Endgame Problems (Spoilers)

[B5JMS Poster]

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From: "Andrew H. Litkowiak" <andylit at starnetinc.com>
Date: 14 Oct 1997 14:52:28 -0400
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As with 419, Endgame shows great plot problems brought on by rushing the
story. 

The absolute worst was the business of smuggling the telepaths aboard
the EA destroyers. You would have me believe that on 30 seperate ships,
not one cargo handler or quartermaster would happen to notice the giant
freezer cases with frozen bodies clearly visible through the glass? Nor
be even slightly disturbed by the PSICORP logos stenciled all over the
place? Not one handler went to his CPO and asked "Gee Chief, I've never
seen one of these before. Where should I put it?" Sorry folks, but JMS
bit the big one on this part.

The fleet is within jammer range as it approaches earth. We run into a
couple of major flaws here.

1) Marcus deserts to return to B5 to save Ivanova. Sheridan feels there
is nothing that can be done because radio contact is not possible due to
EA jamming. Why not detach a single Star Fury to get beyond jammer range
and warn B5 via radio? Or send it dashing back to B5 to warn the staff
in person? Or a shuttle? Or one of the non-aligned world ships. Is one
ship going to make a difference? I think not. 

Mega screw up. It just doesn't work. Sheridan would have immedietly
authorized dispatch of a courier. Jammers are old technology and
doctrine would dictate the use of couriers as a regular fallback.
Military commanders have been dispatching couriers as a fallback since
the first semaphore tower was captured way back when. WWI saw land lines
cut, WWII saw radio communications fail, the future will see hypercom
jammers. Secondary lines of communications are not something a commander
forgets, even in the heat of battle, which Sheridan was not at the time
of this mistake.

2) The Agememnon is about to ram the defense grid satellite, conveying
Sheridan and crew to certain doom. At the last moment, the Apollo saves
the day. The General says "We were monitoring the situation" or words to
that effect. 

HOW??? No communication is possible through hyper space due to earth
jamming. The Apollo is in Mars orbit, crippled, all comm is out. They
fixed their gear, were able to "monitor" the situation in earth orbit,
even though jammers kept the good guys from communicating, and hypered
in to the precise point in earth orbit to save the day. Give me a break.

Look, I love this show. But part of what I love about it is JMS's
insistance on avoiding the grade B Sci Fi movie crap. The effects of
season compression are painfully evident, as they were throughout much
of season 4. Ohhh, what could have been had there only been time!

Andy Litkowiak

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From: jmsatb5 at aol.com (Jms at B5)
Date: 15 Oct 1997 01:43:22 -0400
Lines: 91

Okay, one general response here...people are seeing rush where in many cases
 there is NOT a rush.  Look, pay attention here: WE'RE IN THE FOURTH ACT OF THE
 EARTH CYCLE.  Like the fourth act of an episode, you have to really start
 cranking.  You want it to be at white-heat once you hit the ground.

What's in Endgame, and most of Between... was always going to be there, with or
 without a 5th season.  I made my trims in the period PRIOR TO these episodes,
 for the most part.  

This is the culmination of something we've been building now for three years,
 and I'm going to make it as damned fast-paced as I can.  

So don't go into this assuming it was rushed...it's *fast*, and that's the
 difference here.  

People complain when we do character stories that the arc isn't moving fast
 enough...people complain that it's moving too fast when the arc is in full
 gear...sombody get a concensus going here, okay?

Now, to the other points, described as "flaws":

>The absolute worst was the business of smuggling the telepaths aboard
>the EA destroyers. You would have me believe that on 30 seperate ships,
>not one cargo handler or quartermaster would happen to notice the giant
>freezer cases with frozen bodies clearly visible through the glass? 

In something like this, you don't move unless you have the main quartermaster
 at the Mars base ON YOUR SIDE.  You stuff it all into cargo loaders and
 crates, and ship it up.  Have you ever seen military shipments?  I looked into
 this, and security for big crates like this is done *at the point of
 shipping*.  So that one's down.


>1) Marcus deserts to return to B5 to save Ivanova. Sheridan feels there
>is nothing that can be done because radio contact is not possible due to
>EA jamming. Why not detach a single Star Fury to get beyond jammer range
>and warn B5 via radio? Or send it dashing back to B5 to warn the staff
>in person? 

>Mega screw up. It just doesn't work. Sheridan would have immedietly
>authorized dispatch of a courier. Jammers are old technology and
>doctrine would dictate the use of couriers as a regular fallback.

Okay, here's where YOU'RE wrong.  (If you can sit there and say that things are
 "mega-screwups" and say I "bit the big one" in places, you don't mind--can't
 mind--if I take same tone, do you?

You don't send a ship away to chase one person when you're going into a battle.
  You don't KNOW what ships you are and aren't going to need.  In theory  you
 took everything you had because you thought you needed it.  Yeah, Marcus was a
 friend, but a lot of friends would die this day.  You think he would put
 Marcus's situation ahead of the fleet?  Isolate one ship and risk it to go
 after him?  Ever been in the military?  You talk about it, but what you
 propose doesn't make sense.  Would Patton have sent back a tank because
 somebody fell behind?  No.

The other point comes where you clearly misunderstood what was being
 said...massively misunderstood...bit the big one, one might say.  To
 elaborate, since this touches a point above:

>2) The Agememnon is about to ram the defense grid satellite, conveying
>Sheridan and crew to certain doom. At the last moment, the Apollo saves
>the day. The General says "We were monitoring the situation" or words to
>that effect. 

>HOW??? No communication is possible through hyper space due to earth
>jamming. The Apollo is in Mars orbit,

No, that's NOT what was said.  The jammers are set up to cut off communication
 OUTSIDE MARS ORBIT.  That's what was said, that the jammers cut in once they
 were past Mars (for security purposes).  The same thing was said in Lines
 Of..., where Franklin was having a hard time getting word to B5 *past the Mars
 jammers*.  Further, if all communications were cut off in Hyperspace, inside
 Mars orbit, then you couldn't have had ship-to-ship communications to tell
 Sheridan ABOUT Marcus, could you?  No, you couldn't.

Do you know why you're seeing flaws that don't exist?  Because you think it's
 rushed, so you're LOOKING for things, and actually misinterpreting things
 because of it.

> The effects of
>season compression are painfully evident

No, what's evident...is that you're not paying attention.

And in future, you may want to phrsae things as questions, until you're
 absolutely sure what's opinion and what's fact, and be as polite in your
 comments as you would like me to be in my reply.  Okay?


 jms
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