How Would You Change "Deep Space Nine"?

[Farscape One]

If that were all there was to it, I would agree. The complicating factor is that as far as Janeway and the crew knew, Species 8472 both intended to exterminate all life in the Milky Way Galaxy -- "the weak will perish" -- and had a realistic potential to do so (see their military success against the Borg). That does suggest that it's better to back the force that has so far not gone that far yet.

Now, once Janeway learns that Species 8472 are people who can be negotiated with, the calculus changes completely.

Janeway didn't really know they could be negotiated with until "IN THE FLESH" in season 5.

The turning point in "SCORPION" was when Chakotay found out the Borg started the war by invading fluidic space. Once Voyager went there and used the altered nanoprobe weapons, it was basically just a way to keep them at bay.

And of course, the Borg (Seven) tried to get them assimilated as soon as the threat was over. Being the scorpions they are, as Chakotay rightly pointed out.

 

[Vger23]

Doing a re-watch now, I'd say the ONLY thing I'd change would be to accelerate to the unique and interesting stuff much quicker.

Dukat and Garak only make 1-2 appearances in the entire 1st season...get them going earlier and more often.
Get into the political/religious turmoil on Bajor quicker and more often.
Introduce the threat of the Dominion much earlier...and create the build-up.
Assign the USS Defiant to the station earlier

So...general theme: keep everything the same, but start the really intriguing stuff sooner. I have a feeling the writers hadn't really identified what the show was really going to "be about" when the 1st and 2nd seasons were in production. There were some great episodes in there, but knowing what comes later and how absolutely great it gets...it's really hard getting through the 1st and 2nd seasons. Many of them are written more like TNG, but on a station rather than the unique and special show DS9 would become.

 

[The Knappos]

Really double down on Jake as a 24th Century journalist on the front lines of a Quadrant spanning war.
Jake was shafted in later seasons.

 

[at Quark's]

I have a feeling the writers hadn't really identified what the show was really going to "be about" when the 1st and 2nd seasons were in production. There were some great episodes in there, but knowing what comes later and how absolutely great it gets...it's really hard getting through the 1st and 2nd seasons. Many of them are written more like TNG, but on a station rather than the unique and special show DS9 would become.

To be fair, TNG itself, and ENT had the same kind of problem in the first two seasons, to find their footing. They improved with time, too.

Interestingly enough, the show that had a clearly delineated outline of what it was going to be about from the very beginning, didn't really take advantage of it (VOY).

 

[Soong-type Android]

I suppose the only thing I would change about DS9 would be to get rid of all the religious stuff about the prophets and the emissary.

 

[Poltargyst]

I suppose the only thing I would change about DS9 would be to get rid of all the religious stuff about the prophets and the emissary.

But that's a big part of the story.

 

[kkt]

Really double down on Jake as a 24th Century journalist on the front lines of a Quadrant spanning war.
Jake was shafted in later seasons.

I'm not sure whether Jake got shafted or DS9 did. Cirroc Lofton was in high school and wanted to keep up with his schoolwork. He couldn't be in every episode.

 

[The Knappos]

I'm not sure whether Jake got shafted or DS9 did. Cirroc Lofton was in high school and wanted to keep up with his schoolwork. He couldn't be in every episode.

Schedule his episode(s) to shoot during the school holidays then? It’s a tough juggling act but given how hard hitting the series was and Jake’s vocation, that they didn’t go there is a glaring omission.

 

[STEPhon IT]

Doing a re-watch now, I'd say the ONLY thing I'd change would be to accelerate to the unique and interesting stuff much quicker.

Dukat and Garak only make 1-2 appearances in the entire 1st season...get them going earlier and more often.
Get into the political/religious turmoil on Bajor quicker and more often.
Introduce the threat of the Dominion much earlier...and create the build-up.
Assign the USS Defiant to the station earlier

So...general theme: keep everything the same, but start the really intriguing stuff sooner. I have a feeling the writers hadn't really identified what the show was really going to "be about" when the 1st and 2nd seasons were in production. There were some great episodes in there, but knowing what comes later and how absolutely great it gets...it's really hard getting through the 1st and 2nd seasons. Many of them are written more like TNG, but on a station rather than the unique and special show DS9 would become.

And I would've left that show much quicker and earlier, I get the blood lust from Trekkers and this is the kind of thinking is why we're getting the kind of Star Trek we have on CBSALLACCESS +. Have everything quicker and more often; what I appreciated about those 1st 3 seasons was it took its time to develop the world and the grounds for our heroes.

 

[Soong-type Android]

Probably already mentioned here, but an obvious change would be to get rid of the terrible mirror universe episodes which have aged badly especially how easy it was eventually made to cross back and forth from one universe to the other.

 

[Space Socialist]

I would have never introduced the concept of Section 31 – how it was used in its (brief) appearances in DS9 was fine, understandably leaning into the zeitgeist of mid/late nineties US genre television, but it’s poisoned subsequent Trek series and films. DS9 was clear that these people are bad guys, understand? while later Trek has treated S31 basically as an elite corps of Starfleet.

 

[at Quark's]

Which leads to the question of whether the existence of Section 31 was necessary. DS9 made it clear those people were the bad guys, but Section 31 (by Sloane, I believe) makes the argument that they are doing the rotten but necessary jobs no-one else wants to do to protect the Federation, so that everyone else in the Federation can keep a clear conscience. Even though this is not proved by the outcome of their actions in DS9, I find the argument in itself sounds somewhat convincing (in that it simply will not always be possible to keep your hands entirely clean if you want to survive, as Sisko also finds out in In the pale moonlight).

 

[Space Socialist]

I’d have also given the crew a small or low-end medium sized ship from the start, perhaps at the end of the pilot once the wormhole was found. That would neutralise the naysayers (most of whom never watched the series) dismissing the series’ concept as “boldly sitting on their arse going nowhere”. It’d also make more sense for the DS9 crew members to make their early ventures into the Gamma Quadrant in a ship larger than a minibus. The small/medium ship would be destroyed by the Jem’Hadar in their titular episode – when the battle-ready Defiant makes its appearance in season 3, it’ll be a more palpably “tensions are really building” moment.

 

[Shamrock Holmes]

I’d have also given the crew a small or low-end medium sized ship from the start, perhaps at the end of the pilot once the wormhole was found.

Given that the Defiant itself is pretty small (the Nova-class (probably newer), the Raven-type and the Federation Raider are about the only spaceframes between the Defiant and runabouts) in Starfleet service.

Honestly, the best option IMO, particularly in S2, would have had more joint-ops with the Bajoran Militia and their colonies and the like.

 

[Space Socialist]

Given that the Defiant itself is pretty small (the Nova-class (probably newer), the Raven-type and the Federation Raider are about the only spaceframes between the Defiant and runabouts) in Starfleet service.

Honestly, the best option IMO, particularly in S2, would have had more joint-ops with the Bajoran Militia and their colonies and the like.

Sounds good, but my “cake and eat it” answer is for the creative team behind the series to design a new small/medium Starfleet class of shop to appear onscreen! It’s a shame that for (understandable budgetary reasons) there wasn’t a great variety of starship designs onscreen in DS9. Mostly just Mirandas and Excelsiors. I’m not even sure if there were any new designs onscreen other than the Runabouts and the Defiant!

 

[The Emissary]

1. Have Bajor officially join the UFP by the end of the series. The show covered a lot of plot threads, but the show started with this. The fact that they just didn't follow up on it was so jarring in a show that closed so many plot threads. Hell, they could have just had Kira do a Colonel's log equivalent where she said she would be overseeing the official entry into the UFP if they didn't want to film it.
2. Sisko returns or it is implied he returns. I know it would take out the wind in the emotional sails of him saying goodbye and disappearing, but maybe a shot of him from behind approaching Jake as he stared at the wormhole and leave it ambiguous if he was officially back in the final scene.
3. Speaking of the above - have Sisko say goodbye to Kassidy AND Jake. A large part of Sisko's arc is his relationship with his son.
4. More variety of Dominion species beyond the Founders, Vorta, and Jem'Hadar.
5. More Gamma Quadrant exploration. Perhaps finding allies there to help against the Dominion.
6. Anti-War movement. I found it so odd that in a show about war involving a mostly pacifistic/diplomatic society that there wasn't an anti-war movement on Earth (at least featured on the show). Feels like that could have caused a lot of good morality plays. Especially with Starfleet nearly attempting to create a military coup, Founder inspired or not.
7. Some type of plotline with Maxwell.
8. Follow up on Opaka?
9. Have some type of reckoning with what Sisko did to the Romulans to get them to join the war.
10. Have Odo get better at shape shifting over time combined with his experiences with the Great Link until finally he looks human.
11. More political issues with Bajor. In season 1 and 2, we did get some internal issues with Bajor showing they were diverse and had weird things on their world (Storyteller episode for example). After season 3, most plots around Bajor centered on Kai Winn or if Bajor was under threat from Klingons/Dominion.

 

[Sci]

Have Bajor officially join the UFP by the end of the series. The show covered a lot of plot threads, but the show started with this. The fact that they just didn't follow up on it was so jarring in a show that closed so many plot threads. Hell, they could have just had Kira do a Colonel's log equivalent where she said she would be overseeing the official entry into the UFP if they didn't want to film it.

Ira Steven Behr has commented that Bajor not joining the Federation was the point -- that the idea that Bajor should become a Federation Member was, in essence, cultural imperialism and that the point the show was making was for Bajor being independent.

Anti-War movement. I found it so odd that in a show about war involving a mostly pacifistic/diplomatic society that there wasn't an anti-war movement on Earth (at least featured on the show). Feels like that could have caused a lot of good morality plays. Especially with Starfleet nearly attempting to create a military coup, Founder inspired or not.

That would have been an interesting angle! Every war has its opponents, even when it's genuinely justified and necessary. We do see anti-war protesters in the DS9 novel Hollow Men by Una McCormack.

 

[The Emissary]

Ira Steven Behr has commented that Bajor not joining the Federation was the point -- that the idea that Bajor should become a Federation Member was, in essence, cultural imperialism and that the point the show was making was for Bajor being independent.

That's interesting. I had never heard of that.

I think the loss of their culture was vaguely discussed in season 1 as to why (some) Bajorans didn't like the idea of "trading one occupier for another". However, it seemed like that sentiment began to wane as the show progressed and the Bajorans/Kira saw the UFP were clearly not the Cardassian Union. The show definitely implied that the direction Bajor was going was to become a member world.

It's an interesting concept to explore, but it really wasn't once the Dominion War kicked off. I think the only time they discussed joining the UFP and it was stopped was because Sisko didn't want Bajor to be a target of the Dominion - nothing to do with cultural imperialism.

If Behr wanted to go down that path, I wish they had finalized it to have Bajor reject joining for that reason. As it sits now, it just seems like a loose thread.

That would have been an interesting angle! Every war has its opponents, even when it's genuinely justified and necessary. We do see anti-war protesters in the DS9 novel Hollow Men by Una McCormack.

That's actually where I got the idea! It seemed like such an obvious concept that I was surprised such a movement didn't even get mentioned. As the show stands, it seems like the Federation was wholly in agreement with the war itself. It could have served as a good political vehicle for showing division amongst member worlds.

Kai Winn has this great line where she asks Sisko if Starfleet would protect Bajor if it came at the expense of Vulcan or Andoria. Concepts like that could have been explored by distant worlds closer to Cardassia versus the core worlds that have more protection.

 

[The_Baron]

Starship from the beginning not the Defiant.

How dare you!

 

[fireproof78]

How dare you!

Yes, yes, I know.

The heresy panel will be convened shortly.