Babylon 5

Michael O'Hare died today.

He was sixty. He had a major heart attack on the 23rd, and was in a coma until he passed today.

Since last week's piece on how the Shuttles got their names, I've taken some flack (Mostly through Email) about whether or not it was inappropriate for NASA to name a shuttle after the Starship Enterprise. Most of this has revolved around two points: 1) It wasn't a real shuttle anyway, just a glider, so who cares? and 2) Trek has inspired people to become scientists and astronauts and blah blah blah blah. Here's my take on both of those:

The Narn/Centauri war, which started back in episode 9 of this season (“The Coming of Shadows”) ends tonight. We’re told it’s about six months later. G’kar mentioned in “Acts of Sacrifice” (Season 2, episode 12) that his people defeated the Centauri before with a century-long Vietnam style war, until finally they broke their oppressor’s will, and were set free (Presumably this was Emperor Turhan’s doing). Since that time, the Narn became like abused children who grow up to abuse everyone around them.

Remember how last week was lame? Really lame? Like “Deep Space 9” lame? Well, as lame as that one was, this one promises to be even lamer, starting off as it does with ‘Generic Star Trek Peril Plot #7: Plauge On The Ship.” However, just to drive home how really, really badly Trek had been doing it in the ‘90s, B5 takes that inauspicious, overused, boring ol’ trope, and turns it into something magnificent. Really!

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