Done with the '80s, back to the '90s! As I type this in the '20s but not the Roaring '20s.
Picking up where I left off with reviewing the entire third season of DS9, but I prefer to keep everything on the same page of this thread, if not the same post, so cutting-and-pasting what I already typed, before continuing on.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - The Entire Third Season
Raw numbers aside, I think the third season pushed DS9 forward in all areas but with only one drawback, which I'll get to later.
With the Dominion being a force in the Gamma Quadrant, it gives us something tangible, so we have some sense of the order over there. The Ferengi are people the Dominion can deal with through trade. The Klingons are people they want to fight. The Romulans and Cardassians are peoples they can take advantage of. The Federation is the real threat. The Federation was who they threatened at the end of last season. So, to paraphrase Ira Steven Behr, "You can't defend the station and the Wormhole with just three Runabouts!" I thought the Defiant was a necessary addition to the series. They needed something with serious firepower, and it makes sense that Starfleet would send DS9 a ship that was designed to fight the Borg, and Sisko has that personal connection since he designed the ship, which also reinforces the idea that his character is a builder. He can't use the Defiant to stop his wife from being lost to the Borg, but he can use the Defiant to stop everything he's helped build up on DS9 from being lost.
This third season was very much a Sisko season. To quote Dax, "After Jennifer died, I never thought I'd ever see you so passionate about anything again." Sisko got out of the funk he was in by the end of "Emissary", but he wasn't truly reenergized until the third season. Technically, we see the beginnings of Sisko getting the fire back late in the second season during "The Maquis", ("Do you know what the problem is? The problem is Earth!") but now it's back in full force during the third season. I'd even say vocalizing "the problem is Earth" during "The Maquis, Part II" is what led Sisko to finally realize by "The Search, Part I" that Earth wasn't home anymore. Deep Space Nine was home. Bajor was home.
After "The Search", Sisko gets to take charge and keep history on-track in "Past Tense", he builds a replica of an ancient Bajoran ship in "Explorers", meets the MIrror Universe version of Jennifer in "Through the Looking Glass" before starting a relationship with Kassidy Yates in "Family Business", so it's like looking back (in a strange sense) before moving forward, and he's finally promoted to Captain in "The Adversary" after finally having the idea teased all season. Kai Winn also acts as if she accepts Sisko as The Emissary for her own political advantage. So, Sisko is more valued by Bajor, Sisko is more valued by Starfleet, he has strengthened purpose, and he's building his life up again, including one now with Kassidy. It's safe to Sisko has had more growth this season than either of the previous two. Combined. And, on top of that, he grew the goatee and a fourth pip.
This is where I left off before. To quote Majel Barrett, "And now the continuation."
Of course, Sisko wasn't the only character to have a big season this season, so let's look at Odo. I think he had quite a bit of development in the previous season with "Necessary Evil" where we saw his Origin Story and "The Alternate" when we were introduced to the scientist who first discovered Odo, but those were all situations looking back at Odo's past. Like with Sisko, the third season pushed Odo forward really fast. It used to be a mystery where Odo would be from and, when the series started, I figured we'd never find out about who Odo's people are until the end. Introducing Odo's people at the beginning of this season and making them the leaders of the Dominion, of all things, makes nature of them more personal in scale. These are Odo's people. And because Odo doesn't completely despise and distrust solids, that makes him as much of an outsider among the Founders as it makes him an outsider to people of Deep Space Nine. And now it puts a bigger target on Odo's back because, before, bigots used to hate him just because he was a shape-shifter but now they can pretend they're justified by claiming he's the enemy. Only adding to it is Starfleet not fully trusting Odo at best and questioning his competence at worst.
Assigning Eddington to Deep Space Nine turned out to be rubbing salt onto a wound. In the third season, Eddington represents Starfleet's distrust of Odo. He also represents how different the crew of Deep Space Nine is from Eddington, who represents normal Starfleet (or so they think). He says he wants to make friends, but there's always an uneasy feeling with him around, even without knowing what's to come. The most obvious examples of this, outside of "The Search", are when he becomes a major speed bump to Sisko's plans in "The Die Is Cast" and when everyone accepts a little too easily that he might be a Changeling in "The Adversary".
Circling back to Odo, there were other highlights for him this season as well. Trying and failing to help a young Jem'Hadar become a better person in "The Abandoned", which is completely new territory for Odo that couldn't have been done before the third season. Then admitting his love for Kira in "Heart of Stone", even though it wasn't really Kira, so the only person who knows is the Female Changeling.
Switching gears to Kira. It must've been her worst nightmare seeing herself as a Cardassian in "Second Skin". It was too bad she lost Bariel, but I think the series was better off with Bariel dying. Not because I don't like the character, but because he has no backbone to stand up to Kai Winn. Shakaar, on the other hand, is someone who'll stand up to Kai Winn. I'm glad they didn't take the easy way out and have Kira and Odo become a romantic couple. Odo might love Kira, but Kira only sees Odo as a friend. Especially at this point.
Who else had a big season this season?
Jake did a lot of growing up. He had a girlfriend earlier in the season, a dabo girl, even though she didn't last. He was accepted into Pennington. He's set on a path of becoming a writer. And he got his father hooked up with Kassidy Yates.
At first everyone thought Nog was joking when he said he wanted to join Starfleet Academy, then they realized he was serious. He explained to Sisko why he wanted to join and how he wanted to be able to meet his true potential, unlike his father who never got a chance to. Then, when Quark tried to sabotage Nog's efforts to be admitted, Rom stood up to Quark and fought for his son to join Starfleet. Nog and Rom both had took huge steps forward.
Jadzia Dax had a chance to interact with all her previous hosts, including the newly discovered Joran, and she finally got to stand up to Curzon Dax and confront him about why he really rejected her at first.
O'Brien is O'Brien. Glad to see Keiko be a botanist again.
Bashir gets to meet the Valedictorian of his class to see what she ended up doing. He turned 30 as well, but hitting the Big 3-0 doesn't really change anything. It's just a time-marker.
Quark is contacting me from 1950 to let me know he's shocked he has to think of Ferengi women, including his mother, as having any type of mind for business. On second thought, 1950 is too kind. More like 1850.
Nice to see more and more of Garak as well!
That's the characters. Onto the greater Star Trek Universe. One of the benefits of TNG ending was everything related to the Alpha Quadrant becoming DS9's jurisdiction. Seeing the Romulans in DS9 was huge. Instead of being Cold War enemies like in TOS and TNG, here they're nominally partners of convenience while Starfleet gains more intelligence on the Dominion. Just by making an appearance, Gowron shows that Klingon Politics will become a presence on DS9. Driven home at the end of the season when the Dying Changeling tells Odo that the only two peoples standing in the way of the Dominion taking over the Alpha Quadrant are the Federation and the Klingons.
The only thing that irked me a little bit about the third season was how the vast majority of the progress made between the Bajorans and the Cardassians happened off-screen and was summed up by Bariel toward the beginning of "Life Support". I was worried that with his death, Kira would be the only opposition to Kai Winn going forward, which is why I'm glad Shakaar was introduced.
That's all I really have to say about the third season! Looking forward to the fourth season in less than a week! Originally, I was going to watch key TNG episodes with Worf before this, but I've changed my mind. Between the re-watch I did in 2019 and the re-watches (plural) I've done by watching YouTubers react to TNG, I've seen those episodes enough times. Besides, anything relevant from those episodes that I have to say, I'll bring up during my review of "The Way of the Warrior".
It's going to be great to finally watch "The Way of the Warrior" on my projector!
Picking up where I left off with reviewing the entire third season of DS9, but I prefer to keep everything on the same page of this thread, if not the same post, so cutting-and-pasting what I already typed, before continuing on.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - The Entire Third Season
Raw numbers aside, I think the third season pushed DS9 forward in all areas but with only one drawback, which I'll get to later.
With the Dominion being a force in the Gamma Quadrant, it gives us something tangible, so we have some sense of the order over there. The Ferengi are people the Dominion can deal with through trade. The Klingons are people they want to fight. The Romulans and Cardassians are peoples they can take advantage of. The Federation is the real threat. The Federation was who they threatened at the end of last season. So, to paraphrase Ira Steven Behr, "You can't defend the station and the Wormhole with just three Runabouts!" I thought the Defiant was a necessary addition to the series. They needed something with serious firepower, and it makes sense that Starfleet would send DS9 a ship that was designed to fight the Borg, and Sisko has that personal connection since he designed the ship, which also reinforces the idea that his character is a builder. He can't use the Defiant to stop his wife from being lost to the Borg, but he can use the Defiant to stop everything he's helped build up on DS9 from being lost.
This third season was very much a Sisko season. To quote Dax, "After Jennifer died, I never thought I'd ever see you so passionate about anything again." Sisko got out of the funk he was in by the end of "Emissary", but he wasn't truly reenergized until the third season. Technically, we see the beginnings of Sisko getting the fire back late in the second season during "The Maquis", ("Do you know what the problem is? The problem is Earth!") but now it's back in full force during the third season. I'd even say vocalizing "the problem is Earth" during "The Maquis, Part II" is what led Sisko to finally realize by "The Search, Part I" that Earth wasn't home anymore. Deep Space Nine was home. Bajor was home.
After "The Search", Sisko gets to take charge and keep history on-track in "Past Tense", he builds a replica of an ancient Bajoran ship in "Explorers", meets the MIrror Universe version of Jennifer in "Through the Looking Glass" before starting a relationship with Kassidy Yates in "Family Business", so it's like looking back (in a strange sense) before moving forward, and he's finally promoted to Captain in "The Adversary" after finally having the idea teased all season. Kai Winn also acts as if she accepts Sisko as The Emissary for her own political advantage. So, Sisko is more valued by Bajor, Sisko is more valued by Starfleet, he has strengthened purpose, and he's building his life up again, including one now with Kassidy. It's safe to Sisko has had more growth this season than either of the previous two. Combined. And, on top of that, he grew the goatee and a fourth pip.
This is where I left off before. To quote Majel Barrett, "And now the continuation."
Of course, Sisko wasn't the only character to have a big season this season, so let's look at Odo. I think he had quite a bit of development in the previous season with "Necessary Evil" where we saw his Origin Story and "The Alternate" when we were introduced to the scientist who first discovered Odo, but those were all situations looking back at Odo's past. Like with Sisko, the third season pushed Odo forward really fast. It used to be a mystery where Odo would be from and, when the series started, I figured we'd never find out about who Odo's people are until the end. Introducing Odo's people at the beginning of this season and making them the leaders of the Dominion, of all things, makes nature of them more personal in scale. These are Odo's people. And because Odo doesn't completely despise and distrust solids, that makes him as much of an outsider among the Founders as it makes him an outsider to people of Deep Space Nine. And now it puts a bigger target on Odo's back because, before, bigots used to hate him just because he was a shape-shifter but now they can pretend they're justified by claiming he's the enemy. Only adding to it is Starfleet not fully trusting Odo at best and questioning his competence at worst.
Assigning Eddington to Deep Space Nine turned out to be rubbing salt onto a wound. In the third season, Eddington represents Starfleet's distrust of Odo. He also represents how different the crew of Deep Space Nine is from Eddington, who represents normal Starfleet (or so they think). He says he wants to make friends, but there's always an uneasy feeling with him around, even without knowing what's to come. The most obvious examples of this, outside of "The Search", are when he becomes a major speed bump to Sisko's plans in "The Die Is Cast" and when everyone accepts a little too easily that he might be a Changeling in "The Adversary".
Circling back to Odo, there were other highlights for him this season as well. Trying and failing to help a young Jem'Hadar become a better person in "The Abandoned", which is completely new territory for Odo that couldn't have been done before the third season. Then admitting his love for Kira in "Heart of Stone", even though it wasn't really Kira, so the only person who knows is the Female Changeling.
Switching gears to Kira. It must've been her worst nightmare seeing herself as a Cardassian in "Second Skin". It was too bad she lost Bariel, but I think the series was better off with Bariel dying. Not because I don't like the character, but because he has no backbone to stand up to Kai Winn. Shakaar, on the other hand, is someone who'll stand up to Kai Winn. I'm glad they didn't take the easy way out and have Kira and Odo become a romantic couple. Odo might love Kira, but Kira only sees Odo as a friend. Especially at this point.
Who else had a big season this season?
Jake did a lot of growing up. He had a girlfriend earlier in the season, a dabo girl, even though she didn't last. He was accepted into Pennington. He's set on a path of becoming a writer. And he got his father hooked up with Kassidy Yates.
At first everyone thought Nog was joking when he said he wanted to join Starfleet Academy, then they realized he was serious. He explained to Sisko why he wanted to join and how he wanted to be able to meet his true potential, unlike his father who never got a chance to. Then, when Quark tried to sabotage Nog's efforts to be admitted, Rom stood up to Quark and fought for his son to join Starfleet. Nog and Rom both had took huge steps forward.
Jadzia Dax had a chance to interact with all her previous hosts, including the newly discovered Joran, and she finally got to stand up to Curzon Dax and confront him about why he really rejected her at first.
O'Brien is O'Brien. Glad to see Keiko be a botanist again.
Bashir gets to meet the Valedictorian of his class to see what she ended up doing. He turned 30 as well, but hitting the Big 3-0 doesn't really change anything. It's just a time-marker.
Quark is contacting me from 1950 to let me know he's shocked he has to think of Ferengi women, including his mother, as having any type of mind for business. On second thought, 1950 is too kind. More like 1850.
Nice to see more and more of Garak as well!
That's the characters. Onto the greater Star Trek Universe. One of the benefits of TNG ending was everything related to the Alpha Quadrant becoming DS9's jurisdiction. Seeing the Romulans in DS9 was huge. Instead of being Cold War enemies like in TOS and TNG, here they're nominally partners of convenience while Starfleet gains more intelligence on the Dominion. Just by making an appearance, Gowron shows that Klingon Politics will become a presence on DS9. Driven home at the end of the season when the Dying Changeling tells Odo that the only two peoples standing in the way of the Dominion taking over the Alpha Quadrant are the Federation and the Klingons.
The only thing that irked me a little bit about the third season was how the vast majority of the progress made between the Bajorans and the Cardassians happened off-screen and was summed up by Bariel toward the beginning of "Life Support". I was worried that with his death, Kira would be the only opposition to Kai Winn going forward, which is why I'm glad Shakaar was introduced.
That's all I really have to say about the third season! Looking forward to the fourth season in less than a week! Originally, I was going to watch key TNG episodes with Worf before this, but I've changed my mind. Between the re-watch I did in 2019 and the re-watches (plural) I've done by watching YouTubers react to TNG, I've seen those episodes enough times. Besides, anything relevant from those episodes that I have to say, I'll bring up during my review of "The Way of the Warrior".
It's going to be great to finally watch "The Way of the Warrior" on my projector!
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