Atonement

Overview

Delenn is recalled to Minbar to resolve a problem concerning her relationship with Sheridan, and must finally face up to her role in the Earth-Minbari War. Sheridan sends Marcus and Franklin to Mars on a secret mission. Brian Carpenter as Callenn. Reiner Schone as Dukhat.

P5 Rating: 8.55

Production number: 409
Original air week: February 24, 1997
DVD release date: January 6, 2004

Written by J. Michael Straczynski
Directed by Tony Dow

Plot Points

@@@856745633 After the last Shadow War, Valen, who was still genetically partially human ("War Without End, Part Two,") had children. The children, fearing persecution because they weren't pure Minbari, fled Minbar until after Valen's death. They returned and had children of their own, spreading human genes through the Minbari population to the present day.
@@@856745633 Valen's body was never found after his death.
@@@856745633 Delenn is a descendant of Valen, and as such had some human DNA even before her transformation in "Chrysalis."
@@@856745991 The Grey Council elected not to make contact with humans, who they heard about through the Centauri. When the Grey Council's cruiser came upon the human convoy some time later ("A Late Delivery from Avalon") only Delenn, who had researched humans in the meantime, knew which race they belonged to. Dukhat realized that the Minbari practice of approaching with gun ports open could be dangerous, but before his order to close them could be carried out, the Earth ships attacked.
@@@856745633 Enraged over the death of Dukhat, Delenn gave the order that started the Earth-Minbari War. She was later unable to stop it from proceeding.
@@@856745633 The Triluminaries used by the Grey Council were made specifically for Sinclair. They activate in the presence of Sinclair/Valen's DNA. They were made on Epsilon 3 and brought back in time by Sinclair ("War Without End, Part Two.")
@@@856979209 Franklin has given G'Kar a prosthetic eye, which can see and transmit images to G'Kar's brain even when it's not in its socket.

Unanswered Questions

@@@856745633 Why was Valen's body never found? Is he perhaps still alive or in suspended animation?
@@@856809066 In "Babylon Squared," Delenn was given a triluminary and told there were still two left. Why was Sinclair given three of them, when only one was required to operate the chrysalis machine? ("Chrysalis," "War Without End, Part Two")
@@@856809127 Did Delenn maintain the secret of Valen's human DNA, allowing Callenn to cover up for her as he suggested?
@@@857554159 Exactly what is the dreaming? Does it have a will of its own, or does it simply stimulate the dreamer's subconscious?
@@@856979209 How far can G'Kar's eye transmit? Is it useful for spying purposes?

Analysis

@@@856745633 Callenn said the number of Minbari with traces of human DNA were beyond measure. A rough estimate can be made, however. If Minbari couples have, on average, two children, and have children at age fifty (since Minbari have longer lifespans than humans, a longer delay between generations is plausible) then in a thousand years, there would be twenty generations of Valen's descendants, the most recent numbering about 1,000,000. That estimate assumes no interbreeding among his descendants, and a variation in the number of children of the first few generations could greatly alter the number. Still, it's a useful discussion point.
1,000,000 probably works out to a tiny fraction of the Minbari population, which, it's not unreasonable to assume, is many billions of people spread across various worlds despite Lennier's claim ("Points of Departure") that Minbari population has been on the decline for some time.
On the other hand, if Valen's descendants were markedly more prolific than average Minbari, e.g. with a 30-year generation time rather than a 50-year one (and both numbers are pure conjecture!) there'd have been 33 generations, with 8,600,000,000 in the most recent, in which case the term "countless" would easily apply. Obviously interbreeding, very probable in a population that size, would reduce the number markedly.
Either way, a substantial percentage of the Minbari population most likely still has pure Minbari genes. This is supported by Dukhat's reaction to the triluminary glowing when Delenn touched it; if Valen's progeny were in fact a large percentage of the population, presumably previous Grey Council members would have triggered the triluminary.
@@@857892773 Callenn's horror at the prospect of human DNA mingling with Minbari genes parallels the newscast in "The Illusion of Truth," which attempted to suggest that Delenn and Sheridan wanted to introduce Minbari genes into humans. In fact, just the opposite has occurred.
@@@857586065 David, Delenn and Sheridan's son ("War Without End, Part Two") will be a direct descendant of all three of The One.
@@@877199700 Dukhat's conversation with Delenn is echoed years later when Lennier arrives on Babylon 5 ("The Parliament of Dreams") and she tells him the same thing Dukhat told her: "I cannot have an aide who will not look up. You will be forever walking into things."
In "Rumors, Bargains, and Lies," Delenn said she'd been training Lennier as Dukhat trained her. Delenn eventually succeeded Dukhat as leader of the Minbari, both in this episode and in "Babylon Squared," though she turned the position down in both cases. Will the parallel between Lennier and Delenn in her youth continue into the future? Is Lennier destined to a prominent place in Minbari society?
@@@865624085 Dukhat said he could override the Council's decision to avoid contacting the humans. What is the relationship between the Council and the leader? Do they simply serve as an advisory body, with the final decisions ultimately made by the leader?
@@@857586446 Lennier's pledge to Delenn, to be by her side through fire, storm, darkness, and death, echoes the pledge of the Nine to the One in the Minbari ceremony in "The Parliament of Dreams."
@@@865732097 Delenn feels responsible for the Earth-Minbari War. Her father committed suicide, heartbroken over the war ("Grey 17 Is Missing.") Does Delenn thus feel personally responsible for her father's death?
@@@857335050 Why did Dukhat suspect Delenn was descended from Valen? With so many descendants, he couldn't have followed Valen's entire bloodline, even assuming it was all documented. Perhaps he simply researched the heritage of all the acolytes working with the Grey Council.
@@@875586691 Delenn's childhood vision ("Confessions and Lamentations,") in which a figure appeared to her in a temple and said he wouldn't allow "any of my little ones" to come to harm there, takes on new significance now. If the figure was some kind of manifestation of Valen, "little ones" might have referred to his descendants, and the vision might have been Delenn's first clue that she was somehow related to him. If so, the vision was probably a powerful motivating force for her, perhaps even the source of her belief in her own destiny.
If Delenn told Dukhat about the vision, or he found out about it some other way, that might explain his suspicion that she was a descendant of Valen.
@@@857335050 Did Dukhat know Valen was part human? Callenn was aware of it; was it common knowledge among the Grey Council after Sinclair was interrogated and the triluminary indicated his relation to Valen? ("And the Sky Full of Stars")
@@@857890134 Do Valen's descendants have distinguishing features? Perhaps the presence of human DNA explains why a small number of Minbari men have facial hair, e.g. Dukhat, Draal ("A Voice in the Wilderness") and Kalain ("Points of Departure.")
@@@857326883 In "Soul Hunter," the soul hunter recalls that the Minbari made a wall of bodies to stop Dukhat's soul from being taken. Although soul hunters appeared as the battle began, no attempt to stop them was shown, and Delenn was seeminly unaware of them as Dukhat lay dying in her arms. Perhaps the soul hunter was speaking metaphorically; there were so many Minbari dead that their ability to sense death didn't lead them to Dukhat in particular. However, since the soul hunter recognized Delenn years later, he must have arrived at Dukhat at some point, perhaps after she ordered the attack on the humans.
@@@857889258 Zack's discomfort with his new uniform mirrors his discomfort with the Earthforce uniform in "Voices of Authority."
@@@857325791 G'Kar is wearing rags around his eye in the flashforward in "War Without End, Part Two." Where was his eye? Destroyed or discarded, or simply recharging or sending him images from somewhere else?
@@@857325791 Ivanova is likely still the leader of half the Drazi on Babylon 5. She wore the green leader's sash to the party. Presumably the fact that all the formerly green Drazi are now wearing purple ("The Geometry of Shadows") didn't cause any problems.

Notes

@@@857326883 One of the heavy cruisers in the Prometheus convoy is the Hyperion ("A Voice in the Wilderness, Part Two.") The name can be seen briefly on the side of the ship in one scene. According to coproducer George Johnsen, that was intentional, not just an accidental reuse of a computer model, implying the Hyperion escaped from the Minbari counterattack on the Earth base.
@@@900954390 More than five days may have elapsed between the first scene, Zack's fitting, and the second, the arrival of Callenn and his entourage. ("Thirdspace")
@@@856981120 A slight inaccuracy: The ship carrying Franklin and Marcus is shown to have zero gravity. But the exterior shot shows its engines firing. The resulting acceleration (in the vacuum of space, any thrust will result in acceleration) would have pushed all the objects in the cargo hold toward one of the walls. Of course, it's possible the engines were glowing but not actually in use; perhaps they were in some sort of standby mode.
@@@857891914 Continuity glitch: During the conference scene with Sheridan, Franklin, and Marcus, Franklin is reading over his documents with the folder flat on Sheridan's desk. When the view shifts to show all three characters, Franklin is holding the folder.
@@@875231634 The tune sung by Marcus is "I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General," from "The Pirates of Penzance" by Gilbert and Sullivan. Marcus misquotes the song slightly: he says, "quote the facts historical," when the original lyrics are, "quote the fights historical."
@@@857376446 Delenn's family name, Mir, may be a reference to Mira Furlan's first name.
@@@859361670 Sheridan's line about his true face being mashed up against a pillow and drooling was based on a rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated message commenting on "Shadow Dancing," where the Minbari ritual was first introduced.

jms speaks

@@@857554603 Did Dukhat come out the way you imagined him?
Yeah, that's pretty close to how I saw him in my head. Definitely a bigger than life fellow.
@@@857685549 When I introduce a new character, I just kinda see a sense of the character in my head, an outline...if you take off your glasses, and you're nearsighted, that will give you some sense of it. When an actor comes in and hits it, the character goes into sharp focus.
@@@850297586 Will Delenn appear in flashbacks with her pre-chrysalis appearance?
Yes, Mira got into the original year-one makeup. It's funny...when I walked out onto the set, and saw her in that prosthetic, the first words that came out of my mouth were, "It's *you*! I haven't seen you in almost three years, how've you been?"
I don't think Mira quite knew what to make of me.
@@@855996679 Actually, though the tougher Delenn is in flashbacks in 2 weeks [referring to this episode], the foreground/contemporary story has her very tough, and very smart. Basically, the next mini-arc sequence focuses a LOT on Delenn...she has many facets, and while part of that is the relationship, there's steel there as well, and we're going to explore that. As she at one point comments to Sheridan, "I appreciate that you have come to care for what I have become... but never forget who I am, or what I can do."
After this arc of hers, nobody's ever going to make that mistake.
@@@857376321 How could Dukhat override the Grey Council, if he was simply a member?
There's the One, and the Nine...when Dukhat was alive, there were 9 grey council members and him as the head of it, making ten. (Look at the picture and count the number of people.) 1 and 9.
Valen called together the Grey Council, formed the first one; until then the castes had been in constant competition. He wanted to operate outside of that a bit, so he made sure he was not one of the Nine. That tradition has continued.
@@@857547292 But when he introduced Delenn, there was an empty spotlight.
No, if you keep watching Dukhat comes in, followed by Delenn, through the opening (the empty spot) and then another Minbari comes in to fill that spot.
(Sudden thought...I have to check to see if we *used* that shot or if it was just in dailies...but if you count the Minbari there at the end of the scene, you'll find the count is correct.)
@@@857328008 Calenn was not Delenn's brother; the grey councilor speaks of brothers in the generic sense.
Draal, in his first appearance, also had a small beard.
@@@857554509 Other Minbari have had facial hair; including Draal v1.0 and Kalain in "Points of Departure." It's certainly not common, though.
@@@857547292 Who were the other ships at the battle?
Those were Soul Hunters, who in the first season we learned showed up to attempt to grab Dukhat's soul...they were prevented from successfully boarding the ship by the Minbari, who threw up a wall of bodies to stop them (which is why there were few around with Delenn and Dukhat; Soul Hunters are a pretty advanced sort, the terror of Minbari, and it took a lot to stop them). After Dukhat died, Delenn went down and joined in, confronting them about this.
@@@857554776 Others in the Council died, as was noted when the one says, "Our brothers?" "Dead," Delenn says. So there were others.
@@@864693044 Won't Sheridan be upset when he finds out Delenn ordered the war?
"Listen, honey, while you were out I went to the store and I bought some new candles, you know how we're always running out, and Lennier took the cat in to be cleaned, and oh, did I mention I was directly responsible for the deaths of two hundred and fifty thousand of your best friends and fellow officers? Pass the sugar."
She'll never tell him.
Because it's over...what would be the point, except to ruin what they have now.
@@@864693194 The reality is...in war, one does what one does. Afterward, as we heal, we try to forget what we did, and what they did. He killed as many Minbari as he could; she was on the Grey Council that directed the war. One doesn't go into it.
@@@857889979 Why didn't Sinclair leave Dukhat a message warning him about meeting the humans?
He could have left Dukhat a message...but tampering in the future is VERY chancy business, and could even make things worse, for all we know.
@@@857889418 Did the triluminary sense Sinclair?
Yeah, we showed it glowing when Sinclair was catpured. Since it happened with Valen, they assumed it was because he had a Minbari soul, maybe Valen reborn.
@@@864692860 Dukhat was not descended from Valen; yes, the Grey Council now knows who Sinclair was; and general knowledge of what happened would certainly have an upsetting effect on Minbari society, so they will continue to keep it indefinitely back-roomed....
@@@859454397 Some Minbari on the Grey Council think that Sinclair opened up the "soul door," for lack of a better term, and Delenn's actions can be seen as a kind of back-fire, closing the door again. Ain't necessarily what's true, but what they believe.
And yes, they would've had Delenn remain childless, but would be allowed to marry a Minbari. And, again, it's a matter of marrying a non-Minbari with or WITHOUT kids...it's a very inflammatory sort of thing from a cultural perspective.
@@@857376321 Did Delenn's human DNA allow her to undergo the transformation? Will this be important in the future?
Yeah, the human DNA definitely helped...and overall, this isn't so much the arc as the overall story and history. It's filling out the world.
@@@857547292 Is it a coincidence that Delenn's family name is Russian for "peace?"
Yeah, there's that, and it nicely intersects with the fact that Delenn is portrayed by MIRa Furlan. It's kind of a bank shot.
@@@857554225 Mir is her family; you are generally born into a caste unless you at some point decide that the calling of your heart is elsewhere, at which point you enter training for that other caste (with the permission of your caste leaders) until such time as it's finalized that that's what you want, at which time you're assigned to a clan within that caste. If you choose to stay in the caste you're born into, you automatically are in your familiy's clan.
@@@865731956 Lennier is religious caste; and all members of a given clan belong to one caste.
There are, for instance, no religious caste members of the Star Riders (military caste) clan.
This seems to be contradicted by "There All the Honor Lies," in which Levell, a warrior, was a member of Lennier's clan.
@@@857554509 How does the dreaming know whose memories to probe? Is it whoever drinks the drug first?
I think the order or dominance of the drug is probably determined by the contents of the script....
@@@856981247 "My question is, since we can see that the ship's engine is running, why aren't all of the objects in the hold laying against the bulkhead as a result of the ship's movement? Aside from that, it was a pretty neat effects shot."
Because it's accurate; it's the same reason you don't see everything slammed up against the back wall of the shuttle even though it's circling the earth at thousands of miles per hour.
Ed. note: This is wrong; that effect does occur on the shuttle when its maneuvering thrusters fire, which is why shuttle crews lock everything down during maneuvers. See Notes.
@@@857325171 The ship with Marcus and Franklin *wasn't* spinning... hence, no gravity.
@@@857327683 Coproducer George Johnsen
Re: your comment that the Hyperion was more likely a re-used computer model. All of the models used in the show are stored "nameless" with a link to the naming/numbering file that has to be activated to add the name to the ship to avoid this kind of problem. (Instigated when it happened on an earlier episode). The ship in the picture is the Hyperion 'cuz Joe wanted it that way.
@@@857554509 There was the Prometheus, which was there; and others, including the Amundsen. The one you saw, which looks a bit like the Aggy but without the rotating section, is another, smaller class of destroyer also seen, I believe, in [Severed] "Dreams."
@@@874689595 How did the Earth ships hit the Minbari ships, if human targeting systems can't lock on? Why weren't Franklin and Marcus floating?
They targeted visually, it was close enough to do so.
A hit with full guns of a major destroyer and accompanying ships will kill damn near any single ship that does not have some kind of defensive screen going (fighers or counter-lasers or missiles or the like).
The fightes were launched in main while on approach.
Franklin and Marcus *were* strapped in, which if you look more closely you can see.
@@@857889979 In your comments on "War Without End, Part Two," you said Valen had no children. Is your message right, or is the episode?
What airs is considered canon; in 15 years, nobody's gonna be hauling these messages around. But the show will still be on the air. If it airs, it's canon.
And in another one of those posts, I did mention that on just a couple of small occasions, I have fibbed when asked major story arc questions to protect future storylines from being deflated....
@@@862818943 If you check the archives, when people said, "But what about the relationship between Sinclair and Delenn we see?" (and this is back a long time ago), I said that there is a relationship there, yes, but it isn't what you think it is. Now we see what it was.
@@@859316095 Minbari society doesn't seem to have been affected much by the loss of the Grey Council.
The problems caused by the breakup of the Grey Council will form a major part of the story arc about mid-season.
@@@860558543 Was the song Jason Carter's idea?
The song was in the script; Jason then had to learn it.
@@@865288657 What was involved in using the song in the end credits?
Nothing, really...we just grabbed one of the audio bits from the day's filming and dropped it in.