Starting the Journey of Ds9 Again!
- Thread starter Danoz
- Start date
. Consider this my thread for comments as I roll through the series again.
TNG is the one I know best... but that's because I've seen those episodes more times than I can even count.
I started it from the beginning a few weeks ago, with 'The Forsaken' next up. I have to say the first season is generally much better than I thought it was. There are a few episodes that have an incongruous reliance on technobabble (the whole last third of 'If Wishes Were Horses'), but that makes me appreciate how quickly they grew out of it. That one aside, only 'Move Along Home' and 'The Storyteller' haven't worked. 'The Passenger' and 'Vortex' were episodes that I barely remembered, but were surprisingly good.
I just started on season 3 for the first time, and so far it's showing some real promise.
*spoiler alert*
The Spirit was definitely a prolific start. Odo finally finds the answer he has seeking his entire life as to his origins, and comes away dissapointed knowing his own people lead the dominion. Definitely a great episode for the characterization of Odo, one of my show's favorite characters.
House of Quark was definitely a nice episode as well. Quark shows the crippling faults of Cling-On honor when he chooses to show no opposition to a Cling-On he's supposed to fight to the death. We can clearly see that Quark's scheming nature not only feeds his avarious nature, but also allows him to slyly maneuver out of difficult situations, and in this case, actually help someone.
Equilibrium gets a lot of points for its ending, when it's discovered by Sisco & co that about 1/2 of trills can successfully host simbiants. Definitely a lot of thematically interesting concepts there concerning what our own society might possibly conceal from us, and their justification for it.
In Second Skin, Kira gets to experience being surgically altered as a Kardasian, the very race she despises. Plenty of great things going on here: personal conflict, identity crisis, and by the end Kira comes to respect Kardasians a little more (or at least the dissident father of Ilyana). On top of that, we can see the internal political conflict between the Obsidian Order and the central government, a theme that is later explored in greater detail.
The Abandoned- Again, a lot to appreciate here. Odo now has personal quarters instead of a bucket so he can experiment more with his amorphous properties, which shows that despite the deception he had from seeing what his people truly were, he did reap some positive experiences from it. The relationship between Odo and the hunter (forgot the name of his race) is interesting for obvious reasons, though I'm not fully satisfied that the hunter cannot resist his genetically programmed nature. The B-plot consists of gaining respect for Jake dating a dobble girl (presmably those are hookers), which is cute I guess.
Civil Defense- A total masterpiece. The concept of the station turning against its own crew is fascinating to me, especially when the station was essentially tricked into thinking it was still a flying concentration camp. What really makes the episode though, is when Gal Dukat seizes this opportunity. We finally get to see Gal Dukat's sinister intentions emerge, whereas he is usually helping Sisko keep the treaty in tact, which almost makes him seem like a good guy. At last Dukat has shown himself to be as interesting a personality as Garik, and I couldn't help but laugh when his defensive precautions caused the ship to turn against him, fulfilling Garik's criticism of Dukat's short sightedness.
Meridian- As other board members have insisted, this episode never happened.
Defiant- I didn't particularly like this episode either. I just don't buy that Reiker's brother/clone/wtv would join the Maquis, and he seems out of character the entirety of the episode. Perhaps seeing more of TNG would give me greater insight into Tom, though for now I haven't found anything too memorable here.
Fascination- The whole "love is in the air" concept has been done before in TNG (and apparently in TOS), though the B plot between O'Brien and his wife was interesting. The only overly memorable part about the episode was the exploration of how our subconsious thoughts are better left hidden from others.
Haven't watched Tense yet, though it seems to be yet another temporal anomaly thrusting someone into another time frame concept that Star Trek has done a million times over, so I'm not expecting too much. Hopefully season 3 will pick up from these 2-3 bad episodes in a row.
*spoiler alert*
The Spirit was definitely a prolific start. Odo finally finds the answer he has seeking his entire life as to his origins, and comes away dissapointed knowing his own people lead the dominion. Definitely a great episode for the characterization of Odo, one of my show's favorite characters.
House of Quark was definitely a nice episode as well. Quark shows the crippling faults of Cling-On honor when he chooses to show no opposition to a Cling-On he's supposed to fight to the death. We can clearly see that Quark's scheming nature not only feeds his avarious nature, but also allows him to slyly maneuver out of difficult situations, and in this case, actually help someone.
Equilibrium gets a lot of points for its ending, when it's discovered by Sisco & co that about 1/2 of trills can successfully host simbiants. Definitely a lot of thematically interesting concepts there concerning what our own society might possibly conceal from us, and their justification for it.
In Second Skin, Kira gets to experience being surgically altered as a Kardasian, the very race she despises. Plenty of great things going on here: personal conflict, identity crisis, and by the end Kira comes to respect Kardasians a little more (or at least the dissident father of Ilyana). On top of that, we can see the internal political conflict between the Obsidian Order and the central government, a theme that is later explored in greater detail.
The Abandoned- Again, a lot to appreciate here. Odo now has personal quarters instead of a bucket so he can experiment more with his amorphous properties, which shows that despite the deception he had from seeing what his people truly were, he did reap some positive experiences from it. The relationship between Odo and the hunter (forgot the name of his race) is interesting for obvious reasons, though I'm not fully satisfied that the hunter cannot resist his genetically programmed nature. The B-plot consists of gaining respect for Jake dating a dobble girl (presmably those are hookers), which is cute I guess.
Civil Defense- A total masterpiece. The concept of the station turning against its own crew is fascinating to me, especially when the station was essentially tricked into thinking it was still a flying concentration camp. What really makes the episode though, is when Gal Dukat seizes this opportunity. We finally get to see Gal Dukat's sinister intentions emerge, whereas he is usually helping Sisko keep the treaty in tact, which almost makes him seem like a good guy. At last Dukat has shown himself to be as interesting a personality as Garik, and I couldn't help but laugh when his defensive precautions caused the ship to turn against him, fulfilling Garik's criticism of Dukat's short sightedness.
Meridian- As other board members have insisted, this episode never happened.
Defiant- I didn't particularly like this episode either. I just don't buy that Reiker's brother/clone/wtv would join the Maquis, and he seems out of character the entirety of the episode. Perhaps seeing more of TNG would give me greater insight into Tom, though for now I haven't found anything too memorable here.
Fascination- The whole "love is in the air" concept has been done before in TNG (and apparently in TOS), though the B plot between O'Brien and his wife was interesting. The only overly memorable part about the episode was the exploration of how our subconsious thoughts are better left hidden from others.
Haven't watched Tense yet, though it seems to be yet another temporal anomaly thrusting someone into another time frame concept that Star Trek has done a million times over, so I'm not expecting too much. Hopefully season 3 will pick up from these 2-3 bad episodes in a row.
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Wow...lots of people deciding to rewatch DS9 lately.
I really want to myself. The more I read these review threads, the more I miss the show.
I really want to myself. The more I read these review threads, the more I miss the show.
Nice reviews, V...I agree with what you said about those episodes, although I like "Fascination" more than you and most people here it seems. You remind me of how much I liked that season. I think it was the first one that I found really consistent. "Meridian" and "Past Tense" are some of the only episodes in it that I found unbearable. I think that's the season that really got me on board with the show after I hated much of season 1 and found season 2 hit and miss most of the time.
P.S. Some nitpicks - The opener is called "The Search". I'm tempted to correct your spelling of Worf's race, but I wonder if you spelled it that way on purpose for comedy.
P.S. Some nitpicks - The opener is called "The Search". I'm tempted to correct your spelling of Worf's race, but I wonder if you spelled it that way on purpose for comedy.
I'm not a fan of the Tomas Riker plot because Jonathan Frakes seemed out of place on DS9, but I do love the scenes in this episode between Sisko and Dukat on Cardassia. You get to see a new side of Dukat when he talks about his son's birthday, and we get to see Cardassian politics in action and how the Obsidian Order fits into their military structure.
And don't forget about those ships that the Order had secretly been building, they'll play a big role soon enough.
I have recently rewatched seasons 4 through 6 on YouTube -- there's a user who's uploaded nearly all the eps -- and am now watching Season 7, which he/she just began uploading. I just finished rewatching Take Me Out To The Holosuite, and I forgot how much fun it was. I love it when Odo throws Sisko out of the baseball game, then his arrogant Vulcan rival, Solok! -- RR
I would love to rewatch the series, but it is time consumming and and I just can't right now. 
I have considered DS9 my favorite series because it is the only Star Trek series I have actually seen straight through as it originally aired, and I think it has the best story arc and characterizations. Unfortunately, I have only seen most episodes once and it was years ago, so it is hard for me to remember them in enough detail to discuss on this forum.
Take Me Out To The Holosuite is the most recent episode I have rewatched now that the internet makes episodes more readily available, but I do intend (eventually!) to take the time to rewatch the entire show.
I have considered DS9 my favorite series because it is the only Star Trek series I have actually seen straight through as it originally aired, and I think it has the best story arc and characterizations. Unfortunately, I have only seen most episodes once and it was years ago, so it is hard for me to remember them in enough detail to discuss on this forum. Take Me Out To The Holosuite is the most recent episode I have rewatched now that the internet makes episodes more readily available, but I do intend (eventually!) to take the time to rewatch the entire show.
Ah now that is something I may review again.
Some more reviews for anyone who cares.
Support- I can't say I understand the point of Berile (sp?) dying, being revived by Bashir, then having a condition that will ultimately kill him if he wishes to be conscious during the peace talks with the Cardassians. We could've simply removed the first death and kept the main plot point intact. His personal dilemna seemed so forced by the show's own plot devices that I didn't take much interest in it. I also noticed Kira wasn't really disturbed at Berile's first death, but was traumatized when he died again, which seems to be rather inconsistent. Combine all that with kai Winn's (sp?) terrible acting, and I wasn't overly impressed. Once again, the B plot saved the day with the Jake-Nog character development.
Heart of Stone- Now we're back on the right track. We get to see Kira's reaction to facing imminent death, Odo gives us some backstory in revealing the origin of his name, and even professes his love for Kira. Then, in one of the rare moments that Trek actually surprises me, we find out that the Kira Odo was talking to was really a changling spying on him, trying to determine his feelings towards solids. We also get to see Nog tenaciously fighting to join Star Fleet because he wants to avoid the fate of his father. Although I have trouble believing a Forengi would have such an easy time ignoring their greedy nature and pursue something noble, I nonetheless found it believable and have some anticipation towards how this transpires.
Destiny- Here we get a thought provoking exploration on the notion of religion. Sisko represents religious doubt as he finds contradictions in the scripture of the prophets, and that the words of the scripture are metaphors that have been translated multiple times, and are thus easy to interpret loosely. Kira, having been immersed in a culture carrying such beliefs, insists that the scripture should not be ignored, and uses curious sets of coincidences to try and substantiate her claims. I cannot say I was too pleased with the ending, as it was simply a matter of the scripture coming true, but through a different interpretation than what the vedic had warned Sisco about. As I see it, the show is letting blind faith come out the victor, even though you'd expect a technologically advanced society to place less and less emphasis on religion to explain the unknown. Perhaps I am comparing the prophets against Christianity, even though the religion of the bejorans is likely far less flawed, especially with the existence of the orbs as some evidence of divine power. On a lighter note, I found it slightly humorous that a female Cardasian scientist had a hard time believing that males could make for good scientists, which is a reversal of the human interpretation of gender based competency in the sciences. I found it equally as amusing when the Cardassian scientist through O'Brien was hitting on her by being aggravated with her, because in Cardassia that's how a male shows their sexual interest with a female counterpart. Again, that seems pretty backwards compared to our own human system, though I can understand how it could have functionality. It's always nice to have alien cultures that Trek produces to be contrasted to human ones, as this allows us a means to explore our own ideology from a different angle.
Prophet Motif- Having the Grand Nagus act as the complete opposite of a Forengi leader because of the influence of the wormhole aliens was brilliant. The entire premise of Quark and his brother having such a difficult time accepting the Nagus’ epiphany towards benevolence served as the fuel for a very entertaining episode.
Visionary- Hey folks, it’s time for another time travel episode! You gotta love how O’Brien gets to see the future and alter it purely for the interests of himself and the station as though this doesn’t violate the temporal prime directive at all. Not much else to say.
Distant Voices- This has to be the perfect example of a Trek episode that is both awesome and scientifically bogus. For the bogus parts: how is it that one person, presumably a cell in his mind, can represent an entire set of behaviors? Sorry but the brain doesn’t work like that. And who is Bashir himself supposed to represent if other people represent parts of his brain functions? How can a person escape a comatose state by fighting against representations of his mind? If any episode required suspension of disbelief, it was this one. Despite all that, we get to learn more about Bashir, watch how splendidly he can act as a frail old man, and get to see every character in the show get portrayed slightly differently.
Through the Looking Glass- Let’s take a trip to the parallel universe! Like the episode before, this is a fairly silly concept, but one I don’t have any trouble stomaching. I’ll withdraw any detailed criticism about this episode, though it is certainly refreshing to see this episode being a continuation of “Crossover”, which happened a dozen or so episodes ago. You’d never dream of seeing this kind of continuity in Voyager, and I appreciate the closure provided in seeing Sisco allowing the Terrins to escape to the badlands, whereas in Crossover, it was simply a matter of Bashir and Kira escaping a place they didn’t belong to.
Support- I can't say I understand the point of Berile (sp?) dying, being revived by Bashir, then having a condition that will ultimately kill him if he wishes to be conscious during the peace talks with the Cardassians. We could've simply removed the first death and kept the main plot point intact. His personal dilemna seemed so forced by the show's own plot devices that I didn't take much interest in it. I also noticed Kira wasn't really disturbed at Berile's first death, but was traumatized when he died again, which seems to be rather inconsistent. Combine all that with kai Winn's (sp?) terrible acting, and I wasn't overly impressed. Once again, the B plot saved the day with the Jake-Nog character development.
Heart of Stone- Now we're back on the right track. We get to see Kira's reaction to facing imminent death, Odo gives us some backstory in revealing the origin of his name, and even professes his love for Kira. Then, in one of the rare moments that Trek actually surprises me, we find out that the Kira Odo was talking to was really a changling spying on him, trying to determine his feelings towards solids. We also get to see Nog tenaciously fighting to join Star Fleet because he wants to avoid the fate of his father. Although I have trouble believing a Forengi would have such an easy time ignoring their greedy nature and pursue something noble, I nonetheless found it believable and have some anticipation towards how this transpires.
Destiny- Here we get a thought provoking exploration on the notion of religion. Sisko represents religious doubt as he finds contradictions in the scripture of the prophets, and that the words of the scripture are metaphors that have been translated multiple times, and are thus easy to interpret loosely. Kira, having been immersed in a culture carrying such beliefs, insists that the scripture should not be ignored, and uses curious sets of coincidences to try and substantiate her claims. I cannot say I was too pleased with the ending, as it was simply a matter of the scripture coming true, but through a different interpretation than what the vedic had warned Sisco about. As I see it, the show is letting blind faith come out the victor, even though you'd expect a technologically advanced society to place less and less emphasis on religion to explain the unknown. Perhaps I am comparing the prophets against Christianity, even though the religion of the bejorans is likely far less flawed, especially with the existence of the orbs as some evidence of divine power. On a lighter note, I found it slightly humorous that a female Cardasian scientist had a hard time believing that males could make for good scientists, which is a reversal of the human interpretation of gender based competency in the sciences. I found it equally as amusing when the Cardassian scientist through O'Brien was hitting on her by being aggravated with her, because in Cardassia that's how a male shows their sexual interest with a female counterpart. Again, that seems pretty backwards compared to our own human system, though I can understand how it could have functionality. It's always nice to have alien cultures that Trek produces to be contrasted to human ones, as this allows us a means to explore our own ideology from a different angle.
Prophet Motif- Having the Grand Nagus act as the complete opposite of a Forengi leader because of the influence of the wormhole aliens was brilliant. The entire premise of Quark and his brother having such a difficult time accepting the Nagus’ epiphany towards benevolence served as the fuel for a very entertaining episode.
Visionary- Hey folks, it’s time for another time travel episode! You gotta love how O’Brien gets to see the future and alter it purely for the interests of himself and the station as though this doesn’t violate the temporal prime directive at all. Not much else to say.
Distant Voices- This has to be the perfect example of a Trek episode that is both awesome and scientifically bogus. For the bogus parts: how is it that one person, presumably a cell in his mind, can represent an entire set of behaviors? Sorry but the brain doesn’t work like that. And who is Bashir himself supposed to represent if other people represent parts of his brain functions? How can a person escape a comatose state by fighting against representations of his mind? If any episode required suspension of disbelief, it was this one. Despite all that, we get to learn more about Bashir, watch how splendidly he can act as a frail old man, and get to see every character in the show get portrayed slightly differently.
Through the Looking Glass- Let’s take a trip to the parallel universe! Like the episode before, this is a fairly silly concept, but one I don’t have any trouble stomaching. I’ll withdraw any detailed criticism about this episode, though it is certainly refreshing to see this episode being a continuation of “Crossover”, which happened a dozen or so episodes ago. You’d never dream of seeing this kind of continuity in Voyager, and I appreciate the closure provided in seeing Sisco allowing the Terrins to escape to the badlands, whereas in Crossover, it was simply a matter of Bashir and Kira escaping a place they didn’t belong to.
Vykan,
Hope you're not done talking DS9. I've been watching Season 3 as well (Searching for comments on Destiny, which is a great episode) and it's nice to read someone elses comments on some of these not so talked about episodes like Destiny, and Prophet Motive. Hope you continue.
Hope you're not done talking DS9. I've been watching Season 3 as well (Searching for comments on Destiny, which is a great episode) and it's nice to read someone elses comments on some of these not so talked about episodes like Destiny, and Prophet Motive. Hope you continue.
I've been going through DS9 for the very first time. I always loved the OS films and TNG but absolutely abhorred DS9's pilot episode and, subsequently, wrote it off for a very long time. But since I've started doing Trek reviews, I figured I'd give DS9 another chance -- especially with all of the good thing I've heard about it over the years.
And I have to say, almost two seasons in, it's definitely an underappreciated series. I'm looking forward to going episode-by-episode because it really seems to be a much more purposefully crafted series than either TOS or TNG -- even if I still enjoy TNG episodes more.
And I have to say, almost two seasons in, it's definitely an underappreciated series. I'm looking forward to going episode-by-episode because it really seems to be a much more purposefully crafted series than either TOS or TNG -- even if I still enjoy TNG episodes more.
I'm watching this series and there are a ton of episodes that never get a mention here but are still fantastic. The one I saw last night, Destiny, was one of those episodes. And it was a big episode because I think it's really here where Sisko starts to accept his role as the Emissary of the Prophets. Also, the why Trichore's 3rd unfurled was just really cool.
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