Text 16513, 60 rader
Skriven 2007-08-02 02:20:02 av Janne Mikola (2989.babylon5)
  Kommentar till text 16394 av rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated (2867.babylon5)
Ärende: Is there any reasonable way to interpret "Over Here" withoutaccpeting t
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Hello,

I just watched Voices in the Dark and all the extras. First of all I 
must say that tears started welling up in my eyes when I watched Andreas 
and Richard memorials.

But now to the story of the Lochley-part. Both visiting actors did a 
great job. The story would have been very great as a separate movie with 
no connections to Babylon 5, just as a random scifi movie. But now that 
it is part of the Babylon 5 canon, I'm having difficulties with going 
through it.

If I recall correctly, never before has any kind of divine entity 
interacted in Babylon 5 universe through miracles. Sure there has been 
religion involved in very many occasions starting from Brother Theo and 
Minbari's religious cast. Even JMS himself has stated a long time ago 
that "religion [...] has always been present. And it will be present 200 
years from now. That may not thrill me, but when one is a writer, one 
must deal with realities, and that's one of them. To totally ignore that 
part of the human equation would be as false and wrong-headed as 
ignoring the fact that people get mad, or passionate, or strive for 
better lives. [...] In the Babylon 5 universe, all the things that make 
us human -- our obsessions, our interests, our language, our culture, 
our flaws and our wonderfulnesses -- are all still intact.". I know this 
may sound weird to some of you, but simply put: I don't have any 
problems with supernatural, it is divine elements of religions I have 
trouble with.

Yes, there has been religion involved before. But this time it was 
different, now it seems that it is part of the Babylon 5 canon that god 
and devil exist and they're able to perform miracles, and even are doing 
them, and at least the devil is speaking directly with mortal people 
through his minions withs words which can be heard and recorded. Put in 
extravagant way - it should be from now on always speculated that why 
doesn't Lochley seek for divine intervention when B5 is in trouble.

This is kind of hard to accept as an atheist (JMS has stated he's an 
atheist too, btw). Because as JMS said in the extras of the DVD, Babylon 
5 universe works for me as a place to go to "playing" with people I'm 
come to like and know. I know I'm getting lots of "get over with it, 
it's just a story" -type replies to this message, and of course I will 
"get over with it". It's not about that.

During the second half of the Over Here I was all the time waiting for 
some small signals somewhere which would hint that the allegedly 
possessed person really wasn't possessed - that it would be some plot of 
let's say Drakh or other Shadow-minions. Or some kind of chain of events 
which would have caused so much doubt that for instance Lochley would 
have said that "she doesn't anymore know what that was", or such. Or 
mental instability of people, self-suggestion of priest and malfunction 
of Babylon 5 scanners. Whatever. But there weren't any. God and devil 
from now on exist in Babylon 5 universe, and in any situation it is 
possible that they're interacting and intervening again.

Share your thoughts.

-- 
Janne Mikola
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