The OMG RACIAL PURITY! thing does indeed seem to come almost out of nowhere - the closest we get to it prior is the reactions to Delenn's transformation, which is sort of a different thing. Everybody keeps telling her she's not Minbari anymore. Which, okay, fine - she's not, she's a hybrid. Um. Which you would think would mean they'd be okay with her icky-hybrid-ness going off and marrying some Human so that she doesn't create more icky-hybrid Minbari. Unless Kalenn's plan is to stuff her in a temple somewhere (...which, honestly, the Minbari are just medieval enough that I could buy as his intention, sort of...) then getting her to not marry Sheridan seems like it would run exactly counter to his stated desires.
You're right, Susan would totally not be having with any of this nonsense, and it would be delightful to watch her and Delenn rip the whole thing apart. ♥
Lennier. Ohhhhh, this is one of the best episodes for Lennier, IMHO. He gets to be all awesome! He guesses that Delenn is trying to sneak away alone and he finds her and is all confident and convinces her that he won't let her go alone and, um, this is probably the episode where my subconscious made its quiet and slightly unnerving switch from wanting to hug him and give him cookies over to sort of loving him with a bizarre passion. He's just so fantastic here - quiet, yes, but so very loyal and determined and utterly willing to do anything for Delenn. I ship them so much. ♥
And Dukhat. Gah. So totally the world's scariest advisor, but also bad-ass, and my interpretation that Delenn had a crush on him probably comes a lot from my feeling that oh my god, how could she not? He's so fantastically larger-than-life and bold and clever and... agggggh. Minbari. I don't know what it is, but I seem to find half the damned species irresistibly attractive.
Delenn really did seem to be modeling her behavior with Lennier on Dukhat's behavior with her, and I think she always felt like she failed him by not being for him everything that Dukhat was for her, while at the same time Lennier seems to have all the same insane amounts of emotional baggage around his relationship with her that Delenn has with Dukhat. Judging by this triad and by the whole wacky thing with Neroon and Branmer and how jealous and weird and frankly slightly nuts Neroon was after Branmer's death, I'm thinking that the teacher/student relationship is a pretty damned big deal in Minbari culture. Like, if Dukhat hadn't died he would totally still be a major part of Delenn's life (thus leading to all sorts of hilarity, because that man would totally delight in tormenting Sheridan). And he and Lennier could have hung out, and Lennier could have gotten advice from him and I've thought this all through way too much. Because, as previously mentioned, I have a weird kink or something for the Minbari.
As for Marcus, I think we can safely say that he would quite like the modernists, yes, but more importantly? The man has the soul of an English major. One of the non-annoying ones, not like that guy who showed up in the other episode who was being all "I have a degree in literature" and I wanted to smack him over the head, or like Byron. Who is also the bad kind of English major.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2010-09-19 06:57 am (UTC)The OMG RACIAL PURITY! thing does indeed seem to come almost out of nowhere - the closest we get to it prior is the reactions to Delenn's transformation, which is sort of a different thing. Everybody keeps telling her she's not Minbari anymore. Which, okay, fine - she's not, she's a hybrid. Um. Which you would think would mean they'd be okay with her icky-hybrid-ness going off and marrying some Human so that she doesn't create more icky-hybrid Minbari. Unless Kalenn's plan is to stuff her in a temple somewhere (...which, honestly, the Minbari are just medieval enough that I could buy as his intention, sort of...) then getting her to not marry Sheridan seems like it would run exactly counter to his stated desires.
You're right, Susan would totally not be having with any of this nonsense, and it would be delightful to watch her and Delenn rip the whole thing apart. ♥
Lennier. Ohhhhh, this is one of the best episodes for Lennier, IMHO. He gets to be all awesome! He guesses that Delenn is trying to sneak away alone and he finds her and is all confident and convinces her that he won't let her go alone and, um, this is probably the episode where my subconscious made its quiet and slightly unnerving switch from wanting to hug him and give him cookies over to sort of loving him with a bizarre passion. He's just so fantastic here - quiet, yes, but so very loyal and determined and utterly willing to do anything for Delenn. I ship them so much. ♥
And Dukhat. Gah. So totally the world's scariest advisor, but also bad-ass, and my interpretation that Delenn had a crush on him probably comes a lot from my feeling that oh my god, how could she not? He's so fantastically larger-than-life and bold and clever and... agggggh. Minbari. I don't know what it is, but I seem to find half the damned species irresistibly attractive.
Delenn really did seem to be modeling her behavior with Lennier on Dukhat's behavior with her, and I think she always felt like she failed him by not being for him everything that Dukhat was for her, while at the same time Lennier seems to have all the same insane amounts of emotional baggage around his relationship with her that Delenn has with Dukhat. Judging by this triad and by the whole wacky thing with Neroon and Branmer and how jealous and weird and frankly slightly nuts Neroon was after Branmer's death, I'm thinking that the teacher/student relationship is a pretty damned big deal in Minbari culture. Like, if Dukhat hadn't died he would totally still be a major part of Delenn's life (thus leading to all sorts of hilarity, because that man would totally delight in tormenting Sheridan). And he and Lennier could have hung out, and Lennier could have gotten advice from him and I've thought this all through way too much. Because, as previously mentioned, I have a weird kink or something for the Minbari.
As for Marcus, I think we can safely say that he would quite like the modernists, yes, but more importantly? The man has the soul of an English major. One of the non-annoying ones, not like that guy who showed up in the other episode who was being all "I have a degree in literature" and I wanted to smack him over the head, or like Byron. Who is also the bad kind of English major.