Epic Star Trek Re-Watch - Deep Space Nine - Season 1 - Week 4

Cardassians

Kim Kardashian and co have ruined this species for me, I just can't take their name seriously.

O'Brien is such a racist, even if he slightly learned the error of his ways. :lol:

And corporal punishment still exists in the future ("I used to get hit on the bottom")?

A good episode! A nice twisty mystery and it raised some interesting moral questions. I'm not convinced sending the boy back to Cardassia was the right solution. His adoptive parents were the people he saw as his parents.

Melora

How thick are the DS9 crew? They have no idea why a "disabled" person might not want to be treated like a baby? And they are in space but have never ever turned down the gravity to see what weightlessness is like? :lol:

"Is that why my backside hurts?". Julian you dirty bastard.

Overall a below average episode. The "love" story felt weak, the low gravity thing only made sense one way (for the being from the low gravity environment) and the Quark subplot wasn't as fun as it should have been.

And what sort of strawberry floating nutter willingly goes to a Klingon restaurant? :dread:

Rules of Acquisition

The Ferengi are such misogynistic little gooseberry fools. And I'm pretty sure we're supposed to find it funny that they are groping women. :dread:

Other than that, this was a pretty solid little story. I've heard of (but know nothing about) "the Dominion wars" before and so I'm assuming that making contact with the Dominion is going to be a big mistake later on.

Necessary Evil

Looking on IMDb, it seems this episode is quite highly rated. I don't know why, I found it quite dull.

It was nice to get some backstory on Odo during the Cardassian occupation though. Other than that? Meh.

twitter.com/angrypiln/status/1620009347073064960

Wesley

Second Sight

Another meh episode.

The "alien is made of energy!" has been done to death. The terraforming bloke was quite fun, but otherwise this was pretty gooseberry fool.

Has anybody on Trek ever had a successful relationship? They all seem to be shaggers (Kirk and Riker) widowers (Sisko) or fedora-wearing misogynists (LaForge).

Sanctuary

This seemed very relevant to the world today. Desperate refugees trying to settle somewhere, but who are refused and then shipped off somewhere else. [satire]Priti Patel was obviously a script editor on this one[/satire]

I think I have to use the word "meh" again. There was some interesting stuff, the translator not instantly working (which makes complete sense!) for instance, but overall...meh.

Rivals

I get that DS9 isn't really Federation territory, but I am confused as to why money seems to play such a big part in everything. They have replicators, why are they buying drinks/food? Why can't they replicate blankets for orphans?

The stupid squash game plot was dull.

The other story was slightly more interesting, but I couldn't see why people were so interested in a crap looking blinky light game. I thought it'd be similar to the TNG episode where they all got addicted to a game, but (other than causing bad luck) this game didn't seem to do anything other than make you lucky or unlucky, but I still don't get why people were interested in it when they first saw it, do people in the future really have no better entertainment?

And it was bloody obvious that the woman was conning the con artist.

The Alternate

What if we did a Trek remake of The Thing but made it really really gooseberry fool?

I'm being a bit harsh, but not much. Terrible effects and it was mostly a gooseberry fool plot. As per a previous episode, it's nice to find out more about Odo's background, but I wish they'd do it in a more interesting way.

Armageddon Game

Quark giving out free drinks? :shock:

I thought this was a good one! Plenty of intrigue and treachery wrapped up in an almost James Bond like plot.

Bashir and O'Brien are a pretty good pairing, Bashir wanting respect and O'Brien just wanting him to shut up. :lol:

The plot itself made little sense. The gene weapon didn't seem that powerful, O'Brien lasted hours and then was cured easily at the end. Hardly worth risking war with the Federation to kill people that knew how to make it.

I laughed out loud at O'Brien wanting coffee at the end. :lol:

Whispers

This was good! A nice mystery conspiracy and Meaney was excellent.

I don't think the twist ending really works though. It was obvious the clone O'Brien was paranoid about things, why not talk to him properly, rather than weird and creepy "come with us, we won't hurt you!" while shutting him out of everything and not telling him anything.

Paradise

Not too bad, although it was obvious at least one of the stranded people was behind the technology not working

I assume the punishment box was innocently part of the plot, but it reminded me way too much of the hotbox in Django Unchained. Added to them having to work in the fields, it made for very uncomfortable viewing for Sisko to be the one put in the box. :dread:

Shadow Play

I liked the ideas of this one, but think they could have been executed better. The "are holograms real" and "I think therefore I am" stuff is great, but it just felt like there was something missing to push the episode up into very good territory. Plus we already know Moriarty is alive

Another bit of dialogue about the Dominion. They are certainly building these guys up.

Haven't had a chance to write up my thoughts for ages but I am still watching along with this!

Don't exactly know if I'm in line with where we are meant to be though, just watching the one where Dax is sizing up a potential new Trill initiate/candidate also there's some "proto universe in a bottle" side story going on in the background as well that feels like it should have been more of a focus!

Jenuall wrote:Haven't had a chance to write up my thoughts for ages but I am still watching along with this!

Don't exactly know if I'm in line with where we are meant to be though, just watching the one where Dax is sizing up a potential new Trill initiate/candidate also there's some "proto universe in a bottle" side story going on in the background as well that feels like it should have been more of a focus!

I was beginning to think that you and Cheeky had died.

I can't remember which episode fits where, but my reviews should be up to date with where we should be.

I'm still here too lol.

Been really distracted by other shows and stuff, so I'm still on season 1.

Started to watch them again the other day though.

Dax - It's nice to get more of an insight to Dax, especially Curzon, considering how important the relationship between Sisko and Curzon was.

It's not the most exciting episode and the "court" stuff doesn't have the same tension that the TNG equivalents did.

I still maintain that Seasons 1 and 2 of DS9 aren't bad per se, it's more that they don't really do anything particularly interesting or new. It's a bit dull for a while. I still enjoy it though.

Playing God

A directional sonic generator that's the shape of a screwdriver? Dr Who should sue!

Acquisition rule 112 :lol:

Other than that, meh. I didn't like the Trill lad much and the mini-universe thing was daft.

Profit and Loss

I love that Quark gets more action than Bashir and LaForge combined. :lol:

An instantly forgettable episode. Cardassian rebels, yawn. Quark in love. Yawn. Nobody knowing what tailor bloke is up to. Yawn.

Blood Oath

I've seen the early scene in this episode used as a meme for trans rights, pretty bad that Klingons written in the 90s are more accepting of change than some modern people.

I seem to write "not too bad" way to often with DS9. It's main problem is a lack of good episodes. But that's coupled with a lack of bad episodes, at least bad episodes can be entertaining. Most of DS9 is just tedium.

Klingons on the warpath are always good value though, they are such crazy bastards. :lol:

The Maquis - Part 1

I haven't watched the episode yet, but I seem to remember that the Maquis were in TNG. But I can't remember anything about them other than they were a terrorist or separatist group? I don't know where in the DS9 timeline TNG ends, hopefully soon so that I don't have to remember what happened in another series.

Wow, what a shock that Sisko's mate turned out to be a wrong 'un. I definitely didn't see that coming when he was an dodgy arsehole from the start. I don't know if Trek is particularly obvious with it's "twists" or if a few more decades of TV have made us look out for twists more?

Having said that, I thought this was a decent (a step above "not too bad"!) episode. Quark and his attempts at romance are still the highlight of the show, but this left me intrigued about part 2. Which I'm starting right now.

The Maquis - Part 2

Not too ba......actually this is getting filed under "good". Not excellent or fantastic but good.

Sisko stepped up a notch in this two parter. Some great acting and he was far more interesting than usual. I don't know if this plot is leading to bigger things, but the space terrorism/freedom fighter idea could be fantastic.

I especially liked Sisko's rant that things might be perfect on Earth but are not so great on the colonies at the edge of Federation territory. It makes this version of the future far more believable than the perfect society that TOS led us to believe.

The Wire

strawberry floating McNulty

Woo, another good one! Garak is a decent character and there's a great sense of mystery around who he actually is. I hope we never find out, the lies are far more entertaining than the truth could possibly be.

Bashir was less annoying than usual as well.

Crossover

Finally! A Star Trek v Star Wars crossover.

Wow, I really enjoyed that one. Is DS9 finally kicking into gear? Because that's a few in a row that have been good!

Is there anything that Captain Kirk can't strawberry float up? The parallel universe humans were evil in Kirk's day, but he (and Spock!) caused the enslavement of all humanity!

The Collaborator

After a few good ones, we end up with this meh.

I'm just not at all interested in the Bajor religion, their mystical vision inducing orbs or the boring twat that Kira is shagging.

Meh.

Today I learned that Peter Capaldi auditioned for the role of Benjamin Sisko in Deep Space 9.

That would have been a very different take on the character.

Would have been great to see Sisko telling Dukat to "strawberry float the strawberry float off"

Jenuall wrote:Would have been great to see Sisko telling Dukat to "strawberry float the strawberry float off"

"Far Beyond the Stars" would have played out differently though.

Up to Crossover now on my watch. For some reason I had this down as happening later in the run, but fun to see the return of the Mirror Universe all the same!

Agree with Moggy that this end patch of season 2 has definitely seen a good run of episodes, I don't dislike the early stuff from DS9 as much as some do (I think the cast are a good hang even when the stories aren't up to much) but it definitely does start to find its groove a bit as we get through the first couple of seasons, 3 is another step up and then IMO 4 onward is gold :datass:

Tribunal

I do like a Trek courtroom episode.

There's plenty to nitpick here. The Cardasian court is way too similar to a US/UK court, even with the "guilty before the trial" twist. Even down to a judge banging a gavel.

The ending was rushed, with the resolution crammed into the last couple of minutes.

But overall I liked it. Trek should basically just be episodes with either battles or courtrooms. Or both.

Looking at Wikipedia for the episode, it says this was the first DS9 episode to air after TNG finished. While the TNG movies will be set after the DS9 episodes, I don't care and officially declare this to be the furthest into the future we've so far got to.

The Jem'Hadar

Just watched the opening scene. Oh dear, "it'll be like a vacation, we'll have a great time" is the Trek version of saying "when I get back home" in a war movie or "I'll be right back"/"let's split up" in a horror movie. The Sisko's are therefore strawberry floated.

Haha, Nog and Quark are going with them. They really are strawberry floated. :lol:

Ok, I'm just going to watch the episode and stop pausing to make notes.

Quark's speech about humans having a worse history than the Ferengi sounded great, but falls apart when we remember that Ferengi women are not allowed to leave the house or even wear clothes. :lol:

A really good episode! It's nice to have a "big bad" finally, rather than just constant Bajor v Cardasian tedium. The Dominion are intriguing, they seem to be ahead of the Federation in technology, I'm hoping they are not just a clone of TNG Borg for DS9.

Overall season 2 has been pretty gooseberry fool. I've despaired of it several times but pushed on as people have said DS9 gets good. And the tail end of season 2 was actually pretty decent. If they can carry on like this, we'll hopefully have a good show to watch!

The Search - Part 1

Solid opening to the season. It's nice to see the writers didn't immediately drop the Dominion contact for the first couple of episodes.

I am not sure why the Federation needs a Romulan cloaking device, didn't they have their own in a TNG episode? I remember Picard saying it broke a treaty though, so maybe they discarded their cloak when they revealed to the Romulans that one had been invented.

It's nice to see that Odo has found his people. But strawberry float me those 90s morphing effects look terrible :lol:

The Search - Part 2

Another good one even if it was guilty of my least favourite type of plot characters being in a simulation without knowing it. It means literally the whole series could end up being a Dallas style dream.

They also keeping doing fake outs on who the Founders are. I don't know if Odo's people are telling the truth, but I'm assuming they were as it wasn't contradicted by the end of the episode. I'm interested to how the shapeshifters managed to build an empire like that!

The House of Quark

strawberry floating Klingons, absolute bat gooseberry fool crazy bastards. :lol:

I said recently that Quark gets more action than LaForge and Bashir combined. I'm now adding that he's gone through more species than Shatner and Riker combined. :lol:

I couldn't care less about the O'Brien family troubles. Keiko wasn't great in TNG, I don't understand why they don't write her a better part than just being unhappy on DS9. Why bother crossing her over from TNG?

Other than that pointlessness, it was a good episode!

Equilibrium

Decent, although I wasn't a big fan of the ending. It was a good mystery/conspiracy style story though and I'm not sure how I'd have resolved it, so I won't moan too much!

The mask dudes were creepy as strawberry float!

Second Skin

Another "I have memories that shouldn't exist!" So soon after the last episode?

It's a shame Kira wasn't actually a Cardassian spy. It would have been a bold move to stick in a twist like that near the start of S3

Decent enough but unspectacular.

The Abandoned

I've paused at the start. Ummm that woman is WAY too old to be Jake's love interest. Wtf? :lol:

Edit: looking up their ages, the actress is only 2 years older than the guy playing Jake. strawberry float me, women really do mature faster than men. :lol:

The main plot is like a cross between the one where Troi got pregnant, the Hugh Borg episode and the "Starfleet want to dismantle Data one.

Despite it being a mashup of TNG episodes, I enjoyed it. The boy was decently played and Odo was excellent.

The B plot was pointless though (unless it continues into further episodes).

Civil Defence

That was a lot of fun, especially when Ducat got caught in his own trap :lol:

The Cardassian security is terrible, I get they are paranoid and cruel, but my god it's not a great way of gaining control.

A good one!

Meridian

Yay more energy brings from another dimension. That's not been done before. :roll:

Creepy bloke being creepy with the holosuite? Yeah, that's not been done before. :roll:

Boring as gooseberry fool "romance" that you immediately know will end badly or be completely forgotten by the next episode? Sounds familiar. :roll:

That was gooseberry fool.

Defiant

Riker. Straight in there with Kira. :lol:

Why is he so mad with O'Brien?

Ahh, it's Thomas Riker, not Will! Interesting! I still don't get why he hates O'Brien?

I don't buy Thomas as a terrorist either. He's basically just normal Riker, and I don't see Will doing something like that.

Really good episode! Lots of intrigue, excitement and action.

The end was a little meh and there was lots unresolved, but a good story overall.

Fascination

Great, now I have Alphabeat in my head.

Urghh, Troi's mum, miserable Keiko and Kira's dull boyfriend. This is going to be awful.

Yep, it was gooseberry fool.

How Lwxana hasn't been sacked from being a Betazed ambassador at this point is ridiculous, the woman's a bloody liability! :lol:

Dukat getting hoist by his own petard in Civil Defence is great! Basically any time Garak or Dukat are given any kind of prominence is always a win so when you get them both together it's definitely a special moment!

I always assumed that Thomas being a prick to O'Brien was just to get him out of the way as the person most likely to rumble that he's not who he says he is. The whole episode does kind of reveal that the "yeah just let Tom go off and do his own thing, what could possibly go wrong?" resolution we get to the situation in TNG is insanely stupid! Surely they could have done some DNA shenanigans to make each of them unique to the scanners before letting him strawberry float off on his own?! :lol:

Just watched the Improbable Cause, The Die Is Cast two parter, so damned good.

This is when the gooseberry fool properly gets real :datass:

Past Tense: Part 1

2024 looks about how I'm expecting it to be. Except for the computers. And the hope that America will eventually fix its social problems. :lol:

I'm loving the "how can they treat people like this!" message, but it's also amusing me that if this episode was made today, there would be howls of rage about "keep woke politics out of Trek!" And that's ignoring the rage there would be about the black commander, the "trans" lady and the half/Sudanese doctor. :lol:

As soon as a bloke got involved in the fight, it was obvious it'd be Gabriel Bell. And as soon as he was killed it was obvious Sisko would take his name.

The rich guy with Dax is a little creepy. Maybe it's just because he's giving me Zuckerberg vibes!

I'm not sure the "change time, everything immediately changes in the future except for the people we know" thing totally works, but it's basically the same as Back to the Future so I'll give this a pass.

So far so good, I'm looking forward to part 2.

Past Tense - Part 2

Watching TV on the net? Trek saw that coming. :shock:

A really good 2 parter! I especially enjoyed the hippies being so stoned they didn't bat an eyelid at people vanishing in front of them. :lol:

Heavy handed messaging, but sometimes our idiot species needs that.

Life Support

AC Slater or Screech would have been more fun as a guest star.

I really don't care at all about Kira's boyfriend. He better actually be dead and not suddenly turn into an annoying Data clone because of the positronic brain they put in.

The Jake and Nog subplot was more fun. I'm not sure I buy Sisko's "the Ferengi are just culturally different" argument when Nog is such a sexist twat. It's Nog being culturally insensitive by treating females of other species as he would treat a Ferengi.

Heart of Stone

Odo has such a sad backstory. :cry:

A good one! I liked the Odo/Kira story and the Nog plot was good as well.

Rom sticking up for his son (and himself!) against Quark was great! I'm assuming we'll be seeing Nog at the academy etc, it'd be a shame if that idea is dropped/forgotten about.

Poor Odo, it was a cruel trick by the other changeling.

Destiny

O'Brien the little Casanova

Decent episode but not hitting into the top tier. The whole prophecy thing didn't do it for me, but the rest of the episode worked fine.

I'm hoping that the title of the next episode isn't pointing towards another load of Bajoran religious guff.

Prophet Motive

Meh, another in a long line of "it's ok" episodes.

The Bashir story was dreadful.

The Quark story was better and much more fun. But the Negus (sp?) was annoying when he was good and annoying when he was bad.

Visionary

"I always investigate Quark" :lol:

The time travel made little sense but I didn't care as this was a lot of fun. O'Brien was fantastic in this episode.

Seeing your own death would be horrible and he was obviously confused every time he travelled, but O'Brien really should have cleaned up at the Davo (sp?) table and bankrupted Quark. :lol:

Distant Voices

I guessed when was going on very quickly, I don't know if it was supposed to be obvious.

Overall it was a meh episode. Similar things have been done before and this never strayed very far into "interesting".

Epic Star Trek Re-Watch - Deep Space Nine - Season 1 - Week 4

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