Londo's Narration in "The Gathering"

[glindros]

I was listening to his narration on my ipod this morning. I list it as the season 0 opener. (Yes I'm that B5 geeky.)

"In The Beginning" he was talking to the kids. Who do you think he was talking to in the pilot? The Drakh? A female companion? Vir? Vintari?

[vacantlook]

If I'm remembering part of the Centauri novels trilogy correctly, Londo does spend quite some time writing some memoirs. He does so during the little time he is "unsupervised" by the Drakh. So, I can imagine that his narration could be from said memoirs.

[JoeD80]

I always got the impression from the last part of "Sleeping in Light" that the narrations were part of the whole documentary deal. Like a Londo interview. "Oh yeah, I was there. Let me take you back to that fateful day." {not the actual quote}

jms 8/30/1993 about the opening monologues:

You're right; in my head, I was thinking "surviving characters," but that does complicate the issue enormously. Perhaps it's best to stay with the one voice for now after all...

[Capt.Montoya]

He was talking to the same person that Sinclair talked to in the opening sequence of S1...
Which is the same person that Sheridan talked to to in the opening sequence of S2...
Which is the same person that Ivanova talked to in the opening sequence of S3...
Which is the same person that Lennier, Zack, G'Kar, Lyta, Vir, Marcus, Delenn, Londo, Franklin, Ivanova, Garibaldi, and Sheridan talked to in the opening sequence of S4...

That person is...

YOU!!!

[JoeD80]

From the script of "Sleeping in Light" (Volume 11 of the script books):

The events from 2257 through 2281 saw some of the most important changes in recent Earth history. Those things which we take for granted now, in 2295, were won during those hard years. We hope you enjoyed this dramatization of those events. We wish to thank ISN for permission to use their archival footage, and to representatives of the Interstellar Alliance for allowing us unparalleled access to use many of the actual locations where these events took place.

[grumbler]

He was talking to the same person that Sinclair talked to in the opening sequence of S1...

Actually, no. He is talking to Vir. Those precise words are used by Londo in his last talk with Vir before Londo's death, in which he turns over his history and asks Vir to finish it (vol 3 of the CP trilogy).

In essence, if you believe the CP trilogy, what we are seeing in B5 is the documentary filmed using Londo and Vir's reconstruction of events between 2245 and 2281, (as financed by the An'Lashok Foundation, per SiL).

[JoeD80]

In addition to that bit from the Centauri trilogy, some quotes I found from jms himself:

jms 9/9/1994 during season one:

Re: the "last" of the Babylon Stations...y'all might want to bear in mind the syntax of the narration. It speaks of B5 in the *past tense*. "Bablyon 5 WAS the last of the Babylon stations...it WAS the dawn of the third age of mankind." The narration is the voice of future history, the storyteller, long after the fact, spinning for us the tale of the last of the Babylon stations.

jms 9/20/1998 soon before the airing of Sleeping in Light (emphasis mine):

I also think you'll find some interesting tie-offs in this show...something about Minbari beliefs about souls born in the hearts of suns, and a pay-off to why the narrations of this series have always been in the past tense, and a gift to the crew of this show...to which end I *strongly* suggest that even if you don't normally tape this series, that you do tape *this* episode so you can go back and check some stuff at the end.

[glindros]

Thanks for all the helpful information. Like much of B5, nothing is ever quite what it seems