Episode 77

full
Published on:

24th May 2023

S4E1 - Amadeus Vibes Without the Musical Genius and Whimsy

Join Laura and Xhafer, two internet strangers as they get to know each other while making jokes about one of their favorite TV shows from their childhood, Babylon 5.

Laura and Xhafer are back from hiatus with their review of Babylon 5, Season 4 Episode 1: The Hour of the Wolf.

Transcript
Xhafer:

Hello and welcome to, who Are You, A Babylon five watch cast

Xhafer:

hosted by two friends who have gotten to know each other while rewatching.

Xhafer:

Favorite show from the childhood, Babylon.

Xhafer:

Five.

Xhafer:

I'm Chafe

:

And I'm Laura.

Xhafer:

know it's only been two weeks for you listener, but it's

Xhafer:

been over a month for Laura and I.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

You had a baby.

:

Yeah, there was a little bit going on.

:

It's true.

:

I think we recorded our last episode, like the night before

:

I was supposed to be induced.

:

Right.

Xhafer:

Yeah, that sounds right.

:

And we were gonna do two, and then I was like, man,

:

I just got too much to do.

:

I can't do this one.

:

So.

:

I think it's worked out great though because we're coming back from a month

:

long break with a whole new season.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

:

Whole new season of stuff, and yeah, there's been a lot

:

that's gone on in between for me.

Xhafer:

Yeah,

:

How about you?

Xhafer:

I mean stuff my hair was very briefly blue

:

Sorry I missed that.

Xhafer:

two weeks.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

I went to Space Dive in Detroit, which I totally would've talked about on

Xhafer:

pot if we were recording during then, which is a Artistic theater trou.

Xhafer:

They do lots of performance art stuff in the city.

Xhafer:

Basically rents out a warehouse downtown and turns it into the cant from Star Wars.

Xhafer:

It's crazy.

:

pictures about going to this.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

I was there with Ben, who also I have to talk about a little bit from

Xhafer:

my month off of recording with you.

Xhafer:

But yeah it was a great time.

Xhafer:

Yeah, just life, you know, nothing, nothing too serious.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

but uh, one of the things I did do with a lot of the extra free time

Xhafer:

from not recording about Babylon five for the last month was start a new podcast.

:

Fantastic.

Xhafer:

I've almost started two new podcasts.

Xhafer:

I'm still working at the details and we have to do a

Xhafer:

meet with Scott from grade 17.

Xhafer:

But that v podcast is probably happening right now.

Xhafer:

Science Point to Yes.

Xhafer:

And then Ben and I who's been on the pod before and I know we've brought

Xhafer:

up a bunch, and he's very active in our discord or uh, podcasting again.

Xhafer:

we've been recording for about a month at this point.

Xhafer:

The new podcast is gonna come out in about three or four weeks from now, I

Xhafer:

want to say, and the week we launch, he will be a guest with us on here.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

And so we'll talk about it then.

Xhafer:

But we are doing another kind of watch along style podcast, but with a big twist.

Xhafer:

And it's a lot of fun and I'm really, I'm really looking forward to it.

Xhafer:

It's been.

Xhafer:

Very interesting watching some of this TV show already.

:

Do you have a name yet?

:

Or you wanna leave it like mystery

Xhafer:

We have a name and I've got it registered and it's on pod

Xhafer:

trackers and stuff, but there's no episodes when you search for it.

Xhafer:

Nothing shows up.

:

Okay.

:

Okay.

Xhafer:

We have our theme song, which is actually the thing I'm most excited about.

Xhafer:

Because uh, Jeremy Siegel's still not accepted by friend request if you

Xhafer:

were looking for that status update.

Xhafer:

And so I tasked Ben with getting our theme song.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

as much as the great joke here would be is he sent a

Xhafer:

friend request to Jeremy Siegel.

Xhafer:

He accepted and got a theme from Jeremy.

Xhafer:

What actually happened was he on a lark, reached out to a band we really like,

Xhafer:

and they're not a huge band, but they are like, They do touring cross country, and

Xhafer:

I think they've done international tours.

Xhafer:

They are a funk band called Ripe, and one of our favorite songs from them

Xhafer:

is called Goon Squad, and it's just like, kind of like our little group,

Xhafer:

our friend group's, little anthem.

Xhafer:

And we reached out to them and we heard back from the c e o of their

Xhafer:

record label that were okay to use their song Goon Squad as the theme of

Xhafer:

our podcast, as long as we don't make money and give the band a shout out.

Xhafer:

So very excited.

:

Yeah, that's really cool.

Xhafer:

Yeah,

:

really cool.

:

You were so productive.

:

I don't feel like I was productive.

:

I think that people would tell me that I was produc.

:

I've been productive this

Xhafer:

would say you've been productive.

Xhafer:

I mean, like the,

:

I'm keeping a tiny human alive

Xhafer:

yeah, that's a big deal.

Xhafer:

They,

:

So,

Xhafer:

babies don't, I mean, they, they're a problem sometimes,

Xhafer:

you know, they've got a, this, I don't, nothing about this.

Xhafer:

So it just is instantly terrifying to me.

Xhafer:

So why don't you talk about it?

:

they have a lot of needs and uh, you just kinda have to go

:

down a checklist cuz you don't get to know exactly what they are Right.

:

That, that they want at any given time.

:

But she's, she's the most wonderful little baby.

:

I know all mothers say that, but.

Xhafer:

Mm-hmm.

:

she's perfect.

:

She is perfect in every way.

:

Um, we had to deal with some stuff in the first two weeks where she had

:

some pretty severe lip and tongue ties in her mouth and, If you've never

:

encountered this before, a listener don't feel like it's an obvious thing.

:

But sometimes babies are born and they have like little extra tissue in their

:

mouth where they can't eat very well.

:

And so we had to take her to a dentist and have her get a quick

:

laser surgery on both of those.

:

And that was kind of hard, but we, we'd been through the same thing with my

:

son, so we knew exactly where we were looking at and uh, It was much faster

:

to get her in than to get him in, and

Xhafer:

Mm-hmm.

:

it's been a lot better since I think this week is

:

like, Night and day difference.

:

Like we're really turning around.

:

She's eaten a lot better.

:

She's gaining the weight she's supposed to gain.

:

That's if you have kids and you uh, went through like the drama of the

:

pediatrician visits where they're going, oh, she's not gaining enough weight.

:

Like that's always a little bit fraught for mom because mom feels

:

a lot of feelings about failure.

:

But she's doing so great.

:

We're going to the pediatrician again tomorrow and hopefully she's

:

back where she's supposed to be now.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

:

but she's wonderful.

:

She only cries if she needs something.

:

She's not one of those babies that's just like screaming all the time for no reason.

Xhafer:

That's good to hear.

:

Yeah, that was my first baby, so I was really like, please, please, please

:

let me have one that's not all the time.

Xhafer:

Have you slept more than six hours in one stint?

Xhafer:

Sorry if that's a rough question.

:

No, I have not.

Xhafer:

I figured eight would've been a pipe dream, so I'd go for six,

:

Yeah.

:

Yep.

:

Nope.

:

Not even that much.

Xhafer:

Okay.

:

Four is about the most I'm getting right now,

Xhafer:

Okay.

Xhafer:

Are you doing four in a couple times a day though, or are you at

Xhafer:

least getting naps and stuff like?

:

Lots of naps.

:

I'll get like a four hour stretch in the night and then maybe another

:

two hour stretch, and then like a couple of naps during the day

:

if I need more than one nap.

:

But yeah.

:

But she, she sleeps really good when she is asleep.

:

Like she's not super fussy and, and even we've gotten to this point in the

:

night where she'll wake up and she'll need to eat cuz baby's, you know, tiny

:

stomach, they gotta fill that thing up.

:

All the time.

:

But she'll go right back to sleep.

:

It's not like she wakes up and wants to party in the middle of the night, so

Xhafer:

yeah.

Xhafer:

If I were to wake up and eat, it'd be a nightmare.

Xhafer:

That'd be, that'd be it.

Xhafer:

But I'm glad, I'm glad to hear that's not the case.

:

Yeah, no, she, she wakes up and needs to eat and then she's like, all

:

right, I'm good, and goes back to sleep.

:

So that's about the best you can hope for.

:

So we're really lucky.

Xhafer:

All right.

Xhafer:

Well I'm glad everything's gone well.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

You know, and I'm glad that we're back in the saddle.

:

Me too.

Xhafer:

For season four of Babylon five, we're starting off episode one.

Xhafer:

The Hour of the Wolf

:

Yeah.

:

Such a dramatic title.

Xhafer:

it is we get a finale recap.

Xhafer:

It's also an app's title.

Xhafer:

Given what?

Xhafer:

What they talk about The Hour of the wolf.

Xhafer:

That's nothing good.

Xhafer:

Happens in the middle of the night, right?

:

I, I laughed very hard when we got to the description of

:

the Hour of the Wolf and Yvonne's characterization that she's been living

:

in it for seven days or whatever.

:

I was like, girl, same.

Xhafer:

exactly.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

I thought it was apt given your circumstance.

:

It's just a perfect episode to come back

:

to.

Xhafer:

We get a finale recap to our new theme with that season four drip.

Xhafer:

Love this season four theme.

Xhafer:

It's my favorite of the five,

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

and there's no cold open.

Xhafer:

I don't recall this happening in an episode of Bebble on Five thus Far.

:

Yeah, it's just all recap, right?

:

I mean, we get Kar talking about the.

:

Sadness of ivanova and filling us in on where everybody's at.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Yeah, it's just last time ons.

Xhafer:

Nothing.

Xhafer:

There's nothing new to be said.

Xhafer:

But after this we do after the theme, we do move over and we see Yvanova's

Xhafer:

sleepless quarters uh, has her, Alexa runs down her meeting list.

Xhafer:

And I'm like, I am never setting this up.

Xhafer:

I,

:

I know, right?

Xhafer:

I do have a thing that admittedly is kind of like it, but

Xhafer:

it doesn't have my work meetings.

Xhafer:

I can ask when I wake up in the morning, I can ask, tell Google good morning

Xhafer:

and it will run through the weather.

Xhafer:

My estimated commute to work.

:

Oh, nice.

Xhafer:

Anything on my calendar that day, which is almost nothing.

Xhafer:

Always because it's my personal calendar.

Xhafer:

So the only stuff on there is all like, oh, you've got a concert tonight.

Xhafer:

Or something that I'm already aware of or like relative's birthdays or something.

Xhafer:

But I would never, ever think of tying it in with my work calendar.

:

Oh my gosh.

:

And like it's listing off for her emails, you know, that she's got sitting there.

:

And uh, currently at one month of maternity leave, I'm

:

sitting at 562 unread emails.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Is that all,

:

Well, we actually like took me off of most of the distribution list so

:

they wouldn't be filling up my inbox.

:

So this is just emails that were just sent directly to

Xhafer:

actual emails?

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Okay.

:

But they're also going to my boss, so he's handling those.

Xhafer:

After Ivanova gets this meeting list, we go to the league of Non-Line

Xhafer:

Worlds, who's like, so we won the war.

Xhafer:

Cool.

Xhafer:

Bye.

:

Yeah.

:

Mm.

:

Rookie mistake, right.

Xhafer:

We won one big battle, so the war is clearly over.

:

Yeah.

:

Yeah.

:

That's so shortsighted.

:

But it's just like politicians, right?

Xhafer:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

Over on Centri Prime.

Xhafer:

Lando meets with now Emperor Cart.

Xhafer:

Taja.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

A note from JM S'S name is supposed to invoke Colag.

:

Yeah.

:

I mean,

Xhafer:

Yeah.

:

yeah.

Xhafer:

Dude is pure chaos.

Xhafer:

Energy.

:

Yeah, he's got big like Amadeus vibes without like

:

the musical genius and whimsy.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

The hair too kind of fits.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Veer confirms events as perceived on Zaha Doom to Ivanova since he's

Xhafer:

kind of got a little bit of an insider track with the shadows through Londo.

:

Yeah.

:

Steven first looks different this season.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

:

He, he definitely like lost a little bit of weight or something.

:

Like, he seems different.

:

I don't know.

Xhafer:

for him.

:

Yeah.

:

I don't know how much time was in between filming, but he

:

definitely looks a little bit

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

He was in a movie and with Michael Keaton in like 1989 that came

Xhafer:

out the same year Batman did.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

I've been trying to find weird old movies that I haven't seen from the

Xhafer:

late eighties and early nineties.

Xhafer:

And not for anything in particular, but once I start, I have a feeling I'm going

Xhafer:

to stop pretty quickly because there's gonna be a bunch of problematic shit.

Xhafer:

But right now it's just a pipe dream of something I'm gonna

Xhafer:

do with my time eventually.

:

Speaking of problematic shit, like if we take a movie break

:

and watch a movie with Steven first, it's gotta be Animal House, right?

Xhafer:

Yeah, it does.

Xhafer:

Speaking of which, we have not addressed this at all on Pod because

Xhafer:

it all happened during break, but the Babylon five animated movie

:

Oh

Xhafer:

think is actually gonna come out just in time for our movie

Xhafer:

break episode for this season.

Xhafer:

And we haven't chosen one yet, so we might, we'll, we'll talk about it later.

Xhafer:

I

:

definitely gotta do a review episode

Xhafer:

We gotta do review episode right now.

Xhafer:

I have it very far away on the list.

Xhafer:

I put it at the end of Lost Tales in our viewing order, so it will

Xhafer:

be episode 149 of this podcast, which will air October 24th, 2024.

:

we're not gonna wait that

:

long.

:

We can't.

Xhafer:

that long.

Xhafer:

We've both seen the show.

Xhafer:

We're not one of those watch First Timer Babylon five podcasts.

Xhafer:

Those poor guys gotta wait a year and a half, two years

:

Oh, that's true.

Xhafer:

depending on where it lies and things.

Xhafer:

But yeah, maybe we'll do a special episode.

Xhafer:

We'll just cut it in the middle of stuff if there is a clear point

Xhafer:

for it to exist in the storyline.

:

Oh yeah.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

maybe we move it there.

Xhafer:

I have some suspicions on where it exists.

Xhafer:

I think the league and online podcasts met last week.

Xhafer:

I didn't get to sit in on 'em because I had completely forgotten, but to my

Xhafer:

credit, it's their fault for scheduling a podcast recording session the same

Xhafer:

day the new Zelda game came out.

:

Oh yeah, we were all over that too.

:

Like Aaron had pre-ordered it and he was like, let's go.

Xhafer:

I have put 30 something hours into that game and it's been

Xhafer:

like four days since it came out.

Xhafer:

Listener.

:

Dang.

:

Yeah.

:

Aaron has not gotten to do that.

Xhafer:

Well, has other concerns.

Xhafer:

I took time off work and just played that game just so.

Xhafer:

Yep.

Xhafer:

Anyways so we'll figure out where that's gonna land.

Xhafer:

Um, And if you want to talk to us about the animated movie, we'll do it

Xhafer:

in the Discord or on the next League of Not Aligned podcast gatherings.

Xhafer:

But yeah,

:

been some discord speculation about where it could be in the timeline.

:

Am I right?

:

Okay.

:

I

:

don't remember details.

:

I just remember I saw it.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

So we'll see where that ends up.

Xhafer:

Okay.

Xhafer:

Movie break.

Xhafer:

Veer.

Xhafer:

All right.

Xhafer:

Veer telling Ivan what was going on.

Xhafer:

We got back there.

:

Yeah it was a walk.

Xhafer:

Morden is waiting for Lando on Cent.

Xhafer:

Tori Prime.

:

Yeah.

:

Morton has developed the gray scale from this experience on Saha Doom.

Xhafer:

It's bad.

Xhafer:

It is.

Xhafer:

It is bad.

Xhafer:

He's picking chunks of his skin off

:

Mm-hmm.

:

Makes you Wonder if maybe George r or Martin had seen this episode of

:

Babylon five and it was like, yes,

Xhafer:

It makes me wonder if Mike Meyers had seen this episode of Babylon five,

Xhafer:

cuz besides the very badly burned joke we just made also he's like picking off

Xhafer:

the skin flakes like Goldmember does.

Xhafer:

So there's two, and I'm not, we're not gonna do two.

Xhafer:

Austin Powers drops back to back in, in under a minute, listener.

Xhafer:

But I want you to think about it, hear it in your head.

Xhafer:

Morton's not really making sense here.

Xhafer:

Lando gets told these shadows are gonna be flatmates on Centri Prime,

:

Hmm.

Xhafer:

And he's not happy about it.

Xhafer:

And him and Lao's machinations are what have brought Cartage into power.

Xhafer:

Lando knows this.

Xhafer:

Lando knows that this, at the end of the day, this is his fault right now.

:

Yeah, he made this bed.

:

Now he's lying at it.

:

It's not great.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

He is not pleased with the shadows moving in to Centara Prime.

:

So speaking of being unhappy with one of these elder races, these first ones

:

Dalen is not happy with Kosh Point oh.

:

Dalen, meets with Lida and Kosh in the gardens on Babylon.

:

Five.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Kosh 0.0 here always puts listener at the top of their skills on every resume,

Xhafer:

and he's just like, yeah, the league told you shit's done, so is just useless here.

:

Mm, that's a good word.

:

Useless.

:

And he doesn't care.

:

He

:

knows.

Xhafer:

no, no.

Xhafer:

We won the war, right?

Xhafer:

The shadows fucked off.

Xhafer:

I mean, they're never gonna be fully gone.

Xhafer:

So, good job team.

Xhafer:

This was a short one.

Xhafer:

As far as the shadow wars go,

:

Yeah.

:

And he's like, you know, we know Sheridan is possibly there,

:

but we're not gonna go help.

:

Why would we do that?

:

He threw a monkey wrench in our plans.

Xhafer:

Yeah, if you go to Zaha Doom, you die.

Xhafer:

So he's dead.

Xhafer:

Why are we questioning this?

:

Yeah.

:

but Leeta, we can tell, feels guilty about this whole thing.

:

She, she doesn't agree with Kosh point.

:

Oh.

:

She's feeling a little strife and turmoil and uh, she's

:

gonna go talk to Dylan later.

Xhafer:

Also missing still is Garabaldi.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

The only two characters who care that he's missing are Zach and Kar.

:

yeah.

:

It would be appropriate for Ivanova to express something about Garabaldi too.

:

Right.

:

But I don't think she does.

Xhafer:

she's not even really expressing much about Sheridan besides I'm covering

Xhafer:

his fucking job, you know, and it's really, she's got his job, a chunk

Xhafer:

of Gucchi, Gar Ali's job and her job, and she's doing all of them right now.

:

Mm-hmm.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

It's not like Franklin is gonna take up some security shifts here.

Xhafer:

You know, it's literally all on Ivanova and she just doesn't sleep and just works.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

But we get the shot of Kar in that hat.

:

Yeah.

:

It's cute.

Xhafer:

That is perfect.

Xhafer:

Zach calls Daffy Duck, the Egyptian God of frustration.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Chef's Kiss, it's beautiful.

Xhafer:

But Kar is like, I'm gonna go and find Garibaldi, cuz

Xhafer:

Garibaldi would go and find me.

:

Yeah.

:

He did a great favor for me once and I'm not gonna forget about him,

:

and that's a really, really nice sentiment from Kar.

Xhafer:

The great favor was of course, locking him away

Xhafer:

in a prison cell for a month.

:

Well, sometimes you need a friend who will walk you in a

:

prison cell for a month, right?

Xhafer:

Mm-hmm.

:

We've all been there.

Xhafer:

So when we were recording this podcast back in season one,

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

I referenced a bit of costuming that happens to demonstrate this

Xhafer:

show's dedication to continuity, and that is what happens here.

Xhafer:

So Londo gets a little bit.

Xhafer:

Of, Hey, where's my, my coat, my coat's missing.

Xhafer:

And someone's like, oh, well we had to take it to the cleaners.

Xhafer:

It was, you know, and he's just like, what the hell?

Xhafer:

So he grabs his old coat from season one, which he happened to have in the

Xhafer:

closet, puts it on, and then we see him, see the shadow ships fly over.

Xhafer:

Centura Prime from his vision in season one.

:

Oh

Xhafer:

So that whole little bit about him changing the coat was just

Xhafer:

to explain why he was in the old one and not the new one in his vision.

:

Yeah, that's brilliant.

Xhafer:

It's just the tiniest fucking thing, and they do it for like, it's 30

Xhafer:

seconds of bullshit for that, and it's

:

It also shows off, it also shows off Minister VII's, like,

:

he's rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic is Minister VII's job.

:

Right.

Xhafer:

Yeah,

:

Because he's stuck working for this lunatic.

:

And he, he, he acknowledges that car.

:

Taja is a lunatic and he is crazy, but he can't do anything about it.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

:

So I might as well have somebody's coat sent to the cleaners.

:

It's fun.

:

It works.

:

It works on a lot of levels.

:

Maori goes to see Emperor Carta

:

after these shadow ships show up on Centri Prime.

:

He makes a mistake of trying to touch Emperor Carta,

:

which I thought was a little.

:

He's obviously forgotten himself, right?

:

He's just so distressed by seeing these shadow ships.

:

He, he should not have made this mistake if he was in his right mind.

Xhafer:

no.

Xhafer:

Cartha explains that he gave them an island in exchange for godhood.

:

Yeah, just the island of Salini or

:

whatever.

:

It's nothing.

Xhafer:

just this island off in the southeast, whatever it was.

Xhafer:

It is the same story as Kar tells two seasons ago, though, about the

Xhafer:

shadows settling on the Narn home world

:

Oh,

Xhafer:

where

:

they give it to them?

Xhafer:

no, they just, they, the narn were too primitive back then.

Xhafer:

But it's the same like, This isolated unpopulated or, or very

Xhafer:

sparsely populated continent.

Xhafer:

We just, the, the shadows just take on the planet.

:

Yeah.

:

Yeah, but the narn didn't like

Xhafer:

the nu didn't invite them and they definitely suffered for it.

Xhafer:

But it is like it's supposed to mirror things That's not a

Xhafer:

mistake or a quit coincidence.

Xhafer:

Like they both, both times the shadows on these two worlds have

Xhafer:

taken this uninhabited continent.

Xhafer:

Off to the south, whatever,

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

which I always in my brain is like, it's Australia, right?

Xhafer:

Australia is our sparsely populated continent out in the southeast.

Xhafer:

Like that's the joke that we're making.

:

We'll have to hear what Yum, yum Pod thinks about that.

Xhafer:

We'll ask Ryan with a little Ossy, Ossy Ossie.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

All right.

:

Yeah.

:

Wado backs away from this whole conversation about Godhood.

:

He's realizing this is really, really bad.

:

He's going to let lots of people die so he can be a God.

Xhafer:

Mm-hmm.

:

And the afterlife, which may or may not exist.

:

Oh boy.

Xhafer:

he does get a sick burn in here though.

Xhafer:

He's like, when I'm a God, I will have the capacity to forgive you for your rudeness.

Xhafer:

For now, I will try and forget.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

I wanna get drunk and say that to someone.

:

Let me know when you do, just send me a text.

:

Uh, blonde Runs into Minister Reini in the hallway, and this

:

is where we find out that.

:

Perini is aware that there's a problem.

:

It's a problem he can do nothing about.

:

And he tells Londo that he's heard that the emperor has a, a room full of the

:

heads of people that questioned him

:

that he talks to every night.

Xhafer:

Yeah, just normal people stuff.

Xhafer:

Normal, normal, insane des pot stuff.

:

Yeah.

:

This is where, you know, you and I might think of a sick

:

burn that we should have said.

:

It's about something earlier in the day, you know, you ever do

Xhafer:

Yes, a

:

and you're like, damn, I

:

should

:

have said that

Xhafer:

it would've been, so good,

:

he's just burning this room full of heads with all

:

the things that he remembered.

Xhafer:

yeah, the, the roast of the former Prime Minister every night in there,

:

Uhhuh.

Xhafer:

After this we cut back to B five with Leeta and Kosh Point.

Xhafer:

Oh.

Xhafer:

She's got some free time, but no, the Volans are planning something.

Xhafer:

Londo wakes up veer to tell him to get on the next flight over as we see cart

Xhafer:

Taja talking to his heads of state.

:

Yeah.

:

Turns out that's real.

Xhafer:

Yeah, he tells him he had a good day and then he heads off

Xhafer:

and I'm done.

Xhafer:

All right.

:

So Lida goes to talk to Ivanova.

:

Who tells her about the title of the episode That this, this Hour

:

of the Wolf idea is a Russian idea that the hours of three to 4:00

:

AM is when nothing good happens.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

:

and her father would take a glass of vodka.

:

To try to keep the wolf away and not be up at three to 4:00 AM

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Uh, one thing that I did during the break right before I did my

Xhafer:

initial watch of this episode was I went to a Mountain Goats concert.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

And the lead singer uh, John Darnell briefly, actually talked

Xhafer:

about this hour at the concert.

:

Wild.

Xhafer:

Uh, He did not call it the Hour of the Wolf, but

Xhafer:

basically everything else is there.

:

Wow.

Xhafer:

Yeah, very prescient.

Xhafer:

Very cool.

Xhafer:

Kind of like life aligning moment.

:

Real coincidence.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

That was fun.

Xhafer:

It was like a little, like pause and had to like, that's kind of crazy, right?

Xhafer:

Like it's clearly a coincidence.

Xhafer:

Like it's only, it's only special because it happened in such rapid succession.

Xhafer:

Not that both things happened, but still fun.

:

I think Dalen would say that the universe was aligning for you.

Xhafer:

Yeah, probably.

:

It's lining some stuff up.

Xhafer:

LTA gives Ivanova the elevator pitch on a Sheridan Rescue

Xhafer:

mission which they call Len and then just go and do immediately.

:

Yeah.

:

We cut to hyperspace and White Star.

Xhafer:

Linear doesn't get anything on sensors, but LTA goes all black eyes.

:

Mm-hmm.

:

Yeah.

:

This is, this was funny because once I had my newborn, I'm looking at her eyes.

:

A newborn's like Iris and pupils is very large and you don't see a

:

lot of their white in their eyes cuz they're just, you know, their

:

eyes are kind of squinty and stuff.

:

And I was looking at her and I was like, she's got lead eyes.

:

She's got the eyes from the episode.

Xhafer:

a giant shadow head.

Xhafer:

I don't know how else to describe it in space.

Xhafer:

Hypnotizes the crew.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

As the ship turns around and jumps because of Linear's dead man switch.

:

Yeah, smart.

:

Linear is very smart.

:

What a good assistant.

:

You can delegate anything to linear.

:

This scene where they are being hypnotized by the shadow head, there's kind of a.

:

Shot composed.

:

That's just the three ladies

:

a couple of times.

:

So we see like Lida, Ivanova and Dalin like together in the scene.

:

And Owen looks up from his iPad cuz he's, you know, not watching Babybel

:

on five intently cuz he's eight.

:

But he looks up and he goes, is this a trip?

:

It's like, yeah, yeah.

:

It's a girls'

Xhafer:

Yes.

Xhafer:

This is the plot of the Hangover four.

Xhafer:

This was Sheridan's bachelor party on Zaha Doom.

Xhafer:

It was a real rager with a big bang, and has collected her bridesmaids

Xhafer:

to go get him, cuz since he's

:

Yeah.

:

I'd watch this.

Xhafer:

right, I would watch that movie a hundred

:

Mm-hmm.

:

10 of 10.

Xhafer:

Londo catches veer up on recent events.

Xhafer:

And gets him on board for the planning because they are gonna kill car taja.

:

Do you see the look on Vera's face in this scene?

:

Like he's been waiting for this for three seasons for Wao

:

to do a right thing for once,

Xhafer:

He wasn't expecting it to be Kill the Emperor, but hey, they're there.

:

but yeah, he's ready.

:

He's there.

:

I love it.

:

Ride or die.

Xhafer:

Over on the station, Ivanova still hasn't slept.

Xhafer:

She records a personal log about trying to come to terms with

Xhafer:

Sheridan's death, but then we see him at a campfire on Zaha Doom.

:

Yeah.

:

He's in rags.

:

He's lost his captain's bar.

Xhafer:

right.

Xhafer:

The whole deal.

Xhafer:

And this unknown alien who's clearly not a shadow and is something

Xhafer:

else comes up to 'em and they do our podcast intro to credits,

:

I knew we got this idea from

:

somewhere.

:

Yeah.

:

This alien, of course, we, we don't have his name yet, but the actor is actually

:

the same actor as I wanna say Mori.

:

Yardi.

:

Every time I wanna say Mori Yardi.

:

It's my Star Trek creeping in there.

:

Jack The Ripper.

Xhafer:

Yes, he is.

Xhafer:

I think this guy plays more individual characters than anyone else on B five.

Xhafer:

He's a bunch of stuff.

:

Oh, he's our Jeffrey Combs.

Xhafer:

Yes.

:

Except for that one time when we actually had Jeffrey Combs.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Well, that's the episode.

Xhafer:

We managed to review it in less time than it took to watch it.

:

Oh, weird.

Xhafer:

It's one of those ones where so much happens that it

Xhafer:

feels like nothing happens.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

Which happens in Babel on five a couple of times, and especially

Xhafer:

knowing the pace of the next handful of episodes, I kind of expect that

Xhafer:

feeling to continue for a bit.

:

Well, I think it's appropriate with the theme of the episode too,

:

being that like Hour of the Wolf and just kind of spinning your

:

wheels at three to 4:00 AM with your brain thinking too many thoughts.

:

And yeah, we, we've done a lot and gone nowhere, just like at three to 4:00 AM.

Xhafer:

Which is how I feel about this episode.

Xhafer:

On a scale of one to Babylon, five, I feel like we've done a lot and gone nowhere,

Xhafer:

uh, which is

:

so what does that translate to In numbers?

Xhafer:

a three.

:

Yeah.

:

Okay.

Xhafer:

It's, it's, it's not a bad app by any means.

Xhafer:

There's a lot of fun moments, but it just felt so jam-packed

Xhafer:

and we're at a point now where.

Xhafer:

They did not know about season five if season five was happening.

Xhafer:

That the exact moment has not hit us, but it is close.

Xhafer:

I think it's what they had already started production of season four when

Xhafer:

they found out that P 10 was going under.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

Um, And so knowing that and the accelerated pace things are about

Xhafer:

to just hit you know, this series slams on the gas and does two seasons

Xhafer:

well, it does a season, it does well.

Xhafer:

I think j m s has said that like what is episode 16 or 17 or something would've

Xhafer:

been the end of season four normally.

Xhafer:

And so we have an extra five or six episodes compressed into this space.

:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

it, it shows we're, I'm already feeling that that pressure.

:

Yeah, I really wanted more time to live in the whole Emperor Carta thing.

Xhafer:

We'll get there.

:

Yeah, I know we're gonna get more time with it, but I, you know, I

:

was really hoping for him to show up in season three, cuz I didn't remember

:

exactly when all that happened.

:

And I was like, come on, we need to see this whole drama because it's good.

:

And uh,

:

Now that we're just getting it in episode one of season four, I'm like, dang, I

:

wish that we could have lived in the whole centara intrigue a little bit

:

longer than what we're going to, if I'm remembering, you know, when plots plot

:

lines are wrapping up in this season.

Xhafer:

Yeah.

:

boy, I just wish we could have lived with this crazy guy a

:

little bit longer because, you know when now that we're in this area

:

of like prestige streaming, He's a real like Joffrey type for, to make

:

a Game of Thrones reference, or,

:

Any, you know, there's been several really good, bad guys on that show.

:

And I just wanted a little bit more development on that.

Xhafer:

Mm-hmm.

:

But

Xhafer:

Man, if we were doing this podcast six years ago, we could have had a great

Xhafer:

bit comparing it to Game of Thrones.

:

Yeah.

Xhafer:

Oh, well

Laura:

Yeah, that show definitely had some problems with compression

Laura:

at the end as well, didn't

Laura:

it?

Xhafer:

for sure.

Laura:

Pretty famously.

Laura:

I don't know that anybody in that fandom was happy with that.

Xhafer:

Mm-hmm.

Laura:

I think it's less noticeable with this show though,

Xhafer:

I mean,

Laura:

or it was at the time

Xhafer:

I think people had less of a voice then.

Laura:

Yeah, true

Xhafer:

I, I haven't read any of the Usenet stuff for season five, cuz

Xhafer:

we're not there yet, but we'll see.

Xhafer:

I.

Laura:

Yeah.

Laura:

There certainly were some people out there on the internet complaining,

Laura:

but it wasn't something that was in everyone's hands yet.

Laura:

Right.

Xhafer:

Yeah, not everyone had a Facebook account to bitch about Game

Xhafer:

of Thrones to all their friends.

Laura:

Yeah,

Laura:

So yeah, this episode is definitely a three for me as well.

Laura:

It's a very average five sets up a lot of stuff.

Laura:

I like that.

Laura:

A lot of table setting, and I think we're gonna get even more table setting in

Laura:

the next episode, if I remember right.

Laura:

Like we, we are not gonna go places just yet.

Xhafer:

Mm-hmm.

Laura:

W will you tell me about the next episode?

Xhafer:

So next we have season four, episode two.

Xhafer:

Whatever happened to Mr.

Xhafer:

Garabaldi,

Xhafer:

Kar finds trouble while searching for Garabaldi Sheridan

Xhafer:

hovers between life and death.

Laura:

Nice.

Laura:

I'm looking forward to it.

Laura:

I wanna know what happened to Mr.

Laura:

Garibaldi too.

Laura:

Hopefully Kar finds him.

Xhafer:

All right, well, we'll find out next week, but before we get

Xhafer:

there, let's go ahead and thank Jeremy Siegel for our lovely theme music.

Xhafer:

I do appreciate it, Jeremy, and I totally don't hold the

Xhafer:

pending fend request against you.

Xhafer:

At this point, it's a better bit than anything else.

Xhafer:

Thank you for that.

Xhafer:

You can find more Jeremy's work at Jeremy Siegel 40 two.bandcamp.com and on Spotify

Xhafer:

as nuclear Jaguar, which I just got a push notification on my phone yesterday

Xhafer:

that the next album had dropped from him.

Xhafer:

So I have to go listen to that.

Xhafer:

But yes, I don't know what month it is.

Xhafer:

It might have been April and I'm just behind, but it did,

Xhafer:

it did show up on my phones, so

Laura:

Yeah.

Laura:

April's definitely out and then.

Laura:

At the time this is coming out, it should be, may should be very close.

Xhafer:

If not out soon.

Laura:

Mm-hmm.

Xhafer:

Thank you to Angry Duck time machine for our podcast artwork.

Xhafer:

You can find them on Instagram and then thank you to all of you

Xhafer:

listeners for tuning in joining us on our journey through Babel on five.

Xhafer:

You can chat with us more on our discord.

Xhafer:

Sometimes we show up on the league of not online podcasts and we don't have

Xhafer:

any other projects, Aaron, currently, but we are going to very soon.

Xhafer:

And by we, I mean me, but if you got a podcast going,

Xhafer:

Laura, I'd totally listen to it

Laura:

Yeah.

Laura:

Not, not it right away.

Laura:

Yeah.

Laura:

Other fish to fry.

Xhafer:

for sure.

Xhafer:

All right, well we'll see you next week.

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About the Podcast

Who Are You?
A Babylon 5 Watchcast
Join Laura and Xhafer, two internet strangers as they get to know each other while making jokes about one of their favorite TV shows from their childhood, Babylon 5.