Us against the world.Being a DS9 fan

[SpocksOddSocks]

I find that age matters a lot. Most of the people I know who profess to dislike DS9 watched it as an under-16 teenager. In contrast, most of the people who watched DS9 as an adult either think its an okay show or loved it a lot. Its not surprising as DS9 delves into a lot of adult topics like terrorism, politics and religion which children wouldn't be interested in.

This makes sense. As I've stated before, I wasn't keen in it to been with and I would have been 11 when Emissary was first shown on Sky 1 in the UK. I really managed to get into it younger than sixteen though - but that was only with the later episodes. I didn't get around to watching the earlier ones again until much later.

 

[M.A.C.O.]

"Duet" was the first truly great DS9 episode and the one that first demonstrated just what the show was truly capable of.

That was an intense episode to be shown so early in the series. And the thing is, this is a first season episode --from 1993.

TNG by comparison is airing shows like Timescape--a episode about time freezing. That was the format for TNG, but honestly, by comparison it was bland.

DS9 was going in its own direction early on the show.

The closest match in comparison that I can get from TNG, is Chain of Command II and even then everything is wrapped up and solved by the end of the episode.

What makes Duet great is because it was an exception, but not the standard for DS9 at the time.

Season 1 DS9 still has episodes that bring it down.

If Wishes Were Horses: The Rumplestilskin episode
Move Along Home: Allamaraine, count to 4, allamaraine, then 3 more.
Q-Less: Where Vash and guest star and bicker over things we never saw and aren't interesting.


I think only TOS has the best ratio of great episodes to poor episodes, in their first season.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

I have loved DS9 since I first saw it, though appreciate that it may not be everyone's cup of tea.

For me the thing that I enjoy most is that it feels the most "real" of all the Trek series, as it is painted in shades of grey.

Plus it gave the world Kira Nerys. Best. Trek. Character. Ever!

 

[Greg Cox]

I remember a friend's response at the time. "I like DS9, it's a good show, but it isn't STAR TREK."

I disagreed, but I suspect that my friend's attitude was not uncommon.

 

[Relayer1]

"Duet" was the first truly great DS9 episode and the one that first demonstrated just what the show was truly capable of.

It was a few episodes before that - 'Progress' that did that for me.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

At the time I think a lot of people wanted DS9 to be 'TNG but with a different group'.

I think TNG and DS9 do have very similar storytelling styles, just DS9 took Federation morality out of its bubble.

Part of the reason DS9 wasn't popular at the time was that season 1 started out kind of weak so it gave a bad first impression, but the main reason is that people didn't like the morally ambiguous themes. A coworker told me recently when I brought up DS9: "A Ferengi trying to make a profit, who cares?"

 

[Goji]

I remember a friend's response at the time. "I like DS9, it's a good show, but it isn't STAR TREK."

I disagreed, but I suspect that my friend's attitude was not uncommon.

I sort of thought that way for a while, but not disparagingly. Growing up, TOS, DS9 and Farscape were my three favorite science fiction shows and I did tend to think of them as three separate entities, with "Star Trek" being Kirk, Spock, McCoy and "Deep Space Nine" being everyone on that space station. And that worked for me, since I do like the two shows for very different reasons, though in about equal measure. I had zero interest in TNG, Voyager or Enterprise so I just had the two parts of the franchise to keep straight in my mind.

After a recent rewatch of Enterprise that I enjoyed more than I expected to I'm less locked into the mentality that Star Trek = TOS, but I still do somewhat think of DS9 as kind of its own thing, and it is still the only part of the franchise I like as much or watch as often as TOS.

 

[Nightdiamond]

What makes Duet great is because it was an exception, but not the standard for DS9 at the time.

Season 1 DS9 still has episodes that bring it down.

If Wishes Were Horses: The Rumplestilskin episode
Move Along Home: Allamaraine, count to 4, allamaraine, then 3 more.
Q-Less: Where Vash and guest star and bicker over things we never saw and aren't interesting.


I think only TOS has the best ratio of great episodes to poor episodes, in their first season.

True, good point--for the most part, season 1 and 2 were more bland and silly, but part of the reason I think, was because it was imitating the TNG style while it was developing.

Take Kira's hairstyle for the first part of season 1. It was exactly like Ro Laren's from TNG.

It's was the idea, that she's Bajoran, and all people from the same planet have the same hairstyles.

Then they changed it, and Kira's personality seem to emerge even more.

I've discovered that some of the early episodes were more meaty than I thought at first.

Like In the Hands the Prophets. It was a direct subject on religion vs science in schools.

Usually the other Trek shows would use an analogy to tackle a subject like this. DS9 made it an actual situation that happened to them.

With a school being bombed and religious fanatics and debates.

And the situation didn't completely resolved itself, only the culprits were caught, and cooler heads prevailed, but it was still a lingering issue.

And that was because of the serial nature of DS9--otherwise, on the other shows, it would have been solved and forgotten.

 

[Relayer1]

I love Trek, but after three seasons of TOS, seven each of TNG and Voyager and four of Enterprise, that's way more 'Planet Of The Week' and 'going boldly' than I can hack. Enough already !

DS9 kickstarted my interest in the more 'political' side of Trek, which has flourished in the Trek novels in the last few years. It's my model for Trek these days...

 

[Bossplaya]

New people watching DS9 is interesting but I would never expect them to think DS9 is the best. We are in a TV show renaissance, and opinions on TV shows are all over the place. and DS9 is just another 1 hour drama in the midst of hundreds at the end of the day. Not for me though, it's a brilliant TV show that took risks and really challenged its audience. I still see new things I haven't noticed before even now in 2015.

The batting average was great. Some seasons had 24 episodes I'd consider to be at least good, makes it really easy to watch in bunches, set play and sit back. Considering modern TV shows like TWD have 16 eps or less, with not as good of a ratio that's saying something. The writers must've been free writing with mere hours to edit before shooting and a lot of these eps are still brilliant and hold up. Not very many shows I have been as excited about as DS9.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

For a show with 26 episodes a year, DS9 might have had the best 'Percentage of episodes that are at least good' in all TV history.

 

[Nightdiamond]

Not to knock TNG and the other Treks, but I've found that the serial style is much easier to watch and enjoy.

TNG and and some of the other Treks had the episodic style and you can see the results.

Almost none of the crews were family oriented, and the relationships tended to be the relationship of the week type, and then never mentioned again.

On DS9, they were more family oriented, and the relationships were fewer, but more likely to be remembered and mentioned later.

So this can have big effect when you re-watch these shows. It feels like the characters are stuck in a 2 dimensional universe where they stay the same all the time.

 

[BillJ]

For a show with 26 episodes a year, DS9 might have had the best 'Percentage of episodes that are at least good' in all TV history.

I thought it had a lower batting average than either Voyager or Enterprise. When it was good, it was very good. But it wasn't good very often.

Just goes to show the old adage is true: you can't please everyone.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I feel about the same about Voyager's record as you feel about DS9's record. I think Enterprise had a 0 batting average for 2 1/2 seasons which then got pretty good after Coto took over. (I don't think Enterprise had a single decent episode prior to Similitude). Whereas I thought for DS9, unless it was focusing on the more annoying characters, it was almost always entertaining just on the strength of the chemistry.

The thing about DS9 season 1 is that some of the episodes come off better after you know the characters better from the later seasons.

 

[Amaris]

I find that age matters a lot. Most of the people I know who profess to dislike DS9 watched it as an under-16 teenager. In contrast, most of the people who watched DS9 as an adult either think its an okay show or loved it a lot. Its not surprising as DS9 delves into a lot of adult topics like terrorism, politics and religion which children wouldn't be interested in.

This sounds accurate to me. I was 13 when DS9 first aired, but I didn't get into it until a friend sent me his VHS tapes of the show when I was an adult, and I started loving it. Now I consider myself a Niner for life.

 

[Goji]

I was either 10 or 11 when I first saw Voyager, got into TOS at 11, was 12 when I got into DS9 and was 13 the last time I considered myself a Voyager fan. On the other hand I was only lukewarm to Enterprise when it premiered (when I was 14), lost interest in it fast, and got back into it two years ago at age 26.

What all of this says about me... I do not know. Other than I watch and have watched wayyy too much of this stuff.

 

[Trekkin]

I watched DS9 and VOY around the same time when I was around 10 or 11. VOY was ending, and I caught DS9 though repeats. I was already watching Farscape by that point (in its first year it was prime time in Australia, and after that it aired in the afternoon), so maybe that braced me for both 'darker' Trek and 'silly' Trek.

It was TNG that I didn't like until I was older. Blame intitially trying to watch it from its beginning. ENT I watched through, but didn't really think about again until I got the DVD's in the lead up to 09. It never reruns here for some reason.

I think I caught more crap as a kid for simply being a Trekkie, than for my particular breed. Most of the people I knew at the time probably wouldn't have known the Berman era shows weren't just one big series. A friend I took to see 09 thought Kirk would eventually go bald in the film.

The 'net was different, but I purposefully avoided that. Post-NEM (when we finally had more than 250mb to last us 30 days), Trekkies were angry and that didn't really appeal to kid-me. Plus, my parents probably wouldn't have let me anyway.

DS9's rep seems to have grown a bit since back then.

 

[Relayer1]

For a show with 26 episodes a year, DS9 might have had the best 'Percentage of episodes that are at least good' in all TV history.

I thought it had a lower batting average than either Voyager or Enterprise. When it was good, it was very good. But it wasn't good very often.

Just goes to show the old adage is true: you can't please everyone.

True.

To me, DS9 was very, very rarely poor and often wonderful. TNG, however, with rewatches was regularly less than stellar, although sometimes fantastic. Voyager was more miss than hit and Enterprise would have been way better if it had just been season four and a handful of episodes from seasons one and two.

Trek can't keep doing 'planet of the week', it's not the 1960's anymore ! If the show ever returns to TV, it'll have to be more serialised...

 

[TheVortaKeevan]

I started watching the series when the DVD sets were first coming out in stores for a hefty price. It was Andrew J Robinson playing Garak and Jeffrey Combs as Weyoun that made me want continue to watch the series to its end in the seventh season.

 

[Kilana2]

I started watching the series when the DVD sets were first coming out in stores for a hefty price. It was Andrew J Robinson playing Garak and Jeffrey Combs as Weyoun that made me want continue to watch the series to its end in the seventh season.

Hello fellow Vorta.

Weyoun was the reason, why I chose a Vorta identity. And remember vividly Keevan beeing shot by Gaila. So which new clone number are you?