Babylon 5/Recap/S02/E14 There All the Honor Lies

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< Babylon 5‎ | Recap‎ | S02


Season 2, Episode 14:

There All The Honor Lies

Their honor? We've had plenty of that ourselves. Conspiracies of silence because the larger ideals have to be protected. But you can't have larger ideals if the smaller ones get compromised.
Captain Sheridan

Captain Sheridan runs into legal troubles when he is assaulted by and forced to kill a Minbari warrior. Meanwhile, a new store opens in the Zocalo: Babylon Emporium, specializing in Babylon 5 merchandise.

Tropes seen in this episode include:

  • Alone in a Crowd: Delenn refers to herself, word for word, as being this, though her situation doesn't really fit the trope.
  • Angst? What Angst?: Lennier had family aboard The Black Star when Sheridan sent it straight to hell, but works with him with little difficulty.
  • Barbie Doll Anatomy: Londo is outraged at the "Londo Mollari" doll being sold in the gift shop. Not because they used his image without his permission, but because it isn't anatomically correct. He feels he's being symbolically cast- in a bad light.
  • Can Not Tell a Lie / Will Not Tell a Lie: The Captain's legal troubles center around the fact that Minbari supposedly never lie and a Minbari is saying that he assaulted Lavell. However, Londo later tells him that Minbari will lie if it is to save face for another.
  • Clear My Name: Sheridan.
  • Fantastic Racism: Ashan dislikes all non-Minbari... a category that includes Delenn. He also apparently believes that all non-Minbari are the real racists, while he is an innocent victim.
  • Honor Before Reason: Lennier displays, lampshades, and openly mocks this trope during the course of the episode.
  • Literary Allusion Title

"Honour and shame from no condition rise;

Act well your part, there all the honour lies."
Alexander Pope, "An Essay on Man" Epistle IV, 1733-34
  • Rubber Forehead Aliens: Played with. Ivanova bumps into a Markab in the gift shop...who pulls off his face to reveal he's actually a human in a mask. Then she bumps into a Drazi with a human mask, in a neat subversion.
  • Smug Snake: Ashan.
  • Thrown Out the Airlock: Ba-bear-lon Five, for the crime of impersonating the Captain.
  • You Look Familiar: If Julie Caitlin Brown as attorney Guinevere Corey sounds familiar, it's because she played Na'Toth in the first season. Looks very different without the prosthetics, doesn't she?