h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I always think one of the most brilliant things is that if you watch the first series again after watching series 2 or 3, you realise how evenly match Londo and G'Kar were - each is as bad as the other. I think it says something important about war and oppression that whilst if you watch early episodes you realise that G'Kar would have done just what Londo did and maybe worse, given the chance, we happily forget this (or at least I did!) as the story is played out, and the Narn become the poor oppressed, rather than ruthless warriors.

Consider a comparison with how we view the Serbs and Bosnians - and their respective roles in the last world war!

Oh yes.

But you can also compare them to the Israelis and the Palestinians. Henry Kissinger once said that : "The problems in the Middle East are not caused because the parties do not understand each other. They are caused because they understand each other too well"... To a large extent that goes for Londo and G'Kar too I think.

TM.

Isn't that the thing that made B-5 so good though - the politics all made sense and you could understand why everbody did what they did.
When you watch the older episodes after having seen them all, you can still see why some of the Molari/G'kar interactions were inevitable.

That is teh cleverest thing about B5 - the fact that it has an almost circular plot line. Only by seeing what happened next can you understand what happened before, and the smallest hint suddenly becomes an almost in-joke for the knowledgeable, which is extremely rewarding to find.
And in subtle ways, not just in the "Babylon Squared/War Without End" sense.
Babylon 5 - I love it.

<BB<

I have always thought that you can tell a good science fiction show not by how good the human charcaters are, but by how believable the alien characters are.

It is easier to write dialogue and back stories for humans as we live among humans (although here in edinburgh that is up for debate), but to create believable alien characters that we can emote with and care about is much harder. A poor alien character makes a show a laughing stock, while a well realised one can take the show to the next level (good examples include Spock in Star Trek and Odo in Deep Space Nine, bad example include anyone in Seaquest DSV 2039).

What JMS does so well is present us with not just one or two complex alien charcaters, but with a whole host of them. Out of these G'Kar and Londo are by far the most intriguing and, while Sheridan, Ivanova et al. may be the titular stars of the show, those who watched know G'Kar and Londo were the real stars.

Plus the great line in View From the Gallery:

"How long do you suppose those two have been married?"

It certainly made me chuckle.

Yes, they were very well played.
I have to admit though : I have now seen the whole series and the movies loads of times and although Londo and G'Kar are still my favorites every time I watch the whole hog some other character will present itself. Last time I saw the series(DVD rules!) it was Brother Edward in 'Passing through Gethsemane(sp?). Brilliant play by Brad Dourif. Shame we don't see him more often.

Which reminds me; why don't I check IMDB....

GADZ... I didn't know he was the voice of Chucky...

In-cre-di-ble! I did not know I was this blind...

Brad Dourif :

Chucky
Bride of Chucky
DUNE!!!! (How Could I Forget?)
LOTR : The Two Towers
Alien Resurrection
Wild Palms(of course! Chucky Levitt!)
Mississippi burning
Blue Velvet
One flew over the cuckoo's nest

Those are only the ones I have seen!
I am ashamed that I neede IMDB for that...