A-Plot: There's an epic of the dangerous drug "Dust" on board. It functions by latching onto any latent telepathy gene in a human (or, potentially other races) and bringing it out, leading to a euphoric telepathic experience that can quickly go bad if it turns into a mind-rape of others or the toking individual can't handle all that information.
On the other hand, such a drug could be used as a weapon, for espionage or just to shut off the minds of a potential opponent. As big a problem is that, when used by (or on telepaths), the results can be deadly. Thus everyone's favorite Psi Cop, Bester, comes a-calling. But the B5 Conspiracy of Light doesn't want him wandering around, "accidentally" discovering what they are up to. So first they put him up against a brace of Minbari teeps to block him for a while (http://goo.gl/RtOCnQ), then they administer "sleepers" to him, the drug that knocks out the powers of non-Psi Corps teeps. That means Bester will be on board, "helping" with tracking down the conspiracy, without an of his powers.
All of the scenes with Walter Koenig as Bester shine. Even without his powers, he remains in rhetorical control of every conversation, cool and pleasant and with a biting sense of humor (http://goo.gl/Yurqn7, http://goo.gl/TQQ8OA). Most of his activities on the ship are accompanied by Garibaldi (http://goo.gl/RpXJ9X), who he plays like a violin, getting some of the best laugh lines of the ep (vid Babylon 5 Scene from Dust To Dust). Over the course of his scenes, you get the idea that, yes, he really is sincere in his desire to help his people, the telepaths — and that it is at the expense or domination of the rest of humanity is sad but unfortunately necessary (though, he asserts, the Corps is responsible for saving humanity as a whole from all sorts of threats that even Mr Garibaldi cannot dream of) (GIFfy http://goo.gl/4KQ8WY). He becomes a villain that you almost find yourself wanting to admire for his bon mots and his sense of duty, before you snap back to what sorts of shenanigans we already know he's been up to.
In the end, of course, the Dust seller (http://goo.gl/wOrC69) is apprehended, and Bester is hustled off the ship — at which time we learn from Bester (to his superior — and, as it turns out, Walter Koenig's wife) that Dust was actually an experiment by the Psi Corps itself, to develop more telepathic humans, an experiment that has clearly failed, ah well …
B-Plot: It turns out that one of the big buyers of Dust on the station is G'Kar, who sees it as a potential weapon — deadly, brutal, and easy to smuggle — against the occupying Centauri. We learn (again) that the Narn once had telepaths, but they were all killed long ago (possibly when the Shadows occupied the planet), and the recessive genes have never come back up again. So there's no telling how the Dust will work on a Narn.
Cue, of course, G'Kar trying it, and going somewhat bonkers (http://goo.gl/UG1iSn). Pre-meditatively or not, he staggers off to the Londo's quarters (though it seems unlikely he still has clearance for that area, and there are no guards but nobody notices the clearly hallucinogenic G'Kar), beats up Vir (who was having a nice visit back to B5), and then physically and psychically assaults Londo (http://goo.gl/grukqY). In so doing, he strips Mollari of a lot of his secrets, from his shame to having been given such a joke assignment as B5, to his visions of the future, to his collaboration with Mr Morden et al. in the destruction of the Narn. At which point he gets really angry …
… but is stopped by a strange vision, of his father (who was executed by the Narn http://goo.gl/P2L5x2), preaching forgiveness and rapprochement (http://goo.gl/QCe1lv) — or, at the very least, seeking a less violent and mutually destructive path (http://goo.gl/xqWDaE). "We are a dying people," his father tells him, along with "I have always been here" — two lines that should prick the ears of any B5 wonk. The vision then ups the intensity with a figure of the holy figure, G'Lan, wings like an angel, appearing before him (http://goo.gl/6yyQbo, http://goo.gl/a0C6eO). In the end, G'Kar looks at the bloodied body of Londo at his feet, and bursts into tears (http://goo.gl/3RrrzB): tears over what he's done, tears over what he is now unable to do, and tears over what faces him in the future. And, in the background, Ambassador Kosh slowly turns away … (key scene vid Babylon 5 – My favorite scenes – G'Kar's Epiphany, extended vid of this plot Babylon 5 – G'Kar Enters Londo Mollari's Mind)
G'Kar's immediate future, it turns out, is a 60 day stint in the B5 pokey, per the local ombuds. Londo (who recovers, though he and Vir have some great injury makeup http://goo.gl/aKsVgi) doesn't press any greater charges, perhaps his own atonement for the secrets now shared between himself and G'Kar, perhaps not wanting those secrets spread any further.
G'Kar himself accepts the punishment willingly. He has some thinking to do …
C-Plot: Not much of a plot, to be honest. Vir is back, visiting Londo to discuss a new agreement of some sort with the Minbari. He has seriously gone native, wearing the equivalent of a Minbari Hawaiian shirt (http://goo.gl/5SoTp2) and waxing lyrical about what nice people the Minbari are (except maybe their warriors), and how maybe it would do Londo a world of good to go visit. He has some nice scenes with Londo (who tries to re-instill in him the stubborness, jingoism, and contempt that the Centauri should feel for anyone else) and with Delenn and Lennier (where he confides in how unhappy he is with how Londo is doing, but defends him in almost the same breath as being far from the dark villain the others think him). Then he gets beat up, but then once again shows his compassion and loyalty by sticking next to Londo during his recovery.
All in All: It's an episode much more about character than plot. Everyone gets some good lines, everyone gets to contribute. The command staff, in general, are clearly becoming more and more aware of how far off the farm they've wandered, and fear of detection is beginning to drive their actions; Sheridan, though, is becoming more reckless, willing to confront Bester (or the Night Watch) directly and let the chips fall as they may when word gets back to Earth, assuming that either side is willing to have their own secrets exposed. Beyond that, as noted, the Bester / Garibaldi show is a hoot, but there's crunchy realism under the exchanged quips. And Vir is just plain old delightful as the voice of everyman sanity.
Londo spends the first half of the episode being arrogant and unlikeable on behalf of the Centauri, but then gets to be terrified the rest of the time, and pulls off both beautifully, getting the viewer to both despise and sympathize with him. It's one of Peter Jurasik's best performances, but, alas, it's against an incredibly powerful performance by Andreas Katsulas as G'Kar, filled with overpowering grief and righteous fury and sadistic joy in what he does to Londo, and what he learns in the process. The G'Kar / Londo confrontation is not the bloody catharsis it should be, but strangely only ramps up the tension between the two characters, leaving G'Kar transformed on his internal Road to Damascus, but in what way remains to be seen.
The one character who comes out problematically in all of this is Susan Ivanova. When Bester is on his transport, approaching B5 (http://goo.gl/NBVNz5), she decides to blow him out of the sky. It seems an uncharacteristic moment for her — not that she would do it, but that she'd be so hesitant and panicky about it. This isn't the iron-willed Ivanova we've come to know. (Sheridan stops her and lets her know about the ways he's come up to neutralize Bester http://goo.gl/JE9DZa, but it's a weird moment that they never talk about again.) The other problematic scene is the one we never see. Here's Bester, hopped up on sleepers, just like they used to pump Ivanova's mother with, and she doesn't have single thing to say to him except a few comments in the safety of the conference room with everyone else? She doesn't run into him and Garibaldi in some corridor, and ask for a few moments alone with their "guest"? Here's where fear, and anger, and doing something outrageous (and stupid) would have made sense, but any such scene was a missed opportunity.
From a plot standpoint, it's pretty lightweight: bad guy with drugs gets tracked down and arrested; good guy with drugs has a weird but enlightening trip and has to do some jail time; the end. It's the thinnest of frameworks to hand an amazing amoung of good on.
Still, with all of that, it's an enjoyable ep that advances and evolves the characters involved, always a good thing to see.
Most Dramatic Moment: G'Kar furiously drags the mental truth out of Londo, in a series of flashbacks, and realizes who was behind (in his own way) the bombing of the Narn homeworld. (vid http://youtu.be/39nvDbbrsmI)
Most Amusing Moment: Bester's "piñata" line (vid Garibaldi/Bester: Piñata; GIFfy http://goo.gl/mtwjQw).
BESTER: "If I had my talent working, I could have warned you when he was coming."
GARIBALDI: "Yeah, and if I had a baseball bat, we could hang you from the ceiling and play piñata."
BESTER: "… A piñata, huh? So you think of me as something bright and cheerful, full of toys and candy for young children? Thank you. That makes me feel much better about our relationship."
Most Arc-ish Moment: G'Kar's vision of his father and G'Lan has turned him to a new path, even as we realize that it was Kosh who was responsible.
Overall Rating: 4.1 / 5 — Strong character stuff, great lines, flimsy plot.
– Lurker’s Guide: http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/countries/us/guide/049.html
– Babylon Project: http://babylon5.wikia.com/wiki/Dust_to_Dust
– IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0517646/
– AV Club: http://www.avclub.com/tvclub/babylon-5-voices-of-authoritydust-to-dust-98882 (includes next ep)
– Kay Shapero: http://www.kayshapero.net/b5review/Dust.htm
– TV Tropes: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Recap/BabylonFiveS03E06DustToDust
Next episode: "Exogenesis," one of the last stand-alonish eps for a while.
I so loved Babylon 5