Newbie question

[Ben-Thayer Dunnthaedt]

Life is so ironic, Kevin.

I made my last post and eased home from work. What do I do? Pop in the next ep of B5. I'm watching all four seasons again just before the release of S5, as I've done with all the previous DVD releases.

Which ep is next? Babylon Squared. About halfway though it, it hit me. I FREAKED. I mixed up the scenes, exactly as you said. Ran upstairs and logged in, but - too late! RATS! Already look like an idiot!

Oh well, the T issue was kind of a side thing, and that's what I get for not thinking things through before I post it. I suppose I won't be able to razz anyone for a bad memory, now will I? My real point was, how did the GM get into the whole temporal conglomeration in the first place? Has JMS posted anything about the Vorlons' involvement in the GM? Or maybe not just the Vorlons, but any other first ones? It sure seems like they were involved.

Anyway, thanks for the info. I'll try to do a little better with my episode references in the future...

[colonyearth]

Originally posted by Ben-Thayer Dunnthaedt
Life is so ironic, Kevin.

I made my last post and eased home from work. What do I do? Pop in the next ep of B5. I'm watching all four seasons again just before the release of S5, as I've done with all the previous DVD releases.

Which ep is next? Babylon Squared. About halfway though it, it hit me. I FREAKED. I mixed up the scenes, exactly as you said. Ran upstairs and logged in, but - too late! RATS! Already look like an idiot!

Oh well, the T issue was kind of a side thing, and that's what I get for not thinking things through before I post it. I suppose I won't be able to razz anyone for a bad memory, now will I? My real point was, how did the GM get into the whole temporal conglomeration in the first place? Has JMS posted anything about the Vorlons' involvement in the GM? Or maybe not just the Vorlons, but any other first ones? It sure seems like they were involved.

Anyway, thanks for the info. I'll try to do a little better with my episode references in the future...

BDT,

Someone here can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it's the book "To Dream In the City of Sorrows," which deals with Sinclair/Valen in the past and gives a bit more insight into the great machine and how it played into the whole temporal displacement of Valen.

CE

[Ben-Thayer Dunnthaedt]

CE-

I can't recall too much background info on the Great Machine in To Dream in the City, other than what is fairly well known from the series and the Lurker's Guide. (Gee I hope I'm not wrong on this) Although the section in the novel where the shadows attempt to use the GM for their own purposes does indicate that the GM - in the grand scheme of things - was not meant for the Shadows. WWE confirms this, due to the simple fact that the GM sent B4 back to to aid the Vorlons.

Now, does this imply it was built under direct influence of the Vorlons? Add the information Kevin passed on about the Triluminaries coming from the GM, and it becomes even more interesting! Think about it - did the Vorlons stumble onto the GM and it's wonders or did they influence the builders to build it? It does seem awfully convenient - "we found a time machine AND a handy DNA converter! Just what we need!"

Once again, sorry if I'm incorrect or just digging up old topics. I'll look over the Lurker's Guide some more info, but it's a lot more fun to talk about these things with such a learned group! That's kind of what happened with my error in the post above. I got a little excited when you guys replied to my post - - and I wanted to talk more.

BTW, Kevin, did I mention that I nearly killed myself getting up the stairs yesterday to try and edit the post before I got gigged? You guys are quick! Must remember that

[Kevin]

Originally posted by Ben-Thayer Dunnthaedt
CE-

I can't recall too much background info on the Great Machine in To Dream in the City, other than what is fairly well known from the series and the Lurker's Guide. (Gee I hope I'm not wrong on this) Although the section in the novel where the shadows attempt to use the GM for their own purposes does indicate that the GM - in the grand scheme of things - was not meant for the Shadows. WWE confirms this, due to the simple fact that the GM sent B4 back to to aid the Vorlons.

Now, does this imply it was built under direct influence of the Vorlons? Add the information Kevin passed on about the Triluminaries coming from the GM, and it becomes even more interesting! Think about it - did the Vorlons stumble onto the GM and it's wonders or did they influence the builders to build it? It does seem awfully convenient - "we found a time machine AND a handy DNA converter! Just what we need!"

Once again, sorry if I'm incorrect or just digging up old topics. I'll look over the Lurker's Guide some more info, but it's a lot more fun to talk about these things with such a learned group! That's kind of what happened with my error in the post above. I got a little excited when you guys replied to my post - - and I wanted to talk more.

BTW, Kevin, did I mention that I nearly killed myself getting up the stairs yesterday to try and edit the post before I got gigged? You guys are quick! Must remember that

::laughs:: Well I check here often, so yeah, gotta be quick around here ;-)

Anyways, you're correct; Dream dosen't really give a whole lot more info on the Great Machine then does WWE. But one thing you have to remember about the Great Machine... it's not a time travel device per se. The Sector 14 time rift is a natural phenomenon; it's not artifical and wasn't created. The Great Machine has developed ways to help manipulate it, but at best it's still quite unstable.

JMS has never shown any connection between the Vorlons and the Great Machine, although it's quite possible... the Vorlons were into dark projects and did like messing around the DNA of younger species. But being the lords of order they are, I doubt that they'd create a machine that belonged to no one and one that would use various younger (ignorant and naive in their opinion) species to control it. If a Vorlon made it, they'd have to have complete control over it, which is why I'm a bit dubious of any direct relation.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and present some speculation of my own on the origins of the Great Machine.

I'm willing to bet that it wasn't made by one species, but by many, probably during a time when the Vorlons and Shadows were young. As the Babylon project brought together all of the younger species, so might of this technological achievement been brought about as a joint project between many of the First Ones when they were still young. A machine, combining many different styles of tech, would go about to help bring about the races, and protect the time rift phenomenon that was occuring and perhaps seen as a threat in Sector 14. I have a hard time believing that one species would create a machine to belong to itself, but I have a *very* easy time believing in a powerful machine given to no one specific race designed to protect them all from a natural phenonmenon that, if abused, could have horrible consequences.

This is complete and utter speculation on my part though... jms has said little about the origins of the Great Machine and I suspect that will continue to be the case for sometime.

BTW, while Lurker's Guide is an excellent resource, the JMS comments on this archive are much more complete, and you'd be surprised about the stuff you can find just by using the search button that never seemed to find it's way to the Lurker's Guide... tis quite fascinating to be honest

[grumbler]

BTD, it could be worse! You could have been this guy back in 1998:

Joseph Schierer <[email protected]> asks:
> "Will we ever find out what happened to the missing day in
> Sinclair's life, and will we ever find out what happened to
> Babylon 4?" now, the show is over - but did I miss something?
> the "little surprise" Londo left Sheriden & Delenn for their
> child - whatever happens to it? does Londo & G'Kar meet their
> mutual end, as "fortold" in War without end?

Seems to me we answered all those questions except for the David one in the course of the show.

jms

As to the Great Machine, I agree that everything is speculation. However, I don't think the time rift in Sector 14 was a natural phenomenon. I think it was caused by the GM, because if there was a space anomoly there, presumably EarthGov wouldn't have decidied to build a big honking space station right on top of it! Unless the GM hid the rift, of course. But still the odds are hugely against the only known tempoal rift accidently being right there where it was needed, I would think.

I like to think that the builders of the GM were one of the ancient races tired of the constant warfare between the Shadows and the other races. Not being inclined yet to go "beyond the rim" they decided to go back* in time to pre-Ancient days and there finish whatever was holding them back from the desire to go beyond the rim. No evidence whatever for this fantasy.

There is no evidence that it was built by or at the behest of the Vorlons, but if it WAS built in the last thousand years, then it probably WAS built at the urging of the Vorlons, who knew the role it would have to play.

* or way forward

[Dr Maturin]

<<I think it was caused by the GM>>

What about the tachyon beams Zathras was watching pulse out in WWE1? I think that's evidence.

[Andrew_Swallow]

Babylon 4 was not only built near the time rift it was built in the time rift. Earth would not have chosen to build a spacestation is such a dangerous place. However humans may have been tricked into building it at that location if the rift was hidden. Possibly by the Minbari acting on orders from the Vorlons.

[Kevin]

The Great Machine has the ability to open and close the time rift. That much is confirmed in To Dream in the City of Sorrows.

When it's closed, you really can't tell, which is why Earth didn't notice anything special about Sector 14 until B4 was pretty much engulfed by it. An overabundance of Tachyon emissions only occur when the time rift is open (which is confirmed in Babylon Squared when the only reason why they sound out a Starfury pilot to investigate the area is because there's an abnormally large amount of tachyon emissions in the area. Dittio for WWE if I'm not mistaken, which is why they were able to get the message from the possible future: the time rift was open enough that it was spreading things out everywhere)

Just to clarify things a bit.

[grumbler]

Agreed that the GM can open and close the rift, Kevin. The question is whether or not the rift already existed, or was it created by the GM?

If it already existed, then we have to use explanations like Andrew's to explain how B4 came to be located there. And THEN we have to explain why Delenn, who was part of the Grey Council and their formost expert on the humans, was not (apparently) involved. If she had been involved, I think she would have said so.

The simplest explanation is that the GM causes the rift, and could have done it no matter where B4 was located.

That doesn't get us any closer to who built it or why, of course.

[Ben-Thayer Dunnthaedt]

Glad everyone can laugh along with me in relation to my memory lapse! Might as well try and find some humor in it

Great discussion here! And like Jack O'Neal is fond of saying: "I am SO there!"

Whether or not the GM created the rift or merely manipulates it? A terrific question that I never considered! To Dream in the City offers a clue:

**MINOR SPOILER WARNING** (Don't we have spoiler tags we can use to hide the text?)




The Shadows discover the existance of the rift and attempt to widen it, in order to send their own operatives into the past. Once again, I hope I'm not wrong on this, but the novel didn't indicate that the Shadows had infiltrated Epsilon 3 and taken control of the GM to facilitate this mission. Only that they were attempting to widen the rift.

What does this imply? Hard to say, it could go either way. It does confirm that the Shadows have tech capable of temporal manipulation, and for whatever reason they didn't go for E-3, they went straight to the rift. This would seem to confirm Kevin's opinion that the GM didn't create the rift. You could ask, if the GM created the rift and the Shadows have equal tech (thereabouts), why didn't they create their OWN rift?

But does it actually confirm anything? Once again, hard to say...there are tons of unanswered questions here. Don't you LOVE IT??? An opposing viewpoint could say NOTHING is confirmed...that the GM existed long before, and always had the ability to create a rift, but its knowledge had been lost to the current batch of first ones. (see additional question below) The Vorlons and their allies could have simply FOUND the GM, discovered the ability to create the rift and used it.

Whatever the case, it is a fact that the GM is a part of the WWE temporal loop, and somehow - someWHEN - the GM became an integral part of the loop. Here we go again, which first - chicken or the egg?

Which leads to another discussion question: were the races we know as the first ones actually the FIRST ones? Could there have been others before them? I say YEA. What say you all?

[grumbler]

Originally posted by Ben-Thayer Dunnthaedt
Which leads to another discussion question: were the races we know as the first ones actually the FIRST ones? Could there have been others before them? I say YEA. What say you all?

The specific races know in the series as "the First Ones" were not, with the exception possibly of the Shadows, the actual "first ones" - barring Lorien, the "First One," of course.

JMS seemed a little unsure of the actual case of the Shadows. In ItSoZ Delenn says " The Shadows were old when even the Ancients were young." But he has also said that the Shadows and Vorlons were evolving "at similar periods" here

Will Caraway <[email protected]> asks:
> So what I've been wondering is this: Did the Shadow's try to work
> their evolutionary magic on the Vorlons and the other first ones
> while they were still young races? Is this the explanation for
> Delenn's statement that the first ones have battled the Shadows
> over millions of years? Would this indicate that the Vorlons
> stayed behind because they were the most militant of the anti-
> Shadow faction or perhaps the race least able to evolve beyond
> the eye for an eye concept?

No, the shadows definitely didn't try their advancement routine
on the vorlons; they were cases of parallel evolution at similar
periods.

This was actually a good question by Will: if the Shadows were so much older than the rest, and they believed as they believed, why would they NOT try their stuff on the rest of the "First Ones"? Lorien?

Note also that there are two possible discontinuities with the ideathat the Shadows are that much older than the rest of the "First Ones"
1. Their technology would far outstrip that of the much younger Vorlons (as much as that of the Vorlons outstripped that of the Younger Races), so that not only would the contest be unfair, but the Shadows would appear as godlike to the Vorlons as the Vorlons did to the Younger Races.
2. They would have had the opportunity to get their viewpoints impressed on the rising "First Ones" before they even became "First Ones."

I think it better to consider the Vorlons and Shadows to be peers - after all, when Delenn said "Shadows were old when even the Ancients were young" she could have been talking about the Acients in general, not including the Vorlons. That leaves the Vorlons and Shadows as some of the early- generation "First Ones" and the others we know of as "First Ones" as the generation that the Shadows and Vorlons first fought over.

There were others fighting alongside the Minbari and Vorlons, for Delenn notes in ItSoZ "A thousand years ago, the Shadows returned to their places of power, rebuilt them, and began to stretch forth their hand. Before they could strike, they were defeated by an alliance of worlds, including the Minbari... and the few remaining First Ones who had not yet passed beyond the Veil." Note that this alliance included the Minbari, Vorlons, and First Ones, it didn't consist of those races. So there is another generation of races, those contemporanious with the Minbari, missing from the B5 universe. It seems unlikeley that they all passed beyond the Rim in a mere thousand years, and it also seems unlikely that they still exist (or else the Minbari would be recruiting them), so it seems they either were destroyed in the war (but in that case why wouldn't Delenn mention that to add to the horror of the "greatest nightmare of our times" and convince Sheridan tio release Morden) or they simply ran away from known space to avoid the next round of struggle. Why didn't Sheridan ask about this, I wonder? It certainly occurred to me at the time,

[colonyearth]

Some great points Grumbler...and some excellent questions. This to me is proof that there are many more indepth and mysterious elements in the B5 universe to fuel a film than the Teep War. For all we know some of those races were still around. Some of them might have been met in Crusade (the world that was hit by the plague and stole body parts for analyzing comes to mind, why else would the Shadows attack them?)

There is much to the B5 story that we do not yet know. What's been seen and written, I believe, is only the tip on an iceberg and only JMS knows just how big the damn thing really is.

Lucky man!

CE

[CRONAN]

Food for thought

You raise some interesting points.....

How many characters bite the bullet (not necessarily dyiing) on schedule or otherwise? On one side you have Sinclair, Talia and Ivoniva - with (Keffer) Kosh, Marcus and *cough* on the other... So i'd say roughly half. Since all of the above are incorporated into the the overall arc, the issue whether or not this lessons/hightens the appeal of the show will of course differ from person to person (and whether or not the viewer is aware of the writers intent).

People will seldom revel the passing of major characters in any storyline (at some point we all wanted Marcus, Ivoniva and *cough cough* to make it out of the arc in one piece (insert Kosh here), though in spite of that I think the two others worked in B5s favor; namely the replacement of Talia with Lyta and Sinclair with Sheridan. As to Lochley I'm of the opinion she carried the arc equally as well as Ivoniva did.

One point of interest:
As explained in the S2 commentary: while the exchange of captains was not intended: it did work out in favor of the storyline in one respect: It provided a main character with a direct link to the Shadows - similar with the other's link to the Minbari.

Aslo I seem to recall hearing somewhere that in the *original* B5 arc, Sinclair was intended to realize the entire five years 2258-2262, then travel back through time to carry on the war then. Makes you wonder......

[RCmodeler]

Re: Newbie question

Originally posted by Synbios1978
I am a huge STS9 fan, and heard B5 also has a great story arc, so I tried it out, and I definately wasn't disappointed. Now, I'm done with the 4 seasons that are out on DVD, and I'm looking to something else with a great sci-fi arc like that

You're out of luck. DS9 and B5 represent the pinnacle of TV sci-fi entertainment. If you want that same level of intelligence, the only thing you can do is turn off the TV and try reading some classic science fiction novels.

.....

[colonyearth]

Re: Re: Newbie question

Originally posted by RCmodeler
You're out of luck. DS9 and B5 represent the pinnacle of TV sci-fi entertainment. If you want that same level of intelligence, the only thing you can do is turn off the TV and try reading some classic science fiction novels.

Not necessarily, it depends on what kind of SF you want. Farscape to me was intelligently written and beautifully done. It unfortunately, due to SCI-FI's shortsightedness and other such issues, it was cancelled before the story could be completed. Thank goodness it's getting a mini-series to finish the tale.

As for absolute fun, tongue-in-cheek, but very well written and made SF, there's Stargate. It's a great universe to play in, and the cast and crew, producers and writers are having a blast doing it, which comes through in the characters, their relationships, and the overall quality of the show.

Actually, there's a thread on here under the Babylon 5 discussions about everyone's fav SF shows. It's a great read on the good ones out there.

CE