Classics: B5 - The Gathering

Plot Synopsis:

(Or the major points, at any rate. There is also quite a bit of exposition that has little to do with the primary plot.)

"I was there at the dawn of the Third Age of Mankind. It began in the year 2257 with the founding of the last of the Babylon stations located deep in neutral space. It was a port of call for refugees, smugglers, businessmen, diplomats, and travelers from a hundred worlds. It could be a dangerous place, but we accepted the risk because Babylon 5 was our last best hope for peace. Babylon 5 was a dream given form - a dream of a galaxy without war where species could live side by side in mutual respect. Babylon 5 was the last of the Babylon stations. This is its story.

At the start of this pilot movie, Babylon 5 is well on its way to becoming an active port. Cmdr. Sinclair is already on the job averting inter-species mating incidents, stopping dust traffic, and welcoming new arrivals, including Lyta Alexander from the Psi Corps. Lt. Cmdr. Takashima, meanwhile, has her hands full dealing with Ambassador G'Kar of the Narn, who is quite peeved that a Narn supply ship has not been cleared for docking. Takashima informs G'Kar that the ship's captain won't submit to a weapons search. She mentions that the Narn have invaded a few border worlds and indicates that G'Kar's people are held in suspicion for this reason.

Much of the senior staff is especially preoccupied with the impending arrival of Kosh, the ambassador from the Vorlon Empire. No one knows much about the Vorlons, as they are extremely secretive. Ambassador Delenn of the Minbari, who is on friendly terms with Sinclair, offers some information that her people have gathered on the Vorlons, but this apparently sheds no further light on the mysterious race.

A short time later, Kosh arrives unannounced, two days earlier than anticipated. Upon Kosh's arrival, G'Kar suspiciously becomes far less belligerent and orders the captain of his supply ship to submit to the necessary search. In the meantime, Garibaldi chases Ambassador Londo Mollari of the Centauri down at the casino and informs him that he is expected to show up at the reception for Kosh. Londo seems far more interested in gambling, however, and begs Garibaldi to spot him some cash. Londo eventually launches into story about his world's conquest of the Beta system before Garibaldi finally shuts him up and extracts a promise from Londo to attend to his diplomatic duties.

On his way to meet Kosh, Sinclair is delayed by a power failure in his transport tube. When he finally gets to the airlock, he and Garibaldi find Kosh on the floor. They can't tell if he's alive or dead because of the encounter suit. They take him to the Med Lab, where Sinclair convinces Dr. Ben Kyle to open the encounter suit despite the Vorlon government's orders not to do so.

Eventually, Dr. Kyle discovers that Kosh has been poisoned by an unknown agent. The assassination attempt now confirmed, Sinclair locks down the station, and speculation starts to fly as to Kosh's assailant. G'Kar opines to Delenn that the Centauri might be responsible and tries to convince Delenn to enter into an alliance with the Narn. Delenn refuses, remarking that G'Kar's perspective is colored by the Narn's history with the Centauri. G'Kar mocks the Grey Council's surrender at the end of the Earth-Minbari War, and, in response, Delenn attacks him with a weapon that can increase gravity to many times normal. G'Kar backs off. Concurrently, Garibaldi questions Londo. Londo says he was in the casino when Kosh was poisoned. He claims that a man named Del Varner offered to cover his bets, then left him in the lurch. He waxes nostalgic about the Republic once again before Garibaldi leaves him to his brooding.

Dr. Kyle finally suggests to Takashima that Kosh be telepathically scanned. Takashima is reluctant to break the rules - this apparently got her into trouble while she was stationed on Mars - but eventually, she agrees. Takashima and Kyle then convince Lyta Alexander to assist. When she scans Kosh, she sees Sinclair poisoning Kosh via a skin tab.

As Sinclair is now the prime suspect, Earth Gov pulls him off the Babylon 5 Council, and Takashima is put in his place. The ambassadors conduct a hearing to decide whether Sinclair should go to trial. G'Kar plays prosecutor and manages to extract from Dr. Kyle that the poison came from the same sector that Sinclair's lover Carolyn has just visited.

Garibaldi tells Sinclair he doesn't trust Lyta's testimony. He mentions that Lyta has been seen with Del Varner, who, he has discovered, has been indicted by the Earth Alliance for tech running. Garibaldi thinks Varner is involved in the frame-up somehow. He pursues the lead on Varner and finds him dead. Autopsy soon reveals that Varner has been dead for 36 hours. But Garibaldi has seen him far more recently, which means there's an imposter aboard.

Meanwhile, G'Kar moves in council for Sinclair to be deported to the Vorlon homeworld. Londo votes with him unwillingly - as we later learn, G'Kar has threatened to reveal a dirty secret in Londo's family history if he doesn't materially cooperate with G'Kar's plan. Delenn abstains, and Takashima votes no. G'Kar reports that the Vorlons have said yes; Sinclair will be deported for trial in 12 hours. After this disastrous council meeting, Sinclair seems almost resigned to his fate. He tells Carolyn that he would rather sacrifice himself than see the mission of Babylon 5 come to naught. He shares with Carolyn his experiences at the Battle of the Line and says that he never wants to have the experience of losing his people again.

In the Med Lab, a person who appears to be Lyta walks in, tries to shut off Kosh's life support, and attacks Dr. Kyle. Investigation later reveals that Del Varner was in possession of a changeling net, a high energy piece of tech that can project any image the owner chooses. The Lyta that Kyle saw - and the Varner Garibaldi saw - were both fakes. Realizing this could be the key to proving Sinclair's innocence, the crew tracks down the energy signature of the changeling net, and Garibaldi and Sinclair go after the source. In the resulting fight, Garibaldi is shot, then dragged into the poisonous atmosphere of Alien Sector. Sinclair goes in after him and an assailant steals Sinclair's mask. Delenn rescues Garibaldi and Sinclair before they suffocate, then Sinclair leaves Delenn to tend to Garibaldi and goes after the perpetrator. As a newly arrived Vorlon fleet prepares to open fire on the station, Sinclair and the suspect struggle until Sinclair finally throws the man into an electric grid. The changeling net fails, and the suspect is revealed to be a Minbari. The Minbari tells Sinclair he has a hole in his mind before blowing himself up in one last suicidal move. The resulting explosion knocks the station off of its axis and Takashima has to fire the thrusters to get it back into position.

In the aftermath, Delenn presents to Sinclair a chit with information on the Minbari who framed him. Sinclair subsequently discovers a connection between the dead Minbari and the Narn government. In response, he invites G'Kar over for a toast to peace, then informs G'Kar that he has just swallowed a transmitter by which Sinclair's friends can track his every move and warns him not to try anything else to endanger the station or its mission. Later, Sinclair reveals to Garibaldi that he was lying to knock G'Kar off balance.

The reception for Kosh finally takes place; Sinclair, however, leaves the reception early. Delenn follows, and Sinclair tells her what the Minbari said to him before his death. Delenn lies and tells Sinclair that his 24 hour loss of consciousness during the Battle of the Line is nothing he need be concerned about.

Overall: 5.7 - A good idea that is marred by an overabundance of exposition and a largely mediocre slate of performances.

Writing: 6

The basic plot is pretty good here. It effectively sets up the mystery of the Vorlons, the question of what happened to Sinclair during his missing 24 hours, the Minbari's propensity to share information with the humans on strictly a need-to-know basis, and G'Kar's initial role as the scheming aggressor. Unfortunately, this movie is also weighed down by a lot of clumsy exposition. For example, when Lyta Alexander arrives, Sinclair leads her to her quarters by way of the Alien Sector, and we are treated to a minute or two of explanation regarding the Alien Sector's capacity to provide environments for diverse species. Granted, that's pretty neat, but does it really move the plot? I'd say no. The upshot: because of digressions such as this, The Gathering turns out to be pretty difficult to slog through (or explain comprehensively), which is bad form for a pilot.

Acting: 5

This pilot also suffers from quite a few rather abysmal performances. I'm one of those B5 fans who actually likes Sinclair and Michael O'Hare, but here, O'Hare is simply not convincing in his leading role; there is just no life in his portrayal, which is sad, because if you separate the words JMS wrote from O'Hare's performance, Sinclair turns out to be a bit of a bad ass (if you'll excuse my French). I also do not care for the performances put in by Tamlyn Tomita (Takashima), Blaire Baron (Carolyn), Patricia Tallman (Lyta), or Johnny Sekka (Dr. Kyle); none of them sounded natural to me. Indeed, the only actors who manage to rescue this movie from a below-mid-range score on the acting rubric are those playing the ambassadors and Jerry Doyle. The highest marks go to Peter Jurasik, who, despite his occasionally wandering accent, does manage to capture the poignancy in his character from the start. And I promise I'm not just saying that because Londo is one of my favorites.

Message: 6

Moral messages are largely absent in The Gathering, as it is more a whodunit than anything else. I do appreciate, however, the ways in which this movie telegraphs how very difficult - nay, impossible - it will be to preserve the peace. The Vorlons seem quite trigger happy, the Narn ambassador is untrustworthy, the Minbari ambassador is definitely hiding something, and the Centauri ambassador is frankly unreliable. Optimistic mission statements aside, it's going to take something other than idealism to wrangle this crowd - something that Sinclair demonstrates right away in his clever manipulation of G'Kar. How refreshing to see that Sinclair is a pragmatist first and foremost.

Highlights:

SINCLAIR: I wouldn't. You know the rules about crossing species. Stick with the list.
TRAVELER: What are you, a bigot or something?
SINCLAIR: No, but... obviously you've never met an Arnasian before. After they finish, they eat their mate. - Bwah!

G'KAR: When I learned of your arrival, I ran a genetics scan of your records. Most impressive! A sixth generation telepath!
LYTA: Actually, it goes back further than that, but that's when Earth Central started keeping track of people with psi capability.
G'KAR: We have no telepaths among my people - a genetic oversight, I suppose. One which you could help correct. I am empowered to compensate you quite handsomely for your genetic background. The process would be either a direct mating - you and I - or a donation of vital cells from which we could clone a replica. Yes, obviously cloning is less efficient since we have to grow the clone, so payment would be proportionately smaller... and we'd still have to fuse your genes with our own, and that would take even longer. The direct mating is far more... cost effective. Now - would you prefer to be conscious or unconscious during the mating? I would prefer conscious, but I don't know what your... pleasure threshold is. - Nice pick-up line, G'Kar.

LONDO: I'm not here to make trouble. Do you know why I am here? Hm? I'm here to grovel before your wonderful Earth Alliance in the hopes of attaching ourselves to your destiny, like... What are those fish called on your planet that attach themselves to sharks?
GARIBALDI: Remoras.
LONDO: Yes. You make very good sharks, Mr. Garibaldi. We were pretty good sharks ourselves once... but somehow... along the way... we forgot how to bite. There was a time when this whole quadrant belonged to us! And what are we now? Twelve worlds and a thousand monuments to past glories... living off memories and stories... selling trinkets. My God, man - we've become a tourist attraction. See the great Centauri Republic! Open 9 to 5, Earth time. - This is here because Peter J. nailed it - and because it's important for later.

(After Sinclair lies and tells G'Kar he's just swallowed a tracking device...)
GARIBALDI: Commander, do you know the kind of tests they'll put him through trying to find a transmitter that's not there?
SINCLAIR: (nonchalantly) Yes. - LOL!