The Lost Tales

[0:00] Music.

[0:23] The name of the podcast, Babylon 5, for the first time. Welcome to Babylon 5 for the first time, not a Star Trek podcast. My name is Jeff Akin. And I'm Brent Allen.

[0:36] You know, Jeff and I are two veteran Star Trek nerds that podcasted a bunch. And we're like, hey, you know what? We got all this cool podcasting equipment. And there's this other show out here we've never watched that we know that we're better than. So why don't we do a podcast over there and show just how much better we are than that. And it turns out we're wrong because Babylon 5 was so freaking awesome. We couldn't stop with Sleeping in Light. We had to keep going with the movies and Crusade. And now the movies again for the first time. And like we've done our whole journey through Babylon 5, we're going to watch this through the lens of pulling out those incredible messages, those mirrors to society that J. Michael Straczynski has set up for us to learn from. But we call them sci-fi messages, right? We call those things sci-fi messages. Messages they're not star trek messages because brent i don't know if you realize this or not we're not a star trek podcast literally in the title every time so to make sure people understand that we play a game called the rule of three that limits us to no more than three references to star trek during the podcast discussion portion of this episode that's it three one of those no substitutions exchanges a refund and jeff what happens if we hear one of those references you get to hear this hey brent hey jeff we have a five-star review.

[1:56] This one's on pod chaser fiatster says i remember watching this show in the 90s and loving it as a star trek fan and b5 fan listening to your show reminds me how i felt back in the day You guys are awesome. And since I only recently found this podcast, I had to do a lot of binge listening to catch up. Keep up the good work. You know, one of the things that gets me every single time we get a review like this is people talking about, like, how much they've binged our show. I know. Like, how many hours you've given to Jeff and Brent. And that's just amazing. Fiatster.

[2:33] Fiatster. Fiatster. That's amazing. And you know what? But I very much joke about disparaging all the Star Trek stuff. We still very much love Star Trek here. But Babylon 5 is entirely its own thing and truly not Star Trek. So it is cool to love both. Cool, acceptable, and frankly, the right thing to do. Do you know what is also cool, acceptable, and the right thing to do? What's that? To make predictions about what the next episode is going to be about. Never having seen the title before. never having read a description or seen a thumbnail or anything like that. It's so cool, Jeff, that you and I embedded that into the end of every show that we have done here so far. And it's one of the most popular things that we do. It is. And fortunately, Jeff, is this the last time we're ever doing that? We're doing it. Yeah. The end of this episode will be the last time. Tonight. Yeah. This is the last. Oh, man. Unless we get new Babylon 5. So this will be the last time is what you're saying. Until the. Oh.

[3:36] Anyway anyway that being said this is the counterpart to that particular game where we look back on what our predictions were last week and well usually we would see how close we were but we haven't watched the episode yet so exactly we're just gonna look back and see what our what our jeff do you remember what your prediction of the lost tales was going to be about i do which is surprising because i didn't write it down i need to do that it's important for me but i thought this was going to be the tails between, uh, between objects at rest and sleeping in light, just kind of hitting. Hitting some key points along that journey. What did you think it was going to be about? I gave it nothing specific, but I said it was going to be like an anthology kind of a thing. And it's going to be like, like little, like here's a story and here's a story and here's a story probably could be seated anywhere in the Babylon five history. Cool. That was my thought. Well, Jeff, I think it's time to find out which one of us was right and how close we were. Let's do it. All right, let's do that. Hey, listen, if you guys are joining us for the very first time, welcome. You're amazing. Every episode is somebody's first episode. The way this works is Jeff and I are getting ready to watch the episode. We haven't, or episode, the movie. We're getting ready to watch the movie. We haven't watched it before now, taking notes and coming ready to talk about it.

[4:50] We're going to watch it right now. If you're watching this on YouTube, stick around because you guys are going to get our reactions to this film as it takes place. If you'd like to see the full unedited reaction, you can head over to our Patreon page at patreon.com slash Babylon five first. That's the number five in the word first. And if you're listening to us on a podcasting app, hello, welcome. We love that you're here. We'll meet you on the other side where we're going to share our first time thoughts. And we're going to talk about the messages that we uncover. Brent, let's look for the lost tales.

[5:24] Music.

[5:29] All right brent we just watched the lost tales two stories in one we just watched it for the first time why don't you kick this off what did you think jeff it's this is this is going to be hard i think to discuss this because we we literally have two very distinct very separate stories this is not one thing no i loved this yeah every single second of it i love this i said during the recording and i want to repeat it here on my future rewatches of babylon 5 i don't know that i'm going to watch every single little movie and all of crusade and all of these things again this will be a part of my rewatch though from now on because this was so good in every way shape and form. The two principals here, I mean, not just the two principals, everybody was acting their butts off. The kid that was playing the Centauri in the second one was doing so good. So good. And I don't know what to think of him. I don't know what to think of him. But I mean.

[6:35] The standout has to be the first the first story with Lockley and the priest and the demon dude. Yeah, that has to be the standout piece here. Sheridan getting confronted with an impossible thing, almost pulling the trigger, which I feel like we saw that coming. And I was going, there's no way he's going to do it. There's no way he's going to do it only to find out the different answer. And literally, the answer is like, well, I'm going to bring him into my house.

[7:04] Yeah. I'm going to bring this kid who's supposed to destroy us into our house so that I can try to, so that I can try to change it. Jeff, if I didn't know better, I would have sworn we were watching star Trek. Ooh, really? I'm just saying, but I'm going to say they did it so good here. And I'm not saying it's a star Trek message at all, but this is this, these two stories, but specifically the second one now is precisely why sci-fi more than any other genre is uniquely positioned to be a genre that explores and discusses morality and situations and holding up a mirror to society and showing us how we can be better in the future and better human beings to one another.

[7:50] Absolutely. So, yeah, I thoroughly loved both of these. I think I liked the first one a little bit better, but I'm taking them both. So how about you, Jeff? this we talked about sleeping in light we talked about that being the culmination of everything babylon five like you know it all came together in that in that moment and absolutely it did what this did though is it that took the totality of the story of the characters of babylon five that's what sleeping in light was this using just a handful of characters showed us the culmination of the world of Babylon 5. Like you said, both of these were just interesting stories that were constructed to deliver messages. Yep. And in a way that was amazing. I made the comment during our watch, but like, I don't want New Babylon 5 now. I didn't want New Babylon 5 in 2002 when Legend of the Rangers came out. God, I don't want that series so badly. Right, right. I want it here at this moment when Lost Tales came out. Everything was firing. It was gorgeous. I mean, things looked amazing. Amazing. The acting, the stories, the music, everything was peak.

[9:15] This was because I believe this came out in 2007. So, I mean, here we are almost a decade from the end of the Babylon 5 proper.

[9:25] And I didn't skip a beat. You know, it's just like, oh, hey, upgrade, continue. No, they made everything. I'm sorry, Jeff. Can I can I everything about this felt like an upgrade? The writing the acting the production the the every bit of this felt like an upgrade over everything we've seen before it's almost like and i don't i'm gonna say this and people are gonna hear me disparaging the series of babylon 5 and i am not but this is the moment where they're like hey we're not gonna make mistakes we're gonna we're gonna show up as professionals and we're gonna do what we do you know what i mean like it's it's not that that's the proper was like a training ground but also it was a training ground yeah and and that's where it makes me think like if this had become a new series or a continuing series back at this time frame it would have been amazing now we make tv in a way that would suck for babylon 5 we'd get one story over 10 13 episodes and then the next we wouldn't get all the cool moments that make babylon 5 so amazing and what i like as i'm saying this what i love so much was how first story had three characters, three characters. The second one had like five and, and really had three between Sheridan Galen and Ventari. There was so much character in all of that. I never felt like we were limited on characters or actors. We've thrown this word around a couple of times during our watch of Babylon 5, but Brent, this was perfect.

[10:55] I mean, the only thing they could have, well, they couldn't have done, but the only thing I can imagine that would have made this better, oh God, I'm going to say it and then I'll come back around because I think they actually did it perfectly. The only thing that could have made it better is if more of the original cast was still alive and available to be here. Yeah. And they addressed that in the most perfect, beautiful way possible. Even down to the moment of silence, a full moment of silence for our missing, our missing comrades, our fallen comrades at this point. He says, I'll miss them. And then just him staring in silence. And to tie that, you know, into the other episode too, What we heard in the first episode was an examination. I believe that first episode, that first story was JMS's manifesto on faith and religion and was done really well. But one of the things he talked about was the silence that exists in space and how people see that and it chisels at their faith. But what we saw in that second episode was that silence could be the most powerful thing imaginable. All we got was we got nothing for like 30 seconds and I was moved to almost tears by nothing because that nothing was everything.

[12:11] That first episode specifically deserves multiple rewatches and examinations to examine the opening conversation that was had between the priest and Lockley to examine that conversation about faith and where does your faith like are you a person of faith he asks her. And she stumbles around it a lot yeah and they talk about how how humanity has lost its faith and what that looks like and where it very much sets the scene of okay this is where we are and then you go into the second part where they're talking to amadeus as modius or as as as madeus yeah whatever that is um they're talking to him and basically he's like yeah the the whole center section this is how people get their faith back i'm gonna help you get your faith back and and help all of this happen to the point of going. And then you ask the question, but where is the lie? Well, it's in there somewhere. It's in there somewhere. We just got to find it. And then to watch her, like, just the structure of how that goes. I said, nope, this was never about helping people find faith. This was just you trying to escape your confinement. That's all it was. And we caught you, and now we're going to send you back. Back to the Phantom Zone. Away with you. And the storytelling mechanism they used for it was perfect because it wasn't like she was laying in bed and had a thought and did a little research and came up with this out of left field thing.

[13:32] The answer was already given, right? We were exiled to the stars. We were bound to the stars. It was all there right in front of us. She just put the pieces together in a way that I don't know. I wasn't able to in the moment. And then when she laid it out, you're just like, oh my God, it's so obvious. There it is.

[13:52] A couple of notes. Shall we do the, I guess we need to focus on each story individually. Just, just for a few moments, just for a few moments. So you want to do the first story first? Yeah, because we're already kind of skirting on it.

[14:06] Jeff could not have picked a better opening to draw people like you and me in. To start with the explosion of Babylon 5 and then go backwards and to hear the overlay of Jakar and all of those phrases that we know from the series. What was that moment? Was the line, I think it was objects at rest. It might have been in motion, but I think it was at rest when Sheridan and Jakar are talking. It's like, I'm going to miss you. And they're like, yeah, as I walk these halls, our conversations live forever. Jakar gave that piece. And that was a powerful line when it was stated. But to see it there as the station is exploding and as they're turning the clock back was just like, gave me chills.

[14:45] Just real quick on Lockley. I think we mentioned this. I am so glad that she has gotten her due well beyond just being the season five replacement for Ivanova. Quote, unquote, replacement for Ivanova. Well, but when she came in, that's all she was. That's all we saw her as was the season. She's nothing more than a season five replacement. And she's not even in most of the episodes. Well, we, we tried, you know, I think we did a good job and tried to not see her as that and wanted to see her stand on her own merit. And we didn't until she started showing up for Garibaldi. Yep. And like her second to last episode, you know, it's like, oh, there's okay, cool. This is why she's here. And that justifies her entire existence. And it was great. but then through the films, we've gotten so much more that culminated in this moment I made the comment when we were watching and Crusade and what she got in Crusade oh exactly the whole thing and that culminated in me and the thing saying I don't understand how anyone can not like Lockley.

[15:40] But here's how they could. They only watched season five. So, you know, and I mentioned this and I just I've learned enough about how people watch TV and where things go. As we go into our rewatch and to Babylon five for the second time, you and I are going to look at Michael O'Hare as Valen. Right. We're going to look at Jakar as Citizen Jakar, as Prophet Jakar or whatever. We're going to see Londo as this strong character, tragic, yet strong character who comes through a crap. We're going to see that at the very beginning. We're going to see these characters as they wind up, not as they are, which is why you can never go back for that first watch again. But I'm so excited to go through and watch these things. How could you think that Jakar is just some mean animal Klingon ripoff? I know. We thought he was a lizard, right? Like he's obviously the bad guy. I love the camera work in this, in this film. Yeah. As I was just going to say, it created that tent. Like we were, we were in the room with them. Do you see who directed it? I did not.

[16:48] JMS. Really? Now, I don't know if he directed both of them, but I'm pretty sure I saw him directing at least that first one. So all that handy cam work where they're moving it around and doing all that sort of stuff. Like, I mean, that's his director of photography, but still he's at the helm. It's an interesting thing to think about. Cause we, through Crusade were pretty hard on a couple of the episodes that were written by other people. You know, at that point, he'd given the writing reins to other folks. And I feel like, with a couple of exceptions, when JMS, in Babylon 5, I'm not talking about his other work that he's done, but in Babylon 5, when he's handed the reins to other people, things have gone sideways or not quite gone. They didn't reach their potential, you know. And so Janet Greek is a prolific director through the Babylon 5 series proper and did some really great things, but did so in the confines of what Babylon 5 was.

[17:39] And then in this, I don't know what he did, but when he's hands-on, when he's doing the writing, when he's doing the directing, when he's doing the stuff, it's his vision. He makes it happen. And it's when he hands it off to others that things kind of fizzle. And so like i'm so thankful he he had the reins on this one because honestly that time in the room with the three of them could have been so corny right right like if the directing wasn't great if the acting wasn't up to where it needed to be i mean even you can take away the flourishes of the handycam and put it there it could still be great it could still be good but he added that piece that was great and for me the handycam work part of what made it even more um unsettling was it's like, I recognize the aesthetic of this space. Like I am clearly on Babylon five and I know that, but it's different and wrong. And I don't feel like I belong here. It's brilliant.

[18:34] Luckily as a colonel now yeah that was interesting to me they changed her on her epaulets they changed the thing and she's got the colonel bird on there if so this is 10 years nine years whatever passed where we saw her jeff if she was still a captain after nine years she better have gotten gotten a promotion man the thing is we've talked about the ranks before and now they don't necessarily make sense but captain and colonel are the same rank navy to other things they're they both have the full bird not this bird but the one on the collar um so i'm i'm i want to say this for the sake of our audio listening audience who did not see this happen during the reaction uh which i would encourage you guys go over to our youtube page and check out jeff and mine's uh reaction to this watching this as it happened in real time what amade i've got to call him amadeus i'm not going to say the other word right asmodeus asmodeus asmodeus there you ago, he was talking and we had to stop it for a moment and just take stock of what he was saying. He was saying by going to space, humanity, we found silence and in finding the silence, we lost our faith as a people. But in finding darkness, that will at least imply the opposite, the existence of light, AKA God, that God also exists.

[19:52] So interesting. You were on point in that whole leading to that whole section because they're talking about doing the exorcism and you're like, well, if there's an exorcism that implies that demons are real. And if demons are real, that means angels are real. And if angels are real, that means God is real. And then he came in with almost that exact same thing of, well, if this is real, then this has to be real also. Yeah. And I think it moves, like it transcends religion, right? I think, you know, they used a Catholic priest as the, you know, the device in this. And I think a lot of that was just because it's, when you think about being a Baptist, you don't necessarily think about the pastors doing exorcisms out there. But when you think about the Catholic Church, that's definitely a thing in the zeitgeist. So, and I don't see this as an examination of Catholicism. I don't even see it as an examination of Christianity. It's just replace God with higher power, whatever it is. And in most cases, people believe their higher power is good. And so you can lay this across any tapestry of belief and it still applies. And I think also, oh man, also because they do the interrogation.

[21:10] Why would God allow this to happen? I got upset in an episode of Crusade because they were asking this question. If God is so all-loving, why would there be hunger and death and all this stuff? And I got really angry at how they just felt sloppy.

[21:26] And this was beautiful, the way they did it, because they didn't answer the question, right? They just kind of put it out there, but they kind of did answer the question because if there's evil, death, awful stuff, then there must also be good. Because how would you know evil if you didn't have something to compare it to? Exactly. It's one of the things when people ask me, I'm sure you get asked this as well. A lot of people of faith, why do you believe?

[21:51] And a big reason I believe is because when horrible things happen, there are good things that come out of it. People show up. They help. You know, an advancement happens. A thing happens. And that couldn't happen. You know, good wouldn't come out of bad things if stuff was just sucked. I thought something was really – the father said faith – or maybe Lockley said this. Faith allows you to believe in everything that reason says is impossible.

[22:17] Such a cool line. Such a cool line. But here's what I really noted coming out of that outside of the fact that this by far was Tracy Scoggins best acting we've ever seen and some of JMS is best writing across all his properties. Agreed. From what I've seen. Yeah. When we got to the end and as Modius. Sure. He is trying to entice the priest to doing the exorcism. I was like, think about it. You do this. Your pews are suddenly going to fill back up. You're going to be relevant again all like all of this he's just it's it's i'm thinking of the temptations of christ kind of going through like let's show you all the stuff that you can have but i'm sitting there thinking in the moment and i'm sure there are people out there that say yeah this might not be the way it should be but it is the way it is neither of those two reasons bull pews and the church being relevant are reasons for the church to exist agreed you know what I mean? That's not why we, that's not why we, that's not why the church is, is there, there. It doesn't, whether you have one person in the pew or, or a thousand people in the pews, that's not why you're there. You know what I mean? To, to simply just be relevant, to have relevance.

[23:38] Again, things get twisted because humans are a part of it. So in many cases throughout history we can point to places where that was the motivating factor for those who were in power but for the church itself and and and i would say this is not just the christian church this is across all various religions those are not why we should be doing what we do exactly which i think makes that an even bigger temptation so oh man such an interesting thing that as you say jms's manifesto on this totally and just and again we've said it and i i feel like we're repeating but it's this big of a deal acted to perfection so good I have no idea who the Simon Burke actor was. I don't know. I have no idea who played Father Cassidy.

[24:23] But Father Cassidy specifically, when he was going through that temptation thing, like on his face, he never said it. But you could tell he was thinking about it. Yeah.

[24:33] He's like, God, he's right. You know, all I got to do is let this guy die. And all these cool things are going to happen. It was just the slightest little facial acting when it ended. I made the comment that like this next story has got to be amazing because you don't follow that with a dud yeah and i think i was right the next story i feel like it took a little while to tell what was going on it did but once it started moving it was like oh okay okay this is good there's some well because first you thought it was going to be an interview between sheridan and and dr frazier that's what you know so it's going to be this interview and they're going to go and they're going to have some big you know conversation back and forth that we're going to be just floored with no moment of crisis of of morality yeah that was it for captain chair for president sheridan that's actually what it was i want to believe that the only reason that scene existed is because babylon 5 wanted to up its credibility in the sci-fi world by having dr janet frazier on the show she had she had a camera yeah her boob he's like because i want the director wanted people to look at me or to look into the camera i was like that's funny that's so funny Although the way they were sitting, the camera wasn't pointed at them. Do you want to know? It's funny as horrible because it's because it's true. But which is what makes it funny, by the way, Bruce Boxleitner certainly certainly looks like he has aged 10 years since he since he was and not with makeup like he's sporting an Aiken beard.

[26:01] A little, you know, much more trimmed, but he's got and his his voice is even and not again, not affected, not acted. But his voice is, you know.

[26:10] That much, that much more matured, whatever. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I like, we got him and Galen together in, was that as I call it, arms that we got them together and it was okay. They had a lot of time together here. I liked them together. Yeah.

[26:27] Like playing off of each other. I didn't like Galen in this one. I did not like Galen in this one. did you not like how did you like galen or did you not like the character of you know what i mean like was it that oh galen doesn't belong here here's the thing galen no you and i talked about this during the reaction um, Something seemed to be up with Galen. Galen seemed to be taking this way more personally than, hey, I'm coming in to help you out because I know where this goes. There was something. He was so angry. And so his teeth were clenched. And you could see the gaps between his teeth because his gums have receded. And he was so, like, forceful. This is not the Galen that we saw with Call to Arms or through 13 episodes of Crusade. There was something different. And the fact that it never really got addressed. We don't know what was wrong with Galen in this one bothers me about about this particular side, although watching Sheridan go through the whole he's he's going to commit this unspeakable act of allowing his I mean, he was driving the star for he'd get it up to 5000, you know, miles per hour or whatever.

[27:37] And that's going to kill this other kid because this kid's going to turn into a monster later you know and he has the flashback and and you know ways there's ways we can do also that means there's more than one now i don't have to do this bad thing that i was going to do which i never thought he was going to do in the first place although they did a good job making you think he might like he was teetering well i there is there is always the subverting expectations.

[28:02] There's no way i think he's going to do it and they could do it just to you know throw everybody throw everybody off like the galen stuff for me was colored by so you know we finished crusade and after we finished crusade our incredible uh community on our discord shared um some of the the unpublished or unproduced scripts and storylines with us and yeah yeah what we learned in that that is really key is that the techno mages derive their power and technology from shadow technology like they're of and from the shadows and so like that's what i was thinking like when i saw galen this time and especially how he was showing up with so much aggression in the whole so much anger it really made me question honestly his loyalty like So what I know from reading the Legions of Fire trilogy is that the Drock, who had Londo with the Keeper, and they were all over Centauri Prime and were really steering the political direction, they were building up fleets for the sole purpose of attacking and destroying the Interstellar Alliance.

[29:09] Was this another way of making sure? Either, like, is Galen trying to set the stuff up? Hey blow up his ship because what i know that will do is give them more reason to it was he helping that shadow and drach thing or was he trying to stop it from happening that's where i think his personal thing came in maybe he was conflicted or maybe he just knew how horrible and evil things were going to be galen was even somewhat involved in the events that happened on centauri prime with the drach and we got a little bit of a clip of that so ventari prince ventari talked about the dream, the dreams that he'd been having, you know, about the future glory of Centauri Prime and him ascending the throne and him being in the Star Fury. In those books, we learned that Adrok used dreams to influence people. That's a shadow technology. Galen used the dream on Ventari. It's the same shadow tech.

[30:08] So this is all stuff implied from other pieces and properties of this thing, but it helped me. It helped add context to the thing, but on its own, I agree with you. It just seemed aggressive and weird. And then we got a spoo shout-out, Jeff. We did get a spoo shout-out. We got a spoo shout-out. Which was great. But it was wild, though. That spoo shout-out led to them, you know, Sheridan and Ventari meeting. And, dude, we got a glimpse at this kid's BTE, his big tentacle energy.

[30:39] He's just like, yeah, I'm totally going to kill all you guys. Like i want to become emperor and you guys suck and i'm going to destroy you nice to meet you by the way big tentacle energy as soon as you said that like i'm trying to picture like where the tentacles are like under his vest like how they're you know like how how does that go like if you hug him do you feel them i'm really glad that i was able to put that picture in your head thank you for that i appreciate that you're welcome that's a gift i appreciate that well jeff with that i think we have reached the part of the show where it's actually time to boil it all down and see if this movie this film this duo of episodes i'm not really sure what we're going to call that has any of those moral messages to it the answer is yes and is it holding up a mirror to society giving us hope we can be better in the future is it showing us how to be better people to one another or something else along that nature so jeff i'll put it to you first my friend, what messages did you pick out of this quite a few to be honest like there's a lot in this well We talked about quite a few of them already, which is good, but I saw a message across the whole of both the stories.

[31:44] I think there was a singular through line that I also think is kind of one of the messages of Babylon 5 as a whole. There are always options. It's not that there's a way. There are ways.

[31:58] We got that with Lockley, right? It's, hey, either we exercise him or we don't exercise him. And then she's like, no, there's another option. We got that with Sheridan. Either I kill him or I don't kill him. Nope, there's another option. I can do something else. And so I think that was, that's the message of the lost tales right there. And then there's a numbers that, that, that spill out from there. There's the message of, uh, you know, do we do things because we want to or because we feel guilty if we don't details matter. The devil is in the details and the details are the things that change the future. And the one I got out of the second one that I loved so much is just the power of kindness, safe, showing someone they're safe and showing them kindness. Like, oh yeah, he may have changed the course. Of the galaxy just by being cool to this kid because by the time he gets there the shadows will the the drock and all that you know we understand that ends after londo right like and they're gone after londo because of veer but there's nothing there's nothing that says that the centauri still won't go crazy later on very true they have a real history of it jeff you have a little more knowledge into stuff that's going on because you've read a couple books that i haven't i'm gonna maintain this dude was cartagia's kid i think so i think he's cartagia's kid I think that's who he's supposed to be. I thought about it more. I thought it might have been this other dude's kid, but no, the time timelines don't work. He looked like Cartagia. He carried himself. He dressed like Cartagia. How old do you think he was? 16.

[33:27] Do Centauri age like humans? I don't know. Because if he was, let's say he was Cartagia's kid. See, my assumption is that Cartagia got somebody pregnant. And while that person was still pregnant is when Cartagia got killed. So this kid never actually grew up knowing his father. In my head, that's his backstory, right? That makes sense. You know, so he'd only be actually about 10 years old in this case. Maybe 11. He actually might be 11 because of where that happened. But, you know, he could have been born earlier. I might not be remembering this right, but one of the reasons Londo became emperor is because Cartagena didn't have any heirs.

[34:08] That doesn't necessarily mean he didn't have any kids, though. that's yeah so i'm also saying the whole game of thrones thing of like let's go find his bastards could have been out there somewhere but yeah i i'm gonna i'm gonna be on that with you he's cartagia's kid i love i love the message that you point out there's always another way always another way we that started in signs and portents right oh so it blows up well it's one possible future, And then throughout the whole series, we got that. Did you get any other messages in this one? Anything that I didn't bring up? Well, here's one, and it's kind of along those same lines, but it's this. If you can change the future, then you can change the man. So work on the man, or person, I should say. Work on the person. If you really want to change the future, change people. Because people are what make the future. And Brent, how do you change people? By loving them.

[35:00] Honoring them and by you you doing the things yeah exactly that's what i mean and what and so sheridan's answer here is i'm going to bring you into my household and train you up and show you what's the real going on here like i got a kid you'll love him it's going to be a lot of fun and you know what jeff this is 100 on brand for sheridan and i'm going to i'm going to draw this connection you're going to love this you're going to love this building it up i'm letting it rest dramatic pause right now Jeff I want you to go to the end of garden of Gethsemane okay somebody killed brother Edward that person goes and get his lobotomy Sheridan meets him and he immediately wants to kill this dude yeah brother Malcolm I think it was right yeah but it's not that dude anymore he's if brother Edward was not the person he was but was now brother Edward then this guy in front of you even though you know who he was he is not that person anymore and so you have to give him that same respect.

[35:58] That you were giving to brother edward and sheridan we saw him fight with that and then make a choice and he extended his hand and shook his hand right that's what we're seeing here it's the same it's the same sheridan choice that we saw way back then without the wrestling he had to wrestle with it in that moment but he's grown he's learned since then and so this is just who he is now he understands that he was just looking for a way he didn't want to do it the whole time he was looking for a way out if i don't do this humanity is doomed if i don't do this humanity wait oh here's my way out and he took it and it was such a simple thing be yourself john just be the person that you are and just be super cool which is the.

[36:42] Message too like i said how do you change other people by doing the things you want it you want to see do but also like just be you just be the real you yeah just be you be you don't be somebody else just be you what is it somebody says if you ever have a choice between being you know i don't know abraham lincoln and yourself always choose yourself because there's no one better to be unless you can be batman and then be batman always be batman but the thing is you can be yourself and batman it worked well for bruce wayne there you go there you go, Well, Jeff, with that, you know, one of the things we do here at Babylon 5 for the first time, or whatever we're calling this show now, because it was crusade. I guess we're back to Babylon 5 for the first time now. We are. We're developing our absolute, completely accurate and definitive ranking of the Babylon 5 movies, although it's hard for me to qualify this as a movie, but we're going to qualify it as a movie. Our current top five, our number one is in the beginning. Two is a call to arms. Three is third space. Four is river of souls. Five is the gathering. And we're not even going to mention the name of what number six is. No.

[37:45] But Jeff, my question to you is where do you place in this ranking the Lost Tales? And I don't know if you've seen the note. I have. And I agree. There is a single answer to this question. And everything else is dead wrong. This is number one by a long shot. This was better than in the beginning. in the beginning was a fine TV movie to get people caught up on what the heck's going on it was a fun little romp all the way through it fleshed out the whole Earthman Bari war, and gave us all of that it was good, this was great this was great I'd say that was great this was awesome okay I'll go with that.

[38:30] Incredible I'll go with that oh my god Brent we're done with the lost tales yeah we talked about this a little bit before we really hit record on this thing but next week we're watching the last new thing we haven't watched before we're watching the final movie it's animated called the road home and after that print we're gonna be done with the first time i mean we still have the wrap up to do yeah but like we don't have to watch anything we haven't we will have seen it all I know so we have to mark this occasion somehow I don't know how but this is the last time we're going to play this game one of your, favorite games out there where we guess what's going to happen in the next episode I'm like emotional I'm having a hard time saying this we guess what's going to happen in the next movie or episode based on the title alone make it count Brent last time what's the road home going to be about alright Jeff here's the thing, This is the only Babylon five property that was created during the time you and I have been doing this show. Correct. I will. I'm going to let everybody in on something that I've only told you before. Now, while they were in production leading up to the road home and the release of the road home, I was made aware that the kind of code name that they were using because they hadn't released the name of it yet was Babylon five. TRH.

[39:53] TRH. and i as soon as i heard that i said the title's the road home really i just said i knew that that's what it was it was just boom can i prove it no because i'm telling you guys after the fact now but i just i knew that was the title and when you have something that has been so long you have an animated feature that brings back the original cast and you're going to call it the road home there's literally only one thing it could possibly be about this is this is a a a romp through the history of babble we're going to go back and this is going to be a time time hopping movie where we revisit like the greatest hits of babble on five something's going to happen we got to get back home we're we're lost we're lost in time and we got to get back home that's all this can be to me so it's war without end yeah but just bigger and animated and animated yeah with without having to watch you know all those other episodes to make this one make sense oh my god if zathras is in this episode or in this movie i'm gonna lose it oh i'm so so hope zathras is in this one is uh what's his name tim show.

[41:02] Is he is he i don't even know if he's still i don't know but look i mean andreas is is i mean look at all the actors who who have passed beyond the rim they're all in it all the characters are in it from what i understand so they've had they have to get new voice actors to to do these pieces and it'll be interesting to see how they handle a different voice with these with these characters i i'm eager and nervous and excited to see how that plays out i say it's a time hop revisiting the greatest hits of babylon five what do you say jeff i agree i i i.

[41:32] This is our last time. I'm going to do something we haven't done before. I'm going to have the same prediction as you. And I'm going to phrase it like this. War without end across the totality of Babylon 5. Yeah. I think that's, I mean, what else would you call it? And that's what that has to be. We're going to find out next week just what it was. Thanks for hanging out. If you were on YouTube, you've been with us for quite a while. If you're on Patreon, you've been here almost two and a half hours. Thanks for hanging out with us. This has been incredible. Really looking forward to next week. If you're on YouTube or a podcasting app or somewhere like that, please make sure you subscribe because we have a lot of really cool and exciting stuff coming as we wrap this series up. We have so much more that we're going to do. I'm so excited about the series is wrapping up. You and I are far from done, Jeff. We're not even halfway through the possibilities of things that we're going to do. Not at all. So much in front of us. Our road home. We don't even have home defined yet. Like it's just a road for us. and there'll still be lots of Babylon five to come to so much. I can't, it's going to be great. Subscribe, like rate, do those things. Please share this show with somebody else. That means the world to us. When that happens, Brent, I'm going to sign off. We're going to call this a day until next time. Everybody Jeff. Yes. What's up, dude? It's been two and a half hours of you and I sitting here recording.

[42:51] I'm starving. Can we go get something to eat? Well, I have some stuff here. Bo and Mac came by. I've got his, I got a spoo sandwich. Spoo. Jeff, you know what they say about spoo, don't you? I do. It's the other gray meat. Gross. But I have a question for you. Okay. If spoo is the other gray meat, what's the first gray meat? Shiitake mushrooms.

[43:15] Music.