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icepixiePoints of Departure
Good god, from his first moment on screen, Sheridan is so freaking perky and smug and Full Of The Goodness Of Saving Kittens From Trees that I kind of want to smack him. "If they so much as blink in your direction, yell. We'll be there"? Oh, Sheridan. And then there's his pompous windbag speech, which gets points for the interruptions and for him delivering it to an empty room, but yes, ow. And oh lord, the orange obsession starts here too.
Okay, yes, he's better than Sinclair. I grew to like Sinclair much more than I did the first time through, but I can definitely see that Sheridan is a vast improvement. And yet he knows exactly how to annoy the everliving bejeebus out of me. (I think it was probably a very wise move to have him angsting over Anna in the next episode, because that does create sympathy--even if that sympathy is in part based on relief that we didn't have Michael O'Hare delivering those lines.)
I do like how Sheridan makes Susan downright sunny. She's really adorable when she's in hero-worship mode. See, she could be happy if only life didn't keep giving her so much to be sad about! Like, say, Garibaldi being in a coma. Aw, she comes to see him at the same time every day. And prays for him. *fans tiny little shipper flame* Maybe this time it'll happen! *snerk*
I also like having Sheridan assert that his was the only victory of the entire Earth-Minbar war, and he won't apologize for it. It was a good way of setting him apart from Sinclair, and also of illustrating his character in just a few words.
I've always found the idea of Minbari souls transmigrating into Human bodies, and the implied need/desire by the Minbari to kind of draw them back into the fold, to be utterly fascinating. Although I wonder why the idea of killing more humans to get the souls back into circulation, as it were, didn't occur to them. Maybe they figured that because they were "diminishing" during the war, they ought to find another way. But as cool as I find it,* this is where my distaste for Sheridan/Delenn starts, I think. The prophecy that she would change in order to link the species, as well the whole changing for a man! thing, robs the relationship of all spontaneity and thus interest for me.
Daily random: Corwin got a haircut! He no longer sports a mullet!
* I think it would incredibly entertaining to take the concept, file off the serial numbers, and write a romantic comedy about an alien who thinks a particular Human has "the other half" of his/her/its soul, and thus they are destined to mate and/or marry. The Human would be like, "OH HELL NO," but would of course eventually be won over.
Revelations
Aptly-titled, this.
I guess I'll get the Earth-related stuff out of the way first. Uhhh...sucks to be Human right now? I forgot they figured out the Psi Corps involvement so quickly. And how slimy Clark is from the very beginning. And, switching plotlines for a moment, how early Z'ha'dum gets mentioned.
It also sucks to be Londo, though he doesn't really realize it yet. A little further down the path he goes...
And G'Kar seems to know the most about the Shadows of anyone now, except for Kosh and perhaps Delenn. Because he does Research! :D I've forgotten--were the Centauri involved in the first Shadow War? I seem to recall the Narn had just started wandering out into their solar system (which G'Kar's reading from the Book of G'Quan this time around seems to support), and...possibly they helped the Minbari and Vorlons wage war? Maybe not. It's all very foggy. At any rate, G'Kar got to SCARE THE CRAP OUT OF ME with his speech about things waking up on long-dead worlds and trying to gather their forces quietly and out of the notice of others. It sent chills all down my spine and back up again.
While I'm on that topic, I liked the visual contradictions and ambiguities the editor put into this one. We have G'Kar making that incredibly spine-tingling speech about the darkness coming again, but we see Garibaldi waking up and Delenn coming out of her cocoon. Then we see Delenn examining her new appearance at the "rough beast" line of the Yeats poem.
Speaking of which. First of all, yes "The Second Coming" is the perfect piece of verse for this point in the series. On the other hand, that poem is so overused in our culture that it's lost almost all impact for me. (Sometimes, if I haven't seen it referenced in a while, I can reread it and it'll catch me off guard. But it's fairly rare.) As well, I think of it as so intimately tied to the immediately post-WWI, Modernist period from which it comes--particularly some lines G'Kar doesn't read--that it's jarring to hear it used in other contexts. I also know all too much about about Yeats's arcane spiritualist philosophy and the connections it has too this poem to rewire my perception of it entirely around them. (Don't read A Vision. Just don't. Trust me.) In short, it's the best possible thing they could've used, and yet I can't feel the entirety of the impact I know JMS thinks is there. [end Modernism/Irish Lit specialist tangent]
A few other things:
Delenn: "I did this with the blessings of my government..."
Me: "Define 'blessings.'"
And here's Anna. In retrospect: Yeeeeah, that plotline was definitely supposed to be for Catherine. I'm kind of glad she escaped unscathed, though, despite the fact that the impact would've been greater had they been able to keep her in that position on the gameboard. (...She could have been yet another of Sheridan's former wives?)
Daily Fools, Fools!: Seriously, what the hell kind of a name is Icarus for a spaceship? That's like a freaking engraved invitation to disaster, you know?
Daily Hilarity: "There, you see? One deserts his post without any explanation. The other one picks the most breathtakingly inconvenient moment possible to explore new career options. Like becoming a butterfly!" Oh, Londo. &hearts
Good god, from his first moment on screen, Sheridan is so freaking perky and smug and Full Of The Goodness Of Saving Kittens From Trees that I kind of want to smack him. "If they so much as blink in your direction, yell. We'll be there"? Oh, Sheridan. And then there's his pompous windbag speech, which gets points for the interruptions and for him delivering it to an empty room, but yes, ow. And oh lord, the orange obsession starts here too.
Okay, yes, he's better than Sinclair. I grew to like Sinclair much more than I did the first time through, but I can definitely see that Sheridan is a vast improvement. And yet he knows exactly how to annoy the everliving bejeebus out of me. (I think it was probably a very wise move to have him angsting over Anna in the next episode, because that does create sympathy--even if that sympathy is in part based on relief that we didn't have Michael O'Hare delivering those lines.)
I do like how Sheridan makes Susan downright sunny. She's really adorable when she's in hero-worship mode. See, she could be happy if only life didn't keep giving her so much to be sad about! Like, say, Garibaldi being in a coma. Aw, she comes to see him at the same time every day. And prays for him. *fans tiny little shipper flame* Maybe this time it'll happen! *snerk*
I also like having Sheridan assert that his was the only victory of the entire Earth-Minbar war, and he won't apologize for it. It was a good way of setting him apart from Sinclair, and also of illustrating his character in just a few words.
I've always found the idea of Minbari souls transmigrating into Human bodies, and the implied need/desire by the Minbari to kind of draw them back into the fold, to be utterly fascinating. Although I wonder why the idea of killing more humans to get the souls back into circulation, as it were, didn't occur to them. Maybe they figured that because they were "diminishing" during the war, they ought to find another way. But as cool as I find it,* this is where my distaste for Sheridan/Delenn starts, I think. The prophecy that she would change in order to link the species, as well the whole changing for a man! thing, robs the relationship of all spontaneity and thus interest for me.
Daily random: Corwin got a haircut! He no longer sports a mullet!
* I think it would incredibly entertaining to take the concept, file off the serial numbers, and write a romantic comedy about an alien who thinks a particular Human has "the other half" of his/her/its soul, and thus they are destined to mate and/or marry. The Human would be like, "OH HELL NO," but would of course eventually be won over.
Revelations
Aptly-titled, this.
I guess I'll get the Earth-related stuff out of the way first. Uhhh...sucks to be Human right now? I forgot they figured out the Psi Corps involvement so quickly. And how slimy Clark is from the very beginning. And, switching plotlines for a moment, how early Z'ha'dum gets mentioned.
It also sucks to be Londo, though he doesn't really realize it yet. A little further down the path he goes...
And G'Kar seems to know the most about the Shadows of anyone now, except for Kosh and perhaps Delenn. Because he does Research! :D I've forgotten--were the Centauri involved in the first Shadow War? I seem to recall the Narn had just started wandering out into their solar system (which G'Kar's reading from the Book of G'Quan this time around seems to support), and...possibly they helped the Minbari and Vorlons wage war? Maybe not. It's all very foggy. At any rate, G'Kar got to SCARE THE CRAP OUT OF ME with his speech about things waking up on long-dead worlds and trying to gather their forces quietly and out of the notice of others. It sent chills all down my spine and back up again.
While I'm on that topic, I liked the visual contradictions and ambiguities the editor put into this one. We have G'Kar making that incredibly spine-tingling speech about the darkness coming again, but we see Garibaldi waking up and Delenn coming out of her cocoon. Then we see Delenn examining her new appearance at the "rough beast" line of the Yeats poem.
Speaking of which. First of all, yes "The Second Coming" is the perfect piece of verse for this point in the series. On the other hand, that poem is so overused in our culture that it's lost almost all impact for me. (Sometimes, if I haven't seen it referenced in a while, I can reread it and it'll catch me off guard. But it's fairly rare.) As well, I think of it as so intimately tied to the immediately post-WWI, Modernist period from which it comes--particularly some lines G'Kar doesn't read--that it's jarring to hear it used in other contexts. I also know all too much about about Yeats's arcane spiritualist philosophy and the connections it has too this poem to rewire my perception of it entirely around them. (Don't read A Vision. Just don't. Trust me.) In short, it's the best possible thing they could've used, and yet I can't feel the entirety of the impact I know JMS thinks is there. [end Modernism/Irish Lit specialist tangent]
A few other things:
Delenn: "I did this with the blessings of my government..."
Me: "Define 'blessings.'"
And here's Anna. In retrospect: Yeeeeah, that plotline was definitely supposed to be for Catherine. I'm kind of glad she escaped unscathed, though, despite the fact that the impact would've been greater had they been able to keep her in that position on the gameboard. (...She could have been yet another of Sheridan's former wives?)
Daily Fools, Fools!: Seriously, what the hell kind of a name is Icarus for a spaceship? That's like a freaking engraved invitation to disaster, you know?
Daily Hilarity: "There, you see? One deserts his post without any explanation. The other one picks the most breathtakingly inconvenient moment possible to explore new career options. Like becoming a butterfly!" Oh, Londo. &hearts