A View from the Gallery

I am glad I didn't skip this episode, as I was initially tempted to do. The summaries I'd read screamed "FILLER!" to me, but knowing that this was written by sci-fi legend Harlan Ellison and featured two of the best character actors in the business convinced me to give it a look.

What a fortuitous decision that turned out to be, because despite the fact that this is a stand-alone, outside-the-arc installment, it turns out to be one of the best episodes of the entire series.

The plot has a hostile alien race invading the Babylon 5 sector, with the station's defenses tested to their limits. Meanwhile, two blue- collar techs interact with each of the main characters of the series while sharing their insights with one another about the major players and their own roles on the station.

The space battle provides some of the best special effects a television sci-fi series has to offer, and Ellison delivers a masterful script.

This might well be considered a filler episode, but it's well worth watching.

We have plenty of the "warrior cast" and "religious cast" driven episodes in B5 (and I'm not talking about the Minbari here), but almost none about the "worker cast" on the station, so this episode was a great way to look at things from their perspective. It was funny, realistic and didn't disconnect completely from the story, as everything is done in the context of an enemy attack on the station and involved most of the main characters in the show, albeit from secondary roles. I'd take this type of a filler episode over any epidode about Franklin's "love" affairs or stim addiction, Marcus' English "humour" or King Arthur allegory. Many movies or TV series suffer from concentrating only on a couple of main characters like they would be able to do all by themselves, and B5 is no exception, but at least we got one or two of these episodes to balance things out. Personally, since B5 is all about "building" a better world / universe, I would have loved some episodes about the actual building of the White Star ships, instead of throwing them out of nowhere right when they were needed, earlier in the show.

8 is a realistic rating, since it's not a major episode, but it's very well done, entertaining and emotionally moving in the parts involving the Doctor (now that's how you add to the Doc's character, not by getting him to sleep with women he just met and claim that it involved "feelings" for them).

Instead of the episode being shown in the normal fashion, it is seen from the point of view of two ordinary technicians whose job it is to keep B-5 running. It isn't a glamorous job but Bo and Mack seem like two nice guys and the repartee between them strongly reminded me of Timon and Pumba from Disney's LION KING! I really am not kidding about this comparison. My wife watched the episode with me and when I pointed this out, she laughed and said she agreed 100%.

The problem, though, was that although the dialog between these two guys was sometimes cute and offered some insights, all too often it was cloying and self-serving. All too often, they'd look at Sheridan and make comments about how wonderful he was or how magnificent Delenn's smile was--like some drooling Babylon 5 fans at a sci-fi convention. It really got very annoying after a while and weakened the overall episode--one that SHOULD have been a lot better because the plot involving a probing invasion of alliance space was very exciting. The comments from these two guys got so sickeningly sweet that my wife kept making gagging noises after a while--and it really was pretty bad! Perhaps some of this could be because although Michael Straczynski wrote the vast majority of episodes, this one was not--and most of the non-Straczynski ones are duds in comparison. While this show was written by a big name in science fiction (Harlen Ellison) and he was one of those who helped Straczynski create the idea of Babylon 5, it really wasn't his finest work. For a better Ellison contribution, see the episode "City On The Edge of Forever" from the first season of the original STAR TREK--now THAT was a great Ellison story.

I've seen this ep dozens of times, if it of my favourite Eps of B5. It is written from the POV of two "salt n peppa" maintenance workers- Sort of like "Lenny and Squiggy" (of Happy Days) characters. Basically, what makes this great is Harlan's gift for taking the Mundane and mixing it with the Fantastic.

Raymond O'Connor and Lawrence LeJohn are "Mack" and "Bo" - Two regular B5 Maintenance joes - Who just happen to cross paths with all of the major B5 Season 5 players through the course of this 'sode. These guys are great Character actors and VERY well cast here.

Their insights are our insights, their comments are our comments. It was as if, these guys represented the viewers and fans of B5- Given a voice through Lenny and Squiggy/Mack and Bo. - So their comments are our comments. Like for example, their speculations as to what happened to Ivonova.

One of the best parts of this Ep is that the "Bo" character, respects the "Flight Jockeys" - The guys who drive the Star Furies - And secretly wants to be one of them- In one of the best eps for Byron, Bo is given his dream, by Byron.

As much as I disliked Byron's character, we never got to see this part of him that much - The part who, if approached earnestly, would grant you a boon if within his power.

During the first few eps of Season 5, as Byron is being introduced, you want to think, "this guy could be a good leader IF he just did things the right way" - But he constantly made mistakes, making enemies of Zack Allen and the rest of security, being in the wrong places at the wrong time and being imprisoned so that he could not intervene when the other "teeps" start acting out, and it did not help for Garibaldi to try to force him to help out his own little "Secret Agent Club" - If Garibaldi would have ASKED, instead of being Garabaldi...

And it also did not help for Zack to be jealous of Lyta, causing more animosity between the Teeps and B5 security. This 'sode occurs right after the teeps had helped thwart an invasion, but before they made further nuisances of themselves.

It's just a regular day on B5 - Medical Emergencies, Intruder Alerts, Sheridan being overprotective of Delenn, my favourite part is when Bo is given the gift of flying in a Star Fury by Byron- It is the best interaction between a "Teep" and a "Mundane" in the whole of Season 5, there is a real connection there, for both Byron and Bo. Byron could have done more like this, if he were allowed to, if he would have allowed himself to do it, instead of secluding himself and the other Teeps in Brown Sector.

But as JMS has said, he was trying to introduce a brand new kind of Prejudice. But this Ep was before all things went bad for the Teep colony of B5.

This episode was written by JMS, but the story itself was conceived by both JMS and the legendary Harlan Ellison (who is credited throughout the series as the conceptual consultant), which enticed me when I sat down to watch this. It was a very simple premise: an episode in which a wing of alien invader ships attacks and boards B5, but through the slice of life perspective of 2 maintenance workers. However, the writing in this episode delivers, making it a thoroughly entertaining bit of TV to watch.

This general premise reminds me very much of the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Lower Decks," which is, as this episode is, the show but viewed by lower personnel as opposed to the senior staff. However, this episode for me works better than "Lower Decks" did, as the two maintenance workers, Mack and Bo, are pretty interesting to watch, and have a strong dynamic. There is definitely plenty of humor in this episode, but also some very good space battles. The aliens in this episode were also interesting, wearing crimson helmets and firing laser weapons. They felt like a classic science fiction alien, such as would be found in pulp fiction of the 30s and 40s. They also kind of reminded me of the Sontarans from Dr. Who.

Overall, this was an interesting episode, one which could have failed but, due to the collaborative genius of JMS and Ellison, pulled off a genuinely captivating episode.