Contents: Overview - Backplot - Questions - Analysis - Notes - JMS

Overview

Sheridan is in hot water when he kills a Minbari warrior in self-defense. Caitlin Brown as Guinevere Corey. Sean Gregory Sullivan as Ashan.

Sub-genre: Mystery
P5 Rating: 7.75

Production number: 215
Original air date: April 26, 1995

Written by Peter David
Directed by Mike Vejar

Backplot

• Minbari clans are like close-knit families. One surrenders some of one's identity to the clan, and in return the clan is expected to shoulder the responsibility for one's actions. Despite this, clan leaders sometimes engage in secret plots without the knowledge of the clan members at large.
• Sheridan's tactics in the Earth-Minbari War (cf. "Points of Departure") are considered completely without honor by many Minbari; he used a fake distress signal to lure the Black Star into a minefield.
• Vir was considered a failure by his family. He was sent to Babylon 5 at their behest, mostly to get him out of their hair. There was little competition for the post, which was thought to be something of a joke.

Unanswered Questions

• What was Sheridan supposed to learn from Kosh's lesson? (see Analysis)
• How did Kosh know what Sheridan would find in the chamber?
• Who were the people living there?
• Will Vir's family take him up on Londo's offer?
• What fate awaits the teddy bear?
• Who was the human who stole Sheridan's link? Did he have an ulterior motive for helping with the setup, or was he simply doing it for money?

Analysis

• Considering her dramatic entrance, Sheridan's lawyer didn't actually do much of anything. Who sent her, and what was she supposed to be doing for Sheridan?

• One interpretation of Kosh's lesson is that he was teaching Sheridan to give humanity the benefit of the doubt. Even in what Sheridan considered the most dangerous, nasty place on the station, one can find beauty. If Kosh's pledge in "Hunter, Prey" to teach Sheridan "about you" is taken broadly to mean "about your kind," this is at least a plausible scenario.

• Another possible interpretation: Going to the darkest, dingiest, "worst part" of B5 was an analogy to Sheridan's current very "bad" situation. This is partly confirmed by Kosh's statement that having a "bad day" was perfectly appropriate for the lesson he had planned. What Sheridan saw there was "beauty... in the dark", which was exactly what he needed. He was obviously relaxed and feeling much better after the experience, and he thanked Kosh for helping him.

  The lesson? When things are at their absolute worst, don't simply satisfy your basic needs (eating, sleeping), take time out to enjoy something that will make you feel better despite the conditions. It will help you deal with adversity. Alternatively, the lesson is that even in some of the worst places/situations, there can still be beauty if you allow yourself to look for it.

• Why the monastic chant? Sheridan said in "Points of Departure" that he had met the Dalai Lama in Tibet. The chant wasn't Tibetan -- it is a Gregorian chant, part of the Christmas Mass. The entire incident may have been projected into Sheridan's mind by Kosh or by someone else. The fact that Sheridan could see it might also be related to his dream in "All Alone in the Night."

  The Latin lyrics:

  Puer natus est nobis et filius datus est nobis;
  cujus imperium super humerum ejus;
  et vocabitur nomen ejus,
  consilii Angelus.
  
  Cantate Domino canticum novum;
  quia mirabilia fecit.

  One English translation of which is:

  Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given;
  on whose shoulders the world's dominion rests;
  whose name is;
  He who was sent to us from the great Heavenly Wonder-Counselor.
  
  Sing unto the Lord a new song. He has made wonders.

  There are two quotes here, one from Isaiah 9:6, the other from Psalm 98:1:

  For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.

  O sing unto the Lord a new song; for he hath done marvellous things: his right hand, and his holy arm, hath gotten him the victory.

  Whether this particular chant has any bearing on the story, or was just selected because it sounds good, is an interesting question, but a couple rather tenuous connections can be made:

  The second verse mentions a "hand" being victorious; recall that Sheridan was told, "You are the hand," in "All Alone in the Night."

  The fourth issue of the comic series, dealing with Sinclair's appointment to the Minbari homeworld, is titled "The Price of Peace," one letter removed from the description of Jesus above. (That one is probably just a coincidence.)

• It's also worth comparing Kosh's lessons to his encounter with Talia in "Deathwalker." When she asked what his negotiations meant, he advised her to "listen to the music, not the words" -- advice that might apply to Sheridan's lesson as well.

• The plight of the teddy bear mirrors the story Sheridan told to Delenn; if the bear is really supposed to represent Sheridan, is its fate perhaps a foreshadowing of Sheridan's?

Notes

• Londo's mention of "a certain Minbari" lying is probably a reference to Lennier's lie in "The Quality of Mercy."

• The Centauri expect their dolls to be anatomically correct.

• "Honour and shame from no condition rise;
  Act well your part, there all the honour lies."
  - Alexander Pope, "An Essay on Man" Epistle IV, 1733-34

• Possible Ranger sighting: When Vir and Londo are talking in the Zocalo, a man in what looks like a Ranger uniform walks by twice. Once as Vir says, "Centauri Prime is sending a replacement," and again as he says, "It's my problem, not yours."

• The bear is from the Vermont Teddy-Bear Company. It's a "twenty inch" with "JS" embroidered on the front and "Ba-bear-lon 5" on the back. Peter David says:

  Specifically, on page 13 of their 1994 Winter Collection Catalogue, they have the Custom Embroidered Bears. Ordered with a baseball shirt and hat (NOT jacket), he's 20 inches high and his fur color is 'Pockets (thick milk chocolate)'...

  I should point out that ordering the bear for Joe was my wife's idea. She's a big bear fan. At present she's hard at work on a Minbeari...

• Caitlin Brown, who plays Guinevere Corey, played Na'Toth in season one.

• The Minbari text Delenn showed Lennier can be deciphered using the Minbari alphabet as rendered on the B5 trading cards. Replacing Minbari characters with their corresponding Latin ones yields the English text, "Chester is very spoiled. I guess it's my fault. I loved him too much."

jms speaks

• So after I'd read Peter's script, and decided to go with it, he asked about Ivanova's line, "This isn't some kind of Deep Space franchise, this place is ABOUT something."

  "Are you really going to use that?" he asked.

  "Absolutely," I said. "It's fall-down funny."

  Long pause. "You people really ARE dangerous over there, aren't you?"

• No, the scene in the dark with the robed figures was not enhanced with CGI or any other device.

• Everything featured in the Babylon Emporium was just made up by us. Insofar as I know, none of it is real merchandise. (Everyone, including the crew, are so starved for B5 stuff that when we finished filming the ep, we sold off the stuff, at cost, to those in the crew who wanted them. Two guesses who wound up with the Londo and G'Kar dolls....)

• The B5 model in the gift shop in "Honor" is now in Sheridan's office, bronzed, as is his right as captain.

  Once the show is finally off the air, be assured that the model will end up in THIS captain's office.

• Here's the story of the bear.

  I hate cute. Everybody knows me, knows that. So after buying Peter David's script #2, Peter sends me a gift. A bear. A teddy bear. With my initials JS in front, and Bear-ba-lon 5 in the back. I call Peter back. I say that I must now get him for this. He asks what I had in mind. I said wait and see.

  So I wrote the entire bear thing at the end of the show, and inserted it into his script.

  Never send me something cute.

  Best part was during filming, we shot the bear against blue-screen to be composited into the CGI. And there's our EFX supervisor, standing there on film, against blue-screen, with this long rod up the teddy bear's ass, spinning it round and round and round....

  Whilst doing that, I also wrote and inserted the Kosh/Perfect Beauty scenes, since I was already in it at that point anyway, and I figured it'd be cool.

  It also keeps the Sheridan Learning Stuff thread going, and works in a nice balance to the rest of the episode. Here he's going nuts, being harrassed, and his command is on the line...so he has to learn to bend his knee, accept silence, give up his command symbolically by giving up the stat bar, and finding one perfect moment of peace.

• Yes, Kosh asking Sheridan "what is this place?" was more for his benefit than Kosh's, to underline where they were, and what he was about to experience even in such a place. Also, in psychotheraputic terms, specifically dream analysis, when you travel to your cellar in your dream, it's in part to confront something in your subconscious, to learn something that may not be expressable in words.

• Yes, he did send a fake distress call, and took out the Black Star when it came in to (they thought) wipe out a disabled ship. He's never denied this to anybody.

• Sheridan sent an EA distress signal; the Minbari were in genocidal mode, so it didn't matter to them the condition of their enemy.

Last update: March 15, 1998