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Deep Space Nine [Season
, Episode
]
Shown
Season 2
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 1]
The Homecoming/The Circle
Shown
Reviewed 8th July 1999 [Thursday]
We visit DS9 for a double-bill of Kira/Bajoran episodes.
She helps recover a Bajoran war hero from the clutches of the Cardassians,
and he subsequently becomes a political figure.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 2]
The Circle
Shown
Reviewed 8th July 1999 [Thursday]
This episode sees political plotting among the Bajorans, who now include Frank Langella (
Masters of the Universe)!!!
Quark is the only one who knows what is going on, so Odo deputises him.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 3]
The Siege
22nd July 1999 [Thursday]
17th November 2001 [Saturday]
DS9 is scene of a Federation face-off with Frank Langella's Bajoran rebels.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 4]
Invasive Procedures
22nd July 1999 [Thursday]
17th November 2001 [Saturday]
Having bravely seen off the battle-scarred veterans of the Bajoran military,
the station is then hijacked by socially inept Trill John Glover (
Smallville
), who resembles Roger Daltrey -
Highlander: The Series
, his GF
Megan Gallagher
and a pair of Klingon mercenaries.
Mr pseudo-Daltrey was rejected as a host for the Dax symbiote,
and forces Dr Bashir to transplant Jadzia's friendly parasite into him.
The only problem is, Jadzia will die as a direct result of the surgery.
This is an interesting episode only insofar as Quark shows more spirit
and backbone than all the other regular characters put together.
The cast includes a black Klingon named T'Kar (played by, ironically, Tim Russ from
Star Trek: Voyager
)!
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 5]
Cardassians
29th July 1999 [Thursday]
18th November 2001 [Sunday]
Garak discovers that a Cardassian boy raised by Bajorans
is actually the son of an important Gul.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 6]
Melora
18th November 2001 [Sunday]
Bashir falls in love with a stroppy lo-grav-worlder babe.
Meanwhile, a killer is after Quark.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 7]
Rules of Acquisition
24th November 2001 [Saturday]
Grand Nagus Zek (Wallace Shawn -
Princess Bride
) recruits Quark to take charge of Ferengi trade negotiations
with the Gamma Quadrant. Brian Thompson (
X-Files
) is the negotiator from the Gamma Quadrant, while
Helene Loy
is a Ferengi who has something to hide.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 8]
Necessary Evil
24th November 2001 [Saturday]
Quark is hired by a lady from his past to retrieve an item concealed on the station.
It is worth five bars - too much or too little.
But greedy little Quark goes ahead anyway!
Quark is double-crossed and left for dead.
Odo investigates, and discovers links to an unsolved case from five years previously
... where one of the suspects was Kira!
He has to solve the mystery of his first ever case.
In flashbacks we see his first meeting with Kira and Quark.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 9]
Second Sight
12th August 1999 [Thursday]
25th November 2001 [Sunday]
This episode introduces Sisco to a mysterious woman (
Salli Elise Robertson
) who becomes his love-interest-of-the-week.
She keeps appearing and disappearing,
and distracting Sisco from his duties,
which involve reactivating a dead star.
We all know the romance will not last ...
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 10]
Sanctuary
12th August 1999 [Thursday]
25th November 2001 [Sunday]
This episode delivers a group of refugees from through the wormhole.
A reminder of the foreshadowing of the Ferengi in
Star Trek: TNG Season One
, this time the refugee mentions her race was fleeing something called The Dominion.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 11]
Rivals
Shown 2 Jan 94
Chris Sarandon (
Fright Night
) arrives on the station.
Quark turns him down as a business partner, so he sets himself up in business.
He has a strange gambling machine.
O'Brien creates a squash court, and Bashir challenges him to a game.
Quark discovers their strange rivalry, and decides to run a gambling book on it.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 12]
The Alternate
Shown 9 Jan 94
The Bajoran scientist who discovered Odo arrives on the station.
This is an unconventional version of the cliched
estranged family-member pays a visit storyline.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 13]
Armageddon Game
Shown 30 Jan 94
Bashir and O'Brien complete the dismantling of biogenic weapons
that an alien race have been using in a bitter Civil War.
As soon as the weapons are gone,
a murder squad kills all the witnesses.
Bashir and O'Brien go on the run,
and hope that Starfleet will turn up to rescue them.
On DS9, Sisco and the others get word that there was a terrible accident.
Everyone disarming the weapons was disentigrated -
there is even a video to back this claim up!
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 14]
Whispers
Shown 6 Feb 94
O'Brien arrives home after an away mission,
and discovers that there seems to be a conspiracy.
Everyone on the station is hiding something from him ...
There is one thing that nobody takes into account - O'Brien himself.
O'Brien is one of the toughest men on the station,
because even though he almost had a heart attack when he played Bashir at squash,
he is still an experienced combat veteran.
And not only is he a leading expert on the forcefield technologies that the Federation relies on,
he knows his way around the station's interior.
This evokes memories of the Conspiracy ep from
Star Trek: TNG Season One
. However, the ending has a wonderful twist.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 15]
Paradise
Shown 13 Feb 94
Sisco and O'Brien get trapped on a planet where their tech will not work.
They must adjust to life with a village of lo-tech settlers.
However, the village matriarch is a controlling bitch!
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 16]
Shadowplay
This was written by Robert Hewitt Wolfe (creator of
Andromeda
).
Quark's cousin is due to arrive on the station, wanted by the Cardassian authorities.
Kira wants to arrest him and hand him over to the Cardassians -
she is self-richeous enough to call QUARK a collaborator!!!
Kira is distracted when her pseudo-lover Vedek Barial arrives,
so she assigns Dr Bashir to spy on the Ferengi.
Odo and Dax are on a shuttle.
They discover a remote colony,
and assist the local Law Enforcement in investigating a series of mysterious disappearances.
Sisco decides that his son Jake should get a job.
When they have labour-saving devices and no need for money, why bother?
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 17]
Playing God
Dax is given an aide, a trainee host.
She shows him the ropes, including the Klingon restuarant!
The station has dual dangers this week - an infestation of Cardassian voles
and some Space Seaweed that turns out to be a mini-universe!
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 18]
Profit and Loss
Shown
Reviewed September 1999
This features some Cardassian Dissidents, one of whom is Quark's former lover.
Yes, unlike other Drek shows DS9 allows its characters to become well-rounded,
to have merits as well as flaws.
Quark is this reviewer's favourite character;
he is not part of the namby-pamby Federation,
and actually has to work for a living!
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 19]
Blood Oath
Shown
Reviewed September 1999
This episode features John Colicos, Michael Ansara and William Campbell.
Yes, yet another crossover with
Star Trek: The Original Series
. The three Klingon Captains that Kirk faced turn up on DS9.
Dax joins them - Curzon (the previous host of the Dax symbiote)
had sworn a blood oath to avenge their sons,
slain by a pirate known only as the Albino.
Dax shows the Klingons how to neutralise all the phasers in an area before they attack with Bat'leths.
How come Klingon scientists and technicians never thought of this?
They would be invincible!
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 20]
The Maquis (1)
Shown 24 Apr 94
A terrorist group named The Maquis is attacking Cardassian targets.
Someone tries to abduct Gul Dukat.
He easily defeats the attackers,
then walks slowly away so they have another chance to attack him!
Will Sisco bother to come and save him?
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 21]
The Maquis (2)
Shown 1 May 94
Quark is locked up in the brig with the Maquis suspects.
As a Capitalist, he understands the art of negotiation.
Yes, ironically for a Socialist TV show
it is the Capitalist who comes up with a non-violent solution!
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 22]
The Wire
Shown 8 May 94
Garak the Cardassian tailor behaves erratically.
It turns out there is an implant in his brain,
and it will kill him if Bashir cannot get the relevant medical data
from the Cardassian secret police.
Yes, this episode is the earliest this reviewer is aware
of that mentions the Obsidian Order.
Garak tells Dr Bashir the reason the Cardassians exiled him.
He gives several versions of the story,
featuring a friend and co-worker named Elim.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 23]
Crossover
Shown 15 May 94
Bashir and Kira are returning to DS9 through the worm-hole.
They take a wrong turn, and end up in the
Mirror, Mirror
universe!
Bajor is ruled by The Intendant - the evil version of Major Kira.
Garak is her sadistic and ambitious second in command.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 24]
The Collaborator
Shown 22 May 94
It is the great Bajoran election,
to choose their Religious leader.
Yes, there is complete democracy to select a life-long Religious dictator.
This is worse than the idea of having a "President for Life".
Kai Wynn (
Louise Fletcher
) is among the favourites.
She is plotting something, as always.
A Bajoran who collaborated with the Cardies is on the station.
Odo throws the poor man in prison,
ignoring the fact that Odo himself (and Garak, and whoever else) worked with the Cardies too.
There is a conspiracy to cover up a traitor
responsible for a massacre of Bajoran terrorists during the Occupation.
Kira's BF, Vedek Bareill, is among the suspects.
The Bajoran Resistance were willing to stand idly by
and allow the Cardassians to slaughter hundreds of innocent civilians.
And now the Resistance Clique has political power,
they can force their will on the civilian survivors.
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 25]
Tribunal
Shown 5 Jun 94
Chief O'Brien is arrested by the Cardassians, and put on trial.
A Cardassian verdict is always Guilty, delivered before the trial.
Luckily Odo, as an Enforcer on Terok Nor, is eligible to join the Defence team.
This is a good insight into Cardassian society - peace through Fascism.
If anything, the ep is a parody of Law and Order where the suspect is an Offender,
there is a presumption of guilt, and a good defence lawyer is accused of using Dirty tricks!
Deep Space Nine [Season 2, Episode 26]
The Jem'Hadar
Shown 12 Jun 94
Sisco is getting comfortable on DS9,
finally realising he has begun to think of it as home.
His overconfidence allows him to take Jake (and Nog, with Quark as guardian)
on a trip to the Gamma Quadrant.
The Feds run into a young alien woman (
Molly Hagan
), who is on the run from the Dominion.
Their genetically engineered Rhino-faced troops, the Jem'hadar, are after her.
Starfleet sends its largest available ship.
This thing is the same class as the Enterprise-D.
And how long does it actually last in battle?
It turns out that the damsel in distress is a telekinetic Vorta woman.
Strange that the Vorta in later episodes never exhibit and TP or TK powers.
Season 3
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 3, Episode 1]
The Search (1)
Shown 26 Sep 94
At the start of the new Season,
some things have been shaken up but most things are exactly the same.
The actor who plays Bashir is listed as Siddig El Fadil
, and Avery Brooks still has hair!
Sisco is back in town, with a new Starfleet warship - the Defiant!
He also has a new crewmember - Eddington,
the new Starfleet chief of security.
Odo is strangely offended by this,
even though he is the Bajoran Government's civilian constable
and not actually a military Starfleet officer.
Sisco takes the Defiant, and his main cast members,
to the Gamma Quadrant to look for the Dominion.
He takes Quark along, as the only one who has actually negotiated with the Dominion.
Odo comes as Kira's military aide, because he has nothing to do on DS9.
Well, with Eddington looking after Starfleet duties and Quark on the Defiant,
there is nothing for him to do on the station.
And to round out the crew,
a female Romulan is along to operate the cloaking device.
Odo and Kira manage to discover who the Founders of the Dominion are.
Unfortunately for them, this raises more questions than it answers.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 3, Episode 2]
The Search (2)
Shown 3 Oct 94
Odo and Kira hang out on the Changelings' homeworld.
Odo spends time in the Arboretum,
while Kira investigates a mysterious power source.
Sisco and Bashir meet up with Dax and O'Brien,
and make their way back to DS9.
Negotiations with the Vorta are underway.
The Federation, Cardies and Klingons are willing to sign a truce with the Dominion,
surrendering Bajor and the wormhole.
The Romulans are excluded.
Only Sisco's crew (and Garak) think that this is a bad idea.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 3, Episode 3]
The House Of Quark
Shown 16 Oct 94
Closing time at Quark's bar, and a Klingon dies in a drunken brawl.
Quark is then dragged into Klingon politics.
He even gets married to the dead man's widow - Grillka (
Julie Caitlin Brown
).
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 3, Episode 4]
Equilibrium
Shown
Reviewed Third Week, July 2000
This is an early Dax episode.
It is character-based, not part of the Arc that appears in Season 2.
Dax (
Terry Farrell
) has strange waking dreams where she sees a mysterious masked man.
She also develops some major aggression issues.
The answer has to do with one of her symbiote's previous hosts.
The cure is a dip in a paddling pool.
Unfortunately Dax avoids making it a wet t-shirt contest.
Back on DS9, Keiko O'Brien has closed the school due to lack of attendance.
After all, the only kids still attending are Jake and Nog.
The rest, all Bajorans, have been evacuated with their parents.
As a result, poor Keiko is bored and frustrated.
O'Brien tries everything he can to distract her,
but all his solutions seem temporary.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 3, Episode 5]
Second Skin
Shown
Reviewed Second Week, July 2000
Kira is captured by the Cardassians,
and wakes up to discover she has been adapted to become one of them.
This episode is the earliest this reviewer is aware of
that actually features an operation by the Obsidian Order,
the Cardassian Intelligence organisation
that fights for power against rival Cardassian military power-bases.
The Order seems to be plotting something.
Only Garak (Andrew Robinson) can save her.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 3, Episode 6]
The Abandoned[directed by Avery Brooks]
Shown
Reviewed Second Week, July 2000
Quark buys a cargo that contains the salvaged parts
of a mysterious ship found in the Gamma Quadrant.
Among the wreckage he discovers a baby of unknown species
- and when he reports this to Sisco the entire cargo is impounded without compensation.
The child grows at an incredible speed
- by twelve weeks old it is the equivalent of an 8-year-old human.
Its cognitive abilities mean it has mastered the English language by this stage.
Which begs the question, do Fed crew wear Universal Translators?
Bashir discovers the kid was genetically altered,
and has an inbuilt dependency on an isogenic enzyme.
After all these hints,
most regular viewers should be able to guess the creature's species.
The only one who can capture the kid is Odo, who it reveres.
Yes, this episode takes place AFTER the revelations about the Founders.
The creature moves in with Odo, as a house-guest.
Can Odo teach the creature free will, or will its killer instinct win out?
Can touchy-feely crap win out over the nature of a Tiger or a Great White Shark?
The B-story is about Sisco's relationship with his son.
Jake is a 16-year-old boy, while his GF Marta
is a 20-year-old Dabo Girl (a woman).
The problem is, Sisco does not realise how mature his own son is.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 7]
Civil Defense
Shown 7 Nov 94
O'Brien, Sisco and Jake are messing about
in the disused ore-processing plant at the core of the station.
The station's internal defences are activated.
The crew must ask Gul Dukat for help.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 8]
Meridian
Shown
Reviewed August 2000
Reviewed 20th January 2002 [Sunday]
The Defiant stumbles across a planet that phase-shifts
in and out of the solid universe 50 years at a time.
The crew beam down and explore,
and Dax falls in love with one of the natives.
She must decide whether to stay in her own universe, or join the phase-shifters.
Meanwhile, back on the space station one of Quark's business associates
(played by Jeffrey Combs, who also plays the Dominion's ambassador)
wants a holo-sex program of Lieutenant Kira.
Kira not only will not shag anyone in RL,
she will not let people shag holograms of her, either!
This was directed by Jonathan Frakes.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 9]
Defiant
Shown
Reviewed August 2000
Reviewed 20th January 2002 [Sunday]
Commander Riker (
Star Trek: TNG
) arrives on the station, and Kira takes a liking to him.
She decides to give him a tour of the Defiant,
and he decides to take it for a spin.
The Cardassian Obsidian Order is plotting against the Cardassian military.
Riker and Kira both misuse the term terrorist.
Sisco says he helped to design the Defiant, now he must help destroy it.
He tells the Cardassians how to detect cloaked ships
by using a Dominion anti-proton beam - thus revealing a major military secret.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 10]
Fascination
Shown
Reviewed August 2000
Reviewed 27th January 2002 [Sunday]
It is a Bajoran festival, Luxwana Troi (Councillor Troi's mother, played by
Majel Barrett
) arrives on DS9, and the crew start to go super-horny.
Jake develops a crush on Kira,
who wants Vedek Bareil, who wants Dax, who wants Commander Sisco ...
Bashir and Kira can't keep their hands off each other.
This is a terrible piece of acting,
as their so-called lust displays a complete lack of passion!
This episode was obviously made several years before their real-life romance!
Meanwhile, the married couple (O'Brien and Sisco) are having troubles.
This was directed by Avery Brooks.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 11]
Past Tense Part I
reviewed 27th January 2002 [Sunday]
Sisco, Dax and Bashir travel to Earth and beam down to San Francisco.
However, they end up several centuries earlier!
Oddly enough, they are not in the 20th century!
They are in the year 2125, days before San Fran is scene of terrible riots.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 12]
Past Tense Part II
reviewed September 2000
reviewed 3rd February 2002 [Sunday]
This episode was directed by Jonathan Frakes.
Sisco, Bashir and Dax (
Terry Farrell
) are trapped in a previous century.
The two guys are inside a ghetto for the unemployed;
Dax is shacked up with a multi-millionaire publisher.
This is one of the first episodes where we are shown what a babe Dax is:
she struts round in high heels, sheer black stockings and a micro-skirt.
Meanwhile, Kira and O'Brien are on the Defiant in DS9-time,
trying to recover their comrades.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 13]
Life Support
reviewed 3rd February 2002 [Sunday]
Kira's BF the Vedek is brought aboard the station.
He is slowly dying from an injury.
Wynn pressures Bashir into trying a quick cure, regardless of the risk.
The Vedek is lead negotiator of a peace treaty with Cardassian Legate Andrew Prine (
V: the Final Battle
).
Jake and Nog double-date.
It goes hilariously badly!
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 14]
Heart of Stone
Shown
Reviewed 3rd February 2002 [Sunday]
Odo and Kira explore a remote cave.
Kira gets trapped by a strange crystal,
and as it slowly kills her Odo must examine his feelings for her.
Nog requests Sisco give him a letter of recommendation so he can attend Starfleet Academy.
If only it were that easy for Wesley Crusher!
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 15]
Destiny
Shown
Reviewed 10th February 2002 [Sunday]
Starfleet decides to embark on a wormhole project
with help from civilian technicians from the Cardassian Science Ministry. They include
Tracey Scoggins (
Babylon 5: Crusade,
Watchers 2
), who is still babelicious despite the make-up.
However, the Bajorans have an ancient prophesy that the Celestial Temple
(the wormhole) will be destroyed by the Sword of Stars (a comet).
Ms Scoggins starts to develop an attraction to Chief O'Brien.
O'Brien allows the Cardassians full access to Federation phaser technology!
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 16]
Prophet Motive
reviewed 10th February 2002 [Sunday]
Grand Nagus Zek arrives on DS9, and acts in a generous and caring fashion.
Quark is shocked by the change, and tries to uncover the source.
Seems that the wormhole aliens have messed with his head.
Quark was planning to sell a cargo of stem-bolts at excessive profit.
Somehow commerce is supposed to be unethical,
though if the goods cannot be replicated
then they are worth whatever people are willing to pay for them!
Bashir is up for a Federation medical achievement award.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 17]
Visionary
reviewed 17th February 2002 [Sunday]
O'Brien sees flashes of the future.
It is only five hours time - but he sees himself die!
Romulans arrive on the station,
asking for the info they were promised when they handed over a cloaking device for the Defiant.
Klingon are hanging around Quark's bar, causing trouble.
Odo must find out which ones plated sophisticated surveillance gear on the station.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 18]
Distant Voices
Shown
Reviewed 17th February 2002 [Sunday]
Bashir suffers a telepathic attack courtesy of an alien.
He finds himself rapidly aging,
and the rest of the DS9 crew reflect aspects of his personality.
This is something of a wasted opportunity.
It could have been a wonderfully surreal episode, worth of
David Lynch
. However, they ended up with something far inferior to
Vanilla Sky
.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 19]
Through The Looking Glass
Shown
Reviewed 24th February 2002 [Sunday]
Odo arrests Quark,
thus justifying their contractual obligation to appear in every single ep.
The Chief O'Brien kidnaps Sisco,
and takes him Through the Looking Glass to the Mirror universe.
The Mirror Sisco is dead,
so Prime Sisco must fulfill his responsibilities.
Getting the Resistance to work together is hard enough.
Rom wants revenge for Quark's execution,
but Bashir questions Sisco's plans.
The Bajorans have a new super-weapon in development,
and the scientist in charge is Sisco's wife Jennifer.
Sisco must infiltrate DS9 and save the day.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 20]
Improbable Cause
reviewed 24th February 2002 [Sunday]
A known assassin is aboard the station, and someone blows up Garak's shop.
A conspiracy is afoot, and both the Romulan Tal Shiar
and the Cardassian Obsidian Order are somehow involved.
Garak and Odo set out to discover what is going on.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 21]
The Die Is Cast
Shown
reviewed 2nd March 2002 [Saturday]
Garak and Odo are about to be part of the Cardassian plan.
By combining the Tal Shiar info from the Federation
and the Obsidian Order fleet from
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 9] Defiant
, the Alpha Quadrant villains will wipe out the Gamma Quadrant villains ... the Dominion!
But have the Dominion taken any counter-measures?
Sisco sets out with the Defiant.
Unfortunately, Commander Eddington is aboard
and decides to follow the Admiral's instructions to the letter.
Irony indeed!
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 22]
Explorers
Shown
Reviewed 3rd March 2002 [Sunday]
Dr Bashir meets Dabo-girl Leeta (
Chase Masterson
). However, their assignation is cut short by news that Bashir's
rival from Medical School will soon be visiting the station.
Sisco has grown himself a goatee beard,
and decides to do a Thor Heyderdahl.
He builds a primitive space-ship equipped with solar sails,
and plans to repeat an ancient journey from Bajor to Cardassia.
His son Jake joins him for the journey.
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 23]
Family Business
Shown
Quark discovers his mother has been committing crimes against Ferengi law.
Specifically, she has been earning profit.
She has even been seen wearing clothes!
The villains are the interfering bureaucrats of the FCA (Ferengi Commerce Agency).
Presumably this is a reference to another FCA,
responsible for censorship of American TV shows.
Back on DS9, Sisko is set up on a blind date with a starship captain named Cassiday Yates (
Penny Jerald Johnston
).
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 24]
Shakaar
Shown
Kai Wynn, now the Bajorans' First minister, requests Kira's help.
Some rowdy farmers have refused to return government-owned agricultural machinery.
Kira is the obvious negotiator, because the farmers are her old Resistance colleagues.
Their leader is her old boss, Shakaar (Duncan Regehr -
V: The Series
).
This ep shows the dangers of having a Government dependant on the support of its own military.
The Bajoran society is based around the Resistance,
which is not the best way to run a society.
The debate of centring agriculture on small-scale food crops or industrialised export crops
becomes a violent struggle that may turn into civil war.
The Bajorans have no native concept of democracy
- although the solution is sickly-sweet.
Sisco is officially asked for help by the Bajoran Government,
but refuses because he feels Wynn is overreacting.
Although it is nice to see a loose attitude to insurrection on a Federation protectorate,
one cannot help thinking that he only does it because of his personal dislike for Wynn!
Meanwhile, Nog is trying to get into the Starfleet Academy.
Now, it took Wesley Crusher (a supposed uber-genius) several tries.
Can the teenage Ferengi master simple tasks?
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 25]
Facets
Shown
Dax summons seven major characters to the wardroom for a secret briefing.
She regards each as a friend, and asks them all to embark in a secret Trill ritual.
Another Trill, a guardian, will magically transfer the memories and personalities
of the previous hosts into the unjoined Humans, Bajorans and Ferengi!
Each pseudo-host displays different aspects.
Bashir gets to use a different accent,
while Leeta shows off her gymnastic skills.
She is not just a set of large breasts - she has great legs as well!
Quark is conned by sexual pleasure into becoming a little old lady -
Shimmerman gives a great performance,
which rather puts Sisco's turn as Joran (the murderous musician) to shame.
But best of all is Odo, who becomes the Old Man Curzon that Sisco was so fond of!
The shapeshifter's body allows for a more complete melding,
so Odo is now the equivalent of a joined Trill.
Curzon's presence allows him to create a more humanoid face, with actual hair.
The joined personality is completely different, too.
He drinks like a fish, and wins at Tongo against a cheating Ferengi!
The climax is Curzon's confrontation with Jadzia.
She has had self-doubts for some time,
and now she gets to physically confront herself (in a manner of speaking).
Curzon admits why he did not accept her as a host first time round.
Dax wants Curzon to return.
But he likes being bonded with Odo, and the feeling is mutual.
The benefits for both parties are incredible. This is similar to
Voyager
episode Tuvix, where Tuvok and Neelix are bonded as a new creature.
However, Sisco cannot justify forced seperation ...
The subplot involves Nog sitting some prelim exams before he can get into Starfleet Academy.
Chief O'Brien is uncomfortable about the prospect of having to call the kid Sir.
But does he ever address Julian - I mean, Doctor Bashir - as sir?
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 3, Episode 26 - Finale]
The Adversary
Shown
Reviewed 17th January 2001 [Wednesday]
Newly-promoted Sisco is commanded to take the Defiant on a dangerous mission.
However, there is a saboteur on board.
Luckily (and inexplicably) Odo and Kira are aboard the Federation vessel!
The Defiant is sent on a mission, to stop a civil war.
Sisco takes most of his command crew - Bashir and O'Brien are essential,
Dax is probably useful but Kira's not Starfleet, so why is she going?
It is just as well that she does,
because she is one of the few people authorised to initiate the Defiant's self-destruct.
Why such an important duty is given to someone who is not even a Federation citizen is not explained.
And who will run the station when the main crew are away?
Someone aboard is a changeling.
Is it a regular cast member, or the Head of Security that Starfleet appointed.
The new character is not in the title credits,
and the writers do not go out of their way to make him likeable.
Almost as if he is just there to be written out ...
Odo refuses to carry a phaser, even one set to stun.
He says that no Changeling has ever harmed another -
although he is not part of their society, and thus should not be held to their rules.
Also, the Security Boss points out that if the imposter's mission is successful
then everyone aboard will be killed as a direct result - including Odo.
The crew attempt to search the ship, one room at a time.
But not only do they forget that the Changeling could be ANY physical object,
they also get split up repeatedly.
They then decide to test everyone's blood, like in
The Thing
...
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 1]
The Way Of The Warrior (1)
Shown 7 Oct 95
A Klingon Fleet appears at DS9, under command of General Martok.
Sisco calls in the best negotiator Starfleet has - its own tame Klingon, Worf!
Worf manages to embitter General Martok.
Luckily he is still friendly with Chancellor Gowron.
This is especially ironic when you consider how the final Season ends!
Gowron was once a friend of the Federation,
accepting Worf as a friend and Picard as the arbiter of the succession.
But now he cares nothing for the alliance with Starfleet.
The Klingons have decided to interfere,
but will not take on the Federation or the Dominion directly.
Instead they aim to destroy Cardassia Prime.
After all, the Obsidian Order (and their Romulan allies)
were crippled when the Jem'hadar ambushed their combined fleets.
Now they are at Gowron's mercy.
Worse, someone fed him info that the Cardassia leadership had been infiltrated by Changelings.
Of course, this is entirely possible.
As is the danger of any leader of any Empire being replaced by a Changeling.
The resultant paranoia is one of the Dominion's greatest weapons.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 2]
The Way Of The Warrior (2)
Shown 7 Oct 95
Cardassia is now ruled by a civilian government.
Gul Dukat, sick of his unpopularity with the Military dictatorship,
has decided to throw his lot in with the new government.
Garak does so as well, teaming up with Dukat against the Klingons.
Will the exiled tailor get exonerated by the new regime?
Will Dukat become a heroic ally to the good guys?
The Klingons attack the station.
Luckily, in a fist-fight even women can beat up these superhuman killing machines.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 3]
The Visitor
Shown 9 Oct 95
Fifty years in the future, and Jake Sisco now looks like Tony Todd (Worf's brother!).
He reminisces about how his dad disappeared during a wormhole anomaly.
The rest of the crew helps him try to get his dad back.
In that future, the crew are all the original actors in makeup (including Dax!).
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 4]
Hippocratic Oath
Shown 16 Oct 95
O'Brien and Bashir head home from the Gamma Quadrant a few days early.
They get captured by some Jemhadar -
and nobody knows they are missing, so there is no hope of rescue.
The Jemhadar are running out of Ketracel White.
Their leader wants to break the addiction, so they can escape from the Dominion.
Bashir feels obliged to help them, while O'Brien feels his duty to Starfleet is to escape.
Back on DS9, Worf is suspicious of Quark.
He thinks that Odo is letting him get away with criminal activity,
and takes it as his duty (as Starfleet Security Boss) to interfere.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 5]
Indiscretion
Shown 23 Oct 95
Kira discovers that some Bajoran slaves were lost in Breen space.
She and Dukat must rescue them.
Dukat has his own reason, to cover up a past indiscretion.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 6]
Rejoined
Shown 30 Oct 95
Some Trill Scientists arrive on the station.
One is the new host for the symbiote of a wife of a previous host of Dax's.
Strangely, since all they have is someone else's memories,
they decide to pursue a lesbian relationship.
Unfortunately, that is a major taboo among Trills.
The story itself is nonsensical,
but it addresses issues in contemporary American society.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 7]
Starship Down
Shown 6 Nov 95
Jemhadar attack the Defiant, and trap it in a planet's corrosive atmosphere.
The crew pair off and bond - Worf and O'Brien, Kira and Sisco, Dax and Bashir,
Quark and an alien he cheated (a makeup-clad James Cromwell -
Star trek: First Contact
).
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 8]
Little Green Men
Shown 11 Nov 95
Quark gets a shuttle from his untrustworthy cousin.
He and his brother take Nog to Earth,
to enroll in the Starfleet Academy.
Nog makes a reference to the Bell Riots of
[Season 3, Episode 11] Past Tense Part I
, a similar episode involving a crew that time-travelled back
while their ship was in orbit around Earth.
Thanks to a similar temporal anomaly the Ferengi end up on Earth ...
Roswell, New Mexico, in 1947!
Conor Farrell (
Dark Skies
) is in a black suit, helping debrief the aliens.
However, this time he is a professor rather than an MIB!
He is assisted by US Army Nurse
Megan Gallagher
. The USAAF General in charge is Charles Napier
(who also played a US Army officer in the 1947 episode of
Roswell
).
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 9]
Sword of Kahless
Shown Nov 95
Dax's old friend Kor (John Colicos) summons Dax and Worf
to help him on a quest for the legendary Sword of Kahless.
An alien race known as the Herc stole the sword a thousand years ago.
A Vulcan archaeological survey identified the Herc homeworld in the Gamma Quadrant.
Kor and his friends adopt the
Indiana Jones
method of archaeology.
Kor's drunken boastfulness has ruined their operational security.
Other Klingons have a plan to take the sword Duras, whose life was once spared by Worf,
wants to declare himself Emperor.
Even with Lursa and Betor out of the way (see
Star Trek: Generations
), the House of Duras is still a threat.
The sword seems to bring out the worst in Klingons.
Kor and Worf are under its spell ...
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 10]
Our Man Bashir
Shown 2 Dec 95
Bashir and Garak are enjoying a 1960s-style spy adventure in the holodeck.
However, the rest of the main cast are in a transporter accident
and end up trapped in the emergency buffers of the holodeck.
Bashir and Garak must play along with the plot without killing any of the others.
Predictably, of course, the safeties are off!
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 11]
Homefront (1)
Shown 1 Jan 96
A Federation conference on Earth is bombed,
and the investigators have discovered that a Changeling was responsible.
Sisco and Odo are summoned to San Francisco,
to help Admiral Layton (Robert Foxworthy -
Babylon 5
) prepare adequate defences.
Of course, a career military type like Layton
will never be happy with less than complete martial law.
Nog is a Cadet at Starfleet Academy,
but still finds time to hang out with his grown-up acquaintances from DS9.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 12]
Paradise Lost (2)
Shown 8 Jan 96
Admiral Layton (Robert Foxworthy -
Babylon 5
) demands Sisco's unwavering loyalty, and quotes the usual Chain of Command rhetoric.
Hypocritically he also ignores his own responsibility
to blindly obey his own Commander-in-Chief,
the civilian President of the Federation.
In all fairness, it is a time of war and there is an ACTUAL changeling threat on Earth.
The Defiant is en route to save Earth from the Earthlings.
ALL the senior staff are aboard, even Major Kira.
Who is running the station while they are away - Morn?
And what if they run into a quantum torpedo and the whole ship gets destroyed?
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 13]
Crossfire
Shown 29 Jan 96
Shakaar (Duncan Regehr -
V: The Series
) pays the station a visit.
He is now First Minister of Bajor, presumably winning the elections mentioned in
Deep Space Nine [Season 3, Episode 24] Shakaar
. However, he is being targeted by Cardassian extremists called The True Way.
Nothing traceable back to Kai Winn, of course.
Odo is in charge of Shakaar's security.
But as Shakaar also turns his attentions to seducing Major Kira,
Odo becomes conflicted.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 14]
Return To Grace
Shown 5 Feb 96
Kira hitches a lift on a Cardassian ship
to join a joint Bajoran/Cardassian conference.
Ironically, Gul Dukat has been reduced in rank
and is now the Captain of the transport ship.
The Ferengi rule No good deed goes unpunished
rings true in Cardassia as well, it seems.
This is a direct sequel to
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 5] Indiscretion
. Zyal (Dukat's daughter) and Damar (Dukat's aide) are also members of the crew.
This allows for some further character development.
Kira must put aside her differences with Dukat
so they can team up and hunt down a Klingon warship
that has been raiding behind Cardassian lines.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 15]
Sons Of Mogh
Shown 17 Feb 96
Worf's brother Kurn (Tony Todd -
Candyman
) arrives on DS9. He wants to remove the family dishonour -
by the Klingon version of Sepukku.
Odo is against the idea:
apparently the Bajorans have a law against assisted suicide (regarding it as murder)
but no not have a law against attempted murder!
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 16]
Bar Association
Shown 19 Feb 96
Rom wants to impress Leeta,
so he follows O'Brien's advice and starts a Trade Union.
Quark cannot handle it, so the FCA sends in Brunt.
This ep was directed by Levar Burton (
Star Trek: The Next Generation
).
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 17]
Accession
Shown 26 Feb 96
A Bajoran emerges from the wormhole, where he was trapped for two centuries.
He declares himself to be the Emissary,
and orders the Bajoran people to return to their caste system.
Sisko decides to go along with the Bajoran's demands,
although the Federation is not happy with the results.
Caste-based discrimination means that Bajor will be refused entry to the Federation,
but the Bajorans prefer their religious bigotry to the Federation's cold logical science.
Worf is informed that Keiko is pregnant again.
In a reference to
Star Trek: TNG (Season 5)
episode Disaster,
he announces he will be on duties off the station at that time.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 18]
Rules Of Engagement
Shown 8 Apr 96
Lt Worf is on trial, accused of destroying a Klingon civilian transport.
The Klingon military launched attacks on the Federation's humanitarian disaster relief convoy,
even though they knew their own civilian vessels were in the area.
And now they want to extradite Worf,
so he can stand trial in a Klingon court.
The episode is stolen by the Klingon lawyer,
who is not the stereotypical bloodthirsty warrior.
The actor (Ron Canada) has few other television credits -
presumably he is one of Avery Brooks' theatre collegues.
Levar Burton directed, while Ron D. Moore wrote the teleplay.
This is perhaps the closest to
Battlestar Galactica (2003)
that DS9 ever got,
with Starfleet officers forced to consider the morality of their actions.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 19]
Hard Time
Shown 15 Apr 96
O'Brien remembers spending twenty years in an alien prison.
But he did not spend the time there physically,
so he was not PHYSICALLY prevented from re-offending.
Instead, he was given brain damage and is now suffering from PTSD
due to the hallucination that he spent twenty years being abused in a hellish prison.
Instead of being rehabilitated,
his tendencies towards anti-social behaviour have increased.
Despite knowing the prison was a hallucination,
O'Brien does not attempt to fight the memories.
Despite being a Starfleet-trained combat veteran and expert engineer,
it seems the thought of escape never occurred to him.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 4, Episode 20]
Shattered Mirror
Shown 27 Apr 96
Sisco's wife from the Mirror universe pops by for a visit.
Jake ends up on the other side,
where Smiley conscripts Sisco into helping build a mirror Defiant.
He would have been better off with the parallel O'Brien.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 21]
The Muse
Shown 29 Apr 96
Jake is observing new passengers arriving from a transport ship,
when one of them takes an interest in him.
Her name is Onaya (
Meg Foster
), and she uses her telepathic skills to increase his productivity.
Unfortunately, she is feeding on his energy at the same time.
Odo has a similar position.
Another passenger recently arrived was Lwuxanna Troi,
who is pregnant and fleeing from her estranged husband (Michael Ansara -
Buck Rogers in the 25th Century
). He gives her his protection, and they start to bond again.
But he must convince everyone of his wish to marry her
before her hubby will ever let her go.
Patricia Tallman
, apparently the only female in the Trek franchise stunt crew,
plays a Bajoran in the med-bay.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 22]
For The Cause
Shown 6 May 96
The Federation is sending a shipment of four industrial-scale replicators to Cardassia,
so they can shore up their Empire's infrastructure after the Klingon invasion.
Naturally, the Maquis are expected to attempt a heist.
Sisco and Kassidy Yates have started sleeping together.
But Starfleet Security suspects she could be a smuggler for the Maquis.
Sisco has to approve covert surveillance of his own GF!
Garak is working on a relationship of his own.
He catches the eye of Zyal, the exiled daughter of his arch-rival Gul Dukat.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 23]
To The Death
Shown 13 May 96
Sisko takes the Defiant to track down a Jemhadar raiding party who attacked DS9.
They rescue a Weyoun clone and some Jemhadar who ally with them against the raiders,
who are renegades intent on taking over the Dominion.
There is some predictable but well-played tension between the Feds and their new allies,
as they explore the cliche of teaming up with their enemies.
Finally, the team reach the planet where the renegades are based.
They want to reactivate an interstellar gateway built by a long-dead civilisation.
We learn something very interesting.
A dozen humans can take on ten times their number
in Jemhadar renegades in hand-to-hand combat.
This is despite the fact the renegades have
superhuman strength and speed, invisibility cloaks and so on!
This was directed by LeVar Burton.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 24]
The Quickening
Shown 20 May 96
This ep was directed by Rene Auberjonais.
Except for a pre-credits sequence with Quark, Kira, O'Brien and Worf
he does not appear in it.
Poor Quark is accused of unlicensed advertising by adding his program
onto the Starfleet replicators and display screens.
A bit of high-tech fly-posting - and what is the harm in that?
Kira, Dax and Bashir are taking the runabout home from the Gamma Quadrant.
They receive a distress signal from a planet under attack from the Dominion.
It turns out the attack was 200 years ago,
and the Jemhadar infected the survivors with a plague called The Blight.
The nearest thing they have to a doctor is Michael Sarazzin (
Frankenstein
), who knows there is no cure,
so he runs a hospice to give euthenasia for the dying
and helps the victims out of their pain.
Naturally, Bashir becomes obsessed with finding a cure.
Bashir thinks he can cure the plague.
But it is not going to be as easy as he thinks.
He ignores the fact that the disease is a bio-weapon
created by the same people who created the Jem Ha'dar.
And this ep is a wonderful example of how this show rose to the occasion
when opportunites presented themselves.
It is not the typical schmaltzy crap, although it is a bit predictable.
Bashir's full of the naivite and good intentions that are the hallmark of the Federation,
and should be its undoing.
Deep Space Nine [Season 4, Episode 25]
Body Parts
Shown 10 Jun 96
Quark has been told he has less than a week to live.
He has to pay off all his debts,
and Rom talks him into auctioning his dessicated body in 52 slices.
Will Quark find a way out of the contract?
He hires Garak to put him out of his misery.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 4, Episode 26 - Finale]
Broken Link
Shown
Reviewed 1st August 2005 [Monday]
Odo has contracted a disease, so Sisco takes him to the Dominion.
Garak tags along for the ride.
He even gets to fight someone, though it is not exactly exciting.
There is lots of continuity in this ep - unusual for Trek.
The Founders want to put Odo on trial
for killing a fellow shapeshifter in a previous ep.
Garak wants to know what happened to a Cardassian invasion fleet sent after the Founders.
And the ending - Odo's punishment and the Klingon intervention
- set up yet more continuity between future eps.
Season 5
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 1]
Apocalypse Rising
Shown 30 Sep 96
Thanks to Odo's revelation at the end of last season,
the Federation know that a senior Klingon is actually a changeling.
Starfleet sends in an infiltration team.
In the mantra that there is no need for Special Forces
because any line infantry unit should be able to perform a Special Forces mission,
the Admirals merely send in the nearest unit.
In this case ... Sisco, Worf, O'Brien and Odo.
Sisco adapts well to the Klingon way of life.
O'Brien takes a bit of practise.
But Odo is severely depressed since losing his shapeshifting powers.
This was directed by Andrew Robinson,
so naturally Garak does not have much to do this episode.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 2]
The Ship
Shown 7 Oct 96
Sisco and his team are on a lightly-armed ship in the Gamma Quadrant,
and the only rescue or backup is the Defiant -
still at DS9, several days travel away!
The DS9 crew end up besieged aboard a crashed Jemhadar ship.
This is a predictable piece of filler.
O'Brien bonds with some Starfleet tech we've never seen before ...
Guess who the redshirt is?
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 4]
... Nor The Battle To The Strong
Shown 21 Oct 96
Jake Sisco, teenage reporter, becomes war correspondent
at a small Starfleet outpost under attack by the Klingons.
The result is reminiscent of Red Badge of Courage.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 5]
The Assignment
Shown 28 Oct 96
O'Brien's wife Keiko returns from the Pah-Wraith Caves.
Unfortunately she'd been possessed by one of the pah-wraiths,
and it wants him to help it attack the wormhole ...
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 6]
Trials And Tribble-ations
Shown 4 Nov 96
The main cast get sent back to the Kirk era.
Digitally edited into the classic episode
Star Trek TOS: The Trouble with Tribbles
, they try to save Kirk's life but without disturbing the timeline.
Sisco, Bashir, Dax and O'Brien are all in earlier versions of their Starfleet costumes,
while Odo and Worf try to look like civilians.
Bashir states I'm a doctor, not a historian.
When asked about the TOS-era Klingons, Worf replies We don't talk about it!
And Dax, in a skimpy red dress, has a thing for ... Spock? And McCoy, too!
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 7]
Let He Who Is Without Sin...
Shown 11 Nov 96
Dax and Worf go for a romantic holiday. However, when they meet up with Curzon's ex (
Vanessa L Williams
) Worf gets jealous and teams up with a bunch of puritanical bores.
Bashir and Leeta come along.
Is Leeta not dating Rom?
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 8]
Things Past
Shown 18 Nov 96
Sisko, Garak, Dax and Odo are on a ship returning from a conference on Bajor.
Garak was vilified there, because the Bajorans were inherently racist.
However, Odo's role as a collaborator is ignored
because the Bajorans believe he delivered justice.
Ironically the only one to hold his past against him is Kira,
whose terrorist past resulted in the deaths of innocent Bajorans.
Sisco, Garak, Odo and Dax find themselves seven years back in time.
They are Bajorans on DS9 under Cardassian Occupation.
Dax gets lucky, and catches the eye of Gul Dukat.
After all, he was good enough for Kira's mother!
Meanwhile, the others avoid the attentions of Odo's predecessor,
Thrax (Kurtwood Smith - who co-starred with Odo and Worf in
ST 6: Undiscovered Country
).
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 9]
The Ascent
Shown
Reviewed 12th August 2005 [Friday]
Odo takes Quark to a Federation prison, but their runabout is sabotaged.
They crashland on a remote uninhabitable planetoid.
They must team up together and carry a subspace transmitter
up a conveniently close (but massively high) mountain.
Meanwhile, Jake and Nog become roomies.
While the enemies started to bond,
the two buddies realise how different they are.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 10]
Rapture
Shown 30 Dec 96
Reviewed 13th August 2005
Sisco becomes obsessed with finding a lost city on Bajor.
After being KO'd by an electrio shock he also claims to have visions ...
Kai Wynn decides that Sisco is the true Emissary, and tries to help him.
The Federation announce they will accept Bajor as a member - and Kassiday Yates (
Penny Johnson
) pops by for a visit.
Everything looks good for Sisco.
But the electrification he received is killing him,
and if Bashir cures him he may not get visions again ...
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 11]
The Darkness And The Light
Shown 6 Jan 97
Reviewed 15th August 2005
Someone is assassinating members of Kira's terrorist unit.
Odo and the other self-richeous gits are eager to get the person responsible,
irrespective of the fact that Kira confesses to crimes and terrorism.
It is scary that a pair of middle-aged ex-terrorists
are better than Odo's trained deputies.
Even scarier is the fact that Kira, heavily pregnant,
outfights multiple Starfleet Security personnel!
The assassin is far more sympathetic than the racist Kira.
Unfortunately her racism is not addressed.
A pity, especially since Sisco harps on about our people in a later ep.
Racism is an issue in Trek, it seems, but humanising the racists is not.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 12]
The Begotten
Shown 27 Jan 97
Quark sells Odo a baby changeling.
This is a nice profit for Quark,
since the time he discovered the Jem'hadar baby it meant Sisco confiscated the entire cargo!
Odo tries to teach the changeling how to shapeshift.
Unfortunately, this is not as simple as it seems.
Luckily, Sisco calls in Odo's estranged father-figure,
the Bajoran scientist who discovered him.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 13]
For The Uniform
Shown 3 Feb 97
Reviewed 17th August 2005
Sisco is on a personal mission -
revenge against a Starfleet officer who outsmarted him and defected to the Maquis.
The defector outsmarts the Feds at every step,
sabotaging the Defiant and outwitting his pursuers.
Finally, a decent antagonist!
And since O'Brien installed an ESB-type holo-com system,
he and Sisco can go face to face.
The defector is out to ethnically cleanse all Cardassian colonists out of the DMZ.
He sees himself as a robin hod syle figure, protecting the innocent.
Sisco realises that he must think like a villain to defeat the defector.
He does not appreciate the irony that his hunt for the defector
begins in a refugee camp filed with starving childen!
For all his self-richeousness and high-minded ideals,
he cares nothing for the suffering of innocent people.
And his solution illustates this.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 14]
In Purgatory's Shadow (1)
Shown 10 Feb 97
Reviewed 18th August 2005
Gul Dukat arrives on DS9 to see his daughter.
He discovers she has befriended Garak, and blames Kira for this.
Garak and Worf go to the Gamma Quadrant to find Garak's mentor,
whose ship was destroyed by the Dominion.
This allows Garak some character-development,
and introduces the threat of Dominion invasion.
With regard to the Soap Opera aspects of the series:
Kira has squeezed out the O'Brien sprog, and Odo has got his mojo back.
Odo can shapeshift again,
which means he no longer needs a bed.
When he falls asleep he reverts to his gelatinous state, and slides off it.
So why do the Changelings who impersonate Alpha Quadrant VIPs
not have the same problem?
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 15]
By Inferno's Light (2)
Shown 17 Feb 97
Reviewed 19th August 2005
Cardassia, under its new leader Gul Dukat, has joined the Dominion!
Strange, since the Founders previously told Garak
they would exterminate the entire Cardassian race.
Dukat's plans - drive the Klingons out of Cardassian space,
destroy the Maquis ... and retake Terak Nor!
Bashir, Worf, Garak and Martok are all cellmates in a Dominion POW camp.
Nice coincidence!
And just like in The Great Escape,
the one in the tunnel is claustrophobic!
Sisco, with a Dominion saboteur aboard DS9,
must organise a defence against the Dominion/Cardassian invasion.
Unfortunately, despite the setup the ep's climax is ... unclimactic.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 16]
Doctor Bashir, I Presume?
Shown 24 Feb 97
Reviewed 21st August 2005
Dr Zimmerman (Robert Picardo) arrives on DS9.
His task - to build the EMH mark II, using Bashir as the template!
This is a wonderful, light-hearted piece.
We get to see our favourite Comic Relief character interview the main cast,
and even try to seduce Lyta the Dabo Girl!
She is a money-grubbing slut, of course
- playing him off against the Ferengi.
The ep takes a more serious twist when Bashir's parents turn up.
The twist itself has no foreshadowing,
and makes no real sense when compared to earlier eps.
A pity, really - the ep's wasted potential
just underlines everything bad about modern Trek.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 17]
A Simple Investigation
Shown 31 Mar 97
Reviewed 22nd August 2005
Odo drops out of of Bashir's new
James Bond
holonovel, because he is still uncomfortable with interpersonal relationships with humanoid females.
Unluckily for him, his next criminal investigation involves a manipulative Femme Fatale.
The lady in question is on the run from the Orion Syndicate.
They send a couple of sub-Tarantino hitmen after her.
Odo is stupid enough to fall for a completely obvious trick.
Luckily, she is stupid too - she tries to trade them a data crystal,
but does not even think to check what is on it.
Strangely, while Starfleet had phaser-blast sensors in
ST 6: Undiscovered Country
they have not installed them in DS9, over half a century later.
Also ... Odo's liquid form is about a couple of litres worth.
How can he ... with a humanoid female?
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 18]
Business As Usual
Shown 7 Apr 97
Reviewed 23rd August 2005
Quark is bankrupt.
Luckily, his arms dealer cousin (who tried to kill him last ep)
pops up and offers him a job.
There is even a great reference to Orson Welles' speach in The Third Man.
Steven Berkoff (Rambo II) pops up as a business partner,
and Laurence Tierney (Reservoir Dogs) is a customer.
The Federation disapproves of Quark's business, but can do nothing against him.
Berkoff supplied the Bajoran resistance, you see.
Back when the Federation signed non-aggression pacts with the Cardies,
and even handed their own colonies over!
Yes, the Feds are fascists.
Sidig El Fadil directed this.
He also appears in the subplot, concerning O'Brien's baby.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 19]
Ties Of Blood And Water
Shown 14 Apr 97
Reviewed 24th August 2005
Kira's Cardassian father-figure arrives on DS9.
Unfortunately he is dying, which takes Kira back to the death of her real father.
Being a Kira-centric ep, we get lots of typical Kira racism.
After all, she is an unreformed terrorist and hatemonger.
Speaking of villains, Gul Dukat arrives on the station.
Purely in a diplomatic role, of course.
No mention is made of his daughter or Garak, her paramour.
Dukat is accompanied by Weyoun. Yes, it seems the Weyouns are clones.
In other words, Jeffrey Cooms will not be out of work any time soon.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 20]
Ferengi Love Songs
Shown 21 Apr 97
Reviewed 25th August 2005
Quark's bar is closed due to re-infestation by Cardassian voles.
Worse, his idiot brother is marrying Dabo-slut Lyta (
Chase Masterson
). Yes, it is not just Ferengi who like to profit -
that angelic Bajoran is sleeping with her boss, shagging her way to the top.
Quark, in his dispair, runs home to his mother.
She is still having an affair with Grand Nagus Zek,
a source of much discomfort for Quark.
But Liquidator Brunt (Jeffrey Cooms) offers him his trading licence back
if he saves Ferengi society from the Females influence ...
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 21]
Soldiers Of The Empire
Shown 28 Feb 97
Reviewed 26th August 2005
General Martok is sent to rescue a missing Klingon warship.
He takes Worf and Dax along, as first mate and science officer.
Klingon morale is at an all-time low.
Martok, scarred by two years in a Dominion prison camp, avoids combat at all chances.
There is not even any blood-wine aboard!
Small wonder the crew are revolting. As in, mutinous.
Can Dax and Worf set things right?
It is amazing how much Dax's character has been developed this Season.
She is Curzon in Jadzia's body, and so much more interesting because of it.
Pity it took five years to make her interesting!
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 22]
Children Of Time
Shown 5 May 97
Reviewed 29th August 2005
The Defiant discovers a strange planet in the Gamma Quadrant.
They investigate, and discover it is inhabited by their own descendents.
The will be sent back in time 200 years, and stranded on the planet.
The small civilisation will grow up, complete with a Klingon Caste.
Two of the original crew are still alive after two centuries.
Dax has a new host, but retains Jadzia's memories.
Odo has made his appearance more human-like,
and is so uninhibited he is actually willing to tell Kira his true feelings towards her.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 23]
Blaze Of Glory
Shown 12 May 97
Reviewed 30th August 2005
Martok has intercepted a Maquis signal intended for Eddington/Valjean,
the Starfleet traitor who defected to the insurgency.
Apparently the Maquis launched a dozen missiles aimed at Cardassia Prime.
Although the missiles are probably equipped with Klingon cloaking shields,
as well as NBC warheads, this is not enough to do real damage.
However, it is just enough to provoke the Cardassians and Dominion into a retaliatory war.
Sisco regards the Dominion's destruction of the Maquis colonies as a tragedy,
but the Federation did nothing to stop it.
But he refuses to leave the missiles for Gul Dukat to deal with.
Apparently the life of all those Cardies means more than the lives of the Maquis colonists.
And the Dominion invasion, despite being inevitable,
should be delayed as long as possible.
Peace in our time, anyone?
Sisco goes into the badlands to find the launch site and send the abort code.
He takes Valjean with him, so we have some dramatic tension.
It is just a small two-man ship,
because the Defiant's over-powered engines are a liability in the Badlands.
Back on DS9, Nog is on Security duty.
Evidently Odo and his deputies are too busy harrassing Quark
to keep the Klingons under control.
Nog must work up the courage to stand up to General Martok.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 24
Empok Nor
Shown 19 May 97
Reviewed 31st August 2005
O'Brien, Garak, Nog and a pack of redshirts
go to a derelict Cardassian space station.
Unfortunately they are not alone on the station.
They get picked off one by one ...
For some reason, Cadet Nog is helping Chief O'Brien.
Normally it would be Rom's job, but he is nowhere in sight.
Nog was last seen doing Security work on the Promenade.
Perhaps he is getting work experience in all specialities
before he chooses one for himself.
After all, O'Brien mentions that he used to be a soldier but he is now an engineer.
We actually get to meet a few of the station's redshirts, including
Marjean Holden
. Since we have never met any of them before, it is obvious that they are just cannon fodder.
The final confrontation pits a couple of central characters against each other.
It is certainly an interesting idea.
Conveniently the station's internal structure is identical to DS9's,
so they can use the same sets (with different lighting, of course).
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 25]
In The Cards
Shown 9 Jun 97
Reviewed 5th September 2005
Jake and Nog try to buy Sisco a present, a Willie Mays baseball card, at auction.
However, someone else bids more than them.
They try to buy it back from him ...
The problem with Federation Communism is, it has no currency.
Therefore, everything is reduced to a barter system.
Nog is really the brains behind this - Jake is taken in by Feddie propaganda,
but admits he does not know what working for the betterment of ourselves and mankind actually means.
The winner, being a mad scientist,
wants lots of specialist gear that only the senior officers can provide.
Therefore the dynamic duo end up satisfying the desires of the main cast.
This raises morale ...
Kai Wynn and Weyoun are on the station to sign a non-aggression pact between the Dominion and Bajor.
Nice use of foreshadowing - this fits in well between Sisco's Emmisary ep
(keeping Bajor out of the Federation) and the next ep (the Season 5 finale).
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 26]
Call To Arms (1)
Shown 16 Jun 97
Lyta and Rom are preparing for their marriage.
However, the Dominion are preparing an invasion fleet.
Kira and Odo are avoiding each other - the result of a previous ep.
After Weyoun and Kai Wynn signed a non-aggression pact in the previous ep,
there is nothing to stop the Dominion from taking on DS9.
Sisco and his team prepare for a fighting withdrawl.
They mine the wormhole to prevent the Dominion from importing further forces.
Previously, the wormhole aliens destroyed one invasion fleet
and O'Brien rigged the station's deflector array to shut the wormhole.
Season 6
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 1]
A Time To Stand (2)
Shown 29 Sep 97
After last Season's mission to infiltrate Gowron's Klingon HQ,
it seems that Sisco's crew are the nearest thing to a Special Ops team that Starfleet has.
Yes, despite being experienced at day-to-day admin work on a space staton
they now find themselves being sent deep behind enemy lines on a sabotage mission.
This time, the target is a Ketracel White facility in Cardassian space.
Doctor Bashir, now he has been outed as genetically engineered, is an annoying know-it-all.
This is a complete character derailment, but luckily it only lasts for one episode.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 2]
Rocks And Shoals (3)
Shown 6 Oct 97
Siso's team are trapped on a remote planetoid.
Dax is injured, but luckily there are two redshirts along to help out.
A pack of Jem'hadar are also trapped on the planet.
They are loyal to their commander, a tricksy Vorta,
but he is running out of K-White.
How long will it be before the withdrawal symptom
drive them into a kill-crazy frenzy?
The episode abounds with War Movie cliches.
Sisco tries to get the Jem'hadar to betray the Vorta.
They are stubbornly loyal, which Sisco respects ...
But the Vorta is willing to save himself (and Sisco's crew)
by sacrificing the Jem'hadar - so we are supposed to despise the Vorta.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 3]
Sons And Daughters (4)
Shown 13 Oct 97
Martok and Worf take over command of a crappy Klingon warship.
Worf discovers that his son Alexander is one of the crew.
Naturally, domestic conflict ensues.
Dukat's daughter arrives on DS9.
She has been attending Art College on Bajor,
and shows her work to Kira.
Jake Sisco is still hanging out on DS9, pretending to be a journalist.
He asks Odo and Kira to let him join their Resistance cell.
Unlawful combatants!
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 4]
Behind The Lines (5)
Shown 20 Oct 97
Reviewed 12th September 2005
Jake, Rom, Kira and Odo have all stayed on the station.
They are secretly running a resistance operation.
For Jake and Rom this is a breach of neutrality,
making them illegal combatants.
Kira and Odo, however, are guilty of Treason against Bajor!
Quark, Morn and other innocent bystanders are put at risk, too.
They should not bother with resistance -
Weyoun and Dukat do well enough sabotaging their own plans.
And Gul Dumar has started taking to the bottle.
One of the founders is trapped in the Alpha Quadrant.
Yes, it is the female one we always see.
She visits Odo, melding with him and convincing him to embrace his nature.
She explains about their species -
when she rejoins the link the droplet is lost in the ocean.
In other words they have no individuality ... like the Borg!
And when she melds with Odo, he slowly loses his own individuality.
Sisco is promoted to a desk job, leaving Dax in command of the Defiant.
Given the symbiote's experience (from Curzon alone), it should be an Admiral by now!
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 5
Favor The Bold (6)
Shown 27 Oct 97
The female Changeling insists that the Dominion concentrate
on removing the minefield around the wormhole.
And they quickly come to a solution!
Sisco is sent to retake DS9.
He has a huge fleet, but he is up against the might of the Dominion.
Dukat tries to bring Kira round to his way of thinking.
She refuses - and decides that Odo might be too close to the Female Changeling.
Rom is in the brig, under sentance of Death.
He puts his duty to the Federation first, although he is not a citizen!
Leeta is heartbroken, and offers to work for Quark for free if he saves Rom.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 6]
Sacrifice Of Angels (7)
Shown 3 Nov 97
Reviewed 14th September 2005
It is time for the final battle for control of DS9.
The Dominion send about 1200 ships, and the Feds have a similar number.
They line up opposite each other in archaic style, within visual range.
Sisco commands from his flagship,
while Weyoun and Dukat share command and issue orders from the safety of DS9.
And the Feds are using starfighters!
Meanwhile, Dumar is sorting out the Resistance on DS9.
This means Quark has to take action, and Odo has to choose sides.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 7]
You are cordially Invited ...
Shown 10 Nov 97
Worf and Dax hold their wedding celebration.
But first, the Klingon Batchelor Party.
For the men (Sisco, Bashir, O'Brien) this involves Rites of Fasting and torture.
Worf is in the House of Martok,
and for Dax to marry him she must be deemed worthy of joining it.
General Martok's wife arrives on the station to judge Dax.
Unfortunately for Dax, Mrs Martok is a total bitch!
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 8]
Resurrection
Shown 17 Nov 97
Reviewed 16th September 2005
Kira's old lover, the religious leader, is back on the station.
However, it is not him - it is his duplicate from the Mirror universe.
It seems the Mirror universe rules of attraction hold steady.
And naturally enough, the most interesting duplicate, the Intendant, turns up.
Quark, oddly enough, is the one who saves the day.
A real shame that Kira never truly appreciates him.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 9]
Statistical Probabilities
Shown 24 Nov 97
Reviewed 18th September 2005
Bashir, an out-of-the-closet genetically enhanced person,
is put in charge of a group of botched enhancements.
However, these mismatched savants turn out to have their uses.
Dumar has taken Dukat's place, but is still shaken by events.
A wonderful attempt to humanise the non-human, anti-Federation characters.
The enhancements ARE human,
but the Fed characters have a discussion about the morality of enhancing people.
It gives them an unfair advantage is the excuse for keeping them out of Starfleet.
Harrison Bergeron
might have something to say about that.
And as for people PAYING to have children enhanced?
Surely the Federation is a Socialist Utopia, where money was abolished.
It was back in
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 25] In The Cards
!
Bashir is given temporary custody of a group of similar GM humies -
though unlike him their modifications have made them both briliant and flawed.
All have personality disorders to a varying extent -
though since they had all been under lock and key since early childhood it is small wonder!
Anyhow, the perfect people (too perfect for the Federation nazis, anyhow)
show their superior intellect by analysing Intelligence info on the Dominion
- but in the end their findings are too shocking for the feeble Feds to take!
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 6, Episode 10]
The Magnificent Ferengi
Shown
Reviewed First Week, January 2000
Reviewed 19th September 2005 - Monday
Quark's mother is captured by the Dominion,
and the bartender recruits a gang of Ferengi renegades to rescue her.
Finally, the most (ok, only) interesting species in the Drek universe
finally get to display some talent and diversity!
Predictably, one of them (Inspector Brunt) is played by Jeffrey Cooms.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 11]
Waltz
Shown 8 Jan 98
Reviewed 21st September 2005 [Wednesday]
Sisco is on a ship taking Dukat to trial.
Typical Federation justice - the poor fellow's a Prisoner of War,
and in his current mental state is unfit for trial.
But that does not stop Ben Sisco.
Until the ship is wrecked ...
Sisco wakes up alone with Dukat on an isolated planetoid.
Yes, the Starfleet life-pods have warp engines and sensors to detect M-Class planets.
Now, will our duo bond? Like in
Alien Mine
(itself based on a classic World War Two film)?
Dukat explains his actions during the occupation of Bajor.
As in the flashbacks shown frequently in previous episodes,
he is seen as reasonable.
Does Benjy try to understand him?
Difficult as the task may be, since Dukat is hallucinating about Kira goading him
(though the racism she spouts is certainly in character).
Sisco condemns Dukat as being utterly evil.
Ironic, considering the current US occupation of Iraq.
Would he be so flippant about a US Officer serving in Vietnam?.
This was written by Ronald D Moore,
so the theme is reminiscent of those explored in
Battlestar Galactica (2002)
. It was directed by Rene Auberjonais, so Odo does not appear in the episode.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 6, Episode 12]
Who Mourns For Morn?
Shown
Reviewed Third Week, January 2000
We only saw him at the bar, and he never spoke.
However, everyone turns out to have been his best friend!
This episode must be around Season 5;
the Dax & Worf relationship is in full bloom.
Morn's starship is lost, and he is declared killed.
His will states he left everything to Quark,
although judging by how much he drinks it might not even cover his bar tab.
Worse, Quark discovers there are rival claimants.
A Femme fatale who claims to be Morn's widow,
a couple of reptile-faced Tarentinoesque hoodlums,
and a dodgy cop (Gregory Itzin - 24).
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 13]
Far Beyond The Stars
Shown 11 Feb 98
Sisco feels the pressure of the war getting to him.
Then he has a flashback (possibly caused by the Prophets) to the 1950s.
Yes, the pre-TOS era of pulp sci-fi.
The regular cast (without their alien makeup) are the writing staff of a sci-fi pulp magazine.
That said, Sisco is held back for being a Negro.
Yes, this is all about segregation.
Sisco wants to write the real-life story of DS9,
but he cannot get printed because the station commander is described as looking like him.
O'Brien's character is mocked for writing about Robots,
but nobody notes that Isaac Asimov's protagonists are rarely given a description
(and thus, every reader pictures the character as looking like THEM).
Nor is it mentioned that Science Fiction is at its best when it explores issues like this through METAPHOR,
even in heavy-handed TOS episodes like Let This Be Your Last Battlefield.
Avery Brooks directed this episode,
perhaps because of the spectacular meltdown Sisco has at the end
when his life falls apart and the stress is too much to bear.
The ungrateful SOB turns against his co-workers,
despite their constant support for him.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 14]
One Little Ship
Shown 18 Feb 98
Reviewed 23rd September 2005 [Friday]
The Defiant sends a shuttle to investigate a subspace anomally.
Then the JemHadar attack,
easily boarding and capturing the Starfleet warship.
While Sisco tries to stall the JemHadar
(rookies, cloned in the Alpha Quadrant so obviously less than a year old!)
his only hope is the shuttle crew.
Unfortunately, the shuttle and crew (Bashir, O'Brien and Dax)
have all been shrunk to minature proportion.
Which leads on to some funny lines, and a not-too-serious but still quite fun episode.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 6, Episode 15]
Honour Among Thieves
Shown
Reviewed Second Week, February 2000
Chief O'Brien joins Starfleet Intelligence for an episode,
and goes undercover as a gangster.
However, like the Al Pacino/Johnny Depp movie Donnie Brasco
he starts to get close to the targets ...
This is about the only insight we have ever had
into non-Starfleet members of the Federation.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 16]
Change Of Heart
Shown 4 Mar 98
Reviewed 27th Sepember 2005 [Thursday]
Worf and Dax, despite being a married couple, are sent on a deadly mission together.
They must trek through a jungle, avoiding Jem'hadar patrols.
Worf is left with a choice - will he choose love over duty?
Back on DS9, Quark is the undefeated Tongo champion.
Even Dax could not win against him.
But O'Brien offers to bankroll the genetically-engineered Julian Bashir against Quark.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 17]
Wrongs Darker Than Death Or Night
Shown 1 Apr 98
Was Kira's mom Dukat's lover?
Kira uses the Orb of Time, and travels back.
She and her mum are conscripted as comfort women.
This involves makeup and expensive hairdos.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 18]
Inquisition
Shown 8 Apr 98
Starfleet's Internal Affairs Boss Sloane (William Sadler -
Roswell
) claims Bashir is a Dominion spy.
Not without good reason, it seems.
After all, Bashir was in Dominion hands for several weeks in
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 15] By Inferno's Light (2)
. And then there are the events of
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 9] Statistical Probabilities,
when his genetically engineered patients decided that the Dominion's victory was inevitable
and that they should hand over Sisco's battle-plans to Weyoun!
This is the first ep to mention Section 31,
the Starfleet equivalent to the Tal Shiar or the Obsidian Order.
Until this time, the Feds seemed to gather Intel on an adhoc basis
using whatever Fleet officers were available at the time.
A bit like their use of Sisco's senior staff for Special Forces missions
instead of actually having a well-trained military unit.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 19]
In The Pale Moonlight
Shown 15 Apr 98
This ep has a very dark theme (for Trek).
The Federation is desperate - we hear of the Fall of Betazed!
However, we have to endure the self-richeous Sisko as he narrates his own Fall (from Grace).
After all, the title is a reference to Dancing with the Devil ...
Sisko enlists Garak to trick the Romulans into declaring war on the Dominion.
They plan to con a Romulan Senator (Stephen McHattie -
X-Files
) into accepting faked evidence of a Dominion plot to invade the Romulan Empire.
As well as straight-man Sisco's willingness to go off the rails
(he even gets lectured on morality by Bashir!),
we get some depth from the supporting cast.
Garak is an anti-hero, and Quark shows some uncharacteristic chivalry towards his Dabo girls.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 20]
His Way
Shown 22 Apr 98
This is a lighthearted ep after the serious ones - a musical.
Vic Fontaine (James Darren -
Time Tunnel
) is a 1960s niteclub singer, but he knows he is a hologram!
Worf and Dax go, as a married couple.
Kira and First Minister Shakaar (Duncan Regehr -
V: The Series
) are together - her lover, one year after her breakup.
Odd that Bashir has a holographic version of Kira, but Quark does not.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 21]
The Reckoning
Shown 29 Apr 98
A stone tablet uncovered is uncovered in the city Sisco discovered in
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 10] Rapture
. He takes it to DS9 for Dax to translate.
It contains a prophecy of DS9's destruction.
Kai Wynn (
Louise Fletcher
) starts interfering in Sisco's business.
She starts pulling strings with Starfleet and the Bajoran Government
to force Sisco to return the tablet.
She does not ignore his role as Emissary of the Prophets - she RESENTS it!
The Prophets send two spirits - a red one and a blue one.
One is a Prophet, the other is a Pah-Wraith.
They must take host bodies as vessels, for a battle to decide the fate of Bajor.
Despite existing in non-linear time, the aliens do not know the outcome!
Kira is a devout Bajoran, willing to sacrifice herself for her faith.
She makes an obvious vessel for the Prophet.
The Pah-Wraith chooses Sisco's son Jake.
A strange choice, but obviously Sisco has a personal attachment
so the story is made to seem more dramatic.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 22]
Valiant
Shown
Reviewed Fourth Week, April 2000
The intro scene involves Quark and Dax - Odo realises that the Ferengi cares
about something other than gold-pressed latinum.
Nog and Jake are on a secret mission to Ferenginar,
when they are ambushed by the Jem'Hadar.
They are rescued by a Defiant-Class ship called the Valiant.
It turns out that the ship is run by Red Squad,
a group of top-class Starfleet cadets
who were on a training mission when the war broke out eight months previously.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 23]
Profit And Lace
Shown
Reviewed Second Week, May 2000
After the disgraced Ferengi Liquidator, Brunt,
rescued Quark's mother from the Dominion,
the Grand Nagus (Wallace Shawn) gave him his old job back.
Brunt used the opportunity to depose his boss and become the new Nagus.
Quark must help his mother and the old Nagus regain power,
by convincing the Ferengi that females should be allowed to wear clothes and earn profit.
And once his mother ends up in sick-bay,
there is only one way to provide a suitably business-minded Ferengi female ...
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 24]
Time's Orphan
Shown
Reviewed Third Week, May 2000
Chief O'Brien's daughter Molly is trapped on the far side of a time portal.
O'Brien tries to get her back -
but the time-grab gets her ten years after she had first been trapped there.
In other words, she went there aged eight and came back aged 18,
with no human interaction in between.
Molly's atavistic behaviour causes problems
- she cannot adapt to her new environment,
and wants to return home.
Starfleet believe that homesickness is a mental illness,
and want to confine her to a lunatic asylum indefinitely.
How could ANYONE think that Federation is less than perfect?
Part of the problem of the episode is Molly's apparent immaturity;
8-year-olds are not completely lacking in intellect,
for if they were then there would be no point in sending them to school!
Also, she has no sign of any female hormonal activity -
she does not even appear to become aware of the male gender.
While the O'Briens concentrate on their elder child,
Worf and Dax look after the baby.
For a Klingon warrior like Worf, this is the ultimate challenge.`
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 25]
The Sound Of Her Voice
Shown 10 Jun 98
Jake helps Quark organise Odo and Kira's anniversary.
Of course, Quark has an ulterior motive.
Sisco and crew (including Kassiday Yates) take the Defiant to rescue a trapped Starfleet officer.
They have never met her in person,
but they talk to her (audio only) on subspace radio.
The twist ending is reminiscent of a 1970s animated scifi movie.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 26]
Tears of the Prophets
Shown
Reviewed June 2000
Sisco is awarded the Christopher Pike Medal for Valor
for his part in the re-taking of the space-station.
He has been selected to lead an alliance of Federation,
Klingon and Romulan fleets against the Dominion/Cardassian alliance.
Quark and Dr Bashir are both more than a little put out when Worf and Jadzia Dax (
Terry Farrell
) announce that they are planning to have children. As with
Jane Seymour
in
Battlestar Galactica (1978)
, this should set off alarm bells for everyone watching.
On the Cardassian side, Gul Dukat has returned from the wilderness -
no longer in command, and slightly crazy to boot.
However, he has a cunning plan.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 7, Episode 1]
Image In The Sand
Shown
Reviewed 24th January 2001 [Wednesday]
Sisco and Jake leave DS9 and return to Earth.
However, the Prophets have something in mind for him.
Also, Niki de Boer pops up at the end ...
On DS9, Odo and Kira (apparently now lovers) have to negotiate with their new Romulan allies.
Finally, Worf and everyone else go off on a dangerous mission
so they can send Jadzia's soul to Klingon Valhalla.
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 7, Episode 2]
Shadows and Symbols
Shown
Reviewed 31st January 2001 [Wednesday]
The new Dax was an unwilling host, which certainly makes for a more
entertaining character than the elitist perfect person type would.
She joins the Siscos, who head out to a desert planet
(the budget actually covered REAL desert scenes!) with entrenching tools.
While Sisco digs, he gets visions of himself as a writer in a loonybin.
Damar is the psychiatrist.
This is a sequel to
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 6, Episode 13] Far Beyond The Stars
.
The Dominion plans a counterattack to retake the system Sisco captured a couple of episodes ago.
They have to increase starship production, so Martok plans to destroy their shipyards.
Worf signs on to the crew, so he can get Jadzia into Stovakor (the Klingon Valhalla).
Bashir, O'Brien and Quark sign up too.
Kira and Odo start a game of chicken with the Romulans.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine [Season 7, Episode 3]
Afterimage
Shown
Reviewed 21st February 2001 - Wednesday
Ezri Dax cannot adjust to the way people on the station treat her,
so she decides to leave.
First, she has to soothe Garak's troubles.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine [Season 7, Episode 4]
Take Me Out to the Holosuite
Shown
Reviewed 21st March 2001 [Wednesday]
DS9 is visited by a starship captained by a Vulcan rival of Sisco's.
The Vulcan challenges Sisco to a baseball match,
and Sisco naturally accepts.
The result is ... DS9's motley crew against a bunch of well-trained Vulcans!
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 7, Episode 5]
Chrysalis
Shown 28 Oct 98
Bashir's genetically-enhanced gimps want him to cure comatose girl. Can he?
This is a nice little interpersonal drama with characters we almost care about.
Once the girl is cured, Bashir starts to fall in love with her.
Unfortunately, she displays symptoms of a relapse - like in the movie
Awakenings
.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 6]
Treachery, Faith and the Great River
Shown
Reviewed 4th April 2001 [Wednesday]
Weyoun contacts Odo and claims he wants to defect from the Dominion.
Weyoun and Odo start Bonding.
Nog gets tech gear for O'Brien, thanks to his Ferengi bartering skills.
This is reminiscent of
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 [Season 5, Episode 25] In The Cards
.
This is the first mention of disease among the Founders.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 7]
Once More Unto The Breach
Shown
Reviewed 11th April 2001 [Wednesday]
Worf is visited by the legendary Klingon warrior, Kor (John Colicos).
Kor wants a commission aboard a Klingon war vessel.
Worf gets it for him,
despite the antipathy that Admiral Martok bears for the old man.
However, when battle commences we learn why Kor was refused a commission by the high command.
The sub-plot involves Ezri Dax and Quark, who seems to have a crush on her.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 8]
The Siege of AR-558
Shown
Reviewed 18th April 2001 [Wednesday]
The Defiant drops off supplies at a remote Federation outpost.
It has been under constant siege by the Dominion,
and Starfleet have taken about 70% fatalities.
Worse, Sisco does not think that such a huge loss rate is unusual!
Sisco, Bashir, Dax, Nog and Quark are trapped by a Dominion counter-attack.
Sisco does not even bother transporting Quark (the only civilian) back.
This allows for some great dialogue,
as Quark adds a completely different perspective to things.
Dax helps the local tech (Billy Mumy -
Babylon 5, Lost in Space
), and Bashir plays audio-clips of Vic Fontaine to keep morale high.
It is interesting to see the Trek version of futuristic military tactics.
The idea of units regularly taking such crippling losses is unbelievable,
but phased landmines and holographic decoys are logical extensions of Trek tech.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 9]
Covenant
Shown
Reviewed 9th May 2001 [Wednesday]
Kira is abducted by Dukat, and asked to join his Pah Wraith cult.
Yes, Dukat is now leader of a Pa-Wraith cult.
There is preaching about Sins of the Flesh,
but the story-telling is extremely predictable.
The scope for developing Dukat beyond a cardboard villain is totally lost,
as is the chance for Kira to appreciate any change that may have happened to him.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 10]
It's Only A Paper Moon
Shown 16th May 2001 [Wednesday]
Nog, severely wounded in the previous ep,
is sent back to DS9 to recuperate.
His injuries seem to be psychological as well as physical,
as he spends all his time in the Holodeck with Vic Fontaine.
This has the same moral as the 1980s UK Saturday kids' TV show
Why don't You ...
(Just switch off your television set and go and do something less boring instead)?
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 11]
Prodigal Daughter
Shown
Reviewed 23rd May 2001 [Wednesday]
Ezri Dax is sent home to look for Chief O'Brien.
O'Brien was looking for Mrs Bilby,
widow of his Orion Syndicate friend.
Ezri meets with her mother (
Leigh Taylor-Young
), and we learn that Ezri's family runs a Big Business.
As a result they have been targetted by the Orion Syndicate.
They trade for gold-pressed Latinum - the Ferengi currency,
so why it is used on a non-Ferengi world is a mystery.
It is a non-Federation planet,
so at least it does not clash with Federation values.
It turns out that Mrs Bilby was a greedy gangster's moll.
Apparently Kira was Jadzia's best friend - quite a surprise.
Perhaps most surprising of all,
someone gets sentanced to three years - for Murder!
Three years or thirty?
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 12]
The Emperor's New Cloak
Shown
Reviewed 30th May 2001 [Wednesday]
Quark, Rom and the Grand Nagus accidentally end up in the Mirror Universe.
They land in the hands of Worf, Garak, the Intendant and Ezri.
Meanwhile, O'Brien and Bashir are in the Defiant ...
Quark has to go to the Mirror Universe to rescue the Grand Nagus.
There are some cool Ferengi!
Also, there is a scenario with Dax, Intendant and Leeta ...
the fanfic writes itself!
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 13]
Field of Fire
Shown
Reviewed 6th June 2001 [Wednesday]
This is the best Ezri ep, and one of the best episodes of the whole show.
It was written by Robert Hewitt Wolfe, who later went on to create
Andromeda
.
There is a serial killer on the loose on DS9.
Ezri Dax, the nearest thing they have to a psychiatric profiler,
tries to discover who the killer is.
She has an advantage: one of the previous Dax hosts, Joran, was a killer.
Actually, so were Kurzon and Jadzia -
the klingon-lovers who butchered their foes with deadly bat-leth blades.
However, brutal disembowellment of complete strangers apparently does not count as killing!
Ezri channels Joran, and his consciousness
(reconstructed from the symbiote's memories) appears to her.
Joran tries to put her in the mindset of the killer,
and as a result she has to choose - to kill or not to kill?
There are moments of hypocrisy - Joran states that Combat is too random,
but Ensign Suder in
Voyager
never complained about being able to get his murderous rocks off.
In the original ep, Joran Dax was an anger killer,
while the character presented in this ep is a premeditated, almost sadistic killer.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 14]
Chimera
Shown
Reviewed 13th June 2001 [Wednesday]
A renegade shapeshifter arrives on the Station
and tries to get Odo to help set up a new Link ...
The solids get paranoid, but Quark sticks up for Odo.
Are Starfleet's men and women fighting to protect the Federation's high-minded ideals?
Or are they just doing it to protect their friends and family?
There is another refence to the Siege.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 15]
Badda-Bing Badda-Bang
Shown
Reviewed 20th June 2001 [Wednesday]
Vic Fontaine, the hologram singer in the Holosuite lounge,
gets fired by his gangster. Although just a program, he knows about Starfleet.
The crew band together to help Vic, and the only way is to rob the casino.
Ezri Dax looks GREAT in the cocktail-waitress dress.
Bashir's drink is a vodka martini, stirred not shaken ...
Quark and Worf are not interested in helping.
Quark thinks of you as the competition, someone tells Vic.
But since Quark gets the door fee from Vic's, technically Vic is his employee.
Sisco mentions that the place is historically inaccurate
insofar as it does not bar African-American patrons.
Yes, in the perfect Federation, racism is still an issue with him.
His references to Our people make him a segregationist ...
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 16]
Inter Arma Enim Legea
Shown
Reviewed 11th July 2001 [Wednesday]
Bashir is due to attend a medical conference on Romulus.
Security there will be handled by the Tal Shiar,
the infamous Romulan Secret Police.
Bashir is approached by a Section 31 operative named Sloan (William Sadler).
Sloan states that Bashir worked for them before,
and will do so again because he is a man who likes secrets.
There are more references to previous episodes,
and this makes Bashir's namby-pamby hand-wringing pretty unbelievable.
Bashir tells Sisco, and we learn that Section 31 is unofficial
and unacountable to Starfleet Command.
Section 31 seems the only part of the Federation that is actually EFFECTIVE,
so the distaste the Feds show towards it is quite worrying.
We get to see the Friendly Romulan, Senator Cretak (
Adrienne Barbeau
), and Romulan Ale, which resembles the blue milk in Star Wars.
Bashir's target is the Chairman of the Tal Shiar.
Despite the Romulan's interest in using germ warfare on civilians
(and torture on prisoners), our goody-goody Doctor gets moralistic about his mission.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 17]
Penumbra
Shown
Reviewed 25th July 2001 [Wednesday]
Typically for Trek, this episode does not have an Arc.
Instead in just leaves all the plot threads hanging,
without even a to be continued at the end.
Ezri sets out on a one-Trill mission to save Worf.
They run foul of the Boush-helmeted guys, the Breen ...
Sisco plans to marry his girlfriend, Kassidy Yates.
However, the Prophets object ...
Weyoun assists the Founders in finding a cure for a mysterious malady that afflicts them.
His Cardassian sidekick Damar, sickened by the loss of life his people have suffered,
secretly helps his old friend Dukat.
As a side-effect, we finally get to see what Marc Alaimo looks like without the make-up.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 18]
Til Death Do Us Part
Shown
Reviewed 1st August 2001 [Wednesday]
Kai Wynn gets a vision that tells her to follow the guide.
Meanwhile, Dukat sets off for DS9 ...
Worf and Ezri are prisoners in a Breen spaceship.
There are shades of the far superior
Outer Limits episode.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 19]
Strange Bedfellows
Shown
Reviewed 15th August 2001 [Wednesday]
Kai Wynn and Dukat are now lovers.
He reveals to her his belief in the Pah Wraiths ...
Kai Wynn must decide - stick with the ungrateful prophets and resign from power,
or defect to the Pah-Wraiths?
Like Ben in
Lost,
her path is clear.
Sisco and his new wife Kassidy Yates
start their underhand battle for supremacy within the marriage.
Gul Damar and Weyoun (re-cloned) bicker,
especially since the Founders are now selling the Cardassians out
to their new allies, the Breen.
Ezri and Worf are still bickering, now in Dominion prison.
Worf even admits that he may use the word honour too much.
Worf and Ezri get an unexpected ally.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 20]
The Changing Face Of Evil
Shown
Reviewed 22nd August 2001 [Wednesday]
The Breen launch a secret surprise attack on the Federation's HQ - San Francisco!
Dukat and Kai Wynn get hold of the secret texts
that contain the hidden message of how to unleash the Pah-Wraiths.
Ezri and Worf are finally back on DS9.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 21]
When It Rains
Shown
Reviewed 29th August 2001 [Wednesday]
Bashir and O'Brien try to find a cure for Odo's disease.
Odo and Kira join up with their new allies.
Garak pops up ...
Worf and the Klingons prepare for battle.
Dukat falls out with Kai Wynn.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 22]
Tacking Into The Wind
Shown
Reviewed 5th September 2001 [Wednesday]
Kira is having trouble with Damar and the Cardassian rebels.
John Vickery (Neroon in
Babylon 5
) in especially a pain in her side.
Garak discovers that Odo is physically degrading.
They head off on a secret mission to steal a Breen superweapon,
and it all ends in a Mexican stand-off.
Bashir and O'Brien realise that they cannot
reverse-engineer an antidote to the shapechangers' virus.
The only way to help Odo is by getting the antidote
from the people who made it - the secretive Section 31.
Klingon Chancellor Gowron is sacrificing his own men
in order to undermine his political rival, General Martok.
Worf decides to make a stand against corruption.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 23]
Extreme Measures
Shown
Reviewed 12th September 2001 [Wednesday]
Bashir and O'Brien set a trap for Bureau 31,
in order to get the cure for Odo's disease.
They get Sloan (Bill Sadler), but also get more trouble than they expect.
O'Brien and Bashir do a Virtual Reality
Inception
in Sloane's head.
However, they only have forty-two minutes, making this real-time (like 24).
The Breen and their weapon and Odo are taken to DS9.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 24]
Dogs of War
Shown
Reviewed 17th September 2001 [Wednesday]
The episode's teaser ties up several plot threads from previous episodes:
Bashir and Dax, Odo's disease, the Breen energy-damping weapons.
Kira, Garak and Damar end up trapped on occupied Cardassia.
Jeffrey Combs in his first role (Weyoun) has things stitched up.
Odo accuses the Federation (since Section 31 is part of it) of genocide.
He wants to give the Founders the cure.
Sisco refuses - he claims to hate Section 31's tactics,
but will not help his enemies repair the damage.
And his attitude when the Dominion implements its new strategy is equally blunt.
Quark is in line to be the new Grand Nagus.
Jeffrey Combs in his second role (Liquidator Brunt) kisses ass,
and lets Quark know what has happened to the homeworld.
It is almost like ... a Federation world!
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 25]
What We Leave Behind
Shown
Reviewed 24th September 2001 [Wednesday]
Ezri and Bashir are now lovers.
They join Sisco, O'Brien, Worf and Odo aboard the new Defiant.
The Federation fleet sets off for the final invasion.
Kira, Garak and Damar arrange for the Cardassian Resistance
to co-ordinate their attacks to coincide with the Federation invasion.
Dukat returns to his lover, Kai Wynn.
They head for the Fire Caves, intent on releasing the pah-wraiths.
Star Trek: DS9 [Season 7, Episode 26]
What We Leave Behind: Part II
Shown
Reviewed 3rd October 2001 [Wednesday]
The start of this episode is unique for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, the Last Time On DS9 voice-over is by
Louise Fletcher
(Kai Wynn). Secondly, before the opening credits roll
we see the deaths of a couple of recurring characters.
The Dominion war is quickly ended,
and the good guys head off to Quark's holosuite for a celebratory drink.
Everyone is planning to split up and follow their own destiny.
However, Sisco has to complete his task as Emissary.
He has to defeat the Pah-Wraiths.
The final quarter of the episode is flashback clips and tearful goodbyes.
There are scenes from several comedy holodeck episodes,
but nothing stirring - and Worf does not even remember his wife Jadzia!!!
The final shot is reminiscent of the
Babylon 5
intro shot, but in comparison Straczynski's ending is far superior.
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