EpDis: Endgame

Refresher Links:
Lurker's Guide Main Page for Endgame
Lurker's Guide Extended Synopsis for Endgame

A. All thumbs up!

18 votes for A, none for anything else so far?

People really like watching Marcus die, don't they.

I personally enjoy seeing the Senator and crew storming down the hallway to confront Clark.

Heck, seeing the Aggamemnon come through that fireball, how could we vote any other way? For me, that's the visual equivalent of "If you value your lives, be somewhere else."

Jan

Heck, seeing the Aggamemnon come through that fireball, how could we vote any other way? For me, that's the visual equivalent of "If you value your lives, be somewhere else."
Jan

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That's my favorite part of this one too.

I dunno. It never felt as "WHAM!"y as, say, Severed Dreams or Z'ha'dum. Maybe if JMS hadn't been so rushed to get everything finished...

I dunno. It never felt as "WHAM!"y as, say, Severed Dreams or Z'ha'dum.

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Maybe not, but it's pretty darn close, IMO.

Heck, seeing the Aggamemnon come through that fireball, how could we vote any other way? For me, that's the visual equivalent of "If you value your lives, be somewhere else."

Jan

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I still get a shiver down my spine, every time I see that. And it's not just that Sheridan and the Aggamemnon survive. It's that their Earthforce adversaries, former comrades, have come to their rescue, against Clark. They are united again.

A-. An epic conclusion, although a bit of a stretch / liberty with the ramming speed thing. JMS would call it "a TV moment."

I liked the sudden change in tone at the end. "Yaay we won... hooray... oh fuck... Marcus..."

Elipsis said:

A-. An epic conclusion, although a bit of a stretch / liberty with the ramming speed thing. JMS would call it "a TV moment."

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I've never had a problem with that line... whenever it is used. To me it's just a way of saying "bring the ship up to a velocity that will take out whatever we smack it into", which is essentially what he's trying to achieve and "give me ramming speed" is a lot less mealy mouthy... which is what you need when you are short of time.... and realistically given the tense situation it's the most likely way someone would say it.,

Galahad said:

I've never had a problem with that line... whenever it is used. To me it's just a way of saying "bring the ship up to a velocity that will take out whatever we smack it into", which is essentially what he's trying to achieve and "give me ramming speed" is a lot less mealy mouthy... which is what you need when you are short of time.... and realistically given the tense situation it's the most likely way someone would say it.,

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It's not the line that bothered me, it's the concept that of all the dozens and dozens of ships only Sheridan could get to the last defense grid platform... especially given that 15 seconds prior about 30 ships were clustered together.

One minor thing that niggled me (and I appreciate it's a clever trick to keep the budget low), is the fact that they re-used at least one clip of a starfury pilot from Into the Fire and just altered the CGI backdrop... it'd probably been done several times before but for some reason that particular instance was painfully obvious. As i said though, it's only a niggle anmd doesn't stop me enjoying it.

It's a great episode. I especially loved the last-minute rescue before the ramming.

This episode has it all - action and space battles, dramatic personal moments, and multiple arc elements coming together in a firework (often literally in the visual effects!). The acting is very well done indeed - Carter gives Marcus' face such a bleak look over Ivanova's impending death that he looks as if he's already dead inside. Then he looks hopeful as she's taken back to B5, her "last best hope", he thinks optimistically. Just looking at him throughout is heartbreaking. And which viewer doesn't dream of a love like that - a person who's willing to give his life for his beloved?! Much as I hate to see him go and miss him afterwards, I can't help but admire the way his character goes out with a bang - though not in battle or fight, as could have been expected.

Franklin shows mixed emotions as well, having accepted the fact that the telepaths cannot be saved and so are to be used as weapons. I wonder, do any of them survive the attack, and can they be saved by Earth facilities, as he hopes?

The expressions on the faces of Sheridan and the Agamemnon's captain as they realize that they will lose their lives to save many more on Earth are deeply moving. But it's wonderful to see that highly dramatic shot of the ship emerging from the explosion - saved by their former enemy general.

There's also the ISN anchor who's come back, unsuccessfully fighting her emotions as the station is liberated. I like that they used the same actress to give a feeling of continuity. Interestingly, the German episode title is the translation of the phrase that's used by her, and similarly by Sheridan before that: "Sons and daughters of Earth".

Interestingly, the German episode title is the translation of the phrase that's used by her, and similarly by Sheridan before that: "Sons and daughters of Earth".

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Really? I'm not up on how the show was tweaked for non-American broadcasts, so I didn't know that. But I think that's really cool. I think B5 has some very excellent episode titles, but this one -- "Endgame" -- was always one that seemed a letdown, for me, as title. "Sons And Daughters Of Earth" is a much more dramatic title; I like it a lot more.

Various countries and language areas have different policies, so there is more than one possibility for watching English-language shows in other countries. Some (especially smaller countries/areas, where the dubbing process is too expensive to pay off) keep the original dialogue track and add subtitles; here in Germany (a relatively large country, with additional same language areas in neighbouring countries) almost everything is translated and dubbed. That means the voices may be different than those of the original actors, something that can change the feeling of a character.

Also, not everything can be translated accurately into another language; sometimes it simply cannot be said in the same way, sometimes there is no equivalent for idiomatic phrases or cultural references. There is always change, and usually loss, in translation, which is why I enjoy having the DVDs now, with the option of choosing the original sound/language track.

Title changes can be interesting to analyze - there are cases where the translated title gives away too much in advance, or is a boring repeat of something or other that says nothing. In this case, the translators picked up a good word turn to use.

This is a great episode. One of my favorites, for sure. A fitting conclusion to the "battle for Earth" storyline.

All the space battle stuff is dramatic, exciting, and just plain excellent. I love Sheridan in this. He's always the orator, and this battle is of course a great opportunity for a speech. Grand speeches before battle can easily come out cheesy, but it works here. I love it. And of course, like eveyone in this thread, I love the scene of the Agamemnon coming out the other side of the fireball, saved at the last minute by their former opponent. What I think is interesting about this bit (aside from the fact the Agamemnon seemed to be surrounded by other ships, which has been commented on above) is that it seems to take Sheridan a second to decide to sacrifice himself and his ship. Is the hesitation because of the crew? He didn't hesitate at Z'Ha'Dum, and he didn't hesitate when it came time to send Ranger Ericsson to his death. Why is he hesitating here?

It's indeed sad that Ivanova doesn't get to be at the final battle. And Marcus, alas. I blame Lennier, really He could have lied more convincingly. Not that I wanted Ivanova to die ... Incidentally, was it ever revealed anywhere what exactly she was dying of? Some kind of massive internal injury, I'm assuming? Not that it matters much. Ah this would have been the perfect tragic story if she'd been in season 5. It's been almost 20 years and I still haven't been able to get over it.

The trick with the frozen telepaths was quite unethical. I'm surprised Franklin went along with it. Sure, it won them the war, and as he says in this episode if they'd lost the war, they would have been dead anyway (well, sort of), but that doesn't make it right. He didn't want his notes on Minbari biology to go towards the creation of weapons to be used against them in the Minbari war, even if that meant the annihilation of the human race. But he's ok with using non-consenting human beings as weapons and sacrificing (or potentially sacrificing as the case may be) their lives to save other lives? You can't convince me that that would ever be an ethical thing to do. Not if it saves thousands, millions, or billions.

If you MUST change the title for translation purposes, "Sons and Daughters of Earth" is indeed a great choice. I can't stand dubbing and consider myself quite fortunate, not ever having lived in a place where it's usually done.

I forgot to add: That scene where the old ISN reporter comes back on the air is one of my favorite Babylon 5 bits ever.