“EQUILIBRIUM”
Talk about washing your sins away...
This episode opens with Sisko cooking the senior staff dinner and it’s such a sweet, fun and utterly CHARMING scene that shows how well this cast work together. It feels like a rarity, too, in that we rarely see all these characters together unless it’s during a staff meeting where there’s invariably tension and argument. TNG was great at showing the camaraderie of its crew, so it’s nice to see DS9 playing catch-up in that regard.
Unfortunately, I found the rest of the episode a disappointment. The basic premise is a great one: the notion that Dax has a past incarnation she knew nothing of—and not only that, but a psychopathic killer to boot. This had all the ingredients for a wonderful psychological thriller, but somehow it just doesn’t ignite. I love the idea of a long-forgotten melody being the trigger, and the imagery of masks is a good one, even if I found the hallucinations lacked the visceral punch they needed (the directing feels pedestrian throughout). I actually found my attention wandering a couple of times, and the overall feel is a rather dull, tepid episode that relies altogether too much on talk. There’s a lengthy scene where Sisko and Bashir talk with Joran’s elderly brother and I swear I almost fell asleep; the guy drones on and on and the directing fails to enliven the static exchange.
Even though I find Trill society quite fascinating, this episode doesn’t quite succeed in making me CARE about the consequences of this supposedly devastating revelation. It’s no real surprise that the Trill are covering up the fact that more people are capable of being joined than the official line states, simply because there aren’t enough symbionts to go around. What I find perplexing is that, in most cultures, minorities are not envied—instead, they tend to be denigrated and attacked. People don’t like to feel inferior, so even if someone is objectively their superior in certain regards, there’s a psychological drive to either elevate themselves or tear that other person down. Which makes it odd that Trill society seems to have such mass scale of inferiority and symbiont-envy. Also,I can’t help but wonder how on Earth the first Trill symbiont and host were joined? I mean, who first came up with the rather gross idea of transplanting an underground-dwelling cave worm into their body, just to see what would happen?
Another problem I have with the episode is that it follows the pattern of most previous Jadzia episodes by rendering her unconscious or mute for a significant part of the episode. Perhaps this was done to signify the personal jeopardy, but it sadly means that, once again, she is used less as a character and more of a plot element; which is a disservice to both Jadzia and Terry Farrell. There are certainly some good moments—the opening scene, the Jadzia/Bashir bedtime scene (it’s such a relief find Bashir’s lecherous streak has been ditched) and I also liked the Trill pools, the haunting musical motif and some of the ideas at play (water symbolically represents the emotions and psyche,so the symbolism of Jadzia embracing Joran in the pool is pretty nice). Overall, though, “Equilibrium” feels like a plod, and doesn’t do much justice to what ought to have been a killer premise...if you’ll excuse the pun.
Rating: 5
