The myth of the bad Ferengi episode's on "DS9."

[Mirror_Barclay]

There were some good eps and bad eps... and some better portrayals, Quark especially. Certainly I liked them much better than the Klingon Honor eps, perhaps because of the greater variance in individuals involved, tone, nature of the comedy.

I do agree that they became too much a caricature at times, though I wasn't looking for biting satire either. But some comic relief was welcome on an often serious (sometimes too serious) show.

 

[CommanderRaytas]

This so much! The Klingon Honour Episodes are the only ones I skip because they're not bad per se; they'r just super dull. At least the Ferengi aren't dull.

 

[cultcross]

Well, that's unfair, I think. Nog's character arc was pretty great, especially after he got his leg shot off. 'The Maginificent Ferengi' shows that not every one of them is a stereotype. Actually, the Vulcans and Klingons are much more Hat Wearing Aliens than the Ferengi turned out to be - ymvv of course.

I agree. While Ferengi motivations remained quite consistent, we saw many different takes on this through the show, and different interpretations. One of my favourite Ferengi bits in the show is Nog in Treachery, Faith, and the Great River, when he shows how he still thinks like a Ferengi, but has applied it to a different kind of profit.
Quark, Rom and Nog are consistently interesting throughout the show and there were definitely other interesting Ferengi who came and went. The part for me which went wrong was the Zek/Moogie nonsense which sadly took up way too much of the later Ferengi episodes.
With a Klingon episode, you know what you're getting. A Ferengi episode could be just about anything.

 

[CommanderRaytas]

True that. And yes, Treachery, Faith, and the Great River is a great episode. The Ferengi-heavy shows could be good or bad, depending on the focus. I can't speak for anyone but myself, of course, but I find the Klingon episodes predictable and tiresome.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

I was about to write that there should be a Ferengi Law of Diminishing Marginal Utility, but in truth, such a law would probably apply to all the fictional races: if an episode has more than 4 speaking parts for a particular alien race, the more likely the episode will be annoying.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Having comic relief characters is not the problem. The problem is when said comic relief is 3rd grade level.

Ferengi have been used for good comic relief. Like, when Jadzia confused the rules for Peace and War being good for business. Or the famous root beer scene. But in the most memorable episodes they are mostly screaming and hitting each other or just rattling off on the nose 'Opposite day' morals.

Those times all they did was take a human aphorism and reverse it are lazy and groan-worthy, and way too often that's all they did.

And it never made any sense that in a laissez faire economy, the government could still seize all your property at will. The writers couldn't decide if Ferengi society was libertarian or totalitarian.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Ferengi society apparently is libertarian for men, totalitarian for women, only if you fail to be enough of a jerk it magically becomes totalitarian for you, even if in those cases being less of a jerk would net you more profit.

Because no sci-fi writer has ever taken an economics class.

 

[kkt]

Breaking certain rules results in asset confescation. The rules are understood ahead of time by all Ferengi: A contract is a contract is a contract. Etc.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Breaking certain rules results in asset confescation. The rules are understood ahead of time by all Ferengi: A contract is a contract is a contract. Etc.

Exactly, which makes no sense. A society which both has strictly free enterprise and a government empowered to seize assets at will. They also have a prenuptual agreement mandate (Why would you have to protect your assets if women aren't allowed to sue anyway?), and a requirement not to give your workers benefits even if it helps your own bottom line.

Not to mention that the Nagus has the power to just assume ownership of your business for pennies at will with no recourse.

 

[Andrews]

I'm biased as the Ferengi focused episodes are some of my favorites. Outside of Profit and Lace for obvious reasons, that didn't age well.

 

[CommanderRaytas]

The character episodes are mostly really good, like Bar Association or Treachery, Faith, and The Great River. There's the silly but good ones, e.g. Little Green Men. There's It's Only A Paper Moon, which is pretty great...lots of good Ferengi stuff in there.

 

[kkt]

Exactly, which makes no sense. A society which both has strictly free enterprise and a government empowered to seize assets at will. They also have a prenuptual agreement mandate (Why would you have to protect your assets if women aren't allowed to sue anyway?), and a requirement not to give your workers benefits even if it helps your own bottom line.

Not to mention that the Nagus has the power to just assume ownership of your business for pennies at will with no recourse.

The "at will" is the problem. It's not "at will". It's if you break some of the most important Ferengi laws. If you can break a contract with only minor penalties, free enterprise could not thrive.

 

[Armus]

I know the show has a reputation of having bad Ferengi episodes but I am going to make a argument that this is more theory than fact I went through all the main Ferengi or Quark based shows and counted the number of Great,good and bad episodes and the results might surprise you
Here is the great ones:
1"The Jem'Hadar" I know it's not considered as a Ferengi episode but Quark has a big enough role in it to count for me. Plus all the fun of the first part of the episode comes from Quark and he has the great speech to Sisko were he basically stands up for his people and talks about how Humans use to be worst.
2"The House of Quark" Great episode were you see Quark out of his element. Love the scene with all the Klingons looking at finacial records and Gowron just tosses his to the side. Also like Quark not using the Bat'leth which was really brave and I felt he had solid chemistry with his wife.
3"Family Business" First look at the Ferengi homeworld. I like his realtionship with his mom and they along with Rom and Brunt were just fun together.
4"Little Green Men" Works because all the Ferengi characters just play off each other so well. Toss in old Sci-Fi tropes a garage sale, Quark as a captain, jokes about Sisko looking like Bell from the Bell riots and maybe the first toliet joke via "waste extraction" and it's all great.
5 "The Bar Association" I like that it's exploring a issue like unions and I like that Rom stands up to Quark and even goes and gets a better job.
6"Body Parts" A deep character story that isn't just played for laughs. I'm not sure if Quark had ever had to look at his values as hard as he does in this episode. Basically tells Brunt to go fuck himself at the end which is a stand up and cheer moment.
7"The Ascent" Like "Jem'Hadar" this isn't a full Quark episode but you can't do this ep without him because we get to see one of the most intresting Trek duo's get a episode all to themselves and it works because Quark/Odo scenes always work.
8"Business as Usual" Like "Body Parts" this is more drama than comedy and I like how Quark is basically in dark place and yet finds away out of it. The line that I think is Gaila says about how "In all those lights in sky would anyone notice if one went out" is a great all time favorite line for me.
9"The Maqnifcent Ferengi" I got to admit I wasn't sure if I was going to put this on the great list but I went ahead anyway because I know everyone seems to love it. Me it's good but not great. I just don't think the Ferengi work well as action characters and I know that is part of the joke but I think if your going to do this story they should be at least a little more capable than we see here.
10"Who Mourns for Morn" I love this episode. A fun little caper of back dealing criminals coming together and Quark outsmarting them all. Plus it's nice to get some more backstory on Mourn.
11"The Siege of Ar-558" Not a pure Ferengi episode but Nog does seem to have the second most important story and Quark offers up sage advice and also gets to show concern when Nog is sent on a mission. I always like when they show that the Ferengi are capable of caring about each other and are not just greedy bad people all the time.
12"It's Only a Paper Moon" A little limited because the actor who plays Nog is not super talented but he does know his character well so that makes up for it. It's nice to see them explore PSD and have a character have emotional trama. Also I like VIc Fontaine and I like how he helped Rom basically by just being a friend to him.
13"Meridan" Should have listed above since I was going through the season as they ran but I forgot 2 stories. The A story is awful but I find the B story of Quark trying to create a sex program with Kira to be funny and it has a great payoff with Quark. While I like that Ferengi can have more depth on "DS9" than other Trek shows their is nothing wrong from time to time just writing them as creeps because that aspect is still there.
14"Heart of Stone" A story is average though a little more important than I think we might consider with a Founder already in the AQ and Odo actually saying out loud that he loves Kira. The B story though is what's great. Rom wanting to join Starfleet which feels a little out of the blue since the previous ep we saw him was him acting like a jerk on a double date with Jake. Still they explain his reasons well enough to were it makes sense and It's a great idea to see someone intrested in Starfleet who isn't a utopian human or even a alien who might also be from some paradise style planet.

That's it for the great episodes. I will list the good and bad episodes later. Getting tired of typing and can't find my pet monkey who usually makes half of my threads for me to finish at the moment.


Jason

"Body Parts" and "Business as Usual" are two favs of mine. In both episodes Quark is faced with a moral dilemma and there's a thoughtfulness in the script and the performances. Then there's "Profit and Lace"....Quark in drag. Those "moogie" episodes...just hearing Rom say "moogie" is painful.

 

[jaime]

I believe the Ferengi episodes are unpopular for two reasons:

1. The Ferengi are ugly.

2. The allegory for western capitalism makes viewers from western capitalist nations uncomfortable.

I would say to the second point, whilst true, is not accurate to Ferengi. They are Arab stereotypes which is eastern. (I wrote at length why, but the frelling JavaScript até my post. Three times.)

 

[Tundra Saint]

Personally I consider Profit and Lace to be the only episode thats truly horrible. The rest range from mediocre to fantastic. with House of Quark being my favorite.

 

[jaime]

Personally I consider Profit and Lace to be the only episode thats truly horrible. The rest range from mediocre to fantastic. with House of Quark being my favorite.

I get bored in little green men after the initial viewing. Profit and Lace is unfairly maligned I think.

 

[Armus]

I get bored in little green men after the initial viewing. Profit and Lace is unfairly maligned I think.

"The Emperor's New Cloak" may be the worse one. "Profit and Lace" is less tasteless in my view.

 

[jaime]

"The Emperor's New Cloak" may be the worse one. "Profit and Lace" is less tasteless in my view.

A lot of discussion around profit and Lace always has me think of the sitcom 'Mrs Browns Boys' and the immortal line 'it's a man in a fecking dress.'

 

[UnknownSample]

Next Gen tried to present Ferengi seriously, and so fell flat on their faces. The makers of DS9, stuck in a universe that had Ferengi in it, had the sense to use them for comedy, and this worked. The comedy in these episodes was written by the same writers generally and worked as well as comedy in non-Ferengi episodes, for me. Once they found a way to use the Ferengi that worked, they started adding some seriousness and depth back in, gradually.

I liked the Ferengi episodes more and more each time, up until Profit and Lace, which blew that little trend out of the water.

 

[Lous]

I love the Ferengi episodes, they are the most fun for me. There's a kind of satire with human greed that I love.