Should I Return My Niners Club Card?

[Michael]

One of the often repeated mantras in Deep Space Nine's internet fan community seems to be "The first season sucks! The first season is dull. The series only gets good later on. There are only a handful of episodes from the first season that are actually watchable."

Well, after rewatching the whole first season I have now come to the conclusion that this is not true for me. (Note: There are several hand-picked episodes I've actually seen quite often over the years, but I haven't watched the first season as a whole since its original broadcast way back.) Granted, the series does get much better in the later seasons, but personally I would never want to dismiss the first season. Why, you ask? (Well, maybe you aren't asking, but I will tell you anyway. )

Yeah, one certainly can't deny that most of the actual plots of the individual episodes feel like rehashed stories from The Next Generation. There really is too much Alien/Anomaly of the Week and The Crew is Afflicted By A Virus storytelling going on in the first season. But for the most part it's actually not the stories that hold my interest – it's the wonderful characters! The characters make all these episodes enjoyable for me.

I doubt that all these years ago, when I was younger, I was really able to verbalize the appreciation I feel for the great acting that is going on in the first season. It's only now that I can pinpoint the reason why I like the first season so much. It's the characters and the actors portraying them. There isn't one weak link in this group of characters. And I find it amazing how well the different characters play off each other. For example, there is a wonderful scene in the teaser for The Passenger (an episode that's rather unpopular) where Kira and Bashir (two characters we barely see together) have a funny little exchange that illustrates the differences of these characters. Even episodes like Progress that must seem dreadful on paper are highly enjoyable because of the outstanding acting.

But apart from the actors the credit must also go to the writers: Just look at the dialog written for all these characters. Even in this first season it's obvious that the writers of this show are very inspired professionals. It's amazing how in these first episodes they manage to introduce all the wonderful relationships that enrich the series later on: Quark and Odo, Odo and Kira, Kira and Sisko, Sisko and Jake, Jake and Nog, Bashir and O'Brien, Sisko and Dax, Dax and Kira – all of it is in the first season! (I was actually surprised when I realized how much of the Jake and Nog friendship is in the first season, when in the later years it sometimes seemed like Cirroc Lofton wasn't even part of the cast anymore.)

Another thing the first season is always criticised for is the lack of continuity. While I would agree that the inter-episodic continuity improves much in the latter half of the series, I have to say that even the first season has some ongoing storylines which I enjoy very much. The most obvious example is the multitude of problems Bajor faces after the Occupation, which are plot points in Past Prologue, The Storyteller, Progress, Duet and In the Hands of the Prophets. Even episodes that have nothing to do with Bajor (like Battle Lines, Babel or Dax) mention Bajor and its past in some form or another. The aforementioned friendship between Jake and Nog also has a lot of continuity to it. At least it feels like it's featured in a lot of episodes. In some instances the series even manages to look like it has some of the story threads planned way ahead: I love how Croden's description of the Changelings in Vortex is very much what we get almost two years later when we're finally introduced to Odo's species.

So, am I alone in my love for the first season?

 

[Vulcan Princess]

I like the first season, too. Of course, I seem to be in the minority of DS9 fans in that I think the Bajor stories are the best parts of the show. I wish we had more of them.

 

[Michael]

I like the first season, too. Of course, I seem to be in the minority of DS9 fans in that I think the Bajor stories are the best parts of the show. I wish we had more of them.

Oh, I completely agree! The Circle Trilogy from the beginning of the second season is one of the best things Trek has ever done. It's a shame the writers more or less discarded the whole Bajor storyline in the course of the series. Like you I would have loved to see more of it.

 

[RyuRoots]

I like the first season, too. Of course, I seem to be in the minority of DS9 fans in that I think the Bajor stories are the best parts of the show. I wish we had more of them.

I'm a big fan of those, myself. It's episodes like "If Wishes Were Horses" and "The Storyteller" that make me go "ehhh" about DS9's first season.

 

[TheGodBen]

I'd return my card right along with you but I was too cheap to pay for an official one so I just wrote my name and "Niner" on a piece of paper.

I have always considered the first season to be the weakest the show had to offer, but I don't feel that it was a bad season. It has great episodes such as Emissary, Past Prologue, Captive Pursuit, Vortex, Battle Lines, Progress, Duet and In the Hands of the Prophets, that is 8 episodes out of 19. The worst offenders are the boring TNG style alien/anomaly of the week episodes such as Q-Less, The Passenger, Move Along Home, The Storyteller and If Wishes Were Horses.

I too can enjoy the season based on the characters, but maybe the reason why I feel that way is because I already know them and how great they are in subsequent seasons. For somebody who watches the show from the beginning they probably wont get that warm, fuzzy feeling from them.

 

[Navaros]

I've always thought that the first Season has way more bad episodes than any other Season of DS9 (the others have 5 or 6. Season 1 has much more), yet it also has a few great episodes. But overall, it is mediocre. Which is terrible by DS9 standards, but completely on par with any Season of any and all other modern Trek shows.

I don't like the other modern Trek shows, but I don't see why those who do (which seems to be most Trek fans) wouldn't like DS9's Season 1 as much as them, since its pretty much the exact same thing.

 

[Michael]

I have always considered the first season to be the weakest the show had to offer, but I don't feel that it was a bad season.

I won't argue that. It may be the weakest season, but I wouldn't consider it bad either.

I too can enjoy the season based on the characters, but maybe the reason why I feel that way is because I already know them and how great they are in subsequent seasons. For somebody who watches the show from the beginning they probably wont get that warm, fuzzy feeling from them.

That's actually a pretty good point. I guess that explains why I find this season even more enjoyable now than when I was a child and watched the series for the first time. After all these years I know these characters very well and I must say, I was surprised to find that all of it was already there in the first season (albeit under the constraints of weak plots).

I'd return my card right along with you but I was too cheap to pay for an official one so I just wrote my name and "Niner" on a piece of paper.

But if we do return them, will we still be able to relish all the premium advantages of a Niner? What about the hot tub – will PKTrekGirl still allow us to use it? And I would sure miss the daily body massages, too.

 

[CaptainStoner]

My impression of S1 was that it hit the ground running. The characters were in the pocket. The TNG influence in stories I didn't mind. One in particular I recall was "Move Along Home". I wouldn't be too surprised if that was originally a TNG script. Hell that could have been a TOS script. But the bottom line is, they're good episodes.
I like anomalies.

 

[RandyS]

I like the first season, too. Of course, I seem to be in the minority of DS9 fans in that I think the Bajor stories are the best parts of the show. I wish we had more of them.

I'm a big fan of those, myself. It's episodes like "If Wishes Were Horses" and "The Storyteller" that make me go "ehhh" about DS9's first season.

I agree with you about "The Storyteller" (That's the one where the old Bajoran picks O'Brien to replace him telling the story about the cloud, right?), but "If Wishes Were Horses" was actually pretty good. Mostly for the subplot about Jadzia and Bashir, but it was one of the good ones.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

I like the first season, too. Of course, I seem to be in the minority of DS9 fans in that I think the Bajor stories are the best parts of the show. I wish we had more of them.

Oh, I completely agree! The Circle Trilogy from the beginning of the second season is one of the best things Trek has ever done. It's a shame the writers more or less discarded the whole Bajor storyline in the course of the series. Like you I would have loved to see more of it.

While I also love the other parts of the series...I definitely agree that the Bajor arc is underrated.

It's also rather shockingly prophetic, when you go back and watch it--and not even in a one-sided sense, either...you can see the unintended allegory in a number of different ways, and it works fantastically well no matter what political persuasion you happen to be of.

 

[Michael]

"The Storyteller" (That's the one where the old Bajoran picks O'Brien to replace him telling the story about the cloud, right?)

Yes, that's the one. The Sirah storyline was kind of lame (although it was also one of the first steps in making Julian and Miles friends), but I love the subplot with Jake and Nog trying to impress the Bajoran girl. Granted, that may be purely superficial, but it reminds me of my own youth and experience with girls. It has a huge emotional value to me.

"If Wishes Were Horses" was actually pretty good. Mostly for the subplot about Jadzia and Bashir, but it was one of the good ones.

Of all the manifested fantasies Julian's was pretty much the most interesting, I agree. If only because it revealed much about the doctor's longings and wishes.

If Wishes Were Horses is actually a good example for what I was talking about earlier: Even in this rather tedious episode you can find nifty little character scenes that are definitely worth rewatching. Like the scene where Quark taunts Odo about his lack of imagination; with the reveal that Odo does indead have a lively fantasy.

It's also rather shockingly prophetic, when you go back and watch it--and not even in a one-sided sense, either...you can see the unintended allegory in a number of different ways, and it works fantastically well no matter what political persuasion you happen to be of.

At the risk of coming across as dense, which events are you referring to when you say the episodes are an (unintended) allegory?

 

[PTRACER]

After watching Seasons 5 to 7, you realise the quality the writers could achieve and it essentially makes Season 1 seem far less enjoyable.

I enjoyed Season 1 when I watched it through the first time, but I now consider some of the episodes to be terrible and others to be quite enjoyable.

 

[Too Much Fun]

NCC, you start this thread talking about how you think your opinions on season 1 might make you feel like a minority when it comes to opinions of Niners, but the responses make me feel like yours are closer to the majority and mine are more of a minority opinion. Personally I hate most of season 1 and especially the episodes dealing with Bajor and its issues, and the few episodes I did like were generally the wackier ones like "Dramatis Personae", "Q-Less", "If Wishes Were Horses", and "Move Along Home". I don't like the latter two enough to watch them multiple times, but even though they were often cheesy I thought they were a lot more entertaining than a lot of those Bajor issue episodes, which I found painfully boring. The only episode everyone seems to agree with me on is "Captive Pursuit". Tosk ruled. It's only after the Circle trilogy episodes (beginning with "Invasive Procedures") that I started feeling like the show was finding its groove (although I hate large chunks of season 2) and it wasn't until season 3 that I started liking more than two or three episodes in a row.

 

[Sykonee]

I feel S1 works better in hindsight. Although probably unintentional in some regards (Quark nailing Changeling personalities in Vortex, for instance), there was a lot of solid groundwork that the writers built upon in later seasons. And some dialogue turns quite tragic. The end of Dax gets me every time now (Paraphrase: "Do something for me? Live, Jadzia.").

It has incredibly strong bookends with a decent spike in the middle, but the rest of S1 tends to be trying to find its legs, which can make for some awkward episodes. It didn't help it was going to be constantly compared to TNG at the same time, which was in the midst of a generally excellent S6.

 

[Michael]

Too Much, don't be fooled by the responses in this thread (which generally have been rather reasonable thus far anyway). Believe me, "The first season is a good season" is a minority opinion among DS9 fans. Your views on the first year are definitely shared by the majority. It's just that a thread designed to talk positively about a weak season is more likely to attract posters who will, well, talk positively about a weak season. I'm sure if one started a "The first season is TEH SUCKZ!" thread he would likely get as much or even more responses in the same vein.

(Quark nailing Changeling personalities in Vortex, for instance)

You mean Croden. But I agree with the sentiment; many things mentioned in the first season fit rather neatly into the whole tapestry of Deep Space Nine. And like you I thought about Jadzia's death in the last scene of Dax. The look on her face almost made me feel like she knew about her future.

 

[Sykonee]

You mean Croden. But I agree with the sentiment; many things mentioned in the first season fit rather neatly into the whole tapestry of Deep Space Nine. And like you I thought about Jadzia's death in the last scene of Dax. The look on her face almost made me feel like she knew about her future.

Nope, Quark berates Odo's suspicious nature well before Croden gets a line.

 

[Michael]

Nope, Quark berates Odo's suspicious nature well before Croden gets a line.

Well, I stand corrected. Yeah, Quark does remark on his idea of Odo's nature before Croden elaborates on the Changelings. I should pay more attention.

By the way, wasn't it odd how Odo gets knocked unconscious by these rocks at the end? Or am I the only one who raised an eyebrow?

 

[Zeppster]

I love season one because there's a lot of episodes that establish some of the characters. Outside of Nog and Rom who both basically gets rewritten about season 4 or so. First seasons of shows are not easy to do because they have to establish a lot of character things. But DS9 does this better than most Star Trek shows. The thing people don't like about the first season is that there's no real arc. But Star Trek was never about arcs in the first place. TNG and TOS best stories aren't arc based. And the best show in DS9 history is probably The Vistor. That's got nothing to do with an arc. In fact it's future has the Dominion basically forgetting about the Alpha Quadrant for the rest of their lifetimes.

DS9s first season established the characters and relationships. The 2nd season kind of expanded on that also. There just aren't as many good episodes in the 2nd season IMO.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

NCC...I just sent you a PM. I don't want to derail the thread; you'll see why.

 

[Robotech Master]

I'm another that likes the first season.

Heck, I think it beats TNG S1 and VOY S1 hands down. Never saw most of ENT so I can't comment on that.

The only Trek show which had a better first season was TOS.