixing your camera in 2000, how that didn't work. Right. In 2002, there was an epic, epic film that was released. I was working at the movie theaters when it came out. So I had to watch it and maybe like six other people ever watched it. Mm-hmm but it was called Johana, man. Do you know this movie?

Johana,

Brent: man, I remember hearing about it. I never saw it, but I do. I am aware of the existence

Jeff: of this movie. Do not ever see it. Do not ever watch it. There's okay. You could. Yeah. There's anything is a better use of your time but okay. but, uh, Miguel Nuez Jr. Who's the person who played the, the guy, I think his name was Orwell.

Um, okay. At least based on the credits that came through that he played, he played Joana man. Like he was okay. He was the ball player in there and it was killing new while I was watching. I'm like, I know I recognize this guy from somewhere and. There you go. Little piece of trivia.

Brent: All right, there you go.

Um, alright Jeff, well, I think we have officially reached that part of the show where it's time to boil it all down and see if the show has any of that star Treky quality to it that we talk about. Maybe it's got a deep moral message. Is there something in there? Does it give us a hope of the future? Hold up a mirror to society.

Is it asking us a question to consider and grapple with? Uh, so with that, Jeff, um, I am going to rate this episode on a scale of zero to five deltas as to how star Trek this episode is, but that's not gonna leave you sitting there not doing anything because you, my friend are gonna get to rate this episode on a scale of 0, 2, 5 star theories as to just how much you enjoyed this episode.

I shall go first.

Jeff: All right,

Brent: let's do it. Um, taking my, my.

Fandom hat off for a moment. Cause I, I clearly think I'm a fan of Babylon five. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. And trying to put on, we are at this point, right? I think it's we're fans of the show, right? I'm wearing a star

Jeff: fairy t-shirt right now. Well, you

Brent: listen, when you wear the t-shirt of the band that you're going to go see you are clearly a fan of that band.

Clearly you should never do that though. Anyway. So it says Jeremy P uh and uh, so putting on my, my analytical hat that I've gained as a star Trek podcaster, and I'm, I'm looking for those messages that are in here. And the only one that I find goes back to the conversation we were just having with the Lynn of what does it mean to be more wa more than ever before yourself when you have fully evolved, however, They have given us zero information on what's actually going on.

So I can't count that. So this one gets no deltas. I find DC Fontana. Let me down. Yeah, I love you, Dorothy, but this one, let me down, I'm just going to assume that this was the episode you were assigned by JMS and not your own, cuz I maybe, maybe I was just so in shock by the weird hyperspace rules that I missed it, but this one gets no deltas from me.

I don't find anything star Treky about this at all. I can't

Jeff: argue with that at all. Both times I watched it. I couldn't find anything. And you and I actively look for these things, you know, I mean, yes, in the first season, like we were even accused of like digging, you know, and like trying to find things cuz that's what we do.

Star theories. Did you, um, did you ever see, we were talking before we went on Mike about Disney mm-hmm stuff. Yes. Did you ever see the 1979 Disney joint? The black hole? I saw the black

Brent: cauldron, but I've never seen the black hole.

Jeff: So it came out in 79. It was very much in response to star wars when it came out, it's worth watching.

When I was a kid, like a little kid, I loved the movie. It's got these cool little robots that like float around. Uh, one I think was called Vincent and I forget the other one, uh, Roddy McDowell, not Roddy. McDowell. Yeah. Maybe. I don't know either way, some great voice acting some, some really cool stuff. They had these, um, cool like guns that you held in the middle and had two blasters on the sides.

And I don't know, it was just a cool thing. I watched it not too long, actually with Disney plus I watched it on Disney plus and it's like a 15 minute long movie stretched out. Okay. To the longest hour and a half I have ever experienced in my life. okay. That's this episode, like, I, I was so thankful that the food plan diet stuff, this, that was there to, to break up the excruciating story that literally just told us, Hey, Hey, remember shadows?

Yeah. They're in the rim. They use hyperspace. This other guy kind of saw one of 'em. So there's that? I, um, I liked the star theory. That's it? I liked the star fury stuff. I really liked that. Like telescoping, Daisy chain thing. They did. Sure. And DC Fontana did write it. I want to come from the place that DC, that Dorothy saved this episode, that this would've been an abomination without her mm-hmm

So with, with kind of all that, I I'm, I'm gonna give this one half of a star theory.

Brent: I mean, my question, when you just said that was, did she save it? Okay. Here's a, I would not say this episode was an abomination. Oh exactly. This is not the first 27 minutes of the episode infection. agree. Okay. This is not soul hunter, but this is not it's it's it's not, maybe that's what, maybe that was my problem.

This wasn't a bad episode. It was a blah episode. There's just nothing to it.

Jeff: If this episode, we don't know what we don't know, but at this point, if this episode did not air, nothing would change. I feel like we could watch techno ages and jump right into the next episode and not have missed a beat,

Brent: man. I want techno ages back and I need, 'em a great episode.

I need 'em in a great episode. All right, Jeff. Well, that's it. We've got deltas. We've got star furries. We've got one more thing we gotta do. We do well, two more things, actually. I guess two more things we gotta do before we get outta here, Jeff. Uh, one more, one more thing about this particular episode before we get off of it, we are now in season two, ranking our episodes.

It's kind of like we did in the season. One wrap up episode. This is gonna be our absolute 100% completely accurate definitive ranking of Babylon five. In this case, Babylon five, season two. Currently our ranking stands at points of departure, geometry of shadows and revelations. Jeff, this is your week. I get no say in it.

Where do you put in our rankings? It's gonna be a top four episode, a distance star.

Jeff: This gonna be a top four episode for two weeks, the top five episode for two weeks. and it's gonna go, uh, right after revelations in number four. I don't think I disagree. Yeah. I would rather, I would rather watch Sinclair and his sister than this episode again, Sheridan and his sister.

Yes. Sheridan. Oh my gosh. Wow. Mm-hmm I, I did that. I was gonna say Freudian slip, but maybe it's a Franklin slip. There you go. I don't know. Well, that's it for a distant star next week, next week, Brent, we, so we guess what the next episode is gonna be based on the title alone. We don't look at pictures, summaries, anything.

The next episode is called the long dark. So based on that title alone, the long dark, Brent, what do you think it's gonna be about?

Brent: Well, I feel like I've been in the long dark for these last three episodes. Wow.

The long dark.

If this was an, if this was a show that featured a ship, traveling through space, this would be one of those episodes where like they enter like a void type area and they're like alone. Mm-hmm right. Um, I feel like I'm not gonna tell you what this episode's gonna be about, but I feel like this is one of those episode titles that is very apropo to the episode, but you only get it after you've seen the episode.

Does that make sense? Makes total sense? Um, I like, so you like, you can't, you can't hear it and guess what it's actually gonna be about, but when you see it on the backside, it does make sense. But here's what I will say, cuz I, I, I, I hate to leave it wishy wash. I'm gonna give it this definitive piece. Okay.

Sometimes you hear an episode title and you're like, yeah, I have no idea what that's about. And then you watch the episode and you go, that episode was neither about a parliament or about dreams. That title made no sense whatsoever. I will say that by the time we get to the end of the episode, the long dark will make complete sense.

Okay. It's not gonna be any question what it means, what it's referencing, what it's alluding to. That will be, that'll be the definitive thing that I say that if I'm wrong, I'm wrong. And then I don't think I'm wrong. Like we will know exactly what it means only after we watch the episode. Okay.

Jeff: I'm gonna steal a page from your book.

On my guess, personnel on the station are forced to shelter in brown sector for eight days while a space storm of some kind passes by. Things are a little uncomfortable down there, you know, but they're generally okay. Until the most recent people that have come onto the station start acting a little suspicious.

Ultimately it's gonna bring everyone a little closer together and the episode's gonna end with a movie night.

Brent: At least they're not up in like in a cell tube or something. Exactly.

Jeff: I mean, what it's I feel like infection. Right? What else could it have possibly been, except for, do you infect that's this, this is, yeah, this is the, the starless void of space.

This is them. And in the cell tube, this is some place where they're hold up and alone and they have to like face. Face their demons or whatever. Right,

Brent: right. Come out. And they got a good, big kumbaya out of it

Jeff: or something like that. Exactly. Well, look how now we're all buddies again. Yeah. Well, we're gonna find out right here next week, please.

If you haven't already, don't forget to subscribe to us wherever you're listening or watching us. And please go down, hit the little button and leave us a review. I love reading your reviews and if you leave us a five star review oh yes, we get to hear from Kar. So

Brent: I like the fact that you play that just to tell people to send in the five star

Jeff: review.

I think it might be my favorite sound in all battle on five so far. I just, yeah. And even like his whole like ho like his face when he says it, that whole scene is so good.

Brent: I, I still really like lawn going. Yay.

Jeff: I guess if I can get a sound like, I dunno know how that's gonna sound, but I'll see what I can pull down.

Yeah, I dunno. It could be good. Well, everybody thank you so much until next time, Jeff. No God, not again, not again. Come on

Brent: God. Be between you and harm and all the empty places you must walk.

Jeff: Wow. Thanks man. Peace and long life.