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A minor plot question

KoshFan

Regular
Yes, it's an actual question/discussion topic on the original show posted by someone who's been reading the Lurker's Guide for years. In other words, a pretty rare type of thread these days.

In "Signs and Portents," the Eye is delivered to Londo by a Human businessman, who says it's his job to find things. Londo pays him enough to "buy a small planet." He also comments that Londo really doesn't want to know how he found the Eye.

Next season, in "Hunter, Prey," we see the same human. He's running a minor stall front in Downbelow. While he's still the man you go to see for underhanded, shady dealings, he's clearly gone down in the world, and finding things is no longer his trade.

So what on earth happened to him? Why did he shift jobs? How'd he lose the money? A smart man -- and he does seem pretty smart, the two times we see him -- wouldn't have just lost the kind of fortune Londo gave him. And as a secondary question, where was the Eye all that time, and how did our shady businessman acquire it?

If there's an actual, JMS-confirmed answer to these questions, I'd love to hear it -- but if there isn't, speculate away.
 
For the first volley of questions, I think it's probably just a case of same-actor, different-character going on.

For the secondary question, I don't think the previous location of the eye is of much importance in the overall story, so there probably is no official answer to where it was when it was found by the guy Londo paid to find it.

As a little aside, there was a time where I used to wonder if that "eye" was the "eye that cannot see" and that maybe it contained a cure for the Drakh plague. Yes, it's crazy, but sometimes crazy stuff comes out of my mind. Of course it isn't, and it doesn't, but I could see it happening.
 
Reason 1) probably a double-booking. A lot of minor actors played loads of roles, some of them conflict.

Reason 2) imagine you are a highly succesful criminal. Would you open a 6 story high office building with a "Crimes'R'Us" logo on it?

As for the location of the eye... probably in the south wing of the imperial palace where noone has been for a long time. If they can loose/forget Narn prisoners then they can just as well loose a trinklet.
 
The Eye was lost following a battle, so who knows who might have salvaged it from the wreckage of a ship or the body of a dead combatant? As for the "you don't want to know" comment, I always took that to have more to do with how the artifact was obtained (probably by murder or at least blackmail) and/or from whom - neither of which Lord Kiro would want to know about if he were ever interrogated about The Eye's recovery by a telepath.

Regards,

Joe
 
P.S.

And yes, this probably was just a matter of the same actor appearing in different roles. Happens all the time in TV. (The late Broadway song and dance man Jerry Orbach first appeared on Law and Order in a guest shot as a sleazy attorney and was invited back to play Detective Lenny Briscoe when a opening for a new cop regular came up a few years later. On B5 Ed (Mr. Morden) Wasser famously appeared in the pilot as the C&C tech Guerra.)

Regards,

Joe
 
P.S.

And yes, this probably was just a matter of the same actor appearing in different roles. Happens all the time in TV. [....] On B5 Ed (Mr. Morden) Wasser famously appeared in the pilot as the C&C tech Guerra.)

However, on B5, usually the actor shows up the second time in alien guise, not as a human with the same look. e.g. Neroon/Mr. Welles, and Wayne Alexander's many roles, below.....

Wayne Alexander:
Babylon 5: A Call to Arms (1999) (TV) .... Drakh
Babylon 5: The River of Souls (1998) (TV) .... Soul One
"Babylon 5" playing "Lorien" in episode: "Sleeping in Light" (episode # 5.22) 25 November 1998 (also played Lorien in six other episodes)
"Babylon 5" playing "Drakh" in episode: "The Fall of Centauri Prime" (episode # 5.18) 28 October 1998 (also played "Drakh" in one other episode)
"Babylon 5" playing "Tortured Drazi" in episode: "Intersections in Real Time" (episode # 4.18) 16 June 1997
"Babylon 5" playing "G'Dan" in episode: "And the Rock Cried Out, No Hiding Place" (episode # 3.20) 14 October 1996
"Babylon 5" playing "Sebastian" in episode: "Comes the Inquisitor" (episode # 2.21) 25 October 1995
 
Yeah, I'm hoping it's not just a case of different characters, as I believe that would be the first and only time in B5 that an actor played two different human roles, with no makeup and prosthetics to make him look visually different. Teague, Alexander, Vickery -- some of the finest actors on B5 double or triple-dipped. But they always came back as a different species. The Morden/Guerra thing, of course, is the exception -- but as I recall, Guerra was almost never on-screen and had about three words, delivered from the background. In this case, we're talking two minor but much more distinct characters who actually hold up ends of conversations.

A little poking around reveals that Robert Silver's the actor in question. In Signs and Portents he's credited as "Reno," and in Hunter, Prey he's just "Merchant." Doesn't really rule anything out -- Reno and the merchant could be different people or they could not be.
 
I'm also going to say recycled actors, but let's play devil's advocate (pun intended.)

I would think that after a while (when you deal with evil - we'll call the shadows evil in this scenario) you're frequently playing with fire, as Londo soon learned.

Dark deals have a way of turning against someone.
 
So far, I only have theory on one of your questions. I think I'm going to have to side with the majority here and go with the same actor/different roles theory. Maybe this guy just had the right look to play both someone shady enough to know where to "find" an eye and the kind of fellah you might seen running a shop in Down Below.

Lurker's Guide fans will have seen this list before, but for anyone else who's interested, here's a link to a list of B5 actors and the roles they played:

http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/making/actors.html

Just for fun, look at Harlan Ellison's credits.....I didn't know he was the voice of the computer...or that its name was "Sparky"! :LOL:
 
Just for fun, look at Harlan Ellison's credits.....I didn't know he was the voice of the computer...or that its name was "Sparky"! :LOL:
"Sparky" is the AI personality that comes up when the crew completely reboots the system right after seceeding from EA.
 
Just for fun, look at Harlan Ellison's credits.....I didn't know he was the voice of the computer...or that its name was "Sparky"! :LOL:
"Sparky" is the AI personality that comes up when the crew completely reboots the system right after seceeding from EA.

:D Yeah...from Ceremonies of Light and Dark. I just didn't catch it that anyone had "named" it or that it was Mr. Ellison's voice...pretty cool, huh? :D
 
Lurker's Guide fans will have seen this list before, but for anyone else who's interested, here's a link to a list of B5 actors and the roles they played:

http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/making/actors.html

Thanks for the link - I've been wondering this for years!

Take a look at the following names:

Wayne Alexander
Neil Bradley
Jonathan Chapman
Mark Hendrickson
Michael McKenzie
Marianne Robertson
Kim Strauss

Each one played 5 or more roles :eek: that were not incarnations of an single role (like Lt. Corwin).

Also had a question - noticed Tim O'hare on the list (1st mage in A call to Arms). Any relation to Commander Sinclair?
 
Each one played 5 or more roles :eek: that were not incarnations of an single role (like Lt. Corwin)

:D Weren't they all just great! Once I realized some of the actors kept showing up as different aliens, I started watching for them! Some of them are harder to spot than others... :D but most of the time I find the "eyes" to be a dead give-a-way!

In a couple of the box set commentaries, the actors portraying major "human" or roles requiring less make-up, relayed stories and spoke with fond remembrance of some of the actors on your list. It was nice to hear and gave you sense that it was a "family" and not just a gaggle of "egos" on that set. :D
 
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