Better-spend DS9's budget!

[Navaros]

Let's pretend you are the controller of funds for DS9's budget with absolute power to better-spend it in any way that you see fit.

What are the budget changes that you would make to improve the show?

Here is what I would do:

- Do not hire anyone at all to play Dax, especially since she has no relevance to the plot of the show and therefore performs no useful function. With the money saved from not paying for Dax, I would instead give it to Jeffrey Combs to be a regular performer. Although, I wouldn't tie the salary to having him play one specific role, but rather it would be allocated to him in general to perform whatever role best suits any particular episode (including newly-created roles that we haven't seen from him). Having said that, there would certainly be a whole heckuva a lot more screentime for both Brunt and Weyoun.

- Kill Jake off during the occupation. His best contributions to the series were behind him by that point anyway (Ie: In the Cards, The Visitor). In fact, I'd make Jake's death be the penance that due to a huge gaping plothole, the Sisko never ends up paying for the wormhole aliens deus ex machina-ing away the Jemmy ships that were about to pulverize the Feds. With the money saved by not paying for Jake, I would make Louise Fletcher a regular.

- Do not hire Dorn at all, rather make Garak a regular, instead of Worf, starting in Season 4 and on. I would still bring in Martok to bridge into the Klingon stories, but Worf need not be present in order for that to happen.

- Cut the episodes per season down to 20 from 26, and removing all the 5 or 6 filler crap and/or otherwise unwatchable episodes that are in every season, such as: 'Resurrection,' 'Time's Orphan,' 'Chrysalis,' 'Fascination,' all the MU episodes, etc. etc. With the money saved from this I would spend it on way more space battles and way more changes of form for Odo, including some epic arrests as a result of chasing down criminals across the Promenade in non-humanoid forms.

- Do not hire the Keiko O'Brien actress ever. She dragged the show down immensely and was a complete and utter total waste of every penny ever paid to her. With the money saved from not hiring her, I would spend it on giving more appearances to the great secondary characters who actually contribute to the show and therefore deserve their appearances, like Martok, Nog, Leeta, Vic, etc.

 

[Jono]

Chocolate bilbies for all and embezzle the rest.

The only major thing I disagree with is hiring a new regular Dax. If a suitable script crossed my way I'd have the new Dax appear once (or if it is a two parter twice but that's all) in s7.

With the Dax episodes gone season 7 would be a bit different. I'd need a number of completely new scripts...or not. I can see "Field of Fire" getting worked into a Jake episode where he takes on the investigation to get into the mind of a killer, which is an extension of him wanting to get into the mind of a criminal like Quark.

I'd make sure for the last episode there is enough cash so that no reused battle footage would appear.

Where would I save money? Dabo girls costumes, less is more.

 

[Tallis Rhul]

Re-used battle footage? I saw no footage from Generations at all in that episode, whatever do you mean? *Shifty eyes and rapid exit stage left...*

I agree with some of the things that have been said here so far, but not all - some of the comments are slightly over-critical! I think the comment about Rosalind Chao is possibly a little harsh, she's not that bad.

Oh no, I'm overusing italics.

I can see the logic in not hiring Worf, I think the show would have worked as well without him, and I certainly think that Garak being a regular would have done no harm. Andrew Robinson delivered stunning performances time after time. Heck, he could even have had an official capacity as an Intelligence Officer, as he basically ended up doing that sort of thing anyway, and moreover he could have advised Bashir on what to do with all the Section 31 hilarity.

Personally I like Ezri, I wouldn't kosh the Dax character, but it would have made more sense for Jadzia to have stayed on. I know some people didn't appreciate her acting, but at least we would have had more by way of continuity. I don't think I would have cut down on the amount of episodes either, some people really liked the MU eps (I liked some, but not all). I completely agree with the deus ex machina jem hadar fleet business though, and I DEFINITELY agree with more snacks.

Personally speaking I would have spent a little more money on Bajor. We see some gardens, we see an old man in a... garden... on a moon. We also see some people who live in large... gardens... fighting against their own militia. The architecture on Bajor is full of antique character, and I enjoyed the views from the Kai's palace (I think it was a painting, and I also think palace isn't the right word). The show was originally about the Bajorans, and I'm pretty sure more could have happened with them, and I mean interesting stuff, not just limited to religious angles. Maybe they could have eventually joined the Federation? That kinda got left in limbo.

I think more ship battles would be a good one as well. I really liked Way of the Warrior because of the ship to ship and hand to hand fighting. Not every week, but a bit more often during war time maybe?

 

[Pemmer Harge]

Don't make Shattered Mirror.

 

[TheGodBen]

I'm a fan of cutting the seasons down to 20 episodes each, serialised shows tend to perform best once their episode numbers are culled. RDM's BSG had 20 episode seasons for the most part, Lost's story has been much more focused since they dropped season numbers down from 23+ episodes to 17 or 18 episodes, and The Wire is possibly the finest example of a serialised show ever made, and that show only had seasons of 10-13 episodes.

Of course, my idea is ruined by the fact that DS9 did have a season of only 20 hours and that was the worst of the bunch, but like a good human being I'm going to continue to believe what I wish to believe regardless of any evidence to the contrary.

I would use the money saved on large quantities of cocaine, because what's the point of living if you can't enjoy large quantities of cocaine?

 

[You_Guyz]

Sorry but Star Trek did filler well whereas shows like BSG simply didn't, that is why Star Trek didn't need to cut filler out. It worked well whenever it was doing filler and when it was doing stories revolving around the main plot.
Part of what makes Trek so special for me is the ridiculous amounts of episode per season and I would not give that up for the world, any trip into the world of Star Trek is gold for me.

Not sure why there is all the hate for Dax (my second favorite trek character ever after Seven of Nine) and Keiko from the TC =S

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Cut all "Ferengi comedies" that don't involve 1) Klingons or 2) Vorta.

 

[TheGodBen]

Sorry but Star Trek did filler well whereas shows like BSG simply didn't, that is why Star Trek didn't need to cut filler out. It worked well whenever it was doing filler and when it was doing stories revolving around the main plot.

Star Trek could do filler well because Star Trek was 75% filler. DS9 and Enterprise were the only two Trek shows which had serialised storylines, TNG and Voyager were mostly episodic tales with some episodes building on what happened before, and TOS had no returning plot elements that I remember.

My argument is that DS9 should have been more serialised and plotted out in advance so that the stories could be better developed with greater foreshadowing, and for that to happen the writers need to be more focused. Case in point, Enterprise's third season was actually very well developed and possibly contained greater foreshadowing than DS9 had, but because the writers were focusing their efforts on making the plot-based episodes the filler episodes suffered a lot. In almost every plot-based show the filler episodes tend to suffer and the best way around that is to cut the episode numbers and drop as much filler as possible. If DS9 wanted to be a more plot-based show, and I wish it was, it needed to cut episode numbers.

 

[DevilEyes]

Cut all "Ferengi comedies" that don't involve 1) Klingons or 2) Vorta.

I'd also keep the one with the clueless 20th century Hewmons.

 

[Treker]

How about the we didn't bother with deploying any federation ships at all here to protect us while we mine the wormhole which basically has the entire fate of the Alpha quadrant resting on it??

How cheap was that??

Later Sisko tells everybody they used the fleet to destroy the Dominion Torres 3 shipyards. Now that is a story that I would want to see.

 

[Tallis Rhul]

Sorry but Star Trek did filler well whereas shows like BSG simply didn't, that is why Star Trek didn't need to cut filler out. It worked well whenever it was doing filler and when it was doing stories revolving around the main plot.

Star Trek could do filler well because Star Trek was 75% filler. DS9 and Enterprise were the only two Trek shows which had serialised storylines, TNG and Voyager were mostly episodic tales with some episodes building on what happened before, and TOS had no returning plot elements that I remember.

My argument is that DS9 should have been more serialised and plotted out in advance so that the stories could be better developed with greater foreshadowing, and for that to happen the writers need to be more focused. Case in point, Enterprise's third season was actually very well developed and possibly contained greater foreshadowing than DS9 had, but because the writers were focusing their efforts on making the plot-based episodes the filler episodes suffered a lot. In almost every plot-based show the filler episodes tend to suffer and the best way around that is to cut the episode numbers and drop as much filler as possible. If DS9 wanted to be a more plot-based show, and I wish it was, it needed to cut episode numbers.

You're right in that it would have been nice had it been serialised in advance, but I get the impression from interviews with Ira Behr that he had been told not to serialise it.