Revisiting DS9...

[ClayHefner]

Isn't one of the beautiful things about "Trials..." that it successfully managed to boldly fit TOS-as seen in the 60s- in with the post-TOS universe? ("Relics" also comes to mind).

Plus retroctively made the ridged Klingons *somehow* fit in perfectly with the TOS Klingons because we now knew that, at some time, for some time, *something* happened to the Klingons.

Not quite as elegant as the "different tribes" approach, but perhaps the next best thing.
I think the STVI Klingons' appearance makes little sense (unless you accept ENT's idea and they slowly recovered from the virus). Like your idea, it would suggest that either what we saw on TOS is not what really happened in that universe, or that those bumps were already there in TOS, but we somehow didn't spot them.

 

[Warped9]

Plus retroctively made the ridged Klingons *somehow* fit in perfectly with the TOS Klingons because we now knew that, at some time, for some time, *something* happened to the Klingons.

I hated ENT's bullshit "explanation." But since I ignore ENT anyway I don't dwell on it. As far as I'm concerned there are simply different races of Klingons just as there are different races of humans.

 

[MacLeod]

"Emissary" ****


There is what I think a rather big moment when O'Brien manages to establish a subspace field around the station and moves it across some great distance to get near the mouth of the wormhole. Hello, it's a space station! It's not supposed to be able to go anywhere!

Well to be fair, you would expect it to have some sort of thrusters in case it needed to adjust it's orbit. And the move almost tore the station apart initally.

 

[Warped9]

^^ What's really stupid about it is that the Denorios asteroid belt is still within the Bajoran star system and therefore by default is in Bajoran space. Hence Bajor already has a legitimate claim on the celestial wormhole. Therefore moving the station was totally meaningless. At best all it was was symbolic.

 

[Rom's Sehlat]

I thought it was to provide a military presence there to fire upon opposing ships?

 

[Warped9]

I thought it was to provide a military presence there to fire upon opposing ships?

If so then it was purely symbolic because at that point (as shown in the episode) the station had no way to defend itself or enforce Bajoran territorial rights.

 

[Canadave]

I thought it was to provide a military presence there to fire upon opposing ships?

That's the impression I got, yeah. A joint Starfleet\Bajoran military presence there makes it impossible for the Cardassians to waltz back in and claim they never really felt like leaving Bajor in the first place. Yeah, Kira had to bluff to pull it off, but the idea is still sound.

 

[startrekwatcher]

Far Beyond the Stars is one of the most overrated episodes ever-3 stars.

I didn't like the contrived way they went about to tell the story by shoehorning the stress of the war's toll on Sisko and the Prophets to tell a story about 1950s sff writers. It was out of place. I also thought there was some terrible overacting by Brooks.

 

[Warped9]

“A Man Alone” ***

Security Constable Odo finds himself the only possible suspect in the murder of a criminal he once sent to prison.

There are some okay moments to this as well as some fluff. Frankly, and I know it's still early goings, but Dax and Bashir just bore me.

The murder investigation itself seems to drag to get to the resolution, and Bashir should have been able to figure out something of what was going on before having to wait for his cellular samples or whatever to grow in the tank. It also would have mad emore sense if the Bajoran egging on the civilians against Odo had actually been someone who had been previously associated with Ibudan. Their behaviour after Odo has been around for so long would have made more sense.

On the plus side there is very much a western frontier feel to this story which I'm sure was intentional. But in the end the story is nothing special in itself.

One thing I couldn't help but notice, and I noticed this on TNG as well and it has nothing to do with the story, is the way datapads are used in contemporary Trek. At the time the datapads as shown must have seen advanced, but in light of even the first computer tablets we now have the Trek datapads seem quaint. Today you can already do so many things and store so much information on a tablet as well as the incredible connectivity of the devices (and it's only going to get better) there is no need for a separate tablet for different files or different functions as they do in Trek. This is one instance where it took about twenty years for reality to outpace the fiction.

 

[startrekwatcher]

I agree with everything you said about A Man Alone and the scrore. It is a decent not great episode--I did like the reveal that the murder victinm was his clone--a very neat sci-fi spin and in keeping with Trek values of appreciating all life he ends up being arrested for killing his own clone.

It is interesting watching these early DS9 episodes--the acting from everybody wasn't that great and I hated Odo's make-up at this stage. Thankfully this episode didn't have a TNG crossover--as much as I love TNG I absolutly hated the crossovers and namedropping. I never warmed up to Terry Farrell or Jadzia and never cared for the Bashir macking on Jadzia subplot.

 

[GNDN]

It also would have made more sense if the Bajoran egging on the civilians against Odo had actually been someone who had been previously associated with Ibudan. Their behaviour after Odo has been around for so long would have made more sense.

I can understand even disinterested Bajorans being leery of Odo. Although considered to be fair-minded by most, Odo was Security Chief of the station under Cardassian. To many Bajorans he could still represent the old regime and occupying force which had departed only weeks or even days before these events. So when it comes to siding with a Cardassian-killing Bajoran versus Odo, who had worked side-by-side with the Cardassians, I firmly believe that many Bajorans would choose the former.

The gang mentality here is in no way nuanced, but they did attempt to use proper channels, consulting with Sisko to have Odo removed from the case before resorting to violence.

 

[Ubik]

I wasn't able to watch the next episode "A Man Alone" yet (long story) so I moved onto the next one for now.


"Past Prologue" ***

A former comrade-in-arms makes Kira question her loyaties.

Considering the setup in "Emissary" there's a decent and relevant story to be told here. And it's actually good in some places. Kira really hasn't got a handle on Sisko yet. But there are some moments that I'm not crazy about.

I know Garak is popular, but I find his portrayal here just a little too broad and nearing something of over-the-top territory---nuance is definately not his thing. Additionally Bashir still comes across as something of a naive and immature goof. Introduced into the mix are two of TNG's more comic opera characters in Lursa and B'tor and you have too many eye-rolling moments.

So this is okay, but a bit disappointing after a good pilot startup.

I believe that, with Garak, you're missing the point a bit here. The broadness of his performance during those scenes with Bashir are a deliberate tactic on Garak's part. Garak is not only putting on a performance for Bashir's benefit, but he wants to emphasize to Bashir that he's putting on a performance. He wants Bashir to think he is a spy pretending to be an innocent tailor. And for that to work, he actively wants Bashir to "see through" the act of being an innocent tailor so Bashir will think he's really a spy. Of course, Garak may not really be a spy either. He may only be an innocent tailor pretending to be a spy whose pretending to be an innocent tailor. Or he may be something else entirely, pretending to be a spy whose pretending to be an innocent tailor. You see? Either way, for Garak's game with Bashir to work, his act of being an innocent tailor needs to be deliberately broad and over-the-top, a bad performance essentially, so that Bashir can "see right through it" and decide that Garak is a spy, which is exactly what Garak wants. What Garak is beneath all that, well...that's what Garak is trying to hide, three layers down.

My point is, Garak doesn't lack nuance at all. He's got maybe too much nuance, but certainly not a lack of it.

 

[Warped9]

^^ I disagree. At this point it looks amateurish or as if they're playing to a juvenile audience and Bashir acts way too dense to be credible. None of the other actors are doing it. I really feel it's a case of not being settled into the characters yet as the show is still very new.

And later Bashir acts like a teenager when he tries to tell Sisko.

To me it comes across in a similar fashion as when some of the TNG cast struggled early on.

 

[Ubik]

^^ I disagree. At this point it looks amateurish or as if they're playing to a juvenile audience and Bashir acts way too dense to be credible. None of the other actors are doing. I really feel it's a case of not being settled into the characters yet as the show is still very new.

And later Bashir acts like a teenager when he tries to tell Sisko.

To me it comes across in a similar fashion as when some of the TNG cast struggled early on.

Oh, I don't disagree about Bashir - he's frankly awful for the first season or two, until, as I said, the writers and actor fixed him, and made him awesome.

But the actor playing Garak, I submit, knows precisely what he's doing.

 

[Distorted Humor]

Bashir is annoying in the first bits, but he gets a lot better over time.

 

[Yassim]

It also would have made more sense if the Bajoran egging on the civilians against Odo had actually been someone who had been previously associated with Ibudan. Their behaviour after Odo has been around for so long would have made more sense.

I can understand even disinterested Bajorans being leery of Odo. Although considered to be fair-minded by most, Odo was Security Chief of the station under Cardassian. To many Bajorans he could still represent the old regime and occupying force which had departed only weeks or even days before these events....

Which made it very odd that this came up only in this episode, and never again. There was never any friction again on anyone's part about Odo having worked with the Cardassians ever again.

Imagine a Nazi-occupied France allowing the Nazi Chief of Police to stay in his position after the war. It's just bizarre how it got papered over on the show.

They poke at it later with "Things Past" and "Necessary Evil" but never really believably address it.

 

[Warped9]

“Babel” **

A dormant Bajoran device releases an incapacitating virus aboard the station.

This is competent, but ultimately unengaging. Part of the problem is that while an aphasia virus is conceptually interesting the way it manifests itself doesn't come across as particularly menacing. Yes, it could incapacitate a large number of people rather quickly, but the jeopardy isn't really apparent here. There's no real sense of escalating tension in this story until the last few moments and then I wasn't really that interested. This is a bottle show where there is no threat from the outside to complicate matters and thus lacks yet another layer of tension.

There was a conceptually interesting story idea here, but they don't pull it off well enough.

While I remember these episodes I'm still a little disappointed that what I remember hasn't been challenged and nothing has yet matched the goodness of the pilot episode. Hopefully soon.

 

[Distorted Humor]

While I remember these episodes I'm still a little disappointed that what I remember hasn't been challenged and nothing has yet matched the goodness of the pilot episode. Hopefully soon.

well the next one will at least give it a shot...

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

Welcome to DS9!

One thing I couldn't help but notice, and I noticed this on TNG as well and it has nothing to do with the story, is the way datapads are used in contemporary Trek. At the time the datapads as shown must have seen advanced, but in light of even the first computer tablets we now have the Trek datapads seem quaint. Today you can already do so many things and store so much information on a tablet as well as the incredible connectivity of the devices (and it's only going to get better) there is no need for a separate tablet for different files or different functions as they do in Trek. This is one instance where it took about twenty years for reality to outpace the fiction.

The one case where I could see having multiple padds at the same time--though through modern eyes a larger tablet would be the best of both worlds (I THINK we might actually see a tablet once on DS9, but I can't remember for sure)--would be for side-by-side comparison of two documents, which doesn't work so well on a small screen.

That said, you're certainly right about the apparent limitations of Trek padds.

(But hey...one of the great things about fanfics is that I can try to fix stuff like that. )

Bashir is annoying in the first bits, but he gets a lot better over time.

Oh, he's not just annoying at first...he's a jerk. But you're right, he definitely improved.

But there are a few Siddig El Fadil overacting moments that are cringeworthy in this part of the show. Just you wait, Warped.

As for Jadzia Dax...I wonder, after you see where her character ends up, if you'll want the old Dax back...

 

[DonIago]

I'm not sure about the Trek padds criticisms...I certainly agree that one reason for multiple padds is it can be easier to compare two documents side-by-side, but I also wonder how much of it is the false analogy of the cellphone to a communicator, where a communicator has capabilities cellphones simply don't possess at this time. While padds are certainly used in manners analogous to modern tablets the majority of the time, I don't think we receive a lot of insight into their full potential.