There's also Delenn's "until I see a body Lennier isn't dead" in Darkness Ascending. Which I take as encouragement to have the same attitude. Unfortunatley, it could also mean - if Delenn thinks he's dead (if you take the line in SiL that way) then he most definitely is.
Although, I wouldn't put it past Lennier to fake his own death to keep Delenn from tracking him down. It's what I would do in his position. She's very, very unwilling to let him go - and he really needs to get away from her, at least for a time.
My feeling, though, is that JMS's treatment of Lennier's fate is just JMS going on a homicidal rampage against his own character, which he's not above doing. (Talia is the most obvious example - all that setup, and he kills her in a trivial way. Anna is another example - Sheridan kills her and doesn't care, and we're not supposed to either.) I think that was JMS's intention with the diary - to thow out something so OOC that it undermines anything we might have liked about Lennier. Kind of like 'Everything nice Talia did for Susan was really the program talking' . (grumble) As to why JMS had to destroy Lennier that way - I think in the end he just couldn't stand having a rival for Sheridan. It's just like 'Deconstruction' or Garibaldi's brainwashing - anyone who has anything negative to say (or feel, or imply) about Sheridan must have something wrong with him. It's what I'm most angry at JMS about.
So, I don't see a lot of hope for JMS writing something Lennier-friendly in the future - unless he's gotten over his need to make Sheridan into a Mary-sue, which would be very nice. Still, I do think it is canonically possible.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2004-05-06 06:45 pm (UTC)Although, I wouldn't put it past Lennier to fake his own death to keep Delenn from tracking him down. It's what I would do in his position. She's very, very unwilling to let him go - and he really needs to get away from her, at least for a time.
My feeling, though, is that JMS's treatment of Lennier's fate is just JMS going on a homicidal rampage against his own character, which he's not above doing. (Talia is the most obvious example - all that setup, and he kills her in a trivial way. Anna is another example - Sheridan kills her and doesn't care, and we're not supposed to either.) I think that was JMS's intention with the diary - to thow out something so OOC that it undermines anything we might have liked about Lennier. Kind of like 'Everything nice Talia did for Susan was really the program talking' . (grumble) As to why JMS had to destroy Lennier that way - I think in the end he just couldn't stand having a rival for Sheridan. It's just like 'Deconstruction' or Garibaldi's brainwashing - anyone who has anything negative to say (or feel, or imply) about Sheridan must have something wrong with him. It's what I'm most angry at JMS about.
So, I don't see a lot of hope for JMS writing something Lennier-friendly in the future - unless he's gotten over his need to make Sheridan into a Mary-sue, which would be very nice. Still, I do think it is canonically possible.