Babylon 5 Season 2, Episode 18. Written by
J. Michael Straczynski, directed by
Kevin Cremin. Originally aired on
May 24, 1995.
Primary Plot: A
lethal plague threatens to entirely wipe out one of the alien races aboard station, the
Markab.
Commentary: This is an extremely powerful, moving, and downright
sad episode. Even though it has little to do with any of the main story arcs, it tells a fascinating and important story about the death of an
entire civilization and how the crew's complete inability to stop it from happening affects them. If you're easily
moved to tears, this is probably the one
Babylon 5 episode that would get to you.
It's worth noting that even though this is mostly a "throwaway" episode, the
Markabs were not brought into this episode just to be killed off. As JMS says:
"On one level, this does indicate that we really *are* crazy over here at B5. Here we developed this race for nearly two years. Developed their culture. Mentioned them prominently just last episode. Had them speak before the full Council (in "The Long Dark"). Spent substantial amounts of money making them the biggest single alien group we've got (some of the group shots had 40-50 or more Markabs, all in full prosthetics and full costume)...and now, never to be seen again."
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Babylon 5 Episode Guide.