Re-Watching DS9

[Lord Garth]

"Dramatis Personae"
When I first came back onto this board after a long break, I was on the side of Discovery. Then, years later, there was a split. Most of those who used to be on my side went to SNW while I went to Picard. I switched alliances. Now, during the wait for Legacy, there's a lull on the Picard front. So I was offered an invitation to join the DS9 Side, which I graciously accepted and so I switched alliances once again. The question always is, "What have you done for me lately?" So now I'm on the side of the Niners. And we as Niners must unite to fight against our common enemy who... oh, wait a minute, I'm reviewing "Dramatis Personae"!

This was a fun episode. Watching Sisko and Kira break off into factions. Watching Bashir think everyone's affected but him, telling Odo he should choose a side while ironically he himself hasn't. O'Brien is clearly with Sisko. "Anyone who's against Sisko is against me." But Kira's able to peel Dax off Sisko's side and on to hers.

The best part is when O'Brien tells Sisko they'll have to leave the station, and Sisko says "NEVER!!!!" Then O'Brien says, "But hear me out! We leave then we come back with the fleet and take over!" Something to that effect. Basically, O'Brien's spelling out what's going to happen at the end of Season 5 and into Season 6, when the Dominion takes over the station, Sisko and crew have to leave, then it takes six episodes for them to get the station back. The writers had no idea what was going to happen later, which is what makes this so amusing in retrospect.

I loved watching Sisko's side and Kira's side plot against each other. And Quark being the guy on the street. "Maybe" he has information for Odo. He "didn't hear anything" when Kira was plotting her coup. Great stuff. Then he pretends his neck is more damaged than it really is, when he goes to see Odo.

I don't have too too much to say about the episode. Really, that's it. I'm glad the technobabble stayed out of the way. I'm glad we to see the cast stretch their acting muscles, and I give this episode an 8.

The next two episodes, "Duet" and "In the Hands of the Prophets". I'm going to review them back-to-back tomorrow night. We're going to make a party of it!



Before I do that, however, I'm going to re-watch of "Q-Less" and "Move Along Home". No second reviews, but explanations for why I either will or won't have changed the ratings. Stay tuned.

 

[Farscape One]

I have always loved "DRAMATIS PERSONAE". This episode is a great example of an episode being produced at exactly the right time in a show's life... toward the end of the first season.

If this was made any later, the division between Sisko and Kira would not have been believable. Any earlier in the season, and it would feel too forced. But the placement here, after seeing them work together for only a short time (at this point, around 7 months or so in-universe time), there is still enough of tension between the Starfleet and Bajoran crew that the slow buildup of the potential mutiny is fairly believable for the first part of the episode.

Another win from Joe Menosky, who tends to use mythology and ancient stories as a basis for many of his episodes ("Darmok" and "MUSE" being two of the most prominent examples). In here, the crew are basically reenacting a power struggle from long ago... replaying a myth, you could say.

And we see Sisko's clock debut here, which also subtly shows who he is at the core... a builder. The lead captain of each STAR TREK series tends to have a trait that defines that show. (Janeway having a strong science background and VOY having a huge amount of technobabble/science solutions, for example.) Here, we see another piece of evidence of who he is... a father building a life for his son, strong engineering background, a cook (building a meal)... all of this points to being a builder. And a major plot point of DS9's early years is rebuilding Bajor.

I also give this an 8.

 

[Lord Garth]

I'm sticking with a 5 for "Q-Less". There's nothing to add that I didn't already say before.

"Move Along Home" will have to wait until after I get up. I'm starting to get tired.

 

[Lord Garth]

"Move Along Home" (2nd Re-Watch)

Just finished doing a re-watch of my re-watch for "Move Along Home". The things that I mentioned that annoyed me last time aren't enough to knock it all the way down to a 4. It was an unusual episode, I'm not a gamer or into gambling or into video games, and the episode either caught me off-guard or maybe I was in a bad mood after work, it could've been all kinds of things. But, upon re-watching it again, it's an interesting spin on First Contact.

I also got to see how Sisko and the others ended up in the game when I re-watched the Odo/Primmin scene. It was right there in front of me with the Woti's advanced transporters, but I zone out whenever there's technobabble. As you can tell by now, I'm not a huge fan of technobabble. Luckily, it was all contained to that one scene. But now the whole premise works for me.

I'm glad I didn't re-re-watch this before I went to bed, when I was tired. I'm going to go with a 7.

See you all tonight for "Duet" & "In the Hands of the Prophets"!

 

[mattman8907]

I still think season 5-7 were my favorite seasons seeing Dukat just got from a somewhat even tempered military officer driven to madness and become a true villain was interesting to see

 

[Lord Garth]

A little over four hours to go before I put on "Duet". The format is going to be running commentary, so you'll be able to read my real time reactions.

I'm having a pizza with this, salad, and the drink of choice is going to be some type of dry red wine. I'm going all out. I'll be treating this like how I'd treat an episode of DSC or PIC that I was especially excited about.

I haven't looked this forward to watching an episode of DS9 since 1999. It feels like An Event. The question isn't will I give "Duet" a 10. It'll be will I give it an 11?

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Already in the first season, a tone was established that made the type of over the top story dissonant with the series.

The question isn't will I give "Duet" a 10. It'll be will I give it an 11?

You could go with three digits.

 

[Lord Garth]

I've got the projector set up. Change of plans with the drink. I'm having a Bloody Mary instead... while I watch the "bloody Cardies"!

Rather than create a new post every time I have a new thing to type, I'm going to keep updating this one. So refresh for updates throughout.

And feel free to chime in at any point!

Three, two, one... go! Hitting "Play".

 

[kkt]

A little over four hours to go before I put on "Duet". The format is going to be running commentary, so you'll be able to read my real time reactions.

I'm having a pizza with this, salad, and the drink of choice is going to be some type of dry red wine. I'm going all out. I'll be treating this like how I'd treat an episode of DSC or PIC that I was especially excited about.

I haven't looked this forward to watching an episode of DS9 since 1999. It feels like An Event. The question isn't will I give "Duet" a 10. It'll be will I give it an 11?

When you're not on TrekBBS, are you judging the Olympics?

 

[Lord Garth]

"Duet"

Right off the bat, when Kira describes to Sisko what the Cardassians did at Camp Gallitep, it sounds like something straight out of World War II. It all sounds like something the Nazis would've done to the Jewish. The first clue that something's up is that Darheel isn't on any wanted listed. Sisko wants to speak to Marritza alone, who denies he was ever on Bajor. Bashir is able to prove he was and that he was at Camp Gallitep.

Sisko wants has to walk a really, really tight rope here. He wants proof that Marritza is a war criminal before handing him over the Bajorans. Kira wants him handed over the Bajors five minutes ago. Sisko wants Odo to handle the investigation and Kira asks Sisko if it's because he thinks she has a personal vendetta.

Great acting on Nana Visitor's part when she pleads with Sisko to let her handle the investigation. For all the people who were killed. Then Sisko tells Odo he's handing the investigation over to her.

And that's when things really get going!

Kira: "If you're going to make your lies this transparent, it'll be a short investigation."
Marritza: "Then I'll try to make my lies more opaque."

I love the exchange when Marritza tells Kira she'll be disappointed about what his role was at the Camp and said he was a filing clerk. Kira thinks she has him when she says it's strange that a filing clerk would teach at a military academy. "What did you teach?" "Believe it or not, filing!" That's great! But Kira still thinks he's lying. How much can you trust someone when he sarcastically promises to make his lies more opaque?

Then Kira asks him about whether or not he was aware of the atrocities. "Atrocities? What atrocities?" Sounds just like a Holocaust Denier!

"I recall hearing screams from time to time, but atrocities? No." Bullshit. Bull fucking shit. If there were no atrocities, then why the Hell would there be any screams? He'd probably say, "Torture isn't an atrocity." I bet.

Then Marritza goes into overdrive. Okay, not quite overdrive, but he sure does go into next gear. "You saw what we wanted you to see!" No atrocities he claims, but the mere stories about them would enrage Bajorans. At this point, he's trolling Kira.

Sisko communicates with Dukat. The first time we've seen Dukat since "Emissary"! More on that later. In the meantime, we see the other side of what Sisko has to deal with. He has to accommodate the Bajorans, but he also has to accommodate the Cardassians, who the Federation has a Peace Treaty with. But how would the Bajorans react if Sisko listened to Dukat? That would be a disaster. I feel so bad for Sisko for the situation he's in.

Later on, Odo says Marritza's story checks out. He was just a Filing Clerk. Sisko says they'll have to let him go if that's all he was and Kira reluctantly agrees. Even though she told Dax earlier that she wants him to be something worse. Then they're sent an image of Camp Gallitep with Marritza in it. The only one available since the Cardassians destroyed all records of the Occupation of Bajor. Interesting that. They wanted to get rid of evidence of anything.

The picture of Marritza is blurry. They have to magnify and enhance. Reminiscent of Blade Runner. Always a good thing. Then it turns it's not Maritza. They're holding, they think, Gul Darheel! Now he's who Kira really wants him to be.

Kira comes down, confronts "Darheel" and everything kicks up to 11!

"Darheel": "You can only execute me once."
Kira: "That's my only regret."

This is the half-way mark. From here, it's Kira vs. Darheel!

Now Darheel's doing Revisionist History. "The Bajorans didn't resist." "There was no war." Then what do you call The Resistance? The word is in the name! Resist!

Now Harris Yullen goes into overdrive with his acting as Darheel. I'm going to pause for a moment to say the first time I saw Harris Yullen's acting was in Ghostbusters II in the theater in 1989. He was just as captivating as the judge there as well. Except here, in "Duet", that's taken to the Nth Degree. I don't know if Harris Yellen was ever in any WWII movies, but he should've been.

"Oh! You never saw Gallitep at its height!" FUCK YOU!!! And, you know, if it wasn't for censorship, Kira would've said that to him too!

"And the verdict was always the same! Guilty!" Kira tells him he's insane. "I'd order them to kill Bajoran scum! They'd be covered in blood! But they felt clean!" Oh my God. Oh my fucking God. If this guy was on TrekBBS, I'd flame the shit out of him, assuming his fucking ass wasn't banned on the spot. And I'd take any infraction as a badge of honor. This guy is a pure, humanoid piece of trash. Reviewer Tim Lynch was said Darheel was one of the few characters in Star Trek he'd like to take a swing at.

"I ADMIT EVERYTHING!!! I WAS THE BEST AT WHAT I DID!!!"

That's probably the point where, if I didn't already know what happens, I'd start to suspect something was up. He's too over-the-top and brazen about it. Another example of a similar situation is in "The Conscience of the King" from TOS, when Kirk wanted to see if who he was investigating was Kodos. Kodos was subdued and doing his best to live in denial and to not be found out.

When Kira said of the Bajorans, "We were a peaceful people. We didn't know why you had to be so brutal." That really stuck out to me. I think the Cardassians were brutal because they could be. No other reason. They wanted to demoralize the Bajorans as much as possible. And the more the Bajorans wanted to resist, the more the Cardassians wanted to demoralize them. Humiliate them. Torture them. Kill them. If worst came to worst, exterminate them.

"You can never undo what I've done! The dead will still be dead!"

Pretty crazy. But with all the bluster, "Darheel" lets something slip that he wouldn't know by mentioning the Shakaar resistance unit that Kira was part of.

.
.
.

That space is meant for a breather. And you can see Kira in Odo's office camera panning around her. The camera, Kira, and I are all like, "Wow! We need a breather." The audience needs a breather too.

Kira tells Odo everything about what "Darheel" said. Odo says Kira shouldn't tell him any personal information. Kira says she didn't. Then that's when Odo asks how Darheel could've known about Shakaar's resistance unit. This is when he becomes suspicious. That's when Kira goes to continue the interrogation. And now we're in for Round 2!

.
.
.

"Darheel" starts asking Kira questions. While we see the survivors of Gallitep waiting at Odo's office. All of them mutilated. Just seeing how they look conveys what the Cardassians did better than any dialogue ever could.

Then Odo asks Dukat about Darheel and Dukat says he's dead. He insists it. Before Odo asks Dukat, we how slimy Dukat is when he lies about missing Odo and exaggerates about the past. It's really painting a picture that Cardassians lie. So Odo asks for proof that Darheel is dead, and that's when Dukat grants Odo access to restricted files.

When we cut back to Kira and "Darheel", "Darheel" asks point-blank, "How many Cardasssians did you kill?!" Kira says she regrets a lot of things, but she had no choice. "Darheel" tries to create a False Equivalency by saying he did what had to be done too. Kira counters back with, "Nothing justifies genocide." Then Darheel says, "What you call genocide, I call a day's work." That's when Odo comes in to ask to speak with Kira.

But "Darheel" has goaded Kira so much that I don't think she's interested in hearing he isn't Darheel. I predicted that before even seeing the next scenes and not remembering what happened. And there we are. Kira's resisting everything Sisko and Odo tell her. Then Bashir comes in with proof that someone else had themselves cosmetically altered to look like Darheel. That's when Kira finally believes it.

Then Kira sees "Darheel" and tells him he wasn't there when the accident that caused Calanora happened, and so he can't be Darheel. That's when he goes into denial and starts to get flustered. Kira says he's Marritza. He tries to deny it before breaking into tears feeling ashamed in his part of being at the camp and couldn't stand to hear the screams of the Bajorans.

More powerful acting from Harris Yullen, but in a different way now, where we see Marritza remorseful. He wants Cardassia to acknowledge his guilt by being executed.

It's a monumental moment for Kira when she tells Marritza, what wants is another murder (himself) and she won't allow the murder of another. Kira's grown. Even in this one episode alone.

When Marritza's let out of his cell, Kira tells him that if Cardassia is to change, it'll need people like him. Then that's when another Bajoran comes out and kills Marritza. This Bajoran doesn't care that he wasn't Darheel, only that he was a Cardassian. The End.

 

[Lord Garth]

Wow. "Duet" was gripping from start-to-finish. I need to take a break before going into "In the Hands of the Prophets", which I'll review the normal way, instead of in real time.

What can I say? "Duet" brings up all the horrible things that happened during the Occupation, shows some of the survivors of the camp, conveys how brutal things were, and it's like watching a movie about the aftermath of World War II.

I was so looking forward to this episode and it definitely delivered. It reminds me of what I told someone last year before I went to go see Oppenheimer, "I look forward to being depressed!"

The one thing I was thinking about earlier was that six year earlier, wouldn't the news have gotten out to the Bajorans that Darheel had died? But then I realized they wouldn't know. He was no longer on Bajor by that point, and it's not like the Cardassians would share that information with non-Cardassians, since they'd want to keep everything so classified. But that's only a very, very, very minor nitpick.

What do I give this episode? On a scale of 1 to 10, I'll give it an 11.

"Duet" was for DS9 what "City on the Edge of Forever" was for TOS and what "The Measure of a Man" was for TNG. Early, instant classics. And like those two other episodes, "Duet" truly stands the test of time.

 

[Lord Garth]

Coming back an hour later, after "Duet" has fully soaked in. I don't have it in me to do "In the Hands of the Prophets" right now, so I'll watch it tomorrow.

In the meantime, what did all of you think of "Duet"?

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Coming back an hour later, after "Duet" has fully soaked in. I don't have it in me to do "In the Hands of the Prophets" right now, so I'll watch it tomorrow.

In the meantime, what did all of you think of "Duet"?

When you have the time, watch the first season (or at least the first half thereof) of Outlander. There is an episode, The Garrison Commander, written by Ira Steven Behr, that has the same DNA as Duet. Behr helped Peter Allan Fields with the dialogue of Duet by spouting fascist slogans and phrases full throated for two days. The Garrison Commander has that same cruelty, but deeper and darker.

For reference, I've used the line about feeling clean in teaching to explain how easy it could be to dismiss Nazi violence.

 

[DonIago]

Coming back an hour later, after "Duet" has fully soaked in. I don't have it in me to do "In the Hands of the Prophets" right now, so I'll watch it tomorrow.

In the meantime, what did all of you think of "Duet"?

I don't have much to say about it. I'm an ethnic Jew whose grandparents fled the Nazis, so the parallels weren't at all lost on me. Harris Yulin's performance is amazing as it shifts from horrifying to heartbreaking. I'm not sure Nana Visitor quite keeps up, but I don't think she's really supposed to either. That this is a step in Kira's healing process, perhaps the first large step in that direction, goes without saying. I haven't seen the episode in a long time, but off the top of my head I can't think of anything I would change, nor am I sure anything could be changed without weakening it.

 

[Frontis]

Coming back an hour later, after "Duet" has fully soaked in. I don't have it in me to do "In the Hands of the Prophets" right now, so I'll watch it tomorrow.

In the meantime, what did all of you think of "Duet"?

It's one of my favorite Star Trek episodes at all.

 

[Lord Garth]

The one thing I forgot to do earlier was get back to Dukat. I'm surprised it took until the 19th episode for him to make his second appearance. I wonder why he wasn't in more of the season?

Moving on now to the next episode, which expands greatly on Bajor itself and the Bajorans.

"In the Hands of the Prophets"

Normally I'd feel bad for an episode that would have to follow up something like "Duet", but "In the Hands of the Prophets" was up to the challenge. You can't outdo "Duet", so "In the Hands of the Prophets" went in another direction instead. This episode tackles Religion vs. Science, Religious Extremism and, to quote Sisko, "It also teaches you politics."

Let's tackle Science vs. Religion first. It would've been very easy to have a one-sided argument. Keiko's right, Winn's wrong. But Sisko says there's room for all philosophies on the station. Vedek Winn thinks that teaching of the Wormhole Aliens as not The Prophets is blasphemous. She also says she won't be responsible for what would happen if it doesn't stop. Sounds like a mafia-level threat coming from a holy woman.

That takes us into Religious Extremism. Neela is willing to sabotage the Federation's efforts on Deep Space Nine and assassinate Vedek Bariel, so Winn can become the next Kai. All of this benefits Winn, none of it benefits Neela, who has a promising career and life, and even manages to a little too much on O'Brien's good side to point where Keiko has to keep O'Brien on his toes. But Winn corrupts Neela into thinking what she's doing, throwing her life away, is "the will of the Prophets" which in our world would translate into "the will of God."

Then there's politics. It's a very good thing they had Bariel in this episode. He represents the good in religion. The tranquility, the understanding, and to love. Winn is the opposite. She represents strife, misunderstanding, and hate. Sisko wants to befriend Bariel, but Bariel can't risk being seen as a friend of the "soulless" Federation and risk his becoming Kai. Until he finds it beneficial to formally be Sisko's friend and visit the station after Keiko's school is blown up. Then there's Neela's assassination attempt on Bariel, which we see in slow-motion, that Sisko stops, but Winn's connection can't be proven. That's the end of the episode, but I want to backtrack.

Immediately after the school is blown up, but before Bariel arrives and the assassination attempt on him, Winn gives a speech, then Sisko gives a speech. Sisko sums up the entire first season of the series. The Federation, as represented by Sisko, and the Bajorans, as represented by Kira, don't always see eye-to-eye and they get into some pretty huge arguments, but they don't see Sisko or the Federation as the enemy or "The Devil". Kira agrees at the end of the episode and says she doesn't see Sisko as the Devil. Sisko's glad they made some progress.

I don't think Kira ever saw Sisko as the Devil, but I do think she didn't want him there before and now she does. And that's where the real progress is.

DS9's first season didn't end on a cliffhanger like TNG's seasons did from "The Best of Both Worlds" onwards, but it didn't need to. The main conflict of the second season is already set up. Bajoran politics with Bariel on one side and Winn on the other. Some Bajorans welcome the Federation, others want them gone. Some respect Sisko as the Emissary, others don't. Meanwhile there are the Cardassians in the background. See you next season!

I give this episode a 10. Solid end to the season.

Only because I have a life and other things I want to do, I'm going to take a bit of a break before going into Season 2. But I did it! I made it through the first season. I hope, so far, my re-watching the show has gone the way you hopefully hoped it would.

 

[Lord Garth]

Some numbers:

"Emissary" --> 10 (counts twice)
"A Man Alone" --> 7
"Past Prologue" --> 8
"Babel" --> 6
"Captive Pursuit" --> 7
"Q-Less" --> 5
"Dax" --> 10
"The Passenger" --> 7
"Move Along Home" --> 7
"The Nagus" --> 10
"Vortex" --> 6
"Battle Lines" --> 8
"The Storyteller" --> 7
"Progress" --> 7
"If Wishes Were Horses" --> 7
"The Forsaken" --> 9
"Dramatis Personae" --> 8
"Duet" --> 11
"In the Hands of the Prophets" --> 10

Season Average: 8.0

 

[kkt]

Duet. Yulin and Visitor are perfect. The episode is only slightly diminished by being based on Robert Shaw's play The Man in the Glass Booth. Arguably the best episode of any Star Trek show, definitely on a short list of best hours of television. (Not bad for being a low-budget, end-of-season bottle show!)

 

[DonIago]

The one thing I forgot to do earlier was get back to Dukat. I'm surprised it took until the 19th episode for him to make his second appearance. I wonder why he wasn't in more of the season?

I think it's very possible that Dukat wasn't originally intended to play much of a role beyond the first episode. Consider that even his appearance in the first episode isn't particularly significant. I suspect if they'd known how important he'd become to the series they would have given him more to do.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

I think it's very possible that Dukat wasn't originally intended to play much of a role beyond the first episode. Consider that even his appearance in the first episode isn't particularly significant. I suspect if they'd known how important he'd become to the series they would have given him more to do.

Another actor had been cast as Dukat in the pilot, but it didn't work out. Marc Alaimo was the last minute replacement.