I'm loving ds9

[Nerdius Maximus]

I posted a thread some months back about netflixing seasons 2-7. I'm halfway through six now. I don't know why I didn't fully appreciate this show during its original run. I can't wait to see how the Dominion war pans out.

Something I thought was weird, though: Quark basically saves the station during its occupation, while Odo almost ruins everything, yet once things are back to "normal," Odo is still a total a-hole to Quark. There was even an episode where he says something like, "Because they're heroes. All you care about is profit." WTF? Odo was in his quarters playing around with that founder bitch while Quark, Kira and Rom were busy trying to save the Alpha Quadrant.
Also, it was cool to see Iggy Pop as a Vorta.

Anyway, DS9 is now officially one of my favorite shows of all time. I'd watched it on and off before, but I just didn't "get" it until now. Better late than never, I guess. It makes TNG look positively bland in comparison. I never thought I'd say that.

 

[Jbarney]

I just rewatched the entire 6th season. It was probably better than when I watched it on television in the 1990s.

 

[Too Much Fun]

WTF? Odo was in his quarters playing around with that founder bitch while Quark, Kira and Rom were busy trying to save the Alpha Quadrant.

It makes TNG look positively bland in comparison. I never thought I'd say that.

Yeah, I was pretty iffy about Odo until that happened. I hated him in the early seasons for being so grating and preachy all the time. I started to find him more tolerable as the writers did a great job of making him sympathetic as the seasons progressed, but I never hated Odo as much as I did in that episode, when he basically sold out his friends for sex.

I forgave him a little after his relationship with Kira came to fruition so sweetly in "His Way" and showed him to be a lot more mature and kind in subsequent episodes that explored it, but I can't ever truly embrace the character for what a douche he was in that episode where he and the Founder have their days long sexfest.

And I don't agree with that TNG comment. Am I the only one who hasn't totally turned on TNG after discovering DS9 for the first time and enjoying it thoroughly? It saddens me that everyone seems to think loving DS9 has to mean looking down on TNG like never before. I admit DS9 was a little more ambitious and in many ways more original, daring, creative, and emotionally resonant than TNG, but that doesn't mean people should dismiss TNG as boring, stuffy, and lifeless in comparison. I still think it's the more consistent show. Sometimes simplicity and straightforwardness is better.

 

[RyuRoots]

Good to have another Niner join the ranks, Nerdius Maximus!

@Too Much Fun: I think most people don't hate TNG or think it's stuffy or lifeless now or what have you.

TNG is fantastic, I still love it, and I don't regret buying DVDs for a moment. But DS9 is just a better show all-around. Seasons 1 and 2 are still the weakest, but they had a much firmer footing than TNG did starting out. The characters were more flawed, more real, and they changed and evolved far more than the TNG cast. I mean, excepting maybe Picard and Data, ANY one main from DS9 or characters like Martok and Garak even, had more development as one person than the TNG mains put together.

DS9 also had a tendency to take something TNG introduced, and do a better job with it than TNG ever did. Cardassians, holodecks, and Ferengi to name a few.

I don't agree that TNG was a more consistent show, if you mean quality. TNG 1-2 just sucked, 3-5 were pretty good, and 6 and 7 were very hit-and-miss tho they had several good ones. DS9, for the most part, hit a stride in S3 like TNG did, and never looked back. I also don't agree that it's a more consistent show if you mean continuity. DS9 was way better about reusing old ideas or plot points than TNG, and making them interesting.

I still think TNG is a great show, and probably isn't far behind DS9 for my favorite TV show ever, I just don't think it was handled as well. The tl;dr version, "I like both, just like one more."

 

[DevilEyes]

TNG is a very good show with many great episodes, but it was certainly not consistent. For every great episode, there was usually one average one, one that made me roll my eyes because of the 'we were like this but we have evolved' preachiness, or occasionally even one really awful in the 'WTF were they thinking' way. Not that DS9 didn't have its share of bad and average episodes, but not that many.

I don't agree that DS9 only hot its stride in season 3. I always thought it already hit its stride in season 2 (or rather, at the very end of season 1, with "Duet" and "In the Hands of the Prophets"). Yes, they were a few clunkers in the middle of the season, but it also had "Necessary Evil", "Cardassians", "The Maquis", "The Wire", the Circle trilogy, "Whispers", a decent Klingon episode, one of the better Dax episodes, and the only good DS9 Mirror Universe episode; it developed the Cardassian society and Cardassian characters - Garak, Dukat - in a more complex way, in addition to further developing the Bajorans, it started to develop the Kira/Odo relationship, not to mention the beginning of the Maquis plot that was to return later. The only plot that was still not developed at the time was the Dominion, and that started in the finale. But I never understood why people say that DS9 only became good when the Dominion was introduced. Season 2 od DS9 was certainly better than season 2 of TNG. Season 1 of DS9 is comparable to season 2 of TNG - overall so-so and with too many bad and pointless episodes, but also with 2 or 3 great ones that anticipated the future greatness. Season 1 of TNG... was just awful, unbelievably awful. Not even the worst DS9 season 1 episodes were nearly that bad.


@ Too Much Fun, I wouldn't exactly call linking "sex"... it is very different, and much more than that, to the Changelings. You're oversimplifying things and treating them as if they were the same as humans, which (unlike the Bajorans, Cardassians) they really are not. The Changeling experience is completely different from human.

 

[Navaros]

but that doesn't mean people should dismiss TNG as boring, stuffy, and lifeless in comparison.

TNG should not be dismissed as that because DS9 is a way better show (which it is), but rather TNG should be dismissed as that because TNG is that all on it's own, irrespective of DS9.

TNG tried to be drama with no conflict, which is an oxymoron. Add to that no character development and no story development, and it makes TNG a very poor quality and worst of all, colossally unentertaining show.

 

[PSGarak]

I also thought DS9 was already well in its stride by Season 2. The Dominion story arc made it even more interesting, but the interest was already there and fairly consistent.

I didn't start looking down on TNG when I started watching DS9. I never fully loved TNG. I liked it a lot, but didn't love it. DS9 was almost love at first sight, however.

 

[Farrens]

I've always felt that TNG and DS9 were different types of shows. TNG aimed to present a very episodic storyline. With the exception of Worf's story arc and to a lesser extent the data/lore arc TNG stayed true to that. DS9 however had a strong reoccuring storyline (as it almost had to being a station as opposed to a ship).

As such I've always judged the shows seperately. When I'm looking for just a solid hour of good television I turn to TNG. When I'm looking to fill an afternoon, it's time for DS9.

As for Odo's behavior during the occupation of DS9 I always felt it was poorly handled. Odo always had a very firm sense of justice and loyalty, for that to be seemingly destroyed in a matter of weeks never seemed realistic to me. The only conclusion I was ever able to reach to explain this radical shift was that the "female" founder may have been able to exert a certain amount of control over Odo via the link, as he was unfamilar with the experience.

 

[Too Much Fun]

I know linking was technically very different from sex, but I think it's pretty obviously the Changeling equivalent of sex. The way the two of them were in a room alone together for days, exploring each other, becoming intimately familiar with each other's bodies and minds...the linking as sex metaphor was quite clear.

The Founder uses Odo's reverence for the act to keep him willingly imprisoned with her in that room for days, refusing to see anyone and happily oblivious to what's going on outside of it. And when Kira questions him about it, he basically says "you could never have sex this good, (changeling sex) because having it yourself is the only way you could understand why it would make me completely apathetic to whatever your problems are, even if they're life and death". As far as I'm concerned, he was nothing but pussywhipped right there.

As for the TNG vs. DS9 consistency debate, I find TNG more consistent on an episode-by-episode basis and in terms of its handling of characters and story lines because as I've said before, DS9 could be too ambitious for its own good. It would take its characters in weird directions that tainted their original appeal or put them in continuous story arcs that dragged on and got boring or irritating.

I like that TNG was more black and white. Maybe it was more 'safe', but I found that comforting. I appreciated how if you liked or hated a character from the start, you could settle into that perspective rather than being unable to make up your mind with them because the writers kept messing with them and their arcs too much. In contrast, on DS9 I started off hating Kira, then felt she became more likable, went back and forth with Odo (although overall I feel pretty negative about him in the end), and was even more unsure about Sisko, who routinely alternated between being warm and cold-hearted, sympathetic and preachy, subtle and over-the-top, a resourceful independent hero and a helpless pawn of the Prophets.

On a season by season basis, I don't see how TNG is so inferior to DS9. I find their seasons 1 and 2 are pretty similar. Both are very often almost completely unwatchable with a handful of standout episodes, and seasons 3-5 are the prime of both series. We can't really debate this point objectively though, because I just hate all the Bajoran politics stuff (including the Circle Trilogy), so I have a bias against the first two seasons of DS9. And very few shows including DS9 could match the consistency of TNG's season 3, where every episode save one or two was good to great.

DS9's last two seasons are overall better than TNG's for sure (especially when you compare each show's season 7), but at least they didn't assassinate characters like what DS9 did with Gul Dukat and Sisko, oversimplifying them into caricatures with the Prophet/Pah-Wraith junk. I'll take less conflict-heavy characters and story lines over that nonsense any day. I think it could be just as entertaining as DS9 without the colossal flaws that its overly ambitious nature spawned.

 

[TheGodBen]

And I don't agree with that TNG comment. Am I the only one who hasn't totally turned on TNG after discovering DS9 for the first time and enjoying it thoroughly?

I certainly didn't turn on TNG, it is easily my second favourite Star Trek after DS9, and they are the only two shows that I bothered to buy the DVDs for. There are certainly things in TNG that I look back at and think they held back the show, the Roddenberry box being the big example, but the writers on the show were usually talented enough to stick to the format and still give us some great episodes. TNG had the best writers from DS9 and Voyager while they were still coming up with fresh ideas. Other than season 1 and parts of season 2 and 7, TNG was an excellent show with great writing.

And it brought me the joys of Ron Moore, how could I possibly turn on it?

 

[ClayHefner]

Indeed, my appreciation for TNG (and TOS!) was heightened by DS9.
Even during its (underrated) first season, DS9 managed to really build on the universe that TNG and TOS had established.
Season two was a triumph in that regard. Blood Oath and Crossover were brilliant examples of why using established canon can be a strength, rather than a weaknesss, as it seems to be the consensus now.

Season 3 of DS9, on the other hand, while having some of the best episodes of the series (the Garak two-parter) was kind of a letdown for me after season 2's awesomeness. I was kinda worried then that DS9 had lost its steam and they wouldn't be able to deliver FX-wise once the Dominion conflict would heat up.
Boy I was wrong. Season four kicked ass.

 

[DevilEyes]

I know linking was technically very different from sex, but I think it's pretty obviously the Changeling equivalent of sex. The way the two of them were in a room alone together for days, exploring each other, becoming intimately familiar with each other's bodies and minds...the linking as sex metaphor was quite clear.

The Founder uses Odo's reverence for the act to keep him willingly imprisoned with her in that room for days, refusing to see anyone and happily oblivious to what's going on outside of it. And when Kira questions him about it, he basically says "you could never have sex this good, (changeling sex) because having it yourself is the only way you could understand why it would make me completely apathetic to whatever your problems are, even if they're life and death". As far as I'm concerned, he was nothing but pussywhipped right there.

Odo can't possibly be pussywhipped by the Female Founder, for a simple reason: she does not really have a pussy.

So if that's the equivalent of sex, why doesn't anyone ever mention that Odo "had sex" with Laas? They linked, too. Is it because Laas was "male", while the so-called "Female Changeling" was "female"? Of course, she was not, biologically, just like neither Laas nor Odo are male. The Founders do not have sexual reproduction, and obviously do not have biological sexes. They're actually sentient puddles of goo! But people seem to forget that all the time, because they see a human actor with a bit of weird makeup, an actor who is actually male or female.

But anyway... if linking for the Founders is the same as sex for humanoids, then Founders are real pervs, on the home world they are always having non-stop orgies.

It is clear that linking is a lot more than an equivalent of sex - it is the way that the Founders communicate with each other, and is actually their natural state of being. Taking a solid form, walking and talking, is something that they can do as an imitation of solids, but it does not come naturally to them. Their natural state is being a part of "The Great Link". That could be the equivalent of sex only if humans were constantly all having one big orgy.

The Female Founder was not giving Odo "sex". She was giving him an opportunity to be with his people, to feel like he really belonged and was not a complete outsider. Sure, he had friendships with solids, including a deep loving friendship with Kira, but he was aware that he wasn't really one of them, and at the time, was probably resigned to the idea that Kira would never love him as a lover, and that she could never have the kind of intimacy with her that she had with her boyfriends.

Look at the solids in DS9 - look at how nationalistic (if one can use that word for a species/race of beings) they all are... Bajorans, Cardassians, Trills, Humans, Romulans, Klingons, Ferengi... so many wars and problems and the hatred, despite the fact, they are all, in fact, very similar! The differences are mostly skin deep, and they may have bumpy foreheads or differently colored blood or some other idiosyncrasis, but they all eat, drink, sleep, have sex in basically the same way, and can even have children with each other. While Odo has to turn back into liquid state and go to his bucket. With all these humanoids so obsessed with "their people" and constantly overstating their negligible differences (they are negligible, compared to the difference between a humanoid and a Changeling) - is it really that surprising that Odo felt a desire to be with his species, with those similar to him, even though he was conflicted because he also despised them for what they were doing?

As for Odo/Quark, I don't remember the actual episode you're talking about, but I suspect that Odo was just too used to keeping up their old dynamic, even though, by that time, IMO, he was pretty much aware that they were really friends. It was always kinda obvious that, behind that grumpiness, he always liked Quark deep down. It never seemed like real hatred. Odo has always used his grumpy demenour, the air of indifference and insistance on impartial justice and order to hide his vulneability, loneliness and feeling of just not belonging.

 

[PSGarak]

^ Exactly. Linking is only similar to sex in one respect, that it's an expression of an intimate bond, but for the Founders it's so much more than that and completely unrelated to reproduction. I could completely understand Odo's actions in that. For all of his sentient life, he had known he was completely different from everyone around him. Even the people who cared about him still treated him differently and sometimes viewed him askance.

Imagine if you had to live among big goo piles that could talk to you and interact with you, but you knew on a fundamental level there were interactions you needed and desired they were completely incapable of giving to you. In fact, they couldn't even comprehend these desires of yours, and most of them weren't the slightest bit interested in what you needed or wanted. The first chance you had to be with your own kind, wouldn't you want to spend every single moment you could learning about who and what you really were? Odo was like a person who had been starved finally getting sustenance. It had nothing to do with sex, and it's amazing to me that after experiencing that he still had loyalty to his solid friends and loved ones.

 

[PSGarak]

Deleted. Somehow it double posted. I'm not sure how.

 

[Too Much Fun]

Well in general I do agree that linking is well-established as something more than just a Changeling version of sex, but I am referring to one specific episode where it was blatantly symbolic of that. I don't remember the exact line, but there's even a part where the Founder sits up in bed while Odo is sitting on the other side of the bed and talks about the way humans have sex. Maybe I'm getting confused because Odo simply showed her what human sex is like as part of their 'linking', but there was definitely something going on between them in that episode that controlled and manipulated Odo in the same way that sex can be used to control any hot-blooded human male.

 

[PSGarak]

Maybe I'm getting confused because Odo simply showed her what human sex is like as part of their 'linking', but there was definitely something going on between them in that episode that controlled and manipulated Odo in the same way that sex can be used to control any hot-blooded human male.

Only those unwilling to take responsibility and ownership for their own actions would ever use the excuse that sex controlled them or made them do anything, hot-blooded or otherwise.

 

[DevilEyes]

Well in general I do agree that linking is well-established as something more than just a Changeling version of sex, but I am referring to one specific episode where it was blatantly symbolic of that. I don't remember the exact line, but there's even a part where the Founder sits up in bed while Odo is sitting on the other side of the bed and talks about the way humans have sex. Maybe I'm getting confused because Odo simply showed her what human sex is like as part of their 'linking', but there was definitely something going on between them in that episode that controlled and manipulated Odo in the same way that sex can be used to control any hot-blooded human male.

Yes, he showed her the way humanoids have sex - she thanked him for, as she said, showing her how poor and unsatisfying solids' version of intimacy is, compared to the Great Link.

The writers certainly did go for the sexual overtones - they said as much, that they saw it as her 'seducing him' - but I am saying that there was a lot more going on there, that certainly can't be reduced to sex. She was offering him the acceptance and belonging to a group of people like himself, being one with other members of his own species, and she was using his emotional vulnerability, including his pain over his unrequited love for Kira, to convince him to sever the links to the 'solids' and come to the bosom of the Great Link.

 

[Jbarney]

but that doesn't mean people should dismiss TNG as boring, stuffy, and lifeless in comparison.

TNG should not be dismissed as that because DS9 is a way better show (which it is), but rather TNG should be dismissed as that because TNG is that all on it's own, irrespective of DS9.

TNG tried to be drama with no conflict, which is an oxymoron. Add to that no character development and no story development, and it makes TNG a very poor quality and worst of all, colossally unentertaining show.

Wow, that's harsh. Thankfully TNG was able to carry the Star Trek title until DS9 came along.....

 

[Nerdius Maximus]

WTF? Odo was in his quarters playing around with that founder bitch while Quark, Kira and Rom were busy trying to save the Alpha Quadrant.

It makes TNG look positively bland in comparison. I never thought I'd say that.

Yeah, I was pretty iffy about Odo until that happened. I hated him in the early seasons for being so grating and preachy all the time. I started to find him more tolerable as the writers did a great job of making him sympathetic as the seasons progressed, but I never hated Odo as much as I did in that episode, when he basically sold out his friends for sex.

I forgave him a little after his relationship with Kira came to fruition so sweetly in "His Way" and showed him to be a lot more mature and kind in subsequent episodes that explored it, but I can't ever truly embrace the character for what a douche he was in that episode where he and the Founder have their days long sexfest.

And I don't agree with that TNG comment. Am I the only one who hasn't totally turned on TNG after discovering DS9 for the first time and enjoying it thoroughly? It saddens me that everyone seems to think loving DS9 has to mean looking down on TNG like never before. I admit DS9 was a little more ambitious and in many ways more original, daring, creative, and emotionally resonant than TNG, but that doesn't mean people should dismiss TNG as boring, stuffy, and lifeless in comparison. I still think it's the more consistent show. Sometimes simplicity and straightforwardness is better.

Nah, I love TNG. Poor choice of words on my part.

 

[PKTrekGirl]

WTF? Odo was in his quarters playing around with that founder bitch while Quark, Kira and Rom were busy trying to save the Alpha Quadrant.

It makes TNG look positively bland in comparison. I never thought I'd say that.

Yeah, I was pretty iffy about Odo until that happened. I hated him in the early seasons for being so grating and preachy all the time. I started to find him more tolerable as the writers did a great job of making him sympathetic as the seasons progressed, but I never hated Odo as much as I did in that episode, when he basically sold out his friends for sex.

I forgave him a little after his relationship with Kira came to fruition so sweetly in "His Way" and showed him to be a lot more mature and kind in subsequent episodes that explored it, but I can't ever truly embrace the character for what a douche he was in that episode where he and the Founder have their days long sexfest.

See, for me, the thing with Kira only made it worse. First of all because of the age difference (regardless of how old he was or wasn't in the show, Odo ACTED like a crotchety, grumpy, set-in-his-ways old man throughout the entire show), which to me made him seem almost predatory...but second, because I simply could not buy Kira getting it on with him after what he did during the Occupation Arc. Kira was NOT a character who forgave easily...and Odo collaborated with the enemy for sex, and nearly had pretty much everyone who was near and dear to her killed...without lifting a finger to help them.

So sorry - not buying how easily she forgave him.

To me, that was the absolutely WORST writing blunder in all of DS9.

And I don't agree with that TNG comment. Am I the only one who hasn't totally turned on TNG after discovering DS9 for the first time and enjoying it thoroughly? It saddens me that everyone seems to think loving DS9 has to mean looking down on TNG like never before. I admit DS9 was a little more ambitious and in many ways more original, daring, creative, and emotionally resonant than TNG, but that doesn't mean people should dismiss TNG as boring, stuffy, and lifeless in comparison. I still think it's the more consistent show. Sometimes simplicity and straightforwardness is better.

I don't think it's a matter 'everyone thinking that loving DS9 has to mean looking down on TNG'. I don't think it's that at all.

I just think that audiences today expect more out of scifi than an evil alien of the week and a perfect crew who runs around spreading Federation Enlightenment. And because of that, TNG has not aged well and is dropping in popularity.

When you look at the scifi shows which have been most popular in recent years, pretty much ALL of them are arc-based, with complex storylines - LOST (scifi doesn't GET anymore arc-based and complex than LOST! ), BSG, and even Heroes have all been very arc-based. It's a trend that we have been seeing increasingly for years...and alot of people who didn't have the patience for shows like DS9 and Babylon 5 15 years ago are now going back, revisiting their decisions, and changing their minds.

During the time period that DS9 was airing, Rick Berman was adamently against serializing Star Trek - if you read the Companion or watch some of the special feature interviews on the DVD sets, Ira Behr is very clear about how he had to beg, borrow, steal and outright LIE to Berman so that he could continue doing arcs in DS9 which carried over past two episodes. Rick, at the time, did not believe that audiences wanted anything that complex - they wanted it all tied up nice and neat with a big fat red bow by the 44-minute mark.

Well, he was wrong.

He didn't figure out just how wrong he was until Enterprise was in immediate danger of cancellation and he decided to try some arc-based storytelling in a last-ditch effort to save the show (at the time, he was quoted as saying 'Star Trek has never done anything like this before' ). But he was too late to save ENT. He'd missed the trend and people had already tuned out.

Meanwhile, you had shows like The X-Files, which was hugely popular and moving toward greater serialization all the time.....and later, in the late 90's, shows like Farscape, Roswell, and later, Smallville...all of which are highly serialized, catching on...and eventually leading to the situation we have today, where you need a roadmap if you even hope to keep up with a show like LOST, even if you watch every week!

Personally, I think that shows like DS9 have received a sort of renaissance due to the trend in scifi storytelling over the past 10 -12 years toward arc-based, complex storylines. And modern audiences look at earlier efforts as bland and vanilla by comparison. TOS has survived much better because, although it is not arc-based, it IS the original, and people love the nostalgic, kitchy feel of the show. And seriously - how could you NOT love Shatner? But TNG? Episodic storytellling, combined with that ghastly 1980's PC preachiness? It has NOT aged well, my friend.

And you cannot blame us original hard-core Niners for that.

We are just fans of a show who have been turning up for years in forums like this, and posting. We do not have any membership requirements. We do not insist that ANYONE disavow any former allegiances they might have had to other shows to become a fan of DS9.

If TNG hasn't aged well, that is TNG's problem. It is NOT the fault of anyone around here insisting that it's 'one or the other - you have to choose' or any sort of absurd silliness like that.

And it REALLY irks me when people imply that there is some sort of membership requirment in the imaginary "Niners Club" which insists upon disavowing any allegiance to TNG.

TNG stands or falls on it's own merits. Not on anything DS9 fans have done to it, or to it's former avid fans.