I thought Valiant was a very good episode

[Worf'sParmach]

I've never hated this ep as much as others seem to. It reminds me a lot of "The First Duty."

[Nerys Ghemor]

I always thought this episode would've been better served by putting O'Brien in the mix instead of Nog.

Why?

When Nog failed to take over and decommission Watters and turn that ship around, that was one of the most damning character FAILs you could possibly come up with.

With O'Brien, you'd have a legitimate cause for drama, and you could do it without assassinating his character. Think about this: technically, those teenage brat cadets would outrank him, making it damned difficult for him to order them, yet he's the one with some sense and combat experience and if he tried to tell them what to do, there'd be consequences. O'Brien trying to force them to see reason and get out of whatever traps Watters tried to throw at them could work. I'd at least buy it better than the whole Nog thing.

The episode sucked, but at least if O'Brien were there you'd have an actual explanation as to why the cadets didn't obey right away. At least not until he handed their asses to them.

[teacake]

But Nog is more interesting than O'Brien.

[Nightdiamond]

I always wondered why Nog didn't take command, but then again, looking at how the crew would react--he and Nog would have been given the death penalty in the first 20 minutes of the episode.

The writing didn't do anything to make these characters sympathetic. They seemed really, really arrogant, especially that adorable first officer and her glaring.

They could have brought back the data and become legendary heroes so they could become even more arrogant, but they chose to threw it all away.

How was it that they got that Vulcan to agree with all that?

I thought 24th century humans, especially Starfleet officers-- were supposed to be much more evolved than that?

They could have played the Looney Toons theme in the background while they were getting blown away, and it still would have evoked no emotion.

I actually did feel something when I first watched it, but all in all, the main reaction you get is, "they brought on themselves".

[teacake]

I never felt that because they were young idiots. I always feel bad for them.

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Wasn't Nog's commission just as "field" as those of Watters and all the rest of them? So Nog would have no more right to take command than they.

And since Watters was actually placed in command by the real captain (who then died), IIRC Watters IS the captain and can only be removed by an actual command level officer.

That being said, I agree that Red Squad was a bunch of arrogant jackasses who got themselves killed. But the Klingons probably hailed them as heroes who died in battle against superior forces...a glorious death, yes, in a way?

[MacLeod]

Worf'sParmach wrote:

---

I've never hated this ep as much as others seem to. It reminds me a lot of "The First Duty."

Sure it shares certain themes with "The First Duty", but it isn't as good an episode as "The First Duty". In some respects the actions of that episode about elite cadet squads should have meant that this never happened. As it did it would appear Starfleet failed to learn the lessons of that episode.

Mr. Laser Beam wrote:

---

Wasn't Nog's commission just as "field" as those of Watters and all the rest of them? So Nog would have no more right to take command than they.

And since Watters was actually placed in command by the real captain (who then died), IIRC Watters IS the captain and can only be removed by an actual command level officer.

That being said, I agree that Red Squad was a bunch of arrogant jackasses who got themselves killed. But the Klingons probably hailed them as heroes who died in battle against superior forces...a glorious death, yes, in a way?

I might be mistaken but wasn't Nog's commission due to Starfleet needing people, and several cadets recieved their commissions early.

[NrobbieC]

Yeah Nog was officially promoted, whereas Watters etc were only acting captain and so forth iirc.

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Nog hadn't yet completed his Academy training, and neither had Red Squad. So their commissions were all on the same level, so to speak. They were all field promotions. The only difference was Nog's uniform.

As for Watters, like I said, the real captain of the Valiant placed him in command, and that makes it legit. When a command officer makes someone Captain, only another command officer can remove them.

[MacLeod]

^But Nog's commission was a full commission authorised by Starfleet Command, Red Squad was a field commission, wouldn't Starfleet command have to authorise them to become pernament commissions.

And it wasn't as if Starfleet was out of contact range, whether that be by subspace radio or actually taking the Valiant to a starbase to get the commission approved. I some how suspect that Starfleet wouldn't have let them keep their ranks, maybe a commission to Ensign or Lt. JG but not to Captain.

[NrobbieC]

Yeah Nog was promoted, Watters was Captain by position but only acting captain by rank (I'm failry certain the cadets introduce themselves as 'acting' whatever)

[Mr. Laser Beam]

MacLeod wrote:

---

^But Nog's commission was a full commission authorised by Starfleet Command, Red Squad was a field commission, wouldn't Starfleet command have to authorise them to become pernament commissions.

The Valiant originally did have a skeleton crew of real officers. Presumably they all signed off on whatever commissions Red Squad had. That's the authorization.

[Sexy Human]

LobsterAfternoon wrote:

---

I first saw this one after hearing on the tubes about how bad it was. I have to say, except for the conceit of not one of the cadets thinking "shit, this is retarded, we need to head back to Earth/Vulcan/Andor/any goddamn starbase and tell Starfleet what happened", I like the episode. A good character piece for both Nog and Jake, had the very Trek message about the dangers of arroganace, and it was cool to see the Dominion War from a non-Sisko/Defiant/DS9 perspective.

For what it's worth, my girlfriend, who mercilessly mocks most of the trek episodes she catches me watching, really liked this episode. The only other Trek she's liked were the Abrams movie and the Picard parts of "Darmok", so I'm not sure what that says.

Pics of your gf?

[Spock/Uhura Fan]

^ Lol. You're the one claiming to be sexy. How about some pics of you? (No offense, just kidding.)

----

By the way. I loved this episode. It's one of the best Star Trek episodes, period. For all of the people that are like "It was so obvious they were gonna fail. They were stupid and arrogant and that's what made this a bad episode," I think you're missing the point.

It's a wonderful display of dramatic irony, where we as the audience know that they are going to fail, but as a crew they do not. The tragedy and the real weight of the episode is seeing them realize, far too late, that they are not gods. They are mere mortals, and they are going to fail. The problem wasn't the kind of ship they had, or the fact that they were able to learn hands-on doing some special ops work. The problem was the hubris they were allowed to have by being "Red Squad" members, and it got them killed.

All they had to do was follow orders, and they would have been okay. Even Jake tried to tell them that his dad was exceptional, and even he wouldn't try what they were attempting. This is where I think Starfleet failed them, and this was purposefully shown within the episode. It was no mistake. You had young people who were told they were so great and they were under pressure to be great (like many talented and gifted people that are expected to succeed). The "captain" seemed to be under so much pressure that he was popping pills just to make it. So, there's a tale in there about drug use affecting decision makings skills as well.

There's a lot going on in this episode, and I think to just drum it down to "It's bad" is to miss what you are supposed to be getting out of it. It's very complex and layered, and I think everyone played their part very well. If you don't like it, then you don't like it, but I wouldn't call it "bad." I think you have to be more objective than that, but that's just my (arguably subjective) opinion.

[craig keith]

Its was an okay episode ... it defently was not one of ds9's best... as other people have said nog should have gone in there and taken command. Nog was promoted to ensign and was the senior officer.

But what really really got to me was that watters looked like a young tom cruise ... and even before we relised he was a stim junkey prik of a capt, i wanted him to die just cus he looked like tom frikkin cruise