{"id":7090,"date":"2018-11-29T13:00:52","date_gmt":"2018-11-29T21:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/?p=7090"},"modified":"2018-11-21T18:42:36","modified_gmt":"2018-11-22T02:42:36","slug":"mark-watches-babylon-5-s03e04-passing-through-gethesmane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/2018\/11\/mark-watches-babylon-5-s03e04-passing-through-gethesmane\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Watches ‘Babylon 5’: S03E04 – Passing Through Gethesmane"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the fourth episode of the third season of Babylon 5<\/i>, a monk is plagued with mysterious and violent images. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch Babylon 5<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Trigger Warning: For extensive talk of capital punishment, consent<\/b><\/p>\n

This was\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 a lot. And I know it was designed to be a deeply uncomfortable examination of capital punishment, of justice, of revenge. By the end of this episode, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not sure I have a succinct answer to everything brought up here. Part of that is because JMS did not write this to be easy. Brother Edward had spent eight years doing good for others; that much is undeniable. But it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s undeniable right alongside the misogynist killings he did. He took nine lives, and he ruined countless others. So, was there justice in the personality wipe? Are there some acts so heinous that nothing<\/i> can ever be done to held accountable for them?\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Those questions are complicated all on their own, but they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re even more difficult to answer once you look at all the people affected by what Brother Edward had done. Before I get to that point, I do want to acknowledge how I was utterly convinced of another solution to the mystery here. I thought there were a lot of red herrings in this episode, so my theory went in a\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 well, a very interesting direction? See, I thought the news broadcast that Garibaldi had watched was a clue that\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know. Maybe that<\/i> serial killer\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153wiped\u00e2\u20ac\u009d personality had somehow been transferred to Brother Edward\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s mind? And thus, we were meant to see the random Centauri as a red herring, because THAT was the actual clue, and LOOK, I TRIED. OKAY. DON\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T JUDGE.<\/p>\n

However, this episode instead challenges the notion of how complete a personality wipe is. There might be a poetic sense of justice to this form of capital punishment, and I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really argue about the saved cost. The death penalty, at least here in the states, is an immense drain on the budgets of various state governments, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a good<\/i> thing that prison populations are reduced, rather than deal with what we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve got now. (For-profit prisons should be 100% illegal, y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all, THEY ARE WALKING NIGHTMARES.)\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But did the victims\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 families get to participate in the sentencing of Charles Dexter? And even if they did, it felt clear to me that at least one of them wanted more than a mindwipe. So, does that mean this person was denied justice? Are the desires of a victim above all other concerns? And does that still make the mindwipe ethical because<\/i> it is so poetic?\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s something attractive in the idea of a criminal being sentenced to work for the public good, but there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s another question raised by this episode: Does that work count<\/i> when the criminal cannot remember why they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re doing it? In hindsight, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s deeply uncomfortable to think about how Brother Edward\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s personality is constructed. His memories, his desires, his motivations\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 all of them were made<\/i>. Thus, his attrition is done without personal knowledge. Charles Dexter won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t ever know that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s doing good for communities he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s harmed; as far as the technical definition, he \u00e2\u20ac\u0153died,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d right?<\/p>\n

Thus, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a complicated landscape here that immediately begins to unravel once one of the victim\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s family members hires a Centauri to trigger Edward on purpose. (And I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m unsure on this point, but were the other surviving family members real? Did they follow \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Malcolm\u00e2\u20ac\u009d to Babylon 5<\/i>? If so, then that means they all backed down on the murder, as Malcolm stated. Why did they change their minds? Was Malcolm\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s idea attractive on its own, but once faced with the idea of actually<\/i> crucifying someone, they panicked?<\/p>\n

I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know. I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re supposed to know. We see this conflict from so many sides, y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all, and each one muddies the waters. We know from Brother Theo\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s anecdotes that he had never<\/i> had a better monk in his company, and we know that what Charles did was one of the most vicious crimes imaginable. So where does this leave these characters? Sheridan, Garibaldi, and Brother Theo are completely heartbroken over Brother Edward\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s murder, but truthfully, they only knew one of the men who happened to be in that body. Is it really fair of them to perceive of him this way when they never knew who he originally was? As for Brother Malcolm, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a tragic irony in his fate, but he also willingly chose this path. He knew exactly what he was doing, and he didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t care. Revenge was all that mattered to him, though from his perspective, this was justice, wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t it? All of this is told through a story heavy on Christian imagery, particularly Jesus\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s sacrifice, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an interesting wrinkle to the story. Was Edward accepting his fate a moral act, one deserving of comparison to Jesus\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s sacrifice to atone for the sins of others? In this case, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d argue that the scope is massively smaller. This was about Edward atoning for his own<\/i> sins.<\/p>\n

AND THEN THERE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S LYTA ALEXANDER MAKING THIS EVEN MORE UNNERVING. Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all, I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know what the ending of this episode even means. Was there actually a Vorlon in her body the whole time? Or had Ambassador Kosh just given her something that allowed her body to heal and helped her process oxygen better? DOES SHE HAVE FUCKING GILLS<\/i> NOW, Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ALL??? What does that<\/i> mean??? I AM UNCOMFORTABLE. Actually, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m uncomfortable for another reason: wow, Lyta was real<\/i> quick to perform a nonconsensual mind scan on another person. Was anyone else super disturbed by that? It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s done so casually when normally, everyone would be far more reluctant with it.<\/p>\n

Anyway, HI, THIS SHOW IS FUCKED UP.<\/p>\n

The video for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Passing Through Gethesmane\u00e2\u20ac\u009d can be downloaded here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n

– My YA contemporary debut, ANGER IS A GIFT<\/a>, is now out in the world!\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong>If you’d like to stay up-to-date on all announcements regarding my books, sign up for my newsletter<\/a>! DO IT.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"