| 1 | This page covers tropes found in ''Series/BabylonFive''. Tropes beginning with letters I-P can be found at BabylonFive/TropesIToP and tropes beginning with letters Q-Z can be found at BabylonFive/TropesQToZ. Subjective tropes go to the [[YMMV/BabylonFive YMMV page]]. |
| 2 | |
| 3 | ---- |
| 4 | !!''Babylon 5'' provides examples of: |
| 5 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 6 | |
| 7 | [[folder:#]] |
| 8 | * TwoDSpace: Averted. The human Star Furies have multiple thrusters and rotate across all three axes. |
| 9 | * TwoPlusTortureMakesFive: Sheridan is subjected to this sort of torture by President Clark's forces. A rare {{justified|Trope}} example, since they need him to ''believe'' his false confession is true, so it will stand up to telepathic scans. [[spoiler:Failed when he used their argument of "truth is fluid" against them by saying his truth is still just as right to him as long as he believes it.]] |
| 10 | [[/folder]] |
| 11 | |
| 12 | [[folder:A]] |
| 13 | * AbandonShip: |
| 14 | ** The first season episode ''Babylon Squared'' features a long-thought-lost space station re-emerging from a NegativeSpaceWedgie just long enough for the crew of Babylon 5 to effect an evacuation. As the station is about to disappear again, the remaining crew members (and the personnel from Babylon 5 who came to retrieve them) make a hasty retreat to cram onto the remaining shuttles.[[note]]Incidentally, the GoingDownWithTheShip trope is {{discussed|Trope}} and [[AvertedTrope dismissed]]: Commander Sinclair is most definitely ''not'' that station's commander, and the officer who ''was'' in charge had every intention of leaving as soon [[TheMenFirst as the personnel under his command had been evacuated]].[[/note]] |
| 15 | ** The same episode includes a FlashForward where Babylon 5, in flames, is being evacuated as the security personnel frantically attempt to hold off the unseen attackers to give the civilians time to escape. As a matter of fact, the visual of a lone shuttle escaping the station just before it explodes gets used for a long string of {{Prophecy Twist}}s. [[spoiler: That visual does finally come true. But not the way anyone expects.]] |
| 16 | ** Commented upon in the episode ''No Surrender, No Retreat'', where one of the ships defending Proxima 3 is critically damaged after another ship collides with it and Sheridan comments "My god, the crew... get to the life pods... get to the life pods--" before the ship explodes. |
| 17 | ** ''A Voice In The Wilderness'' has the planet of Epsilon 3 in danger of [[EarthShatteringKaboom blowing up]], and taking the orbiting space station with it. Sinclair and Garibaldi agree that if they can't stop it, Garibaldi is to force Ivanova to evacuate on the last shuttle, even if he has to knock her out and throw her on the shuttle himself. |
| 18 | ** In the battle seen in ''Severed Dreams'', Major Ryan tells Captain Hiroshi to get to the lifepods due to the bad state the EAS Churchill was in. Hiroshi reports she can't do it due to the decrepit state the ship was in and instead, launches a [[HeroicSacrifice Kamikaze]] attack on an opposing ship. Later on in the battle, Captain Sheridan radios the EAS Agrippa ([[AccidentalMisnaming misidentifying it was the Roanoke]]) to surrender due to their damaged state and that B5 will take on prisoners and give safe passage, but it's too late as the ship blows up. |
| 19 | * AbortedArc: There are a few, but Garibaldi's vengeance against Psi Corps is never fully fleshed out. The closest he comes to it is trying to make the SmugSnake who used MindRape on him confess at gunpoint, which is ''very'' out of character for our loveable ManipulativeBastard, especially when Sheridan promised that Garibaldi would be "creative, colorful, and highly unpleasant" in settling the score. |
| 20 | ** Several of the aborted arcs set up in ''Babylon 5'' and ''Crusade'' get picked up in the ExpandedUniverse books. |
| 21 | * AbsurdlyDedicatedWorker: In "A Tragedy of Telepaths", Londo and G'Kar discover [[spoiler:that G'Kar's former aide Na'Toth had been imprisoned and forgotten for the last two years in a Centauri dungeon, since nobody ever countermanded the late Cartagia's orders putting her there]]. Londo explained that sort of thing happens with an absolute monarchy, and related a story of a guard detail that was continuously posted at a spot in the Centauri palace gardens, on orders from an emperor 200 years ago to guard a special flower there that had long since perished. |
| 22 | * AbsoluteXenophobe: The Thirdspace Aliens, they consider that the only ones with the right to exist in the Universe (in ''any'' universe) is them. |
| 23 | %%* AbsurdlySpaciousSewer: The ColdOpen for "Divided Loyalties" shows a Mars Resistance member staggering through one of these beneath the Mars colony. |
| 24 | * AbusivePrecursors: The Shadows and the Vorlons. The two elder species has been in a cold war with each other for thousands if not millions of years, and had a bad habit of using the "younger races" as pawns against each other in the same manner that the US and the Soviets would often use third-world nations as pawns against each other. They were written as an analogy for abusive parents. |
| 25 | * [[ScienceIsBad Academia Is Bad]]: In the commentary for the last episode of the fourth season, JMS stated that, as an academic himself, he always hated the habit of deconstructing a historical character, thus perhaps the title "The Deconstruction of Fallen Stars". He also intended the holographic operator in the third segment to be a doctor. |
| 26 | * AccidentalMarriage: The "Religions Week" in "The Parliament of Dreams" featured an extremely confusing Minbari ceremony involving eating red fruit and some intense looks between Delenn and Sinclair. Although the people attending it were told that it was a "rebirth" ceremony, Catherine Sakai informs him that it could also have doubled as a wedding. He jokes that he didn't think that Londo and G'Kar were one another's type. [[spoiler:Also, it ''was'' a rebirth ceremony, as Delenn goes into the Chrysalis at the end of the season, to be reborn as half-human.]] |
| 27 | * AcquiredPoisonImmunity: When Sheridan is captured and interrogated by President Clark's forces, his interrogator shares a corned beef sandwich with him to gain his trust. Both halves of the sandwich were poisoned, but the interrogator had been eating small amounts every day for several years and had built up an immunity. Sheridan had not, and the poison made him very sick. |
| 28 | --> "That's a metaphor for something...but I'm not quite sure what." |
| 29 | * ActuallyPrettyFunny: |
| 30 | ** When talking with Londo, Emperor Cartagia notices the Court Jester had been miming his movements in an exaggerated fashion. At first everyone fears for the jester's life as one does not mock the Emperor. Then Cartagia laughs and joins in the fun. And everyone laughs with the Emperor. [[spoiler:Not five minutes later, after Londo left the room and came back, the Emperor [[AvertedTrope had had the jester killed]].]] |
| 31 | --> '''Cartagia''': [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDKHmlBzG6o Humour is such a subjective thing]], don't you think, Molari? |
| 32 | ** Earlier, in season 3 , Marcus fought a desperate HoldTheLine against Neroon, famed Minbari warrior. Marcus basically got beaten within an inch of his life but managed to convince Neroon with his [[TheDeterminator determinator]] attitude not to challenge Delenn. Later, he meets a recuperating Marcus and admits his psychological defeat. Marcus barely gets out the words, "The next time you want a revelation, could you possibly find a method that isn't quite so... uncomfortable?" [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRxqorKqqkc And Neroon can't help but laugh out loud.]] |
| 33 | ** When G'kar is locked up he passes the time by, among other things, singing. When he mentions this to Garibaldi, the Chief says he knows because they received a formal petition. |
| 34 | --->'''G'kar''' For or against?\ |
| 35 | '''Garibaldi''' Based on the sound, they think we are torturing you in here.\ |
| 36 | '''G'kar''' ''(cracks up laughing)'' ...you know a true artist is never appreciated in his own time. |
| 37 | ** Warren Keffer suggests that he and the very non-ironically nicknamed marine "Large" can discuss their differences face-to-face, as soon as he can find a ladder. "Large" considers it funny enough to put InterserviceRivalry aside and even offers Keffer a cigar. |
| 38 | * AdvertisedExtra: Happened surprisingly frequently. Just having your name in the opening credits didn't necessarily mean you'd be treated like a regular character. Getting this particularly bad, however, were Na'Toth and Warren Keffer. Na'Toth only appeared in five episodes of the first season and ''two'' in the second. The initial actress didn't like the make-up and the second was found to be unsatisfactory. As for Keffer, he was only in the cast for the second season and was purposefully used as little as possible because JMS had the character forced on him. |
| 39 | * TheAestheticsOfTechnology: Played mostly straight with the Minbari, Centauri, Vorlons, and several League and Independent races, but subverted with the Narns. They deliberately try to invoke this trope with their fancy looking ships, but the only thing advanced about them are the weapons they pilfered from their former Centauri overlords/oppressors. Granted, they mount a lot of those pilfered weapons, making their G'Qan heavy cruisers a match for any ship in its class short of the Minbari. |
| 40 | ** Also [[JustifiedTrope justified]] in-story, as Narn buy technology from anyone they can and just slap a coat of paint in their [[ColorCodedForYourConvenience team colors]] on it. |
| 41 | ** The Centauri, on the other hand, might count as an ''aversion'' of this trope, since their ships are rather ugly. (To humans, anyway. For all we know, the Centauri like them like that.) |
| 42 | *** The Centauri ships seem to be ''fancy'' more than anything else, but then, the Centauri love ostentatious things in general. |
| 43 | ** One of the league races (the Brakiri) copied the aesthetics of the most advanced races in their ship design (anyone with organic technology), but they're only marginally more advanced than the others in the setting. |
| 44 | ** As the designs become more powerful, the human ships get gradually sleeker and meaner looking, as shown by the warships in the order they are introduced, going from the somewhat ungainly looking Hyperion to the intimidating Omegas and the imposingly angular Warlocks. |
| 45 | * AffablyEvil: |
| 46 | ** The Interrogator from "Intersections in Real Time." Carried out the task of slowly mentally breaking Captain Sheridan over the course of days, with the demeanor of a kindly and mild mannered middle aged accountant. JMS was trying to make a point there, about the evil of the common man. He was meant to be like all those Nazi war criminals who said "I was just doing my job." |
| 47 | ** Lyndisty, Vir Cotto's one-time fiancée, is a prim and proper StepfordSmiler with absolutely zero regard for Narn life. She proudly mentions how she accompanied her military father on his eugenics programs, and personally knifed ''hundreds of Narns to death''. |
| 48 | ** Alfred Bester. There are moments in the series when you ALMOST like him. |
| 49 | * AffectionatePickpocket: In "Legacies", Ivanova has a heartwarming conversation with a StreetUrchin that ends with the two of them clasping hands in a gesture of mutual sympathy... and the street urchin takes the opportunity to steal the commlink off Ivanova's hand, just to keep in practice. |
| 50 | * AgriWorld: The Centauri Republic colony world of Ragesh 3 is identified in discussions as an agricultural colony. |
| 51 | * TheAlcoholic: Played several different ways by several different characters: |
| 52 | ** Londo is all about wine, women, and song, and turns into quite TheGadfly when drunk, telling personal stories to amuse friends or strangers alike, and passes out in the middle of a Centauri religious ceremony (which, to be fair, is meant to be an alcohol-fueled party). As his story arc proceeds, he also drinks rather often simply to [[INeedAFreakingDrink to deal with his problems]], and finally [[spoiler: to keep the alien parasite controlling his actions unconscious so he can act freely.]]. |
| 53 | ** In later seasons, Ivanova is shown to drink vodka as a means of dealing with insomnia and nightmares, a practice she picked up from her father. |
| 54 | ** Garibaldi is a teetotaler, because once he ''starts'' drinking, [[OffTheWagon he can't stop.]] |
| 55 | * AlarmSOS: In "Exogenesis", Marcus tries to contact security with Dr. Franklin's stolen comlink. Since his DNA doesn't match Dr. Franklin's, the call doesn't go through. It does, however, trigger an alarm and notify security of his location, which is exactly what he was trying to achieve in the first place. |
| 56 | * AlienAbduction: |
| 57 | ** Played for laughs in the 1st season episode [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhC_KHkihKY "Grail"]], in which the great-grandson of a human abductee sues the great-grandson of his alien abductor for damages. |
| 58 | ** Played a bit more straight however with the Streib in the second season episode "All Alone in the Night". |
| 59 | ** The Vorlons abducted a man named Sebastian from 19th century London and "re-educated" him regarding the depths of his mistakes, arrogance and superiority so he could later be employed as an "inquisitor". [[spoiler: Turns out he was taken the day after a string of prostitute murders in London's East End and that Sebastian is known to history under a different name: [[UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper Jack]]...]] |
| 60 | * AlienArtsAreAppreciated: Human art and cultural artifacts were the only things the humans had to offer the Centauri after first contact. Fortunately the Centauri appreciate fine arts and were more than willing to reciprocate with higher technology. May actually be an example of HumansAreSpecial, since while members of several races are intrigued by human culture, the closest we hear to examples in any other direction are Narn and Centuri complaining about each other's opera. |
| 61 | * AlienBlood: The alien kickboxing champion in "TKO" bleeds white. |
| 62 | ** Some species are mentioned as having "yellow" and "green" blood cells. [[spoiler:Specifically, the Markab and the Pak'ma'ra, which is a plot point in "Confessions and Lamentations".]] |
| 63 | ** Minbari blood is red like human blood but is a lot thinner, from what we saw in ''Soul Hunter'' |
| 64 | * AliensNeverInventedDemocracy: Earth Alliance is the only known democracy in the Galaxy, and even it becomes an authoritarian PoliceState for a while. The others are: |
| 65 | ** The Minbari Federation: An oligarchy with three representatives of each of the three Minbari castes (Warrior, Religious and Worker). |
| 66 | ** The Centauri Republic: Despite the name, it's a monarchy (and not the constitutional kind) with TheEmperor full in power. The Centauruum which is like the Roman Senate and is composed of representatives from the noble houses may control the Emperor's actions but rarely does. |
| 67 | ** The Narn Regime: A Military Junta lead by the leaders of LaResistance against the Centauri. Background material goes into more detail and explain that the Narn government's name is the Ka'ri and it is made of several concentric circles of power from nobility and high priests to artisans and peasants. G'Kar is from the third circle of professionals and intellectuals. |
| 68 | ** The Drazi Freehold: Every five years its population draws a scarf of two different colors from a bucket, and the two newly born factions fight each other. The winning side becomes the new Drazi government. Rank within the government is determined by who drew the special leader's scarf. |
| 69 | ** The Hyach Grand Council of Elders: A gerontocracy. |
| 70 | ** The Brakiri Syndicracy: A case of {{Corporatocracy}}. |
| 71 | ** The Pak'ma'ra: An [[UsefulNotes/{{Anarchism}} anarchist]] communitarian utopia with no State. |
| 72 | * AlienNonInterferenceClause: The Psi Corps regulations (which get broken almost as much as the original Prime Directive). |
| 73 | ** Otherwise, it is shown that various alien races do not mind handing over advanced technology to help uplift younger races, with caveats. The Centauri refuse to sell advanced weapons to less advanced races (the Narn, who stole their weapons technology from the Centauri, have no such compulsion, and have gotten in some trouble for it on the show). Meanwhile, even the Centauri declined to offer the humans ArtificialGravity at first, eventually offering it (alongside the Minbari) to the humans as an incentive for the Earth Alliance to sign on with the new Interstellar Alliance. |
| 74 | * AliensSpeakingEnglish: English seems to be the ''lingua franca'' of Babylon 5, but many aliens (especially Centauri nobility) have noticeable accents when speaking it. They all have their own languages, but a TranslationConvention applies most of the time (The creators have verified this, at least for when you have two or more aliens of the same race talking to each other). One alien calls English "the human trade language", implying that there are other languages in common use. |
| 75 | ** In "A Voice in the Wilderness", a previously-unknown alien race requests "language files" from the station's computers in order to be able to speak to them in English. |
| 76 | *** Canon indicates that Spanish, French, and Arabic are also encountered on the station frequently enough to be noticeable but nowhere near as commonplace as English. |
| 77 | ** A variation of this trope becomes a plot point in the fourth season. Delenn and Lennier are aboard a Minbari ship that has a First Contact situation with another alien race. Lennier siezes the initiative to send the alien ship [[UniversalTranslator language files]] on Interlac so they can communicate. The aliens respond in ''Minbari'', [[BlatantLies despite claiming that they haven't encountered the Minbari before.]] |
| 78 | ** There are a few times this trope is averted. |
| 79 | *** When Sheridan is forced to leave in the middle of a very long Minbari meal/ceremony, Lennier mutters something presumably unflattering about Sheridan under his breath. This was left untranslated, presumably because JMS thought it would be [[RuleOfFunny funnier]] if the audience didn't know what he said. |
| 80 | *** In another episode, Delenn and a Minbari captain are being held prisoner by unfriendly humans. When they speak to each other, it is in their native tongue (with subtitles), to avoid confusion. |
| 81 | *** Similarly, a few sentences spoken by Sinclair and Delenn in "War Without End, Part 1" are in Minbari, for similar reasons as the previous example. |
| 82 | *** When Ivanova tracks down one of the First Ones, she asks them to aid the younger races. When she mentions the Vorlon, the First One responds angrily "Vorlon tavutna chog!" When asked about it, JMS said the sentence could be loosely translated as "The Vorlon can kiss my ass." |
| 83 | ----> '''Ivanova''': At least it proves that they understand our language, they're just not willing to communicate in it. |
| 84 | ----> '''Marcus''': Who knew they were French? |
| 85 | * AliensStealCable: In "A Voice in the Wilderness", Varn learned English from monitoring human radio communications. |
| 86 | ** [[AllThereInTheManual According to source material]], the Brakiri race picked up Earth transmissions at some point in their history and began modeling their culture after what they saw. This presents itself on the show in subtle ways, such as the Brakiri Ambassador wearing clothing that resembles a human business suit. It's stated that there is one piece of Earth pop culture that got garbled in transmission and has been a great mystery to the Brakiri for years: [[Series/{{Dallas}} Who shot J.R.?]] |
| 87 | * AllegianceAffirmation: Zack is asked by the Nightwatch to betray Captain Sheridan and the command staff. They confront him [[spoiler:and arrest the Nightwatch for mutiny with his help]]. |
| 88 | * AllLoveIsUnrequited: Ivanova says this verbatim at one point [[spoiler: shortly after [[HeroicSacrifice Marcus saves her life at the cost of his own]].]] The series is not itself an example, however, as several major characters [[spoiler:(Delenn and Sheridan, with each other; Garibaldi, with Lise; Sinclair, with Catherine Sakai)]] end up HappilyMarried. |
| 89 | * AllMythsAreTrue: Well, more like "All Religions Are True." Every alien religious belief portrayed on the show (with the exception of the Centauri's) is shown to be at least partially based in fact, even the one about a bicentennial festival where the dead come back to life for one night. |
| 90 | * AllThereInTheManual: Several details, such as Ulkesh's name (in universe, he insists on being called Kosh, supposedly to maintain appearances [[spoiler: after Kosh's death]], but quite possibly just to dick with the younger races on the station.) |
| 91 | ** The ship designs have lots of little features that were explained on paper, but never used in the show itself. The Earth Alliance Omega Destroyers, for instance, featured Starfury launch bays in the rotating sections, energy mine launchers in the bow section below the hangar bay, and missile tubes along the sides of the hull (all of these details are visible on the models as seen in the show). The first generation Starfury design also included panels trailing back from the aft thrusters which were supposed to pivot to redirect their exhaust for thrust-vectoring manurers, but this was never actually done in-show due to the limitations of the CGI technology being used at the time. |
| 92 | ** There's tons of this. The Official Guide to Babylon 5 fleshes out the minor aliens that make up the League of Non-Aligned Worlds. Such details as the name of the Drazi currency, the political structure of the Llort, and how the Abbai reproduce; it's all in there, though next to none of it was mentioned onscreen. |
| 93 | * AlmostDeadGuy: Stephen Petrov in "Chrysalis". |
| 94 | * AltarDiplomacy: |
| 95 | ** The Centauri, with their system of noble houses, often use marriage as a political tool. Londo has three wives ([[spoiler:at first]]) all arranged for him. This has lead to some rather cynical views on marriage, with weddings being solemn affairs rather than joyous ones. |
| 96 | ** Outright defied in one episode where a pair of Centauri youth run away after their families arrange marriages for them, one to someone he calls "the ugliest woman on Centauri Prime", and the other to a man old enough to be her grandfather, but they would much rather marry each other. Londo at first encourages them to go through with it for the good of the Centauri Republic, but eventually realizes that doing so would cause them to become like him, after which he arranges a way to get them out of it without disgracing their houses. |
| 97 | ** Minbari have a custom dating back to the days when they [[ApeShallNeverKillApe actually made war on each other]] where the winning side would offer a daughter as a symbol of life. [[spoiler:Delenn's family decides to pass off her marriage to Sheridan as this rather than have her go public about the fact that she's descended from Valen (i.e. Jeffrey Sinclair) and has been partially human the whole time]]. |
| 98 | *** [[spoiler:Even worse, as Delenn points out, the Minbari take pride in their "pure" genetics, but after Valen's death, the children of Valen and Catherine Sakai returned to Minbar and joined Minbari society. After 1,000 years the family tree will not just have Delenn in it]]. |
| 99 | * AlternatePersonalityPunishment: The Earth Alliance's standard method of capital punishment is DeathOfPersonality. In "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS03E04PassingThroughGethsemane Passing Through Gethsemane]]", a group of people related to a serial killer's victims attempts to take revenge on the person he's become post-mind wipe, a Trappist monk. |
| 100 | * AlwaysABiggerFish: ... no, seriously. Earth thought the Minbari were out of their league. Then they met the Vorlons. [[spoiler: Then they met the First Ones. [[OverlyLongGag And ''then'' they met the Thirdspace Aliens.]]]] |
| 101 | * AlwaysChaoticEvil: The Shadows. |
| 102 | ** The Shadows are actually a rare case of AlwaysChaoticEvil KnightTemplar due to BlueAndOrangeMorality. They believe what they do is best for the younger races. |
| 103 | ** The Drakh might count too. But then, they're servants of the Shadows. |
| 104 | * AlwaysLawfulGood: Well, Always Lawful ''Something'' when talking about the Vorlons. They're on the opposite end of the BlueAndOrangeMorality scale from the Shadows ''and'' similarly believe their imposition of order is best for the younger races. Part of the plot in Season 4 is learning this conflict and resolving it. |
| 105 | * AlwaysOnDuty: An [[EarlyInstallmentWeirdness early episode]] made an attempt to avert this with a throwaway line referencing a Lieutenant Commander who ran the night watch, but that character is never seen, and is never mentioned again. When we ''do'' see [[TheBridge Command and Control]] during the night shift, it is usually being run by [[TheLancer Commander Ivanova]] and [[BridgeBunnies Lieutenant Corwin]]. |
| 106 | ** Several years later, they established that there was another Command & Control on the station, which could presumably run things when the primary was offline for some reason. |
| 107 | *** In "Midnight on the Firing Line", it's mentioned that C&C regularly goes offline for maintenance; Sinclair generally is there at that time for the quiet. It comes up again in "Points of Departure" when Sheridan gives his good-luck speech at the end of the episode to an empty room. As Ivanova said at the time, "Of all the times he could have picked!" |
| 108 | * {{Ambadassador}}: All the ambassadors to Babylon 5 get many shining moments of badassery throughout the series. |
| 109 | ** The Centauri in particular seem to consider it a job requirement, or at least Londo does. Londo declares Vir Cotto ready to be ambassador of the Centauri Republic after Vir hacks up a Drazi's fruit stand with a sword in revenge for the latter slipping a bug into Vir's groceries. |
| 110 | * AmbiguouslyBi: Deconstructed and averted. After spending time with another woman, and conspicuously late at night and in pajamas, Ivanova later comes out and says she was in love with her. |
| 111 | * UsefulNotes/AmericanCustomaryMeasurements: The station is consistently described as five miles long. However, TheMetricSystemIsHereToStay as well, especially when the Earth military is giving space distances. |
| 112 | * AmnesiacDissonance: The episode "Passing Through Gethsemane", where a person is vengeful against the black rose killer (now known as Edward) who was sentenced to a mind wipe and uses tricks to try bringing up memories of the past - simple things as leaving a rose, fading text on walls, and a telepath to give a nudge. |
| 113 | * AmnesiacsAreInnocent: The episode "Passing Through Gethsemane". At the end of said episode, Theo reminds Sheridan about forgiveness and that he and Edward's killer will head to the monastery to Earth for training the new member of the Cistercian Order. |
| 114 | * AnalogyBackfire: From "Hunter, Prey": |
| 115 | -->'''Franklin:''' Michael, you ever consider climbing out of the barracks sometime and looking around at the world, huh?\ |
| 116 | '''Garibaldi:''' Yeah, I will, when people [[ProperlyParanoid stop shooting at me]]. |
| 117 | * {{Anaphora}}: On the opening lines of the fourth season: |
| 118 | -->'''Lennier:''' It was the year of fire\ |
| 119 | '''Zack:''' '''the year''' of destruction\ |
| 120 | '''G'kar:''' '''the year''' we took back what was ours.\ |
| 121 | '''Lyta:''' It was the year of rebirth\ |
| 122 | '''Vir:''' '''the year''' of great sadness\ |
| 123 | '''Marcus:''' '''the year''' of pain\ |
| 124 | '''Delenn:''' and the year of joy.\ |
| 125 | '''Londo:''' '''It was''' a new age.\ |
| 126 | '''Dr. Franklin:''' '''It was''' the end of history.\ |
| 127 | '''Ivanova:''' '''It was''' the year everything changed. |
| 128 | * AncientAstronauts: |
| 129 | ** The Vorlons spent quite a bit of time imprinting themselves as Gods/Angels and a fear of the Shadows in all of the "Younger Races". |
| 130 | *** [[spoiler: Except ''maybe'' the Centauri. It's never completely clear whether Londo's failure to see Kosh in "The Fall of Night" is due to a lack of indoctrination in this regard, or if his association with the Shadows has caused this. Or Londo could have been lying about not being able to see anything, it's hardly out of character for him to do so.]] |
| 131 | ** The fear of the Shadows is directly the fault of the Shadows themselves. They seem to find it useful, and every time that they awaken go out of their way to learn what they can use to frighten and mindscrew the younger races with. |
| 132 | ** Also, a first season episode shows that an alien race (the Vree), who look a lot like TheGreys, did indeed abduct humans in [=UFO=]s. Word of God is that the Vree can't understand why humans make such a fuss out of [[BlueAndOrangeMorality perfectly ordinary scientific research]], although their government did sign a treaty with the Earth Alliance to allow the descendants of abductees to be compensated from the estates of the particular Vree who abducted their particular ancestors. |
| 133 | * AndIMustScream: Psi Cops do not take serial killers who target telepaths lightly. They will break every rule for their own version of justice, MindProbe anyone who might be connected. And then they don't kill him because it would be too quick. They use this trope on the man: |
| 134 | -->'''Lyta Alexander:''' Somewhere on Beta Colony there is an institution. In one room of the institution there is a man who spends his days and nights screaming at things that only he can see. Things we planted in his mind. They have to keep him in a straitjacket 24 hours a day or he'll claw his own eyes out just to make it stop. |
| 135 | * AndManGrewProud: The leadership of the human race appears to have started to get delusions of grandeur as they began to expand into the galaxy with the help of the Centauri, and began to grow more expansionist and militant. After a successful war against a species called the Dilgar the human leadership believed they could handle anything that came their way. Then there was an unfortunate incident with a Minbari cruiser... |
| 136 | %%** The monks portion of ''Deconstruction of Falling Stars'', which itself was [[strike:an unconscious]] a blatant homage to ''Literature/ACanticleForLeibowitz''. |
| 137 | %%** The intro to "In the Beginning" qualifies as this. |
| 138 | * AndStarring: "with Andreas Katsulas as G'Kar and Peter Jurasik as Londo Mollari" (or vice versa, depending on the season--or, in season five, the episode). |
| 139 | * AndThenWhat: [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] in the episode "Signs and Portents". Mr Morden asks Narn Ambassador G'Kar "What do you want?" G'Kar replies that his closest-held wish is to see all the Centauri -- the former oppressors of the Narn -- exterminated, to which Morden then asks, "And Then What?" G'Kar is at a loss, and responds that "as long as my homeworld is safe, I don't see that it matters". ...And this is what causes Morden to pass him over. |
| 140 | * AndThisIsFor: In "Born to the Purple": |
| 141 | -->'''Londo:''' ''That'' is for Adira. And ''this'' is for me. |
| 142 | * AngelicAliens: The Vorlons appear as angels to humans and the equivalent to other species. [[spoiler:It's part of their grooming us to fight a proxy war against the Shadows.]] |
| 143 | * AngelUnaware: Subverted with Kosh, who cryptically remarks that if he open his encounter suit, he will be recognized by "everyone". When he finally does remove the suit, Kosh takes the image of [[spoiler: a "being of light", a divine being whose appearance changes according to the different races who behold him]] -- all save Londo Mollari, [[TheDarkSide who sees nothing]]. |
| 144 | * TheAnticipator: One episode had Delenn being questioned by an inquisitor to determine her worthiness using [[ElectricTorture harsh methods]]. When he hears the door open he says, without looking, "And the third player in our little drama arrives at last," implying he knew it was Sheridan and that he'd been expecting him to show up eventually. |
| 145 | * AntiMutiny: |
| 146 | ** Attempted by Boggs, along with a handful of other Nightwatch members who eluded Sheridan's roundup ("Ceremonies of Light and Dark"). |
| 147 | ** Also attempted by Captain [=McDougan's=] second in command in ''No Surrender, No Retreat'', complete with B5's version of a ClickHello. [[spoiler: He is dragged to the ground and restrained by the rest of the bridge crew.]] |
| 148 | * AnythingButThat: Garibaldi ear-pulling an officer into helping him steal a mail package. |
| 149 | -->'''Garibaldi:''' What are you so nervous about? We went up against the entire Earth Alliance ''and'' two carrier groups.\ |
| 150 | '''Security Officer''': Yeah, but this is the '''[[SeriousBusiness post office]]'''! This could get us in ''real'' trouble! |
| 151 | * ApeShallNeverKillApe: "Minbari do not kill Minbari." [[SubvertedTrope Yeah.]], but it was the only thing [[spoiler:that saves Humanity in the Earth-Minbari War]]. |
| 152 | ** Despite this thousand year tradition, the Minbari ''do'' have a tradition of dueling to the death. This contradiction is explained in one of the books by saying that if you agree to participate in denn'Sha, you take responsibility for your death upon yourself if you lose. This technically makes all deaths by dueling acts of suicide, [[LoopholeAbuse which don't count]]. |
| 153 | * ApocalypseHow: |
| 154 | ** Stellar Societal Disruption after the drubbing the humans suffered after the Earth-Minbari War. While there were plenty of humans who still feel the urge to project power, most of humanity learned to take alien relations much more cautiously: thus, the Babylon Project to help prevent a repeat. |
| 155 | ** Planetary Societal Disruption depicted in ''The Deconstruction of Falling Stars''. As well as Stellar Physical Annihilation at the end of the same episode (but the inhabitants by this time have left the system). |
| 156 | ** The humans on Earth are threatened with Planetary Society Disruption due to [[ThePlague an alien bioweapon]] in ''A Call To Arms'' and ''Crusade'', but survive more-or-less intact. Given ''Crusade's'' cancellation, we never get to see the details of how the plague is dealt with, but the creators have said it was resolved within a couple of years. |
| 157 | ** The Markab fall victim to a [[ApocalypseHow/Class3b Galactic Species Extinction thanks to a disease]] with 100% lethality. Franklin discovers a cure, but too late to save them. [[spoiler:At least the Pak'ma'ra, who are similarly susceptible, were saved, so the cure wasn't ''totally'' useless.]] |
| 158 | ** [[spoiler: And then there's the Vorlon and Shadow planet killers, respectively Planetary Physical Annihilation and Planetary Total Extinction]]. |
| 159 | ** [[spoiler: Centauri Prime undergoes Planetary Societal Disruption twice, due to the Drakh. First one seen is in Season 3 but set nearly 20 years after the second incident in Season 5.]] |
| 160 | ** Stellar Societal Disruption happens twice to the Narn homeworld (the first offscreen a hundred years prior to the events of Babylon 5). The second time is during the third season where the Centauri end the war in the bloodiest, most horrific way imaginable and use Mass Drivers[[note]]Basically, you take a big old space rock or other large expendable object, accelerate it to a respectable percentage of the speed of light and launch it at a target planet. The resulting impact makes Hiroshima look like a damp squib[[/note]] to bomb Narn back to the stone age, an act so vicious that even the normally disinterested Vorlon lodge a formal complaint. We are told that long ago, Narn was once a beautiful world of rich arable land, but when we see it onscreen it's a bleak desert. |
| 161 | ** Galactic Species Extinction was also the fate of the Dilgar in the show's backstory. The Earth Alliance intervened in a very nasty war started by the Dilgar, and after the Dilgar were forced to retreat back to their home star system, their sun unexpectedly went nova. The creators said this didn't occur naturally, but that none of the younger races (humanity included) were responsible for it. The show itself never goes into the details. There are a handful of survivors, including [[TheButcher Deathwalker]], but most of those are laying low in quiet corners of the galaxy and hoping to avoid the fate of the rest of their race. |
| 162 | * ArbitrarySkepticism: Particularly egregious in the first few seasons. When Delenn and Kosh warn the main characters about an ancient evil arising to threaten all intelligent life in the galaxy and how it was all foretold in the Minbari religion, they tend to be taken seriously. When G'Kar says ''literally the exact same thing,'' backed up by the fact that he personally ''flew to one of their worlds'' and saw them with his own eyes and the fact that this evil is described in detail along with ''illustrations'' in Narn religious texts that match up perfectly with the characters' own eyewitness experiences, [[TheCassandra he's typically laughed at or ignored]]. |
| 163 | ** Probably because it's, well, ''G'Kar''. Up until this point, all he's done is scheme and undermine the peace. He's a known agitator - just because he happens to be telling the truth this time, presumably it doesn't mean his latest attempt to stir up trouble for the sake of his own agenda will be believed. Delenn is more trustworthy, and Kosh commands a lot of attention due to the whole mystique-of-the-Vorlons thing. |
| 164 | ** Delenn and Kosh told Sheridan to keep knowledge of the Shadows secret so they would have enough time to build up their opposition. They intentionally feigned ignorance or disinterest when G'Kar, the Markab ambassador, and Earthforce investigator David Endawi openly mentioned or inquired about them. When G'Kar was finally brought into the Conspiracy of Light, Delenn profusely apologized for not being able to support him at the time [[spoiler:and prevent the Centauri devastation of the Narn homeworld]]. |
| 165 | ** In the fifth season episode "Day of the Dead", several deceased characters come BackFromTheDead to converse with the living. Of these characters, [[DeathByOriginStory Zoey]] doesn't believe in the afterlife, despite quite definitely remembering dying, and [[TemporaryLoveInterest Dodger]] outright doesn't believe in ghosts or people coming back from the dead. She admits that she might be wrong, given that she herself is BackFromTheDead, but prefers not to trouble herself with figuring out the implications. |
| 166 | * ArcNumber: 1000, the number of years since the last Shadow war (whose years is never mentioned) |
| 167 | ** 5: The fifth Babylon station is five miles long, host to an advisory council headed by five governments, the setting for a story intended to last five seasons/years.... |
| 168 | * ArcWords: Used liberally in every arc and season. |
| 169 | ** For the series as a whole, the two most important are the questions "Who are you?" and "What do you want?", being the questions of the Vorlons and Shadows respectively. The creators state that these two questions, along with "Where are you going?" and "Why are you here?" reverberate through all five seasons, sometimes blatantly, often subtly. |
| 170 | * AreWeGettingThis: Invoked in "And Now For A Word", when ISN reporter Cynthia Torqueman captures rare footage of a Vorlon (Kosh). |
| 171 | * ArmorPiercingQuestion: |
| 172 | ** "Who are you?" and "What do you want?" are asked by the Vorlons and the Shadows, respectively. Sheridan once asked Kosh, without knowing the signifigance, "What do you want?" and received an extremely agitated response. It's implied the Vorlons and the Shadows have missed the point [[spoiler: since the questions are at their most armor-piercing when Sheridan turns it around and asks them ''of'' the Vorlons and the Shadows. Neither has an answer.]] |
| 173 | ** Lorien, being even older than the Vorlons and Shadows, asks two questions that are in a way deeper: "Why are you here?" and "Do you have anything worth living for?" Later, when the end of [[spoiler: Sheridan's artificially extended life comes,]] Lorien asks, "Where are you going?" It puts the situation in something of a different context. |
| 174 | ** In the DistantFinale, when [[spoiler:the Minbari and humans]] have replaced the Vorlons and Shadows as the guardians of the younger races, they adopt two of Lorien's questions--"Why are you here?" for the former, "Where are you going?" for the latter--to serve as their guiding questions. As a result, they get along better than the Vorlons and Shadows ever did. |
| 175 | ** "Why am I alive?" probably rates this status too, even if it wasn't intended to be armor-piercing at the time. |
| 176 | * ArrangedMarriage: |
| 177 | ** The usual Centauri marriage is arranged for the advantage of the family, without reference to the preferences of the being-married. "The War Prayer" features a young Centauri pair who want to marry each other for love, as well as the first mention of Londo's three wives, all from arranged marriages, who he credits with his success as a diplomat (as in: the more successful his diplomatic career, the more excuse he has to spend long periods away from home). [[spoiler:To help the young couple, he has them adopted into his second cousin's home for a "fosterage" (an old custom which the couples' families should not object to) and at the end of the fosterage they would likely be allowed to wed each other.]] |
| 178 | ** Vir Cotto's marriage to the beautiful, [[spoiler: psychotic and murderous]] Lindisty was arranged by their families through Londo (Vir being a member of a minor cadet branch of House Mollari). [[spoiler:That said, when Vir's involvement in the Underground Railroad freeing Narns comes to Londo's attention, the marriage is put on hold as Vir's standing is no longer what it was. As the series continues, Vir becomes more powerful again and so might still be made to wed her. And considering divorces are permitted only by the grace of the Emperor and Londo not being well-in-mind, he would be stuck with her for a long time. Fortunately, according to the ExpandedUniverse novels, Vir was still single when Londo died and Vir became Emperor, meaning that he would be able to release ''himself'' from this arrangement if Londo hadn't.]] |
| 179 | ** The Psi Corps also practices [[BureaucraticallyArrangedMarriage the bureaucracy-driven version of this trope]] with the goal of breeding progressively more powerful telepaths. |
| 180 | * ArtifactOfDeath: The life force transfer machine. It was originally designed to drain life force from criminals to give to the sick, but can be used as a healing machine with a perfectly healthy and innocent person. It's used several times. |
| 181 | ** A lot of Shadow technology will also kill anybody foolish enough to touch it. |
| 182 | * ArtificialGravity: Certain alien species such as the Minbari have this advanced technology. Not equipped on Earth ships, which instead rely on rotating parts to generate the force of gravity. |
| 183 | ** [[spoiler: The Earth Alliance gains artificial gravity technology in return for endorsing the Interstellar Alliance at the end of the fourth season. We don't see any of the products of this until the TV movie ''A Call to Arms'' and the spinoff ''Crusade'', however.]] |
| 184 | ** The Narn lack artificial gravity, and are shown to strap themselves in aboard their ships with five-point harnesses. |
| 185 | ** It was stated both in-series that ArtificialGravity is a side-effect of the gravitic drives advanced races use, and the Minbari seem to be the only younger race that has gravitics on their fighters (along with BeamSpam weaponry that can cut an Earther heavy cruiser in half, making them quite the LightningBruiser). Of course, the Minbari were fighting interstellar wars when the humans thought the most advanced warship was the one you could fit a ''lot'' of archers on. |
| 186 | ** Centari capital ships appear to have artificial gravity, as seen by the shot of Londo standing on the deck of one [[spoiler: as it bombs Narn back to its equivalent of the Stone Age]]. |
| 187 | * ArtisticLicenseReligion: After being chastised for showing a rabbi singing and dancing along to a gospel choir, JMS claimed he hadn't realized it was a New Testament-exclusive song. One wonders if he ever actually listened to it, since it's a song about sinners trying to avoid the wrath of God on Judgement Day and name-checks Jesus repeatedly. Presumably, it was an interfaith session given the presence of aliens. |
| 188 | * ArtisticLicenseNuclearPhysics: In "A Voice in the Wilderness", Ivanova speaks of a nuclear reactor "approaching critical mass", meaning that it's about to blow up. See the trope page for an explanation for why this is incorrect for nuclear fission reactors -- and then add to that the fact that Ivanova was talking about a nuclear ''fusion'' reactor, with which the concept of "critical mass" doesn't apply at all. |
| 189 | * AsTheGoodBookSays: The Vorlon Inquisitor citing the story of Jonah and the whale. |
| 190 | * AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence: |
| 191 | ** Jason Ironheart. |
| 192 | ** The First Ones who "go beyond the Rim". |
| 193 | ** Also, [[spoiler: Sheridan in "Sleeping in Light"]]. |
| 194 | ** [[spoiler: The entire human race by the end of ''Deconstruction of Falling Stars'']] |
| 195 | * AscendedExtra: |
| 196 | ** In the episode "Spider in the Web," JMS gave Jeff Conaway a bit part as a security officer, simply wanting to help him get back on his feet after he kicked his heroin addiction that cost him his job on ''Series/{{Taxi}}''. His character later got a name, Zack Allen, and eventually got promoted to main cast. |
| 197 | ** Neroon was not originally part of the five-year plan. He was created by D.C. Fontana specifically for the episode "Legacies." But JMS was so impressed by John Vickery's performance that he brought the character back several times, eventually making him an essential part of Delenn's story. |
| 198 | * AssInAmbassador: All of the ambassadors have their moments. Londo and G'Kar have more than most. |
| 199 | * AssShove: How Sheridan hides his link when he goes to confront a mad bomber in early season 3. |
| 200 | --> '''Garibaldi:''' Turn it up high enough, and we'll be able to tell what you had for lunch. |
| 201 | * AssholeVictim: The series has its fair share of such individuals; |
| 202 | ** In the season one episode "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS01E09Deathwalker Deathwalker]]" no one is upset when the Vorlons kill Jha'dur, the Dilgar called ''Deathwalker'' because of all the war crimes she committed. |
| 203 | ** People are happy to see Mr. Morden get his due in "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS04E06IntoTheFire Into the Fire]]" and Vir fulfilling his wish of waving at Morden's head just as he said he would earlier. |
| 204 | ** Not too many people are upset that President Clark AteHisGun in "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS04E20Endgame Endgame]]." |
| 205 | * TheAtoner: |
| 206 | ** Delenn and Londo. Londo is more directly responsible for what he has to atone for, but Delenn is far less cynical. |
| 207 | ** "King Arthur" in ''A Late Delivery From Avalon'' |
| 208 | * AuthorAppeal: JMS seems to be a big baseball fan. |
| 209 | ** He's gone on record as having a thing for "strong, witty women", which certainly explains all the strong female characters who have been on the show. |
| 210 | * AuthorTract: Quite a few first and second season episodes. |
| 211 | * AwesomeMomentOfCrowning: (Retired) Capt. Sheridan has just been elected to the office of the President of an Interstellar Alliance. A general (who does not like / is not happy with Sheridan) goes in to confront him on the matter. Sheridan points out that he now outranks the general who used to be one of his bosses. |
| 212 | --> '''Sheridan''': Funny thing about retiring, you no sooner pick out the places you want to go on vacation and someone comes at you with another job offer. |
| 213 | [[/folder]] |
| 214 | |
| 215 | [[folder:B]] |
| 216 | * BackhandedApology: Sheridan to the Centauri, in truly epic style. |
| 217 | -->'''Sheridan:''' I apologize. I'm... sorry. I'm sorry we had to defend ourselves against an unwarranted attack. I'm sorry that your crew was stupid enough to fire on a station filled with a quarter million civilians, including your own people. And I'm sorry I waited as long as I did before I blew them all straight to hell! [[IronicEcho As with everything else, it's the thought that counts.]] |
| 218 | * BadFuture: In the prime timeline, the Shadows were more cautious than they had been in previous iterations of the Shadow War. They retreat into the background because they overextended themselves during the last round and lost much of their fleet against the combined forces of the Minbari (under Valen's leadership), Vorlons and other remaining First Ones. The first couple of seasons show the Shadows gathering their strength and activating the organic ships they left to mature at the end of the last war.\ |
| 219 | In the bad timeline, without [[spoiler:Babylon 4]] to serve as a forward base for the Minbari, the Shadows do not take the losses that they did in the Prime Timeline. The Shadows come out of their hibernation cycle (which allows them to survive into modernity) much sooner than they should. [=B5=] can't put much of a fight against this larger Shadow fleet and is destroyed. Clips of this timeline are shown in "Babylon Squared" (Garibaldi's last stand against a Shadow boarding party) and "War Without End" (Ivanova's frantic message just before [=B5=] self-destructs). |
| 220 | * BadassArmy: The Anla'Shok aka the Rangers. They're pretty damn awesome and badass, a mix between {{Ace Pilot}}s and [[Franchise/StarWars Jedi]] but they're so badass they don't need special powers. Of course, this was only later on when they were equipped with the [[CoolStarship White Star Fleet]]. Before that, they were more of a covert intellience gathering operation, and as the prequel movie ''In The Beginning'' reveals, a poorly funded one at that- though somewhat justified, as they were an intelligence gathering service against an enemy that had been gone for a thousand years, so them losing funding to more immediate concerns is understandable. |
| 221 | ** Later on, the Army of Light become this, with much of the League of Non-Aligned Worlds joining up with Babylon 5, TheRemnant of the Narn Regime, and the Minbari under the banner of the Anla'Shok. |
| 222 | * BadassBoast: |
| 223 | ** In the first episode of Season Three, "Matters of Honor," everyone else is pressing Sheridan to flee the area when the Shadow battleship shows up because the White Star has no hope against it. Sheridan's response reminds everyone that this wouldn't be the first unkillable ship he's gone up against. |
| 224 | -->'''Delenn:''' "This is a foe that cannot be fought! Captain, we must flee!" |
| 225 | -->'''Sheridan:''' (smirks at Delenn) "No offense Ambassador, [[CallBack but I've been told that before]]." |
| 226 | ** In the third-season episode ''Severed Dreams'', Delenn gets one of the best in the series: |
| 227 | ---> '''Delenn:''' Only one human captain has ever survived battle with a Minbari fleet. He is ''behind'' me. You are ''in front of'' me. If you value your lives, be somewhere else. |
| 228 | ** Ivanova gets a couple too: |
| 229 | --->'''Ivanova:''' "Who am I? I am Susan Ivanova. Commander. Daughter of Andrei and Sophie Ivanov. I am the right hand of vengeance, and the boot that is going to kick your sorry ass all the way back to Earth, sweetheart! I am Death Incarnate, and the last living thing that you are ever going to see. ''God'' sent me." |
| 230 | --->'''Ivanova:''' On your trip back, I'd like you to take the time to learn the Babylon 5 mantra: "Ivanova... is always right. I will listen to Ivanova. I will not ignore Ivanova's recommendations. Ivanova... is God. And, if this ever happens again, ''Ivanova will personally rip your lungs out!''" Babylon Control out. |
| 231 | --->and from Season 1: when a reporter is bothering Sinclair, Ivanova steps in front of her and says "Don't. You're too young to experience that much pain." The reporter wisely does not test her on it. |
| 232 | ** G'Kar keeps up the tradition: |
| 233 | ---> '''G'Kar:''' "No dictator, no invader, can hold an imprisoned population by the force of arms forever. There is no greater power in the universe than the need for freedom. Against that power governments, and tyrants, and armies can not stand. The Centauri learned this lesson once. We will teach it to them again. Though it take a thousand years, we will be free." |
| 234 | ---> '''G'Kar: [to an arms dealer]''' "The money to buy these weapons comes from the life savings of those Narn who were able to escape the Centauri occupation. It is a limited resource, purchased with blood. If it should be squandered or stolen... be assured that while your body might one day be found, it could never be identified from what's left." |
| 235 | ** Marcus explaining to a group of lowlifes why they should answer his questions: |
| 236 | ---> '''Marcus:''' "Because if you don't, then in five minutes I'll be the only person at this table still standing. Five minutes after that, I'll be the only person in this room still standing. So, who's in?" |
| 237 | *** [[spoiler: And [[NotHyperbole Marcus is right]], but it leads to the unfortunate consequence of having no one awake to question. "Bugger! Now I have to wait for somebody to wake up!"]] |
| 238 | ** In another episode, Marcus gets into a fight with Neroon. Neroon says Marcus can disengage from what would otherwise be a fight to the death with no dishonour because he's not Mimbari, but Marcus responds with: |
| 239 | ---> '''Marcus:''' I am a ranger! We walk in the dark places no others will enter. We stand on the bridge and no one may pass! [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUD5QnEB5_k We live for the one, WE DIE FOR THE ONE!]] |
| 240 | ** Ivanova to a Drazi ship that is making threats: |
| 241 | --->"Vakar Ashok, our gun arrays are now fixed on your ship. They will fire the instant you come into range. You will find their power most impressive…for a few seconds." |
| 242 | ** [[BewareTheNiceOnes Surprisingly,]] one of the best badass boasts in the series comes from '''Vir''' of all people, in the season 2 episode "In the Shadow of Z'ha'dum": |
| 243 | ---> '''Morden:''' "What do ''you'' want?" |
| 244 | ---> '''Vir:''' "I'd like to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would gaze up into your ''lifeless'' eyes and wave like this." (mocking cutesy wave) "Can you and your associates arrange that for me, Mr. Morden?" |
| 245 | *** Morden can't, [[BrickJoke but Londo can]]. This is because Londo ''is'' technically one of Mr. Morden's associates! And Vir did wave, 'like this'. |
| 246 | *** Further, it should be noted that everyone who answered Morden's question got what they wanted. Vir is the only one who got what he wanted without it being twisted into something horrible...for him at least. This might be because he didn't actually ask to see Morden's head on a pike. He assumed that this was inevitable. He just asked to live long enough that he would be there when it happened. |
| 247 | * BadassCreed: |
| 248 | ** "Never start a fight, but always finish it." |
| 249 | ** "We are Rangers. We walk in the dark places no others will enter. We stand on the bridge, and no one may pass. We live for the One, we die for the One." |
| 250 | * BadassPreacher: Aldous Gajic from the episode "Grail". The dude not only takes on a bunch of guys, wielding guns, by kicking the crap out of them with a giant stick, but also talks down a [[MindRape mind-raping]] alien monster right before he [[TakingTheBullet takes a bullet]] ''for a guy he only just met''. The guy is badass, to say the least. And he's played by David Warner. |
| 251 | ** Lennier starts as a lowly monk and amanuensis to Delenn, then [[spoiler: [[TookALevelInBadass takes a level or two]] when he joins the Rangers in Season 5]]. His martial arts prowess, however, is shown in several earlier episodes (including rescuing Londo from a bar brawl that the Centauri had instigated). |
| 252 | ** G'Kar counts as well, being the senior representative of his religion on the station (whether this is due to age, social status, or an actual religious title is never explored although the Narns do have an elaborate social caste system). He is responsible for leading his fellow Narns on the station in worship. [[spoiler: Later on he becomes a prophet of his own religion, rather against his will]]. G'Kar is also quite capable of handling himself in a fight with anything from words to [[AcePilot space fighters]]. On [[BigDamnHeroes one occasion]], he manages to bring ''[[TheCavalry an entire fleet]]'' of warships from mutually hostile alien races to help the heroes. |
| 253 | ** If G'Kar counts, then Delenn, the ''de facto'' leader of the Religious Caste of the Minbari Federation, certainly does. She's already [[KingIncognito far more powerful]] than she lets on in the first season, but by the beginning of the fourth season, it's safe to say she is probably one of the single most powerful figures among the younger races, able to command large portions of Minbar's surprisingly fractious society through sheer unadulterated force of will, despite spending the second season as a pariah due to her decision to become a HalfHumanHybrid. |
| 254 | * BadVibrations: In "Mind War", the first mindquake topples a cup of water a character has just poured. |
| 255 | * BaffledByOwnBiology: In "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS02E07SoulMates Soul Mates]]", Delenn, having become a HalfHumanHybrid, has to seek advice from Commander Ivanova on how to deal with a self-inflicted bad hair day: Minbari don't have hair so she has no idea how to care for it. [[spoiler:Which becomes a BrickJoke at the end of the episode when Delenn [[FirstPeriodPanic starts having strange cramps]]. Apparently Minbari don't menstruate, either.]] |
| 256 | * BaitAndSwitch: In "Divided Loyalties", Lyta Alexander returns to Babylon 5 claiming that Psi Corps has planted a [[ManchurianAgent sleeper agent]] on the station. Throughout the episode, we're given subtle hints that it's [[spoiler:Ivanova. Turns out it's Talia Winters, and Ivanova has her own problems.]] |
| 257 | ** On the scale of the series as a whole, [[spoiler:the first half of season 1 makes the Narn out to be aggressive, underhanded warmongers, and the Centauri to be arrogant but basically harmless. This does not turn out to be the case.]] |
| 258 | * BaldOfEvil: |
| 259 | ** Sheridan's torturer. |
| 260 | ** Pvt. Kleist. |
| 261 | ** Again, Londo when he's being framed in a less sympathetic light. |
| 262 | * BallOfLightTransformation: "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars" has a being who's watching the events of the episode do this to reveal that he's in the future, and that humanity has evolved into EnergyBeings much like the Vorlons before them. |
| 263 | * BarbieDollAnatomy: When Earthforce opens a gift shop on the station, Londo is outraged to discover that a "Londo Mollari" doll is being sold there. Not because they used his image without his permission, but because it isn't anatomically correct. He feels he's being symbolically cast-- [[LastSecondWordSwap in a bad light]]. |
| 264 | * BastardlySpeech: In his televised interview, Londo disputes G'Kar's claims that the Centauri are smuggling weapons through Babylon 5 to kill Narns. He goes on to dismiss allegations of Centauri's enslavement of Narn as malicious "propaganda", claiming that his people wanted to help modernize the Narn and raise their standard of living, and left the planet voluntarily when the Narn proved too attached to their savage ways ("And Now For A Word"). |
| 265 | %% There is no mention of fights in any of the examples. * Bar Brawl: |
| 266 | %%** What happens when a horny idiot makes the mistake of approaching a drunk Ivanova and calling her "cute". |
| 267 | %%** Or when Londo and Lennier go play poker but the former gets caught cheating. |
| 268 | %%** Or when a Starfury pilot accidentally backs into a JerkAss marine. |
| 269 | %%** When an ISN report blares news of the Centauri Republic's occupation of the Narn homeworld... in a bar which is coincidentally packed with Centauri and Narns. |
| 270 | %%** Marcus Cole walks into one of the roughest bars on the station and announces that they're going to tell him what the Nightwatch did with the Minbari ambassador - or else. |
| 271 | %%** When a freshly-drugged Sheridan realizes he’s fallen for [[spoiler:Garibaldi]]’s trap to turn him in to Earthforce. |
| 272 | * BarFullOfAliens: |
| 273 | ** The bar where Londo and Lenier go to play poker. |
| 274 | ** The bar where the Centauri guard finally captures G'Kar. |
| 275 | * BashBrothers: G'Kar is so impressed with Arthur's gallantry against a pack of lurkers, he immediately jumps down from a balcony to join the fight. The pair get drunk afterward, and Arthur promptly "knights" G'Kar with his sword. |
| 276 | * BatmanGambit: Babylon 5 likes this trope; then again, it ''is'' part political intrigue. |
| 277 | ** Sheridan sends a White Stars to do nonsensical/suicidal things to accomplish objectives that can only happen if others react the way he expects. |
| 278 | *** In the Shadow War he orders a suicide attack to plant intelligence to lure the [[BigBad Shadows]] to the site of the FinalBattle. If the Shadows hadn't come the ship that was lost would be a SenselessSacrifice. |
| 279 | *** He orders three White Stars to go to an asteroid field and shoot up the place. He then plants the completely true story that nothing of note happened there on the [[TropeNamer Voice Of The Resistance]]. This makes the ambassadors to various factions paranoid that there is an invisible threat and only the White Stars have sensors that are able to detect it. They then go to Sheridan and demand he assign patrols to their borders, ostensibly to protect against SpacePirates and adventurism by other League worlds still reeling from the Shadow War. . . which is exactly what Sheridan wanted in the first place, but knew that if he offered to have White Stars patrol the League borders for their own protection, the League would fight him tooth and nail. |
| 280 | ** The plan to capture Nightwatch before they can take over the station: Nightwatch has basically taken over station security, when they get word of a bunch of Narns coming in to replace them. In response, Nightwatch musters every able hand in security to stop this...[[spoiler:and then they get trapped in a PPG-proof cargo bay. Bonus points: Sheridan reveals that he's hired a bunch of Narns to cover the shortfall created by the detention of the disloyal security officers, making the intercepted report ''true''--in a sort of self-fulfilling manner]]. |
| 281 | ** Mr. Bester's manipulation of [[spoiler:Garibaldi]]. |
| 282 | ** Morden [[spoiler: turning Londo against Refa in order to make him come to Morden for support]]. |
| 283 | ** Londo manipulating G'Kar to leave the station, supposedly so he can be legally arrested by Centauri forces. [[spoiler: It was really part of a plot, with G'Kar's knowing assistance, of entrapping Lord Refa for a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown by a group of Narn resistance fighters]]. |
| 284 | ** Sinclair's talents with LoopholeAbuse let him pull a few of these off, most notably the time he's given full authority to end an illegal strike by any means necessary. Sinclair does employ any means to break the strike - including agreeing to the striker's demands and offering an amnesty on any striker who didn't break any laws not related to the strike, on condition that they get back to work. He even uses funds from the station's military budget to pay for the costs involved in meeting the demands of the strikers. By any means, indeed. |
| 285 | * BattleButler: |
| 286 | ** Lennier and Na'toth, when necessary. |
| 287 | ** Vir, when [[LetsGetDangerous least expected]]. |
| 288 | ** Ta'Lon and G'Kar, [[{{Determinator}} whether you want them to be or not]]. |
| 289 | * TheBattlestar |
| 290 | ** Most ships are shown to at least be ''capable'' of carrying fighters, but only a few of the biggest ones are shown to carry them in large numbers. The name the humans use for this type of ship is [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Destroyer]][[note]] in contrast to the 20th century ship of that name, [[UsefulNotes/TypesOfNavalShips which is a type of escort ship]][[/note]], a name which is adopted by the [[TheAlliance Interstellar Alliance]] for their new class of warships. |
| 291 | * BavarianFireDrill: The rescue of Sheridan from Clark's goons involved Garibaldi donning his old Earthforce uniform and walking into the prison under the pretense of being sent (off the record, of course) to interrogate Sheridan. |
| 292 | * BeardOfEvil: Kalain, a rare Minbari example. |
| 293 | * BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor: Londo REALLY should have put a bit more thought into his answer to the question "What do you want?" In "In the Beginning", Londo states that the child who answered the same question [[MyGreatestFailure had done far better than he had]]. |
| 294 | ** A fifth season episode had a downbelow gang roughing up a Ranger, hoping that it would get station security called off them. It worked ... because Delenn invoked the Rangers' jurisdiction over the matter, meaning the gang now faced a foe trained in applying ''terror'' to their enemies, rather than one that was bound to apply the ''law''. |
| 295 | * BecauseDestinySaysSo: The [[YouCantFightFate eerily-accurate]] prophecies of Valen. (With a fairly significant ProphecyTwist at one point.) |
| 296 | * BeautyIsNeverTarnished: The rebel telepaths, living in [[TheCityNarrows Brown Sector]] and waging a secret war against the Psi Corps, still manage to have really fabulous hair. |
| 297 | * BedtimeBrainwashing: In ''The Centauri Trilogy'' (novels in the ExpandedUniverse), while Emperor Londo has a [[PuppeteerParasite Drakh Keeper]] controlling him, the Drakh used a more benign (less coercive) variation of a Keeper known as a "Dreamweaver" to implant dreams in Minister (and eventual Prime Minister) Durla during his sleep, encouraging and guiding his ambitions for empire that the Drakh planned to use with the Centauri. |
| 298 | * BeliefMakesYouStupid: Franklin, the poster boy for analytical logic, is beleaguered by alien cultures who hold dim views on medicine and/or interpret illness as divine judgment. |
| 299 | ** Later on in the show, Garibaldi accuses Franklin of this when the latter explains that he's aimlessly wandering the station to "find himself," a practice his particular religion borrowed from Australian Aborigines. [[spoiler:Even ''Franklin'' does this to himself, when he finally ''does'' find himself in a NearDeathExperience.]] |
| 300 | * BeneathTheMask: Amusingly but painfully when Delenn shows she has trouble with washing hair and ''cramps'' and other ills that epic heroines are not supposed to have. Lennier shows it all the time; his shyness and lack of self-confidence makes his "honorable Minbari" mask seem to fit on clumsily in his day to day life and you get the feeling he is reciting formulas to convince himself. [[MoreThanMeetsTheEye Except when he is doing something really Badass, of course.]] |
| 301 | ** Delenn's cramps were mentioned to demonstrate that, post-transformation, she has a human-compatible reproductive system, thus foreshadowing that she would [[spoiler: have a child with Sheridan.]] On the other hand, there's a scene in the first season where Sinclair and Garibaldi are shown coming out of the mens' room: JMS put ''that'' in as a TakeThat to the various comedians who pointed out that nobody on TV dramas is ever seen using such facilities. They run this on in season 2 by using having a covert discussion take place ''in'' the mens' room. |
| 302 | * Berserk Button: |
| 303 | ** Be ''very careful'' what you ask a Vorlon. "What do you want?" will get an emotional reaction an unvarnished, direct response. . . but ''not'' one you're going to like. |
| 304 | ** Never hide surveillance devices in Vir's shopping. He'll hack up your fruit stand with a sword. |
| 305 | ** For that matter, don't try to bug a Technomage. They have ways of making you regret it. Like turning computer demons loose on your finances. |
| 306 | ** Don't insult Delenn when Lennier is present. NeckLift results. |
| 307 | ** Don't tell Ivanova [[BarBrawl she's cute]]. [[ActionGirl She'll kick your ass.]] |
| 308 | ** Do not invade Lennier's personal space when he's worried sick about Delenn. Again, NeckLift results. |
| 309 | ** Do not pull a colored sash off one Drazi and put it on another. Green fight Purple, Purple fight Green. Guy wearing Green ''and'' Purple has bad day. |
| 310 | ** Delenn will go into a royal rage at times. When she does you are wise to, well, ''be somewhere else''. Especially if she has a fleet of Minbari ships at her back. |
| 311 | ** In ''Series/{{Crusade}}'', every suggesting that there is a God in the presence of Galen is bound to get you hit with a fireball. |
| 312 | ** Don't try to telepathically scan Susan Ivanova, and don't talk about her mother. Just... don't, okay? |
| 313 | ** Don't bring up Jeffrey Sinclair's fight in the Battle of the Line. Ever. At best, he'll tell you to leave it alone. At worst, he'll punch you in the kidney. |
| 314 | * BetaCouple: Subverted. It looked like Susan/Marcus were being set up as one to alpha Delenn/Sheridan but [[spoiler: Marcus died and Ivanova left Babylon 5 in devastation while Delenn and Sheridan actually got a happy ending and (relatively) smooth sailing afterwards.]] |
| 315 | * BetrayalByInaction: [[spoiler:Lennier]] finds Sheridan trapped behind a containment door in a corridor filling with toxic smoke, but as he reaches for the switch to open it, he instead turns around and leaves, as with Sheridan dead, he would [[spoiler:be once again the [[GreenEyedMonster closest person to Delenn]]]]. |
| 316 | * BewareTheNiceOnes: |
| 317 | ** Vir: |
| 318 | ---> "I'd like to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would look up into your ''lifeless'' eyes and wave like this." (Vir does a mocking cutesy wave) "Can you and your associates arrange that for me, Mr. Morden?" |
| 319 | ** Lennier: |
| 320 | ---> "Do not touch me in that fashion. We may sometimes look like you, but we are not ... you! Never forget that." |
| 321 | ** Delenn |
| 322 | ---> He was the best of us... they struck without provocation, there was no reason... animals! Brutal! They deserve no mercy. Strike them down! Follow them back to their bases and kill them, all of them. All of them! No mercy! |
| 323 | ** Dr. Laura Rosen in "The Quality of Mercy". [[MamaBear Threaten her daughter]] and this sweet old lady will ReverseThePolarity on her miraculous [[LifeEnergy healing machine]] and kill the living shit out of you ''using her own terminal illness.'' |
| 324 | * {{BFG}}: The ''Nova''-class warships of Earth Alliance are armed with 18 ''immense'' twin turrets (a defunct site measured them as 41 meters wide and 85 long). ''Then'' there are two structures identical to the Omegas' mine launchers... |
| 325 | * BigBad: The Shadows are, directly or indirectly, responsible for pretty much all of the major bad things that happen, [[spoiler: even after they leave]]- though it should definitely be noted that their rivals [[spoiler: the Vorlons]] are hardly saints either, just somewhat less proactive. |
| 326 | ** Once the Shadows [[spoiler: leave the galaxy]] early in season 4, [[spoiler: President Clark]] pretty much steps in to fill the position. Though the only reason Clarke had so much power was that he was [[DealWithTheDevil working with the Shadows.]] |
| 327 | * BigDamnHeroes: |
| 328 | ** In the season three WhamEpisode "Severed Dreams": [[spoiler:"Only one human captain has ever survived battle with the Minbari fleet. He is behind me. You are in front of me. If you value your lives, BE SOMEWHERE ELSE!"]] |
| 329 | ** Again in season four's "Endgame": [[spoiler:Sheridan orders the crippled ''Agamemnon'' to [[RammingAlwaysWorks ram]] the defence platform, the only hope of preventing it from firing its [[WaveMotionGun particle cannon]] at Earth. Then the ''Apollo'' comes out of jump and shoots down the platform, the ''Agamemnon'' emerging triumphantly from the fireball.]] |
| 330 | * BigGood: Alternatively, Lorien or Sheridan. |
| 331 | ** According to the backstory, Humans managed to ingratiate themselves with most of the other races by moving in to help them win the Dilgar War. |
| 332 | ** Kosh seems to serve as this for the first few seasons. |
| 333 | ** The Narns (and, specifically, G'Kar) attempted to mediate an ending to the Earth/Minbari War, [[spoiler: but a Centauri attack ordered by Londo--who merely wanted to prevent what he thought was a Narn arms deal--put an end to this, and [[FromBadToWorse the war continued to go badly for Earth]].]] |
| 334 | ** Sinclair during the first season as ReasonableAuthorityFigure [[spoiler: and for the entire arc, with his time travel and transformation into Valen.]] |
| 335 | * BilingualBackfire: |
| 336 | ** In the third season episode ''Ceremonies of Light and Dark'', Delenn and a [[strike:RedShirt]] Minbari captain get kidnapped and tied up. Speaking to each other in Minbari, the captain mentions to Delenn that he thinks his ropes are loose. One of the kidnappers [[OffscreenTeleportation leans forward from nowhere]] and says "Then I guess I'd better tighten them." He explains a moment later that he learned their language during the war. |
| 337 | ** Another Minbari example: While Ivanova is out looking for First Ones with Lorien, she attempts to give an order to her Minbari crew, despite not being able to speak the language very well. In frustration, she says "Ah Hell," which in Minbari, apparently means [[EpicFail "Continuous Fire."]] |
| 338 | * BioAugmentation: Two characters get gills implanted in their necks, allowing them to breathe in atmospheres where their species normally can't. |
| 339 | * BiotechIsBetter: The First Ones use OrganicTechnology and LivingShips that consistently cream non-living ones until the younger races start incorporating biotech into their designs. |
| 340 | * BizarreAlienPsychology: Lower- to mid-level telepaths like Lyta Alexander and Talia Winters don't like to go very deep into alien minds. It's... not a comfortable experience, as demonstrated at least once on the show when a P-5 telepath scans a Narn, and practically craps herself. |
| 341 | * BlackDudeDiesFirst: Ray Galus in "A Distant Star" is one of those unfortunate not-thinking-things-through examples. Casting a black dude as a character in a position of authority is good. When it's a character who only appears to be killed off so a (white) recurring character can be promoted to that position... not so good. |
| 342 | ** Said recurring character (Keffer) was an executive pet. JMS wasn't really fond of the whole idea, so the character was killed off in the season finale. |
| 343 | * BlackShirt: |
| 344 | ** The Night Watch. Got more sinister as the series went on. |
| 345 | ** Politdivision Central, the future anti-ISA faction from "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars" |
| 346 | * BlandNameProduct: |
| 347 | ** ''Universe Today'', a spoof of ''[[UsefulNotes/AmericanNewspapers USA Today]]''. (Also an aversion of NoPaperFuture, although their paper stands can also recycle old editions.) |
| 348 | ** A [[UsefulNotes/McDonalds McBari's]] fast food restaurant is briefly mentioned. |
| 349 | ---> '''Vir:''' "It tastes so good going down. Coming back up, not so good..." |
| 350 | * BlessedWithSuck: a small percentage of [[{{Telepathy}} telepaths]] are also [[MindOverMatter telekinetic]]. Unfortunately, three-quarters of those telekinetics are clinically insane. |
| 351 | ** Not to mention the regular human telepaths being [[TheCorpsIsMother required to join the Psi Corps]], take mind-dulling drugs, or face imprisonment. Along with the social stigma caused by being potentially able to read others thoughts, whether they want to or not. |
| 352 | * BlingOfWar: |
| 353 | ** The Centauri. Dear ''God'', the Centauri. Centauri combat uniforms are essentially Napoleonic Era uniforms. One episode sees a Centauri military ops unit caught on ''Babylon 5'' because they were wearing reasonably sneaky cloaks, but ''were wearing their gold-trimmed purple uniforms underneath.'' |
| 354 | ** Also to a lesser extent the Humans, the Narn, and the Minbari Warrior Caste. |
| 355 | ** The later, Minbari-made uniforms are a double-subversion. While they look like pretty nice and dressy daily wear uniforms to human eyes, they are constructed from materials normally only worn by religious leaders, revered military commanders and the like among the Minbari. They are definitely Bling Of War by minbari standards, but Minbari standards on the topic are quite subdued. |
| 356 | * BlondeBrunetteRedhead: The three telepaths, Talia, [[spoiler: Ivanova]], and Lyta. |
| 357 | * BloodOath: Whenever a Narn "Shon-kar" is declared, the head of the family is honor-bound to see it through. Should that relative lose their life beforehand, the responsibility passes down to the next in line. |
| 358 | ** Na'Toth's family swore a blood oath against the war criminal Jha'dur. |
| 359 | ** Lyndisty, daughter of an infamous Centauri officer, is targeted for Shon-kar by a surviving relative ("Sic Transit Vir"). |
| 360 | * BlueAndOrangeMorality: |
| 361 | ** An almost literal example in "The Geometry of Shadows". Every five years, the rulership of the Drazi is race is determined by every Drazi in the galaxy dividing up between two factions, called "Purple" and "Green", and fighting it out. "Purple" and "Green" are not representative of any ideology, nationality, ethnicity, or religion. They're just abstract colors. And no Drazi decides which side he wants to be on, they literally pick colored scarfs out of a barrel to determine affiliation, and the sash with the badge on it designates the local leader. And they are genuinely flummoxed at Ivanova's inability to grasp the logic behind this system. |
| 362 | ** The First Ones. We are to them as ants are to us. They have no interest whatsoever in the affairs of the "young races" and will often destroy their ships simply because they hadn't noticed their presence. |
| 363 | ** Both the Vorlons and Shadows. While initially presented as "Good" and "Evil" respectively, it pretty quickly becomes clear that things aren't so simple. It's finally revealed that [[spoiler:the Vorlons are "Lords of Order," while the Shadows are "Agents of Chaos"]]. Neither of them is good or evil, both commit "evil" acts for the sake of what they consider "the greater good," and both [[spoiler:have gotten so wrapped up in proving the other one wrong that the Shadow Wars have long since ceased to be about guiding the younger races]]. |
| 364 | *** Not a true case of BlueAndOrangeMorality for Shadows and Vorlons, as each is supposed to represent the 'roles' of Neutral Chaos and Neutral Order in a Yin Yang like balance to guide and help they younger races grow and develop. Goes slightly off the tracks when both sides (in an attempt to impress their own teacher) try and show up the other and prove their side is better. This culminates in a proxy war waged through the younger races and eventually even all out war. However, all this remains within the general human understandings of morality. |
| 365 | * BluffTheEavesdropper: Londo discovers a listening device in a bag of groceries from a Drazi grocer. He spends a few moments saying several insulting things about the Drazi ambassador's wife under the pretense of not knowing he was being recorded, before smashing the bug. The next time he encounters the Drazi ambassador, he brings up the bluff and gets a reaction, confirming his suspicions and adding onto the insult at the same time. |
| 366 | * BluffWorkedTooWell: Vir's scheme to fake the deaths of Narn dissidents in order to smuggle them off-world worked so well the sheer volume of death certificates coming from his cover identity's office made a third party investigate, suspecting the cover was involved in some form of ethnic cleansing scheme. |
| 367 | * BoardingPod: During the attack on the station in "Severed Dreams" President Clark's forces attempt to board the station with breaching pods. They show up in a couple other episodes as well. |
| 368 | * BodyHorror: |
| 369 | ** Nelson Drake being [[TheAssimilator taken over]] by an organic virus, eventually turning into a hulking monster (he got better). |
| 370 | ** Bester's ex-girlfriend, [[spoiler: and the other telepaths abducted by the Shadows.]] |
| 371 | ** Anyone unfortunate enough to come under the sway of a Keeper. |
| 372 | ** For a short while before it was realized it was just flakes easily brushed off, Delenn's skin immediately post-chrysalis was... startling to the eyes. |
| 373 | * BoldlyComing: G'Kr opened the series by propositioning Lyta under the guise of donating genetic material, and is reputed for a rotating harem of human females in his diplomatic quarters. The show was made right at the tail end of the era where G'Kar using his artificial eye to spy on Sheridan and Delenn's honeymoon could have been seen as anything but weird cyber-stalking. |
| 374 | * BookEnds: In the first season, Garibaldi is shown reading the newspaper, and says disgustedly "lousy Dodgers." He does the same thing in the very last episode. |
| 375 | ** In the first pilot, G'Kar goes to Lyta and asks her for her body to try and produce telepathic Narns. The last episodes, she decides to take up this offer with a few more details added to the deal. |
| 376 | * BoringButPractical: The seat of Earth's government is a domed concrete-like structure called [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Earthdome, a rather bland looking building no different than any other industrial building in this setting (and in stark contrast to its surroundings--Geneva, Switzerland)]]. By contrast, the Minbari Grey Council convenes aboard a warship in an undisclosed location (the Religious Caste leadership meets in [[CrystalSpiresAndTogas an immense crystalline temple on Minbar]]), while the Centauri have an elaborate royal palace in which to [[DecadentCourt hold their intrigues]]. While their specific governmental buildings may or may not be shown, the Narn and Drazi also look like they put at least a little thought into their architecture. In the FlashForward 100 years in the future in "Deconstruction of Falling Stars" Earthdome looks to have added a large steel and glass tower, so perhaps the Interstellar Alliance is influencing Earth's architectural aesthetics. |
| 377 | ** Earthforce in general. Their ships are boxy, gray weapons platforms, compared to Minbari ships (look like giant aquatic creatures), Centauri ships (elegant curves in purple and gold), and League ships (which range from classic flying saucers with "antimatter shredder" weapons, organic-looking ships, and so on.) Narn ships tend towards the boring but practical approach, though they still have a noticeably alien design. |
| 378 | * BottleEpisode: Often used, since it was set primarily on a space station. |
| 379 | * {{Bowdlerization}}: The comics had the characters use "What in the hull?" |
| 380 | * BoxingEpisode: Walker Smith ("TKO") used to be a prize fighter on Earth until he refused to [[ThrowingTheFight take a dive]]. Now blacklisted, Smith travels to B5 to enter the [[BloodSport Mutai]], a brutal fighting competition among aliens of all races ([[FantasticRacism except humans, for some reason]]) and oh I wouldn't dream of giving away the [[UnderdogsNeverLose shocking surprise ending]]. |
| 381 | ** [[spoiler: Technically Smith didn't win, the match was called as a draw, but this was against their ''champion''. Smith gained a lot of respect and renewed credibility (and possibly a revived career in the alien fight circuit) and human fighters were allowed to compete in the Mutai from that point on. To complete the ShoutOut to the first ''Film/{{Rocky}}'' film the crowd even chants his name after the bout... at the insistence of said champion!]] |
| 382 | * BreakInThreat: An assassin leaves a black flower in Ambassador G'Kar's bed, as a warning that he has been targeted by the assassins' guild. |
| 383 | -->'''G'Kar:''' And you have no idea how that [black flower] got into my bed?\ |
| 384 | '''Na'Toth:''' Ambassador, it is not my place to speculate on how anything gets into your bed. Your reputed fascination with Earth women, for instance... |
| 385 | * BreakTheCutie: Lyta, especially in Season 5. |
| 386 | * BreakTheHaughty: Both Londo and G'Kar, in their own ways, and probably leading to their OddFriendship. At the beginning of the series, both are arrogant, uppity ambassadors, and can be quite unlikable. Then, as calamity after calamity hits G'Kar and [[PlagueOfGoodFortune success]] [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor after]] [[GoneHorriblyRight success]] hits Londo, both come to realize what is truly important. It's quite possibly the best-managed depiction of CharacterDevelopment in TV science fiction, ever. |
| 387 | * BreatherEpisode: Lampshaded by Sheridan in "Sic Transit Vir". |
| 388 | * BrickJoke: |
| 389 | ** All unanswered questions. ''All of them.'' |
| 390 | ** Vir, getting his wish ([[spoiler:Morden's head on a pike]]) does exactly as he said he would several seasons earlier. |
| 391 | ** At the beginning of the series when Delenn first meets Lennier, she asks him to look her in the eyes and he says it is disrespectful to do so, but she replies "I cannot have an aide who will not look up. He will be forever walking into things." Late in the fourth season, a flashback to many years before when Delenn was first appointed as aide to the great Minbari leader Dukhat shows them having this same exact exchange (only the pronoun changed). |
| 392 | ** Garibaldi reads the first draft of the holy book G'kar has authored, but accidentally sets his coffee cup on one of the pages, leaving a ring. The thing is, Narn holy books are always copied exactly as originally written, including the mistakes and edits, "right down to flaws in the paper" as G'Kar says. Thus, the ring from Garibaldi's coffee cup will be replicated in all subsequent copies of ''The Book of G'Kar'' for as long as it is in print. |
| 393 | ** In "Midnight on the Firing Line", Garibaldi mentions to Ivanova that Sinclair likes to be in C&C during a part of the day where all its consoles are offline for maintenance, for the quiet (as no one else is in there at the time). In "Points of Departure", Sheridan gives his good-luck speech to an empty C&C, implying that he'd given the speech during this mainentance period. Ivanova even says, when she hears what's happened, "Of all the times he could have picked!" |
| 394 | * TheBridge: C&C, or '''C'''ommand and '''C'''ontrol, is the station's equivalent to this. The ''White Star'' is a more traditional example. |
| 395 | * BroadStrokes: "The Gathering" is only mostly canon. |
| 396 | ** One big example of this is Delenn. In "The Gathering," her makeup is markedly different from how it looks in the first season, making her look rather androgynous. The creators said originally she was meant to be male, and that her transformation at the beginning of Season 2 would include turning her female. This was dropped when it was deemed too difficult to do (for one, they couldn't figure out a way to convincingly make Mira Furlan's voice sound masculine). |
| 397 | * BurialInSpace |
| 398 | * BuryYourGays: In every way that matters, [[spoiler:Talia Winters]], who was dating (and eventually sharing quarters with) Susan Ivanova, was killed when her "sleeper" personality was activated. Ivanova later confesses to Delenn that she believes she loved [[spoiler:Talia]]. It should be noted that the relationship was to be explored more thoroughly if the actress playing the former hadn't left the series]]. |
| 399 | * BureaucraticallyArrangedMarriage: The Psi Corps arranges marriages between powerful telepaths in order to facilitate the breeding of even more powerful telepaths. If the people involved try to refuse, the Corps is perfectly willing to arrange rapes instead. |
| 400 | * TheBusCameBack: |
| 401 | ** Sinclair in "[[{{Recap/BabylonFiveS03E16WarWithoutEndPart1}} War Without End]]". |
| 402 | ** Lyta as well, though Sinclair's example was more dramatic. |
| 403 | ** For a more mundane example, the Abbai. They were an important League member race in season one, were mentioned several times and seen as background characters in season two, then they disappeared for two seasons. Come season five, however, they're mentioned again (including having sent representatives to join the Rangers) and then their representative to the Interstellar Alliance is clearly visible in several episodes (though she has no lines). It seems they must have largely sat the Shadow War out. |
| 404 | [[/folder]] |
| 405 | |
| 406 | [[folder:C]] |
| 407 | * CadreOfForeignBodyguards: Garibaldi goes on a mission to the Drazi homeworld, where he meets a human friend working as a bodyguard. He tells Garibaldi that rich aliens hire human bodyguards as a status symbol. |
| 408 | * TheCaligula: Centauri Emperor Cartagia. |
| 409 | ** CaligulasHorse: The Shadow Council, made up of people who objected to his move to reach out to the Shadows. Whom he had beheaded. |
| 410 | * CallARabbitASmeerp: According to G'Kar, every sentient race has a dish that, regardless of its name (the Narn call theirs Breen), is just like Swedish meatballs. He says this after another Narn visiting him, who was eating Swedish meatballs, asked how he managed to get "breen" imported from the Narn homeworld, [[spoiler:which is under Centauri occupation.]] According to the guidebook, even the Vorlons have it; theirs is called "elaa" and is itself sentient. This may be a notable ShoutOut to a similar joke in ''Franchise/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy''. |
| 411 | * CameraAbuse: |
| 412 | ** B5's numerous, independent "Securecams" floating around the hull. We see a few of them get trashed during a skirmish between Narn and Centauri ships ("And Now For a Word"). |
| 413 | ** A few of the space battles later on even show us a Starfury pilot's eye view of his impending death due to incoming fire or mid-space collisions (''Fall of Night'' and ''Into the Fire'') |
| 414 | ** In ''The Illusion of Truth'', Lennier is escorting a reporter and his camera team throughout the Station. While they're all in an elevator, one of the floating hover cameras keeps bopping him on the head, more than likely on purpose. When the elevator doors open, he gestures for the newsmen to precede him out the door. Then, while no one's looking, he headbutts the camera. |
| 415 | * CampStraight: The Centauri nobleman appointed as Regent after [[spoiler:Londo and Vir assassinate the Emperor]]. To the point that his first act in office is to begin redesigning the Imperial Palace's decor... in ''pastels''. The Regent hints at one point that his foppish manner is an act he affected to make him seem less of a threat to the rest of the Imperial Court. Becomes [[spoiler:tragic when we see him get a Keeper and then learn the full extent of what it is; his old sillyness only drives home how broken the man's become]]. |
| 416 | * CantHoldHisLiquor: |
| 417 | ** The Minbari, who are turned crazy by alcohol. A bit of an InformedAbility, as it's never actually shown in the show. |
| 418 | ** Vir's intolerance for alcohol is a RunningGag in the series. In one episode he swallows Londo's drink and passes out. Londo, who is a borderline alcoholic (especially in the first season), is constantly disgusted by it. |
| 419 | ** The only way for [[spoiler:Londo to temporarily shake free of his Drakh Keeper]] is to get drunk; [[spoiler:it passes out before he does, so he can have a little time not under its terrifying control]]. |
| 420 | * CantStopTheSignal: During the end of the Shadow War [[spoiler:with Lorien broadcasting Delenn's conversation with the Shadows and Sheridan's conversation with the Vorlons when both are giving JoinOrDie speeches, Sheridan and Delenn give them each a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech, everyone in the coalition fighting both sides now know the truth of why the Shadows and Vorlons are at war. And if they live or run, they will tell others and so on, meaning the masquerade and authority of the Shadows and Vorlons is broken.]] |
| 421 | * CannonFodder: |
| 422 | ** Both the Vorlons and the Shadows use entire races as CannonFodder. |
| 423 | ** During the Earthforce assault on B5, we see the Narn reinforcements being picked off by the dozens. |
| 424 | *** It's rather self-inflicted. The [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Narns]] aggresively charge into the fight, ignoring Garibaldi's instructions to take up defensive positions. |
| 425 | ** The Vorlon have apparently been manipulating the genetics of younger races to create an army of telepaths to serve as cannon fodder in their next proxy war with the Shadows. It's stated that this is why scientifically verifiable human telepaths apparently came out of nowhere about 100 years ago. Shadow ships have a living sentient being at their core, and a powerful telepath can potentially use their talent to jam shadow ships and render them helpless. [[spoiler: Psi-corp was the Shadow's answer to subvert this scheme. It put human telepaths under indirect Shadow control and provided a source of telepathic individuals that could potentially resist telepathic jamming if used as a Shadow vessel CPU]] |
| 426 | * CanonDiscontinuity / CanonImmigrant- The story holds the early Dell B5 novels as a pick-and-choose-your-canon affair, barring ''To Dream in the City of Sorrows'' and the Anna Sheridan plot of ''The Shadow Within'', which are canon. The later novels and most of the comics are 100% canon. |
| 427 | * CaptainsLog: Used occasionally, with not only the Captain's Log, but also Commander Ivanova and Dr. Franklin's personal logs. |
| 428 | * CarnivalOfKillers: A protagonist example. In "Objects in Motion", Garibaldi learns, but can't prove, that the board of Edgars Industries is trying to have him assassinated. As part of his response, he arranges to put large bounties on all their heads if anything happens to him or Lise. |
| 429 | * TheCassandra: G'Kar was ''specifically'' described as such by the creators back when the show was on. [[spoiler: Subverted in that others (notably the Minbari and Vorlons) knew of the coming threat, but had to conceal that knowledge because they were not prepared to face the shadows yet]] |
| 430 | * CassetteFuturism: The show featured lots of curved CRT screens disguised as flatscreens. |
| 431 | * CasualKink: when Lyta is leaving the station for the last time the security guards bring her to G'kar in handcuffs. As they go to release her she simply takes off the cuffs using her telepath powers and hands them over to her bemused escort. When G'kar asks why she hadn't taken them off before she replies that she rather enjoyed wearing them. |
| 432 | * CatapultNightmare: Ivanova walking onto the command deck in her [[NakedPeopleAreFunny birthday suit]]. |
| 433 | * CatScare: During Lyta's hunt for the ManchurianAgent aboard B5, Lyta takes turns scanning the minds of the entire crew. When Garibaldi's turn comes up, he doubles over and grips his head in pain... then grins at everyone's stunned reactions. [[DudeNotFunny Very funny]], Garibaldi. |
| 434 | * CatsAreMean: The Dilgar, a races that exemplifies BloodKnight. |
| 435 | ** [[OrphanedPunchline While we only hear the last part of it]], Sheridan tells Delenn a story that seems to be about a friend's cat tearing up his place. |
| 436 | * TheCavalry: Following an intense battle against Clark's forces in which the station was badly damaged and a friendly destroyer lost, Sheridan finally breathes a sigh of relief and asks for a status report -- right before [[YourPrincessIsInAnotherCastle a fresh wave of reinforcements appear through the jumpgate]]. It seems like all is lost. Then four more jump points materialize around the station, followed by ''three Minbari warships'' and the ''White Star'', all under the command of a ''[[TranquilFury really really angry]]'' Delenn. |
| 437 | -->'''Earthforce Commander''': Do not force us to engage your ships. |
| 438 | -->'''Delenn''': Why not? Only one human captain has ever survived battle with a Minbari fleet. ''He'' is behind me. ''You'' are in front of me. If you value your lives, '''''be somewhere else!''''' |
| 439 | ** [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere And the Earthforce ships promptly leave.]] |
| 440 | * CellPhonesAreUseless: |
| 441 | ** While investigating Grey Sector, Sheridan's comm signal starts breaking up ("Knives"). |
| 442 | ** In one episode a character loses his communicator. He finds another person's communicator, but can't use it to call for help, because the communicator will only work for its owner. |
| 443 | ** Another episode has a character trying to call security on someone else's comm link, it won't let him make the call. But it ''does'' ping Security to report the stolen comm, resulting in pretty much exactly what the character was trying to accomplish. |
| 444 | * CentrifugalGravity: The Earth Alliance relies on spinning for gravity on B5 and their capital ships. |
| 445 | * TheChainsOfCommanding: Turhan never chose to be Emperor; he was born into the role. When he ascended the throne, the Centauri Republic was embroiled in a brutal occupation of Narn. By virtue of his position, Turhan caught heat for atrocities that were already set in motion by his family (so much so that G'Kar even tries to assassinate him). Near the end of his life, Turhan confides the irony that despite his vast power, he never really had a "choice" in much of anything. Londo gets a taste of this for himself once he allies with Morden. |
| 446 | -->'''Londo:''' Five years ago I had no power, but all the choices I could wish. Now I have all the power, but no choice. |
| 447 | * ChairReveal: Captain Sheridan is introduced via a meta-Chair Reveal; it's not a reveal for any character in the scene, only for the audience. |
| 448 | * ChallengingTheChief: G'kar faces several attempts to depose him as the series goes on, all by his own people. |
| 449 | * CharacterAgedWithTheActor |
| 450 | * CharacterOutlivesActor: |
| 451 | ** Neither Dr Stephen Franklin nor G'Kar were ever [[PutOnABus put on a bus]] before their actors Richard Biggs and Andreas Katsulas passed away, but in The Lost Tales, the late actors' characters are stated to have gone exploring "beyond the rim," the in-universe euphemism for [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence ascending to a higher plane of existence]]. |
| 452 | ** In the case of G'Kar, the character's death was actually seen on-screen before the actor died. [[spoiler: Londo shakes off his Drakh controller long enough to ask G'Kar to kill him to save him and the Centauri from having a mind-controlled Emperor any longer, but as G'Kar tries to oblige the symbiont wakes up and fights back, resulting in G'Kar and Londo killing each other.]] This was set years after the five-year plot, though, which ended with G'Kar and Lyta going adventuring in unknown parts, so he really could have been "beyond the rim." |
| 453 | ** Doctor Franklin, meanwhile, appears in the series DistantFinale, "Sleeping In Light", so he lives at least as long as Sheridan does - 20 years after Sheridan's trip to Z'Ha'Dum. |
| 454 | ** Canonically, Marcus Cole will most likely outlive his actor, Jason Carter, as in the ExpandedUniverse, he is a HumanPopsicle for a couple of centuries before he is thawed out and goes on one last adventure to [[EarnYourHappyEnding finally get his chance to live happily ever after.]] |
| 455 | ** Michael O'Hare, who played Commander, then Ambassador Sinclair, finally going into the distant past to become Valen, outlived his character by 653 years before dying of a heart attack in September, 2012. |
| 456 | * CharacterizationMarchesOn: |
| 457 | ** In the pilot movie and the early episodes of Season 1, G'Kar is a SmugSnake recurring villain, while Londo is the PluckyComicRelief and often an UnwittingPawn. It serves to make their transformations over the course of the next five years all the more meaningful. |
| 458 | ** The pilot movie also has a very out-of-character moment where Delenn does a full-on PsychicStrangle on G'Kar using some kind of magic jewellery, after he annoys her. While she's never exactly nice or harmless, the scene depicts her as bad-tempered and deliberately sadistic to a degree that she never approaches again. |
| 459 | * CharacterShilling: For Captain Lochley by admitted author avatars. An awful lot of minor characters early in the 5th season seem to go on at length about how amazingly awesome she is, to the point of her getting ''applauded'' by an entire mess hall full of personnel after going on a tirade at Garibaldi. JMS has said he regrets having ThoseTwoGuys from "A View from the Gallery" singing her praises at the end of the episode, thus giving the impression that shilling her was the whole point of the episode. |
| 460 | * ChekhovsGag: |
| 461 | ** During one of his periodic meetings with Morden, Londo jokingly wonders why their "associates" don't just wipe out the Narn homeworld. Near the end of the season, when his own people bombard Narn with asteroids (which is forbidden by law), Londo goes along with it and watches it happen from orbit. Morden's only reply was a humorless, "One thing at a time, Ambassador." |
| 462 | ** At the beginning of "Walking Through Gethsemane", Ivanova asks "Brother Edward" (Creator/BradDourif) if he'd like to place a wager. The monk quips that gambling is a lesser sin, and that he's always believed, "if you're gonna sin, you should go for one of the really big ones." [[spoiler:Before he was humanely 'executed' in a court of law via "death of personality" (read: having his memory wiped), he was a headline-grabbing serial killer who only targeted women]]. |
| 463 | * ChekhovsGun: Possibly JMS' favorite trope. He talks about it extensively in his commentary tracks, frequently mentioning the corollary that "if you shoot someone in Act 3, there had better be a gun on the mantle in Act I." He sets things up in ''The Gathering'' that don't pay off until the series finale, he's that dedicated to this trope. |
| 464 | * ChekhovsGunman: The cruiser ''G'Tok'', which in the Season 2 finale plays the passive role of a damaged ship seeking shelter at B5 to lick their wounds, comes back in a Season 3 episode to return the favor to the heroes in a GunshipRescue. |
| 465 | * ChekhovMIA: [[spoiler: Anna Sheridan]]. |
| 466 | * ChekhovsBoomerang: The alien healing device. |
| 467 | * TheChessmaster: A lot of the characters go in for this, but the prize goes to the Vorlons and Shadows who have been playing chess for millions of years, at an infinite level above even Gary Kasporov [[spoiler: with us as the pawns]]. |
| 468 | ** Ultimately though, Sheridan proves to be Playing On A Higher Level as he out maneuvers both of them into facing their own failings to end the Shadow War. |
| 469 | * ChewingTheScenery: While Londo Mollari is clearly ''supposed'' to be a LargeHam, in the first season there is also a lot of bad '''''ACTING!!!''''' by the principals, possibly as a result of trying to overcome the limiting effect of their [[RubberForeheadAliens facial applications]]. They get more subtle as time goes on. |
| 470 | ** G'Kar is another big offender. He emphasizes every word so much that when actual emphasis is called for, he looks like he's having a small stroke. Again, his performance becomes far more nuanced with time. |
| 471 | ** Bruce Boxleitner said in one of the cast commentaries that it didn't matter what anyone else did in a scene if they were sharing it with Stephen Furst (Vir), since he was the only one the audience would be paying attention to. |
| 472 | ** The MadBomber in the episode ''Convictions'' turns in a performance that would make Creator/NicolasCage at his most hammy proud, yelling so much it's a wonder Sheridan wasn't covered in spit. |
| 473 | ** Similarly, Knight Two in "And The Sky Full Of Stars," who seems to want to make sure his performance can be seen ''from orbit''. Website/SFDebris outright wonders if the VR scenes are so dark because the set has been eaten. |
| 474 | * ChildMarriageVeto: "The War Prayer" has this with a couple of Centauri, each arranged to marry someone else, but wanting to marry each other. |
| 475 | * TheChosenOne: Masterfully executed, even though [[spoiler:the character they were setting up for that role got cut]]. This was retconned into him being one of three The Ones. |
| 476 | * ChronicHeroSyndrome: "King Arthur". He chivalrously beats up a lurker for robbing a destitute old lady in Downbelow. Ties in nicely with him also being TheAtoner. |
| 477 | * ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Laurel Takashima, the first officer of Bablyon 5 in the pilot episode, is never mentioned again after the pilot (and one of her quirks, her secret coffee supply, is given to Ivanova). This is notable especially because the other main actors who left after the pilot have at least a HandWave explanation for their characters' absence. |
| 478 | * ChurchMilitant: In the third season the Minbari religious caste seems far more warlike then the warrior caste. |
| 479 | ** That's because they have [[JeanneDArchetype Delenn]]. |
| 480 | * CityOfSpies: Babylon 5. At the least a city of political intrigue, which is hard to carry on without spies. |
| 481 | ** Londo at one point mentions that, at the very least, he and G'Kar have spies. We never see them, which means they're ''good'' spies, or we ''do'' see them and never know, in which case they're ''really'' good spies. |
| 482 | * TheCityNarrows: The Downbelow on Babylon 5 itself which adds to the atmosphere of B5 being an urban centre as much as a space station. |
| 483 | * CivilWar: Two of them in fact. The Minbari Civil War and the Earth Alliance Civil War. |
| 484 | * CivilizationDestroyer: The Thirdspace Aliens in the MadeForTVMovie ''Thirdspace'' have, according to the Vorlons, massacred thousands of races in their home universe and continue doing so every day because they believe only they have the right to exist. |
| 485 | * ClashOfEvolutionaryLevels: For humans, telepaths versus "Mundanes" is this. While human prejudice against their telepaths is mostly due to the [[JerkAssHasAPoint not-unjustified]] fear of telepathic invasion of privacy, some of it is due to the fear that telepaths are "homo superior," and will eventually supplant and replace "mundanes." Then there are some telepaths who believe ''themselves'' to be "homo superior," and will gladly inherit the Earth Alliance once they've rid it of those pesky mundanes. For what it's worth, the series itself implies telepathy is the next major step in evolution, and [[spoiler: will eventually result in humans evolving into EnergyBeings.]] |
| 486 | ** {{Subverted}} with [[spoiler: the Hyach and the Hyach-do]]. When the [[spoiler: Hyach]] eliminated the [[spoiler: Hyach-do]], they inadvertently deprived their species of necessary genetic diversity, causing them to begin a very slow die-off. |
| 487 | * CliffHanger: Used sparingly, which is surprising given the context of other MythArc based shows spawned by this one. |
| 488 | * CliffhangerCopout: The 4th Season episode "Intersections in Real Time" ends with Sheridan imprisoned on Mars, being psychologically tortured in an attempt to brainwash him, with no hope of rescue or escape in sight. The next episode opens with Sheridan, no worse for the wear, sitting in his quarters with Dr. Franklin, sipping coffee and calmly discussing his daring escape. [[spoiler: [[AvertedTrope Then it turns out]] that it's all a hallucination, and his interrogator has drugged him to the gills hoping he'll reveal valuable intelligence on the Resistance.]] |
| 489 | * ClosedCircle: Delenn and Lennier offering aid to the Markab during the Drafa outbreak. Due to the quarantine, the pair are effectively sealed inside Grey Sector for the duration of the pandemic. |
| 490 | * ColdBloodedTorture: |
| 491 | ** Emperor Cartagia tortured G'Kar to the brink of death several times, not for punishment, not [[JackBauerInterrogationTechnique to gain information]], but simply as an amusing diversion. |
| 492 | ** Boggs's accomplice is a shell-shocked veteran of the Earth-Minbari War. Described by Garibaldi as a "real psycho", he used to enjoy ordering Minbari [=POW=]s to dig their own graves. He also claims to have once taken seven days to kill a Minbari, by systematically amputating his extremities and limbs. |
| 493 | * ColdEquation: Considering it's something of a CrapsackWorld setting, this comes up rather frequently. |
| 494 | ** The reason why the "Battle of Coriana VI" is not the "Battle of Centauri Prime" is quite simply down to respective population sizes. |
| 495 | --> '''Lyta Alexander:''' I've heard that [[spoiler: some of the Vorlons]] would be within striking distance of Centauri Prime about the same time we reach Coriana 6. So... why are we here instead of there? |
| 496 | --> '''Marcus Cole:''' 6 billion lives on Coriana. 3 billion lives on Centauri Prime. We have enough ships to make a stand at one of them, [[LampshadeHanging so which do you choose? It's numbers - cold, unsympathetic numbers]]. |
| 497 | ** The Minbari Grey Council learned of the reawakening of the Shadows long before all the other younger races. Instead of warning them, they prepared against the Shadows in secret (albeit with the assistance of the Vorlons, who were also only too well aware). After G’Kar made his expedition to Z’ha’Dum he also learned that the “Ancient Enemy” that devastated his homeworld a millennia ago had returned, and tried to warn the other races. The Grey Council (of which Delenn was a member at the time) chose not to verify his story, so ultimately [[CassandraTruth he was ignored]]. With the help of the Shadows, the Centauri were later able to capture the Narn homeworld, resulting in the death and enslavement of millions of his people. Delenn confesses as much to G’Kar in “Ship of Tears”, but in her defence tells him that had the Minbari spoken in his support the other races may have still disbelieved him, and the Shadows would have completely exterminated his people in retaliation. He accepts this explanation, but with a very heavy heart. |
| 498 | * ColdSleepColdFuture: Invoked with the surviving cryogenically-preserved crewmember of the ''Copernicus'', a cold-sleep ship that was not recalled by Earth after hyperspace jumpgates were introduced by the Centauri: |
| 499 | -->'''G'Kar''' (to the survivor): "Go back. The future isn't what it used to be." |
| 500 | * ColonizedSolarSystem: A colonized Mars is an important (and [[TheWarOfEarthlyAggression restive]]) member of the Earth Alliance. Commander Sinclair was born and raised there, and numerous human military characters[[note]]Commander Sinclair, Chief Garibaldi, Captain Sheridan, Commander Ivanova, and [[PutOnABus Lieutenant Commander Takashima]][[/note]] were stationed there earlier in their careers (often tying in with Mars's and Earth's backstory in the show paralleling the relationship between [[UsefulNotes/TheTroubles England and Ireland]]). It was outright stated that many of the Earth Alliance and Earthforce agencies on Mars were [[DirtyCop blatantly corrupt]]. There are also references to the Earth Alliance's colonies on the moons of Earth and Mars, and three of Jupiter's Galilean moons. |
| 501 | * ColorCodedForYourConvenience: The six branches of B5. Blue Sector consists of the station's entryways and [[TheBridge command hub]]. Red comprises the commercial district, Green is the diplomatic area, Brown is the industrial sector, Gray the maintenance bay, and Yellow contains the station's fusion core. |
| 502 | ** The two types of Starfuries seen, the Aurora (space only, canopy like the nose of a WWII bomber) and the Thunderbolt (folding wings for atmosphere flying, two-seat jet-fighter style canopy), can be easily told apart in wide angle shots by their engines: Blue for the Aurora, Red for the Thunderbolt. |
| 503 | ** Not to mention Lyta's GlowingEyesOfDoom. |
| 504 | ** Babylon 5 has a blue color scheme. [[spoiler: Babylon 4 is shown to have a green color scheme, and the original incomplete Babylon Station had a red color scheme.]] |
| 505 | ** Earthforce capital ships are blue and grey (mirroring the station's Blue sector). Civilian vessels are green and grey. Centauri warships are usually [[PurpleIsPowerful purple]]. Narn military vessels are red. Minbari ships tend to be a lighter shade of blue than Earthforce. Vorlon ships are usually a shade of green (though the replacement Vorlon ambassador's ship was an orangish-red colour). Shadow ships are black. |
| 506 | * ColorCodedPatrician: |
| 507 | ** The Emperor of the Centauri Republic wears all-white. All other Centauri wear various different colors. |
| 508 | ** The Grey Council of the Minbari wear...well...[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin grey]]. Council members wear hooded grey robes during their deliberations (outside of the chamber, they wear what they wish). |
| 509 | * [[CombatByChampion Combat by]] SelfImmolation: Used by the Minbari to resolve inter-caste disputes before the rise of the grey council. Delenn was able to appeal to it simply because she was so badass. |
| 510 | * CombatMedic: Dr. Franklin normally stays clear of the action, and at one point destroys his own research rather than let it be used as a weapon, but if he ends up in a fight, he can lay most mooks out with one or two well-placed kicks. [[BadassBookworm He must have studied those anatomy textbooks to know the best places to hit.]] |
| 511 | * CommLinks: Earth Alliance's Hand links. Attached to the back of the users' hand via a molecular bonding material individually encoded to each user.[[note]]Though Garibaldi says he tapes his to his hand, ever since the hair on the back of his hand stopped growing back.[[/note]] Sounds awesome, but it can be hazardous if you're ever in danger and try calling security with someone else's commlink; of course, if you don't need to get a message through, it still gets them to your location. |
| 512 | * CommunicationsOfficer: On the station itself, this job would typically fall to Lieutenant Corwin (in the first season, it alternated between him and an un-named BridgeBunny.) If Sheridan or Sinclair was in Command and Control, this job would instead go to Commander Ivanova. When traveling out and about aboard one ship or another, this job would fall to whichever character was serving as TheLancer for that mission (Lennier or Marcus, usually). |
| 513 | * CompletelyUnnecessaryTranslator: Correlimurzon brings along his servitor, Taq, to speak for him until he can decide whether humans are worthy of his esteemed presence. Talking directly with a "lesser species" constitutes a loss of face in his culture. |
| 514 | * CompressedVice: The Minbari's extreme beliefs about honor in "There All the Honor Lies", which are never mentioned in any other episode and don't jibe with the way most Minbari characters actually behave. (That said, the bit about lying to protect another's honor originally came up in the previous season.) |
| 515 | * ComputerVoice: PlayedForLaughs with "Sparky", a {{Jerkass}} AI (ably voiced by Creator/HarlanEllison) who refuses to shut up. |
| 516 | ** The normal computer voice, which is very rarely heard, has a very flat, robotic sound to it. |
| 517 | * ConnectedAllAlong: The canonical Psi-Corps Trilogy novels reveal that Lyta's great-great-great-grandparents Desa Alexander and Jack O'Hannlon were also the foster parents of Bester's maternal grandfather Kevin Vacit. |
| 518 | * ConspicuousGloves: In addition to their badges, [[MutantDraftBoard Psi Corps]] telepaths wear black gloves as a reminder that [[ComesGreatResponsibility they must be constantly on guard against invading the privacy of others with their powers]], effectively isolating themselves from those around them. While most of them do sincerely try to take that to heart, many of the Psi Cops, powerful telepaths tasked with hunting rogue telepaths and ensuring that the others follow the rules, give the impression that [[SmugSnake they really don't care.]] |
| 519 | ** Also, telepaths can accidentally read people's thoughts through physical contact, so their gloves serve a practical purpose as well. |
| 520 | ** Though the gloves don't offer perfect protection, as telepaths can still read surface thoughts just by being close, and physical contact (gloves or no gloves) can still relate thoughts, especially ones charged with strong emotion. But when a group of telepaths with no gloves on hold hands, get ready for a [[CurbStompBattle curb stomp battle]] [[BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind in the center of the mind.]] |
| 521 | ** The (government-mandated) gloves and badge also mean human telepaths (who otherwise look just like everyone else) [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything are instantly recognizable to non-telepaths around them]] and [[ThoseWackyNazis can't blend in with the crowd.]] |
| 522 | %%* ContestWinnerCameo: Dr Lillian Hobbes. |
| 523 | * ContinuityNod: The newspaper Garibaldi is seen reading in "And the Sky Full of Stars" has headlines relating to several events in recent episodes (as well as a sidebar {{foreshadowing}} a major development later in the series). |
| 524 | ** At the end of "The Long Night", Sheridan recites a poem by Tennyson, which some unknown party[[note]] presumably Commander Sinclair, who was a big fan of Tennyson, unbeknownst to Sheridan but something the audience would be fully aware of[[/note]] had left a copy of on his desk before he first arrived to the station. |
| 525 | ** In the second season episode ''A Distant Star'', Garibaldi is doing everything in his power to smuggle in the ingredients for Bagna Cauda for a birthday tradition in defiance of Doctor Franklin's instructions on his new diet. In the third season episode ''A Late Delivery From Avalon'', Garibaldi is once again trying to get a hold of the ingredients, this time having to deal with a trade embargo with Earth and an [[ObstructiveBureaucrat obstructive]] [[UnstoppableMailman postal clerk.]] |
| 526 | ** In the second season episode ''Confessions and Lamentations'', the entire Markab race is wiped out by a fatal disease. Two episodes later, in the council chamber there is a delegate's chair labeled "Markab" that is conspicuously empty. Even later, Sheridan destroys the Markab jump gate to kill a Shadow vessel, selecting that 'gate because it's expendable, since the Markab don't need it anymore and the only people using it are looting the planet. Sheridan doesn't like graverobbers. |
| 527 | * ConvergingStreamWeapon: Vorlon ships have several booms on the front of the ship that each emitted a lightning bolt - like beam. They met in the middle to create a WaveMotionTuningFork effect. |
| 528 | * CoolBike: In "Eyes", Garibaldi and Lennier assemble a 1992 Kawasaki Ninja ZX-11 from parts. Lennier adds a Minbari power source so they can ride it. |
| 529 | * CoolOldGuy: |
| 530 | ** It could be said that [[spoiler: Sinclair becomes a CoolOldGuy in "War Without End", after experiencing a number of age-altering effects from the time jumps that turn him grey and wrinkly in a matter of minutes, but still leave him with the ability to take Babylon 4 back to the distant past to kick some Shadow ass as Valen]]. |
| 531 | ** Lorien is [[Really700YearsOld older than he looks]], considering he claims to be the only member remaining of the first sentient race in the galaxy... and given how long the ''other'' "First Ones" have been around... |
| 532 | ** Brother Theo, in a somewhat irritating way. |
| 533 | * CorporateConspiracy: Edgars Industries, "the biggest biochemical conglomerate on Mars", is involved in a scheme to [[spoiler:commit [[FinalSolution genocide]] on telepaths]]. |
| 534 | * CorruptCorporateExecutive: Sheridan takes advantage of one working for Interstellar Expeditions, making critical supplies embargoed by Earthgov his price for ISX access to the Thirdspace artifact. |
| 535 | * TheCorruption: The alien bioweapon in "Infection". |
| 536 | * CosmicChessGame: Vorlons vs Shadows. Everyone else is a pawn. |
| 537 | * CosmicPlaything: Londo Mollari claims that he is this on a couple occasions. In one episode in the fifth season, he comments that he would have thought that the universe would say "Well, we've had our little fun with Londo Mollari" and moved on to torturing someone else by now. Of course, he tends to ignore the fact that many of the bad things that occur to him are the direct result of his own decisions, and a lot of things he complains about affect more people that just him. |
| 538 | * CracksInTheIcyFacade: Londo and G'Kar both have moments of this thought the first season that indicates at their future CharacterDevelopment: |
| 539 | ** ''[[Recap/BabylonFiveS01E12ByAnyMeansNecessary By Any Means Necessary]] ": For the show's duration thus far, Londo has been on the receiving end of G'Kar's bullying. When Londo has a chance to acquire a rare plant G'Kar needs for a religious ritual, Londo show he's capable of just as much cruelty, and G'Kar shows some humility for once. |
| 540 | ** ''The very next episode, [[Recap/BabylonFiveS01E13SignsAndPortents Signs and Portents]] ", sees the mysterious Morden ask the same question of each of them: "[[ArcWords What do you want?]]". |
| 541 | -->'''G'Kar:''' Wait. What do I want? The Centauri stripped my world. I want justice. |
| 542 | -->'''Morden:''' But what do you want? |
| 543 | -->'''G'Kar:''' To suck the marrow from their bones and grind their skulls into powder. |
| 544 | -->'''Morden:''' What do you want? |
| 545 | -->'''G'Kar:''' To tear down their cities, blacken their sky, sow the ground with salt...to completely, utterly erase them. |
| 546 | -->'''Morden:''' AndThenWhat?? |
| 547 | -->(Dramatic Pause) |
| 548 | -->'''G'Kar:''' ...I don't know. As long as my homeworld's safety is guaranteed, I don't know that it matters. |
| 549 | -->'''Londo:''' ...All right. Fine. You really want to know what I want? You really want to know the truth? I want my people to reclaim their rightful place in the galaxy! I want to see the Centauri stretch forth their hand again and command the stars! I want a rebirth of glory, a renaissance of power! I want to stop running through life like a man late for an appointment, afraid to look back, or to look forward! I want us to be what we used to be. I want... I want it all back, the way that it was! Does that answer your question? |
| 550 | * CreatorCameo: |
| 551 | ** Creator/HarlanEllison, who is credited as a "conceptual consultant" on every episode and four of the movies, appears briefly as the Psi Cop who brainwashes [[spoiler:Garibaldi]] in the episode "The Face of the Enemy". He also provides the voices for "Sparky" the computer and Zooty's talking machine. |
| 552 | ** [[Creator/JMichaelStraczynski JMS]] himself appears in the GrandFinale as a member of Babylon 5 crew that switches off the main lighting to the station before it's demolished. |
| 553 | *** Before JMS knew he'd be putting himself in the Finale, he was quoted as saying, "I don't make cameos, my initials do." (Jeffrey Sinclair and John Sheridan both had the same initials as Joe Straczynski.) |
| 554 | *** In addition to that, the first initials of each of the main characters are each of Joe's initials: John, Michael, Susan/Stephen. |
| 555 | ** That wedding photo of John and Anna Sheridan occasionally seen in Sheridan's rooms? That's Creator/BruceBoxleitner and Creator/MelissaGilbert's actual wedding photo. According to the creators, the only change made to it was to modify Bruce's collar to make it look like the ones people wear in the 2200's. |
| 556 | * CreditChip: Credits are stored on cards that slide into readers, as seen in "A Voice in the Wilderness" after Garibaldi gets tricked into paying for Londo's drink. |
| 557 | %%* CreepyCrossdresser: We find out after the fact that Cartagia was one. |
| 558 | * CrucifiedHeroShot: |
| 559 | ** A mortally-wounded Brother Edward is strung up in this fashion somewhere in Downbelow. |
| 560 | ** [[spoiler: Sheridan, when the Inquisitor gets his hands on him. "This is Hell, Captain, and you are its chief damned soul"]] |
| 561 | * CruelToBeKind: Season 4 Episode 19 "Between the Darkness and the Light" Lyta puts Garibaldi through a deep scan, at Garibaldi's insistence, [[spoiler:breaking the blocks Bester put in his mind. This chances destroying Garibaldi's mind or killing him.]] The alternative is that [[spoiler:The Mars' Resistance would execute him for betraying Sheridan; naturally, Garibaldi considers it worth the risk.]] |
| 562 | * CrystalSpiresAndTogas: The Minbari homeworld. |
| 563 | * {{Cthulhumanoid}}: The Pak'ma'ra, who are benevolent for the most part, but since they're mostly antisocial and care little about other races, are often stated as being lazy, don't have an organized government as described above and refuse to eat anything that [[ScavengersAreScum hasn't been dead for at least 5 days]], other races generally only put up with them because they're the main providers of a rare resource needed to make jump gates. |
| 564 | * CurbStompBattle: The Earth/Minbari War. The Minbari absolutely trounced the Humans at every battle. Earth won exactly one battle, and that was done by seeding the Asteroid Belt with [[NuclearOption nukes]]. And then...the Minbari surrendered on Earth's doorstep. |
| 565 | * CurbStompCushion: |
| 566 | ** "The Long Twilight Struggle" features [[spoiler:a Narn fleet getting slaughtered by a group of Shadow warships. It is some consolation that one of the Shadow warships ends up getting caught in the crossfire of two Narn cruisers and is crippled to the point that another ship has to latch on to take it away.[[note]]This is the first time we see that the Shadows are vulnerable at all, in fact. What's more, it was done by the ''Narn''- whose ships are cobbled together from stolen or purchased tech from other races, and are notably not as powerful as some of the ''really'' big players out there.[[/note]]]] |
| 567 | ** Alluded to by Commander Sinclair when talking about his experience at the Battle of the Line, mentioning that he managed to shoot down a single enemy fighter, while his entire squadron was wiped out in the same engagement. |
| 568 | * CurseCutShort: |
| 569 | ** "Born to the Purple": |
| 570 | -->'''Londo:''' Yes, and ''you'' can kiss my plump Centauri -- [[DistractedByTheSexy ah!]] Gentlemen, this is what I've been waiting for! |
| 571 | ** All things considered, Sheridan takes the news of Earthforce charging him rent for using his quarters pretty well. |
| 572 | -->'''Sheridan:''' "They can take a flying f--!!" |
| 573 | * CutHisHeartOutWithASpoon: Ivanova ''really'' dislikes Psi Corps, and everyone associated with them. If there's any doubt on that subject, when Harriman Grey tries convincing her to go along with a mental scan, she threatens to "twist [his] head off and use it as a chamber pot." |
| 574 | * CyanidePill: In "Points of Departure", a die-hard Minbari has one of the hollow-tooth variety, which he intends to use to arrange his own death apparently at human hands and thus spark a new Earth-Minbari war. |
| 575 | * CyberneticsEatYourSoul: See {{Cyborg}}, below. |
| 576 | ** The teeps that were destined to be put into Shadow vessels had all kinds of implants placed into their brains, and they were so badly messed up by the process that they were borderline insane. And that was prior to implentation in a Shadow ship... |
| 577 | * {{Cyborg}} / PsychoElectro: Abel Horn was posthumously recruited into the "Lazarus Project", leaving him little more than a reanimated corpse with no mind of its own, as well as grafting a electric robot hand onto him (as seen in a RoboticReveal). |
| 578 | [[/folder]] |
| 579 | |
| 580 | [[folder:D]] |
| 581 | * DangerousWorkplace: Between the occasional crazy person who comes into the station, government conspiracies, and the raiding parties, the station is not the safest place to live. |
| 582 | -->'''Sinclair:''' "It can be a dangerous place..." |
| 583 | * DarkIsNotEvil: The Brakiri. They have a mildly sinister appearance, they're nocturnal, and they have a creepy necromantic religion, but they aren't bad people. Indeed, during the Shadow War, the Brakiri ambassador was one of Delenn's most loyal allies amongst the League races. |
| 584 | ** The Rangers tend to lurk in the darkness, acting as spies and messengers, and often wear dark cloaks as well. They have also spent centuries preparing for the resurgence of the Shadows and end up forming the core of the Army of Light. |
| 585 | * DarkestHour: Most likely the beginning of the Fourth season, the beginning of the year 2261: [[spoiler: [[TheCaptain Sheridan]] is dead, [[DaChief Garibaldi]] has been abducted by the Shadows, the Army of Light is on the verge of total collapse [[DecapitatedArmy without their leader]], Centauri Prime is under the rule of [[TheCaligula a mad emporer]], and Earth is under a totalitarian dictatorship. It's no wonder that Ivanova has [[TheAlcoholic fallen straight into the bottle]] just to cope.]] |
| 586 | * DarknessEqualsDeath: [[spoiler: Talia's]] assassination attempt on Lyta is signaled by the corridor's lights shutting off. |
| 587 | * DataCrystal: Occasionally seem as a means of transporting information. |
| 588 | * DayOfTheJackboot: No one moment marks [[spoiler:Earth's]] slide into fascism, but the declaration of martial law in "Severed Dreams" in the middle of the third season definitely marks the completion of the transition. |
| 589 | ** A short time later, ISN is stormed and taken off the air, marking the end of the free press. ISN goes back on the air a few weeks later, but has become a propaganda station. |
| 590 | * DecadentCourt: Two Words: The Centaurum. |
| 591 | * DeadManWriting: |
| 592 | ** In "The Parliament of Dreams", G'Kar receives a message from an old enemy: "By the time you get this recording, I will already be dead... Ah, but then, very shortly, so will you." |
| 593 | ** In the episode "Z'ha'dum", one such message is left [[spoiler: by Sheridan for Delenn]]. This death ends up non-permanent, but the accompanying LoveConfession is still heartbreaking. |
| 594 | ** As seen in the prequel movie ''In The Beginning'', Dukhat leaves such a message for Delenn so she can take up his role as liaison with the Vorlons in the event of his death. This message is also apparently what causes her series-long quest to become closer to the Humans. |
| 595 | ** As seen in the penultimate episode, at least one message was recorded [[spoiler: by Sheridan for his unborn child]], as he knows his years are numbered. |
| 596 | ** [[spoiler: Technically, Sinclair received one from ''himself'' when he got a message from his future self... who was dead by that time in the past.]] |
| 597 | * DealWithTheDevil: "What do you want?" |
| 598 | ** Everyone who answers this question receives their wish, but with a dark twist. The only exception is Vir, whose request is quite different from the others. He gets his wish exactly. [[spoiler: Londo granting Vir's wish is part of what leads the Drakh to target Centauri Prime, and Londo himself, for retribution.]] |
| 599 | * DeathByOriginStory: Many doubling as TakeUpMySword: |
| 600 | ** G'Kar's father worked as an indentured servant for a Centauri household during the Narn occupation. His mistress ordered him to be hung from a rope after he mistakenly [[DisproportionateRetribution spilled a hot beverage on her]]. |
| 601 | ** Aldous Gajic was originally an accountant for a major Earth corporation. At some point, he and his family took a vacation on Mars; While they were driving across the Amazonis Planitia, the ground gave way beneath them. Aldous awoke in the hospital to find that his wife and daughters had perished in the accident. He eventually returned to work, only to find that his job held no meaning for him anymore. It was then that Aldous encountered a staff-bearing monk who claimed to be the last of his kind--a seeker of the Holy Grail. When he lay dying, he passed his staff along to Aldous, who set off into space to find the Grail himself. |
| 602 | ** William Cole, the estranged brother of Marcus Cole, was recruited by Sinclair to join the Rangers in 2259. In April of that year, he returned to the mining colony where Marcus lived and tried to convince him to join, but Marcus did not believe his stories about the Shadows and was suspicious of what he saw as a Minbari cult. William later sent a warning about an imminent Shadow attack on the colony. Marcus was not on the colony at the time, and returned just in time to see his brother die. Blaming himself for the death of his brother, Marcus joined the Rangers to finish the work he had started. |
| 603 | ** Anna Sheridan was a researcher working for Interplanetary Expeditions. She signed on with an exploration mission to a newly discovered world out on the Galactic Rim. A mysterious accident destroyed the ship, killing the entire crew. Dealing with her death and learning to move on with his life is a major character arc for [[TheCaptain John Sheridan]]. [[spoiler: Anna Sheridan did not die on Z'Ha'Dum. [[FateWorseThanDeath It may have been better for her if she had.]]]] |
| 604 | * DeathIsTheOnlyOption: |
| 605 | ** When Sheridan goes to Z'ha'dum, his only way out from being captured and controlled by the Shadows is to jump hundreds of feet down into a deep pit (or stay in the city and get vaporized by the nuke-loaded ship he called down on it per his mission plan). He jumped, and literally died, but was revived by Lorien. |
| 606 | ** And when Emperor Londo, in the flash-forward shown in "War Without End" (and detailed further in the ExpandedUniverse Centauri Trilogy), aids Sheridan's escape, he must "submit to his greatest fear" and have G'Kar strangle him before his Keeper awoke and forced him to stop the escape, and likely killed him anyway afterwards for going against its (or rather, the Drakh Shiv'kala's) wishes. (The Keeper did awake, and he and G'Kar ended up mutually strangling each other). |
| 607 | * DeathOfPersonality: The TropeNamer: |
| 608 | ** In the episode "The Quality of Mercy" a serial killer is sentenced to [[TropeNamer Death of Personality]], because he's considered too dangerous to ship back to Earth and military law only allows [[ThrownOutTheAirlock spacing]] in cases of mutiny and treason. |
| 609 | ** The punishment is deconstructed in the episode "Passing Through Gethsemane" when one of an order of monks living on the station is horrified to find out [[spoiler: he's actually a convicted serial killer who was mind wiped and reprogrammed with a personality inclined to do service. When his detention center had a fire he got lost, and eventually found his way to the monks.]] |
| 610 | * DeathSeeker: At 400+ years old, Sebastian has continually been put into stasis by the Vorlons, being revived only periodically to serve as their Inquisitor. During his departure from the station, he expresses the hope that the Vorlons will finally let him perish. |
| 611 | ** Garibaldi suspects that Sinclair has some tendencies in this regard, as many people came out of the Earth/Minbari war not knowing how to cope and many veterans like Sinclair found it easier to find something to die for than something to live for. |
| 612 | * DeathsHourglass: |
| 613 | ** Londo Mollari. From the first season we know that Centauri have prophetic dreams about their own deaths, that they know where and when they are going to die. In Londo's case his dream has him as an old man, twenty years from now (2258) with his hands at G'Kar's throat and vice-versa. He is very fatalistic about it. He indeed dies in 2278, although the context is somewhat different than he'd originally expected. (see "ProphecyTwist") |
| 614 | ** There's another person in the series who fits in the trope even better: [[spoiler: Sheridan after dying in Z'ha'dum gains limited amount of life-force from Lorien, and from then on knows exactly how long he is going to live]]. |
| 615 | * DeathWorld: Z'Ha'Dum |
| 616 | * DecapitationPresentation: [[spoiler: Mr. Morden]]. |
| 617 | * DefectorFromDecadence: |
| 618 | ** Harriman Grey ("Eyes"), a Psi Cop interrogator who finally has his fill of Col. Ben Zayn's vindictive WitchHunt. |
| 619 | ** "Rick", an ISN reporter, briefly hijacks the anchorman's desk to protest Earthgov's actions. The feed is quickly cut. |
| 620 | * DefensiveFeintTrap: Garibaldi actually states this as one of Sheridan's talents in his intro episode. "He can take an inferior defensive force and turn it into a superior offensive force." Specific examples: |
| 621 | ** His famed defeat of the Minbari flagship by using a distress signal to lure them into a nuclear minefield. Also used by the Minbari in the battle immediately preceding this, where they use a fighter feigning damaged to lure Sheridan's Fleet into a trap. Which makes the Minbari condemnation of this tactic throughout the rest of the series a bit hypocritical. |
| 622 | ** On the ''White Star's'' Maiden Voyage, he encounters and is pursued by a Shadow Battle Crab. Even though the ''White Star'' has jump engines, he pretends that they don't, since ships as small as the ''White Star'' usually have to rely on Jump Gates. This allows him to use the ''White Star's'' jump engines and superior speed to open one jump point inside another, creating a massive explosion only the ''White Star'' was (barely) able to outrun. |
| 623 | ** In "Messages From Earth", he plunges the ''White Star'' deep into Jupiter as a Shadow ship -- having gone berserk as a result of the human serving as its CPU -- gives chase. The ''White Star'' bolts out of the atmosphere at just the right moment whilst the insane Shadow ship is unable to do so. The ship is pulled further into Jupiter's atmosphere where it is eventually destroyed. |
| 624 | * DeflectorShields: |
| 625 | ** The Thirdspace aliens have those. [[spoiler: To get through the gate's shields from one side, the protagonists concentrate fire on the other side.]] |
| 626 | ** Ironheart also whips one up using his PsychicPowers just before he [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence goes all First One]]. |
| 627 | ** Most other groups rely on [[StealthInSpace stealth]] or very effective use of [[PointDefenseless point defenses]]. |
| 628 | * DeliberateValuesDissonance: "The Corps Is Mother, the Corps Is Father" is made of this. Even the seemingly sweet and perky NaiveNewcomer has been conditioned to think nothing of tossing a sedated and helpless "mundane" out of an airlock and into hyperspace as punishment for killing a member of the Corps. |
| 629 | * DescentIntoAddiction: |
| 630 | ** In the second season Dr. Franklin starts using stims to keep himself going as more and more injured refugees arrive from the Narn-Centauri War. As time goes on, he becomes more reliant on them, even after the war ends and by the mid-third season it's clear he's become dependent on them. Once he realizes it, he goes on a "[[JourneyToFindOneself Walkabout]]" to figure things out. |
| 631 | ** Michael Garibaldi is shown to have had a problem with [[TheAlcoholic alcohol]] in the past, but aside from one relapse in the first season he doesn't touch the stuff, making a point to just drink water, until the fifth season at which point he starts spending more and more time intoxicated to passed out [[spoiler:which causes him to miss a critical call, and possibly a chance to stop a war before it begins]]. |
| 632 | * DescriptionPorn: For a 20th century Kawasaki motorcycle, of all things. |
| 633 | * DesecratingTheDead: {{Discussed}} when Vir answers Morden's question [[CatchPhrase "what do you want?"]] as below. |
| 634 | --> "I'd like to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price." [[labelnote: spoiler]]A couple years later, he gets his wish, as Londo puts Morden's head on a [[DeadGuyOnDisplay pike for display]] on the Palace grounds on Centauri Prime, after having him executed.[[/labelnote]] |
| 635 | * DesignatedVictim: Done delibrately with Spoo. A mealworm-like herd animal whose primary activity is sighing, a sound which causes severe depression amongst other races. Their only redeeming quality is that they are delicious, and they are considered a delicacy amongst most civilized races. |
| 636 | -->''"Spoo are the only creatures of which the Interstellar Animal Rights Protection League says, simply, 'Kill 'em.'"'' |
| 637 | * DesperatelyLookingForAPurposeInLife: The Vindrizi were created be living recorders, passing their knowledge on to future civilizations in the event that all records are lost and the universe descends into a new dark age. The lurkers on B5 willingly subject themselves to bonding with these aliens, believing that they have finally found a purpose. |
| 638 | ** Both Delenn and Garibaldi say this of Sinclair during the first season. Eventually, he discovers his purpose: [[spoiler: to go back in time and become the Minbari prophet Valen]]. |
| 639 | * DeusExNukina: "Z'ha'dum." [[spoiler: Sheridan placed a couple tactical nukes on the White Star when he went with his wife Anna to the eponymous planet. The episode ends with him sending the ship crashing down into the middle of the planet's capitol city.]] |
| 640 | ** He also did it with the Black Star, the Thirdspace Gate, several Vorlon and Shadow vessels. |
| 641 | * DevilButNoGod: There is cosmic evil but no cosmic good unless you count Lorien. The Vorlons at first ''seem'' to be cosmic good but reveal that they are almost as bad as the Shadows and arguably more distasteful for pretending to be good. By contrast Creator/JRRTolkien has cosmic good that is prevented from interfering directly by the nature of the setting. |
| 642 | * DidntSeeThatComing: |
| 643 | ** During the Earth-Minbari War, the Minbari were previously held as one of the strongest forces in the galaxy. Their ships were unmatched in terms of power and speed among the Younger Races. Most every other space faring race would have surrendered against the insurmountable odds of defeating them. Humans wouldn't. Humans would rather invoke DoNotGoGentle than lay down in fear when their husbands, wives, children, and friends were on the line. The fact humans would even ram their damaged ship into a Minbari to take them with them or mine an asteroid field if a Minbari ship came back to finish off the damaged vessel were tactics not considered either. |
| 644 | ** The clincher in the above mentioned War was [[spoiler:Jeffery Sinclair and other humans having Minbari souls within them, and Sinclair himself has the same soul as Valen.]] |
| 645 | ** Bester is a schemer and long planner. He knew there is some anti-telepath groups plotting serious trouble for his telepaths. However, when [[spoiler:Garibaldi, who he made into his ManchurianAgent]] to fetter out the conspiracy, revealed [[spoiler:William Edgars planned to introduce a virus that would kill telepaths and only telepaths unless they received a biweekly injection thus making them a slave race]], even Bester was shocked at how far this one group went. |
| 646 | ** In "The Coming of Shadows" G'Kar's hatred and desire for revenge against Emperor Turhan for the [[SinsOfTheFather crimes of his family]] [[spoiler:was halted by a personal message from the Emperor, delivered by Dr. Franklin. The Emperor wanted to apologize publicly for all the crimes his people committed]]. When G'Kar is next seen running into Londo [[spoiler:he orders a drink for both of them and drinks to the good health of the Emperor. Needless to say, Londo didn't see this coming either]]. |
| 647 | * DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu: the whole Shadow wars arc, basically. |
| 648 | * DidYouJustFlipOffCthulhu: "Get the hell out of our Galaxy!", combined with ShutUpHannibal! |
| 649 | ** I'd hazard that the flipping off was the nuking the Vorlons & the Shadows, at the same time, at the same place. To wit, "Captain? They're pissed." |
| 650 | ** Vir, the TokenGoodTeammate delivers one of the most polite middle fingers ever extended to Cthulhu. Morden makes his usual opening offer [[DealWithTheDevil "What do you want?"]] over a "friendly" drink and Vir's reply? |
| 651 | --->'''Vir''': I want to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come at too high a price. I want to look up into your lifeless eyes and wave, like ''this.'' Can you and your associates arrange that, Mister Morden?[[note]][[EarnYourHappyEnding Vir certainly got what he wanted]]![[/note]] |
| 652 | ** Not to mention Londo nuking a Shadow base on his own homeworld, and sticking their representative's [[DecapitationPresentation head on a pike.]] |
| 653 | ** Ivanova [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Op2jLtbzWJI outright insulting the Walkers of Sigma 957]] in a desperate gambit to get their support in the Shadow war. In an {{Implied}} YouGotGuts moment, it works. |
| 654 | * DiedInYourArmsTonight: |
| 655 | ** In Season Three, Delenn reveals that the former Minbari regent, Dukhat, died in her arms. |
| 656 | ** [[spoiler: Inverted with Marcus and Ivanova.]] |
| 657 | * DietEpisode: The B-plot in "A Distant Star" involves Dr Franklin putting Sheridan, Ivanova and Garibaldi on [[InsistentTerminology food plans]] because none of them eat right due to the stress of their jobs, and two of them are recovering from [[ContinuityNod injuries suffered in previous episodes]]: |
| 658 | ** [[DaChief Garibaldi's]] body is suffering due to the after effects of being shot InTheBack by TheMole in an earlier season. Meanwhile, [[TheCaptain Captain Sheridan]] is ordered to eat what he considers "Rabbit Food" because he has gained ten pounds since his previous exam. [[TheLancer Commander Ivanova]] is ordered to eat ''more'' because she is suffering nutrition deficiencies because she doesn't eat enough healthy food. |
| 659 | ** At one point, the three officers, realizing that each of them is being forced to eat something one of the others prefers, trade their lunches. [[CantGetAwayWithNuthin This is, of course, when Doctor Franklin shows up]]. |
| 660 | * DisappointedInYou: Sheridan to Garibaldi in "Wheel of Fire". |
| 661 | * DisappointingPromotion: In "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS03E22ZHaDum Z'Ha'Dum]]" Londo gets a "promotion". He's been offered a position as advisor to the emperor on planetary security, but Londo doesn't think it's because he's actually earned it. He's gotten to be too dangerous, so they're bringing him back home where he'll be easier to watch. |
| 662 | * DiscOneFinalBoss: The Raiders. They're the primary antagonists for most of Season One, a major threat to local shipping and, in one of the finest space battles ever committed to film, the station itself. They have a carrier that can jump in and out of hyperspace, allowing their fighters to hit targets wherever they want, and they plan to ransom a priceless Centauri artifact (and the Centauri who helped them get it) for enough money to buy to or three more carriers. . . then the Shadows show up and take them out in one shot. The creators state that the Raiders were built into such a significant threat to invoke TheWorfEffect. |
| 663 | * DisproportionateRetribution: The start of the Minbari War. One crazy trigger-happy human gunner fires at a Minbari ship and happens to kill the leader of the Grey Council. Their reaction? [[FinalSolution Exterminate the entire human race]]! The Minbari only stopped because [[spoiler:their ancient leader happened to be a human who traveled to the past]]. |
| 664 | * DistantFinale: |
| 665 | ** "Sleeping in Light". |
| 666 | ** "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars" is a Distant (Season) Finale, filmed to replace "Sleeping in Light" (which, as evidenced by its credits, was filmed during the fourth season) when the show was [=UnCanceled=]. |
| 667 | * DittoAliens: Sheridan, when attempting to describe a Minbari witness: "Bald, with a bone on his head". |
| 668 | ** In his defense, he only saw the Minbari for a couple seconds, and was standing several feet above him. And heavy SarcasmMode is involved. |
| 669 | * DocumentaryEpisode: "And Now for a Word" details an [=ISN=] crew's time on the station as things escalate in the Narn-Centauri War. |
| 670 | * DocumentaryOfLies: |
| 671 | ** The second half of "The Illusion of Truth." |
| 672 | ** The anti-ISA faction of Earthforce is working on one in one segment of ''The Deconstruction of Falling Stars''. [[spoiler: Their attempts get cut short when the facility preparing the video is bombed.]] |
| 673 | * DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: |
| 674 | ** The Minbari Fighting Pike, a MartialArtsStaff that collapses into a small cylinder about the size of your hand and grows rapidly when firmly shaken. Most prominently used by a virgin who says that playing with it helps him relax. Lampshaded by Marcus when he's describing it to G'kar after [[BigDamnHeroes saving G'kar]] from a BadGuyBar full of people ready to turn him over to the Centauri: |
| 675 | -->"It's a Minbari fighting pike. It's hundreds of years old. You're just jealous because you don't have one. A case of ''pikal envy'' if you ask me..." |
| 676 | ** One of the characters is harboring a DarkSecret. One that she has kept even from her closest friends, and she believes they'll never forgive her when they find out. [[spoiler: She's a Latent Telepath. The same episode also subtly reveals that she's bisexual, but that never gets addressed as an issue of concern for anyone.]] |
| 677 | * DontYouDarePityMe: |
| 678 | ** P.F.C. "Dodger" comes to Garibaldi looking for a one-night stand, and becomes annoyed when he mistakes her intentions as something more. After admitting that her next deployment may very well be a suicide mission, she rebuffs Garibaldi's attempts to console her and leaves. |
| 679 | ** Delenn's captor, having grown accustomed to the screams of tortured Minbari, is unamused when Delenn instead describes in minute detail what a pitiful, sad loony he is ("Ceremonies of Light and Dark"). |
| 680 | * DownerBeginning: |
| 681 | ** Oh, God, the Season 3 intro. Extra points for being read by Susan Ivanova, a '''strong''' contender for the most tragic character ''throughout the show's entire run''. |
| 682 | ---> ''"[[HumansAreDiplomats The Babylon Project]] was [[EarnYourHappyEnding our last, best hope for peace]]. [[DespairEventHorizon It failed.]]"'' |
| 683 | ** The movie "In the Beginning," could also technically count, as it ''is'' a beginning, and it tells the story of the death of the beloved Minbari Leader due to a tragic accident and the ''near-total annihilation of the human race.'' |
| 684 | * DownerEnding: Several episodes in the show have one. |
| 685 | ** In Season 2 there are ''four'' such episodes in a row: [[spoiler:''Knives'', ''Confessions and Lamentations'', ''Divided Loyalties'' and ''The Long, Twilight Struggle'']]. |
| 686 | ** Also of note, the first season had a DownerEnding (indeed, [[spoiler: They completely fail to stop, or even largely to even ''detect'' TheConspiracy before they were able to achieve their goals.]]) The second and third seasons are {{Bittersweet Ending}}s at best. |
| 687 | ** This is mainly because JMS feels even if the show ends, the story continues, so there are no real final endings, only the end of a part. |
| 688 | * DramaticGunCock: Earthforce [=PPGs=] make a distinctive "charging-up" sound reminiscent of a cordless drill being revved up when loaded or turned on seemingly just so this trope can come into play. |
| 689 | * DramaticallyMissingThePoint: When Vir is caught falsely registering thousands of Narn as dead, Londo heartily congratulates him on such a high body count. That is, until Vir confesses he merely smuggled the Narns out of Centauri space. Londo's warm smile is immediately replaced by a furrowed brow. They're ''alive''? That's quite a different matter entirely! Though his real reason for getting Vir the post in the first place was to get him ''out'' of danger. |
| 690 | * DrawSwordDrawBlood: In "A Day in the Strife" the Narn warrior Ta'Lon draws the katana he's had on his back all episode for effect. G'Kar is shocked, identifying it as a K'tok, which cannot be resheathed until it has drawn blood. After convincing G'Kar to stay on Babylon 5, Ta'Lon discreetly cuts his palm with the sword before returning it to its scabbard. |
| 691 | ** Ta'Lon does this a few times. He generally draws the sword (especially in the case with G'Kar above) to demonstrate how serious he is about the current situation. He's willing to draw blood (someone else's, or more frequently his own) to see things through. |
| 692 | * TheDreadedDreadnought: [[DownplayedTrope Downplayed.]] Humans have ''Nova''-class Dreadnoughts, but they're seen as more of a midrange warship during the show's run, having been [[OvershadowedByAwesome outclassed]] by the new ''Omega''-class [[TheBattlestar Destroyers]] (which share a lot of design traits with ''Nova''s). ''Nova''s are still plenty scary, [[MoreDakka packed stem to stern]] [[{{BFG}} with very large guns.]] |
| 693 | * DreamIntro: One episode starts with Ivanova dreaming that she's reported for duty on the command deck [[NotWearingPantsDream naked]]. She naturally has a CatapultNightmare wakeup. |
| 694 | * DreamSequence: Very effectively used in "Interludes and Examinations" and "The Very Long Night of Londo Mollari" |
| 695 | ** DreamingOfThingsToCome: According to Londo, all Centauri have a gift for predicting the manner of their own death. In the first episode, Londo predicts that he and G'Kar will end up strangling each other. Once Londo falls in league with Morden, the dream becomes more frequent; what's more, Londo now dreams of other things -- such as his coronation as Emperor, and Shadow vessels flying over Centauri Prime. Following this, he becomes riddled with anxiety, purposely shunning opportunities to win prestige from the royal court. |
| 696 | * DrillSergeantNasty: |
| 697 | ** The Inquisitor. |
| 698 | ** Less metaphorically and more literally, the Sergeant Major in "Gropos". Slightly subverted near the end, when Dodger runs back to kiss Garibaldi; instead of hauling her off him and dressing her down viciously, the Sergeant Major just orders her back into line and gives him a knowing smile. |
| 699 | * DrinkingOnDuty: In Season 5, Garibaldi's drinking problem prevents him from informing Sheridan (or handling it properly) of Centauri ship movements before open warfare breaks out. A few episodes later, Sheridan discovers that Garibaldi is drunk on duty, and suspends him after a short discussion. |
| 700 | * DrivenToSuicide: [[spoiler: Garibaldi]], [[AvertedTrope very nearly]] after being shot InTheBack and failing [[spoiler: [[MyGreatestFailure to stop the assassination of President Santiago]]]]. [[TheCaptain Sheridan]] enters and sees the gun laying on the table next to its holster. |
| 701 | --> '''Sheridan:''' ''The Universe doesn't give you any points for doing things that are easy.'' |
| 702 | ** Captain Michael Jankowski, the man who started the Earth-Minbari War by ordering his ship to fire on the Minbari cruiser ''Valen'Tha'', eventually blew his own head off in guilt. His corpse was found in his room with looped recordings playing of the destruction of Earth fleets and colonies and a suicide note simply stating ''"On my head".'' |
| 703 | ** President Clark decides to do this rather than face the courts when Sheridan's Fleets come to Earth demanding his government be stopped. |
| 704 | * DrivingQuestion: Several. |
| 705 | ** Season 1: What happened to Sinclair during the Battle Of The Line? Why did the Minbari surrender on the cusp of their final victory? |
| 706 | ** Season 2: Who is the new player on the galactic stage, and why do they seem to not want to be found out? What ''does'' a Vorlon look like? What are the Vorlons up to? |
| 707 | ** Season 3: What's going on back home? (This mostly affects the human characters in relation to Earth, but the status quo "back home" is a subtle but important thread for Londo, G'Kar, and Delenn as well.) |
| 708 | ** Season 5: AndThenWhat |
| 709 | ** Series-wide: The Babylon Four (four questions that, in form or other, reverberate through all five seasons and affect each character deeply): |
| 710 | *** Who are you? |
| 711 | *** What do you want? |
| 712 | *** Where are you going? |
| 713 | *** Why are you here? |
| 714 | ** This is part of what made the show hold up so well, espcially compared to modern MythArc dramas. JMS' philosophy was that, rather than have one big driving question strung out for the whole series, have several small and mid-size questions, then answer some of them relatively quickly, leaving others unanswered, and have answers that lead to bigger questions. More modern stories tend to build a Driving Question for so long that in the end, no answer can possibly be a satisfactory resolution. In ''Babylon 5'', the questions, answers, and answers leading to more questions just becomes part of the overall tapestry. |
| 715 | * DroppedAfterThePilot: Lt. Cmdr. Takashima, Dr. Kyle, and Lyta Alexander. The chief doctor and second-in-command of the space station telepath from the two-part pilot were given SecondEpisodeSubstitute treatment (replaced by [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute Susan Ivanova and Doctor Franklin]]), which became plot points. The writers did attempt to explain the characters' disappearances in-story. JMS had written out a plan for replacing any of the pilot episode characters just in case. |
| 716 | * DrunkOnMilk: Vir. |
| 717 | * DuelToTheDeath: The "Marago", a jousting match between two honor-minded Centauri. In a last-ditch effort to save his family name, Urza challenges his former friend Londo, knowing he will not face the dishonor of refusing. Despite maintaining the upper hand, [[spoiler: Urza allows Londo to run him through. As per Centauri custom, Urza's sacrifice results in his family being merged with House Mollari, sparing them a life of poverty and disgrace]]. |
| 718 | ** Den'Sha, the corresponding Minbari tradition. Traditionally the only way Minbari [[ApeShallNeverKillApe can kill other Minbari]], as the death is ruled a suicide. Marcus Cole manages to invoke one on a Minbari [[spoiler:and live]]. |
| 719 | * DyingReconciliation: In "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS01E03BornToThePurple Born to the Purple]]", Garibaldi discovers that the unauthorized activity on the gold communication channel is Commander Ivanova communicating with her dying father back on Earth. He unintentionally eavesdrops on Andrei Ivanov apologizing to her for an apparent estrangement and failures as a father, shortly before passing on. |
| 720 | * DyingRace: Several: the Narn, Centauri, and many of the 'First Races'. Explicitly stated by Kosh in an early episode, regarding the first two, and when asked if he means the Narn or the Centauri, Kosh gives the MathematiciansAnswer ("yes"). |
| 721 | ** However, this is more philosophical than literal - Kosh meant that both were trapped in a cycle of revenge and fixated on each other's deaths to their own detriment, and were therefore (from a Vorlon point of view) on the path to eventual destruction. Both the Narn and Centauri are in fact populous and relatively vital. |
| 722 | ** The Hyach are a more literal example; though there are still a lot of them around, their genome is slowly collapsing due to having become dependent on a counterpart species that is no longer around [[spoiler: (because the Hyach killed them all.]] |
| 723 | ** The creators said the Humans and Minbari managed to [[EvolutionaryLevels evolve]] to First One status, while the Narn and Centauri didn't. It's implied in the show that getting to a First One level of advancement is as much due to enlightenment as evolution. |
| 724 | ** In contradiction to the above, the creators stated early in season 2 that the Minbari are also a dying race. Each succeeding generation consists of fewer individuals than the preceeding one implying negative population growth, and the individuals that make up the current generation don't measure up to their forebears. [[spoiler: They think that this is because Minbari souls are reincarnating in human bodies]]. Presumably they manage to resolve whatever issues their species is having after the end of the end of the Shadow War and/or Minbari Civil War |
| 725 | [[/folder]] |
| 726 | |
| 727 | [[folder:E]] |
| 728 | * EagleSquadron: The Rangers. Originally a secretive Minbari organization, they began recruiting human members some time after the resolution of the Earth-Minbari War. As the show went on, they gradually began enlisting members of all of the League races until it had officially become a MultinationalTeam mandated to [[SpacePolice keep the peace]] between the different races. |
| 729 | ** Also the Narn [[spoiler: Security personnel]] starting around mid-third season. |
| 730 | * EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: |
| 731 | ** The PilotMovie uses different guns than the series uses ("Set PPG to force 5"), the uniforms are slightly different,[[note]]The collar is cloth, not leather, and the leather strip running down the right side of the jacket is missing. In fact, the epaulettes are the only part of the jacket that's not cloth. Overall, it makes the uniform look more like a jumpsuit than what's in the show.[[/note]] and the link is a wristwatch device instead of adhesive they use for the main series. |
| 732 | ** The voiceover refers to the actions of the last Commander of Babylon 5 and how his actions were momentous. The last Commander of Babylon 5 was actually William Nils whom we meet in the final episode. |
| 733 | ** Delenn's androgynous-looking makeup. The original version of the pilot also had her voice shifted to lower pitch in post-production. The original concept was for Delenn to be male and her chrysalis transformation to also alter her biological sex. Both Mira Furlan and JMS felt it didn't really work in the pilot and the character was shifted to be clearly female. |
| 734 | ** Uhh, how does one ''poison'' a Vorlon? If that was the case why didn't they use it against Kosh 2 when they tried to evict him? And even if the containment suit was organic like his ship, the Vorlons have been seen outside of their suits on enough occasions to raise doubt as to whether they even need it. The poison thing was weird enough that it even warranted a mention later on as an in-universe headscratcher. |
| 735 | ** Various elements in the TV movie were only rarely ever mentioned again (the gill implants and the Changeling Net) or were excised from the "Special Edition" by JMS: Sinclair's tour of the alien sector was removed because fans complained it looked like a zoo, not a barracks. The meeting between G'Kar and Lyta was shortened to remove a "privacy mode" technology that JMS didn't like, along with a reference to G'Kar's mate (which implies he has a wife, albeit in an open marriage). |
| 736 | * EarthShatteringKaboom: Both the Vorlons and the Shadows possess weapons capable of doing that. During the fourth season, when an all-out war erupts between these two races, they start using these weapons to outright destroy planets belonging to races who have allied with the opposing side. |
| 737 | * EarthThatWas: Inverted, once Earth is bombed back to the dark ages in the future, it's aliens and space travel, TheAlliance, Sheridan, and the war of the third age that [[FutureImperfect become myth]]. |
| 738 | * EasilyForgiven: Very widespread: |
| 739 | ** Delenn, although the fact that hers was the deciding vote that started the Earth-Minbari War (and that she was the one who called for complete genocide) is never widely revealed, and according to JMS, never was. |
| 740 | ** G'kar and the Narn Regime are militaristic and expansionist in season one, exactly like the Centauri they so dearly hate. But they quickly win sympathy once the Centauri reconquer them with the aid of the Shadows. |
| 741 | ** Londo, who was positively scary during the initial resurgence of Centauri imperialism which he helped orchestrate. In fairness, he tries very hard to make up for it later, but still a ''lot'' of people died because of him. |
| 742 | ** Garibaldi, whose betrayal of Sheridan is accepted as really being Bester's doing by both his friends and the Mars Resistance entirely on the word of Lyta, which is ironic because... |
| 743 | ** The trope is averted with Lyta. She actually risked her life many times to help Sheridan, fight the Shadows and liberate Earth from President Clark. About the only time she defied Sheridan was in telepathically triggering Za'ha'dum's self-destruct mechanism to prevent Shadow technology from getting into Bester's hands. Sheridan threatens to hand her over to Psi Corps if she ever does anything against his wishes ever again, and he subsequently treats her progressively worse and worse. |
| 744 | ** Also averted with Sheridan himself. The Minbari, especially the Warrior Caste, had a very hard time swallowing their resentment towards him. Likewise, Earthgov was less than thrilled about him leading a military insurrection against President Clark's dictatorship. Prosecution (and execution) were presented as serious options to make an example of him. |
| 745 | ** Interestingly subverted with Bester. Everybody knows he's aplotting a war between mundanes and telepaths. Nobody likes or trusts him. Even Minbari telepaths glare at him like he's revolting. It also becomes known that he arranged MindRape of Garibaldi in order to turn him into a ManchurianAgent (and he was probably involved in creating Talia's sleeper personality as well). But most of the heroes do nothing to try to oust him or halt his growing power. The exceptions being Garibaldi and Lyta, who both have very personal reasons to hate him. Not so much easily forgiven as easily forgotten. |
| 746 | * EasyLogistics: Averted. The station is shown to be highly dependent upon shipping traveling through the area for food, supplies, and money to pay for the operation and maintenance of the station. This becomes a major plot point after [[spoiler: they declare independence from Earth, and are placed under an embargo.]] |
| 747 | ** Even ''[[MustHaveCaffeine coffee]]'' is mentioned as being prohibitively expensive, leading more than one officer to smuggle coffee plants aboard the station and placed in the hydroponics garden, reserved for producing oxygen and food for the station's population. |
| 748 | * EldritchAbomination: The Thirdspace aliens. [[NiceJobBreakingItHero Nice going, Vorlons.]] |
| 749 | * EldritchStarship |
| 750 | ** All the ships of the First Ones are millions of years ahead of the ships of the younger races. They are so advanced that the younger races can't even begin to understand the technology that went into building them. |
| 751 | ** Shadow ships are alive, [[spoiler:requiring [[WetwareCPU a sentient being to be plugged in to function as the CPU]].]] They constantly scream into the minds of their foes. |
| 752 | ** Vorlon ships appear to be sentient artificial creatures. |
| 753 | ** The [[http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_l9_M3jYn25I/SOwYuVnD_HI/AAAAAAAACzk/_E32mrESJnw/s1600/first+one+attack.JPG ships of]] [[http://b5thoughts.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/vlcsnap-304185.png the First Ones]] were mostly just [[http://www.notentirelystable.com/screenshots/B5%20Season%204/first%20ones%20cool%20ride.PNG very advanced looking spacecraft]], and some or most of them may have been {{Living Ship}}s, but one was stated in supplementary materials to have been ''[[http://www.isnnews.net/hyperspace/first/first-2_lg1.jpg the core of an Earth-like planet, mined out and re-engineered for interplanetary travel]]'', with smaller, unattached segments orbiting in a ring-like field of artificial gravity. |
| 754 | ** In the B5 movie ''[[Film/BabylonFiveThirdspace Thirdspace]]'', the smaller fighters of the Thirdspace aliens look like {{Living Ship}}s similar to the ones used by the Vorlons, but their larger cruisers, glimpsed just before the interdimensional portal to Thirdspace was closed, were made up of separate parts that floated in what looked like artificial gravity fields around a big glowing ball of light. |
| 755 | ** Shadow vessels "phase" into hyperspace instead of opening a portal like other ships. The effect looks much like a cloaking device, but is in fact their method of FTL travel. |
| 756 | * ElectiveMonarchy: The Centauri Republic (which [[NonIndicativeName despite its title]] is really a constitutional monarchy[[note]]Befitting its theme of being the Roman Empire--which after all called itself a republic well into the Principate--wearing 19th-century European uniforms.[[/note]]) allows the Centauruum (the Republic's parliament) to elect an Emperor when the line of succession has become unclear. Though when Cartagia (inherited) is found to have had a son the kid ends up behind Londo's (elected) chosen successor Vir in the line of succession. |
| 757 | * ElevatorConference: Happens often enough on the show, both in the actual elevators and in the Core Transport Tube which runs the length of the station. Gets subverted in a number of ways, and [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] at least twice: Talia Winters complains that every time she gets into an elevator, [[DoggedNiceGuy Michael Garibaldi]] happens to be casually waiting inside to make small talk and flirt with her[[note]]As she mentions this, the person she's talking to claims she's paranoid... before the elevator they're waiting for opens up and Garibaldi is inside[[/note]]. In a later LowerDecksEpisode, Garibaldi and Captain Lochley have a heated discussion about the latest interstellar crisis, and the two unimportant crewmembers riding the elevator with them treat it as an UnusuallyUninterestingSight. |
| 758 | -->'''Talia''': I think I'll take the stairs.\ |
| 759 | '''Sinclair''': I think I'll join you. |
| 760 | * EliteAgentsAboveTheLaw: Psi Corps theoretically works for the government of the Earth Alliance, with the job of putting telepaths to work while protecting the privacy rights of [[{{Muggles}} "mundanes"]]. In practice, Psi Corps has become a rogue agency answering only to itself, experimenting on mundanes and telepaths alike and giving Psi Cops the effective authority to kill anyone at will with little consequence. [[spoiler:By ''Series/{{Crusade}}'', Psi Corps is overthrown by LaResistance and telepaths are brought into the Earth Alliance's normal legal structure.]] |
| 761 | * EmbarrassingNickname: In "A Distant Star", Sheridan's first commanding officer, Captain Maynard, visits the station and we learn that his nickname for Sheridan is "Swamp Rat". Sheridan takes it well, because they're friends, and perhaps also because ''his'' nickname for Maynard is "Stinky". |
| 762 | * EmergencyAuthority: The Earth Government under [[PresidentEvil President Clark]] uses fear of alien invasion or infiltration to justify martial law and its progression of power grabs. While the fears are generally unfounded, they used scary footage of Shadow ships (their secret allies), {{False Flag Operation}}s (including the assassination of [[spoiler: the previous president]]), and alleged conspiracy theories such as Sheridan and the Minbari breeding Minbari-human hybrids on the Babylon 5 station to subvert the human race--all in order to build a full-blown Orwellian dictatorship where everyone was paranoid and spying on everyone else, and the government could dispense with its political enemies however it saw fit. |
| 763 | ** In a season one episode, Sinclair is given sweeping authority to resolve a trader's guild strike by any means necessary, with the presumption that he will take a security force into the docking areas, bust heads, take control of the facilities, and put them under government control. With this dictatorial power in mind, Sinclair... gives the guild all the pay raises and safety upgrades they wanted. Which he was in favor of to begin with, but was limited in his ability to provide as his superiors wanted him to take a harder line, but when given the option, his perception of "any means necessary" became a lot more expansive. |
| 764 | * EmergencyPresidentialAddress: In the film ''In The Beginning'', the president of Earth gives a sobering DoNotGoGentle speech in which she pleads for combat-worthy ships to sacrifice themselves by holding the line in face of an imminent Minbari invasion, while the evacuation of civilians is underway. |
| 765 | ** And in ''[[WhamEpisode Severed Dreams]]'', Sheridan also addresses the station's population when [[spoiler: Babylon 5 declares independence from the Earth Alliance]]. |
| 766 | * EnclosedExtraterrestrials: |
| 767 | ** The Vorlons claim to use their strange-looking exo-suits to survive in other environments, although later is reveal that the real reason is to hide their true EnergyBeings meet StarfishAlien look from outsiders. |
| 768 | ** The Gaim are InsectoidAliens, the Gaim ambassadors are the only humanoid ones according to background material (as they are all genetically design by their queens) but still have insectoid features. They use a full body armor not so much to hide their look (other insectoid aliens walk without them) but because they can't breed in the environments that most races find comfortable. The name of the race is an homage from Creator/JMichaelStraczynski to Creator/NeilGaiman as the Gaim's helmet looks like the one use by ''ComicBook/TheSandman1989''. |
| 769 | ** On LowerDeckEpisode "A View from the Gallery", the station is attacked by alien FacelessMooks who look like a red Stormtrooper. |
| 770 | * EnemyMine: |
| 771 | ** Invoked by Londo when he's stuck in an elevator with G'Kar. Unfortunately for him, G'kar would rather watch him die than survive himself. |
| 772 | --->"As the Humans say, Up Yours!" |
| 773 | ** The Rangers literally wear this trope on their badges. It is an illustration of a human and Minbari, their arms intertwining around "the darkness" - their common enemy. |
| 774 | ** Played straight many other times, as various people and groups teamed up on different occasions to deal with more powerful common enemies, [[spoiler: most notably Londo and G'Kar again in later seasons. Perhaps one of the best examples is "And The Rock Cried Out, 'No Hiding Place'" when Londo, G'Kar, and the Narn resistance collectively deliver Lord Refa's LaserGuidedKarma]]. |
| 775 | ** Sheridan found out, however, getting the League working together against the Shadows was incredibly difficult, namely because half were still at war with the others and the overall distrust that had developed made it hard to organize. [[spoiler:It took a solid victory by the Vorlons curb stomping the Shadows to make them agree.]] |
| 776 | ** In the third season, Bester reveals to the crew that the Shadows have infiltrated "his" Psi-Corps, and he cannot tolerate that. After they team up for a mission, he learns that the Corps handed his lover over to the Shadows [[WetwareCPU to serve as a control unit for a Shadow warship]]. |
| 777 | -->'''Bester''': I promised her I would take care of her and the baby. It's the only promise I ever made that means a damn to me. If you can save her, I'll do anything you want to help. [[ThisIsUnforgivable Your war]] [[ThisMeansWar is now my war]].[[note]]He continues to jerk them around to his own goals, naturally. They have common enemies. That does not make them friends.[[/note]] |
| 778 | * EnergyWeapons: PPG ('''P'''hased '''P'''lasma '''G'''un) weapons. According to the creators, [=PPGs=] fire bolts of energized, super-heated helium sheathed in an electromagnetic field and propelled by an opposed magnetic field. On impact, the projectile discharges its thermal and kinetic energy. They are primarily used because while they can be fatal to humanoids, they will not damage a bulkhead and cause an air leak. |
| 779 | * EnforcedColdWar: Kosh's role is to prevent Sheridan from making a move against the Shadows too quickly, as they are still marshaling their forces. If the Shadows' existence was suddenly made known, they would swarm the galaxy before the Army of Light was prepared to face them. |
| 780 | * EnforcedMethodActing: In ''In the Shadow of Z'ha'dum'', Sheridan tricks Talia into walking past Morden in the hopes that she'll pick up something. She does, and the event is so traumatic she ends up in Medbay. When Sheridan comes in to apologize, she slaps him and storms off. Andrea Thompson, the actress who played Talia, got herself so worked up for the scene that she didn't pull her punch, and really slapped Bruce Boxleitner as hard as she could, hard enough that it would have left a mark if she hadn't been wearing leather gloves. His reaction to the slap was genuine. And in every reshoot, she still didn't hold back. |
| 781 | * EngineeredPublicConfession: Lennier coaxes one out of [[spoiler:Ashan by threatening to claim responsibility for the latter's frameup of Sheridan.]] Interestingly, the original ending as scripted was somewhat...different. Instead, Delenn [[spoiler:simply told Ashan to explain things. And brought out her old gravity rings...]] |
| 782 | * EnlightenedSelfInterest: The series name-drops the concept a number of times, though it should be noted the show goes up and down the SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism depending on the episode, with member nations of the Babylon 5 Advisory Council engaging in both enlightened self-interest and {{Realpolitik}}. |
| 783 | ** {{Discussed}} by G'Kar in season one's "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS01E11Survivors Survivors]]". Garibaldi has been framed for plotting to assassinate President Luis Santiago (this is well before he actually ''was'' assassinated), and G'Kar offers to grant him asylum on Narn in hopes of making use of his skillset. This exchange provides the page quote. (Garibaldi declines, instead choosing to ClearMyName.) |
| 784 | ** When Drall takes charge of the Great Machine of Epsilon Three, he places its use at the discretion of the Babylon 5 Advisory Council, believing "their enlightened self-interest" would keep it from being misused. Of course, Draal is perfectly capable of using the Machine for whatever he wishes and ignoring any requests made of him with impunity, so this is little more than a token gesture. |
| 785 | ** In the first half of season four, G'Kar and Londo Mollari make a pact of mutual benefit: Londo will end the Centauri occupation of the Narn homeworld if G'Kar helps Londo overthrow Emperor Cartagia, an OmnicidalManiac. |
| 786 | ** In season four's "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS04E19BetweenTheDarknessAndTheLight Between the Darkness and the Light]]", G'Kar and Londo Mollari convince the Babylon 5 member governments to throw their militaries behind Sheridan's war against [[PresidentEvil President William Clark]]. The two of them note that it's both the morally upright choice and a sound decision from a foreign policy standpoint: if Sheridan's rebels should ''lose'', Clark's anti-alien regime means they'll lose the humans as trade partners and potentially gain one of the region's major superpowers as an enemy. |
| 787 | --->'''Vir Cotto:''' Politics and morality on the same side? That doesn't happen every day, Delenn. |
| 788 | * EqualOpportunityEvil: Nightwatch. Many members sign up primarily based on the [[PunchClockVillain extra 50 credits a week]] that would be added to their regular paycheck. Zack Allan thought this was a great thing, as he was already a security guard, so the Nightwatch duties were pretty much the same as his normal job with the added benefit of more money. |
| 789 | * EternalEngine: The Great Machine of Epsilon III. Its precursors deemed it [[YouAreNotReady too dangerous]] to fall into the hands of lesser races, and set a DoomsdayDevice to [[EarthShatteringKaboom destroy the planet]] if anyone tries to meddle with it. |
| 790 | * EvenTheLovingHeroHasHatedOnes: Vir Kotto is the TokenGoodTeammate of the Centauri and one of the kindest characters in general, but he has two moments. The first is when he is sent by Londo to meet Mr. Morden and tells him to his face that he hopes that he'll be executed and that he'd love to wave to his head on a pole (and when his hopes come true much later, he does). And the second is when he unhesitatingly agrees with Londo that Cartagia, the [[TheCaligula sadistic and homicidally insane]] Centauri emperor, needs to be assassinated. |
| 791 | * EveryoneKnowsMorse: In "All Alone in the Night" Sheridan knows at least enough to do the classic "S-O-S" And Ivanova can recognize it. [[spoiler:He used it while escaping in an enemy escape pod to prove he wasn't an enemy inside.]] |
| 792 | * EvilBrit: |
| 793 | ** The interrogator in "And the Sky Full of Stars", played by professional Evil Brit Christopher Neame. |
| 794 | ** As Sebastian, from ''Comes The Inquisitor''. Of course, being an EvilBrit is unavoidable when you're [[spoiler: UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper]]. |
| 795 | * EvilEvolves: The Lumati believe in a strict adherence to natural selection, to the point of frowning upon medical treatment performed on "lesser races". Their ambassador, Correlimurzon, reasons that the purpose of Downbelow is to isolate the "inferior" lurkers from humanity's genetic line, and says that the Lumati will implement the idea on their own homeworld as soon as possible. |
| 796 | * EvilIsHammy: |
| 797 | ** The interrogator from "The Sky is Full of Stars". He sounds really pumped to be inside another guy's brain. |
| 798 | ** Cartagia. Hey, if you're about to become a God you have to act the part. |
| 799 | * EvilLaugh: Jha'Dur. When your military rank is War Master and your enemies have nicknamed you "Deathwalker", it's safe to say you didn't earn it through your sweet personality. |
| 800 | * EvilTakesANap: The Shadows. They are in hiding while their agents are gathering. A human expedition to their world "wakes them up". |
| 801 | * EvolvingCredits: Each season has its own, unique opening sequence proportionate to the events that have or will occur. The fifth season's opening compiles the four years (seasons) past, prior to an upbeat and very optimistic tune previewing scenes taking place in that season. |
| 802 | ** Worth noting, the second season has the first season's mysterious-sounding theme song, and gives it a darker, more militaristic tone. The third season mixes two songs associated in earlier seasons with crushing defeats that the heroes suffered, to match the desperate situation the characters are finding themselves in, and the fourth season was the original theme again, now as a victorious reprise. |
| 803 | * EvolutionaryLevels: The final level is an amorphous energy form, still physical, but also able to go through walls. |
| 804 | * ExactEavesdropping[=/=]WalkInChimeIn: why don't President Sheridan and Captain Lochley's offices have doors? People randomly walk in to interrupt meetings or stay in the hall and eavesdrop. |
| 805 | * ExactWords: |
| 806 | ** In the season one episode "By Any Means Necessary" Sinclair watches as the dock workers strike over bad pay and unsafe conditions. The Earthgov negotiator forces Sinclair to invoke the Rush Act, which would permit him to use military force to stop the strike as it stipulates he can do so [[TitleDrop by any means necessary.]] [[spoiler:Sinclair invokes it and then cuts through the bureaucratic red tape keeping the pay raise and better work conditions from being implemented to end the strike.]] Sinclair even asks to see the Exact Words of the Rush Act, to make sure it'll allow him to do what he does. |
| 807 | ** Also for Sinclair in the same episode, G'Kar needed to do a ceremonial ritual at the same time when the light of his world's sun strikes a mountain. Due to certain troubles, he couldn't get the flower he needed until it was too late. Sinclair notes two things. First, the conditions for the ritual predate space travel. Second, that the same light used in a ritual decades ago would soon strike the station in a few hours. G'Kar could use that light to complete the ritual. G'Kar is thankful for this. |
| 808 | ** In "The Geometry of Shadows" the Drazi population is going through their political season. They randomly divide up into two factions: Green and Purple. They then beat each other up and who ever has the most wins decides the rule of the government. And it lasts several months. Near the end of the episode [[spoiler:Ivanova pulls Green Drazi Leader's sash off of him, making her the new leader of Green Drazi as the exact words of the tradition predate contact with non-Drazi. So Ivanova orders every Green Drazi to dye their sash Purple.]] |
| 809 | ** In "All Alone In The Night" when Delenn was confronting the Streib and ordered them to [[spoiler:release all their captured prisoners]] seeing the powerful ships Delenn, namely remembering the last time they pissed off the Minbari, [[spoiler:'''spaced their captives.''']] Delenn and Ivanova were not happy with this. Not at all. |
| 810 | ** An Earthgov investigator comes to the station to ask about images of a Shadow ship recorded earlier. He shows the video to Delenn, and asks if she's ever seen a ship like this before. She says she has not. The investigator leaves, and Sheridan calls Delenn out on a blatant lie, since she's told him all about the Shadows by this point. Delenn replies that while she knew exactly what it was, she had truthfully never ''seen'' one before. Minbari in general are big fans of this when it comes to WillNotTellALie. |
| 811 | ** Marcus pulls this stunt ''twice'' in "Exogenesis". When Marcus alerts Garibaldi that his friend is [[NotHimself acting strangely]], the Security Chief blows him off, telling him to go bother Dr. Franklin instead. At an impasse, Marcus asks, "Can I quote you?" In the next scene, Marcus is down in Medlab, claiming that Garibaldi believes the situation to be [[MetaphoricallyTrue very urgent]] and asked for Franklin's help specifically. Leading to an OhCrap moment when the pair are captured, with Franklin putting absolute faith in Garibaldi coming to rescue them. --oh, wait. He doesn't even know they're down there, does he? |
| 812 | -->'''Marcus:''' ''(beat)'' Not as such, no. |
| 813 | ** Once they arrive at the quarters belonging to Marcus' friend, Franklin declares that he can't go any further (presumably because he is an Earthforce Officer, and would be violating regulations pertaining to principles such as unwarranted search and seize). Marcus, nodding, waltzes through the door. |
| 814 | -->"''You'' can't go in. I don't have that problem." |
| 815 | ** From "Grey 17 Is Missing" Lennier proves himself to be very good at this, plus some LoopholeAbuse, as Neroon has threatened to kill Delenn if she becomes the leader of the Rangers. Delenn told Lennier to to not inform the Captain or others about it. His response: |
| 816 | -->'''Lennier:''' I'm trying to keep a promise. By breaking a promise. I was told not to mention this to anyone in the chain of command. You were not mentioned by name but that is implicit. However, by telling you, the captain need not find out about it and I will not have broken the promise.\ |
| 817 | '''Marcus:''' I'm in awe, Lennier. The way you can take a simple proposition and turn it inside out so that it says what you want it to say rather than what it actually says. Does this come naturally or did you attend some sort of…martial arts class for the philosophically inclined? |
| 818 | ** Sheridan's interrogator pulls this on him a few times. For example, he offers Sheridan a corned beef sandwich. Sheridan starts to eat it, then pauses, suspicious. The interrogator points out that no one's going to try to kill him, since they want a confession out of him. Sheridan eats the sandwich, and they continue their discussion. As the interrogator leaves, he informs Sheridan that the sandwich contained a poison that will make him throw up the entire contents of his stomach. After all, he just said the sandwich wouldn't kill him. He never said it wasn't poisoned. |
| 819 | ** In the matter of Lady Adira Tyree, [[spoiler:Emperor Cartagia had her death investigated, as she was close to Londo. Upon his head of intelligence discovering it was not Lord Refa but Mr. Morden who killed her, the Emperor told him to not speak of this while he was alive. True to the order, the Head of Intelligence waited until after Cartagia's demise and then told Londo.]] |
| 820 | *** [[spoiler:Special mention should be made to the head of intelligence who understands this trope very well. So he always uses precise and exact wording for the situation, avoiding any MetaphoricallyTrue ideas.]] |
| 821 | --->'''Minister of Intelligence''': As I said, the details are ''everything''. |
| 822 | ** In "Messages from Earth" there comes an order for Nightwatch to take over the station. They were very clear where they came from as [[spoiler:they came not from President Clark, but one of the civilian political offices he created. The Exact Words bit comes from the long standing military fact: Civilians who are not directly in the chain of command cannot order military personnel. Nightwatch on the station, by virtue of being Earthforce personnel, are also military police. Following these orders constitutes an attempt at mutiny.]] |
| 823 | * ExcessiveSteamSyndrome: In "Mind War", the damaged area of the station includes several broken pipes leaking steam. |
| 824 | * ExoticExtendedMarriage: Londo Mollari has three wives, all {{Arranged Marriage}}s, whom he hates. It's apparently not uncommon for high status Centauri nobles, and made easier by their [[ExoticEquipment six "appendages".]] |
| 825 | * ExplosionsInSpace: Frequent. [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded]] and [[JustifiedTrope justified]] in the episode "A View from the Gallery," which explains that the explosions are the atmospheres in the destroyed ships briefly igniting before being extinguished by the vacuum. This is also why the explosions are different colors: different races use different atmospheres. |
| 826 | * ExplosiveInstrumentation |
| 827 | ** The survey ship in "A Voice in the Wilderness". |
| 828 | ** The ''Cortez'' in "A Distant Star". |
| 829 | ** In the prequel ''In the Beginning'', an Earth Alliance ship and a Minbari ship both suffer from things exploding and metal beams falling from the ceiling during the botched First Contact space battle. |
| 830 | * ExposedStarshipBridge: When Babylon 5 is preparing for combat, extra armor covers the view outside to help protect the bridge. |
| 831 | * {{Expositron 9000}}: The station computer. |
| 832 | * ExpositionOfImmortality: Kosh, Lorien, Morden for the Shadows - all pull very similar "we have been here for longer than you" speeches. Sebastien, the Vorlon interrogator also engages in some reminiscing about his life in VictorianLondon. |
| 833 | * ExtendedDisarming: Dureena's arrival in "A Call To Arms". |
| 834 | * ExtraDimensionalShortcut: This is the way hyperspace works. Hyperspace is actually another physical dimension parallel to ours, but where distances between points are significantly shorter. |
| 835 | * EyesAlwaysAverted: Both Delenn and Lennier start out this way in their respective careers. Lennier keeps it up longer, though. |
| 836 | [[/folder]] |
| 837 | |
| 838 | [[folder:F]] |
| 839 | * FaceDeathWithDignity: |
| 840 | ** Brother Edward in "Passing Through Gethsemane" discussed this topic with Delenn when speaking of Jesus' choice in Gethsemane to wait for the coming dawn and the eventual pain and death. Later, he [[spoiler:was revealed to have been serial killer who had his mind wiped and given this gentle personality where he wanted to just serve people. However, the families of his victims wanted his blood and hunted him down. He waited patiently and met them with a calm demeanor. He let the only one who was still hateful enough to want him harmed beat him to death. Even as he lay dying, all he wonders is if there was enough forgiveness for even a monster like him, never crying, never whimpering in pain, his only small show of weakness being his admission that he was afraid. A stoic attitude about his whole affair.]] |
| 841 | ** The Regent in "The Fall of Centauri Prime": |
| 842 | --> '''Milo Virini:''' "I have been many things in my life, Mollari. I have been silly. I have been quiet when I should have spoken. I have been foolish. And I have wasted far too much time. But I am still Centauri. And I am not afraid." |
| 843 | * Both the FaceHeelTurn and the HeelFaceTurn, at many points. [[spoiler: particularly the Vorlons, who turn out to be {{Knight Templar}}s, and the main cast, who break away from the Earth Alliance in the third season episode "Severed Dreams".]] |
| 844 | ** [[spoiler:Londo]] is a striking example of how to [[FaceHeelRevolvingDoor do both]]. |
| 845 | ** Ditto [[spoiler: Lennier]]. |
| 846 | * FacialDialogue: In "The Rock Cried Out 'No Hiding Place'" Ivanova told Delenn that Sheridan had been "carrying on cranky". Delenn tried to look up the word "cranky", only to be given the runaround as she got shunted from one synonym to another. Finally, partway into a conversation with Sheridan, she finally got it just by looking at his rather grumpy expression. |
| 847 | * FactionCalculus: A non-video game example, in which the Vorlons are considered the Powerhouse (massively powerful ships bristling with weapons), the Shadows the Balanced (more ships than the Vorlons with a single devestating weapon, tough but definitely beatable), and the Army of Light as the subversives (hopelessly low-tech compared to the Vorlons and Shadows, but making up for this in numbers, built around a small corps of "elite" rare and expensive units in the form of Minbari cruisers and White Stars). |
| 848 | * FakeKillScare: One of the psychological tortures used against Sheridan when he was a prisoner of the Clark regime was to stage a mock execution of a fellow prisoner (who was actually working for the interrogators). |
| 849 | ** Sheridan himself was subjected to a fake execution shortly after. |
| 850 | * FakeMemories: With capital punishment reserved for crimes like treason, psychopaths and murderers are instead sentenced to Death of Personality; they have their [[EasyAmnesia memories erased]] and altered by telepaths and their personality restructured to become [[RestrainingBolt pacifists]] and useful members of society ("The Quality of Mercy", "Passing Through Gethsemane"). |
| 851 | ** Interestingly, while many characters voice their opinion on Death of Personality, the show itself makes no judgement call on whether it's a humane punishment or not. JMS was of the opinion that the viewers should make their own decisions on such matters. |
| 852 | ** One character subjected to it, upon learning of his history, pointed out the [[GrayAndGrayMorality moral dilemma]] this presented him with: To get into Heaven, he has to genuinely seek (and receive) forgiveness for his sins. Just ''how'' was he expected to do that if ''he himself'' had no way of knowing what his (considerable) sins were? Ironically enough, had he never been subjected to the procedure, he quite possibly wouldn't have cared about seeking forgiveness for his actions. |
| 853 | * FakeStatic: Londo's phone call in "The Fall of Night". |
| 854 | * FamilyHonor: Both the Minbari and the Centauri have this in spades, and the Narn to an extent. |
| 855 | * FamousFamousFictional: In "Infection", it's mentioned that Dr Franklin aspires to become one of the great names of medicine, alongside Fleming, Salk, Jenner, and Takahashi. |
| 856 | * FanOfThePast: Garibaldi's hobbies include watching old Warner Brothers cartoons and restoring vintage (manufactured in the distant past year of 1992) motorcycles. |
| 857 | * FantasticallyChallengingPatient: In the pilot movie, one Ambassador Kosh is mortally wounded in an attack on the station by factions not wanting it to come online. Dr. Kyle is forced to operate to save his life, but this proves a problem as the Vorlon are secretive and don't like the idea of one of their own being operated on, even to save his life. |
| 858 | * FantasticDrug: Dust, which can unlock latent telepathic powers. See also PsychoSerum. |
| 859 | * FantasticHonorifics: The Minbari use the title "Satai" for the members of the Grey Council. |
| 860 | * FantasticRacism: There are a lot of tensions between the various races, some of it expressed in the form of xenophobic attacks on one species by another. It wasn't just humans who were guilty of or fell prey to such behaviour either. |
| 861 | ** There's also racism against Human telepaths by nontelepathic Humans. The Psi Corps seems to indicate that telepaths in turn are indoctrinated to see themselves as superior to non-telepaths. A lot of them even refer to nontelepaths as "mundanes". |
| 862 | *** The [[AllThereInTheManual supplementary material]] reveals that when telepaths first appeared on Earth, reactions ranged from fear, imprisonment and ostracizing to ''mass murder'' of telepaths, and we see remnants of this with plots like Edgars's anti-telepath virus, suggesting that when Garibaldi blames some of Psi Corps' [[PuttingOnTheReich more militant tendencies]] on humans having shoved them all into a box labeled "Psi Corps" out of fear, he's probably not wrong. |
| 863 | ** On top of that, there's even discrimation by Earth-born humans against Mars-born humans, with the ongoing [[LaResistance resistance movement]] on Mars being an ongoing background plot point for the first four seasons of the show. The fallout from this continues forth into ''Series/{{Crusade}}''. |
| 864 | ** The Centauri's FantasticRacism can seem pretty arbitrary at times. When the Centauri met the primitive, backward, simple Humans, they established trade with them and sold them some pretty damn nifty high technology, including jump gates, enabling their meteoric rise as a major galactic power. When they met the primitive, backward, simple Narn... they enslaved them and nearly wiped them out. Yeah. Perhaps the Centari liked Humans more than Narn because Centari look more like Humans than Narn? |
| 865 | *** Or possibly even they were already having [[LaResistance problems with the Narn]], and could not afford to conquer another race while trying to maintain their dominance over the Narn. |
| 866 | *** The Narn may have been less advanced than Humans when the Centauri first conquered them. Also, the Centauri may have learned their lesson from the Narn occupation, and sought to take [[VichyEarth a different strategy with Earth]]. The Centauri originally tried to convince Earth's leadership that humanity was a lost Centauri colony and held a monopoly on Earth's interstellar trade for a century or more. It seems likely that Earth would have fallen into the Centauri sphere of influence had the Humans not provoked the Minbari and forced the Centauri to cut their losses. |
| 867 | * FantasticShipPrefix: Earthforce ships are E.A.S. for Earth Alliance Starship. |
| 868 | * FantasyCounterpartReligion: |
| 869 | ** Foundationism is a new religion among humans. Details of the religion are never given but what is known is that they consider that God is in all religions and that they take the best from each one. A particular ritual, taken from the Australian aboriginals, it's described as: The person, having discovered they have lost themselves, would leave everything and start walking and keep on walking until they (metaphorically) meet themselves. The person would then sit down and have a long talk with their "self", about everything they have learned and felt until they run out of words. |
| 870 | ** The Narn have different religions but the most presented in detail is G'Kar's who is a follower of the philosophist G'Quan and seems to be similar to Taoism. |
| 871 | ** The Minbari religion is based in Pantheism and have a believe in reincarnation similar to many Eastern religions. |
| 872 | ** The Centauri religion is more of a Pagan polytheistic religion with 50 official gods (and one unofficial based on a noble man who bought his way in the pantheon). |
| 873 | * FasterThanLightTravel: The jump gates, and (on larger ships) Jump Drives. |
| 874 | ** If you pay attention, you'll notice that every time a ship is shown coming ''out'' of hyperspace, the jumpgate looks blue, while every time a ship is shown ''entering'' hyperspace, the jumpgate looks yellow. Straczynski said that this was a nod to the Doppler Shift -- hyperspace "stuff" coming toward you out of the jump gate is blue-shifted, while material receding away from you into hyperspace is red-shifted. |
| 875 | * FearIsNormal: In "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS02E10GROPOS GROPOS]]", a young Earth Alliance Marine (i.e. ground-pounder or "gropo" for short) named Yang is about to go on his first combat mission and confesses to being terrified. His veteran squadmate Large tells him that's okay: "Like Buffer used to say, 'A gropo who ain't scared is either dead, or stupid.'" |
| 876 | * TheFederation: |
| 877 | ** The Earth Alliance. [[spoiler: At first]]. |
| 878 | ** The Interstellar Alliance |
| 879 | * FeeFiFauxPas: Sheridan's dinner with Delenn and Lennier. The poor guy should have just ordered take-out. |
| 880 | ** G'Kar commits one on purpose in "Soul Mates." All guests at he celebration of Londo's ascendancy are required to be barefoot. G'Kar shows up wearing his customary boots, knowing full well what a grave insult it is. Unfortunately, this [[InsultBackfire backfires]] on him: Londo is in such a good mood that he doesn't care. Plus, he loves [[MindScrew messing with G'Kar's head]]. |
| 881 | * FelonyMisdemeanor: Earthgov trying to make Sheridan pay fifty credits a month rent for his spacious quarters, which appear to be larger than many apartments on Earth. |
| 882 | ** Sheridan claims that it's not the money, it's the principle of the thing. If he lets the bureaucrats back on Earth get a toe in the door, then they'll start micromanaging his job until he can't wipe his nose without a countersigned order. |
| 883 | * FictionalAccent: A notorious example is the bizarre heavy accent Peter Jurasik created for his alien character Londo Mollari which was mostly vaguely Slavic in nature but occasionally had Italian overtones. Jurasik has given conflicting statements about whether it was based on anything real, on one occasion claiming that it was based on an old man he'd known as a child, who came from a very aristocratic pre-revolutionary Russian background and had grown up mostly speaking Russian-accented French. No actors playing other characters from Londo's species, the Centauri, attempted to copy his accent, with some prose ExpandedUniverse material claiming that within that culture it was a very old-school ultra-aristocratic way of speaking that was barely used anymore (like "heightened RP" or "Sandhurst" in England). |
| 884 | * FictionalAgeOfMajority: Centauri are said to come of age at sixteen. |
| 885 | * FictionalCurrency: Thanks to [[AllThereInTheManual approved tie-in material]], we know the currency for many of the alien nations: |
| 886 | ** Abbai use ''Gy'', ''Nori'' and ''Chuk'', |
| 887 | ** Brakiri use ''Grull'' or credits, |
| 888 | ** Drazi use ''Tok'', |
| 889 | ** Grome use ''Vorl'', |
| 890 | ** Hurr use ''Fla'', |
| 891 | ** Llort use ''Yat'', ''Heek'' and ''Molat'', |
| 892 | ** Markab used ''Galot'' |
| 893 | ** Yolu use ''Ogo''. |
| 894 | ** Hyach and Pak'ma'ra use a barter system instead. The Gaim, being hive insects, don't have money. The Centauri use ducats and the Humans use credits. No word on the Narn or Minbari. |
| 895 | *** The later two are particularly odd, as the backstory shows Earth's banking system tied closely to both Narn and Minbari economies: The Narn sold weapons to Earth in the Earth-Minbari War (at immense prices, as Earth was losing and extermination was expected, devaluing human currency), and the Minbari ''paid for'' Babylon 5. |
| 896 | * FictionalGenevaConventions: Interstellar law prohibbits the use of Mass Driver weapons for planetary bombardment. However when the Centauri break this rule, no one does anything to reprimand the Republic (possibly because that they were all frightened that the Centauri would use their Mass Drivers on them ''next''). |
| 897 | ** The other governments file formal protests, including the Vorlons, who normally can't even be bothered to show up to the meetings. None of them are willing to start a fresh war over it though, which is justified because the Centauri just curb stomped the Narn, none of the other nations were as strong as the Narn had been, and the conflict had ended with the Narn Homeworld being bombarded by the aforementioned Mass Drivers. On top of that, of the three races best equipped to challenge the Centauri, the Vorlons and Minbari are both preparing for war with the Shadows (the Centauri's secret backers), and the human government [[spoiler: is similarly being influenced by the Shadows.]] |
| 898 | * FictionalUnitedNations: |
| 899 | ** The eponymous station served as a UN of sorts, with ambassadors from the League of Non-Aligned Worlds, the Narn Regime, the Centauri Republic, the Minbari, the Earth Alliance, and the Vorlon Empire each having a vote on various diplomatic resolutions. Often (as with the RealLife UN) this council proved ineffective in some crucial matters, ultimately (by admission of Ivanova in the Season 3 opening monologue) failing in its mission for peace as the Shadow War expanded. |
| 900 | ** The Interstellar Alliance which formed toward the end of the series after the Earth Civil War was probably a more effective version, as each member was mutually protected from aggression by the treaty binding all members, which was enforced by the organization's military force, the Rangers. |
| 901 | * FieryRedhead: |
| 902 | ** Lyta. |
| 903 | ** P.F.C. Elizabeth "Dodger" Durman. |
| 904 | * FighterLaunchingSequence: A particularly inventive one. Starfuries aboard Babylon 5 are launched from the "Cobra bays," so-called because the way they cling to the station's forward sphere makes them look a bit like hooded cobras. The station rotates to provide artificial gravity, so launching the Starfuries basically consists of opening the launch doors, tilting the fighters so they're facing "down" towards the doors, releasing the clamps holding them in place, and letting the station's centrifugal force fling them out into space. |
| 905 | * FightingForAHomeland: The Drakh, Byron's Telepaths. |
| 906 | * FilchingFoodForFun: In "Babylon Squared", Ivanova, awakened early and short on sleep, dozes off at breakfast as Sinclair quotes a meditation chant. Sinclair and Garibaldi then hide everybody's food and wake her up, causing her to think that she's a half-hour behind schedule. |
| 907 | * FindersRulers: |
| 908 | ** The Centauri Imperial Seal, at least [[UnreliableNarrator as claimed by Londo]]. |
| 909 | ** [[spoiler:The Drazi factions' leader sashes]] in "The Geometry of Shadows". |
| 910 | * FindTheCure: Subverted in "Confessions and Lamentations". [[spoiler: For the Markab, the Drafa Plague has a one hundred percent infection and mortality rate... and the entire species is wiped out. However, there were ''other'' races that weren't immune to the plague, so the cure ''did'' help those (such as the Pak'ma'ra).]] |
| 911 | * FirstContact: Due to a [[NobodyEverComplainedBefore series of]] [[FirstContactFauxPas cultural misunderstandings]], the First Contact between the Earthers and the Minbari lead directly to a full-blown war of genocide that was only barely stopped short of wiping out Earth. |
| 912 | ** By the time the show itself takes place, Earthforce seems to have a very cautious and thought-out approach to dealing with potential First Contact situations, even going so far as to justify [[TheMainCharactersDoEverything Sinclair and Ivanova]] going down to Epsilon 3 to investigate a newfound installation rather than sending {{Red Shirt}}s. |
| 913 | * FirstDayFromHell: Delenn's first day as a full-member of the Minbari Grey Council was the day the Minbari encountered the Earth ship ''Prometheus''. An encounter that resulted in the botched first contact-turned-battle that killed Delenn's mentor, Dukhat, and sparked the Earth/Minbari War. |
| 914 | * FirstGirlAfterAll: We go the entire series believing Lennier came first in the Sheridan-Delenn-Lennier Love Triangle, as Lennier appeared in the first season, while Sheridan was not introduced until season two. The Prequel movie though has a scene where Sheridan and Delenn actually did meet, very briefly and without introduction (or seeing each other, but they did exchange a few lines), during the Earth-Minbari War, ten years before Delenn met Lennier. |
| 915 | * FirstNameBasis: |
| 916 | ** He has a last name, but to friend, foe, and stranger alike, it's just Marcus. [[note]]It's Cole, by the way.[[/note]] |
| 917 | ** Awed by Delenn's sacrifice in lending aid to the Drafa Plague victims, Sherdian asks that should they meet again, she call him "John" from then on. |
| 918 | ** Played with in "Objects At Rest", the penultimate episode. As G'Kar and Sheridan are bidding each other a fond farewell, G'Kar calls Sheridan "John". Sheridan starts in surprise, and says that's the first time he's ever called him John. |
| 919 | --->'''G'Kar:''' "No it's not."\ |
| 920 | '''Sheridan:''' "Oh, yes it is." |
| 921 | ** Though on duty they usually stick to protocol and call each other "Captain" and "Commander", John Sheridan and Susan Ivanova are also close friends and so use first names in less formal (or more emotional) situations. |
| 922 | %%* FishPeople: The Abbai. |
| 923 | * FixedForwardFacingWeapon: the Vorlon Cruiser and the Narn G'Quan cruisers are equipped with them, as is the Vorlon Planet Killer, though we don't see much of it to determine if it's as fixed as it seems. However, Vorlon weapons, while mounted on the bow of the ship were not limited to firing directly ahead, and could fire in any direction except directly astern (aka through their own ship). |
| 924 | ** With very few exception ever races fighter craft generally only had forward firing weapons. |
| 925 | ** Human Capital Ships, while having many turrets along the dorsal, port, and starboard sections also had a single large forward firing laser cannon. |
| 926 | ** Alliance White Star Vessels had all there weapons mounted in this fashion and could not fire in any other direction than straight ahead. |
| 927 | * FlashForward: "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars" consisted almost entirely of four flash-forwards. |
| 928 | ** ''Babylon Squared'' and ''War Without End'' also. In the former, Sinclair gets a vision of Babylon 5 being boarded by [[spoiler: the Shadows]]. In the latter, Sheridan sees himself on Centauri Prime 17 years in the future. |
| 929 | * FlashbackEffects: When the script needs to bring viewers up to speed, clips from earlier episodes are viewed in DeliberatelyMonochrome. |
| 930 | * FlauntingYourFleets: Right after [[spoiler:Sheridan liberates Earth from the Clarke regime.]] After Delenn announces the formation of the Interstellar Alliance, the Rangers fly their White Stars in formation over Earthdome, pounding the point home. |
| 931 | * FlingALightIntoTheFuture: The past, in this case. [[spoiler:Babylon 4 was sent to help in the last Shadow war.]] |
| 932 | * FlowerFromTheMountaintop: Ranger instructor Turval uses a hypothetical mission along these lines as an example of the sort of seemingly-trivial mission that might be worth dying to complete, whether you realise it at the time or not. |
| 933 | * FlyingCutlerySpaceship: |
| 934 | ** This is a design hallmark of all organic Shadow vessels, which all have prominent spikes/tentacles all over their bodies. |
| 935 | ** This is also seen among some Earth vessels operated by elements associated with the Shadow-influenced Clark government in later seasons. A Psi Corp base was a heavily modified civilian ship covered in spiky antennae like a big black sea urchin. There are also the Advanced Omega destroyers, which are definitely described as having Shadow technology incorporated, but obviously not fully effectively, as their hulls are covered with random, unhealthy-looking black spiky outgrowths. |
| 936 | ** Some Narn vessels have a milder pronged design. |
| 937 | * FlyingSaucer: The Vree use ships of this design. |
| 938 | ** The Walkers of Sigma 957 have huge and very impressive-looking saucer-shaped ships. |
| 939 | * ForeignMoneyIsProofOfGuilt: Garibaldi is framed for a bombing, and as part of this Centauri Ducats are planted in his quarters. |
| 940 | ** His situation is not helped any when he is later aprehended and is carrying Centauri Ducats on his person, in this case because Londo decided on a whim to give him some cash to help him out since Garibaldi had helped him in the past. |
| 941 | * {{Forgiveness}}: Brother Theo's main theme. As a Catholic monk, he seeks to always love the enemy and would forgive any their transgressions. In "Passing Through Gethsemane" he forgives Brother Edward [[spoiler:even after learning the man was a serial killer whose mind was erased and given this false persona]]. Brother Edward feels he cannot accept because [[spoiler:he doesn't even know all his sins]], Theo retorts that God would know and would forgive. Then [[spoiler:upon finding Edward beaten and dying from an attack the family member of one of Edward's victims, he grants hims full absolution]]. In the final act, Theo shows the full circle of this by forgiving [[spoiler:Edward's killer and after his mind-wiped asks he join their order]]. Sheridan is at first angered but comes around by this final line by Theo: |
| 942 | --->'''Brother Theo:''' I believe you were saying that forgiveness is a hard thing but something ever to strive for. Were you not, captain? |
| 943 | * ForgotAboutTheMindReader: |
| 944 | ** In one episode of Babylon 5, resident telepath Talia Winters is explaining to someone that telepaths sometimes cannot avoid picking up particularly strong emotions and thoughts before entering a lift with [[HandsomeLech Security Chief Garibaldi]]. After she explains this, Garibaldi, standing behind her, gives her [[MaleGaze the once over]]. Talia elbows Garibaldi in the gut before getting off. |
| 945 | -->'''Garibaldi:''' I think [[MeetCute I'm in love]]. |
| 946 | ** In another episode, Garibaldi is having an argument with the Psi Cop Bester, and as Garibaldi glares at him, Bester says, "Anatomically impossible, Mr. Garibaldi, but [[BringIt you're welcome to try]], any time, any place." |
| 947 | ** Played with in one episode. Bester has been forced to take a drug which dulls his telepathic abilities. He and Garibaldi are interrogating an informant, and Bester at one point blurts out "he's lying." This causes the informant to break and tell them what they need to know. Garibaldi confronts Bester on this after the interview. Bester explains that he couldn't hear any of the man's thoughts, but the other guy didn't know that. And chances were good he was lying about something, so Bester merely played on the guy's guilty conscience. |
| 948 | * ForgottenFriendNewFoe: Urza becomes this to Londo, after a resolution is drafted by way of Lord Refa whichs declares Urza and his entire House traitors to the Republic. Urza arrives on Babylon 5 to ask for Londo's help, but when he hears of his connection with Refa, the old friends fall out with a crash. |
| 949 | ** [[spoiler: Subverted; Urza set up the whole situation as part of a BatmanGambit to ensure that his family would be under Londo's protection against Refa, as under the rules of Centauri duels to the death, the loser's family is absorbed by the winner's. The two children to whom Londo is telling the story in ''In The Beginning'' are members of Urza's former house.]] |
| 950 | * ForgottenPhlebotinum: The Great Machine on Epsilon III is brought into play very selectively. Draal is apparently very particular about the circumstances in which he will allow it to be used, because most characters never even consider it in many situations where it would be useful. |
| 951 | ** Lampshaded in one episode where Ivanova is trying to set up a Voice of the Resistance but can't get enough power to get the signal past the jammers to Earth. Franklin off-handedly suggests using the machine on Epsilon 3 for power, leading to much face-palming from Ivanova for not thinking of that first. |
| 952 | * {{Foreshadowing}}: Don't even start. |
| 953 | ** Since the series was so intricately plotted in advance, if we list them all we'll be here all week. Additionally, the show is front-loaded with many prophecies (of the "YouCantFightFate" and "YouAlreadyChangedThePast" sort), and a particularly well-crafted example of a StableTimeLoop. It was built-in such an extent that actors were forbidden from ad-libbing, for fear of it screwing up the arc. |
| 954 | ** The biggies: |
| 955 | ### The disappearance of Babylon 4 and mentions of Valen. |
| 956 | ### Premonitions of Emperor [[spoiler:Mollari II]]'s death. |
| 957 | ### The upcoming election cycle. Also, Londo gets a wonderful moment in ''The Gathering'' where he foreshadows the Clark regime, but the viewer is misdirected by his self-pitying speech about the Republic's decline. Characterization ''and'' a rewatch bonus in just two lines total. |
| 958 | ---->'''Londo''': I'm here to grovel before your wonderful Earth Alliance in the hopes of attaching ourselves to your destiny, like--what are those fish called on your planet that attach themselves to sharks? [...] Yes. [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters You make very good sharks]], Mister Garibaldi. |
| 959 | ### The very core of the show is foreshadowed by it's own name. [[spoiler: According to Babylonian creation myth, the Earth was created by the conflict between Order and Chaos. The Vorlons versus the Shadows is a conflict of Order and Chaos.]] |
| 960 | ** [[spoiler:Keffer]]'s last appearance, "The Fall of Night", [[ColdOpen opens]] with Starfury pilots goofing off during target practice. Ivannova jibes, "You're ''dead'', Zeta leader!" It's less funny once the episode's over. |
| 961 | * AFormYouAreComfortableWith: Kosh entering the minds of G'Kar and Sheridan, appearing as their respective fathers. |
| 962 | * FortuneTeller: Lady Morella ("Point of No Return"). She was the third wife of the late Emperor Turhan and a powerful seer. That said, she has no control over what or when she will see. Londo seeks her counsel to try and avoid his dreaded future. |
| 963 | * FourEyesZeroSoul: The Interrogator from "Intersections in Real Time" |
| 964 | * {{Frameup}}: Outraged at "Starkiller" Sheridan's promotion to station commander, a pair of Minbari (Lavell and Ashan) arrange for a lurker to [[FiveFingerDiscount steal Sheridan's commlink]], knowing he will chase after him. Lavell then attacks Sheridan with Ashan as the only witness, planting a PPG nearby for Sheridan to find. Sheridan reluctantly [[SuicideByCop shoots and kills]] Lavell while Ashan looks on. Lavell's intention was to sacrifice himself as a "martyr" to ruin Sheridan. |
| 965 | ** G'kar does this to his would-be assassin in "Parliament of Dreams" |
| 966 | ** [[DaChief Garibaldi]] is framed for the sabotage of one of the station's fighter bays. He finds himself trying to find out who framed him, while avoiding [[ScyllaAndCharybdis both the Security personnel and the many enemies he has made in the station's criminal underworld.]] |
| 967 | *** Garibaldi really gets it good with this trope. [[spoiler: He's also manipulated by the Psi-Corp into turning against his own friends so they can use him as a tool to overturn a conspiracy against telepaths and as an added bonus get their hands on Sheridan. While it's technically true that he did do the things of which he was accused, it's still a frameup as it was against his will]] |
| 968 | * FumblingTheGauntlet: Calling a Minbari a liar usually requires an immediate and fatal response (well, for [[CompressedVice one episode]], anyway, and one JMS didn't write). |
| 969 | * FunctionalAddict: Doctor Franklin starts using stims in the second season, and becomes addicted to them going into the third season. While he does eventually have a burnout, he goes nearly an entire season with no major problems. |
| 970 | ** In the fourth season, Ivanova appears to have become an alcoholic, doing double-shots of vodka to try and sleep at night, though she doesn't have the [[OffTheWagon same issues with the stuff]] that Garibaldi has from time to time. |
| 971 | ** [[LargeHam Londo Mollari]] not only loves to drink, but often has [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone much to]] [[MyCountryRightOrWrong drink about.]] [[spoiler: Eventually, his alcoholism becomes a tragic ChekhovsSkill, giving him the key to his brief moments of freedom from his [[PupeteerParasite Keeper.]]]] |
| 972 | * FunnyBackgroundEvent: In the episode "The Parliament of Dreams", during the Minbari rebirth ceremony, the various characters are handed out ceremonial fruits. When the camera focuses on Delenn again after this is done, G'Kar surreptitiously switches his fruit with Ivanova's. Doubles as a MeaningfulBackgroundEvent; [[spoiler:G'Kar's been targeted by an assassin, and he's on edge because his bodyguard did not show up at the ceremony.]] |
| 973 | ** Same episode: While Londo crawls along the table raving about the Centauri gods, Garibaldi surreptitiously sneaks nearby plates off the table before Londo can mess them up (or them him, perhaps). |
| 974 | * FunWithAcronyms: '''SUAEI''' (Shut Up And Eat It) |
| 975 | ** Combined with {{Foreshadowing}} (and a StealthPun) in the abbreviation for Babylon 4: B4. |
| 976 | * FrogMen: The Narn have a reptilian/frog-like appearence, albeit they are actually marsupials. |
| 977 | * FTLTravelSickness: In ''The Lost Tales'', Sheridan is being interviewed by a newsreporter aboard a starship that uses a newly-developed FTL method involving travelling through "quantum space". Sheridan mischievously only informs the reporter at the last minute that it can cause nausea in people, and it's implied that she pukes on camera. |
| 978 | [[/folder]] |
| 979 | |
| 980 | [[folder:G]] |
| 981 | * GagPenis: The alien Centauri have SIX penises. All of them prehensile. Ambassador Mollari uses them to cheat at cards. (He also gets extremely offended when a doll made in his likeness has BarbieDollAnatomy.) |
| 982 | * GameChanger: The results of Sheridan's visit to Z'ha'dum ([[spoiler: mainly the nuking of the Shadows' center of power]]) "opened an unexpected door" (in the words of Kosh II/Ulkesh), which [[spoiler: emboldened the Vorlons to unleash their planet killers and go all out destroying any worlds "touched" by Shadows--and the Shadows to reciprocate in this escalation. This turn of events showed the younger races just how dysfunctional and dangerous the Vorlons' and Shadows' guardianship had become. Sheridan gathers a massive fleet of the younger races to confront both the Shadow and Vorlon fleets near a targeted planet of six billion sentient beings, and calls them out on their unfitness as guardians, and persuades them to leave the galaxy as their moral exposure becomes apparent to all.]] Thus had the events of "Z'ha'dum" not happened, the current war would arguably end up being just one more of a millennial cycle of wars orchestrated by the Shadows [[spoiler: and Vorlons]], rather than [[spoiler: the last of them]]. |
| 983 | * GasLeakCoverup: |
| 984 | ** When the discovery of a 1000-year-old Shadow ship is followed by an immediate quarantine and unmarked shuttles flying in and out of the area, Garibaldi knows something's up. |
| 985 | ** ISN's report that an unremarkable, benign, [[{{Area51}} totally non-suspicious]] base on Ganymede was destroyed by an "alien ship" (the ''Whitestar'') which the ''Agamemnon'' pursued all the way to Jupiter and then destroyed ("Messages From Earth"). |
| 986 | --->'''Ivanova:''' ''(to Sheridan)'' You look pretty good for a dead man. |
| 987 | ** Inverted and Invoked by Sheridan when he has Ivanova state that absolutely nothing happened that day in Sector 83 by 9 by 13. Absolutely nothing ''did'' happen, but that's not what he wants everyone else to think. . . |
| 988 | %%* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: Please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition. |
| 989 | * GeneticEngineeringIsTheNewNuke: The source of Ironheart's power in "Mind War". |
| 990 | ** The Vorlons pull this off with [[spoiler: the creation of telepaths. More specifically, Lyta Alexander's alteration by the Vorlons is hinted at to be the equivalent of a last-ditch nuclear weapon.]] |
| 991 | ** The Narns are attempting this [[spoiler: by soliciting genetic material from alien telepaths in an effort to recreate Narn telepaths--the last of whom had been killed and/or assimilated by the Shadows during the previous Shadow War. Ultimately Lyta Alexander agrees to supply G'Kar with the genetic profiles of underground human telepaths in exchange for covert Narn assistance in the Telepath War of Season 5.]] |
| 992 | * GeneticMemory: Fear of the Shadows and reverence for the Vorlons are explained as a combination of several species retaining race memories of the last Shadow War and the Vorlons using genetic and mental manipulation on the young species... |
| 993 | ** It should be noted that the fear of the Shadow was purposely put there by the Shadows themselves. |
| 994 | * GhostlyGlide: [[SufficientlyAdvancedAliens Kosh (and other Vorlons]] in contact with younger races) wore an "encounter suit" to conceal his true form, and moved in a silent, gliding motion. He ''could'' have moved pretty much any way he wanted to in his true form (even through bulkheads), but chose to present himself in this way. He could seem to suddenly appear to a character due to this silent movement--not necessarily to scare but to make a dramatic impression. |
| 995 | * GiantEnemyCrab: Shadow vessels are commonly referred to as "Battlecrabs." They'll cut through just about any fleet like it was made of soft cheese. |
| 996 | ** The Shadows themselves appear to be a horrible hybredization between spiders, crabs, praying mantises, and the screams of orphans. Oh, and are taller than most men. |
| 997 | * GiveMeAReason: |
| 998 | ** Ivanova does this often: |
| 999 | --->'''Sinclair:''' Commander, please remove Major Kemmer from C&C.\ |
| 1000 | '''Ivanova:''' With pleasure. ''({{beat}})'' You are going to ''resist'', I hope. |
| 1001 | ** When the mole who shot Garibaldi in the back is arrested, the arresting officer invites him to "make my solar year". |
| 1002 | * GlowingEyesOfDoom: The Shadows, the monocular "eye" in the Vorlon encounter suits and [[spoiler:Lyta gets BlackEyesOfEvil when she starts using her enhanced telepathic abilities in her AGodAmI stage, and when being possessed by either Vorlons or Shadows during their FinalBattle, her eyes are ColorCodedForYourConvenience: They glow when possessed by the Vorlons, and turn ink black when possessed by the Shadows.]] |
| 1003 | * GoMadFromTheRevelation: Franklin tries to help "King Arthur" overcome his denial by confronting him with his real identity (against Marcus' warnings). The resultant trauma is so severe, he falls into a catatonic state. [[spoiler:Recalling the deaths of 250,000 soldiers (and the near-annihilation of your species) will do that]]. |
| 1004 | ** G'Kar speculates that the reason why every race in existence seems to have one type of food in common (Swedish meatballs, the Narn call their version Breen) is something that will either never be known, or would drive you mad if you did know. |
| 1005 | ** PlayedForLaughs by Londo when he attempts to determine the significance of the "Hokey Pokey": |
| 1006 | -->It doesn't mean ''anything!!!'' |
| 1007 | * GoalOrientedEvolution: Complete with EvolutionaryLevels with EnergyBeings being the end result. |
| 1008 | * AGodAmI: [[spoiler:Lyta gets like this near the end of the series before she [[PutOnABus leaves forever]] with G'Kar.]] Cartagia is like this, but then he is AxCrazy. |
| 1009 | * AGodIAmNot: Jason Ironheart, who while gaining immense godlike powers, was trying to suppress and control them long enough to get away and [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence finish "becoming"]]. |
| 1010 | * GodEmperor: Emperor Cartagia wishes to ascend to GodEmperor status through his dealings with the Shadows. |
| 1011 | * GodGuise: The Vorlons modified the "younger races" (includig the League members) so that a Vorlon's true form will evoke piety, and the image of the Shadows will evoke primal fear. |
| 1012 | * GodSaveUsFromTheQueen: Delenn is usually even tempered but occasionally has a truely royal rage, which caused an "unfortunate incident" in her MysteriousPast. |
| 1013 | ** G'Kar experiences this first-hand in the pilot movie, when Delenn breaks out the gravity rings for the first (and only) time. |
| 1014 | * TheGodsMustBeLazy: The older races (apart from the Shadows, who are very busy indeed). |
| 1015 | * GoingNative: |
| 1016 | ** Delenn and [[spoiler:Sinclair]] each go native ''biologically'' in opposite directions. In a slight subversion Delenn remains culturally Minbari while being biologically human. By contrast [[spoiler:Sinclair takes this [[Exaggerated to extremes]], making himself the Minbari equivalent of Moses and Delenn's [[StableTimeLoop ancestor]] to boot, which would also make him a MightyWhitey.]] |
| 1017 | *** Played to all kinds of hell by [[spoiler: Sinclair.]] In ''War Without End,'' Marcus mentions off-hand that "Ranger One" (Sinclair) could be mistaken for a Minbari given his oft-convoluted logic and responses to questions. This makes sense when you get to the end of the episode: [[spoiler: Sinclair is Valen, and as Valen became ''the'' basis for Minbari life and culture for the next thousand years.]] |
| 1018 | ** Marcus Cole is a human who lives like Minbari. |
| 1019 | * GoldDigger: Daggair and Mariel (Londo's first and third wives, respectively). |
| 1020 | ** You do get the impression that most Centari women are like this. Then again, the main source of data we have on Centari women is Londo, who may not exactly be totally reliable, or through the eyes of Centauri Nobility, and may not reflect accurately on the average Centauri female. |
| 1021 | * GoodCostumeSwitch: The entire staff gets new uniforms [[spoiler:courtesy of Delenn, officially christening them as the Army of Light after giving up their Earthgov uniforms because they are rebelling against their own government. Ironically, these uniforms are black. ("Ceremonies of Light and Dark")]] |
| 1022 | ** [[spoiler:When Garibaldi retires, Zack receives the a new uniform, though he complains it itches.]] |
| 1023 | * GoodDocBadDoc: Dr. Stephen Franklin vs. Dr. [[OnlyInItForTheMoney Vance Hendricks]] ("Infection"). |
| 1024 | * GoodGuyBar: Quite a few on the station. Perhaps the most notable ones are the Eclipse Cafe (itself an extension of the Zócalo, easily identified by its blue neon sign), Earhart's (an establishment reserved for Earthforce personnel and their guests), and the high-class restaurant Fresh Air. |
| 1025 | * TheGoodKing: Emperor Turhan of the Centauri, [[spoiler:near the end of his life he wanted to formally apologize to the Narn and their government for what the Centauri, and his family, did to the Narn people and homeworld during their occupation. The first step towards healing both races and true peace. [[TearJerker To say he didn't get a chance to would be a grave understatement...]]]] |
| 1026 | * GoodRepublicEvilEmpire: The Centauri Republic is an interesting case. When first introduced, they seem like pretty good sorts (it probably helps that the only Centauri we meet are initially the PluckyComicRelief and/or the UnwittingPawn). Then we find out they have an Emperor, and they suddenly drop about 200 points on the KarmaMeter. |
| 1027 | ** The first emperor we meet is a very kind and noble man, seeking to apologize to the Narn for what his people did to them. After his death, however, [[TheCaligula Emperor Cartagia]] arrives on the scene to make up for that. |
| 1028 | * GoodScarsEvilScars: |
| 1029 | ** Col. Ari Ben-zayn. |
| 1030 | ** Boggs, the leader of the Nightwatch in "Ceremonies of Light and Dark", has a rather nasty-looking scar disfiguring one side of his face. Unfortunately for the actor, the scar is real. [[BigDamnHeroes He got it from diving into a crowd of men carrying knives who were trying to rape a woman]]. JMS was rather amused by fans who complained that the scar [[RealityIsUnrealistic looked fake]]. The same actor plays Kaliban in the first season episode ''TKO''; if you look carefully you can see the scar under all his [[RubberForeheadAlien makeup]]. |
| 1031 | * GoshDangItToHeck: The comics from DC have this due to censors. "What in the hull" and "We're in deep spit!" |
| 1032 | * GospelRevivalNumber: ''[[NoHoldsBarredBeatdown I went to the rock to hide my face,]] [[SoundtrackDissonance and the rock cried out no hidin' place...]]'' |
| 1033 | * GovernmentConspiracy: The Earthgov/Psi Corps conspiracy to assassinate President Santiago and install an earth-centric, xenophobic, fascist government and |
| 1034 | * GovernmentDrugEnforcement: Human telepaths who refuse to join the Psi Corps must take powerful medication to suppress their abilities, drugs that eventually [[DrivenToSuicide drive them to suicide]]. |
| 1035 | * GovernmentExploitedCrisis: This is something the Clark administration keeps doing subtly throughout the second season and into the third. They keep creating the sense that alien governments are infiltrating Earth, that there's a crisis of loyalty, and introducing new government programs and agencies to monitor and control the situation. Then a Shadow vessel Earth discovered on the Jovian moon Ganymede goes berserk, forcing Sheridan to destroy it, and thereby creating the impression that alien forces have attacked an Earth outpost in the Sol system itself. Clark uses the incident as the justification to declare martial law. |
| 1036 | * GraffitiOfTheResistance: The phrase "Free Byron", referring the leader of the Telepath Resistance. After his death, it becomes "Byron Lives". |
| 1037 | * GRatedDrug: Stims, a stimulant that Dr. Franklin becomes addicted to. |
| 1038 | * GrayAndGrayMorality: The Narn-Centauri War, in a big way. The Shadows and Vorlons, too. |
| 1039 | ** The heroes do various morally questionable things as well, throughout the series, but [[IDidWhatIHadToDo usually with good reason.]] This ranges from relatively minor things like LoopholeAbuse to [[spoiler: using outright MindRape to find where a murder was about to take place, and of course, the whole launching a rebellion against the government of Earth.]] |
| 1040 | * GreatOffscreenWar: Many: during the run of the show we have various wars between the Centauri and smaller races and at least one conflict involving the Earth Alliance, and the backstory has the previous Shadow Wars (of which we only see a flashback with a couple Minbari warship of the previous one) and the Dilgar War, in which the [[ANaziByAnyOtherName Dilgar]] massacred their way into the League on Non-Aligned Worlds until Earth Alliance got involved and reversed the odds (we only see one of the Dilgar warmasters resurfacing after being believed dead for years, and that the war was so scarring for the collective psyche of the galaxy that Na'toth's reaction to seeing her was to try and murder said warmaster, and the whole League demands the warmaster's death). |
| 1041 | * GreaterScopeParagon: The Vorlons, Kosh in particular, are established early on as the BigGood in the fight against the Shadows, [[spoiler:though that image is shattered later when it turns out that the Vorlons are just as much a part of the problem as the Shadows,]] but early in the fourth season Sheridan encounters Lorien, the First One, the one who taught the Shadows and the Vorlons when they were young. Though he makes no claim of being good or virtuous, he does care for the welfare of the younger races, [[spoiler:and realizes that the First Ones have become a hindrance to their development, and so he and Sheridan gather the Shadows, Vorlons and other First Ones and send them out of the galaxy, Lorien himself included.]] |
| 1042 | * GreetingGestureConfusion: PlayedForDrama: at FirstContact between the Earth Alliance and the Minbari Federation a Minbari force approached an Earthforce flotilla with their gunports open, which the Minbari warrior caste considers a gesture of respect. Dukhat, the Minbari head of state, realized what this would look like seconds before the human ships opened fire in (they thought) self-defense. The result was the Earth-Minbari War. |
| 1043 | * TheGreys: ''Babylon 5'' really likes this trope, with three separate races each riffing on the concept. |
| 1044 | ** The first introduced are the Vree, in a throwaway gag about a human suing one because the Vree's ancestor abducted the human's ancestor. While this is the only Vree seen in the show, they are mentioned a few other times, and their ships (nifty blue flying saucers with potent antimatter weapons) become a fixture of the show starting in Season 3. |
| 1045 | ** The Strieb, of "All Alone In The Night," again physically resemble descriptions of the Greys, and abduct other species and experiment on them for unknown purposes (it is believed, and some EU material confirms, they are servants of the Shadows). |
| 1046 | ** Finally, the "Shadow Surgeons," the most villainous version of the trope, employed by the Shadows to run medical and scientific tests, experiments, and modifications on other races. Shadow Surgeons prominently implant the devices that allow a person to merge with a Shadow ship to become its CPU. |
| 1047 | * GroinAttack: Garibaldi uses one in a fight scene in "Survivors". |
| 1048 | * TheGuardsMustBeCrazy: Judging by "Soul Hunter", they're still falling for the ol' "sick prisoner" trick in 2258. |
| 1049 | * GuiltFreeExterminationWar: |
| 1050 | ** The Dilgar War ended with the Dilgar being confined to their homeworld just as their sun was about to go supernova. As the Dilgar were extremely warlike, expansionistic, and xenophobic when they were around, no one seemed to mind that they were doomed to extinction. |
| 1051 | ** Subverted with the Minbari's war against humanity. While initially it was Delenn who called for a total war of extermination against the humans (and it was fully within the Minbari's capabilities to carry out the genocide), Delenn had a change of heart later on, and the war dragged on mostly due to contrived PoorCommunicationKills situations. Even then, the decisive argument for ending the war was [[ScaryDogmaticAliens that Sinclair apparently bore the "soul" of Valen]], and even afterwards there were some (like Neroon) who were unhappy that the genocide wasn't completed. |
| 1052 | * GunboatDiplomacy: ''If you value your lives, be somewhere else''. |
| 1053 | ** The Earth-Minbari War shows what some of the downsides of this can be. |
| 1054 | [[/folder]] |
| 1055 | |
| 1056 | [[folder:H]] |
| 1057 | * HamToHamCombat: |
| 1058 | ** Delenn vs. Neroon vs. Shakiri in the climax of "Moments of Transition." |
| 1059 | ** Any scene with Londo and G'Kar in the same room. |
| 1060 | * HappilyMarried: [[spoiler:Sheridan and Delenn]] |
| 1061 | * HappyHarlequinHat: The jesters of the Centauri court wear a hat very similar to ones found on Earth for some reason. |
| 1062 | ** The Centauri were at one point very interested in [[AlienArtsAreAppreciated Earth art and culture]]; perhaps the fashion caught on. |
| 1063 | * HandyCuffs: "Quality of Mercy". The crack security staff cuffed the murderer Mueller with his hands in front of him, while escorting him to be executed and he therefore had nothing to lose. He ended up holding an old woman at gunpoint. |
| 1064 | * HangoverSensitivity: In "Born to the Purple", Londo suffers from it. (The knockout drug in his last drink probably had as much to do with it as the alcohol on this occasion.) |
| 1065 | * HeKnowsTooMuch / NobleFugitive: |
| 1066 | ** Vice President Clark disembarks from Earthforce One 24 hours before it explodes, claiming to have caught a flu. His personal physician, Dr. Everett Jacobs, is forced to go on the lam after discovering that Clark was in perfect health at the time. |
| 1067 | ** Mary Kirkish, Xenoarcheologist and one of the last surviving witnesses of the excavation of a Shadow Vessel on Mars. |
| 1068 | * HeWhoMustNotBeSeen: |
| 1069 | ** David Sheridan, in the few stories where he could appear, chronologically speaking. |
| 1070 | ** President Clark was rarely seen but often mentioned. |
| 1071 | * HeadInTheSandManagement: Earthgov representative Frederick Lantz, who quotes the famous [[UsefulNotes/NevilleChamberlain "peace in our time"]] line in regard to humanity's pact with the Centauri. |
| 1072 | ** The Drazi and Hyach ambassadors, following the "pause" in the Shadow War following Sheridan's actions (and disappearance) at Z'ha'dum, try to convince the population of Babylon 5 that if they stop fighting the Shadows now they may go dormant, and that Delenn is risking everyone's lives by continuing the war. |
| 1073 | * HeelRaceTurn: PlayedWith extensively throughout the series, which helps cement its reputation for moral complexity. Seen one way, the five-year story arc is full of races turning one way or the other; seen another way, it's just each race acting in its own perceived self-interest, not changing at all. |
| 1074 | ** The Narn Regime are bad guys for the first season, but after their former overlords the Centauri get power again and reconquer them, they are treated as wholly sympathetic. [[spoiler:However, when they're freed again in Season 4, the Narn immediately begin rebuilding their war machine, suggesting that they've learned nothing from the events of the last four years.]] |
| 1075 | ** The Centauri Republic starts out as a downplayed VestigialEmpire, then turns Heel when it becomes a ResurgentEmpire. It turns back to Face after [[spoiler:Londo kills [[TheCaligula the psychotic Emperor Cartagia]]]], and then turns Heel again in the final season. It's implied in the DistantFinale that they eventually turn good again. But [[spoiler:underneath it all, the Centauri leaders are driven by their own interests, not any desire to "do good" or "be good". The initial Heel turn happens only with Shadow assistance; the Face turn is only because Londo and his fellow conspirators realize Cartagia's madness is dragging the Centauri Republic to destruction; and the final-season Heel turn happens after the Drakh take over by implanting the Regent and then Emperor Londo with a PuppeteerParasite]]. |
| 1076 | ** The Minbari turned Face at the end of the Earth-Minbari War, and during the series proper they become Earth's strongest allies in the Babylon Project. But eventually it's revealed that they did it for reasons of their own, which had nothing to do with whether they ever saw humans as "good" or "bad." |
| 1077 | ** Several of the Non-Aligned Worlds ally themselves with the Shadows for protection against neighboring star nations that threaten to conquer them. |
| 1078 | * HelloAttorney: Guinevere Corey ("There the Honor Lies"). |
| 1079 | * HelpingAnotherSaveFace: Helping another save face is one of the few situations where Minbari culture allows one to lie. Seen most obviously in "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS01E21TheQualityOfMercy The Quality of Mercy]]", when Centauri Ambassador Londo Mollari is caught cheating at cards with his [[BizarreAlienBiology prehensile genitals]] leading to a bar brawl, a Minbari, Lennier is willing to take the blame for the fight. |
| 1080 | * HeroicNeutral: When G'kar asks for Minbari aid, Delenn, not unreasonably, points out that the Narn record isn't so good either, they were not totally without responsibility for their fate, and if the Narn won they would [[PersecutionFlip treat the Centauri the same way]] and ''they'' would be the ones asking for aid. Not to mention the fact that Minbar had had more then enough of war, thank you very much. |
| 1081 | * HeroicSacrifice: A whole station full of them, in chronological order: |
| 1082 | ** '''Backstory''': In the Earth-Minbari War, almost every battle was a loss for the humans, but they died willingly to try and stop the advance of the Minbari fleet. Humans would stand up against stronger Minbari forces knowing it was hopeless. In the entire war, there was only one Earth victory, which was when John Sheridan destroyed the ''Black Star''. All other Minbari ships that were destroyed fell because of a Heroic Sacrifice. This was taken further with the Battle of the Line, where almost all the human ships were destroyed this way. The goal of the battle was less to prevent the Minbari from reaching Earth, and more to allow refugees to leave while the Minbari forces were occupied. |
| 1083 | *** During the Battle of the Line, Jeffrey Sinclair attempted a kamikaze run on a Minbari ship after his Starfury was damaged. Obviously, it ended differently than he expected it to. |
| 1084 | ** '''3.10 ''Severed Dreams''''': At ISN headquarters, [[spoiler: news director Rick openly stated that Proxima 3 and Orion 7 had broken away from the Earth Alliance in protest of President Clark's bombing of civilian targets on Mars.]] He did this as a last-ditch effort since Clark was also sending military forces in a move to put the network fully under its control and turn it into a propaganda machine. Though it's not stated, he probably didn't survive prison. In the same episode, the EAS ''Churchill'' was already critically disabled up from damage taken, so it rammed a hostile Earth Alliance Ship to take it out as well. |
| 1085 | ** '''3.15 ''Interludes and Examinations''''':[[spoiler:Kosh arranged for some Vorlon ships to attack the Shadows to help Sheridan build his alliance.]] He was then killed by Shadows for his interference. |
| 1086 | ** '''3.17 ''War Without End'' Part 2''': [[spoiler:Sinclair went back in time 1000 years to become Valen,]] abandoning everything and everyone he knew in the present to assume the burden of [[StableTimeLoop living a historically-predetermined life without messing up the timeline]]. He did this in order to make sure the Shadows don't get the upper hand in the present-day Shadow War. Though unstated, it also would have allowed Minbari civilization and Minbari-Human relations to reach what they were meant to be. |
| 1087 | ** '''3.19 ''Grey 17 Is Missing''''', Marcus showed himself willing to do this for Delenn when he engaged Neroon in a DuelToTheDeath, in hopes of defusing a brewing conflict between the Warrior and Religious castes over control of the Rangers. The conflict between castes ended up happening anyway several months later, but the outcome of the duel — a draw, forcing Neroon to recognize Delenn's moral authority and respect human combat prowess — is the beginning of Neroon's HeelFaceTurn. |
| 1088 | ** '''3.22 ''Z'ha'dum''''': Sheridan took a one-way trip to Z'ha'dum, home of the Shadows, hoping that it will end the war sooner and prevent the destruction of Centauri Prime. Since he figured it was a trap, he took along some bombs as well, enabling him to destroy their capital city. This one is seemingly subverted in the following episode, but then turned back around with the reveal that when he came back to life, he could only be given twenty more years. He accepted this, but some of his loved ones weren't happy about it. |
| 1089 | ** '''4.05 ''The Long Night''''': A Ranger ship went on a suicide mission solely to give the Shadows information that would get them where the good guys wanted them, without their becoming suspicious. |
| 1090 | ** '''4.06 ''Into the Fire''''' had two: |
| 1091 | *** On Centauri Prime, a few Centauri workers remained on the island the Shadows were using as a base to keep up appearances when Londo set up his gambit to get rid of Shadow influence before the Vorlons came to destroy them. He wasn't able to convince the Shadows to leave, so instead he put nukes in place without them noticing, and those citizens were killed in the process. |
| 1092 | *** At Coriana VI, a number of ships take one for the team as part of their collective "screw you" to the Vorlons and Shadows at the final battle, when they are trying to destroy Sheridan's ship but the others fly in front of the missiles. |
| 1093 | ** '''4.14 ''Moments of Transition''''': Delenn was willing to do this as part of an ancient ritual, with the hope that it would mend the rift between the Minbari castes and end their civil war. In the end, Neroon pulls her out of the circle before it activates, and dies in her place, so there is still a sacrifice, just not the one initially expected. It helps that, in his final moments, he converts to the Religious caste, thus signifying their moral victory. |
| 1094 | ** '''5.18 ''The Fall of Centauri Prime''''': [[spoiler:Newly-crowned Emperor Londo]] took on the [[PuppeteerParasite Drakh Keeper]] to avoid massive destruction of his homeworld. |
| 1095 | *** It was also a Heroic Sacrifice on [[spoiler: G'Kar's]] part later when [[spoiler: Londo]] told him to kill him, since it's at least implied that [[spoiler:G'Kar knows Londo's Keeper will awake during the strangling and make Londo kill him as well; they both die together.]] This last part was actually shown as a flashforward in season three, but is part of the chronology of this story line. |
| 1096 | * HeroicSuicide: |
| 1097 | ** In the Earth-Minbari War, some humans rammed their ships into the Minbari vessels to protect Earth. |
| 1098 | ** During the Battle of the Line, Jeffrey Sinclair attempted a kamikaze run on a Minbari ship after his Starfury was damaged. Obviously, it ended differently than he expected it to. |
| 1099 | ** '''2.17 "Knives"''': [[spoiler:Urza Jaddo, Londo's old friend, deliberately lost a duel with Londo to save his family from disgrace, as cultural expectations required that the victor absorb his opponent's house into his own after the duel.]] |
| 1100 | ** '''4.20 "Endgame"''': [[spoiler:Marcus Cole gave his life to save Ivanova]] using an alien machine that moves life force from one person to another. |
| 1101 | ** '''5.18 "The Fall of Centauri Prime"''': [[spoiler: Londo told G'Kar to kill him]] so Sheridan could escape Centauri Prime. |
| 1102 | * HeyYouHaymaker: |
| 1103 | ** Garibaldi surprises Matthew Stoner in a corridor with this greeting. |
| 1104 | ** During a one-on-one fight between G'Kar and a Narn insurrectionist, another Narn who is overlooking the fight draws his gun, preparing to shoot the ambassador [[InTheBack in the back]]. N'Toth politely taps him on the shoulder, then wallops him. |
| 1105 | * HiddenDepths: A minor {{Mook}} working for Bill Edgars persuades Garibaldi to go along with a plan by invoking this. |
| 1106 | -->'''Garibaldi:''' I'm going to look silly. |
| 1107 | -->'''Mook:''' None of us are what we appear. Have I ever told you I have a degree in literature? |
| 1108 | -->'''Garibaldi:''' Well don't take this the wrong way, but [[DumbMuscle you don't seem the type.]] |
| 1109 | * HiddenPurposeTest: The Inquisitor's interrogation of Delenn in Downbelow, which consists of only one, inscrutable question: "Who are you?" When hours of torturous questioning fail to produce results, Sheridan breaks up the test and attempts to release her. Instead, the Inquisitor seizes Sheridan and starts torturing ''him'', having anticipated his meddling and [[BatmanGambit incorporated it into the test]]. [[spoiler:Delenn then begs the Inquisitor to turn his attentions back to her. He asks her if she is willing to die for Sheridan, and she replies that "life is her cause" -- that one life or a billion is all the same]]. The Inquisitor is pleased, allowing them both to leave and telling him that they are indeed "[[WhatYouAreInTheDark the right people, in the right place, at the right time]]." |
| 1110 | * HiddenVillain: The Shadows aren't introduced till mid season 1, and it isn't until mid season 2 that we learn anything about them. |
| 1111 | * HidingBehindTheLanguageBarrier: When Zack gets one of the Army of Light uniforms, he is fitted for it but talks down on Minbari fashion sense. |
| 1112 | -->'''Zack Allan:''' Oh yeah, I should listen to a Minbari about fashion. I mean, robes? Hoods? No offense, but I've seen Vorlons with more fashion sense.\ |
| 1113 | ''[The Minbari tailor stabs Zack with the needle.]''\ |
| 1114 | '''Zack:''' She did that on purpose.\ |
| 1115 | '''Lennier:''' Yes, I believe she did. I will deal with this.\ |
| 1116 | '''Lennier:''' ''[in Minbari]'' Good work. Give me a moment with the Human, and next time…use a bigger needle.\ |
| 1117 | '''Zack:''' Yeah, and don't you forget it! |
| 1118 | ** Delenn has to tell Minbari under the command of Susan that if they laugh, they deal with her... when Susan cannot speak Minbari properly. "Hatrack Ratcatcher," anyone? |
| 1119 | * HigherTechSpecies: At the beginning of Season One, all the other major species are this to Humanity. By the time the series has ended, the Humans have surpassed the Narn in basic tech level and are closing in on the Centauri. The Minbari, having been a space-faring civilization for thousands of years, remain head and shoulders above everyone but the Vorlons, whose technical knowledge verges into SufficientlyAdvancedTechnology levels. |
| 1120 | * HisNameIs: In "Chrysalis", a severely wounded man manages to spit out "They're going to kill him! They're going to kill --" before dying. During the investigation, [[spoiler:Security Chief Michael Garibaldi]] is severely wounded; he makes a visible point of finishing the sentence before the medical staff cart him away. |
| 1121 | * HistoricalPersonPunchline: A "set in the future" variation: the Vorlon Inquisitor is revealed to be [[spoiler:UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper]] at the end of the episode. |
| 1122 | * HistoricalRapSheet: A [[TouchedByVorlons Vorlon]] "inquisitor"-slash-TortureTechnician sent to test the resolve of Delenn and Sheridan mentions that he was [[AlienAbduction abducted]] back in the [[spoiler:Victorian age... and it's implied that he was UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper]]. |
| 1123 | * {{Hobos}}: Lurkers are a future equivalent of this. Sheridan is quick to point out that transients still exist on Earth, too, but the Ministry of Labor got around this problem by re-categorizing those people as [[MetaphoricallyTrue underachievers]]. |
| 1124 | * HollywoodTactics: |
| 1125 | ** Seen in the ''Legend of the Rangers'' pilot. "We do not retreat, whatever the reason." A rather stupid tactic for a group known as "Rangers", whose job often involves '''bringing back information''' on mysterious aliens of '''terrifying technological superiority'''. But then, it's ''Legend of the Rangers: [[strike:The Search For More Money]]'', you don't expect much from it anyway. |
| 1126 | ** Notably averted most of the time. Defensive fire, strategic maneuvers, flanking, and kill boxes are all used to help the heroes win the day. |
| 1127 | * HoldYourHippogriffs: Ivanova to Sheridan in "Lines of Communication": "What am ''I'', chopped [[strike:liver]] flarn?" |
| 1128 | * {{Homage}}: |
| 1129 | ** The series' MythArc is one long homage to [[spoiler: and a bit of a {{deconstruction}} of]] a similar MythArc in Creator/EEDocSmith's ''Literature/{{Lensman}}'' series, with the Vorlons and Shadows standing in for the Arisians and Eddorians respectively. |
| 1130 | ** Numerous other sources get nods here and there, some of the more obvious being ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' and Arthurian legends; there is also the aforementioned direct reference to ''Literature/ACanticleForLeibowitz''. |
| 1131 | * HonoraryUncle: |
| 1132 | ** In "Survivors", we hear about a friend Michael Garibaldi used have, whose daughter called him "Uncle Mike". |
| 1133 | ** Rabbi Koslov, Ivanova's Uncle Yossel, in "TKO". |
| 1134 | ** [[spoiler: In ''Sleeping in Light'' Garibaldi's daughter calls Dr. Franklin "Uncle Stephen".]] |
| 1135 | * HonorBeforeReason[=/=]ProudWarriorRaceGuy: Deconstructed several times over with the Minbari warrior caste, whose rigid determination to uphold honor and tradition results in a great deal of pain and pointless death. |
| 1136 | ** In ''Gray 17 is missing'' Delenn is warned that a fellow Minbari might try to assassinate her, and forbids Lennier to ask for Captain Sheridan's help rather then air the Minbari's internal dirty laundry in front of aliens. |
| 1137 | ** In ''Atonement'' Delenn submits her right to marry Sheridan to her clan elders even though she was the most powerful woman in Minbar and could do whatever the heck she wanted. She obtains her desire not by simply defying convention but by manipulating traditional precedent. This episode shows what a society that really does think in terms of HonorBeforeReason is like and is thus while not quite a CMOA, certainly a Crowning Piece Of Good Writing. |
| 1138 | ** The Drazi's "Green-Purple" conflict shows how stupid such traditions can be- from "Randomly beating up people because they wear a sash" to "An alien now controls our faction because she's wearing the right clothes." |
| 1139 | *** Rules changes held up in committee. |
| 1140 | * HopelessWar: The Earth-Minbari war. |
| 1141 | ** The Narn/Centari war[[spoiler: , as the Centari had Shadow backing]] |
| 1142 | * HospitalGurneyScene: In ''Shadow Dancing'', when [[spoiler: Dr. Franklin]] is stabbed trying to stop a mugging, he is wheeled into Medlab, complete with a POV shot of the rest of the Command Crew pushing his gurney. Of course, that's a hallucination, as the staff still hadn't returned from the A-plot's space battle. |
| 1143 | * HufflepuffHouse: |
| 1144 | ** The Minbari worker caste, who get no lines, no characters important enough to even warrant the title of RedShirt, and come to power only because a religious caste leader put them there. They're also only seen a few times in the background, and even then you'll only notice them if they're pointed out to you. [[note]]They wear blue and yellow sort of coveralls, and the men shape their bone ridges like Religious Caste women do[[/note]]. |
| 1145 | ** Several of the lesser alien races get this treatment too. Several members of the League of Non-Aligned Worlds (e.g. Vree, Abbai, Yolu, Grome) are reduced to background characters after the first season. They're mentioned in dialogue every now and then or are seen sitting in council sessions (and in the case of the Vree their ships show up as part of the allied fleet) but other than that they're unimportant. The most extreme example is the Llort, who ''never'' get a speaking part or any focus at all. |
| 1146 | * UsefulNotes/HugoAward (Best Dramatic Presentation) -- "The Gathering" nominated 1994; "The Coming of Shadows" won 1996; "Severed Dreams" won 1997; "Sleeping in Light" nominated 1999 |
| 1147 | * HumansAreDiplomats -- as said by Delenn, "Humans Build Communities" |
| 1148 | * HumansAreDivided: Earth is the only major world to still have nation states, and has by far the most diverse religions. Only the Narn seem to have more than one, and they seem to only differ by which sage's teachings they prefer. |
| 1149 | * HumansAreSpecial: Used rather often, and to occasionally obnoxious effect. Straczynski [[WriterOnBoard seems to hold this trope close to his heart]]. Alien customs are generally portrayed as bizarre and just so gosh darn ''wacky'' -- see the Centauri contribution to "religion week" in season one, Sheridan's dinner with Delenn and Lennier in season two, the Drazi pilgrims' reaction to an apparent visitation by [[spoiler:an angel]] in season three, et cetera. If an episode features alien customs, expect them to be used as lazy comic relief. Human customs and ceremonies, on the other hand, are treated with the utmost respect -- silly or not. |
| 1150 | ** This is not always the case. G'Kar's religion is only made fun of once, and that's by Londo, who's just thumbing his nose at G'Kar. When they show the Narn ceremony, it's very serious and solemn. Also, the Minbari ritual in the "religion week" episode is presented with respect. Same with the Brakiri "Day of the Dead" in the episode by the same name. On the other hand, one human tradition, the "Hokey Pokey" song, is shown to be so bizarre and wacky that it makes Londo apoplectic. |
| 1151 | --->'''Londo:''' "It doesn't mean ''anything''!" |
| 1152 | *** For the matter of that Centauri drinking-party religious rites don't really look all that bizarre even if Sinclair and Delenn disliked it. After all, humans have Mardi Gras. And indeed, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purim a religious observation that involves getting drunk to celebrate the defeat of an attempted genocide against ones ancestors]] has its human equivalents. |
| 1153 | *** Given that, it seems fitting that Ivanova, an admittedly lapsed Jew, is the only human who seems to be getting into the spirit of things. |
| 1154 | * HumanityIsSuperior: Humans are said to be really good at community building to the point where no one else would have even attempted anything like the Babylon Project, and they have quickly risen to a major power on the galactic scene despite their technology seriously lacking compared to three of the other major powers and a number of League races. |
| 1155 | ** A large reason for this was a political move made by the humans before the start of the series. The League of Non-Aligned Worlds was on the [[CurbStompBattle losing side]] of a war with the Dilgar. Humanity decided to sweep in and [[BigDamnHeroes help the Non-Aligned Worlds win the war]] while the Big Three; Centauri, Narn, and Minbari, either ignored the war or secretly aided the Dilgar. |
| 1156 | ** However, when it comes to projection of military might in the series... it doesn't really go that well for purely human forces. Earth ships tend to be severely underpowered and weak versus the sort of threats out there, such as the Centauri, Minbari, or First Ones. Justified, as those groups have been in space for countless generations by the time that humans manage to get out there. |
| 1157 | ** Also averted in that humans are almost always physically weaker, one to one, than members of alien races. The average Narn or Minbari need have no special fears when fighting the average human, and even a skilled hand to hand combatant like Marcus loses every direct fight he has with a Minbari. |
| 1158 | * HumanOutsideAlienInside: several examples, such as the Centauri, who have two hearts and radically different sex organs: males have six two-meter-long prehensile genitalia located on either side of the back, and which curl up under the arms when not in use, while females have six corresponding orifices. |
| 1159 | ** More literal examples in Sinclair, who was [[spoiler:born human but with the soul of a Minbari]]; and Sheridan and Lyta, who both [[spoiler:spend time hosting Vorlons inside them, ending up permanently changed even after the Vorlons leave for good]]. |
| 1160 | * HumanPopsicle: |
| 1161 | ** Second season, we learn that a few human [[GenerationShip sleeper ships]] were sent out before the Centauri sold [[PortalNetwork jumpgate]] technology to Earth. Medlab also has a few units to store and transport patients who need more help than the station can provide. And then there are the [[spoiler: Shadow-altered telepaths]] that turn up later. |
| 1162 | ** [[spoiler:Marcus Cole]], notably because of Straczynski taking his sweet time to decide if he was this or [[spoiler:{{Killed Off for Real}} after using the alien healing machine to keep Ivanova alive.]] If the fifth season hadn't been allowed to air, then Straczynski would have said he was [[spoiler:dead instead of being this for about 300 years]]. |
| 1163 | * HumansNeedAliens: The Shadows and Vorlons both saw themselves as guardians of the younger races (including humans), guiding their development and evolution. They had conflicting philosophies as to how these younger races should develop, and ended up fighting periodic wars over this [[spoiler: using younger races they've [[AbusivePrecursors manipulated (often secretly)]] as [[SpaceColdWar proxies]], to supposedly prove the superiority of their respective philosophies. This pattern is finally exposed to the younger races through the maneuverings of Sheridan, who then shames them into leaving the galaxy to allow the younger races room to determine their own ways.]] |
| 1164 | * HyperspaceIsAScaryPlace: An [[AnotherDimension alternate dimension]] which allows for speedy travel. The entire dimension appears as a stormy environment with a blood red hue. A set of beacons is placed between jumpgates to prevent ships from getting lost; ships that go off-track are generally lost forever, since a rescue effort becomes near-impossible once the vessel goes adrift. One exception is the EAS Cortez, which is saved by a squad of Zeta Wings acting as a fishing line and using lock-on signals to keep track of each other. |
| 1165 | ** It's mentioned several times that there are rumors to the effect that hyperspace contains living things. In ''Series/{{Crusade}}'', we found out the rumors were true, and the living things encountered ''might'' only have been at the ''bottom'' of the hyperspace food chain. |
| 1166 | ** Trying to pass through a jumpgate that's under cannon fire isn't such a hot idea, either. |
| 1167 | ** Aside from having an eldritch appearance, the biggest issue with hyperspace in the B5-verse is that it is full of strong, constantly shifting and apparently random gravitational inclines (they don't appear to be associated with any massive object or other potential source of a gravitational field). This means that a ship without any navigational aids will quickly be pulled off course by the gravity incline and will never find their way back to a beacon. The bizarre nature of hyperspace means that any remotely competent tactician would never countenance the idea of an in-hyperspace ship to ship battle because it would rapidly turn into an unmitigated disaster for both sides. |
| 1168 | * HyperspeedAmbush: A common strategy in this setting, with ships in various episodes both being destroyed by enemies coming out of Hyperspace and being ambushed themselves by waiting ships upon exiting themselves. The latter variety usually happening when using a [[CoolGate Jumpgate]] |
| 1169 | ** The Minbari are particularly good at this. On one occasion during the Earth-Minbari War, a scout ship lured an Earthforce fleet into a pre-planned position so that a Minbari warcruiser could exit hyperspace in the middle of them. The jump-point, basically being a hole in space itself, [[TeleFrag took out half the human ships]] even before the warcruiser existed Hyperspace. |
| 1170 | ** Opening a jumpgate ''inside'' another jumpgate has ''very'' nasty consequences and is referred to in-universe as the "[[TooDumbToLive Bonehead Maneuver]]". The tactic is used to take out a Shadow vessel during the early stages of the war. |
| 1171 | * HyperspaceLanes: Most ships traveling in Hyperspace make sure to closely follow the navigational beacons transmitted between the Jump Gates. They could go in any direction they want, and try to take shortcuts, but then they run the very real risk of joining the ranks of ships that have gone off the beacon never to be seen or heard from again. Larger ships, which can create their own jump points, have more sophisticated navigational equipment which allow them to travel more freely. |
| 1172 | ** There's a story that Londo tells of a race of aliens who tried to escape from another by turning off their beacons... but when they turned them back on, the frequencies that the galaxy used for ''their'' beacons had changed, and they were never heard from again. |
| 1173 | * HyperspeedEscape: Played straight but only sometimes. Bigger ships can produce jump points to escape, but there is often little preventing their enemies from pursuing them if they want to. Many smaller ships cannot exit to Hyperspace without use of a [[CoolGate Jumpgate]], and thus end up having to flee for some distance in normal space with their enemy chasing after them. They can piggyback in and out of Hyperspace if a friendly warship is nearby to open a jump point for them, but then they also lack the navigational equipment to safely navigate alone without having a beacon to follow, so this tactic is rarely used unless their escorting warship can follow them. Additionally, forming jump points requires a lot of energy, so if a ship jumps out of hyperspace via jump point, it can't escape to hyperspace until the jump engines have recharged. Additionally, even if you manage to open a jump point successfully (either with your own engines or a gate) you still have to actually fly into the jump point. If your engines are disabled before you enter the jump point you'll not be able to escape, as seen when the ''Trigati'' has her conventional drive disabled and is unable to make the jump point she created to flee. |
| 1174 | ** {{Subverted}} in ''And Now For A Word'' when a Narn and a Centauri cruiser get into a fight near the station. The Centauri ship is destroyed outright, but when the Narn ship attempts to jump to hyperspace (to avoid detainment by B5 security for violating neutral space), its damaged jump drive malfunctions and explodes. |
| 1175 | ** Also in ''The Coming Of Shadows'', when a large fleet of Narn warships are trying to beat a hasty retreat from a Shadow ambush, the Shadow ships fire a weapon that disrupts their Jump Points right as they're passing into them, and all of the Narn ships are disintegrated as a result. |
| 1176 | * {{Hypocrite}}: The Minbari complain that Sheridan lured the ''Black Star'' to its death by sending a DistressSignal after setting up a trap to destroy the Minbari flagship. Their complaint ignores the fact that, not only was the ''Black Star'' moving to destroy a ship that was obviously damaged and out of the fight and sending out a distress signal, but was crewed by a race that was fighting for its very ''survival'' in a genocidal war that the Minbari were winning. Had the ''Black Star'' not gone back to finish off the crippled ship, they would have lived to fight another day. |
| 1177 | * HypocriticalHumor: In "There All The Honor Lies" Sheridan vents at how he loathes the idea of being forced to have a merchandising store on his station to help it pay for itself. After all of it, he asks Ivanova to see if they have any baseball caps. For his sister, not him. |
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