FuckYeah Babylon 5

Walker Smith from the episode T.K.O. is the most perfect encapsulation of a Season one misstep you can ever find.

The idea of a boxer who’s career has been sabotaged and decides to seek his fame by being the first to fight in an Alien martial arts competition is a great one. It pairs up the sense of competition that we see in Boxing through the likes of Muhammad Ali, a more mentaly stable Mike Tyson and others, and it gives us a glimpse into how Earth isn’t the multi-coloured candy wonderland of Star Trek, which we don’t often see in Season one.

The concept is fantastic, it’s something you’d really want to see, however the execution falls short.

The idea that he walks in, is kind of xenophobic and stops around like a bull in a china shop is great, however we don’t see enough of him being a good enough buddy to Garibaldi to counter act the supreme douchallity of his actions. Now I’m not faulting this idea because for one, we can’t spend all of a 45 minute episode with his development especially when there’s Ivanova and her father’s Wake which really is the pillar of the episode, and for another, I know a couple of guys whom, despite being pretty decent guys and being good fun to hang out with, are pretty douchey, and so I can understand how two guys like that can be friends.

But the thing is, you need a lot of chemistry for that kind of relationship and McKinney and Doyle just don’t have it in this episode.

Furthermore, I like the idea of an african american walking in and being kind of xenophobic to these aliens, because there’s a lot of animosity towards aliens at the minute, but the problem with this is that… well most of the command staff are caucasian, and they don’t often do xenophobic and douchey things to aliens. The only time we see it is Garibaldi, and he’s never portrayed to be a dick for doing those things, so why is Walker a dick for doing these things and Garibaldi isn’t?

The final misstep is the Mutai itself.

They call it “Trail of blood” that they walk in the “sands of blood” and constantly Garibaldi is telling Walker that it’s a terrible idea to partake in it, and then we see it.

Guys, I watch Mixed Martial Arts. The Mutai is kind of tame compared to it.

The pay off is never going to match the hype on a TV show, especially one of it’s budget because in order to make it seem as threatening as they say we’d need to have people coming out of the ring with broken legs and arms, blood pouring profusely. It’s just your usual martial arts competition. Pointing out that people die in the Mutai is a good idea, but personally I think it’s where it should of been left, as talking it up past that just makes the pay off seem pretty disappointing.

I think it was a good idea, I think he was an okay character, but when looking at it you can see why it’s only the big Ivanova fans who enjoy this episode.