JMS's Comments in 'Deconstruction'

[circularREASON]

In 'DECONSTRUCTION' JMS said that by the end Humanity had evolved into the equiv of THE VORLONS and were leaving for 'THE VORLON HOMEWORLD when the sun exploded. He said that an external force was being used to destroy the sun. He also said that the story had come full circle and that made me think.

Which of the races of the Interstellar Alliance are destined to be in positions of authority when the next group of younger races is ready?

And which of these would fill the gap left by the SHADOWS?

[Kevin]

JMS has said in a number of posts (which can be seen at the Lurker's Guide, rather then have me post them here), that both the Humans and the Minbari are the two that make it. But just because Humans are taking residence in the Vorlon homeworld dosen't mean that they've become the Vorlons nor the Minbari become the Shadows. They've just reached the level and position of guardians of the newer races, which is what brings the story full circle. Dosen't mean they do the same stuff or are destined to fulfill the roles of order and chaos... the hope is that they would have learned from those mistakes... so that they could make other ones instead ;)

[CRONAN]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

MAJOR PLOT SPOILERS

Whew, caught myself in time. I hope everyone else is as lucky as I was!

[grumbler]

Kevin, you are correct, but cR is also correct that someone must be "doing the Shadow thing" if they are detroying an entire solar system in an attack on humanity.

[circularREASON]

Exactly.

MY take on it is that the role ( as in the one ) is not expendable - however the person ( or persons ) who take those positions are.

Apply this in a larger scale to the individual races after the first ones left.

The role of the first ones was to look after and guide the younger races - much as the Interstellar Alliance does.

So the role does not change - but the races fulfilling the role do.

My take on Humanity being the equiv of the VORLONS comes from JMS himself on disk6 of S4.

Who takes the shadows role is a question which really interests me. Who would destroy a star to destroy a whole race?

[Ranger Foster]

Who takes the shadows role is a question which really interests me. Who would destroy a star to destroy a whole race?

Maybe its the First Ones that are making sure Humans and Minbari don't make the same mistake they did. The only way they can help is to push the humans out of the galaxy peacefully,that means destroying the earth and making them think its there time to leave the galaxy and join the Vorlons and Shadows, who now should be more advanced than Humans and Minbari.

[grumbler]

Originally posted by circularREASON
...So the role does not change - but the races fulfilling the role do.

My take on Humanity being the equiv of the VORLONS comes from JMS himself on disk6 of S4.

Who takes the shadows role is a question which really interests me. Who would destroy a star to destroy a whole race? The advantage of the star destroyer is perhaps that is possible to destabilize the star "covertly." Also, the goal might not be to kill people, but to make them feel what it is like to lose your heritage (e.g. to pay humans back for some sort of "cultural imperialism").

As to the nature of differing "First Ones" roles not changing, this would fit in with JMS's "everything is circular" logic... and it would then imply that some race of the "New First Ones" disagrees enough with Humanity's plan for raising up the "New Younger Ones" that they would stealthily attack humanity's home world.

The opposing concepts might not be order versus chaos, it could be human individualism ("What do you want to be") versus Minbari collectivism ("How will you serve?") or just about anything else.

Hard to speculate on, given the limited data.

[Andrew_Swallow]

The Sol destroyers will have to be a race whose weapons are sufficiently powerful that they can blow up a planet and expect to survive a war with a race of angry first Ones.

Pity the humans have to retreat to the Vorlon home world.

[RCmodeler]

I'm surprised.

When I watched that episode, I thought the sun was *dying naturally*. After all..... 5 million years from now, the sun will flare up and then become a brown dwarf..... no external help needed.

[Stunaep]

Make it 5 *billion* years and you might be right. But that particular sequence wasn't nowhere near that far.

[Jan]

JMS said that something not natural was affecting Sol (atypical emissions iirc) but he didn't say it was being attacked. In addition, Lyta said that humans couldn't go to the Vorlon Homeworld until they'd earned it, "...in a million years". So we don't know why the sun is going nova but it seems that transferring to the Vorlon homeworld is a reward, not punishment.

Jan

[jal]

atypical emissions

that just means thatsomething outside of normal is happening.

it could be an attack, but then again, humanity could have messed things up by themselves many thousands of years before it went nova, without any outside intervention at all.

sounds like the Vorlon homeworld is more like something to strive for rather than a fallback position, humanity reaches a certain level of development and gets access to the bigger playground as a reward. :)

[nyranger66]

maybe the humans are destorying it on purpose so that the younger races dont use the more advanced technology thats on earth?

[Kevin]

I have to agree with Jan here. As I said before, we know which two races "make it", so to speak. So the thought of a new enemy destroying the sun of one of the god-like races seems dubious to me. And again, going to the Vorlon home world is a treat, not a nessecity.

But, to be kind of blunt here... I can't say I really care ;) The future events of Deconstruction always failed to captivate any real intrest from myself... I think in many ways I'm simply too attached to the lifetimes of our characters, and have a hard time getting enthused about things outside of that.

[snodman]

I agree. In season 1 Sinclair says to a reporter that the reason we go to the stars is that some day the sun will go Nova and we will have to find another home as a species by then or be destroyed. And if the human species was ready a few million years early to leave earth for Vorlon, they would likely want to Za'hadoum the old place so that whatever was left behind didn't fall into the wrong hands. Besides, as Kosh said, "it will end in fire".

[RCmodeler]

Perhaps the reason the Sun died prematurely (5 million instead of 5 billion years) is because the Humans had mined it for fuel? That would clearly shorten its lifetime. It's not natural, but it's not an attack either. It was self-induced.

.

ASIDE: I wish JMS had put episode 501/"Deconstruction" at the END of the series...just prior to Sleeping in Light. IMHO, it would have made more sense to have John/Delenn in bed on their new homeworld pondering the future.

As it stands now, it feels like an interruption to the story. One minute you're fighting the Earth Civil War, the next you're millions of years into the future, and then suddenly you meet Captain Lochley/Byron. It's jarring.

Or as one person put it, "Now that I've seen the future, seen humans become Vorlon-like, why do I need to watch season 5? I already saw how it all ends."

The story would have flowed better with Deconstruction as the second-to-last episode.
Troy

[Radhil]

Or as one person put it, "Now that I've seen the future, seen humans become Vorlon-like, why do I need to watch season 5? I already saw how it all ends."

Because how it ends is only one part of the story. The middle and the beginning are just as important.

Did Londo suddenly become unimportant because you knew he and G'Kar would strangle each other in the end? Even after you find out they strangle each other as friends at the end, does that make the slow train wreck of Centauri Prime and Londo being sealed to his Emperorship any less moving? Hell, knowing the ending lends it greater strength. Or for a reverse example - Sheridan's final fate would not have nearly the impact had you not seen him go through what he did over the course of the series.

Not to mention - you only saw Earth's end in Deconstruction. You didn't see B5's end, Sheridan's end, or any other meaningful end to the story. You didn't even see humanity's end - who knows what we're up to know that we've become shiny glow-things.

So two things, really. First, the point of any story is not just in it's end, it's in the duration, the full detail of it. Second, endings are hardly ever ends to the whole story.

[circularREASON]

the sun went nova ( in b5 ) a million years after the events of year 4.

Something was accelerating the suns demise.

But was not the end of B5 the story. It was part of a completely different story which related to B5 through historical references.

p.s. Wouldn't it be wonderful if that was David Sheridan standing there watching the suns demise. ( note the goaty )

[nyranger66]

Originally posted by RCmodeler


ASIDE: I wish JMS had put episode 501/"Deconstruction" at the END of the series...just prior to Sleeping in Light. IMHO, it would have made more sense to have John/Delenn in bed on their new homeworld pondering the future.


He put it at the end of Season 4 because he didnt know if there was going to be a Season 5.

[Kevin]

Originally posted by nyranger66
He put it at the end of Season 4 because he didnt know if there was going to be a Season 5.

Incorrect. Deconstruction was filmed *because* he knew he had a Season 4. It's actually filmed as the first Season 5 episode (thus it's production number 501), and was used to replace Sleeping in Light, which was filmed in the Season 4 run to be ran if there was no Season 5.

[grumbler]

Deconstruction was filmed and shown when it was because Ivanova was gone and Lockley not yet cast and they had to have a 22nd ep for the 4th season. I think it doesn't fit in all that well, and shows signs of hasty writing, but still its better than watching a blank screen (interrupted by commercials) for an hour.

[RCmodeler]

Originally posted by Radhil
Because how it ends is only one part of the story. The middle and the beginning are just as important. Yes, but as I said: "As it stands now, it feels like an interruption to the story. The story would have flowed better with Deconstruction as the second-to-last episode."



Deconstruction was actually a season 5 episode (501), paid by TNT, but it was used to provide a year 4 finale.

Sleeping in Light was actually a season 4 episode (422), but it was held until the very end.

Anyway, I would have preferred deleting one of the dumb episodes (like Day of the Dead or Byron Gives a Boring Speech), and put Deconstruction in its place... just prior to the last episode. And instead, the season 4 finale could introduce Lochley... or maybe review the destruction on Earth, Mars, et cetera.

[Stunaep]

Don't you dare call Day of the Dead boring. It was good, and it was a welcome break from the less-interesting-than-usual-yet-not-as-bad-as-people-make-it-sound-though-quite-close Byron episodes.

[RCmodeler]

It was boring from my point-of-view. Virtually no plot and boring conversations.

[grumbler]

Originally posted by RCmodeler
And instead, the season 4 finale could introduce Lochley... or maybe review the destruction on Earth, Mars, et cetera. Lockley wasn't cast when DoFS was written, so JMS put together some ideas floating around in his head and put out an episode that would work no matter what happened to the Ivanova/Lochley charactor. Remember that the ep couldn't feature much in the way of FX because it had to be shot and produced quichkly enough to air at the end of season 4, and lots of FX would make that impossible.

[Kevin]

Day of the Dead is one of my favourite episodes in Season 5, but it is a character piece, utterly and completely.

Still, my favourite episodes do tend to be character pieces, so I gotta agree with Stunaep on this one

[Leto II]

Originally posted by Jan
JMS said that something not natural was affecting Sol (atypical emissions iirc) but he didn't say it was being attacked. In addition, Lyta said that humans couldn't go to the Vorlon Homeworld until they'd earned it, "...in a million years". So we don't know why the sun is going nova but it seems that transferring to the Vorlon homeworld is a reward, not punishment.

Jan

Here's what JMS himself says about this particular subject:

Actually, the computer voice specifies that it is continuing to note atypical solar emissions...atypical meaning something unusual is going on.

And what if you, say, interfered substantially with the mass of the sun by, say, causing a series of jump points to open up *inside* the sun across several days?

You'd also substantially decrease the mass of Sol, which as I understand it, would result in the sun going nova.

jms

So, we have the "how," but not necessarily the "who" or the "why."

[SpooRancher]

Deconstruction was an interruption?

Day of the Dead was boring?

Whew! I did not know that.

I found Deconstruction of Falling Stars to be as much of an interruption as, say, And Now for a Word, A Day in the Strife or View from the Gallery. I thought it worked well, a moment for us to, to quote the broadcast anchor from that very episode, pause and reflect. The entire 5th season was about the consequences of the previous four, and that episode was the long-range consequences. Not an interruption, merely a moment to "pause and reflect".

Day of the Dead was written by Neil Gaiman, who, along with Peter David and JMS, is VERY well known in the comic trade. Neil is a very good author, and wrote an EXCELLENT episode with VERY little knowledge beforehand of the series and it's characters. In fact, with little preparation, he wrote some of the BEST character moments of the season.

I guess it's just a case of "I say poe-tay-toe you say poh-tah-toe".

[jal]

Deconstruction was an interruption?

Day of the Dead was boring?

what a very peculear thing to say. :rolleyes:

[SpooRancher]

I was responding to an earlier post. Check back and learn.