Marcus Cole Character Profile

Marcus Cole was the Ranger liaison to Babylon 5. Jason Carter played the role.

Marcus Cole represented the honor and chivalry of the Rangers.

Note: This is a complete biography of Marcus Cole. Therefore, it contains spoilers for Seasons Three and Four of Babylon 5. The biography is written in chronological order, so if you are watching Babylon 5 for the first time you can safely read the early parts of this article and stop before you reach the sections that would reveal events that you haven't seen on the show yet.

History

Marcus Cole was born on Arisa colony in 2226. His family owned and operated Cole Mining. This company mined Quantium 40, a material vital to jump gate construction.

Marcus was too young to face combat in the Earth-Minbar War, but he was drafted into EarthForce and worked as an intelligence gatherer.

His younger brother, William, had no interest in the family business. He traveled for fun, and eventually ended up on Minbar where he became a Ranger.

With William off gallivanting around, the management of the family business fell to Marcus alone when his parents died. Marcus was running the Arisa Mining Colony when William visited him in July 2259 and tried to convince him to join the Rangers. Marcus was not interested until the Shadows attacked and killed all the colonists except for Marcus. He promised his dying brother that he would continue his work in the Rangers.

Marcus arrived on Minbar in August 2259 and studied under Jeffrey Sinclair, becoming an accomplished Ranger.

Shortly after his graduation from Ranger training in November 2259, Marcus accompanied Sinclair and Catherine Sakai on a mission to prevent the Shadows from accessing the time rift in Sector 14.

The Ranger

Marcus Cole was assigned to the Drazi world of Zagros VII, where he set up one of the largest Ranger training camps off Minbar. At the request of Morden and the Shadows, the Centauri blockaded the planet with a minefield. Marcus escaped the blockade and traveled to Babylon 5, where he requested help from John Sheridan. He presented Sheridan with the first White Star, which was instrumental in breaking the blockade.

Marcus became the Ranger liaison to Babylon 5. He set up a series of contacts on the station and was one of the original members of Sheridan's secret war council.

In August 2260, Marcus participated in the mission to steal Babylon 4 and send it back through time. When Delenn was preparing to succeed Jeffrey Sinclair as Entil'Zha, Marcus challenged Neroon to a duel to prevent him from interfering. Neroon was moved by Marcus' willingness to die for Delenn and decided to accept Delenn as Entil'Zha.

After the end of the Shadow War, Marcus teamed with Stephen Franklin in May 2261 to meet with the Mars Resistance and negotiate an alliance. The following September, Sheridan sent him to Proxima 3 to gather intelligence on the EarthForce fleet blockading the planet.

The Romantic

During his time on Babylon 5, Marcus Cole fell in love with Susan Ivanova. He was very open with her, revealing that he was a virgin and that he suffered from a fear of spiders. He coupled his humor with his admiration for her by constructing a diagram of the Babylon 5 command structure using the Ottoman Empire as a template... with Ivanova at the center. Marcus realized that Ivanova would not allow herself to grow close to him. He complimented her in Minbari, then saved her from embarrassment by giving her an innocuous false translation.

Although he was a cynic at heart, becoming a Ranger opened Marcus to noble ideas. He helped the lurkers in Downbelow, and he was willing to not only play along but actually accepted that a delusional visitor was in fact King Arthur.

His Final Sacrifice

Marcus Cole was devastated when Susan Ivanova was mortally wounded during the civil war against Earth. A slip of Lennier's tongue led Marcus to search Dr. Franklin's records until he learned of Laura Rosen's alien healing device. He abandoned his position in the fleet and rushed back to Babylon 5. Arriving on November 4, 2261, he used the device to transfer his life energy to Ivanova, restoring her life at the expense of his own. Franklin rushed back to the station, but he was too late to stop Marcus. A bereaved Ivanova ordered Marcus placed in cryonic suspension.

A Second Chance

Marcus awoke nearly 300 years later.

In the intervening years, his cryotube had been moved to Minbar. Eventually, the ruins of the alien civilization that had built the healing device were found, and the Minbari doctors gained the information they needed to revive Marcus.

Marcus had conflicting feelings about his predicament. Had Ivanova frozen him as a form of revenge, condemning him to live his life without her as he had condemned her to live without him? Or had she really loved him?

Marcus inherited a large trust fund that had been prepared for him. He purchased a small jump-cable ship and traveled to Sirius Nine. From the Neural Archives there he stole Susan Ivanova's Voice, a neural map of her mind.

His next stop was a rogue human scientist operating in Brakiri space. He gave the doctor a strand of Ivanova's hair that he had found on his jacket to create a clone. It would cost the bulk of his money. Marcus ordered the doctor to implant Ivanova's memories from her Voice into the clone, but only up to the point at which she was mortally wounded during the Earth Civil War.

Next, Marcus traveled to Mars where he rented a cryotube for 32 years and four months.

Thirty-two years later, Marcus returned to the rogue scientist and retrieved the new clone. He took her to Chryn III, a planet he had discovered long before with his brother. It was a beautiful paradise but had no sentient life or mineral resources. He unloaded his ship and destroyed it.

The Ivanova clone awoke to find herself stranded in paradise with Marcus Cole. She remembered very little after her injury on the White Star, but he assured her that they had won the war.

Marcus and Susan set off to explore their new home...