How do limiters work?
When Gan tries to shoot the guardian in "Time Squad" his limiter kicks in and he collapses; however, in "
Space Fall" and "
Cygnus Alpha" he threatens two people with grievous bodily harm and is absolutely fine. So does the limiter only act when there is genuine intent? If so, could Gan just shut his eyes and shoot, since he would be reasonably sure they'd survive (as opposed to 100% survival if he tries to shoot with a limiter)? Vila is squeamish about guns but positively trigger-happy on the weapons console; can Gan then fire on other ships?
- The limiter supposedly only prevented an attempt to intentionally kill. Gan was perfectly capable of violence provided he was not trying to kill.
- But in "Cygnus Alpha" there's a scene where Gan appears to be jamming a spear into someone lying on the floor! The lower part of the spear is off-screen though, so perhaps the spear was stuck in the floor and he was trying to pull it out, so he could use it to fend people off?
Why did Vila stay onboard Scorpio after Orbit?
Given that Avon burned all bridges between them in this episode, Vila really had no reason to stay there. He didn't have much love or respect from from Tarrant, Dayna, or Soolin. He could have left during the events of Warlord and maybe just join one of the other planetary leaders who were anti-Federation?
- Sure, Vila's Vitriolic Best Buds relationship with Avon was completely shattered after "Orbit" but he still clearly got along well enough with Dayna and Soolin, if not necessarily Tarrant. They don't exactly treat him any worse than anyone on the original crew and with all the Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass qualities Vila displays various times throughout the series, it's sort of implied that he honestly prefers it that way rather than having their respect for openly displaying what he can do. It's also made clear repeatedly throughout the series that Vila is someone who likes to keep things to the status quo as much as possible - a "better the devil you know" type, if you will. He knew he could trust (to some extent) Dayna and Soolin and Tarrant since they were all still clearly on the same team and shared the same goals; going off with one of the other leaders whom he knows very little about could easily have lead to trouble, especially given that Zukon then pretty perfectly displays the dangers of choosing to trust someone you have no existing relationship with beyond both parties ostensibly being "anti-Federation". At least the whole situation with Avon in "Orbit" could theoretically be blamed on the stress of the situation combined with Orac technically being the first to throw Vila under the bus and, once Avon discovered the actual cause of the extra weight on the shuttle, he did immediately switch to getting rid of that rather than just continuing to hunt down Vila (and it's at least implied in "Blake" that Avon feels somewhat guilty over what happened given how reluctant he is to leave Tarrant alone on Scorpio). If nothing else, Vila was not likely to have allowed himself to be paired up alone with Avon again - there's virtually no guarantee that were Vila to go off with one of the other leaders and they ended up in a similar situation, the leader in question wouldn't have hunted down Vila even if said leader discovered another solution to the problem.
