JMS's Comments in 'Deconstruction'

[circularREASON]

In 'DECONSTRUCTION' JMS said that by the end Humanity had evolved into the equiv of THE VORLONS and were leaving for 'THE VORLON HOMEWORLD when the sun exploded. He said that an external force was being used to destroy the sun. He also said that the story had come full circle and that made me think.

Which of the races of the Interstellar Alliance are destined to be in positions of authority when the next group of younger races is ready?

And which of these would fill the gap left by the SHADOWS?

[Kevin]

JMS has said in a number of posts (which can be seen at the Lurker's Guide, rather then have me post them here), that both the Humans and the Minbari are the two that make it. But just because Humans are taking residence in the Vorlon homeworld dosen't mean that they've become the Vorlons nor the Minbari become the Shadows. They've just reached the level and position of guardians of the newer races, which is what brings the story full circle. Dosen't mean they do the same stuff or are destined to fulfill the roles of order and chaos... the hope is that they would have learned from those mistakes... so that they could make other ones instead

[CRONAN]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

MAJOR PLOT SPOILERS

Whew, caught myself in time. I hope everyone else is as lucky as I was!

[grumbler]

Kevin, you are correct, but cR is also correct that someone must be "doing the Shadow thing" if they are detroying an entire solar system in an attack on humanity.

[circularREASON]

Exactly.

MY take on it is that the role ( as in the one ) is not expendable - however the person ( or persons ) who take those positions are.

Apply this in a larger scale to the individual races after the first ones left.

The role of the first ones was to look after and guide the younger races - much as the Interstellar Alliance does.

So the role does not change - but the races fulfilling the role do.

My take on Humanity being the equiv of the VORLONS comes from JMS himself on disk6 of S4.

Who takes the shadows role is a question which really interests me. Who would destroy a star to destroy a whole race?

[Ranger Foster]

Who takes the shadows role is a question which really interests me. Who would destroy a star to destroy a whole race?

Maybe its the First Ones that are making sure Humans and Minbari don't make the same mistake they did. The only way they can help is to push the humans out of the galaxy peacefully,that means destroying the earth and making them think its there time to leave the galaxy and join the Vorlons and Shadows, who now should be more advanced than Humans and Minbari.

[grumbler]

Originally posted by circularREASON
...So the role does not change - but the races fulfilling the role do.

My take on Humanity being the equiv of the VORLONS comes from JMS himself on disk6 of S4.

Who takes the shadows role is a question which really interests me. Who would destroy a star to destroy a whole race?

The advantage of the star destroyer is perhaps that is possible to destabilize the star "covertly." Also, the goal might not be to kill people, but to make them feel what it is like to lose your heritage (e.g. to pay humans back for some sort of "cultural imperialism").

As to the nature of differing "First Ones" roles not changing, this would fit in with JMS's "everything is circular" logic... and it would then imply that some race of the "New First Ones" disagrees enough with Humanity's plan for raising up the "New Younger Ones" that they would stealthily attack humanity's home world.

The opposing concepts might not be order versus chaos, it could be human individualism ("What do you want to be") versus Minbari collectivism ("How will you serve?") or just about anything else.

Hard to speculate on, given the limited data.

[Andrew_Swallow]

The Sol destroyers will have to be a race whose weapons are sufficiently powerful that they can blow up a planet and expect to survive a war with a race of angry first Ones.

Pity the humans have to retreat to the Vorlon home world.

[RCmodeler]

I'm surprised.

When I watched that episode, I thought the sun was *dying naturally*. After all..... 5 million years from now, the sun will flare up and then become a brown dwarf..... no external help needed.

[Stunaep]

Make it 5 *billion* years and you might be right. But that particular sequence wasn't nowhere near that far.

[Jan]

JMS said that something not natural was affecting Sol (atypical emissions iirc) but he didn't say it was being attacked. In addition, Lyta said that humans couldn't go to the Vorlon Homeworld until they'd earned it, "...in a million years". So we don't know why the sun is going nova but it seems that transferring to the Vorlon homeworld is a reward, not punishment.

Jan

[jal]

atypical emissions

that just means thatsomething outside of normal is happening.

it could be an attack, but then again, humanity could have messed things up by themselves many thousands of years before it went nova, without any outside intervention at all.

sounds like the Vorlon homeworld is more like something to strive for rather than a fallback position, humanity reaches a certain level of development and gets access to the bigger playground as a reward.

[nyranger66]

maybe the humans are destorying it on purpose so that the younger races dont use the more advanced technology thats on earth?

[Kevin]

I have to agree with Jan here. As I said before, we know which two races "make it", so to speak. So the thought of a new enemy destroying the sun of one of the god-like races seems dubious to me. And again, going to the Vorlon home world is a treat, not a nessecity.

But, to be kind of blunt here... I can't say I really care The future events of Deconstruction always failed to captivate any real intrest from myself... I think in many ways I'm simply too attached to the lifetimes of our characters, and have a hard time getting enthused about things outside of that.

[snodman]

I agree. In season 1 Sinclair says to a reporter that the reason we go to the stars is that some day the sun will go Nova and we will have to find another home as a species by then or be destroyed. And if the human species was ready a few million years early to leave earth for Vorlon, they would likely want to Za'hadoum the old place so that whatever was left behind didn't fall into the wrong hands. Besides, as Kosh said, "it will end in fire".