I should make one devoted to Keffer. Yeah!

[kungfuwaynewho]

Last night I was futzing around in Photoshop, trying to do something with the brig reunion images from War Without End - which are just so dark - for a wallpaper.  And wonder of wonders, I actually ended up making something pretty!  Usually I have a real struggle with wallpapers because the palette is so much larger than an icon, and I find it tough to know how to arrange multiple images.  But this actually worked; I was very pleased.  Now I just want to make one more so that I'll have five for my babylon5_love graphics post next week.  So far, I have an S1 wallpaper, one with all the major characters, and two John/Delenn.  Any ideas?

From rivendellrose :

Ask me my Top Five Whatevers. Fannish or literary or otherwise. Any top fives. Doesn't matter what, really! Fandoms, books I might get around to writing one day, women in my fandoms, ideal holiday destinations, goals for the future, celebrity crushes, books I wish would be made into movies, love songs. And I will answer them all in a new post (or in comments).

Comments

[nhpw.livejournal.com]

Um, NOT Keffer?

I was all set to give you a Sheridan!Idea because, er, that's just where my mind lives. But then I got a better one.

Ivanova's "I am Susan Ivanova... etc... God sent me" speech. Especially that last part. WIN.

(Don't you just love how easy I just made it sound right there? :P)

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

I totally made a "God sent me" icon! I'll have to think about how to make a wallpaper out of that. That could definitely work.

Haha, I was making that wallpaper with all the regular characters, and I looked up the regulars for each season to make sure I hadn't missed anyone, and there was Keffer. And I was like, OMG, he was on the show, wasn't he? What a random waste of a character, jeez.

[nhpw.livejournal.com]

I can't remember which ep's commentary this is in - Season 2 finale, maybe? - but JMS comments on Keffer. He says that the creation of Keffer came from one of the very last times Warner Bros. gave him notes. And he knew as soon as he created him that he would kill him off. And I heard that and was all, "Yeah, that was the right move."

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

I read about that - that he kind of intentionally used him as little as possible and then relished killing him off. It would have been a lot more effective to see Keffer die had anyone actually cared about him as a character; as it was, it was almost like watching a red shirt get it.

I mean, JMS's inability to deal with network notes is essentially what killed Crusade, right? Like, pick your battles, dude.

[nhpw.livejournal.com]

Babylon's Top 5: Top 5 favorite episodes (& why, if you feel like sharing.)

IRL Top 5: Top 5 places you'd like to visit someday (again, & why, if you feel like sharing.)

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Top Five Episodes

1. "Between the Darkness and the Light" - I am a sucker for reunion scenes, and this one is probably one of the best. It's what we should have seen after he returned from Z'ha'dum. Seriously, I have probably watched this scene a hundred times. At least. Of course, I love the rest of the episode, too; Susan's speech and the Council voting to give assistance and John nearly breaking and taking control of the Agamemnon. It's just epic.

2. "Severed Dreams" - Action! Delenn saving John's butt! Civil war! Delenn breaking the big Grey Council stick! Space porn! Delenn swaggering into the docking bay! That camera move when that one Captain tells Sheridan they're coming to seize control of B5, when they pan in and zoom out! He kisses her hand!

3. "Comes the Inquisitor" - Delenn centric? Check. Big hugs for the first time? Check? John riding in to be the hero only having to be saved by Delenn? Check. A guest star who actually knows how to act? Check.

4. "Sic Transit Vir" - Which is a cheat, since I never actually watch the A-plot. Just the shippy date parts.

5. "Intersections in Real Time" - As much as I love the previous episodes more, however one tries to quantify that, this to me is the single best episode of the series. Technically perfect, and Bruce gives his best performance of the show.

[un-crayon-rouge.livejournal.com]

Is it in "Intersections in Real Time", when the interrogator (whom I totally *heart*, btw, not for hurting Sheridan, obviously, but he's a pretty damn good character, with his little waistcoat and glasses) asks him to sign the confession and Sheridan just raises his head a little and looks at him and says "no" with such relish? He almost growls it. That always makes shivers go down my spine, no matter how often I watch it.

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

I don't remember, but I should have each and every growl committed to memory, so I'll probably have to rewatch it now. (What a hardship.)

The interrogator is totally great. It's hard to craft a villain who's a three-dimensional character and yet still make him/her someone the audience will loathe.

[nhpw.livejournal.com]

This is waaaaaay late, but yes. That comes from "Intersections." It comes at the climax of the ep, where John gives a speech about how if the truth is fluid and subjective, then maybe you CAN fight the system.

Interrogator: "But can you win?"
John: "Every time I say 'no.'"

And then the interrogator gets all pissy and asks him one more time if he will sign his confession, and that's when John gives that, "NO." And. Ugh. Last chance, last rites, Room 17, etc.

This is my absolute favorite episode. So, like, five or six viewings in, I pretty well have most of it memorized.

[nhpw.livejournal.com]

...And actually he does it twice, now that I think about it. He does it once before this. When he hallucinates Delenn and spits on the confession. Yeah. That's it.

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Top Five Places to Visit

1. New Zealand. Because I know I'm not the only person that watched Lord of the Rings and thought, I want to go to there. And there. And there.

2. Italy. I've loved reading about Ancient Rome for about as long as I can remember, so I want to see not just Rome with all of its sights - the Forum and the Coliseum and the Parthenon - but Pompeii and Herculaneum and Naples, &c.

3. Iceland. Because it's pretttttttty.

4. Egypt. I love ancient Egypt almost as much as ancient Rome. The Pyramids, the Valley of the Kings, Karnak, riding a barge up the Nile - it would be awesome.

5. Croatia. My grandpa's parents emigrated from there, and it's the one place where I feel most like "that's where I'm from" about.

[vjs2259.livejournal.com]

How about 5 favorite movies that either a) you re-watch again and again or b) you love but can never watch again. Or both if you're feeling masochistic, or wordy, or whatever.

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Ooo, that's a good one.

Top Five Favorite Movies

1. Young Frankenstein. My favorite movie since I was five years old and I saw it for the first time. If I'm flipping and its on TV, I sit and watch it pretty much no matter what. I could write an essay on why I love it so much, but I'll spare you. (For now...)

2. Lord of the Rings. My one and only movie fandom. I own every movie three times over; theatrical editions, extended editions, and the ones that came out a few years ago with feature-length making-of documentaries. I could write an equally long essay on these.

3. Galaxy Quest. Alan Rickman, Sigourney Weaver, Tony Shalhoub, Sam Rockwell, Enrico Colantoni, Missi Pyle, and even Tim Allen - by Grapthar's Hammer, what a cast. David Mamet once wrote that there have been two perfect scripts written for film; one, The Godfather. The other, Galaxy Quest.

4. Apollo 13. I don't care how many times I watch it, I still end up crying when they see them reappear after the black-out.

5. The Philadelphia Story. Katherine, Cary, James. Perfection. Also, one of my cats is named C. K. Dexter Haven.

I'll have to think about the other one. That's a very specific kind of movie, and I know exactly what you mean, but I'll still have to think about it.

[lizbee.livejournal.com]

Top five Babylon 5 fics you haven't written.

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Ooo. That's interesting. In no particular order:

1. Early S3. A malfunction in the Great Machine sends some MacGuffin field over B5, and the station is populated by Our Heroes as well as alternate versions of themselves: a Delenn who never went through the Chrysalis, an Ivanova who was a P6 and a member of Psi Corps, a Sheridan who had never lost Anna and she's there, too, etc. (I've been mulling this one over instead of, y'know, finishing the three series I've already started or, more importantly, any of my actual original writing.)

2. Raising David Sheridan. I think it would be John and Delenn dealing with a moody pre-teen. I haven't thought about much other than the title.

3. Late S4, Sheridan's on Mars and being interrogated, and Delenn leaves the war on Earth in Ivanova's hands to go rescue him.

4. Fluffy fluff about Sheridan taking a two-week vacation early S5 and bringing Delenn home to Earth to visit his parents and show her where he grew up.

5. Ivanova doesn't interrupt John and Delenn's first kiss in Sic Transit Vir. (AKA, porn.)

[un-crayon-rouge.livejournal.com]

Excellent ideas, all. I've toyed around with the fluffy fluff about Sheridan showing Delenn where he grew up. It included a Very Serious Conversation between Delenn and John's mother.

I've also more than toyed with the idea of an AU where Anna is still alive and comes to the station with John, but Delenn goes through the transformation anyway and John and Delenn fall in love anyway because they are Meant To Be. Much angst and suffering ensues, of course. I tried various approaches, inlcuding the one with the alternate versions, but I could never get it right...

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

I was just kind of disappointed in Z'ha'dum, that Sheridan finds out pretty much right away that Anna wasn't really Anna - I wanted him to have to choose.

[ghanimasun]

Since I don't know that much about you, I'll just ask an easy one!
Top Five Musicians/Bands.

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

In alphabetical order:

Circa-Me

1. Ben Folds Five/Ben Folds
2. Fiona Apple
3. Gogol Bordello
4. No Doubt
5. Radiohead
6. Sigur Rós/Jónsi

ETA: I literally was lying in bed last night trying to fall asleep when I said out loud, "I forgot Gogol Bordello!" So there's six, and I can't cut it down any more than that. SUCKS TO BE YOU, TOP FIVE MEME.

Circa-My Parents

1. Cat Stevens
2. David Bowie
3. Electric Light Orchestra
4. Queen
5. Tommy James and the Shondells

Circa-Old Dead People

1. Bach
2. Brahms
3. Chopin
4. Elgar
5. Schubert

[ghanimasun]

I've never heard of Gogol Bordello, but I like a lot of the other bands you listed, so I shall check them out!

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

I'm setting up a locked music swapping post, so I'll upload an album or two!

[ghanimasun]

Oooh that sounds interesting! I just listened to one of their songs on youtube. Very different stuff :)

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

I uploaded one of their albums here (http://kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com/11831.html?thread=92727#t92727).