“A Voice in the Wilderness, Part I”
Written by J. Michael Straczynski
Directed by Janet Greek
Season 1, Episode 18
Production episode 120
Original air date: July 27, 1994
It was the dawn of the third age… B5 has been getting some strange readings from Epsilon III, the planet they’re in orbit of, so a geological survey team heads out in a shuttle, led by Dr. Tasaki. As it launches, Ivanova expresses concern that they haven’t heard anything from Mars in the latest batch of dispatches from Earth. That will probably be important later.
The shuttle has to turn back when an energy discharge from the planet destabilizes them. Tasaki isn’t sure what caused it, but he’s excited to go back and figure it out. A steady stream of energy pulses is coming from the planet now, which Sinclair orders Ivanova to keep an eye on.
After Delenn finishes a negotiation with Sinclair and Mollari, she returns to her quarters to find her old teacher and mentor Draal waiting for her. She is delighted to see him, though she is less delighted to learn why Draal is there. He is “going to the sea,” which appears to be a Minbari euphemism for suicide. Draal says he no longer recognizes Minbar and doesn’t want to be part of it anymore. However, he also says he’s not in a rush to get to the sea in question, and intends to spend as much time with Delenn catching up as he can, which placates her somewhat.
A breaking news report from ISN reveals that there has been rioting on Mars, with the Free Mars movement getting their hands on heavy weapons. Sinclair then sees the image of an alien asking him for help.
Sinclair and Ivanova discuss the Mars situation over breakfast. They figure that Garibaldi—who lived and worked on Mars prior to taking the post on B5—is beside himself. That is, if anything, an understatement, as Garibaldi is a mess, worried about what happened to his ex, Lise Hampton. He can’t get a signal through, so he goes to Winters to ask if she can talk to the secret Psi Corps base on Mars. Winters—who is already nonplussed by the fact that Garibaldi keeps showing up in the elevator when she wants to take it—is not thrilled that Garibaldi even knows about the facility. But she says she’ll talk to them and see what she can do, but no promises.
After being told very explicitly by Ivanova not to go into the atmosphere, Tasaki takes his shuttle into the atmosphere. (Ivanova sent Starfuries to escort them this time, but they aren’t designed to function in an atmosphere.) Sure enough, some missiles fire on the shuttle, which the Starfuries are (barely) able to distract or destroy. The shuttle and Starfuries head back to the station, where Tasaki reports that the missiles were fired from a crevasse that’s about five miles deep, and which wasn’t on the original survey—but which may have been created by the recent seismic activity.
Because it may be a first contact situation, Sinclair and Ivanova take another shuttle down to investigate what’s happening on Epsilon III. It was chosen as the site for B5 precisely because it was uninhabited, so they need to investigate. They fly down, avoiding the missiles, and disembark. They need breathing apparatus, and—after finding a corpse—are able to get past a brutal security measure. Eventually, they come across a massive machine whose components are miles long.
Winters gets in touch with the Mars Psi Corps base. They’re not happy that Garibaldi knows about the base—and they’re not even sure he really does, just that he suspects and is trying to verify it—but they do check on any mentions of Hampton. However, they can find no mention of her among the people who are accounted for. Garibaldi is confident that she’s okay for no obvious reason except for uncharacteristically cockeyed optimism (or denial).
Another bit of seismic shock hits Epsilon III, cutting Sinclair and Ivanova off from the shuttle. However, they find an alien attached to the machine: this is Varn, the same alien Sinclair and Mollari saw images of. He says they’re all in really big trouble. They free him from the machine and he leads them to the shuttle by another route so they can get him to medlab on B5.
As the shuttle takes off, the jump gate opens, and a big-ass ship comes through…
To be continued…
Nothing’s the same anymore. Proving that he doesn’t understand that he’s on a TV show where stuff like this wouldn’t be mentioned without a plot reason, Sinclair dismisses Ivanova’s concerns about the lack of news from Mars as probably being a glitch.
Ivanova is God. This section gets its title from Ivanova’s words to Tasaki after he disobeyed her instruction not to go into the atmosphere of Epsilon III with his shuttle: “I’d like you to take the time to learn the Babylon 5 mantra: ‘Ivanova is always right. I will listen to Ivanova. I will not ignore Ivanova’s recommendations. Ivanova is God. And if this ever happens again, Ivanova will personally rip your lungs out.’”
The household god of frustration. Garibaldi was dating Hampton on Mars, but when he got the offer to take the gig on B5, it led to an argument because she didn’t want to leave Mars.
If you value your lives, be somewhere else. Like far too many old people, Draal doesn’t like the way Minbar is going, because it’s not like it used to be, and these kids today don’t got no respect, and in my day Minbar was Minbar, dammit!
In the glorious days of the Centauri Republic… Mollari sees Garibaldi being all despondent crying into his water in the Zocalo, so he cheers him up with the story of an exotic dancer he saw perform whom he shortly thereafter married.
Mollari also is apparently completely bumfuzzled by the human song known as “The Hokey Pokey,” as he is having tremendous trouble determining how, exactly, that’s what it’s all about…
Though it take a thousand years, we will be free. While G’Kar does not appear in the episode, his nonexistent ears were likely burning at Mollari complaining about how difficult he is to negotiate with and how inevitable the Centauri-Narn hatred is and shall remain.
The Corps is mother, the Corps is father. Psi Corps has a sooper-seekrit base on Mars because of course they do. Garibaldi knows about it, because of course he does.
No sex, please, we’re EarthForce. Garibaldi obviously carries a big ol’ torch for Hampton.
Welcome aboard. Louis Turenne debuts the recurring role of Draal. He will continue in the role for Part II, but afterward, starting in season two’s “The Long, Twilight Struggle,” the role will be played by John Schuck. Turenne will return in the third season’s “Convictions” in another recurring role (one without heavy prosthetics), that of Brother Theo.
Curt Lowens plays Varn, who will also return for Part II. Jim Ishida plays Tasaki
Trivial matters. This is B5’s first two-parter, in part inspired by the strong sales of the VHS tapes of the two-hour pilot in Europe and Japan, and so they were encouraged to do another episode that could be similarly sold.
Two future recurring characters are first referenced in this episode: Garibaldi’s ex, Lise Hampton, who will appear in Part II, and Delenn’s fellow Grey Councillor (and fellow former student of Draal’s) Rarthenn, who will appear in “War Without End.”
This is the only mention of Mollari’s other wife, who would appear to predate the three arranged-marriage wives he mentioned back in “The War Prayer.”
The notion of Free Mars getting their hands on heavy weapons was first mentioned in “Eyes.”
The echoes of all of our conversations.
“It’s a Russian thing. When we’re about to do something stupid, we like to catalogue the full extent of our stupidity for future reference.”
—Ivanova to Sinclair as they go on their mission.
The name of the place is Babylon 5. “And so here we are: victims of mathematics.” It’s really hard to judge this episode on its own, for much the same reason why it’s hard to judge most any first part of a two-part episode: it’s all setup.
More to the point, it feels like it’s two separate episodes mushed together unconvincingly in order to make the two-parter that Warner Bros. could then sell as a two-hour VHS tape. This is not helped by a particularly weak cliffhanger. Rather than end on Sinclair and Ivanova finding Varn, they instead end on Sinclair and Ivanova having already rescued Varn and heading back to B5, thus draining any possibility of suspense. And the actual cliffhanger is Garibaldi saying “What the hell?” as a ship comes through the jump gate—a ridiculously commonplace occurrence.
Still, there’s some fun stuff here. While Garibaldi’s worry-about-his-ex storyline is kinda meh, the scene where Mollari cheers him up is beautifully played by Peter Jurasik and Jerry Doyle, with the added punchline of Mollari wandering off and sticking Garibaldi with the bill. That punchline, by the way, is funnier than Mollari’s attempted dissection of “The Hokey Pokey,” which didn’t tickle my fancy as much as it might have others, though you can totally see how someone unfamiliar with humans would be completely confused by it. Hell, I’ve been hearing it all my life, and I’m fairly certain I’m human, and I’m completely confused by it…
Mira Furlan beautifully plays Delenn’s affection for Draal, while Louis Turrene has a quiet dignity as Draal. And I adore Jim Ishida’s Tasaki and wish we’d seen him again, as his enthusiasm for science is adorable and infectious.
Plus, we’ve got the “Ivanova is God” speech. Honestly, the whole episode is worth it for that…
Next week: “A Voice in the Wilderness, Part II.”
