First time watching DS9

[Rahul]

The storyteller

Synopsis
Federation officers have a remarkable high chance of ending as a Bajoran spiritual idol. O'Brien, who is with Julian on Bajor, inherits the important spiritual task of telling a story to a village to defeat a cloud. Jake and Nog try to get into the pants of a young Bajoran leader, who risks civil war over a river stream.


Review
A remarkably lakluster episode. The Enterprise often visits so called 'planet of the hats', where the whole species has one 'shtick', and apart from it is pretty bland and unrealistic. DS9 seems to have exchanged that against 'villages of the hats' on Bajor. The backstory of the village doesn't seem to make a lot of sense, the Bajorans really seemed as backwards as the Cardassians described them. The best thing you could say about Jakes romance plot on DS9 is that there have been worse on Star Trek before.


Pros
-The cloud monster looked fine
-Nog being too shy to talk to a girl was really nice and humen (or "hew-mohn"?)

Cons
-there wasn't an A-story and a B-story, both storys were about the same lenght. And both suffered for it.
-Remarkably, both storys had nothing to do with each other whatsoever, except that they included Bajorans.
-Jake turns into Wesley this episode.
-The whole monster story is essentially one big con by a single guy who wants "the best" for his people (and gains a lot of profit and sexual favours for it). When Kirk encountered such a situations he would have the decency to reveal the truth and end this hypocrisy. The DS9-crew just leaves. Because nothing could ever go wrong when only one man knows the secret to protect his village from destruction. Yeah. Way to go if you want to join the Federation, numbnuts.

Grade
2/10

 

[MacLeod]

The Kai issue will be addressed in later episodes, but I won't say anymore.

Anyway for those keeping track Runabouts Lost: 1

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I liked Move Along Home. I loved the idea of being trapped in a board game, and even stole that idea in my old D&D campaign. The only problem is that the puzzles they were presented with were badly done.

The ending of Nagus was pretty dumb, but there's one scene I really love in that episode. Or one particular line.

"And why? Because no matter where we go, our reputation precedes us. A reputation that has been tainted by the lies of our competitors who maliciously spread the erroneous impression that we are not to be trusted. But now thanks to the discovery of the wormhole we can finally avoid such falsehoods."

I would have liked to see more exchanges like that in future Ferengi episodes.

 

[The Old Mixer]

The passenger

[...]

Cons
-The criminal taking over Bashir wasn't even cunning. It was really hard to watch the main characters so long noticing that something about Julian is different. Especially since everybody seemed to know the bad guy was still alive and has taken over somebody. In fact, they failed to notice it untill the end when he reveals himself. Not a good move to make the main characters of your show that dense.
-Julian Bashir talking half an hour or so about how awesome he is while being in a runabout with Kira. The guy is quite sympathic, but the way he is written lately is insufferable.
-The second species we meet from the beta quadrant are rubber forehead aliens. At least they look better than the ones in 'Dax'.

Also, speaking as a native English speaker who revisited Season 1 recently for the first time in years...Siddig's "possessed" voice was very, very bad...cringeworthy...awful.

Dr Evil-Award
For the DS9 officers: When Ty Kajada (the female captain of the prison ship) takes a phaser and destroys the device in which the mind of the criminal is hold, no one tries to stop her or arrests her afterwards. Murdering a murderer is still murder.

As I recall, she did that after it was confirmed that she had custody of the device. It was an internal matter of her people, not within the Federation's or Bajor's jurisdiction.

 

[Rahul]

Also, speaking as a native English speaker who revisited Season 1 recently for the first time in years...Siddig's "possessed" voice was very, very bad...cringeworthy...awful.

YES! THANK YOU! I totally forgot to mention it, but it seemed really off. The weirdest thing is: He did use it again in one of the following episodes! I don't recall which one it was, but there he tries to slowly explain something to one of his patients, and he uses the exact same vioce for it!

As I recall, she did that after it was confirmed that she had custody of the device. It was an internal matter of her people, not within the Federation's or Bajor's jurisdiction.

Hm, yeah, that's right. You could still make an argument for it happening on DS9, but now that you pointed it out, I think they did 'hand it over' to her before.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

A) Technically, Vantica was already dead at that point, all the still existed of him were a bunch of brain cells capable of bestowing his consciousness of another person. There was noone left to murder.

B) Starfleet doesn't believe in the death penalty but they explicitly don't interfere in other cultures' implementation of it.

C) To bring Vantica back to life they would have had to steal the life of another person.

 

[Dobian]

I liked The Nagus well enough. Wallace Shawn is of course unmistakable, you recognize his voice right off from things like Rex the Dinosaur in Toy Story, and Princess Bride. His interactions with Quark and Rom are funny. He does show up in again in future episodes, but it's hit-and-miss. The Nagus is for me sort of a one-off character, funny at first but grating after the second or third viewing. There's a real clunker of a Nagus-centric episode in season 3 when you get to it.

 

[Rahul]

Progress


Synopsis
Old white guy stands his ground on one of Bajors moons, Kira struggles to forcefully remove him. Jake and Nog play the fetch quest from The Legend of Zelda.


Review
This Episode started really promising: one of Bajors moons has to be evacuated to be devastated for an energy project. But one old Bajoran refuses to go, and Kira, now on the side of the governement, has to persuade him to leave. But the Bajoran, Mullibok, turns out to be a devious old man who manipulates Kira. Within in the first five minutes of the episode, she decides she can't do this and instead abandons her post and stays with the Bajoran.
Then NOTHING HAPPENS ANYMORE. LITERALLY. People come by to convince Kira to do her job, one of the Bajoran security officers gets stabbed, but really, any scene is just a repetition of the previous one: Kira tells him he has to leave. He refuses and tells a story. Kira is conflicted and goes to bed. The next morning she tells him to leave. He refuses. And tells a story. Kira is conflicted. Repeat.
I think a good comparison would be 'Duet' later this season. In both storys, it's about Kira interacting with a cunning old man on confined space. But 'Duet' has twists and turns, quickly moving from one plot point to another, one revelation after another. Once you think you have a grasp about the motivations of the players, the situation turns upside down, on the way discussing it's moral dilemma from all different angles. 'Progress' just drags on. Both Mulliboks and Kiras motivations and attitudes are exactly the same in the beginning of the episode up to Sisko's "get'yo shit together"-visit 40 minutes later. Which is really a shame, because the initial conflict is really interesting. The episode is very lovely produced and the actors do a fine job. Sadly, Jake and Nog acquiring and exchanging McGuffins is the only part of the episode that moves forward and shows any form of progress.

Something very interesting happened with this episode: It's a little while ago since I watched it, and when I first thought about it I remembered it kindly. Because it's basic idea was interesting and the cast was great. But then I noticed: It was the episode in my head that was exciting, full of potential, twists, complex motivations and insights into the different characters. The episode this could have been. Sadly, not the one it actually was.


Pros
-the actor playing Mullibok did a fine job! A bad actor can easily ruin a good story. This time, sadly, it was the other way around.
-this time the Bajoran felt like real people. Especially compared to the previous episode, where there was a whole village of extras and they felt completely unnatural.
-the set was great! As the expert eye can see, Mulliboks house and the whole garden were a studio set, but it felt very real. One of my quibbles with modern Star Trek is that everytime our heroes visit other planets, they beam directly into ordinary corridors or straight into their extensive cave set. Not this time!
-Sisko came across great this episode, especially how he 'advised' Bashir to advise him back to give Kira a few days off. When he visited Kira at the end of the episode, he spoke friendly words, but you knew he just gave her a last chance to return.
-the alien captain from whom Jake and Nog got the 'self sealing stemples' had an awesome make-up! I really whish to see him again!


Cons
-Kira and Mullibok were interesting characters. There should have been twists, turns! Mullibok making promises, than not keeping them, Kira hating him, then learning more about his past and understanding him better. Only to realize she was deceived by him. Then try to turn his own followers against him. Maybe failing, then both of them understanding each other better. Maybe not reconciling, but Kira realising to do what she has to do (instead of being told to). The story needed structure. And development. And, you know, progress.


Dr. Evil-Award
The Bajoran gouvernement for destroying the surface of a habitable moon. It was previously evacuated and Bajor needed this energy project, but still, they destroyed an entire eco-system, with wild animals, plants and stuff. On a planetary scale! (Gravitation on this moon seemde normal, indicating it's at least the size of Mars). Lucky for them Greenpeace wasn't around.


Grade
3/10
Intruiging concept. Sadly the episode doesn't live up to its ideas.

 

[Rahul]

If wishes were horses


Synopsis
Everyone's secret imaginations on DS9 become true. Apparently no one in the future watches porn.


Review
I can easily see why this episode gets overlooked often, because it feels a lot like a TNG-episode. But this isn't exactly true, the episode really depends on the stationary seeting near a wormhole, that is visited by the aliens. And the threat to the whole Bajoran system really only works because we saw the Bajorans so often before. Sure, the episode will not end with the apocalypse. But still, it was very exciting to watch and the danger felt very real. I also really liked the twist at the end: The threat to the station was just a manifestation of Jadzia's imagination, just like Rumpelstiltskin. There has previously a whole star system vanished and no one knows why, and Jadzia was obvously afraid of this happening again - leading to an actual phenomen like this. And the fact that our heroes didn't fully understood this phenomen made it feel much mnore threatening.

Out of all previous episodes, this one is probably the most 'classic' Star Trek, with strange anomalies and new lifeforms. Which isn't a bad thing, all of this 'exploring the universe' stuff is the reason why I got into Star Trek in the first place after all. Sadly, it also has an enormous amount of bad technobabbel, with data for all kinds of real, theoretical and made-up particles being read out loud.

For me this episode felt a lot like a highlight episode of TNG I had never heard of before and were now watching for the first time. Since TNG is one of my favourite series of all time, this is not a bad thing. AND this episode still manages to NOT be TNG, but a new series, DS9, using it's own setting to all it's advantages.



Pros
-Naughty Jadzia, Rumpelstiltskin and a famous Baseball player from the past conspire against the DS9 crew. And it works. Damn.
-Rumpelstiltskin offers to save DS9 and all of Bajor in exchange for O'Brien's first born child. Now THAT is way scarier any technobabbel could ever be.
-It really reminded me a lot of the original series, with the unimaginable powers of the mind, strange and unknown aliens to which we are like an ameba.
-The famous Baseball players leaves and gives Sisko a Baseball as a gift. Making this an episode with lasting consequences
-This is actually the first time DS9 really surprised me with a twist! I thought the strange anomaly was the reason for all the imaginations getting real-shenanigans, and because of that had no idea how to solve the threat to the station and the whole planet.
-It's actually quite hard to pull a believable threat to a whole star system off. This episode did it.
-I like the fact that the true looks of the aliens was never revealed. They interacted with Sisko in the end, but he stayed in the form of the Baseball player, leaving their true apperance to a much powerfull medium: our own imagination!
-Rumpelstilstskin really worked. Let me repeat that: Rumpelstiltskin! In a scifi-show!
-Sisko is probably the only captain by now who could ORDER his people not to imagine a threat to their lifes and the whole star systems. Others would have to convince their crew the anomaly wasn't real, maybe even beg. But Sisko? He's ordering the sensor readings are wrong, so they are!


Cons
-My only problem would be the (sadly Star Trek typical) horrendous use of technobabbel. It felt like a few solid minutes of people just looking at their screens and talking gibberish. A few solid numbers could have been much more effective ("All particle readings of the scale. Space rift approaching, 100.000 kilometers distance. 80.000. 60." and so on)
-With everyone's imagination becoming real, there could have been a lot more crazy stuff going on. Obviously a TV-show has only limited budget, so I can not fault the episode for this.
-I don't believe Baseball will get extinct anytime in the next hundred years. Hell, we're still playing a lot of games from the Roman era! And hitting a ball with a bat is such a magnificent feeling, that as long as human society exists, there will be a variant of it still being played.


Grade
8/10
Star Trek Star Trekkin' at it's best.

 

[Dobian]

I kept waiting for Mr. French to pop out the door in Progress, or maybe Buffy and Jody lol. Brian Keith was a great actor, though.

In If Wishes were Horses, I always hated that the Star Trek universe killed off baseball on Earth. Sacrilege! And couldn't they have gotten someone a little more athletic looking to play the last great baseball superstar?

On Star Trek technobabble, I agree it's ridiculous and annoying. I mean, I would expect even characters on the show to say, "alright O'Brien, now explain it in English, okay?" I always found TNG to be the worst offender of this, with Voyager a close second. Giordi was the worst, so many times I wished he would just STFU.

 

[MacLeod]

Well they didn't kill of Baseball per say rather that it ceased to played professionally circa 2042. But saying that there was no real indication in ST that many of today's sports were played professionally in the 24th Century. One of the other sports we know that was still played at some level in the 24th century was Football (Soccer for our American Cousins).

As for techonbabble the worst offender by a country mile was VOY, but on balance I would say "Progress" was better than "If Wishes...." Based on having seen the entire series I would rate Wishes as a 4 and Progress as a 4.5 relative to the other episodes in DSN

 

[Rahul]

'Progress' definetely deserves an 'A' for effort for tackling a complex issue. But the episode is much better remembered than it really is, because you remember a lot of the ideas, problems and characters, not so much how absolutely nothing happens during its runtime and how much disservice it does to Kira as a character.

That I like 'If whishes were horses' so much has probably to do a lot with personal preference: I really like these crazy science fiction ideas, weird aliens, the big unknown, 'the power of the mind' and stuff like that, with space as a scary place where anything can happen and to think about existential stuff and all.

 

[Relayer1]

Progress was the first episode that made me think that the show showed some promise...

 

[Dobian]

Progress was the first episode that made me think that the show showed some promise...

Oh that would have been Duet for me.

Professional baseball ending in 2042 might have happened in the Star Trek universe, but it's not likely to happen in this one. That's only 28 years away and baseball is a billion dollar business, lol.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Baseball will come to an end with the covert introduction of Kahn augments, who subsequently try to take over the world before the Bell riots.

 

[Rahul]

Progress was the first episode that made me think that the show showed some promise...

I can absolutely see that! 'Progress' fell flat on a narrative level, but it also showed that the producers were willing to take risks and tap into complex issues. Also it's the first time they seem to handle the Bajorans and the whole Bajoran situation right (especially compared to it's previous episode), giving the whole show direction, promising more (and better executed) stories in the future and seperating it from TNG.

I probably should have mentioned that in my review a bit clearer

 

[JirinPanthosa]

You would have really liked Progress better if it were more overdramatic and soapy? The episode did miss the mark a bit, I give it a B-. But it was about Kira coping with the fact that she is done rebelling and is now 'The man' and it would have been an F- if it ended with an angry dramatic speech or something. She had to force him to leave, even though he reminded her of what she used to be, by her own moral decision, and not because she finally realized he was a jerk.

I don't know about baseball lasting forever. Baseball may be a billion dollar business but it's on the downswing relative to the other major sports. Attention spans are only going to get smaller and smaller, and that's only going to hurt baseball.

 

[Rahul]

You would have really liked Progress better if it were more overdramatic and soapy? The episode did miss the mark a bit, I give it a B-. But it was about Kira coping with the fact that she is done rebelling and is now 'The man' and it would have been an F- if it ended with an angry dramatic speech or something.

Erm, no? Did you even read my review?

Have you ever watched an episode of TNG? Were Picard had an 'overdramatic' speech about moral dilemmas and making tough decisions? If that's what you consider 'soapy' and 'angry dramatic' than fine, that is what I like...

The problem of the episode is not the acting (again, as in my review...) but that there's absolutely zero development, neither in the plot nor in the characters. You could show the very last scene where Sisko appears and Kira burns down the house directly after the first scene where Kira decides to stay, and you wouldn't have lost anything.

Kira doesn't learn anything in the end, neither about herself or others, and neither does Mullibok. Which wouldn't be a problem, but WE as the viewers dont' learn anything either. Except that she is unreliabel at her job! Which isn't exactly the best message for a character episode. It doesn't even fit her character, since as a freedom fighter she should have been used to make tough decisions. (Again, this episode could have been great if it would have showed us her internal struggle a bit). But this time, Sisko has to do the important decisions for her (again, not exactly showing her in her best light...)

Really, compare this episode to the 'soapy' and 'overdramatic' 'Duet', with which this episode has a lot in common structually, and it's easy to see where this episode fails and the other one succeeds.

She had to force him to leave, even though he reminded her of what she used to be, by her own moral decision, and not because she finally realized he was a jerk.

Well, sadly that is NOT what happened in the episode. If this would have happened, I would have liked it. A lot! But Kira was never proactive in this episode. All important decisions were made for her by men, Mullibok, Bashir and Sisko. Which is really a shame, because she is such a strong character in other episodes!

 

[Rahul]

The Forsaken

Synopsis
DS9 doesn't has an antivirus firewall and gets HACKED! by a strange computer program from a satellite. Lwaxana Troi is just shy of dryhumping Odo when they are stuck together in the turbolift. Bashir has to deal with three wacky Federation delegates.


Review
I have to admit, I dreaded watching this episode, simply for one reason: Lwaxana Troi. I don't hate her, in fact I think Majel Barett is a fine actress, and we don't exactly see a lot of middle-aged women on TV in general. But she is always written as such a bad cliché, it's hard to watch an episode with her.

I was pleasantly surprised when the episode started: Sisko delegating Bashir to deal with the annoying Federation representants led to a few funny moments. The plot with the strange computer entity wasn't exactly thrilling, but comfortable to watch. Lwaxana hitting on Odo was bothersome as expected. I really don't like the 'running gag' of Picard/Odo trying to hide from her in the turbolift, that is really misogynist writing. How can someone be so bad at romancing WHEN THEY'RE A FREAKIN' TELEPATH???

Anyway, Odo and Lwaxana get stuck in the turbolift together. And what followed was breathtaking! It started bothersome as expected. But then we learned A LOT about Odo: He has to turn into liquid every 16 hours. That we knew before. But it is a very intimate process for him, and he is ashamed to do it in front of Lwaxana. But Lwaxana is appreciative. They talk a lot about personal things, at first only Lwaxana, later Odo as well. We hear his backstory for the first time in detail, how he grew up in a laboratory, being experimented on, before he turns into liquid. It is a very intimate moment. Hell, they made LWAXANA TAKING OF HER WIG a touching moment! Damn!I'm impressed.


Pros
-Auberjonois' and Baretts acting were phenomenal, as was their dialog.
-We learn A LOT about Odo, even more than in his own episode 'Vortex' before.
-Sisko is the perfect leading officer. He has authority but is still a very human being. I don't think we see any other Star Trek captain smiling and joking as much as him and still being badass!
-Watching the DS9-crews daily routines is really enjoying. Sometimes even more so than the actual episode.
-The Federation Delegates were a nice addition, especially the Vulcan.
-There was a nice shout-out to 2001: A space Odyssee when they tried to shut down the main computer. Referencing my favourite movie always gives bonus points

Cons
-The actual plot of the episode was thin at best.
-You cannot leave the turbolift when it gets stuck without dying? Seems like a real design flaw, even for Cardassians. It would have been much more believable if Lwaxana was just too freaked out to climb in such heights in dark corridors, but being too scared for Odo to leave her alone.
-In the end the DS9-crew decides to just let the Computer entity in their main computer, locked up to do no harm. I'm sure home on earth some scientists with big computer were really eager to study and try to communicate with it! Also it seems like an unnecessary risk to leave a potential harmful program on a computer. What happens if you have to shut down and reboot? Do you kill the lifeform?
-On the Ops, the Vulcan ambassador wants to replace Dax during the crisis. He is hindered by Julian with the remark that Jadzia is much more experienced. I'm sorry, I don't think so. I would have felt safer with the Vulcan at the science station, he seemd more experienced. A lot.
-The three Federation delegates and Bashir should have been dead at the end. Not from the fire itself but from smoke inhalation. Being trapped in a very confined space wouldn't exactly have helped. They would have needed at least serious medical care, which is a bad thing when the doctor is harmed. Has anyone ever seen any nurses on DS9?


Grade
5/10
The episode itself is average at best, but the stuff in the turbolift was amazing.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Odo was severely underused/underdeveloped in the first season. The interaction between Odo and Troi is magical, but somehow I feel that comes more from Auberjonois' talents than from the story itself. Certainly, the writers would be inspired by Auberjonois' performances and write for him, much to the benefit of the series.