Contents: Overview - Backplot - Questions - Analysis - Notes - JMS

Overview

Lyta tests the limits of the Shadows' newly-discovered weakness. Dr. Franklin goes on a journey to discover his place in life, and meets a singer in Downbelow. The new Ambassador Kosh arrives on the station. Erica Gimpel as Cailyn. Jennifer Balgobin as Dr. Hobbs. Patricia Tallman as Lyta Alexander. Robin Sachs as Na'Kal.

P5 Rating: 7.89

Production number: 318
Original air week: August 18, 1996 (UK)
                   September 30, 1996 (US)
DVD release date: August 12, 2003

Written by J. Michael Straczynski
Directed by Kevin Cremin

An episodic soundtrack is available.

Backplot

• Lyta has previously carried "pieces" of Kosh with her. This is most likely what she was doing at the end of "Passing Through Gethsemane."
• At least ten Narn ships have survived the battle with the Centauri, damaged but able to be repaired. A new Narn fleet seems to be gathering.
• It takes the White Star 20 minutes to recharge its jump engines after they've been taken offline and their energy diverted into the weapons systems.
• The Vorlons are a long-lived race, are relatively few in number, and death is a rarity among them. It had been a very long time since a Vorlon had died.
• Franklin is a Foundationist. The Foundation apparently borrows customs and beliefs from various cultures, perhaps in the belief that no one people has all the right spiritual answers.

Unanswered Questions

• What was the message the Vorlon ship showed to Sheridan?
• Lyta, a P5, could barely hold one Shadow ship at bay. How much telepathic energy is required to defeat a Shadow ship? What effect would a high-rated telepath like Bester have on a Shadow vessel?
• Is Lyta still "only" a P5, or has she been enhanced by her relationship with Kosh?
• Why does the new Vorlon insist on being called Kosh in public and private? What does he mean by his statement that "We are all Kosh?" (see Analysis)
• Where did the pattern in Kosh's quarters come from, and what does it mean? (see Analysis)
• Why did Lyta bleed from her eyes during the battle? Was it just the strain, or is there some deeper explanation?
• Why didn't the forces of Light take the destroyed Shadow craft in tow for analysis?
• Why didn't the Minbari cruiser open fire on the "held" shadows?
• Lyta required 'line of sight' to the Shadow ship in order to attack it. Did the Minbari telepaths also need to see the Shadows in order to attack them?
• How did the Vorlon ship know where to find Sheridan?
• Does the "piece" of Kosh that may be left behind in Sheridan have anything to do with Sheridan's place as "The One?" How might it fit in with Kosh's statement that if Sheridan goes to Z'ha'dum, he will die? It may explain Kosh's final words to Sheridan: "As long as you're here, I'll always be here."
• Do the Shadows know a piece of Kosh survived?
• Does the different style and color of the new Vorlon ambassador's encounter suit denote anything?
• Is this the same Vorlon who was on Minbar in "War Without End?"
• How did G'Kar manage to persuade the other races to come to Sheridan's aid in his battle against the Shadows?
  

Analysis

• The strange pattern which the new Vorlon sees on the screen in Kosh's quarters could be a representation of Kosh's death. It could be construed as a diagram of two or more Shadows attacking a Vorlon. It could also be construed as a diagram of Shadows being accompanied by a human. Presumably the human would be Morden, and the images were burned into the wall in some form, silhouettes, when Kosh was killed.
• It's clear that Lyta believes, based on her vision, that Sheridan may hold part of Kosh within him. What that means -- for Sheridan, for Lyta, and for Kosh -- remains to be seen.
• How did the piece of Kosh get into Sheridan's mind? If it was the result of Kosh's contact with Sheridan, might G'Kar also have a piece of Kosh following their contact in "Dust to Dust?"
• More disturbingly, might Morden also have a piece of Kosh, present as he was at Kosh's death? Perhaps that was why the Shadows brought Morden along; they wanted someone there who could carry part of a Vorlon.
• In "All Alone in the Night," Kosh tells Sheridan, "I have always been here." Could he perhaps have been referring to Sheridan's mind, implying that Sheridan has carried a piece of Kosh for quite some time?
• Might the statement that "We are all Kosh" suggest that the Vorlons exist more as a collective whole than as individual entities? (See also JMS speaks.)
• The tide may be turning, now that it's clear that telepaths are effective weapons against the Shadows, especially considering that all major races except the Narn have telepaths. (Which begs the question: what will the Shadows' response be?)
• Telepathic control over Shadow ships is tenuous at best, and may be limited to preventing them from attacking; the three ships being held by the Minbari telepaths were free to flee the scene when G'Kar and the others arrived.
• In "Revelations," G'Kar told Na'Toth that when Narn warships jump into normal space, they're briefly out of contact because of the energy drain of the jump engines. Yet the G'Tok was able to fire on the Shadow warship before it even left the vortex. Does that mean that the weapons systems take less energy than establishing faster-than-light communications? Perhaps Narn FTL communication involves the use of the jump engines to beam a signal into hyperspace, and the effect in "Revelations" was simply a matter of the jump engines needing to recharge from the ship's main power source.
• The Shadows now probably know that the White Star is capable of solo jumps. It seems Sheridan has decided that keeping that capability a secret is no longer of strategic importance ("Matters of Honor.") Or perhaps he figures that the secret is out by now anyway, perhaps as of Delenn's emergence from a jump point in the White Star in close proximity to Babylon 5, and thus presumably in full view of a large number of people ("Severed Dreams.")
• The new Kosh's ship is reddish in color, as is his encounter suit's eyepiece, perhaps suggesting the link between Vorlons and their ships.
• Every sentient race, according to G'Kar, has food resembling Swedish meatballs. The Narn call it "breen." Since the Vorlons have manipulated all the younger races, perhaps Swedish meatballs are really a Vorlon delicacy, part of an intricate plan to defeat the Shadows through culinary unity.

Notes

• In Australian aboriginal cultures, a "walkabout" is a ritual in which a young man goes on a solitary journey through the wilderness in an attempt to learn more about his own character and strength.

• Metazine, the painkiller Cailyn used, was also used on Sinclair to keep him unconscious in "And the Sky Full of Stars."

• In the initial UK broadcast, as well as the first-run US broadcast, Patricia Tallman's first name was misspelled "Patrica" in the opening credits.

• JMS wrote both songs in this episode. See jms speaks.

• When the ship bearing the new ambassador arrives, Sheridan originally says, "Welcome to Babylon 5." This line was edited out later.

jms speaks

• As it happens, as soon as I finish the two-parter, this week, the next script will get a lot more into Lyta and the Vorlons and all that jazz.

• It came out pretty well; it's exceeded by Shadow Dancing, Z'ha'dum and Rock, but it ain't bad.

• Re: "Walkabout," thanks...of the final 5, it's not at the top, but it ain't bad. If you happen to be out of the house this coming Thursday, and miss "Grey 17 is Missing," you miss a little, but not a lot. It's okay. But the ones after that are just *killer*.

• Was this supposed to come before "War Without End?"
  Correct. Initially we'd wanted to put Walkabout in first, but that would have meant airing only WWE1 in that sweeps period, and having to wait until the fall for part 2, which seemed not only excessive but remarkably stupid. So we reversed the shooting/airing order to accommodate that, and the fact that we knew we'd need a LOT of EFX in WWE1, and this would give us time to do it properly.

• Will the order be corrected when TNT airs the series?
  Not really, because it doesn't make *that* much difference to risk confusing them about it....

• About Patricia Tallman's misspelled name
  WHAT?!?!

  Are you sure? We changed it on my copies here.....

• (slow burn)

  We delivered a corrected print ages ago.

  Someone gon' DIE.

• It's fair to say that Lyta has been...aided, slightly, in her abilities. But I'm not ready to pull the trigger on that one for a while yet.

• The new Vorlon arrives in Walkabout.

• Is the new ambassador the same as Kosh?
  Actually, no, the replacement isn't Kosh, as you say, it's another Vorlon, with a very different personality...the "we are all Kosh" is more of a conceptual thing....

• I'd say this Kosh has a bit more of an edge to him....

• Will we ever find out what was written on the side of Kosh's ship?
  What, do I look like someone who can speak Vorlon? Oh, sure, a few words, mainly "Where is the bathroom" and "What's that smell?" but to translate something like that...pfsh, please.

  (Answer: probably not.)

• What did the ship say?
  "Welcome to Hawaii."

  There was apparently a hideous malfunction...they never talked about it thereafter....

• Franklin isn't gone from the show; he's in the very next episode, in a major way, and has a big part in "Shadow Dancing." He just has a lot to work out right now.

• "When is walkabout a legitimate choice, and when is it a cop-out?"

  When you're more afraid of what you're running *to* than what you're running *from*.

• It's not widely known -- I guess mainly because I haven't ever mentioned it much -- but from time to time I've written songs. Mainly the lyrics; I know how the music should sound, but I'm incapable of reading music...I think it's the same mental glitch that hits me when I try to do certain kinds of math. "X is a numerical value." "No, X is a letter, 7 is a numerical value." I can't ever seem to make the one equal the other in my head. Similarly, a black note on a piece of paper isn't the music...anyway, it's a glitch.)

  So when I write songs, and I have a specific melody I'm hearing in my head, I'm invariably placed in the humiliating position (since I can't play a musical instrument) of humming it, or somehow trying to suggest it to the music-person. Suffice to say it looks really goofy and stupid.

  Anyway...despite this, I do sometimes write songs, and like to keep my hand in, as they say. I did two songs for an ABC-TV prime-time Real Ghostbusters special, did a few songs that have been recorded by small groups (you've never heard of any of them, trust me), another song that, much to my chagrin, is apparently still being used in church songbooks (and that's all I will ever say about that)...and when I decided to do a show with a singer for B5, I wrote a couple of songs for that one, with Chris Franke providing the music.

  They're bluesy, Billie Holliday kinds of songs, updated slightly. I'm actually very pleased with how they came out (Erica Gimpel, one of the cast members from Fame, plays the part and sings the songs). Several folks around here want either or both songs to come out on the next B5 album, but I"m loathe to do so, on the theory that the soundtracks work better in the style we've already used, all instrumental. (There've even been some inquiries from music people who've heard the songs about releasing them commercially, but that would mean adding about 30 seconds to each song to make them airplay compatible, and I'm not sure I want to take on the extra hassle just now.)

• Who did the music?
  I wrote the lyrics, Chris Franke did the music.

• Are the songs linked to elements of the story?
  Not coincidences, no, but not quite as tightly linked as you suggest. Thematically indicative more than anything that points to story specific elements.

• I figured it might be cool to continue the song over the credits. That happens one more time this season.

• Here's what I think is a bit of cultural short-sightedness. Everybody keeps saying, "well, if they had that kind of music, shouldn't it have been shown to be an oldies bar or something?"

  Look at classical music for a moment. Goes back to Beethoven, Brahms, Bach and lots of composers whose names don't even begin with B. And earlier. Now, I don't mean to alarm anyone or startle anyone with this revelation, but classical music is *still being written and performed* hundreds of years later. Not old stuff, new stuff, of that school and in that style. The orchestral suites in the Star Wars movies are strongly based on classical compositions...is that "oldies" stuff? You've got one of the longest running musical plays running now in London, in "Phantom of the Opera," a *new* composition (well, mostly, knowing how Webber works).

  Jazz and blues kinda formally began in the 1920s and 1930s, but its roots run back to spirituals and african-american music in the 1800s. And it didn't just stop suddenly in the 1930s. There's still new material being written in that style now; so should Stevie Ray Vaughn's albums or performances have been labeled "oldies?" After all, it's sixty years later and more.

  Certain musical styles will stay with us for a long, long time. Not performances based on old stuff, but new material in that vein, for those forms that have shown themselves to be enduring. 200 years from now, in addition to other forms, you're still going to have original blues songs, original classical compositions, original jazz, original compositions in the style of gregorian chants, on and on and on.

  It's odd when people try to apply illogical rules to the future that don't apply now; no one said, as noted, that a Stevie Ray Vaughn concert should be billed as an "oldies" event, or an oldies bar...even though it's over half a century since serious blues started going...it's just silly.

• Vorlon ships come out backwards when possible to help decelerate.

  Pat has interesting eyes...they're slightly larger than is the norm, and they take some getting used to. Those eyes are one of the things that beckoned to me to cast her...they're the eyes of a telepath, who sees more than should be seen. They're terrific eyes.

• So, were the shadows following Lyta, or were they an image on the wall?
  They weren't following Lyta. We were in Kosh's old quarters, and those images were burned into the wall when Kosh died. Bear in mind that she doesn't actually meet the new ambassador until the next scene.

  It was the same effect you would get in a massive energy burst that "paints" shadows on the wall, which only he could see.

  Those are two different scenes; the first one takes place in Kosh's quarters, the second one out in the hallway. Perhaps that could've been made clearer....

• Garibaldi said he went over Kosh's quarters with a fine-toothed comb. How'd he miss the image?
  Watch the scene again; the first time the new Vorlon looks at the wall, he sees nothing; the next time he looks at it, the lens wide open, the image is somewhat distorted around the edges, and now he's seeing the afterflash. Only certain types can see it.

• Is there significance to the different eye-piece colors of the two Koshes? Why no one would suspect Kosh suddenly having a different encounter suit?
  No signicance to the eyepiece color; no reason to assume Vorlons only have one encounter suit their entire life.

• Actually, the new Vorlon's encounter suit is more purple/red than green. The design is a matter of form following function.

• On differences between the two Koshes:
  They're not that far apart in age, but yes, Kosh would be a bit older.

• The look of the new Vorlon was developed by John Vulich of Optic Nerve based on my suggestions. I got in after a bit and redesigned/sketched the headpiece a bit, and recommended the colors used. We're actually doing a bit of fine-tuning on the new Vorlon prior to next season.

• Re: the new Kosh...yeah, the look is intentional. I worked with Optic Nerve to get the new lines right, messed with their sketches until I had what I wanted. It's very effective in some lights, less so in others, but the sense comes across.

• Is the new Kosh really Ulkesh from the novel "To Dream in the City of Sorrows?"
  The new Vorlon was Ulkesh, yes...the Kosh thing was meant in a Vorlon philosophical sense. They ain't wired up like the rest of us.

• Sheridan commands the Army of Light, Delenn as second. If the AOL speaks with one voice on something of importance, they have to be listened to. When Sheridan put himself on the front lines, he was then taking on the role of soldier, not commander. They also felt it risked leaving them without said commander if it went wrong.

  Bear in mind that their orders in *no* way compromised his actual mission, or over-rode his decision. They were sending along a secondary mission to keep an eye on the primary mission. I don't see a conflict here.

• Just some comparisons to illustrate...during WW II, the head of naval operations for the Japanese fleet insisted on being on board during several of their more pivotal missions. His subordinates insisted that additional ships be sent as escorts given his importance to war strategy. That's a very rigid military structure, but when *all* the subordinates get together on something, to go against it causes more problems than it's worth.

  Even within the context of a conventional military situation, there's flexibility. If a commanding officer gives an order which is immoral, illegal, or against the rules of engagement, a subordinate can refuse to implement that order, even give a countermanding order which, depending on the situation (such as a nuclear missile firing) would take precedence over the CO's order (though you'd first have to relieve the CO of command, and if you do that, you'd darned well better be prepared to back it up with every legal and moral means at your disposal, or it's mutiny). Heck, it was just this kind of dilemma that was at the core of the movie "Crimson Tide," and was brought up in the recent war crime trials going on investigating what happened in Bosnia, with a soldier being asked why he didn't refuse to carry out an order to kill civilians.

  Ain't a lot of black-and-whites in the world, but a whole lotta greys.

• There's nothing dangerous at all about a fleet coming out of hyperspace or a jump point together.

• The UK cut Lyta's line from the Shadow battle, "Burn, you bastards!"
  They cut that? How curious...I didn't know that. From what I'd seen of British TV, some shows use the word bastard like I use a comma, they're ubiquitous....

• Why not use Bester in the test?
  Because Bester is on Earth or Mars, can't just drop everything and come when beckoned, and it would take 3 days to get there, and they were in kind of a hurry to test this. Besides, P10s are very few and far between; they're more likely to have lower levels as their main weapons, so best to see what impact those will have.

• The fragmentation or fractionalizing is also visually cued by the last shot of Franklin through the window, split into many versions of himself.

  Re: the hand-on-shoulder gesture, from Marcus it was an upbraiding, stop-him motion, whereas from Sheridan it was one of congratulation.

• It's imagery, yes, of his still being fractured, still looking to find himself, as it were.

• Why isn't Sheridan setting up propaganda to help turn the Shadows' allies, such as Earth, against them?
  There's really no need for propgaganda. By about now, everybody out in this part of space knows the situation...and what's going on back home is secondary to winning the war. Also, you can be sure that if they set up a network -- and who has time in the middle of a war -- you can be sure Earth would find some way to jam it.

• You're the leader of an isolated space station with a quarter million inhabitants, who need air, food, supplies, space, support. You no longer have ties to Earth, no support from there, no money, so you have to rely on whatever docking fees you can get from other worlds. You're in the midst of a war in which you have few resources, little money, allies that have a tendency to turn on one another, nobody's giving you a break, your position is tenuous as hell, you're constantly undermanned, shorthanded....

  Now you tell me where the heck you're going to get the time, resources, money and manpower to launch a propaganda operation, which if you're going to broadcast (and what's the point otherwise?) on an interstellar basis is going to require extensive and expensive facilities, broadcast repeaters, tacyhon carrier wave generators to get around the time-delay aspects, writers, directors, broadcast engineers, spokespersons, propaganda specialists, psychologists, technicians, camera equipment, space in which to PUT all of this stuff...on and on and on.

• The Minbari could help with the propaganda.
  For starters, having just had a MAJOR WAR with the Minbari, which nearly wiped out Earth, and many folks back home *hating* the Minbari...do you think for one second that they're going to believe a word of what the Minbari say to them? Do you think the government would allow this to go through unjammed? Hell, EarthGov would have a field day with this..."See? It's all alien propaganda, just like we told you, they're trying to destabalize Earth."

  Second, I don't think the Minbari have the propagandists, writers, directors, and others needed to put together a propaganda network, and would find the whole idea immoral to begin with...and a couple of paragraphs of text are meaningless...Earthgov says "it's not true," and it's your word against theirs. That's why you must have absolute, unvarnished PROOF, otherwise it blows up in your face, which any journalist worth his or her salt knows.

• Does the Army of Light have access to any of the Minbari's resources?
  Yes, they do...but bear in mind that the Minbari are currently having their own problems. The Grey Council has fallen apart, the Military Caste (as we'll see in one of the next episodes) is having some serious doubts about how the Religious Caste is handling things, and that much of the support given Earth (by way of B5) has been covert; the White Star program was launched in secret, and the greater amount of the Minbari population aren't aware they're so much "in bed" with the humans (as it were). As far as they're concerned, we're apparently necessary to the plan, but not much more than that. So I think they wouldn't be warm to the notion of extending their services overmuch to Earth.

• Is the White Star more powerful than a regular Minbari cruiser because of the Vorlons' involvement in its design?
  The Vorlons were cooperating in the recent past, yes, and it still takes a couple of Minbari cruisers under most circumstances to take out an immobilized shadow vessel, though one can do it if the firepower is concentrated and prolonged.

Originally compiled by Jason Snell.

Last update: May 27, 2024