Not many people seem to like this episode, but I actually did. Of course, there's the continuity issue of the Alliance already having cloaking tech since they had ships with the ability in "Through the Looking Glass", but that could easily be worked around. They key contributing factor was that unlike what we saw in TOS's "The Enterprise Incident", in the savage universe, there was no Klingon/Romulan alliance in the 23rd century. It was most likely around the time the rebellion started that the Cardassians and Klingons began developing their own cloaking tech which wasn't really that sophisticated at the time. Once Smiley built their Defiant, he was able to modify the sensors to much better detect cloaked ships. A quick tie-in to the weapons array, and the majority of enemy ships could be destroyed with just one shot to a vulnerable area (like what was seen in ST: Generations). As a result, the Alliance was force to scrap the cloak until they could better develop (or in this case, steal) it.
The reviewer does seem to oversensationalize the potential lesbianism here. I would have preferred it if the evil Kira finally paid the price for her crimes (at least the alternate Garak does). Sometimes I wonder if she hooked up with the alternate Gul Dukat and then killed him to get her post on Terok Nor. Unlike our Kira, she would resort to that, or any tactic, to get what she wants even if it was beneath her. And with any Dukat, he's as beneath as they come.
