This episode starts a string of dark episodes that might very well continue to the end of the season. The episode in itself was mediocre, but did have quite a few good moments.

It's nice to see Bester back and with his much talked about bloodhound units. Bester hasn't been seen since the end of the Earth War, but his concerns are still the same (his telepaths). Bester seems especially concerned with Byron and doing anything to capture the man. Bester this time goes through different channels, when he can't telepaths by force he actually uses the book to lay claim to Byron and his group. If Bester hadn't got temporary sidetracked he would have possibly stopped the future events that were hinted at in "Deconstruction...". Bester even seems to know something bad will happen, implied by his parting shots to the crew of Babylon 5 (which also seem to indicate that he knows Byron).

Lyta's relationship with Byron, the telepath's, and Psi-Corp. really changes in this episode as she becomes more involved. At the beginning of the episode Lyta's simply getting some extra supplies from medlab, but during the course of the episode she protects them (stretching her former agreement with Bester and as a secondary effect drawing away from the B5 crew). Finally at the end of the episode she openly joins the telepath's by taking off her glove and Psi-Corp pin (openly severing her new status with the Psi-Corp.). Not that I blame her, to see people she helped, like Zach, working against her probably was what pushed her fully into openly becoming involved in the telepath colony.

There is not much to say about Byron and teeps in this episode. Other than two things there was nothing particularly good or bad. The first is Byron's horribly sappy weeping willow speech (I would have been stupified if Lyta was actually suppose to fall for it), and the other was the singing at the end which,while understandably worked for atmosphere, bordered on heavy-handedness.

Garibaldi's suspicion of Lochley finally comes to fruitation in this episode. The arrival of Bester on station, causes a explosive confrontation between Garibaldi and Lochley resulting in Garibaldi's trip to the brig. I liked the storyline here, but thought it was executed badly at a couple points. First, while Garibaldi's attempt on Bester makes perfect sense, I find it hard to believe that Lochley could in reality hold him back like she did. I had a problem with the secret Lochley - Sheridan relationship itself when it finally gets explained to both Garibaldi and the audience, but I will put that complaint elsewhere in the review.

One scene with Lochley worth noting is the one towards the beginning of the episode. When Lochley is inspecting the damage, the dialogue between her and the construction crew about how long it will take to fix the damage is noteworthy. While still a little preachy, this scene was a much better attempt at gaining support for Lochley's Character than the heavy-handed attempt at the end of "A View from the Gallery".

The revealed past relationship between Lochley and Sheridan was disappointing. I do think the storyline had some potential (if not a lot), but to have them married in the past destroyed most of it. If I wanted to watch a soap opera I would do just that. One of the few saving graces worthy of note is the position the previous marriage to Lochley puts Sheridan in. Sheridan has been married to a warrior (Lochley), a worker (Anna), and now a religous figure (Delenn). Still this fact doesn't justify the whole, questionable plotline of Lochley and Sheridan being married.

A couple more things worth noting about Lochley is how much her attitude is like Sheridan when he first arrived of B5. Also Lochley is walking a thin line between the telepaths and Bester and her "medical" solution should not have worked in my eyes.

Londo's comment about it all starting to go bad is haunting in the context this dark episode. However, hopefully this comment was not in the context of episodes like "View from the Gallery" and "Learning Curve", because in that case the series is starting to go bad. Anyway's coming right after his apology in "The Very Long Night of Londo Mollari", the news of the Regents failing health is ironic. Seems like the more good Londo does, the more the universe rallies against him.

As far as the Londo/Gkar Bodyguard storyline goes, I was disappointed by it. While it does fit the future from "War Without End II", the Gkar/Londo Bodyguard thread comes off as somewhat stilted since none of the obvious concerns (include some possible solutions to those concerns) from the pairing are dealt with in this episode (hopefully they will be in future episodes and by doing so solving the problem). I think this plot thread deserved to be an A plot in another episode. In an episode of its own the whole issue would have more time to play out and address any concerns. I honestly believe that in that instance the storyline would work well. Instead its slid into this episode behind more teep stuff causing some problems that did not have the time to be addressed.

While this episode did have some good moments with Bester, Lyta, and Garibaldi it was quite unbalanced causing a lower score.

Rating: 5.5

Next Week: The Telepath Situation takes on a New Form