On paper, this SHOULD be at least a decent episode overall. The events that occur in this episode ultimately have HUGE repercussions for the Ferengi Alliance, a major player in the Alpha Quadrant and of course on the show.
Think about it. The Ferengi have for thousands of years
forbidden women from having equal rights as men. They can’t leave the home, do business, even speak directly to men. Now within a couple of years, the influence of Ishka has changed that, to the point that the
leader of the Ferengi has been ousted from office by the Ferengi Alliance.
So the deposed Grand Nagus and Ishka arrive on Quark’s doorstep to ask for his help - again. (You would think that the Nagus would have other options, but Ishka’s with him so I guess I’ll go with it.) Together, our heroes hatch a scheme to reinstate Zek by convincing Ferenginar’s big business CEOs that these new philosophies are RIGHT about women. Again, this is big. This is a HUGE change for the Alliance or any species for that matter, but especially the Ferengi Alliance. If something like this were happening to the Klingons this would be a milestone. But in the very least this has the potential of being a pretty good Ferengi episode.
But no. It all goes south from here. Ishka has a 'comical' heart attack (?) arguing with Quark. Somehow the rest convince
Bashir to spend the better part of his Starfleet day
surgically altering Quark to make him a woman …then poor Armin Shimerman has to parade around like an idiot for the rest of the episode. Watching him crying “like a woman” with all his crazy female hormone injections, having him ask if he’s pretty, hearing him say things like
“All these facts and figures… it’s just too much to remember.”, watching him literally chased around the room by the Ferengi CEO Nilva, and culminating the “comedy” by having him actually
exposing his boobs to the unconvinced Brunt and horny Nilva (which somehow, inexplicably THAT is what will initiate this sea change of Ferengi Equal Rights for Women.) It’s all just too much. I honestly cannot see how this episode can’t be insulting to women, to transgenders, to cross-dressers, and possibly to Ferengi. It’s like the writers all took a day off and turned the show over to the future
Enterprise writing staff.
Seriously though, had the show just let Ishka handle the negotiations and kept out all the Quark-in-drag antics, it would have been a considerably better episode which still could have contained several plot twists and comedy moments. Leaving the
Ferengi woman out of the episode about
equal rights for Ferengi women just doesn’t make any sense to me - especially since Ishka more than proved herself as capable in the previous episodes.
Another thing I don’t understand is that at the beginning of the episode, it was established that Zek had
ALREADY granted these rights to women. Ferengi females were ALREADY running around clothed, purchasing, trading and contributing to the economy PRIOR to Zek’s arrival on the station. So much in fact that it caused the entire planetary communications grid to shut down all over the Alliance. (and how were they able to contact all the FCA Commissioners in the next scene?). Anyway, if all this had taken place already… WHY did they need to send these commissioners all the way to the station for Ishka to convince them females with equal rights were a good thing?
Quark’s motivations are all wrong here too. Prior to and
following this episode, Quark is against the new changes in Ferengi policies, including its treatment of women, so why would he go through all the trouble to keep it that way? Loyalty to the Nagus? His mother? I guess . But to have a
sex change operation to achieve something he was against in the first place? And as it's been said - he learns NOTHING after all this!
Yeah - not a good episode. Embarrassed that it was on DS9.
