S5: No Compromises, The Very Long Night, Paragon

[alto2]

I'm pinch-hitting here, and am mostly concentrating on the Londo episode because, well...I can. And it's Londo being so, so Londo. Feel free to comment on any of the three, though.

Comments

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Everyone gives Vir a pass

And yet, Vir not only spoke out, he was running the Underground Narn Railroad on Minbar. I'm not sure his pass is altogether unjustified.

I do think Cartagia wouldn't have hesitated to kill Londo if he'd dared to speak out, in which case Londo would have been able to do nothing for G'Kar at all, G'Kar would doubtless have been tortured until he was dead, and Narn would still be occupied while Cartagia was living it up at home. I can't really make an argument that says that Londo didn't take the best course of action for all involved, no matter how much I agree with G'Kar that Londo should have said something and allowed terrible things to happen. Perhaps, though, that's an argument better made re: Refa's invasion of Narn? In that case, Londo speaking up definitely had more potential to make a difference. (I'm not convinced Refa would have given a damn, though.)

Sometimes I think that the moral imperative would have been filled by Londo's keeping quiet at the time but admitting his complicity to G'Kar with an apology earlier. Which is what he did eventually, but not until his own life was on the line.

Except that that's not true. Londo apologizes to G'Kar when he goes to see him in No Surrender, No Retreat about issuing the joint statement supporting Sheridan. G'Kar throws it back in his face, but he at least says it, and he even admit that he doesn't expect G'Kar to accept it. JMS apparently forgot this when he was writing this episode, because the idea that Londo's never apologized to anyone...well, he just did, not that long ago, and for this very thing. (Of course, if we acknowledge that, we knock a fair chunk of drama/impact out of the episode, but the fact remains.)

And G'Kar's scream parallels Londo's apology...the worst thing for either of them to have to do.

Ooh, nice catch!

I find it amusing that they used something like the Tarot. It seems to fit Delenn's habit of speaking obliquely, and in metaphor.

I think this whole episode is about metaphor, in many ways.

The telepaths were certainly abused, I do believe that.

Were they, though? They were paid for their services. Sure, there were those who mistrusted them, but I don't recall them being attacked simply for being telepaths, unless I'm forgetting something (always possible). If they were treated differently than "mundanes," that may be, but how much of that is their own doing, or in their perception? When the Corps makes you wear black gloves and a badge and behaves in ways that make everyone else suspicious, I'm not sure you can blame mundanes' reactions entirely on their own prejudices.

His whole 'we're homo superior' gig is straight from Bester's playbook. I think it's ironic he resorts to the words of a mundane (Shakespeare) to describe the situation.

Very true, especially about Bester. Why can people never decide that we're all different--not better or worse, just different? Why is that so hard for humans??

[vjs2259]

My very long and interesting reply to this was lost somewhere around Hartford on I-91 yesterday. *shakes fist at Verizon*

I can't remember the details of Londo's abortive attempt at a rapprochement with G'Kar...was it a direct apology or one of those 'things have not always been right beteween us' or 'things happened that shouldn't have'? The whole thing seems to be more about the torture which is why I don't really include Vir--he was directly apologetic and bravely so, about the bombing of Narn. But this seems to be more about the torture. Londo, I think, needed to confront an individual that he had wronged, and apologize directly.

As for the teeps, yeah, I believe they were abused. PsiCorps was developed to keep them in check and under control, and as a result of our fear of them. So they were taken from their families, whether they wanted to go or not, forced to choose between staying with their family and being drugged out of their minds or leaving them, brain-washed into believing the Corps was their only family, told when and who to mate with to generate more and better telepaths, experimented on (Ironheart, Talia), told when and who they could work for, set apart by their clothing so they could be identified and (potentially) avoided...it's a terrible system. Understandable in some ways, but still terrible.

[alto2]

Eee, sorry to hear about the lost post!

I just hauled out the DVD and watched that scene again, and it turns out I'm wrong--Londo does not actually say he's sorry--he thanks G'Kar for his part in the events that not only freed Narn but also rid the universe of Cartagia. That said, I'd still say that he says a helluva lot more--in a much more meaningful way--in this scene than he does simply by saying, "I apologize," but I may be the only one who thinks so.

PsiCorps was developed to keep the teeps under control, yes, but now they've got so much power that they seem to be controlling everyone else--which is why I question how much we can say that the teeps are currently abused. (Rogues are another story altogether, and an argument could be made that the Corps abuses rogues at least as much as normals do.) In the beginning, you get no argument from me that they've been abused, but since the number of rogues is far less than the number of Corps, I am just not sure you can say, overall, that the normals are the ones doing the abusing, either. The Corps seems to run itself, and as we saw when Bester made his deal with Lyta, they're the ones who enforce things like the gloves. I dunno, I see it as two distinct time periods and thus two distinct sets of circumstances.