Season 3 as the strongest of the Babylon 5 seasons has a few episodes in contention for the worst one.  “Exogenesis” is up there, though I actually kind of like it.  Some see it as an interruption before we get to one of the most explosive mini-arcs in the show, but I like a quiet low stakes episode before we take the plunge, and this is a great example.  Plus it has the added bonus of foregrounding one of our background characters and I appreciate the show taking the time. 

The episode opens up with a shuttle arrival being anxiously watched by a pair of rough looking humans, before jumping over to Lt.jg Corwin’s promotion party to full Lieutenant.  The command staff are in attendance to celebrate, though at something of a remove as makes sense for the senior officers.  We jump from their quiet discussions, back to the pair from earlier as they calmly watch a man writhe in agony on the floor, with a giant bug attached to his back.  The bug fades into his body, and his wounds disappear as the pair smile.  

 Back from credits the two are more agitated as the man on the floor has died from whatever they were doing.  They flee before security can arrive.

The b plot kicks off due to Lt. Corwin’s promotion.  Now that the young man will have more responsibilities Sheridan becomes concerned he might find out about the various conspiracies and secret alliances that are entangling the senior staff.  He orders Ivanova to feel out the junior officer so that they can decide to either bring him in, or freeze him out.  Ivanova approaches him to ask to talk, and then shoots down his suggestion to meet at the mess hall and instead she invites him to her quarters for coffee.  The poor dope does not know how to interpret this and panic buys fake flowers that he ultimately loses the nerve to give.  At the end of this silly plot Ivanova has to conclude that Corwin is probably too much of an order follower to be involved in the main cast activities.  

Marcus pops after being discussed earlier, here jokingly harassing a sleeping merchant named Duncan.  The old man is clearly unwell, and Marcus tries to cheer him up by buying one of his wares.  He then proceeds to the bar where he meets his contacts.  He notices something is amiss when some of his regular network of informants are no longer around.  Marcus goes to confront Samuel, one of his missing helpers, and finds him standing around silently with a bunch of other people.  After Marcus leaves we see that Duncan is the next person to be implanted with an alien.  When Marcus finds that Duncan has abandoned his spot in the market he goes to Garibaldi and gets the brush off that is standard in these alien takeover stories.  He seizes on a comment from the chief and goes to bother Franklin about his concerns. 

Franklin gets pulled into the alien plot by a mysterious body, with no obvious signs of death.  He agrees to help out another doctor by doing an autopsy to figure out a cause of death.  He ends up pulling some very odd living tendrils out of the body, which only furthers his curiosity.   Thus he is easily convinced to go off on an adventure with Marcus to Down Below.  They quickly find some oddities with Duncan’s quarters and end up captured by the people that have been taken over.  

As Franklin and Marcus watch the aliens take over another person, Franklin goes to the worst case scenario, that the aliens are going to take the station, but Marcus points out that if they wanted to do that they wouldn’t have targeted homeless people.  Eventually Duncan comes to explain that the aliens are the Vindrizi and that they are not harming anyone.  They ask Franklin for help with the mergings that are ongoing.  Naturally he refuses.  

In a quiet moment Marcus asks why Ivanova is somewhat standoffish.  Franklin explains that Ivanova just really does not trust new people before he eventually gets irritated at the idea of discussing personal relationships while they are under threat of death.  The conversation gets broken up by the aliens coming and removing Franklin to give medical treatment to another host body that is not handling the process well.  This gives Marcus the opportunity to defeat the two guards that are left and he comes running to the rescue.  The aliens explain that they are living archives that are nearly 500,000 years old.  They plan to escape from the coming Shadow War so that their knowledge cannot be misused or lost, echoing the technomages from season 2.  To show that they are telling the truth Duncan sheds his alien and confirms the story, though this means he cannot ever again merge. 

Duncan ends up deciding to go and travel the stars, now that he has had a taste of what is out there.  Marcus sees him off.  While that is happening Ivanova, Garibaldi and Franklin are meeting up at the bar and discussing the Vindrizi situation, when Franklin hints that Marcus is interested in Ivanova, and she guesses that he sent the roses.  She angrily tosses them at him while he is eating, leading a confused Marcus to take it as a good sign about their relationship.

All in all a pretty weightless episode, but most scifi shows need to do an Invasion of the Body Snatchers riff and this show decided to make the nice, which is pretty standard curve ball to throw.  Not my favorite episode of the season, but I dont think it deserves all the flak that it gets.  

Next week we kick things into overdrive with the Fascist Earth plot colliding with the Shadows plots in “Messages From Earth”.  It is great and starts off what JMS considers a three episode mini-arc that is really great. 

As always the show is available to watch for free on Tubi with ads. 

Where do I know them from?

• James Warwick who plays the alien leader I have not seen in anything else, but he apparently does the Qui-Gon Jinn voice for a few games I have played.
•  Aubrey Morris had a long career in TV and film but I remember him as showing up in the original Wicker Man and in Deadwood for a few episodes. 
• Josh Coxx has bounced around TV for a while, I recall seeing him in the show Revolution which was not terribly good. 
• Eric Steinberg, who plays Samuel is another regular across TV but I remember him best as the first Starfleet guy to get borgified in Star Trek:First Contact.

The Good

• I like the light plotting and the episode of the week format for this one.
• I also enjoy this as the first time Franklin and Marcus get paired up, which is a pairing that is fun later on. 

The Bad

• The episode does not really have any weight, most especially as we never see the Vindrizi again. 

Arc Points (Spoilers Ahead)

• Corwin will eventually fold pretty seamlessly into the rogue Babylon 5, so none of his plot here really matters either.
• We do get the hint about next week, with Marcus learning his “package” is on the way.
• All in all not a whole lot of arc in this one.