Review - Babylon 5: The Gathering

Babylon 5's command crew as never seen again.

Short review: Welcome to Babylon 5. Now let's frame Sinclair.

Haiku
With The Gathering
Although not yet fully formed
Babylon 5 starts

Full review: I am always torn when I introduce someone new to Babylon 5 - do I tell them to start with The Gathering, or just have them skip it and go straight to Midnight on the Firing Line? This is because The Gathering is so different in tone and appearance from the rest of the series (in large part because it aired nearly a year before the series itself got off the ground), and in a lot of ways, is just not a particularly effective introduction to the show. Oddly, for a program intended as a pilot for a television series, it probably is much more entertaining for someone who has already seen at least a chunk of episodes of the actual show, rather than someone who is a complete newcomer. For a veteran watcher of the series, the show is laden with ironic twists, quirky oddities that never show up again, and the embryos that will develop into major plot points. For the newcomer, the movie is probably going to seem somewhat slow, and fairly confusing. Even so, I have always ended up starting off a neophyte with The Gathering, because when I get to Londo Mollari's opening voice over, the series just pulls me in.

I was there at the dawn of the Third Age of Mankind. It began in the Earth year 2257, with the founding of the last of the Babylon stations, located deep in neutral space. It was a port of call for refugees, smugglers, businessmen, diplomats and travelers from a hundred worlds. It could be a dangerous place, but we accepted the risk because Babylon 5 was our last, best hope for peace. Babylon 5 was a dream given form, a dream of a galaxy without war where species from different worlds could live side by side in mutual respect. Babylon 5 was the last of the Babylon stations. This is its story. - Londo Mollari

And with that, the series begins. One interesting thing about this voice-over is that it is told in the past tense: by the time the speaker is talking, Babylon 5's story has presumably ended, and long enough ago that Londo needs to make a point of pointing out that he was there for the events. In other words, Londo knows how the story ends, even if the audience does not. I'll digress for a bit here and point out that there are two distinct versions of The Gathering in circulation. When the show was originally aired in 1993, as a pilot for the series on PTEN, it was fairly long and slow. This version is only available online, on sites like Hulu. After the fourth season of the show, PTEN abandoned the series and it moved to TNT. As part of the shift to the new network, J. Michael Straczynski recut a "special" version of The Gathering to make the plot move faster, which as a side effect allowed him to add in some additional character development scenes. In addition, the special edition excised an extended walk through the alien sector, which, quite frankly, was kind of dull and not really necessary to the plot of the episode, or the eventual overarching plots of the series itself. The "special edition" is the one that is included on both versions offered on DVD: the two-sided DVD with The Gathering and In the Beginning, and the Babylon 5: The Movie Collection DVD set. For clarity, the version I am going to talk about here is the "special edition".

Commander Jeffrey Sinclair

At the outset I'll note that even though the special edition is quicker paced and flows better than the original television pilot did, the show unfolds fairly slowly. This is mostly because the show has to do some fairly heavy expositional lifting: introducing four alien races, the political web that interlocks them together, a half dozen major characters, and of course, something of a story to tie everything together. There are no dramatic space battles, and very few action sequences. The basic plot of the movie - a murder mystery interlaced with diplomatic posturing - sets the tenor of the show itself, which was heavy on political intrigue and character development. However, despite being recognizably related, The Gathering is quite different from the series that came after - both in appearance and tone. In the end, most of the changes were ultimately beneficial, as it seems that during the eleven month lag several elements of the show were reexamined and improved substantially. Only a few (such as the switch from Patricia Tallman to Andrea Thompson as the installation's primary commercial telepath) were net losses for the show.

My name is Laurel Takashima. You won't see me again.

To a certain extent, given the eleven month lag between the airing of the pilot and the first episode, it is somewhat amazing that they managed to keep as much of the cast from the movie for the series - Michael O'Hare (as Commander Jeffrey Sinclair), Jerry Doyle (as Michael Garibaldi), Mira Furlan (as Delenn), Peter Jurasik (as Londo Mollari), and Andreas Katsulas (as G'Kar) all transition from the pilot to the series. But Tamlyn Tomita (as Lieutenant Commander Laurel Takashima), Johnny Sekka (as Dr. Benjamin Kyle), Blair Baron (as Carolyn Sykes), and, as noted before, Patricia Tallman (as Lyta Alexander)left the series, and all but Tallman were never seen again on the series. In a shift that is horribly disconcerting to me, Ed Wasser also made the transition from the pilot to the series, but shifted characters from the command deck crew member seen here to, well, a pretty different role in the series proper.

Hi. I'm Delenn.
I'll look very different soon.
Twice.

In addition to the cast changes, the appearance of the show changed substantially as well - most notably in the appearance of the Minbari. In The Gathering, the Minbari appear much more androgynous than they do on the series. I suspect that Straczynski was trying to create a race somewhat akin to the genderless and gender-switching Geth from Ursula K. LeGuin's The Left Hand of Darkness, but that is purely speculation on my part. No matter if this is true or not, this experiment doesn't survive past this movie, and the appearance of the Minbari is pretty substantially revised for the remainder of the series. Both G'Kar and Londo have some alterations to their appearance as well. But the most notable change in appearance is that of the station itself. Throughout The Gathering, the station is fairly dark. Much of the episode takes place in shadow or in very subdued lighting, which for me tires my eyes out when I watch it. I'll also note that the decision to film the episode with this kind of lighting does not do any favors to Johnny Sekka, whose very dark complexion combines with the darkened lighting to effective obscure his facial features in several scenes. During the run of the series, the station became a much better lit place, except for scenes that take place "down below" (which actually served to contrast the portions of the station better).


So, the show open on the shadowy command deck, which I guess is supposed to be atmospheric, but why would the command deck be poorly lit? After a brief interlude where Sinclair warns a tourist off of a sexual encounter with a dangerous alien, we move to the entry corridor (a set that ended up being completely redesigned for the series) where Sinclair meets with the new commercial telepath Lyta Alexander. After Garibaldi completely screws up the apprehension of a drug smuggler attempting to board the station, Sinclair gets the chance to play the tough negotiator. This scene is quite strangely laid out - first off, with his entire security team there, presumably including trained hostage negotiators, why would Sinclair jump in? And why does Garibaldi need Sinclair need him to tell him what to do in a situation like this? Garibaldi is head of security, he should not only pretty much know what to do in this situation but his team should have a standard procedure for dealing with it. I know this is a pretty standard type of scene to establish the character of the leading man, but like many other scenes in this episode, it mostly just serves to diminish Garibaldi as a character who is effective in his job (making one wonder exactly why Sinclair keeps expressing so much confidence in him). In the end, Sinclair makes an angry speech about how "no weapons or dust" are allowed on the station (and dust will return as an issue most notably in the season three episode Dust to Dust), he goes back to a modestly distraught Lyta, puts on a big incongruously happy smile and says "I'll get you to your quarters".

I'll also note that this scene is just the first of the strange relationship Babylon 5 has with distance. Sinclair tells the smuggler that if his ship ever gets "within fifty clicks" of Babylon 5, they will blow him out of the sky. Now, unless they meant to coin a new vernacular here, clicks is usually a slang term for kilometers. Fifty kilometers is not a particularly long distance for weapon systems on Earth in the present day. In space, fifty clicks is so close that it would be practically inside the station. This scene also shows a very different style of personal weaponry used - both Garibaldi and the smuggler have a very obviously plastic hand weapon that looks like a rejected phaser design. This is another design quirk that doesn't last beyond the pilot episode.

Hey! Aren't you supposed to be on the rim somewhere?

We move back to the shadowy command deck and are introduced to Laurel Takashima, the no nonsense Lieutenant Commander who is preparing for the arrival of the ambassador from the secretive Vorlon race, but takes time to confront Ambassador G'Kar over the refusal of a Narn supply ship to submit to a weapons scan, telling him that they can wait outside for a "solar year" for all she cares. This is a sort of forced toughness that just doesn't seem to suit Tamlyn, which I suspect is one of the reasons she was replaced by Claudia Christian as the second in command of the station. The early command deck scenes are also where we first get a shot of Ed Wasser on the command deck, which is, of course, quite a dissonant moment. This sort of continuity gaffe is, I think, one of the reasons doing television is more difficult today than it may have been in the past. Now that television shows are available on DVD, tiny errors that would have been overlooked and forgotten are now noticeable. (And really, without watching The Gathering on DVD after seeing the whole series, who would have remembered that Ed Wasser was on the command deck in a couple scenes of the pilot episode?) And of course, with the internet, these sorts of tiny details can be dissected in detail. One of the most impressive things about Babylon 5 is that there are so few of these sorts of errors, and most of them are, ultimately, fairly trivial.

Hopping back to Sinclair and Lyta, they cut through the alien sector. In the original version of The Gathering, this led to a lengthy tour laden with special effects intended to both show off how large the station is, and to provide a glimpse of the wide array of aliens that populate the Babylon 5 universe. This has mostly been excised from the special edition, which is good from a narrative standpoint - the extended tour really broke up the story - but comes at something of a cost. Either way, much of Sinclair's mostly-monologue to Lyta (in this scene and the last) is basically a spoken version of the "As you know Bob" scenes that plague science fiction in which a character tells another character things they really should already know for the narrative purpose of telling the reader (or in this case the viewer). Sinclair reviews the rules for telepaths on the station, something someone would think Lyta would know already, being a member of Psi Corps. Lyta even asks Sinclair why it is called Babylon 5, whereupon he explains that the first three stations were sabotaged and the fourth vanished without a trace. But one has to wonder why she wouldn't know that already. The destruction of an installation intended to be the headquarters for interstellar equivalent of the U.N. should have been big news, and someone coming to reside there probably would know this already. But since the viewer needs to be handed this information, Sinclair tells Lyta things she should already know.

A pool for zen skinny-dipping

After going over the fact that they know next to nothing about Vorlons with his command staff, Sinclair meets with Delenn. One element of The Gathering that was not really carried forward to the series is an Asian influence - the loss of Tamlyn Tomita as a character removes her Asian-themed quarters, and also missing from the series for the most part is the Japanese stone garden that serves as the setting for the first interaction between Delenn and Commander Sinclair. As is usual for a Straczynski scene, the setting serves as the third character as Delenn interprets the meaning of the garden as she sees it, and then demonstrates an unusual affinity for Sinclair by handing over all the data she has concerning the Vorlons (using a data card, another difference from the series, where data crystals are used). This is also where we get the first hints concerning the Earth-Minbari war. In a kind of odd statement, Delenn mentions that she is looking forward to meeting a Vorlon. For those familiar with the show, this is an interesting comment - either this is a continuity error or Delenn is playing her cards quite close to the chest.

I'm the Commander's girlfriend. At least for now.

The pace quickens a bit, as Kosh shows up early, giving us the first view in the series of a hyperspace jump gate, and the first view of a Vorlon living ship (the Vorlon living technology predates the appearance of the living ship Moya on Farscape by about five years too). We also see brief, mysterious and apparently deadly transaction, and Sinclair's girlfriend announcing her impending early arrival at the station (everyone seems to be showing up early). Pretty soon, the tropes that will become recurring elements of the show start flowing thick and fast though. In a scene between Takashima and G'Kar in which G'Kar says his ship has reconsidered an will now allow a weapons scan, he uses the Narn salutation "Good Eating" for the first time. In the background of the scene we also get a shot of a worker doing some sort of repair work in a steam vent - an indication that the show intends to present an industrial kind of science fiction, with shots of the blue collar work that goes in to making an installation like Babylon 5 function (most notably followed up on in episodes like By Any Means Necessary and A View from the Gallery). The action shifts to the casino where Garibaldi is hunting down Londo to ensure he is there to meet the Vorlon Ambassador Kosh when he arrives. This is the first opportunity for Londo to give a story about the good old days of the Centauri Republic. One thing that is odd about this scene is that Garibaldi is sent to ensure that the Centauri Ambassador is present for the reception. One would think that whether Londo showed up for the reception would be a matter for the Centauri government to police, not for the Babylon 5 security chief to deal with. If the Centauri want to make a diplomatic gaffe and have their representative snub the Vorlons, isn't that up to them? As a side note, this is the first scene where we see Londo's truly impressive hair, which was thankfully toned down for the series itself.

We move back to a little character development as we see Lyta plying her trade, acting as an intermediary between two businessmen negotiating a deal. This scene is noteworthy for the appearance of "Universe Today" in a brief scanning shot, and G'Kar's attempt to negotiate a deal with Lyta for her genetic material to try to develop telepaths for the nontelepathic Narn race. Besides finding out that the Narn lack telepaths, we also learn, for the first time, of G'Kar's proclivity for non-Narn women. And we learn of G'Kar's high opinion of himself, as he asks Lyta if she would prefer to be conscious or unconscious for mating "depending on her pleasure threshold".

After all of this build up, the plot itself finally really gets underway. After Sinclair is stuck in a stalled transport tube he arrives to join Garibaldi and Takashima where they find an apparently nearly dead Kosh. This whole scene is odd. First off, the alarm goes off with a "station alert" letting them know something is wrong. But since Kosh is in the docking bay lying on the floor incapacitated with no one else present, who set off the alarm? Second, upon hearing the alert, Sinclair immediately turns to Takashima and says "notify station security". Leaving aside the question "notify them of what", since they haven't gone in to find Kosh lying on the floor yet, Garibaldi is right there. His presence means that security already knows there is a problem of some sort, and since Garibaldi is the station security chief, shouldn't he be notifying his people? In one of the few sane things anyone says about Kosh's condition, Garibaldi says he cannot tell anything about the Vorlon's condition. Which, since humans know next to nothing about Vorlons one would think would be true even if Kosh wasn't wearing an encounter suit. Sinclair, on the other hand, says "if you open the suit, our air will kill him". How the hell would he know that? This is just the first in a massive string of statements by Babylon 5 characters about Kosh and his condition that make no sense at all. They are all more or less necessary statements for the story to work, but when you stop and think about them, they are just nonsensical.

Vorlons. They glow.

Moving to Dr. Kyle's medlab, we find out that the Vorlons refuse to let Kosh's encounter suit be opened "for security reasons", but Sinclair orders Kyle to do it anyway, relying on Kyle's vow of confidentiality to preserve secrets. Takashima recounts a legend about a human seeing a Vorlon and turning to stone, while Kyle opens the suit and light streams out - the first indication in the ongoing mystery that is "what do Vorlons look like". And then it is time for more character background, as during a conversation with an unnamed Senator we learn of Garibaldi's checkered past (unknowingly expressing his reservations with Garibaldi in earshot). After Sinclair stops off to have sex with his girlfriend and take a nap, Dr. Kyle reports that they have confirmed a "foreign compound, type unknown" and that Kosh's prognosis is terminal. He tells Sinclair that "it looks like poison". Once again, how the hell would he know any of this? How would they know that any compound in Kosh's body is a "foreign compound"? How would they know he is dying? They don't know anything about his biology. As Kyle says, "even for an alien, this one is pretty alien". How could Dr. Kyle know what is or is not a poison to Kosh? For that matter, how would Dr. Kyle have known how to stabilize Kosh to begin with? Without this sequence, there is no story, but this just doesn't make any sense at all. This is one of the few seriously silly elements in this Babylon 5 story, and one of the few stories in the series that has such a silly element: Most of the episodes are much better thought out.

Then we shift to some alien intrigue, as G'Kar tries to convince Delenn that Londo was somehow responsible for the attempt to kill Kosh and proposes an alliance. Delenn rejects it out of hand, and in the process reveals another story element that will drive much of the series - the fact that the Narn had been occupied and subjugated by the Centauri for a century. In turn, G'Kar reveals to the viewer that in the Earth-Minbari War, the Minbari had defeated Earth and then mysteriously surrendered on the eve of victory, the result of a decision that supposedly came from the Minbari holy men on the Grey Council. Delenn then whips out a weapon that is never seen again - a ring that allows her to control the local gravity around G'Kar and crush him. She uses it to force him to swear he will never mention the Grey Council again, presenting the viewer with another mystery. I suspect the ring weapon was never used again in the series because it was just not very visually interesting in action, mostly just resulting in Andreas Katsulas moaning and flailing his arms about.

My name is Londo, and I have really big hair.

Sometimes I wonder why Babylon 5 is such a great show that still affects me more than a decade later. And then I am reminded by scenes like the next one with Garibaldi and Londo. After some preliminaries, one of which has Londo saying "I suppose there will be a war now. All that running around and shooting at one other. You would have thought that sooner or later it would go out of fashion." As anyone who has seen the series knows, this statement is laden with irony. But then, Londo reveals that he is there to grovel before the on behalf of the fading Centauri Republic before the rising vigor of Earth, hoping to attach themselves to the shark-like Earthers like remoras. As he says:

"You make very good sharks Garibaldi. We were pretty good sharks ourselves once. But somehow, along the way, we forgot how to bite. There was a time when this whole quadrant belonged to us. What are we now? Twelve worlds and a thousand monuments to past glories, living off memories and stories."

One can hear and almost feel the despair and the anguish. And this is exactly why Londo is so vulnerable to the developments that take place over the course of the show. In large part, Londo is the central character of the show - as it is his personal story as much as anything that drives the action.


Watch my facial features fade into the background.

Takashima and Kyle engage in their own intrigue when Kyle appears in Takashima's quarters and admits he's been taking stims to stay awake through the crisis (a character flaw that fans of the show will recognize as having been transferred to Stephen Franklin). Takashima mentions that she breaks regulations by having a coffee plant, allowing her to offer Kyle coffee, before immediately contradicting herself in the course of the conversation asserting that she hadn't broken regulations since Sinclair got her out of a jam while she was working on the Mars colony. But the upshot of this conversation is that they try to convince Lyta to scan Kosh to find out where the poison entered his system. Lyta is, as one might expect, reluctant to do this without a court order or consent from next of kin. She says she could be "thrown out of the Psi Corps", a statement that makes limited sense given that we later discover that pretty much the only way out of the Psi Corps is feet first. They arm twist her into it, eventually assuring her that Kosh is so far gone that he probably won't remember her scan. Once again, the question is how the hell would they know how out of it a Vorlon, a species they admittedly know nothing about, might be, and how would they know what he would remember no matter how "out of it" he was or not?

In a quick cut scene we learn that Sinclair's alibi doesn't hold up - there is no record of the tube malfunction that delayed him. Sinclair then says that knowing Garibaldi's work he'd hate to end up on opposite sides of an investigation, which is ironic as he's been undermining Garibaldi as security chief for most of the episode.

But back to Lyta. She says she cannot see Kosh, and Kyle says "trust me, it's better this way", which is a little bit strange if one knows what is revealed about Vorlons over the course of the series. Lyta then reveals an tidbit about telepathy that becomes modestly important in the series: it is intensified by direct contact. In her scan we see Sinclair greeting Kosh. There are numerous important long-term plot elements in this sequence. First, Kosh refers to Sinclair as "Entil'zha Valen" (which is a retcon introduced for the special edition). Second, Kosh's glowing hand appears outside of his encounter suit, both giving some indication of what Vorlons might look like and raising the question as to whether he actually needs the suit to begin with. And of course, in the element most salient to the immediate plot of The Gathering, Sinclair appears to slap a poison tab onto Kosh's wrist. Consequently, we get a dramatic scene where Lyta accuses Sinclair of attempting to murder Kosh.

Once again we have a conversation with the unnamed Senator and he says that Sinclair's case is being handed over to the Babylon 5 Advisory Council, where we have the obligatory outburst of crew loyalty in support of Sinclair. Then we get our first shot of the Babylon 5 council chamber, which in this version is cramped and dark. G'Kar seems to act as a prosecutor, although no explanation is given as to why he would be placed in this role. He questions Dr. Kyle, and in a continuity error Kyle says he was part of the group that was present to meet Kosh, when he clearly was not. Kyle reveals that the poison was flourozine, a rare toxin available only from the "Damocles sector", at which point G'Kar dramatically reveals that Carolyn had just been on a trip that passed through there and returned twenty minutes before Kosh arrived. This is a pretty amazing coincidence, and since both Kosh and Carolyn arrived much earlier than they were supposed to, one wonders how the conspirators (you knew there were conspirators, didn't you?) arranged this - either that, or it was a huge bit of serendipity for them.

Why am I the prosecutor here?

Taking a break, we get more character development wrapped up in plot as we learn that Garibaldi doesn't trust telepaths, and that Del Varner, who had cropped up a few times before, making himself get noticed by offering to back Londo's gambling bets and then backing out, is a "tech runner". We also get our first scene with Londo and G'Kar alone together as G'Kar asks to discuss Mollari's vote. Back in council we get another trope that will become a recurring event in the series - an extended speech by G'Kar, and in this one he moves for the Advisory Council to decline jurisdiction and transfer Sinclair's trial to the Vorlon home world. Takashima, acting for Earth, votes no, and Delenn abstains, which oddly counts as a "no" vote. Having made the motion G'Kar votes yes, as does Mollari (which surprises everyone in the chamber, but not the viewer, as we saw G'Kar meeting with Mollari earlier). Takashima declares this to be a deadlock, but G'Kar pulls out his trump card, indicating that the Vorlons had told him to vote yes on their behalf. (As an aside, veteran viewers of the show will notice that there is no League of Nonaligned Worlds present). But given the later developments on the show, why would the Vorlons vote in favor of G'Kar's proposal, which supposedly would result in a blow to Babylon 5's prestige and severely hamper its mission? The Vorlons in The Gathering seem to behave in a manner different from how they behave at pretty much any other point in the series, and entirely inconsistent with anything that would enable them to accomplish their goals as revealed by later installments. One can only chalk this up to the growing pains experienced by a series trying to forge its storyline.

We get a few scenes in the aftermath of this decision that also reveal some fairly interesting plot information. Leading off with Garibaldi discovering the dead body of Del Varner, and then moving to Carolyn meeting with Delenn to plead for Delenn to take action, berating her for not doing anything to help Sinclair (which is a little strange, since even if Delenn had voted "no" instead of abstaining, it would not have changed the outcome). At this juncture, Delenn reveals that insofar as Sinclair is concerned, she is present strictly to observe. To which Carolyn asks "observe what". Indeed. The obvious mystery of the attempted murder of Kosh is front and center, but it seems that there are much deeper mysteries underlying everything. We also get a scene in which Londo attempts to explain his vote to Garibaldi, saying that G'Kar used information about atrocities committed by Londo's grandfather to blackmail him. Mollari says that he knew about them before, but that if they were leaked at home they would prove embarrassing and damage his reputation - which is yet another bit of irony given how Londo's story plays out over the course of the upcoming seasons. Londo pleads that he thought is would result in a deadlock, but admits when asked that if he had known G'Kar's plan ahead of time, that he would not have done anything differently, a telling character point about Mollari.

Lose twenty-four hours. Gain a medal.

And then we get to the mystery that when Babylon 5 originally aired was the subject of the most intense speculation among fans during the first season - what happened to Sinclair at the Battle of the Line, the climactic battle of the Earth-Minbari War. Carolyn apparently never knew Sinclair fought on the Line, because he never wanted to talk about it. We learn that it was a suicide mission, that he was a squad leader and his team was destroyed in less than a minute. But to defend Earth they had to stop the Minbari no matter the cost. And then we get another great line: "The sky was full of stars, and every star was an exploding ship." And then we learn about the missing 24 hours of Sinclair's life, after which he learned that the war was over, and Earth had won. Carolyn asserts that this was because of the Line, but Sinclair reveals that this was just propaganda. The Minbari had defeated Earth, and then stopped themselves, and no one knows why. Carolyn then gives a little rah-rah speech about how everyone is with him and that Earthers fight. Once again, how does she know what people like Garibaldi and Takashima think? Then Sinclair grabs his coats and says he's going to go "get some answers". And I am left asking the question: isn't that what he's been doing already?

Meeting with Lyta, it is revealed that G'Kar apparently has gill implants that let him breathe hostile atmospheres, but this is yet another piece of information that never comes up again in the series. G'Kar tells her that they need to tie up a loose end. Following this, Lyta sort of strolls into medlab to start messing with the medical equipment. One wonders about the security on Babylon 5 if someone can just waltz into the medical facility where the subject of an attempted assasination is being treated and start hammering buttons. Kyle tries to stop her, at one point grabbing a long plastic bar to hit her with (why would they have that in medlab?), which reminded me of a Minbari fighting pike, and then turning a large laser on her (and really why would they have that in medlab?) And as she flees we find Lyta coming up the hall to come into medlab - where we have Lyta and Lyta come face to face, and Lyta is seemingly saved when Sinclair comes around the corner. But Lyta had fingered Sinclair as the killer earlier, which makes it seem strange that she is calm and collected when he runs up to see if she's okay. Just to make it clear - she just saw her double point a gun at her, and then the man she said attempted to murder someone runs up to see if she's fine, and she's not completely freaked out. This seems, well, odd.

The mystery begins to reveal itself quickly now - Varner was dead for a long time, but people saw him after he was supposedly dead, an environment tech named Hazeltine too. They bring in a small pod from the hull of the station that could have carried as single person into the station. And then Takashima calls in (and Sinclair responds using a wrist communicator of a style that is never again seen in the series) to fill in the final piece of the puzzle - Varner had a "changeling net" which projects a holographic field, and as Sinclair note has to put out a lot of energy. We then get a Star Trek: The Next Generation moment as Sinclair asks Takashima to recalibrate the station's sensors to locate the changeling net while he and Garibaldi stop off to pick up some really impractically designed guns.

"There is a hole in your mind"

In another "why would they do that" moment, the Vorlons send an enormous fleet to pick up Sinclair when presumably a single ship would serve just as well. They then proceed to immeidately threaten to blow up the station, and consequently kill the quarter million mostly completely innocent people on board (including Ambassador Kosh). This is sort of like trying to kill a fly with a sledgehammer, and makes about as much sense. In response, Takashima orders the "screens to maximum", which I can only explain as a continuity error, as it is later pretty well established that there are no force fields or other defensive screens. Meanwhile, Sinclair and Garibaldi engage in their own "why would they do that" moment by heading off to catch the msyterious assassin by themselves. Sinclair commands a five mile long space station, with, one assumes, hundreds of subordinates. Why does he head off to confront a dangerous killer with only his head of security for backup? Where is the security detail he should have brought along? Of course, much of the action would have therefore been rendered moot, including Delenn's intervention (her decision to take an active role clearly being a repsonse to Carolyn's earlier admonishion that she "do something"). In the end, the assassin is thrown against a steel fence with live electricity running through it (one wonders why this fence is there, that seems, well, pretty dangerous), and turns out to be a Minbari who taunts Sinclair with one line "There is a hole in your mind" before blowing himself up. The resulting explosion throws Babylon 5 out of its orbit, which seems fairly realistic, but is not very consistent with the subsequent series in which the station takes pounding after pounding without any similar effect. Another slight continuity problem stems from the fact that Sinclair holds his own in hand-to-hand combat with the would-be assassin, wheras later in the series it is established that Minbari are tough, probably too tough for a single human to have any hope of taking on in hand-to-hand combat, and warrior caste Minbari especially so.

Which brings us to the epilogue. First Carolyn heads back into space (in a spaceship that looks exactly like the one Catherine Sakai uses later). Then Delenn strolls into medlab (seriously, is there any security at all around medlab?) and reveals that the Minbari was a warrior caste member of the "Wind Swords" clan, and hands over a data card with all the information about them to Sinclair. This is significant as it seems to be the first mention in the show of the Minbari caste system, although the only caste referenced is the warrior caste. The scene closes with Dr. Kyle giving what is clearly supposed to be a stirring description of his encounter with the Vorlon that just falls flat and is completely uninspiring.

But Sinclair then hosts a brief encounter with G'Kar laying out how Del Varner had substantial contacts with the Narn, and outlining a scenario that points to G'Kar as the hand behind the attempt on Kosh's life. G'Kar, of course, denies it, leading Sinclair to reveal the nanotracker he had put in G'Kar's drink, telling him that his friends would track down G'Kar if anything bad ever happened to the station. Garibaldi gets in a road runner-like "beep beep" (a hint of things to come), and Londo gets in one more "there we were" story about the old Republic. Shifting back to the stone garden, Sinclair discusses the Minbari assassin's cryptic line with Delenn, who claims it to be an old Minbari insult. Then, in a revelation concerning the somewhat ambiguous relationship between the Minbari and the truth, Delenn says "I would never tell you anything that was not in your best interest." Sinclair then explains why they kept rebuilding the Babylon stations, saying that humans rebuild something they value until it stays, and for the first time in the series, quotes Tennyson. This leads to another continuity error as Delenn asks Sinclair for an explanation of poetry, even though we later learn in The War Prayer that she is close friends with Shaal Mayan, a famous Minbari poet.

The Gathering is, ultimately, a very mixed bag. While it is loaded with moments of interest and import for someone who is familiar with the series, I always wonder about how effective it is to introduce new viewers to the Babylon 5 universe. The movie is quite slow for the first half, flooding the viewer with piles of exposition, and then picks up at an almost breakneck pace as it rushes to the resolution of the murder mystery. In some ways, The Gathering is a pilot for a different (albeit very similar) series than the one that actually ended up airing. Although the direct story of this pilot is built around characters leaping to conclusions without any real basis for doing so, the actual murder mystery itself is almost beside the point. Despite the handful of continuity oddities, The Gathering serves its primary purpose well - establishing all the major characters fairly well, giving the basic layout of the political landscape, and providing the foundation for the mysteries that would drive the series for the entire first season and beyond. For that reason, I give this movie a slightly guarded recommendation, noting that it is probably more enjoyable for those familiar with the show than it is for the presumed intended audience of those first coming to the series.

Subsequent episode reviewed: Midnight On the Firing Line

Babylon 5     Movie Reviews     Home

Review - Passion Play by W. Edward Blain

Short review: One of my high school teachers writes a murder mystery about killing boys at a thinly disguised version of the high school I attended.

Haiku
Montpelier School
Is not Woodberry Forest
But really it is

Full review: At the outset I must reveal that W. Edward Blain, who was, and at the time of this writing still is, an English teacher at Woodberry Forest School, taught me English in my 6th Form year there. Consequently it is quite possible that this novel, published just four years after I graduated and set at the fictional Montpelier School for Boys which is an incredibly thinly disguised version of Woodberry Forest, might hold more interest for me than it does for the average reader. Notwithstanding this, Passion Play is a very good mystery novel involving faculty intrigue, adolescent turmoil, and a series of murders.

One thing must be made clear: in addition to serving as the backdrop for most of the action, the Montpelier School for Boys is, in a certain sense, a character in the novel. The particular and somewhat unique way of life at the school dominates the action throughout the novel. And that way of life mirrors the real life of Woodberry students almost exactly. Montpelier students go to classes on a rolling schedule, with Tuesday and Friday afternoons off, with Saturday classes, just like Woodberry students. They have dorm inspection at 10:15 every day, are required (with limited exceptions) to participate in organized sports, have mandatory nightly two-hour study periods, all just like real Woodberry students. Even the "training meal" athletes who are going to an away event eat (roast beef, mashed potatoes, peas, and white bread, which everyone would just mix together to eat) is exactly the same. And, of course, the most important element common to both schools is the student run, single sanction honor code that prohibits lying, stealing, or cheating. To make the parallel even more obvious, the main building at the Montpelier Academy for Boys, housing administrative offices, the dining hall, and several dorms for the boys is Stringfellow Hall, while at Woodberry Forest the same function is filled by the Walker Building, named for the school's founder Robert Stringfellow Walker. In short, if an element of student life is introduced into the novel, it is almost certain that it is drawn from reality.

But other than providing a view into the world in which the students at Woodberry Forest live and work, does Passion Play deliver a story worth reading? The answer to that a resounding yes. The novel opens with a bang as an unnamed character picks up an adolescent male prostitute in New York and proceeds to murder him in a dingy movie theatre. The action then shifts to the Montpelier School in Virginia, where the murders continue as boy after boy is killed (for the record, as far as I know, no students attending Woodberry Forest have ever been murdered). The story is told from a shifting third person viewpoint, allowing Blain to move about from character to character, and relate his experiences in the unfolding grisly drama from each of their perspectives. This is a brilliant storytelling device, as it allows Blain to tell the story primarily from the perspective of Ben Warden, the head of the school's English department, Thomas Boatwright, a somewhat ordinary student at the school, and Cynthia Warden, Ben Warden's wife. Each has a unique perspective on both life at the school and the mystery. Finally, the unknown killer crops up from time to time as a viewpoint character, giving the reader insight into his motivations, and allowing Blain to cast suspicion on a number of characters in the process. Some chapters are told from the perspective of a handful of other minor characters, but the bulk of the story is told from the perspective of the four main characters.

From my perspective, as a former student, the character who I identified with most was Boatwright, whose life at the school rang true to me. His travails as he struggles to deal with the rigorous academic standards, the vagaries of the disciplinary system and its interaction with the honor code, and the usual adolescent difficulties understanding the new and alluring world of sex, are compounded by his difficulties dealing with Greg Lipscomb, his black roommate, and understanding (or even being aware of) the racism, both blatant and subtle, that Lipscomb must deal with. For one unfamiliar with the school, it should come as little surprise that as a private boarding school in the Southern United States, Woodberry has had few black students, and those that have attended have had to deal with some fairly nasty behavior by scions of wealth Southern families. Boatwright must deal with the overt racism displayed by several of the more obnoxious characters in the book, but also comes to realize his own prejudices and the pressures his roommate faces. Boatwright also has to figure out who, in the jungle that is the world of adolescent boys, who to turn to for advice concerning relationships with girls, and stumbles through making several foolish choices along the way.

The story of the two Wardens is more serious, but somewhat less compelling. Cynthia is mysteriously ill, and much of the action of both Ben and Cynthia in early part of the book is preoccupied with unraveling why this is so. Ben is a somewhat notable poet, and struggles to continue his output and his responsibilities to his students even while he struggles with his wife's unknown malady. The action of the story is told against the backdrop of the school's production of Othello, and although Ben is not the director of the play, as the head of the School's English department he (and Cynthia) are deeply involved. The use of Othello, with its themes of love, betrayal, and sex, is no accident, as those themes are mirrored in the action of the story ranging from Boatwright's fumbling adolescent romance with a girl from a nearby all girls boarding school (which seems to be roughly based upon the Madeira School for Girls, whose former headmistress Jean Harris famously killed her lover Herman Tarnower), to the rude sexual escapades of the bully boy Robert Staines, to the ill-disguised lust some of the other faculty members have for Cynthia, and finally, the sexual perversions of the unknown killer. Othello also serves to highlight the racial tensions that underlie the work, as Lipscomb assumes the title role in an effort to avoid the racial stereotyping that would accompany his participating in sports and prove himself intellectually. On that score, choosing to appear as Othello seems like something of an odd choice, given that the part is so identified with black actors, which seemed to me to run against the point of having Lipscomb's character in the book to begin with.

There are only a few minor miscues in the book. Some of the chapters don't work very well as they are told from the perspective of viewpoint characters with little to offer to the story. In one, for example, a vain faculty member who also happens to be a basketball coach spends much of the chapter trying to steer the conversation to his team's recent victory, and secure praise for himself. The chapter is mostly harmless, but it doesn't add much to the story, as the character doesn't really figure into any other part of the plot. The other weakness involves the resolution of the story. The mystery of who the killer is is not really solved. Instead, the killer reveals himself and ends the mystery on his own. In effect, the actions of all the other characters of the story become more or less irrelevant at the end, as the killer takes matters into his own hands. This is a rather unsatisfying end to the central element of the book.

Despite these minor flaws, the book remains quite good, primarily because the murder mystery mostly serves as a framing mechanism for exploring the relationships between the characters, and on that score, the book is excellent. As an aside, I must say that while none of the characters in the book were direct copies of faculty or students from my tenure at the school, there were definitely characters who, in the broad strokes, I recognized and have a feeling I know who they were loosely based upon. Being drawn from real people probably helps make the characters and their interplay so effective in the book, and make their interactions ring true. In the end, this book is an excellent read for anyone who is interested in a good mystery coupled with a detailed and well-crafted treatment of life in a boys boarding school.

Subsequent book in the series: Love Cools

W. Edward Blain     Book Reviews A-Z     Home

Review - Asimov's Science Fiction: Vol. 33, Nos. 10 & 11 (October/November 2009) by Sheila Williams (editor)

Stories included:

The Sea of Dreams by William Barton
Blood Dauber by Ted Kosmatka and Michael Poore
Wife-Stealing Time by R. Garcia y Robertson
Flowers of Asphodel by Damien Broderick
Flotsam by Elissa Malcohn
The Ghost Hunter's Beautiful Daughter by Christopher Barzak
Where the Time Goes by Heather Lindsley
Erosion by Ian Creasey
Before My Last Breath by Robert Reed
Deadly Sins by Nancy Kress

Poems included:
Derivative Work by Elissa Malcohn
For Ye, of Very Little Faith by W. Gregory Stewart
Monsters by Geoffrey A. Landis
Unghost Stories by Greg Beatty
The Hedge Witch's Upgrade by Sandra Lindow
Edgar Allan Poe by Bryan D. Dietrich

Full review: The double issues of Analog and Asimov's often struggle to fill the whole volume with the usual fare of high quality material. This issue suffers a bit in that regard, with a number of stories that, for various reasons, are simply underwhelming in quality. However, given the large number of stories in the issue, that is not unexpected, and is more than offset by the generally high quality of the remaining material in the issue. Among the high quality material is Mary Robinette Kowal's essay Thought Experiments: Almost Possible in which she examines what should qualify as hard science fiction and what should not based upon what physicists believe is possible and what is not. Interestingly, it turns out that very little is truly impossible, which might stick in the craw of hard science fiction purists, but to me seems to open up a whole vista of storytelling possibilities for the subgenre.

Four of the stories in this issue were pretty weak, all for very different reasons. Blood Dauber is a collaboration between Ted Kosmatka and Michael Poole. I always wonder about shorter length stories written by multiple authors, as it seems like there is so little space for each to work with, but it seems like the two each took on subplot and wove them together. The story links the crumbling personal life of a zookeeper at a dilapidated local zoo with the discovery of a bizarre insect that seems to mutate every generation to whatever form seems most advantageous when the creature is in the larval stage. The connection is fairly heavy handed, and the story doesn't seem to come together very well, which seems to be a problem for a fair number of collaborations.

Flowers of Asphodel by Damien Broderick is the weakest story in the issue. It aspires to be a deep meaningful story telling a tale of love and betrayal, but it crashes and burns under the weight of its own self-importance and pretentious language, making it almost unreadable. I kept turning the pages hoping the author would get to some kind of story or make some sort of point, but he didn't. Flotsam, by Elissa Malcohn is also a weak story, but much less so than Flowers of Asphodel. Flotsam has very little science fiction content, focusing on a child's memory of discovering a mermaid washed up on shore with a tide of fish killed by the polluted water of the ocean. She holds this memory, driven to clean up the environment, but unable to do much effectively due to her impoverished background until she discovers another one when she is much older. There is a bit too much serendipity in the narrative, and the only science fictional element is the undiscovered life form, so the story is pretty lightweight even though it is clearly intended to be a dire warning about environmental disaster.

I was generally unimpressed by The Ghost Hunter's Beautiful Daughter by Christopher Barzak, but mostly because I simply did not care about the characters. Both the ghost hunter and his daughter seemed to be cardboard cutouts, and the rest of the characters (including the ghosts) simply props to be hustled about the story. The story itself doesn't help much, as the ghost hunter's daughter has second thoughts about hunting ghosts and makes her father stop.

The remaining stories in the book more than make up for the weaknesses of those four. This issue marks the return of SinBad the sand sailor in R. Garcia y Robertson's Wife-Stealing Time. A denizen of a quasi-plausible artificially created version of Barsoom, SinBad is quickly becoming one of my favorite recurring characters in Asimov's. He is a sex criminal (consorting with lesbians among his many crimes), but no one in the stories seems to take this particularly seriously. It is unclear to me if this is a commentary on the overly broad sex offender registries in many part of the U.S., or on the condemn the sin but look the other way attitude of most religious groups these days, or if it is something else entirely. In any event, the story follows SinBad as he stumbles across a pretty young transplanted Crow Indian girl taking refuge during her tribe's annual wife-stealing time, and the troubles they both run into when they become entangled in the doings of an off-world hunting party. The story is humorous and recreates Burrough's Barsoom pretty well, but retains a core of science plausibility that makes it that much better.

Where the Time Goes by Heather Lindsley follows a pair of time traveling entrepreneurs who go into the past and harvest wasted time. One of their harvesting runs goes awry, and they find themselves having to scramble to avoid calamity. In the end, they come up with a creative way to make ends meet. Deadly Sins by Nancy Kress is also a humorous story about a scientific discovery that allows a person to detect the scent of people's emotions. The humor comes from the unusual array of emotions the creator decided to build into his detection system (which the astute can probably guess from the title of the story).

Two of the stories are hard science fiction tales about colonizing hostile worlds. Erosion by Ian Creasey is about a person who has been enhanced to survive the rigors of a mission to colonize an alien world testing out his new body. He acts recklessly, and pays the price while learning a lesson that will probably serve him sell in his future home. The story is both sad and hopeful. In Before My Last Breath by Robert Reed the hostile world is Earth, and the colonizers are aliens who crash-landed on the planet in the distant past. The story focuses on the discovery of the alien burial ground in the modern day, and the discovery that the alien culture slowly fell apart as they lost their technological know-how and descended into superstition in the face of the harsh and unforgiving Earth climate. Overall, this is probably the best story of the issue.

The longest story in the issue is The Sea of Dreams by William Barton, a bizarre time-travel tale that assumes that a branching alternate reality is created each instance that time is altered. The protagonist has been transformed into a reptilian creature as a result of anti-radiation treatments, and works with a computer pseudo-personality that is in love with him. He finds himself isolated with one of the pseudo-personality's cloned drones, who develops a personality of her own while they are traveling through their own distant future. Each hop through time alters things radically and seals off the reality they just came from. The story is just as strange as it seems, and the strangeness just makes a good story better.

This issue, on balance, is above average. While there were some definite misses, and some stories that were simply no more than adequate, several stories in this issue were quite good, with two (Wife-Stealing Time and Before My Last Breath) that stand out as superior. Overall, this is a good issue of a good magazine.

Previous issue reviewed: September 2009
Subsequent issue reviewed: December 2009

Asimov's     Sheila Williams     Magazine Reviews     Home

Follow Friday - Aces Over Eights

It's Friday again, which means it's time for Follow Friday. To join the fun and make now book blogger friends, just follow these simple rules:

1. Follow the Follow My Book Blog Friday Host (Parajunkee) and any one else you want to follow on the list.
2. Put your Blog name and URL in the Linky thing.
3. Grab the button up there and place it in a post, this post is for people to find a place to say hi in your comments.
4. Follow, follow, follow as many as you can, as many as you want, or just follow a few. The whole point is to make new friends and find new blogs. Also, don't just follow, comment and say hi. Another blogger might not know you are a new follower if you don't say "Hi".
5. If someone comments and says they are following you, be a dear and follow back. Spread the love . . . and the followers.
6. If you want to show the link list, just follow the link below the entries and copy and paste it within your post!
7. If you're new to the Follow Friday Hop, comment and let me know, so I can stop by and check out your blog!

And now this week's question: What embarrassing thing have you done on cold medicine?

I don't remember this, because I was on cold medicine, but my ex-wife said that I woke up in the middle of the night for about five minutes, rattled off a bunch of incomprehensible legal jargon, and fell back asleep.

Go to previous Follow Friday: Sevens
Go to subsequent Follow Friday: Number Nine

Follow Friday     Home

Review - Daredevil: The Man Without Fear by Frank Miller

Short review: The origin story of Daredevil retold from his childhood, through his teen years and up to the moment in which Matt Murdock accepts his destiny as the man without fear all given the typical hyper violent somewhat misogynistic treatment that is Frank Miller's trademark.

Haiku
Murdock is blinded
Trains to fight all injustice
Daredevil is born

Full review: In the early nineties, several years after his long and successful run with the character, Frank Miller returned to writing Daredevil for a special series filling in the details of the character's youth and origins. The result is the graphic novel Daredevil: The Man Without Fear. Oddly, though the content was originally conceived as a graphic novel, due to the fact that Marvel had phased out the graphic novel format, it was released as a limited comic book run. The materials from the run were then later collected together and released in its present form as a graphic novel.

Daredevil is one of my favorite Marvel characters, possibly because his alter ego Matt Murdock and I share the same profession. The interesting thing about Daredevil as a superhero is that his primary "superpower", his enhanced nonvisual senses, serve primarily to offset the fact that he is blind. Granted, his senses are so enhanced that he actually is more aware of his surroundings than a typical sighted person, but for the most part, his superpower is mostly effective in making him not disabled. Daredevil is also interesting insofar as he is one of the few comic book superheroes who has a regular "day job" as his alter ego that is more or less directly connected to the same impulses that drive him to don a mask and hunt villains in the night. Unlike, say Tony Stark, who is a playboy industrialist, or Peter Parker, freelance newspaper photographer, or any number of other heroes who have jobs that are often glamorous or exciting, but have basically nothing to do with their super-heroic persona, Matt Murdock is a lawyer who advocates for the same poor and downtrodden people that Daredevil fights to protect. Of course, this means, as Miller notes in his introduction to the book, that Murdock in his persona as Daredevil, is a lawyer who routinely breaks the law, a tension that makes the character even more interesting.

Daredevil: The Man Without Fear is basically a straightforward and linear story. it starts with Murdock as a young boy being raised by a single father in the slums of Hell's Kitchen in New York. His father, a one time boxing champion, is now a boozed up has-been pressured by the mob to work as an enforcer. His father pushes Matt to excel academically, hoping his son will have a life that he was never able to achieve. The younger Murdock grates under this pressure, tormented by bullies on the schoolyard, but forbidden to fight back with his fists. Still, he obeys, building the strong will that is one of the hallmarks of the character. Eventually Matt is blinded in an accident, with radioactive material spilled into his eyes. He is then instructed by a mysterious character named "Stick", who is also blind, in the ways of martial arts, learning to use his other senses to compensate for his lack of sight. This is all very quasi-mystical, as it is made clear in the story that Stick was shadowing Matt before his accident, apparently possessed of foreknowledge that the accident would occur. This version of the Daredevil origin story also deemphasizes the traditional "radioactive materials did it" back story explanation for Matt's heightened senses, substituting the mystical martial arts training provided by Stick. (This makes one wonder why other blind people do not routinely develop similar radar powers. Apparently they aren't dedicated enough or something).

In one of the pivotal events in Murdock's life, his father refuses to throw a fight for the mob and gets killed as a result, starting Matt's career as a crime fighter. Matt then goes on a revenge fueled murder spree, killing all the men who participated in killing his father, but killing an innocent woman along the way. This causes Stick to disavow him as heir to the shadowy mystical organization that Stick is part of and sets Murdock free from that potential entanglement. The story then ticks off all the requisite back story boxes. Murdock goes to college and law school. meets his longtime friend Foggy. Comes across and has an ill-advised and ill-fated romance with the unpredictable and dangerously mercurial Elektra (who is already apparently under the influence of dark forces, hearing disembodied "voices" that drive her to commit unspeakable acts). Matt befriends a young girl named Mickey in Hell's Kitchen who frequents the same abandoned gym that Matt has haunted as a youth, and when she is kidnapped by a minor functionary in the Kingpen's organization he once again takes on organized crime, this time in an effort to save Mickey. This brings him to the attention of the Daredevil's long time nemesis, the Kingpen, and all the pieces of the back story are in place. The final panel of the novel is Matt's coming out as Daredevil in his familiar red costume with horns.

As an origin story this graphic novel is effective to a certain extent. Unfortunately, the story pretty much assumes that one already knows a great deal about "Daredevil lore", as the connections between various characters are left undrawn, and the significance of some events is left unexplained. For example, though there are oblique references to the organization of which Stick is part of, the significance of this organization is left entirely a mystery. It is implied that Elektra killed her own father at the behest of her inner voices, but whether she actually did, and whether the demons that drive her are anything other than delusions is entirely unexplained in the pages of this book. Those who had read the comic book series in the years before this run was penned will immediately understand who they are, and why they are important, but for someone reading this as an introduction to the Daredevil character, it will be essentially meaningless. The graphic novel has a sort of "fill in the boxes" feel to it as well, checking off the required elements of the back story one by one like clockwork. As a result, as an introduction to the Daredevil character, this graphic novel is less than effective. As a gift to longtime fans of the series, it is perfect. While I give this a strong recommendation to anyone who is familiar with the Daredevil character (and who, as a result, has probably already read this graphic novel, making this recommendation redundant), for someone just starting to read this particular superhero's tale I can give only a modest recommendation, as much of the material will probably seem confusing and extraneous to the story being told within its pages.

Frank Miller     Book Reviews A-Z     Home

Review - The Elements of Style (3rd Edition) by William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White

Short review: Get it. Read it. Improve your writing.

Haiku
Strunk and White's advice:
Clearer, simpler, shorter
Makes writing stronger

Long review: There are some books that everyone should own a copy of. The Elements of Style is one of those books. Although it is only eighty-five pages long (with an additional seven page index), the book is an essential guide to the basics of writing concisely, clearly, and effectively.

The book lays out rules and suggestions for writing in the English language, starting with the mandatory, moving on to the strongly suggested, and finally to the merely recommended. As a rule of thumb, it seems that the earlier an item appears in the book, the more critical it is that a writer follow the instructions given if they want their end product to be worthwhile. So, for example, a writer could ignore some (or all) of the advice regarding style in Chapter V and still produce a coherent and readable piece of work, but ignoring the rules of usage in Chapter I will almost certainly result in an incomprehensible mess.

Following the rules and advice laid out in this book will result in a clear and straightforward piece of writing. Most writers would do well to try to follow all of the rules and pointers in the book, especially those who are producing written material in a professional context. When writing a business letter, or a grant proposal, or even just an e-mail to a work associate, the most important goal for the writer is to convey his intended meaning properly, and following the advice in this book will substantially aid in reaching that goal.

But wait, I hear you cry, my favorite author routinely ignores several points that the book makes. I'm sure they do. But I would also lay heavy odds that they are aware of the stylistic element that they are flouting, and they are doing so deliberately, and after at least some consideration as to the impact of making such a choice. The Elements of Style provides the template for what might be called conventional writing. If one wants to be rebellious and engage in unconventional writing, and be effective when doing so, one has to know the conventional rules first. Even still, all but the most skilled writer ignores the advice contained in this book at his peril.

Anyone who writes should have a copy of this book on their shelf, and should read and reread it on a regular basis. Even the most experienced writer who peruses this manual is likely to be reminded of some tidbit of advice that could strengthen their prose. And even for those who reject all of the advice on the way to forging their own unique style, this book is a must read, as one should at least be conscious of what one is rejecting (although, to be perfectly honest, I cannot imagine the output of a writer who did reject all of the suggestions in this book being anything other than an unreadable nightmare). The Elements of Style is an essential part of every person's library.

William Strunk, Jr.     E.B. White     Book Reviews A-Z     Home

Biased Opinion - The Top Ten Science Fiction Television Shows

So recently IGN.com put out their list of the top fifty science fiction shows of all time. And, well, in my opinion their list is moronic. One of the primary reasons is that as their top show of all time they picked the revamped Battlestar Galactica, and despite the fact that actors like Edward James Olmos and Jamie Bamber did everything they could with the material they were given, the reimagined Battlestar Galactica was a completely derivative piece of shit. The show was little more than a collection of rehashed World War II movie cliches overlaid with a pile of pretentious and badly thought-out theology. It also got tons of praise for dealing with issues like religion and racism "first" that, well, shows like Babylon 5 and Farscape actually dealt with first and did infinitely better job doing so. And believable characters? Are you kidding me? The cardboard characters on the original Battlestar Galactica had more depth and believability than the collection of walking stereotypes that populated the reimagined version. For anyone who ever thinks that because I have written about other science fiction shows that it might be fun to watch me review the reimagined Battlestar Galactica, just realize that it would be an unrelenting hate fest as I thrash the piece of crap episode by episode for being the horseshit that it is. If you think that would be fun to read, then by all means, send me a copy of the DVDs and ask me to review them.

The fact that junk like Lost and The X-Files (both awful for their own reasons) are also on IGN's top ten list tells me that someone should have hit their selectors with a clue-by-four before they let them try to spell their own names, let alone select a list of the top science fiction shows. Compounding this, the IGN top ten list is missing actual good science fiction shows like Babylon 5, Farscape, Stargate: SG-1, and they only include Dr. Who because of the revamped version, but even more unforgivably, Blake's 7 is not even in the top fifty. So, to rectify this, and to provide the world with the actual list of the best science fiction shows of all time (as selected by the completely unbiased panel consisting of me, me, and only me), here is my top ten list.

10. Red Dwarf: It's cold outside, especially if you are the last human left in the universe. Double especially if your only companions are a senile ship A.I., a hologram of the biggest jerk you knew when you were alive, and the descendant of your pet cat a million generations removed. Eventually add in a stuffy robot butler, and you've got the life of the chicken vindaloo loving Lister, the lowest ranking crew member of the mining ship Red Dwarf, saved only because he was in suspended animation in the brig of the ship when everyone else was killed. Comedy is hard. Comedy mixed with science fiction is even harder. And the odd thing is that so many of the people who seem to be able to make consistently good genre fiction comedy are British: Douglas Adams with the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, Terry Pratchett with his Discworld series, and Doug Grant and Rob Naylor with Red Dwarf. The series dances at the edge of insanity and absurdity, and pretty much always delivers snarky humor and pretty good (although never sensible) science fiction.

9. The Prisoner: Take Kafka. Mix it with some Orwell, add some 1960s influenced psychedelic elements, throw in a retired spy and a bunch of science fiction, and you have The Prisoner. Co created by and starring Patrick McGoohan as the title character, the show is only seventeen episodes long, but packs more creepy and scary psychological drama than most televisions shows were able to generate in years of airtime. Most importantly, the show is filled with a set of mysteries that are actually mysterious, and the actions taken by characters to unravel them or escape the consequences of living in the Village actually lead somewhere and have a story related point (as opposed to the crap that passed for "mysteries" on a show like Lost). Set in a secluded location where enemies of the authority have been spirited away to, stripped of their personal identity and various means of pressure are used to try to obtain the results that the authority desires, The Prisoner has maintained its relevance for more than forty years, and likely will be just as topical and pointed forty years from now.

8. The Twilight Zone: It is a mark of the pervasive influence of a television show that it has the ability to spawn pop songs. It seems almost inconceivable now that a network would air a show that was basically a collection of unrelated science fiction, horror and paranormal short stories, and not only that, it would be a television classic watched almost sixty years later. Rod Serling's opening monologue has become so iconic that it is routinely the the subject of parody. Television programs routinely do spoofs and homages to the program. People who would never be caught dead watching Star Trek or reading a book that contained science fiction fondly remember their favorite episodes of the show. That said, I do have some problems with the show. Due to the format of the program, a large proportion of the plots and characters are little more than cliches, and far too many episodes rely upon the "one twist at the end" formula for their impact. The show also definitely suffered in quality when the network decided to shift the program from half-hour episodes to full hour episodes. Finally, when taken as a "science fiction" show, the science fiction episodes were leavened with a generous helping of paranormal and fantasy focused installments, which I enjoy but serve to pull down its ranking a bit when considering it as a science fiction show.

7. Doctor Who: In their list, IGN ranked Doctor Who in their top ten list, but pooh-poohed the original run of the series, effectively saying that it was only the 2006 relaunch of the series that resulted in the show meriting inclusion on their list. This is simply hogwash. Sure the 1963-1989 run had cheesy special effects and unconvincing aliens with awful make-up clad in badly fitting costumes. But despite it being fun to look at, eye-candy is the least important element in good science fiction. What made Doctor Who great was not flashy cool special effects, but rather the broad palette available for its stories, and the fascinating (and constantly changing) character of the Doctor as well as the panoply of interesting companions and iconic villains. With the entire range of space and time as the backdrop for their stories, the series left almost no possible science fiction idea unexplored (and in many cases, was the first to explore it in televised science fiction: When Star Trek: The Next Generation introduced the implacable supposedly unstoppable Borg, they were more or less just walking down a path originally laid by Doctor Who with the Daleks and the Cybermen). While the current version with Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant remains great television, pretending that, for example, the John Pertwee, Tom Baker and Peter Davidson years wouldn't result in the show meriting inclusion is just silly.

6. Blake's 7: In many ways the post-apocalyptic dystopian world of Blake's 7 is the anti-Star Trek. Whereas Gene Roddenberry's vision of a future interstellar government was of a benevolent, almost utopian Federation, the Federation of Blake's 7 was a totalitarian nightmare. Featuring a band of escaped convicts on an alien ship reluctantly led into acting as a resistance movement by the idealist titular character (until he is replaced by the mercenary-minded Avon), the show had a dark and and gloomy atmosphere that wouldn't be replicated in science fiction television until Farscape (which was clearly influenced by Blake's 7, even down to the insane military commander pursuing the heroes) was produced in the late 1990s. The show was also one of the first genre shows to attempt to have something of a continuing storyline that ran through the entire series, although efforts to make this a reality were hampered by network politics and changes in the roster of writers for the show. One of the most interesting elements of the show is that the petty criminals Blake cajoles into becoming his freedom fighters are still petty criminals at heart, and only reluctantly do anything noble or self-sacrificing. From the opening episode featuring the framing and show trial of the lead character, to the final mayhem and death-filled scene of the show, Blake's 7 is a thought-provoking ride through the dark dystopian flip side of utopian Star Trek-influenced science fiction.

5. Firefly: Joss Weedon combined space opera with the classic western, threw in some Chinese influence, and created a masterpiece. The abuse of this short-lived series is Exhibit A in the prosecution's case against the intelligence of network television executives. During it's initial eleven episode run on FOX, Firefly was repeatedly preempted, moved in the schedule, and the episodes were shown out of order (which had some rather negative effects on continuity). After mistreating the show in this manner, FOX decided to cancel it for "low ratings", presumably blaming the quality of the show for this problem rather than admitting that the "low ratings" were the result FOX's own stupidity in handling the show. Despite its all too short and cruelly truncated run, Firefly remains one of the best science fiction shows ever put on television, and one of the better shows of any kind ever to air. Melding science fiction with the western and revolving around the inhabitants of the space ship Serenity captained by Mal Reynolds, a veteran who fought on the losing side in a civil war against an authoritarian government, the show has a gritty and rustic feel that is somewhat unique in televised science fiction. Fortunately for people who want to see the show now, it is available on DVD in the correct intended order with two additional episodes that were filmed but not aired by FOX. In addition, fans of the show got a bonus when series creator Joss Weedon was able to give an ending of sorts to many of the main plot lines via the movie Serenity, which delved more deeply into River Tam's background and the mystery of the Reavers. Though the initial projected seven year arc of the show will never be played out properly (and doubtless the show would rank higher on the list than it does if it had), what little there is of the show is stellar.

4. Star Trek: (Star Trek: The Original Series Reviews Page) I'm talking about the original series here featuring Kirk, Spock, and McCoy with it's five year mission to boldly go where no man had gone before. Quite frankly, Star Trek: The Next Generation has aged badly, and is nigh-unwatchable now, and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is basically a collection of Star Trek lore grafted onto the ideas that were original to Babylon 5 and executed better by Straczynski. And the less said about Star Trek: Voyager and Enterprise the better. But the original is the eight hundred pound gorilla of televised science fiction (as evidenced by the numerous spin off series, movies, and books that it has spawned). Though the series lasted only three seasons, its influence is pervasive, even outside of the science fiction genre: almost everyone recognizes the term "redshirt", the catch phrase "Beam me up, Scotty", and a dozen other references that have worked their way into the popular lexicon. The heart of the show was the interplay between Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, but all of the regular characters on the series are memorable. Despite some fairly obvious flaws, a hopelessly utopian outlook, and the absurdity of the Prime Directive, the popularity of the series endures for a reason, and that is because it is just that good.

Honorable Mention: Star Trek: The Animated Series. The best of of all the Star Trek spin offs by far. The animated format allowed the creators to do things they could not do in the live action show, including the second crew with several very alien members added to the inhabitants of the Enterprise. It also has an episode adapted from Larry Niven's short story The Slaver Weapon featuring Kzinti as opposition for the crew.

3. Stargate: SG-1: Spun off from a movie of modest popularity, Stargate: SG-1 became the longest running science fiction show ever to air on U.S. television. The show was built around one of the greatest props of all time - the Stargate, and developed a stunningly engrossing mythology upon the bare bones left behind by the movie. Having replaced Kurt Russell with Richard Dean Anderson in the role of Colonel O'Neil(l), the series even felt comfortable poking fun at the switch with a recurring gag. In many ways, the structure of the primary interstellar travel technology in Stargate: SG-1 made the odd quirks of Star Trek (such as why are all the planets habitable, why does everyone speak English, why is there always a settlement within walking distance of where the crew touches down, and why do they send a tiny away team consisting of the command crew, and so on) make sense. The camaraderie of the tight team of O'Neil, Carter, Jackson and Teal'c drove the show for much of the series, and for the most part changes in the roster of the team worked fairly well. The show also featured interesting (and often theatrically over the top) long running villains such as Apophis, Anubis, and the Replicators as well as allies such as the Tok'ra and the Asgard. While the Ori seemed like a good idea, for the most part the episodes dealing with them as the main antagonist were just not as strong as the rest of the series. Even so, the show managed to turn out excellent science fiction week-after-week for a decade. The show was popular enough to spawn two spin-off series - Stargate: Atlantis, and Stargate: Universe, although neither was nearly as good as the original.

2. Farscape: (Farscape Reviews Page) Shot through a wormhole while testing an experimental spaceship, astronaut John Crichton falls in with a collection of escaped prisoners on a living ship and flees from a series of insane military commanders seeking the knowledge locked inside his head. Along the way Crichton deals with the weirdness of being the lone human in a world dominated by aliens, makes frequent references to Earth based pop culture, and tries (only somewhat successfully) to avoid being driven insane. The true strength of the series was the well-defined characters and their interplay as well as the richly imagined universe it was set in. The show gets major points for being the only show (that I know of) to incorporate two puppetry driven characters as series regulars, and it was able to pull it off successfully to boot. Anyone who criticizes the show for having "muppets" gets to go sit in the corner and think about how much better the special effects in this show were than those of their favorite series. Badly dealt with by the SciFi Network, if Firefly is Exhibit A in the case against network executives being permitted to tie their own shoes, and Crusade is Exhibit B, then Farscape is Exhibit C. The show ran for four seasons, was promised a fifth, and was abruptly cancelled by the SciFi channel in the middle of an ongoing dramatic arc intended to serve as the primary story line of the fifth season (leading to the series ending with a "To be Continued" card on the screen). Though the fans got closure in the form of the miniseries Farscape: The Peacekeeper Wars, this compromise required jamming what was intended to be twenty-two episodes worth of story into four hours of programming, which was obviously a suboptimal outcome. Despite the network abuse the show suffered, it remains one of the best science fiction shows ever made.

1. Babylon 5: (Babylon 5 Reviews Page) I have said this before, and I will say it again - Babylon 5 is not merely the greatest science fiction show of all time, it is the best television show of any kind ever made. Created, produced, and mostly written by J. Michael Straczynski, the show is almost unique in television history in that it was conceived from the start as a complete five-year story. Because Straczynski was so heavily involved in the show from start to finish, it has a level of internal consistency that is simply alien to television. (Not to say there aren't a few missteps, but they are fairly minor). Granted, network executive idiocy resulted in fifth season that wasn't up to par with the rest of the show, and cost the show the services of Claudia Christian (and thus, the character Susan Ivanova), but taken by itself even the subpar fifth season of Babylon 5 is better than the best season of the revamped Battlestar Galactica. Straczynski's involvement also meant that the show incorporated many elements drawn from classic literary science fiction: one can see the influence of books such as The Demolished Man, A Canticle for Liebowitz, and the Lensman series among others. While Farscape told its space opera from the ground level perspective, Babylon 5's ranges from the gritty underworld of Michael Garibaldi and Marcus Cole, all the way to the corridors of galactic power inhabited by Sheridan and Delenn. The show featured storytelling strong enough to turn a villain into a prophet and a buffoon into a villain into a hero and finally into a tragic figure. Quite simply, Babylon 5 was the best use of television ever.

Honorable Mention: Crusade. Spun off by popular demand following the end of the original Babylon 5 series, Crusade was just getting a head of steam when it was shut down, leaving nothing but tantalizing unrealized promise. Almost as soon as it was launched, TNT executives started doing their very best to kill it with moronic demands and the show only lasted half a season. But for the sad mistreatment of Firefly, Crusade would be the most ill-used science fiction show of all time. As it is, it is Exhibit B in the prosecution's case against network executive asshattery.

Television Reviews     Biased Opinions     Home