Column Babylon 5 Rewatch Babylon 5 Rewatch: “The Exercise of Vital Powers” Garibaldi finally meets his new employer, while Dr. Franklin discovers that Lyta can influence the modified telepaths… By Keith R.A. DeCandido | Published on January 5, 2026 Credit: Warner Bros. Television Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: Warner Bros. Television “The Exercise of Vital Powers”Written by J. Michael StraczynskiDirected by John LafiaSeason 4, Episode 16Production episode 416Original air date: June 2, 1997 It was the dawn of the third age… The rebel fleet has moved on from liberating Proxima to liberating Beta Durani colony and the Mid-Range Military Base. In a personal log, we hear Garibaldi lamenting that Sheridan is really doing this. This concerns him sufficiently that he has gone against a long-ago-taken oath to never return to Mars. He and Wade are in a transport tube, heading to Edgars’ Mars home. Wade insists that Garibaldi put on a blindfold, as Edgars values his privacy. Garibaldi thinks that’s absurd and that he’ll look silly. Along the way, they babble about various things, including Wade surprising Garibaldi with the revelation that he has a Masters Degree in English Literature. On B5, Franklin is continuing his efforts to free the telepaths from Shadow influence, but nothing is working. Allan, who is there on other business, asks for an update. After Franklin tells him, and expresses his frustration, particularly with the fact that Sheridan has yet to tell him what, exactly, is the hurry. Alexander arrives, Allan having asked her there to scan the victim of an assault, who’s having trouble remembering his attacker and wishes some psionic assistance in doing so. While there, Alexander makes telepathic contact with Franklin’s patient, who gets up and walks toward her and doesn’t go crazy or try to destroy everything or reach out to control the equipment. Credit: Warner Bros. Television It only lasts a moment, and as soon as it’s over, Alexander buggers off. Franklin tracks her down, and she apologizes for messing up his experiment, but Franklin gleefully explains that this is the first progress he’s made in ages, and asks her to come back when she’s done with her current job. She reluctantly agrees. On Mars, Garibaldi arrives at Edgars’ palatial home—Edgars apologizing for how small it is, saying his place on Earth is way bigger. But domed space is at a premium on Mars. However, because he owns businesses on Mars, Edgars has to live on the red planet for half the year to make use of the tax benefits. Edgars wants to know why Garibaldi was so eager for a face-to-face right now, and Garibaldi explains that he’s concerned about Sheridan. Yes, Clark’s bad news, but Sheridan’s military attack will just tear Earth apart. Garibaldi also seems to think that Sheridan has designs to take over Earth himself. But Garibaldi absolutely does not want to turn him over to Clark. He’d rather Edgars do it. He’ll be seen as a hero, and that will be capital that will be useful to him. Over the course of the next few days, Garibaldi and Edgars have several conversations. It’s clear that Edgars doesn’t trust Clark, and is especially concerned at how much power he’s given to Psi Corps. He makes it clear that the megacorps have really been running things, and they suspected that Clark had Santiago assassinated long before B5 released the footage proving it. One of those conversations happens in the middle of the night, with Garibaldi forcibly taken from his bed and brought to a room with a telepath (Edgars wants him frazzled and out of sorts so he’s less likely to hide his thoughts). Edgars asks him several pointed questions, with the telepath showing with a nod whether or not Garibaldi is telling the truth. Garibaldi says he doesn’t trust telepaths. Credit: Warner Bros. Television On B5, Alexander is able to help Franklin find a way around the Shadow implants, though Alexander also has to stop the patient from killing himself. When Sheridan checks in with Ivanova, he transfers down to medlab, at which point Franklin demands to know what he needs the telepaths for so urgently. Sheridan only tells him in private on a secure coded channel—and does so off-camera, so we only see Franklin’s devastated reaction. He then asks if Alexander is available for a long-term gig that will involve travel to Mars. On Mars, Edgars eventually reveals that he’s incredibly concerned about telepaths. Both he and Garibaldi agree that there will be a reckoning, and Edgars’ concern is that it won’t be a war in the military sense, but rather a war of information and privacy—or lack of same. Plus, Clark has given Psi Corps a great deal more power, and they won’t just give that up once Clark is out of power. They also agree that Sheridan needs to be stopped. Edgars needs Sheridan off the table to that Clark will relax and lower his guard. He’ll read Garibaldi completely in on what he has planned once he knows for sure he can trust the erstwhile security chief. And his condition for gaining that trust: to turn Sheridan over to Clark. Garibaldi initially refuses, as Clark will kill him, but Edgars assures him that he’ll want to capture Sheridan and gain the propaganda value of having him as a prisoner. Garibaldi then reveals how to capture Sheridan: through his father David. Edgars says that Clark’s been turning Earth upside down to find David to no avail, but Garibaldi knows how to do it. David suffers from a blood disease that requires a Centauri drug called tenasticin. Find a bogus prescription of that, and you’ll probably find David. We also see Edgars and Wade looking in on three patients, who are obviously dying, their bodies covered in lesions. Edgars instructs Wade to put them down, as if they were sick pets, as they shouldn’t have to suffer anymore and they have all the information they need. Credit: Warner Bros. Television Get the hell out of our galaxy! Sheridan is nervous because everything is going so well. Both Franklin and Garibaldi talk about how much he’s changed since returning from Z’ha’dum. Ivanova is God. The episode opens with Ivanova’s “Voice of the Resistance” broadcast filling in the viewer on the rebel fleet’s progress. In addition, she reports to Sheridan that Clark sent two destroyers to take B5 but as soon as they arrived, they defected. The household god of frustration. Garibaldi makes it clear that he knows that Edgars is up to something more complicated and dangerous than he lets on, mostly by the very fact that he hired Garibaldi. If he just wanted to keep his shipments safe from his competitors, he’d buy a ship and keep it off the radar. He needed secrecy from everyone, which is why he hired Garibaldi. If you value your lives, be somewhere else. When Ivanova tells Sheridan that Delenn is finishing up her business on Minbar and will be returning to B5 soon, Sheridan gets this goofy grin on his face. It’s very adorable. The Corps is mother, the Corps is father. Alexander is able to telepathically help the Shadow-infested psis. Meantime, the poor telepath that Edgars hires to polygraph Garibaldi is “paid” by being shot and killed by Wade. The Shadowy Vorlons. Alexander hears the sound of a Shadow vessel when she scans Franklin’s patient. Also, according to Edgars, the Shadows’ interest in Psi Corps is what prompted Clark to keep them close and make them a bigger part of his administration. Garibaldi doesn’t bother to explain the reasons to Edgars—that the Shadows are vulnerable to telepathy—probably because the Shadows aren’t really a factor anymore. Credit: Warner Bros. Television Looking ahead. Sheridan’s use for the Shadow-infested telepaths will finally be revealed in “Endgame.” Edgars’ full plan will be revealed next time in “The Face of the Enemy.” No sex, please, we’re EarthForce. The last question Edgars asks Garibaldi while in the room with the telepath is if he’s still in love with Lise. Garibaldi lies and says no. Later, Garibaldi and Lise have a fraught conversation in which it’s clear that Garibaldi still loves her and that she needs more than a declaration, especially since it’s clear that he’s married to the job first, and any relationship is secondary. Welcome aboard. Back from “Conflicts of Interest” are Denise Gentile as Lise and Mark Schneider as Wade. Back from “Moments of Transition,” and actually appearing in front of the camera and credited for the first time, is the late great Efram Zimbalist Jr. as Edgars. All three will return next week in “The Face of the Enemy.” In addition, Shelley Robertson does excellent work with her facial expressions and actually gets credited despite having no dialogue as the telepath. Trivial matters. The episode title derives from Aristotle’s description of happiness, which Edgars quotes: “The exercise of vital powers along lines of excellence in a life affording them scope.” Edgars mentions times in history when the people of a nation let fascists take over, citing Russia in 1917 and Germany in 1939 (which actually happened, though it would’ve been more accurate to say Germany in 1933, which is when Hitler was elected chancellor), and also Russia again in 2013 and Iraq in 2025 (which didn’t happen), as well as France in 2112 (which still might). Edgars also makes reference to the Nazi party and the Communist party, as well as the “Jihad party,” which one assumes is supposed to be one in our future and the show’s past. Garibaldi mentions that three times Mars tried to kill him. One would be when he and Sinclair trekked across the surface of Mars, mentioned in “Infection” and dramatized in the “Shadows Past and Present” storyline that ran through the fifth through eighth issues of DC’s B5 comic book by Tim DeHaas & John Ridgway. The echoes of all of our conversations. “Did you know this place was named after the god of war? Its rising foretold the death of kings, the collapse of empires. It was a very bad sign. Now there are two million people living here.” “It’s still a bad sign.” —Wade and Garibaldi discussing Mars. Credit: Warner Bros. Television The name of the place is Babylon 5. “Everybody lies.” As with “Conflicts of Interest,” we have Michael Garibaldi as a twenty-third-century Dashiell Hammett character, with his manly demands and his cynical voiceovers and his weepy scene with Lise and his macho posturing and his reluctant descent into betrayal. And it’s actually kind of fun. Jerry Doyle in particular sells the character’s disgust at having to return to Mars. Denise Gentile is a little too melodramatic, but given the awful dialogue she’s stuck reading, there’s only so much she can do. The episode is, however, owned by the mighty Efram Zimbalist Jr. Edgars has to deliver a lot of exposition, and the dialogue he has as written could very easily have devolved into didactic droning. But his silken voice and relaxed delivery absolutely sell it. It’s a magnificent performance. Overall, this is a very quiet, talky episode, the calm before the storm, and almost entirely setup. It sets a lot of important things in motion, many of which will pay off next time. On its own it just barely works, mainly due to the frank discussions about telepaths between Edgars and Garibaldi, which Doyle and Zimbalist Jr. make more compelling than they might be in the hands of lesser talents. Still and all, these discussions do a nice job explicating the ethical issues that would come up if a subset of humanity developed the ability to read minds. Mention should also be made of Shelley Robertson, who has a superb gift for facial expressions, conveying quite a bit without saying a word as the telepath who serves as Garibaldi’s polygraph. Next week: “The Face of the Enemy.”[end-mark] The post <i>Babylon 5</i> Rewatch: “The Exercise of Vital Powers” appeared first on Reactor.