We are moving through more of the season’s main plots again, with a heaping dose of Byron and the telepaths, but we are also following up on Franklin and his new mission to study the medicine of other races more fully.  Franklin’s plot is an interesting examination of genocides that happen behind closed doors, whereas the Byron plot is moved along by Byron and the rest of the telepaths discovering what we already know concerning the origin of telepaths.  

We start off with a Franklin voice over that catches us up.  He is examining a Pak’ma’ra and asking them questions about how, as carrion eaters, they are so resistant to infection.  The patient insists this is because they are blessed by god, as long as they dont eat fish. He asks the patient to ingest a contrast solution but wisely or luckily ducks out before it gets spewed up all over the isolab.

Down at customs Zack encounters a group of rogue telepaths that have come to join Byron.  The chief is frankly kind of an asshole about it to their faces. Thankfully before we can fully process this, Byron arrives to be an even bigger asshole, and a much louder one.  Zack takes Lyta aside as Byron takes the telepaths down to their living area.  One of the newcomers named Peter shows off that he has telekinetic abilities, something that Byron decided not to tell anyone about.

Zack sits down with Lyta and just blurts out that he thinks Lyta should not be hanging out with what he considers to be a bad crowd.  Lyta responds by describing Byron as sweet and charming, perhaps confusing him for another Byron that Zack may know.  Zack keeps pressing, and Lyta does a good job of standing up for herself, even bringing up the fact that the B5 staff were going to evict her and force her into smaller quarters.  She finishes her rant against Zack by declaring her allegiance to Byron and his movement.  

In Down Below Byron and his group are accosted by some of the other residents who are resentful of the telepaths Byron manages to defuse their anger somewhat by giving the leader repeated permission to hit him, which kind of takes some of the fun out of it.  It is a decently good response, before Byron decides to be aloof and superior again and imply that he knows the man’s secrets.   

Franklin continues his mission with a visit to the Hyach ambassador.  He explains his mission, but the Hyach are hesitant to share information that could be used to create biological weapons.  He does his best to allay their fears, and they seem to agree to transfer the medical data to him.  After the doctor leaves, the two Hyach argue amongst themselves about the medical data.  

Lyta comes back to Byron and frets over him and asks him why he did not fight back.  He insists that violence is only for mundanes and the Psi-Corps and that he wont allow his movement to be violent.  They talk more and then share a kiss. Byron questions why Lyta sleeps separately from the rest of them.  She replies that she does not feel like she belongs, and Byron announces this to the group.  They all come up and embrace Lyta.  

Franklin takes delivery of the medical records, but he questions why they only go back eight hundred years or so when the Hyach civilization is roughly seven thousand years old.  This gets the doctor curious and he finds that all historical information that is publicly available on the Hyach only goes back about eight hundred years.  

Peter the telekinetic ends up separated from his group and he runs into the same group of guys that roughed up Byron.  Peter however panics and begins mentally throwing things at the gang, causing them to beat him severely.  He gets rushed to Medlab where Franklin gets his treatment started.  Byron comes in to blame all mundanes for the actions of a few, lumping in bleeding heart Franklin with the gang.  Byron watches the Medlab team work on Peter, and projects the information to the rest.  The others go all Village of the Damned on another resident of Down Below, though it is not the one that attacked their comrade.  Byron gets them to stop, but security shows up just when he looks guiltiest.  Byron surrenders without a fight.

While Byron is locked up, the telepaths manage to find the right guy this time, and rough him up.

Eventually Franklin locates some records that are older, including a Drazi ships log that references the Hyach-Do.  One came into the Drazi camp and begged to go with them, but instead the Drazi turned them over to the authorities.  This causes Franklin to do some more digging which in turn causes the Hyach to abduct him and take him to a cargo bay.  There the reveal is that two different sentient species evolved on their planet.  Eventually the two races lived in an uneasy peace.  Eventually religious laws were passed against the Hyach-Do that eventually led to the annihilation of their species, a genocide that took centuries.  The younger Hyach trots out the line about the current Hyach not being responsible, but the ambassador then reveals that the Hyach population is collapsing as intermarriage with the Hyach-Do was necessary for continued genetic survival of both species.  The Hyach beg for Franklin to help them reverse the process, but Franklin counters that he cant do it alone, and the only way is for multiple planets to cooperate in finding a solution.  

Zack moves to release Byron, mentioning that they found the body of the man that attacked the telepaths.  Byron blames Zack fully for the murder insisting that he should have been released when he demanded it.  Lyta escorts Byron back to his quarters.  They eventually become intimate even after Lyta warns him that due to the Vorlons her powers are strong enough that she could hurt him.  As they have sex Byron and the rest of the telepaths see everything that has happened to her, including her time in a tank on the Vorlon homeworld, being altered in a lab with countless other races also in tanks.  This reveal wakes all the other telepaths who weep for Lyta’s experiences.  Right after they finish Byron goes on a rant against the Vorlons.  He quickly shifts the blame to all the existing races, saying that telepaths, though only human telepaths, are owed a homeworld by all the races of the galaxy for saving “their” worlds.  

Next week we have a breather episode that is all about magic and being visited by the spirits of the dead.  Sadly one of the talking points to boost this episode has not aged well, written by Neil Gaiman.  On the other hand you cant get more 90’s than a guest spot from Penn and Teller so at least “Day of the Dead” has that still going for it.

Where do I know them from?

• Fiona Dwyer, as Kirrin the Hyach assistant, I have not seen in anything and many of her credits are ADR looping.
• Jack Hannibal, as Peter, has bounced around TV, but never in anything I have seen.
• Stuard McLean as Carl(the guy that gets killed), has had a pretty strong TV career, everything from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, to Scrubs, and, Euphoria.
• Jana Robbins as Ambassador Tal, had a mild TV career, but nothing that really stand out.

The Good

• Franklin’s plot is an interesting take on the responsibilities that societies have for genocides long in the past.  It also dovetailed well with Byron’s group finding out about the Vorlons.

The Bad

• Byron is still Byron, and it is hard to feel sympathy for a character that regards everyone not like him with a sneering contempt.  Especially in a show that tends to be about diverse groups of people working together. 

Arc Points (Spoilers Ahead)

• Byron and his group are some of the first telepaths to find out how the Vorlons manipulated various species to create telepaths in the first place.  They are suitably shocked by the information.
• Byron’s plan to force the “mundanes” to give them a whole habitable planet is sheer lunacy, but it will be the main thrust of the telepath plots for a bunch more episodes. 
• The Hyach dont disappear like the Markab so presumably Franklin is able to do something for them using the ISA’s resources.