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urban-trek-thru-middle-earth · 4 months ago

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S03 E14 - Ship of Tears

#babylon 5 #alfred bester #uttme

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davey-dammit · 2 months ago

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A box of some of my vintage sci-fi and fantasy collection

#my stuff #fritz leiber #michael moorcock #jrr tolkien #hp lovecraft #alfred bester #daw books #Karl Edward Wagner #elric of melnibone #corum #kane #lord of the rings #lotr #the fellowship of the ring #the two towers #the return of the king #stormbringer #fafhrd and gray mouser

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therighthandofvengeance · 2 months ago

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Something that’s been on my mind as of late is Bester. Specifically, the fact that if he were to undo the propaganda/brainwashing done by the corps, he’d have Ivanova’s mentality about the organization, minimum.

Bester is fueled by pettiness to the same extent that Ivanova is fueled by vengeance. Some might argue those two words to be synonymous, but by my perception (within the context of their respective characterization), they’re different.

Bester doesn’t see himself as petty— he sees himself as just, as fair, as a kind human who is trying to make the world a better place for the next generation. He’s doing humanity a favor in his brainwashed mind.

Ivanova is vengeful and she knows it. She sees someone who’s wronged her in some way take a low road, and she starts digging a path beneath it. If she sees someone else being wronged, she might be more inclined to boost them up on their path to a higher road, but that doesn’t mean that she’ll somehow refuse to go about it by digging deeper to make a solid foundation for them.

They both lost their non-Corps telephathic parents at the hands of the corps. The difference is that Ivanova knows her mother would have never done such a thing without the “influence” (medication) of the corps, and Bester’s parents chose death over assimilation to the corps.

With Bester, the corps is mother, the corps is father. There is nothing to be mourned because they were simply the people who physically created him. They were never truly there to differentiate between what they believe should’ve been perceived as “right” and “wrong.”

Ivanova, on the other hand, got into heated debates with Andrei. They fought, they argued, they bickered— and based off of what we know about Sofie, there’s very little to suggest that the fight in Susan somehow isn’t (nearly) identical to the fight in Sofie. Nature versus nature, it’s hard to tell. (In my opinion, the exact similarity was both the cause and the effect— Andrei missed Sofie to such an extent that he craved the knowledge that she might be dead, but she wasn’t gone. Provoking his daughter was clear and direct pathway to see Sofie again. Sofie wasn’t alive, but Susan is. Susan’s similarities to her mother ironically nearly killed her father, and it kills Susan herself on a daily basis.)

They both lost their loves at the hands of the corps— perhaps the first (if only) true romantic love they’ll ever experience. They lost these people because their respective loves had come to the conclusion that the corps is a corrupt organization (to say the least). They both lost them by the corps chosen mentality that the homo sapien are not human, but are rather a resource for them to freely exploit in the pursuit of greater strength in the next generation.

This enrages Ivanova. Of course, she values strength, and she does so to such an extent that it can often be to her own detriment. However, she can acknowledge that there are multiple forms of strength, and lots of ways to demonstrate them, too. She’s not going to say that her way is the most right way, but she knows it’s more right than the corps’. She’s (at least learning to start) acknowledging that humanity is a strength and should be treated as such.

This mentality should enrage Bester, but it doesn’t. Instead, he’s disappointed by other people’s line of thought, because his way is the right way— if it weren’t, he wouldn’t have been trusted to enforce the rules of the corps, because he’s that special. He’s that important, and the corps taught him that. Because of the corps, all of his value is based in his telepathy, and therefore his humanity doesn’t matter at all. It would be irrelevant, but he’s a psi-cop. Humanity is a deterrent.

Both Bester and Ivanova have been denied the outward practice of humanity being granted to them, and it shows. The difference is that Ivanova learns to make it from scratch, make it by herself. Bester can’t even fathom how to truly do that. If he did, his fury would be directed towards the corps (and not its enemies).

#who are queue? what do queue want?#babylon 5 #b5 #susan ivanova #alfred bester #psi corps #source: @therighthandofvengeance #I haven’t gone on a B5 rant like this in a hot minute #so anyway #just gonna leave this here

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vanillabearcinnabear · 5 months ago

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