I never did like telepaths anyway, they seemed to be too "generic scifi addon".
The telepaths were an integral part of the story from the
opening moments of the pilot when Sinclair is called to the docking bay to meet the newly-arrived Lyta Alexander. "Generic sci-fi add-on"? No, teeps in
Star Trek, where the privacy and other implications of telepathy were never explored, were generic SF add-ons.
B5's telepaths, from Lyta, to Talia to Bester and Ivanova, were as critical to the over-all story as Centauri and Narn, as Londo and G'Kar. Or are semi-reptilian aliens also just a "sci-fi add-on". Doesn't what you
do with an SF idea matter most? (Given how few original ones there realy are?)
Of course, they played a major role in the Shadow War back then... But... I just hope that TMoS will not be about telepaths. I hate half of Season 5 because of Byron and telepath "crisis". It's utterly pointless.
1) The teep thread only extended through 8 of 22 episodes, and was only the "A" story in about 5. So much for "half the season".
2) That "half season" would have been considerably more dramatic and involving had Claudia Christian not decided to leave the series. Those 8 episodes were
supposed to pay off the latent telepthy thread that had been built up around her since
her first appearance (when practically the first thing she does is snub new telepath Talia Winters - in marked contrast to Sinclair's warm greeting for Lyta.) Don't blame the teeps if a lot of the dramatic force was sucked out of that thread. Blame Claudia for bailing at the 11th hour. (Even Byron becomes easier to understand when you realized he was intended as someone that Ivanova could be attracted to - briefly - as a substitute for Marcus.)
3) One reason the whole thing seemed "pointless" is that the
Crusade debacle wrecked JMS's plan to continue exploring the aftermath of the Teep War in the new series while telling the full story of the War itself in a then-planned feature film. That part of S5 was partly a matter of
setting up future events that would have been covered on-screen down the road. It isn't JMS's fault (or the Teeps
) that TNT went nuts and Warner Bros. lost faith in the viability of the
B5 universe.
Of course your preferences are your preferences. No one can argue over emotions or matters of taste, because they are purely personal and not subject to fact checking and the like. But when you cite supporting evidence or reasoning to explain your dislikes, that
evidence and
reasoning is fair game for a challenge.
Regards,
Joe
