Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:05:29 — 60.2MB)
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | iHeartRadio | Stitcher | Podchaser | RSS
Welcome to Show #216!
Tim’s daughter Meg drops by with her own Babylon Podcast stories, and gives a shout-out to her friends. You never know when brushes with fame will appear in your life! And have the seeds of a Callender & Callender “Doctor Who” podcast been planted?
Listener Feedback: One more show, catching up on the voicemails!
Lurker’s Guide 2.0: Summer is expanding the documentation to be covered at Lurker’s Guide 2.0, the major change being converting the episode guide into a full Wiki with cross-referenced topics, tidbits and everything you’d want in a Wiki. She’s still searching for pictures of rare collectibles, photos of magazine covers and toys, and all sorts of other B5 goodies that didn’t get included in the original guide during the years after Crusade. Let her know if you want to lend a hand.
More Parody/Filk Songs Wanted: If you know of any more B5-related fan songs out there, definitely let us know, so we can let other B5 fans know where to buy them! And if those CDs are out of print, let’s brainstorm on ways to get those songs back out there for fans!
Babylon Podcast Social Communities:
Twitter: @babylonpodcast
Babylon 5 Information Gathering: If you know of a dead or abandoned B5 related website that may be in need of a new home, let Summer know! Maybe we can mirror it here or house it on a sister site.
If you can, Please Donate to the show!
Promo: Tuning Into Scifi TV
Just want to thank Tim again for being on The Casting Game. I still hope to get Summer or Bret on at some point (perhaps for a book or video game or comic as opposed to a remake since I just did two remake CGs in a row).
Anyway, the Babylon 5: The Gathering Casting Game is available at http://castinggame.blogspot.com/2010/10/episode-11-babylon-5.html
I think you guys nailed the Battlestar differences on the head. I loved BSG, especially the end seasons (first and last-both halves). The thing no one mentions is how inconsistent the pace of the show appears at times. BSG seems to have 2 gears – pedal to the metal or slooowww. A feature that makes B5 more rewatchable than BSG might not be due to the darkness of BSG, but rather the ability of JMS to weave together a story that doesn’t become too bland. B5 maintains a steady pace that continuously grows until season 5. Staleness appears to make the middle seasons of BSG as unbearable as Season 5 tends to be for B5.
Regarding Bill’s comment…
Ronald D. Moore has publicly admitted that the writing staff of the show worked better in the 13-episode Season 1 format – I think it’s remarkable that in Seasons 2, 3, and 4 the pace sputters in the back half of those seasons. It happened every time.
I liked the show; I might have even loved it. I also am not as affected by the darkness of the show as some, and can rewatch it with impunity. But what I always come back to are the flaws, and there are kind of a lot. The pacing is one of those flaws.
Paul:
RDM also admitted, many times, that they were making it up as they went along, and sometimes, especially in the third season, they would find themselves forced to change major plot threads mid-stream, when they just couldn’t get something to work. The second half of the third season, in particular.
John,
Ah yes, the love triangle of doom!
No, John – the so-called Final Five, which I’m convinced they pulled out of their frakholes halfway through.
Whoops – meant to aim that one at Paul from California. That’s what I get for pulling an all-nighter sewing up the Liz Ten cloak for Meg.
Actually, I was talking about the whole intrigue surrounding what was supposed to inform the Trial of Gaius Baltar. They rewrote that so late in the game that they had to drop some plot elements entirely to make it work, since they couldn’t take the time to resolve the dangling threads and introduce the new ones at the same time!
“The Woman King”, in fact, was supposed to play into the original idea of the story, but ultimately feels like a really poor stand-alone instead.
The Final Five was definitely made up well after the fact…RDM talks openly about it in the podcast/commentary for the episodes in which they are introduced.
I kept wondering if there’s a connection between my favorite BSG wallpaper and those Final Five. I think this pic originally came out during the Season 3 hiatus, and it blew my mind after seeing the episode “Crossroads”. I sat down at my computer, and realized that the hint, if it was one, had been staring at me from my computer desktop for at least a year (see actor placement on right side of photo).
Huh… never noticed that they changed the channel logos on the wallpapers. Kinda makes me glad I got mine when they were still scifi.com 😉
Summer, there are definitely a lot of very convenient coincidences that worked in their favor, when all was said and done!
It was very cool hearing Tim’s daughter. Congrats on being famous, Tim. And I second the vote for the Father-Daughter ‘Doctor Who’ Podcast!
Wow, people have actually SEEN Summer in order to recognize her? I thought she was just a disembodied voice…
And I had to laugh at Rod’s(?) comment about the Sheridan/Delenn shippers. I cut my fandom teeth on XF fandom, where it was all MSR (Mulder/Scully Romance) all the time. All these years later, it still is. You’d think that there was absolutely nothing else happening on this show, aside from M&S looking at each other a certain way or whatever. Hearing this comment made me realize that in some ways, I’m glad I discovered the show just a few years ago. The shippers are the same in every fandom and I’m sure B5 was no exception. It would have made me tear my hair out to be in a fandom where there were so many wonderful characters and so much plot, and have it reduced to just that. Being a woman myself, it’s a stereotype I hate, but it really is true.
The funniest thing of all is that I adored Sheridan & Delenn. (And Marcus & Susan too!) I screamed out loud when I realized we were not getting a wedding scene. That is SO not like me. I guess it’s because I loved both these characters as individuals. They had a life and a purpose aside from just each other. And as far as the show is concerned, the relationship was there, but it never overtook the show and made it into a soap opera. Unlike… that other show I was talking about.
I also appreciate that this Podcast has not turned into the Shipper Show!
Mo, Meg and I are in discussion about the Doctor Who ‘cast. However, our immediate priority is raising French I and World History grades. 😉