DS9 Season 6 Rewatch
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Rocks and Shoals for all practical purposes is a filler episode... but a great one. The dynamic and respect between the Jem'Hadar Third and Sisko is great and Keevan is the utterly despicable villain. But he'll get poetic justice in the Magnificent Ferengi.
Really the whole Occupation arc was excellent and well done. I love that DS9 was willing to upset the status quo. I just remember the first time I watched A Time to Stand how... creepy it was. Dukat was giving the captain's log, him, Damar and Weyoun were parading around DS9 like they owned it(and they did), and the good guys were displaced. Not to mention the drastic direction everyone's character arcs took. No one from this story arc was really unchanged by the end of it.
Rocks and Shoals for all practical purposes is a filler episode... but a great one. The dynamic and respect between the Jem'Hadar Third and Sisko is great and Keevan is the utterly despicable villain. But he'll get poetic justice in the Magnificent Ferengi.
Really the whole Occupation arc was excellent and well done. I love that DS9 was willing to upset the status quo. I just remember the first time I watched A Time to Stand how... creepy it was. Dukat was giving the captain's log, him, Damar and Weyoun were parading around DS9 like they owned it(and they did), and the good guys were displaced. Not to mention the drastic direction everyone's character arcs took. No one from this story arc was really unchanged by the end of it.
Rocks and Shoals is not a filler episode. It's probably the most pivotal episode in the entire arc. Maybe not for the reasons of the Jem'Hadar storyline (Even though that vorta does come back) but it changes Kira's attitude about the entire occupation in one of the most gruesome and biggest scenes in the entire series.
Rocks and Shoals for all practical purposes is a filler episode... but a great one. The dynamic and respect between the Jem'Hadar Third and Sisko is great and Keevan is the utterly despicable villain. But he'll get poetic justice in the Magnificent Ferengi.
Really the whole Occupation arc was excellent and well done. I love that DS9 was willing to upset the status quo. I just remember the first time I watched A Time to Stand how... creepy it was. Dukat was giving the captain's log, him, Damar and Weyoun were parading around DS9 like they owned it(and they did), and the good guys were displaced. Not to mention the drastic direction everyone's character arcs took. No one from this story arc was really unchanged by the end of it.
Rocks and Shoals is not a filler episode. It's probably the most pivotal episode in the entire arc. Maybe not for the reasons of the Jem'Hadar storyline (Even though that vorta does come back) but it changes Kira's attitude about the entire occupation in one of the most gruesome and biggest scenes in the entire series.
You could've cut the whole episode from the arc and just start the next one with Martok rescuing them and Kira having decided she's had it with Dukat, which wouldn't be out of character. So, yes that does fit the definition of filler since it's focusing on the small details. That's not to say it's not effective, stunning, or the greatest episode in the arc at all. I'd say it is. That's part of what made DS9 a great show, even the filler episodes were full of such great character material and dramatic storytelling.
Also DS9 used its filler episodes to quietly set the stage for later events by establishing relationships between characters and adjusting your perception of important characters.
A lot of episodes that seem like filler when you first watch them become important in retrospect. The Dominion were introduced in a seemingly-inconsequential Ferengi episode.
Personally I consider Rocks and Shoals too important to be a filler episode. Seeing Kira WAKE UP was a huge part of the story. Just because an episode can be skipped over without losing too much of the story doesn't make it filler.
No one would call The Inner Light or City on the Edge of Forever "filler episodes."
Personally I consider Rocks and Shoals too important to be a filler episode. Seeing Kira WAKE UP was a huge part of the story. Just because an episode can be skipped over without losing too much of the story doesn't make it filler.
No one would call The Inner Light or City on the Edge of Forever "filler episodes."
I guess whenever I see the term "Filler" in regards to episode descriptions, I see it used as a bit of a negative connotation. I see that was not the case here, but it is why I just don't like the term "filler". I mean TNG was a episodic TV show, but I wouldn't call their episodes filler. Filler to me sounds like a type of show that the crew didn't have their best time at and it served as a bridge from one episode to another. When I think of Rocks and Shoals, there's just too much important stuff in there to see it labeled as "filler". It was a great character study, and the stuff on the planet explained the entire dominion war from a philosophical point of view. That's more than what I've come to understand "Filler" being defined here.
Agreed, but in retrospect. I think it was a good choice to go the way they did. The only episode I was slighly dissapointed with in the opening six episodes of S6 of DSN was "Sons and Daughters"
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