Babylon 5 - The Scripts of JMS

Very interesting so far, especially for those interested in the process of making a TV show.

Volume 4

Confessions and Lamentations

A warning to James... this is a preachy episode :D

SHERIDAN They're not your own people. DELENN I didn't know that similarity was required for the exercise of compassion.

SHERIDAN In the last seven days we've learned that an entire race can judge itself to death. That fear and silence can be as deadly as the plague that spawned it. We've learned that there is no such thing as someone else's problem, that in the end, we are all connected. (beat) A human writer, John Dunne, wrote 1: "No man is an island, entire of itself. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. Therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee." If we can remember that lesson, then all this might not have been in vain, and their deaths will have meaning.

Religion plays a huge role in this story, as guidepost, tradition, and liability. I wanted to hilight the reality that religion has served a great many positive purposes over the centuries, but that at the same time we must accept the fact that on more than one occasion it has worked against humanity's best interests, in the currency of crusades, jihads and intolerance. Science and religion both emanate from the same wellspring, the desire to understand who we are, where we came from, and where we are going. The problem comes when the means of answering those questions is framed in the negative, i.e.: we are who we are because we are not those people over there, the infidels, the unbelievers, the heathens. The moment you do that, you create an atmosphere of us vs. them, of true believers vs. enemies. It is my opinion that very little good comes from that dichotomy. [...] In the interests if fairness, however, it is important to make the point that there is something far worse than religious dogmatism: the kind of political, secular cowardice that restricts scientific inquiry because those in office are afraid of being voted out of office. It's one thing to act out of love of heaven or fear of hell, but to act out of fear of losing votes is indefensible on every conceivable level.

This is an interesting episode in that JMS (an atheist) paints not only the negative side of religion, but the positive side at the same time. Even his final speach is mostly taken from a minister.

There are three major changes in the episode from the script to the screen.

The Markab isolation is changed to be self-imposed instead of a command decision

While this takes the ethical responsibility off of our heroes and places it on the shoulders of 'bad religion', parts of the episode just didn't make sense to me until I read the script. (The security search teams trying to find the Markab, Delenn asking Sheridan if she can enter the isolation sector and him saying 'I can't let you out', etc.)

The plague jumps species

While this helps with the 'no man is an island' sermon at the end, it leaves various logic holes at the end of the episode, i.e. why doesn't the Pak'ma'ra species get wiped out as well? (Or at least have more than just one die of the plague before they can get a new antivirus worked up to generate 'green cells'.)

The second quote I have above from Sheridan is given to Delenn and the ending reworked

Personally, I find Sheridan's speech much more moving than the one that was shortened and given to Delenn, particularly the Dunne quote. I also think it was more moving to end with that than the depressing 'Nothing changes' that now ends the episode.

Mind you, this is one of my favorite episodes, but why, with such a contageous, deadly disease does it last for a year in the population until the day that Franklin notices it and then suddenly the entire species is wiped out on all of their colonies in a single day??