Yora reviews Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - All of it!

[bguy]

Which is strange because dang that sounds surprisingly economical. They mentally suffer their full prison term, but aside from implanting the memories, there is little cost to the government, and with the ability to implant memories, you would THINK they would include memories that make people not want to re-offend. Implanting them with memories meant to drive them to suicide just seems a really sadistic way to enforce a death penalty. If they did it in a rational manner, it would be similar to this episode (minus the crazy) where he gets his punishment, but rather than actually leaving the prison as an 80 year old man, he can mentally recover and go back to work as a hopefully productive member of society after paying his debt.

Well keep in mind that O'Brien was convicted of espionage. Nations really hate being spied upon, and you don't have to worry about reintegrating a spy into your society, so it isn't that surprising that the program was especially brutal. The Argrathi might well use a much softer version of the program that is more focused on rehabilitation for offenders who are going to actually be reintegrated into their society.

[Yora]

S4E20: Shattered Miror

Jennifer Sisko from the other universe comes to visit Sisko to tell him about the Terran rebels having taken their station from the Alliance. When he leaves to deal with work stuff, she lures Jake into coming with her to her dimension. She leaves behind one of the devices to beam between the two dimensions and Sisko follows her to get Jake back. He's welcomed by Smiley who tells him that they stole the plans for the Defiant and build one of their own, but they only have the original prototype designs and still need to make the modifications to actually get it running. Since they overthrew the troops on the station and took evil Kira prisoner, they are expecting an Alliance fleet to show up to retake the station very soon. If Sisko gets the Defiant working before that, they send him and Jake back to their dimension. If not, they will both be killed or get send to the mines.

Sisko is very angry with Jennifer for effectively kidnapping Jake as a hostage, but does his best to explain the adjustments that need to be made to the Defiant. They probably won't have enough time, so Sisko goes to evil Kira to help them defend the station. Otherwise she will have to deal with her superiors punishing her for losing the station.

Jennifer gets along strangely well with Jake, seeing him as the son she never had. She feels bad about tricking Sisko and using Jake and decides that at least Jake should return home before the battle begins. When the fleet arrives, Smiley tells Sisko he can go, but Sisko decides to stick around to help them win.

Evil Nog breaks evil Kira out of her cell, and she shots him to cover her tracks. She runs into Jennifer and Jake and takes them as hostages, but then shots Jennifer and decides to kill Jake as well. When she figures out Jake is Sisko's son, she decides to let him leave as a friendly gesture to him.

The rebells fight back the Alliance fleet, but they've figured out that it must have been evil Kira who betrayed them.

--

Hm, this wasn't so great. I've remembered the Mirror episodes as being a lot of fun, but at this point where had one that was barely good and two that were pretty disappointing. Really not a fan of this one. It's just all very banal and the characters aren't really that fun.

There's some pretty space fighting this episode, but it all clearly has the plastic 90s CGI look and I think the flying actually looks too fancy. This is Star Trek, not X-Wings in Star Wars.

[tomandtish]

The thing is, there isn't really a case to defend.

Even if the Federation and the Klingons are not officially at war, they have their warships destroying each other, and neither side questions the legality of that. When Federation ships are fighting alongside Cardassian ships in a war against the Klingons, then for all practical purposes the Federation is at war with the Klingons. Even if neither side is sending forces into each other's territory.

And I don't see any government ever even considering the idea of sending their commanders to stand in show trials in the enemy's courts during ongoing hostilities. Especially not for the supposed warcrime of hitting a civilian ship that the enemy snuck into the middle of a pitched battle. Because as space battles are shown in Star Trek, there is no way a ship could accidentally fly between fighting ships. The only way something like that could have happened is if the Defiant had attacked a Klingon space station and hit a transport that was undocking and trying to leave the area. Not while the Defiant is escorting a Cardassian convoy.

The fact that the admiral even came to the station to listen to the lawyer is already ludicrous.

The thing to understand is that Worf did basically break Star Fleet's rules of engagement by firing on a decloaking ship without making sure it was a combatant.

Don't get me wrong, it's a stupid rule of engagement in an active battle with cloaked ships, but Sisko himself makes it clear that Worf overstepped. Starfleet would rather take the first hit than risk firing on a civilian. And the Klingons were smart enough to pick up on this, and use it to call Worf's motives into question.

Again, it only works if you accept the rules of engagement as Sisko presents them at the end.

I have always interpreted it that all the treatment did was give him the experience of being in prison, based on O'Brien's own personality and real-life experiences. The big source of angst for O'Brien therefore is that the experience is authentic.... which means that had he ACTUALLY been put in prison for 20 years, it would have broken him and made him murder another man.

That's why his breaking point is when he yells at Molly. It's the same temper that he felt in the cell, and it horrifies him that he is THAT man around his family.

Although that being said, I'm still not sure why Bashir could wipe some of Worf's brother's memories but not O'Brien's. Technobabble that escaped me, possibly.

This. I was always under the impression that it was somewhat interactive, like a dream. So it pushed at O'Brien until it found his breaking point.

Also note that they basically wiped ALL of Kurn's long-term explicit memory, not some of it. Bashir may not be able to get selected memories only.

[Yora]

S4E21: The Muse

Lawxana Troi comes to Odo to ask for help. She's having another child and her current husband insists on his cultural custom to separate sons from their mothers at birth. Odo tries to be polite and helpful, and she's only moderately clingly and obnoxious to him. Her husband tracks her down and tells Odo that he insists to have his son. So Odo marries her to somehow override the marriage with her previous husband and get the claim to their son.

Jake meets a creepy alien woman who flatters his writing and offers to help making him famous by teaching his methods to focus his creativity. While she has him writing, she's sucking some energy from his brain. Eventually he passes out and is taken to the infirmary. The woman kidnaps him and hyponotizes him to keep writing while she drains him, and Sisko goes to rescue him. The woman turns into energy and flies off into space.

--

Frequently considered to be possibly the worst DS9 episode ever. Which is really unjustified. Sure, it's really boring and pointless, but it's not infuriating and insulting like some others. Though it is indeed amazingly irrelevant from start to finish.

Lawxana's husband is the awesome techno wizard from Babylon 5. Much better role for him.

Dax somehow got Kira to play the King Arthur program in the holosuite.

S4E22: For the Cause

Edington provides a confidential security briefing to the command staff. The Federation has agreed to deliver industrial replicators to the Cardassian to rebuild their infrastructure that has been destroyed by the Klingons. The main concern is that the Maquis might try to to destroy or steal the transports, so the whole thing is kept as secret as possible. After everyone is informed, Edington and Odo ask to have a private word with Sisko, and inform him that his girlfriend Kassidy is under investigation as a suspected smuggler for the Maquis. He is extremely frustrated by the situation, but gives them permission to do inspections of her ship if they can have a reasonable excuse.

Bashir takes Garak to watch Kira play a match of a high intensity ball game. Garak doesn't really care about the game but is more interested in introducing himself to Ziyal to make new Cardassian friends. Bashir thinks it's a really bad idea, because she's the daughter of his worst enemy, and also the friend of Kira, which is calling for major trouble.

Knowing that Kassidy is under surveillance makes things really akward for Sisko, and he's asking odd random questions that could possibly explain the suspicious detours in her regular cargo runs. When Odo does his inspection, Kassidy tries to pull some strings through her personal connections. Against Edington's direct recommendation, Sisko clears her for immediate departure. Instead he sends Edington, Worf, and O'Brien to follow her ship. And she does indeed make a detour to the Badlands where the Maquis is having its main hidden bases. Worf and O'Brien are disagreeing about their opinions about the Maquis, while Edington's position is that his job doesn't require or benefit from having personal views about them. After a while, they get a perfect observation of the freighter transferring cargo to a Maquis ship.

Garak ends up alone in a turbolift with Ziyal (though Garak probably has a talent to make such a situation happen) and in his usual roundabout and silly way reveals to her that he means her no harm. Fortunately, Ziyal is also fluent in obfuscation judo and lets him know that she accepts his peace offer. She later comes to his store to look at dresses and ask him if he want to come with her to a Cardassian sauna in the holosuite, since there's nobody else on the station who could endure it.

When the Defiant returns to the station, they report that the cargo looked to be mostly food, which is of course not as bad as delivering weapons to the Maquis, but Sisko still has no idea how to proceed once the freighter gets back to the station. Sisko doesn't expect her to smuggle another shipment to be Maquis right after that, but Odo and Edington still want to follow her and seize the ships if they find her to make another delivery. In private, Edington also requests that someone else will take care of the raid. Should a fight break out during the arrests, he doesn't want to be responsible for things that would damage his relationship with his direct superior. Instead he would rather stay on the station and lead the security arrangements for the replicators being transferred on the station. Sisko allows it and will command the raid himself.

Kira gets wind that Garak has been talking to Ziyal and goes to tell him in no uncertain terms that this won't fly. Garak isn't really concerned about it, since if Kira wanted to do anything to him, she wouldn't come and warn him. Quark wonders if maybe Kira only did that to make him drop his guard against her, which makes Garak suspect that Ziyal is using Kira as a tool to assassinate him for her father,

Kassidy's ship goes back into the Badlands, but the Maquis never show up. Odo thinks it's super fishy that smugglers would stay at the meeting place for hours when their customers don't show up, and makes the conclusion that the whole thing is a diversion to get Sisko and the Defiant away from the station. The Defiant decloaks (which we were previously told is super illegal) and Sisko and Odo beam to Kassidy's ship to get some answers. She confesses that's she's indeed smuggling for the Maquis (no sense in denying now), but insists that she knows nothing about any plans for attacking the station. But she has been very worried about getting caught with the Maquis making a lot of pressure to get a lot of deliveries in the last weeks.

Edington tells the security crew that the cargo transfer is a top secret opperation and that the external communications systems are taken offline until it is complete. He takes out Kira and locks the room where she's knocked out. Once the replicators are loaded, he gives command of the station to one of his lieutenants until the Defiant returns. When Sisko returns, the transport ship is long gone. He gets a call from Edington who has a message that if the Federation stays out of the conflict between the Cardassians and the Maquis, they won't be causing them any trouble. If they keep sending material to the Cardassias, the Maquis will consider the Federation enemies as well.

Garak goes to the holosuite to talk with Ziyal. Among other things, he admits that he had arrested and killed Dukat's father. Ziyal had considered to treat him like an enemy, but she's open to give him a change regardless of what Kira and Dukat think of him.

Kassidy returns to the station with her ship, but the rest of her crew went into hiding with the Maquis. She decided to stand trial and go to prison in the hope that Sisko might give her another chance once she gets out. She gets arrested and they part with the words "I'll be back." - "I'll be here."

--

This episode is actually pretty good. Better than I remembered. I don't find the Maquis stuff very engaging or compelling itself, but this episode is just really very well executed.
There's a lot going on here, with Sisko having basically two plot lines at once, and then there's the true B-plot with Garak and Ziyal as well. And it works, despite there not really being a thematic overlap between the Maquis traitors and Cardassian exiles stories. I usually find that very irritating, but here it somehow doesn't cause any issues.

I remembered that Edington is a Maquis fighter and that later Sisko was really upset about him betraying Starfleet. But I think the situation is actually much worse than that. That he's a traitor is one thing, but he sacrificed Kassidy to specifically distract Sisko while he pulls his big move. It's easy to understand why Sisko is taking this so very personally. It was very personal.
It's not made clear for how long Kassidy has been smuggling for the Maquis, and one has to wonder if they deliberately contacted and hired her to be a pawn to be used against Sisko. And if that was the work of Edington, that might be a reason for why she ends up getting away with such a light sentence. I think she ends up serving only one year before she gets released. But if she got entraped by a Starfleet security officer, then I can see that being held in her favor by a Federation court. And she's also just a really small fish in probably one of the biggest criminal scandals in the Federation for decades. Of course the real reason is that the show only has three more years and if they want to do something with the character again they need to get her back quickly. Maybe she only got charged with violating a trade embargo instead of being part of a terrorist organization. And Federation justice probably is about rehabilitation more than anything else, and supplying food and medicine isn't really evil.

[Cikomyr]

Eddington is a great adversary of Sisko, that's for sure. And is probably the only reason the Maquis was ever entertaining on DS9.

[Rodin]

S4E19: I remembered this from being a kid, so I didn't subject myself a second time. The thing that bugs me about this one (as well as other "let's torture X" episodes is that it should be something that CHANGES a person. O'Brien should have been a different person from this point on in the show, having experienced 20 years in a hellish prison. Instead there's no mention of it ever again, because who cares about continuity for a filler episode?

S4E20: I've already gotten bored of the mirror universe episodes (there are a lot more of them than I remembered!) so I just didn't even bother.

S4E21: Lwaxana episode. PASS!

S4E22: Even though I knew that Eddington went rogue at some point, I didn't remember that it was for the Maquis. I was quite impressed by how they still caught me off-guard by including such a momentous event inside another plot about Kassidy being a smuggler. Great episode.

The one complaint I have is the usual incredibly low Federation prison sentences. A year in prison for smuggling supplies to a terrorist organization? Can you imagine? This isn't the only time that this happens either - I seem to recall Quark spending a few months in the brig for compromising station security and nearly getting Dax killed, and there's another incident later on involving Dr. Bashir where someone gets a few months for a very serious crime.

I wanted to find the exact time she spent in prison, but the Wiki doesn't seem to have it. Instead, the first line of her biography is "Yates normally got out of bed at 0500 hours, and usually fell asleep before 0100 hours."

Thanks Wiki. Crucial, need-to-know information there.

Galaxy Quest was a freaking documentary.

[Talakeal]

S4E21: The Muse

Lawxana Troi comes to Odo to ask for help. She's having another child and her current husband insists on his cultural custom to separate sons from their mothers at birth. Odo tries to be polite and helpful, and she's only moderately clingly and obnoxious to him. Her husband tracks her down and tells Odo that he insists to have his son. So Odo marries her to somehow override the marriage with her previous husband and get the claim to their son.

Jake meets a creepy alien woman who flatters his writing and offers to help making him famous by teaching his methods to focus his creativity. While she has him writing, she's sucking some energy from his brain. Eventually he passes out and is taken to the infirmary. The woman kidnaps him and hyponotizes him to keep writing while she drains him, and Sisko goes to rescue him. The woman turns into energy and flies off into space.

I remember first watching this episode while lying in a hospital bed after having spilled a pot of boiling water on my crotch earlier that day.

While I clearly remember the Jake plot, the Troi subplot is a complete blank to me. So, somehow, out of all the trauma I endured on that day, that was the part that my brain chose to block out.

[Lord Vukodlak]

The one complaint I have is the usual incredibly low Federation prison sentences. A year in prison for smuggling supplies to a terrorist organization? Can you imagine? This isn't the only time that this happens either - I seem to recall Quark spending a few months in the brig for compromising station security and nearly getting Dax killed, and there's another incident later on involving Dr. Bashir where someone gets a few months for a very serious crime.

How often does the Federation trade medical supplies and other humanitarian aid to one side in a war while claiming neutrality? Hell those industrial replicators were intended for the Cardassians. So her lawyer could argue she was only doing what the Federation often does and provide food and medicine for anyone who needs it.

[hamishspence]

I wanted to find the exact time she spent in prison, but the Wiki doesn't seem to have it.

Memory Beta does though. 6 months:

https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/Kasidy_Yates

In 2372, Yates was sent to prison for six months after inadvertently using her ship to smuggle Replicators on behalf of the Maquis and was released in 2373. (DS9 episodes: "For the Cause", "Rapture")

[Rodin]

Memory Beta does though. 6 months:

https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/Kasidy_Yates

In 2372, Yates was sent to prison for six months after inadvertently using her ship to smuggle Replicators on behalf of the Maquis and was released in 2373. (DS9 episodes: "For the Cause", "Rapture")

Because of course there's a backup Wiki in case the first one misses some information. See previous comment about Galaxy Quest.

If Yates was the only case of this, I'd be willing to argue extenuating circumstances reducing the sentence. It's the comparison to some of the other cases (like Bashir's father and Quark) that makes me really scratch my head about the prison sentences.

[hamishspence]

Memory Beta's schtick is "Trek & Trek expanded universe" whereas Memory Alpha sticks firmly to TV & movies.

[Cikomyr]

Because of course there's a backup Wiki in case the first one misses some information. See previous comment about Galaxy Quest.

If Yates was the only case of this, I'd be willing to argue extenuating circumstances reducing the sentence. It's the comparison to some of the other cases (like Bashir's father and Quark) that makes me really scratch my head about the prison sentences.

The amount of time Kasidy Yates spend in prison will be outright state in the season 5 episode "Rapture". It's not a minor detail.

[Rodin]

The amount of time Kasidy Yates spend in prison will be outright state in the season 5 episode "Rapture". It's not a minor detail.

I didn't actually mock the Wikis for having that information. I mocked them for having information on her sleep schedule (but not the prison sentence) as literally the first line in her biography, and for there being two of them covering the same character.

Beta covering expanded universe stuff as well makes a lot more sense for why it's around.

[Yora]

S4E23 To the Death

The Defiant is returning to the station (why do episodes always start with people returning to the station?) and find one of the docking pylons blown off. A group of Jem'Hadar hiding on a disguised freighter just raided the station for Federation technology and disappeared back through the wormhole with their loot as quickly as they came. Bashir stays on the station to treat the wounded while Sisko takes Odo on the Defiant to pursue them. When they follow the trail, they don't find the freighter but come across a badly damaged Jem'Hadar warship. They beam over the crew of Jem'Hadar and their Vorta leader Weyoun, who wants to talk to Sisko in private.

He was pursuing a group of Jem'Hadar deserters that is trying to repair an ancient gateway that is part of a galaxy-wide network. They raided Deep Space Nine for repair equipment and supplies and then managed to disable Weyoun's ship. The Dominion expects that the deserters could use the gateways to organize a complete uprising of the Jem'Hadar. And if they wanted to, they could also use the gateways to invade the Federation just as easily. Sisko asks why the Founders didn't just send one of them to order the deserters to obey, but Weyoun has to admit that their genetically engineered loyalty to the Founders is not actually as reliable as they claim it to be.

Sisko explains the situation to the officers on the Defiant and Worf tells them that when the Enterprise found one of the gateways, the decision to destroy it before the Romulans can take control of it was regarded as exactly the right thing to do by Starfleet Command. So they most certainly would command Sisko to do the same to prevent Jem'Hadar deserters from controlling one. Sisko fully agrees with that assessment and tells the others it's important that Weyoun's Jem'Hadar don't know what the gateway is and what the deserters plan to do with it.

Since the facility is deeply underground and heavily shielded, bombing it from space probably won't destroy the target. The number of Jem'Hadar guarding it should be 150, and Weyoun has only 6 of his own left. Even being genetically engineered super soldiers designed to obey, the Jem'Hadar are actually quite unruly and constantly antagonizing the Starfleet people to provoke them into fights. Everyone is doing practice runs on the Defiant and Worf, Dax, and O'Brien fail to set the bomb before the alarm is raised because they couldn't find the third guard that should be assigned to the gateway room. The Jem'Hadar sergeant tells them that there were only two guards, since it can never be taken for granted that all the guards are placed according to standard procedures. The only way they could have been certain that the bomb isn't disarmed before it explodes is to detonate it immediately and not use a timer.

Weyoun tries to be diplomatic to make the two sides work together, but the sergeant outright tells him to his face and Sisko that he thinks those ideas are stupid. And the Jem'Hadar all know what the whole mission is about, though he won't tell how, and find it incredibly insulting that their loyalty is being questioned. Later during lunch time, the Jem'Hadar come into the mess hall with the White supply and demand that Weyoun give them their rations now. Weyoun quickly sees that they won't take a no for an answer and goes through the ceremony of swearing oaths to the Founders in a bit of a rush and visibly bored. Once they got their stuff, they immediately provoke Worf into another brawl. As punishment, the Jem'Hadar sergeant kills the soldier that started the trouble, and is terribly disappointed by Sisko not executing Worf as well.

In a quiet moment, Weyoun approaches Odo to tell him that the Founders are still hoping for him to return to them, but Odo makes it clear that he doesn't want to and doesn't want to talk about it either. Worf talks to Sisko because he heard that the Jem'Hadar sergeant threatened to kill Sisko. "I didn't know this was common knowledge." - "You told it to Commander Dax." - "Well, that explains it." Worf doesn't expect Sisko to take his advice to stay away from him, but wants him to at least be very careful. And in private, if he somehow does manage to do it, Worf will avenge his death.

When they beam down to the planet, they find that an energy field is disabling all phasers. So it's all fighting with Jem'Hadar battleaxes. They make it to the gateway room and place the bomb, and then blow it up successfully. Weyoun beams down to ask if the mission was completed. The sergeant simply kills him on the spot as revenge for having his loyalty questioned. He suggests that Sisko and his people leave while he and his men will hunt down the remaining deserters.

--

Great episode. I said back in S4E5 Indescretion that it was the first episode that felt to me like being of a slightly different new style. This episode takes it even further, giving a first peek into the violent war stories of the later seasons.

In this episode we get the Jem'Hadar in their natural habitat, and they turn out to be complete psychos that the Founders and the Vorta can barely control. This episode should have come before S3E6 The Abandoned and S4E4 Hippocratic Oath. After getting humanized early on, they are now suddenly get demonized even more than ever before. I assume decisions have been made to escalate the conflict with the Dominion in the near future and they need Jem'Hadar to become more savage and terrifying for that. Aside from this inconsistent back and forth, I quite like how this episode establishes that the Dominion is in some aspects much more show than actual substance. The Jem'Hadar are obviously really as scary as they are always made out to be, but they are not the perfectly obedient genetically engineered super soldiers. They are incredibly destructive, but it obviously takes a lot of effort to control them and neither the Vorta nor the Founders actually trust them to be reliable. And it's easy to extrapolate this and assume that a lot of the Dominion's seemingly efficiency and complete control might actually be mostly efficient posturing. There's been plenty of dictatorships that managed to convince their own people and even their enemies that they were masters of control, but when you check more closely it was really just a giant mess plagues by corruption.

I found it quite interesting that the actual attack on the gateway only takes up the last 5 minutes. It first looks pretty impressive, being set in an actual forest with natural lighting, but as so often in Star Trek, the fight choreography is terrible.

[Yora]

S4E24: The Quickening

"Come to Quark's, Quark's is fun. Come right now, don't walk - run!"

Quark hacked the station and even the Defiant to put advertising on displays and in replicators. Everyone else is not happy.

Bashir, Dax, and Kira do some scouting in the Gamma Quadrant when they get a cell for help from a planet that has been devastated by the Dominion. Bashir and Dax beam down and find the population of survivors inhabiting a ruined city. Many of the people are extremely sick, and one of them tells them to not bother and leave the planet for their own good. They take a sick woman to the local hospital, which turns out to actually be a hospice. The doctor tells them that the Dominion used a bioweapon against the planet that infects all people, including any newly born children. At some random point in their live the disease suddenly strikes and causes a horrible slow death. The only treatment he can provide is to give poison to people who have reached the final stage. Bashir makes a scene because of this and gets thrown out.

Dax does some looking around and thinks the message they got was an automated signal that was turned on two centuries ago and everyone had forgotten about since. Bashir is ready to throw his hands up and leave, but a pregnant woman asks him if he really thinks he could help them. Kira detects Jem'Hadar ships still patrolling the area, so they will have to get their ship back to the station, but Bashir wants to set up a lab with whatever medical equipment they have on board and start working while they wait for a Federation science team to be send with full scale facilities. Dax stays with him and the local woman becomes a kind of assistant and housekeeper to them.

Bashir goes looking for volunteers to study the disease on and while at first they other locals are not interested he gains some trust when he treats other injuries and ailments for free. The hospice doctor says they had other people promising miracle cures in the past, who then ran away with whatever resources they scrounged together as payment. Bashir tells them he can't be making any promises, and gets told better not to, because they really don't like such people there.

Later that day, some volunteers show up at the lab, among them the rude man who first told Bashir to just keep going and leave the planet. He tells him that he's making a real sacrifice, having decided not to go to the hospice for the poison. During the night the patients in the last stage suddenly get seizures and when Bashir goes to check on the sickest man he realizes that the electromagnetic radiation from the equipment accelerates the progress of the disease. They turn off all their machines but the rude man dies and when the hospice doctor arrives to see what's going on, most of the other terminal patients request the poison from him. In the morning, all of his patients are dead.

Bashir feels terrible, primarily about himself having thought he could beat a dominion bioweapon in just a few days. He decides to give up, but his assistant reaches the final stage that very day. And when Kira arrives to pick them up to return to the Alpha Quadrant he instead stays behind to keep trying. His assistant is getting sicker, but her baby still seems to be going strong and should be ready for birth in two more weeks. She gets visited by the hospice doctor who reminds her that she can get the poison if she wants it, as it would spare the child suffering life in the destroyed world. She politely declines, but Bashir is still pretty horrified by the man.

She later dies in childbirth, but the treatments he tried out to cure her prevented the baby from becoming infected. The hospice doctor is amazed by the result and more than eager to produce and distribute the vaccine across the planet.

When Bashir returns to the station, Sisko comes by to praise him, but he keeps working on cures for the sick in his lab, without making any progress.

--

Pretty good episode. A bit awkward perhaps, but that's because of the subject matter and not the execution. I think this really turned out quite well.

The bioweapon has a lot of similar traits to HIV, and the scale of the epidemic reminds of the worst affected areas in South Africa, probably completely deliberate. I was only 12 when this episode was made, so I don't remember what the public awareness of the issue was at that time. The method of vaccinating babies to prevent them from being infected by their mothers also seems to be based on a similar medicine against HIV that just came out in 1990.

What I am a bit ambivalent about is the White Saviour narrative. While Bashir is North African(?)/(Persian?), he's still obviously British. And he's a Federation doctor, and obviously the Federation is 'Murica! That is not to say that European and American scientists and doctors didn't go to areas where their huge scientific advantage helped them to treat health crises that the locals were not able to deal with themselves. Nor that they did a bad thing in doing it. That part is fine.
But again, like for the last 200 years or so in Western fiction, we are told a story in which the White Saviour does everything by himself, and the affected locals only receive the cure with gratitude while having done nothing to contribute to it's creation. The hospice doctor has clean beds and poison, and that's it. That's probably the best they were able to do right when the disease was spreading through the population, but seemingly no efforts were made to improve on that. Not to blame him personally. Why would someone with meager resources and only the most basic equipment have any hope to cure a condition that has affected everyone on the planet for centuries? But the writers of this episode are responsible for putting him into such a situation where he can't be doing anything to contribute to creating a cure. The other native we see involved in this story is Bashir's assistant. Who I would say is a well executed character. But again, she's a simple peasant woman with no education, who doesn't understand any of the medical stuff that Bashir is doing, and who simply works as a volunteer nurse and housekeeper. Which as a character is good. She volunteers to help, and is the first to believe that Bashir could be more than the snake oil salesman of the week. She's a good person. But her assistance to Bashir still does not constitutes what I would consider a collaboration on equal terms. Having one black servant does not make a story about white aristocrats inclusive. And having one native housekeeper and devoted servant does not make Bashir helping the people to develop a cure. He is developing a cure all by himself and hands it down to the recipients in his mercy.

It is quite possible that in the 19th century, European doctors went to Africa or Asia and treated a disease in a population without cooperating with the local health professionals. And given the attitudes of 19th century Europeans, probably quite likely, But those aren't stories that are worth writing today, and they weren't back in the 90s either. If your work has progressive ambitions, and this show certainly did without doubt, then tell stories about progressive events. Don't write stories using revisionist narratives. That the natives of the planet look like North-West Europeans is irrelevant. They don't stand in for any specific human population, but they represent a way of portraying actual human populations in an unfair way.

I've mostly been using this space to write about this issue in general because it came up in this episode. But this episode is far from the worst example of this problem, and I would say probably one of the least harmful ones. But still, it could have been avoided if the writers had been more conscious about White Saviour narratives.
That being said, still a pretty good episode.

Also, this episode continues the trend from the previous one of showing the savage brutality of the Dominion. The Founders come across as aristocratic and eloquent, the Vorta as chillingly charming, and they are technologically very advanced. But in practice, they give both the Klingons and Cardassians a run for their money when it comes to cruelty and unrestrained violence.

[Lord Vukodlak]

What Julian did wasn’t out of line with what other federation doctors or engineers have done over the course the series. Whip up a technical solution to a problem that destroyed another ship or civilization that they didn’t even know existed an hour ago.

The fact it took him weeks instead of hours to whip up a technical solution to the problem he didn’t know existed before the episode started and he only created a vaccine is a subversion of the norm.

How often was the Enterprise(pick one) called in to save a planet because the natives can’t do it without Federation aid.

[Xyril]

Memory Beta does though. 6 months:

https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/Kasidy_Yates

In 2372, Yates was sent to prison for six months after inadvertently using her ship to smuggle Replicators on behalf of the Maquis and was released in 2373. (DS9 episodes: "For the Cause", "Rapture")

Wait, "inadvertently"?

I thought she was caught literally parking her ship in the Badlands waiting for someone to meet her?

[Lord Vukodlak]

Wait, "inadvertently"?

I thought she was caught literally parking her ship in the Badlands waiting for someone to meet her?

Her ship was carrying medical supplies, however she was used as a distraction to allow the Maquis to steal the replicators.

[Talakeal]

S4E24: The Quickening
Snip.

This is one of my favorite episodes because it changes the typical Star Fleet dynamic from "Can but won't" to "Wants to but can't," so many stupid episodes (Dear Doctor being the most flagrant) involve some high minded notion of letting the natives die, but this episode mostly subverts that, where Bashir comes in, assumes he can fix it, and then finds he is actually making it worse.

I have never looked at Star Trek from "white savior" or "Murrrica!" context before, they seem pretty harsh on ideas of colonialism and capitalism, but I can see how the episode looks very different from that lens.

[Traab]

This is one of my favorite episodes because it changes the typical Star Fleet dynamic from "Can but won't" to "Wants to but can't," so many stupid episodes (Dear Doctor being the most flagrant) involve some high minded notion of letting the natives die, but this episode mostly subverts that, where Bashir comes in, assumes he can fix it, and then finds he is actually making it worse.

I have never looked at Star Trek from "white savior" or "Murrrica!" context before, they seem pretty harsh on ideas of colonialism and capitalism, but I can see how the episode looks very different from that lens.

The Federation runs on a strong mindset of "we have the superior culture and its our duty to spread it around to the heathens throughout the universe" Everyone else they meet is barbaric and horrible in some way, even their allies are generally flawed. Take the klingons. Sure they have a strong sense of duty and honor which is to be respected, but they are so violent with everyone else and each other! Or even the Vulcans. Sure they are logical and brilliant and have a strong moral code, but they are so COLD and dispassionate and dont seem to understand that there are times when you have to toss logic aside to do whats right! Its very rare to see an episode where the failure of the federations culture is a factor. Generally they have a "we know best" attitude even though its not always being shoved directly in our faces. "You are doing it wrong, let us fix you" might as well be the earthling federation motto.

[Xyril]

This is one of my favorite episodes because it changes the typical Star Fleet dynamic from "Can but won't" to "Wants to but can't," so many stupid episodes (Dear Doctor being the most flagrant) involve some high minded notion of letting the natives die, but this episode mostly subverts that, where Bashir comes in, assumes he can fix it, and then finds he is actually making it worse.

I always felt "Dear Doctor" was the most justified.

In most Prime Directive episodes, there's never any downside to intervention beyond a very abstract idea that maybe it's just that species' time. These are situations where, for example, geological forces will prematurely tear a planet apart, wiping out all life unless Starfleet intervenes. In "Dear Doctor" we actually saw a concrete example of these abstract principles at work. Out of the two sentient species on the planet, the sick one was the dominant species. The other species was treated as something between a slave and a second-class citizen. The dominant species seemed to sincerely believe that the subordinate species was intellectually less complex on a biological level and basically built a society where the Menk had a place. I wouldn't call the dying species bad guys--I think it was explicitly noted that most dual-sentient worlds ended up in slavery or extinction for one race--but Phlox noted that they greatly underestimated the intelligence of the Menk, and that it was very likely that being treated essentially as pets were stunting their development.

In this case, the alternative to saving a sentient species wasn't reverting to a lifeless rock or a world without any higher lifeforms at all--it was removing an impediment to the development of a second sentient species. The Menk are pretty much a living example of why the Prime Directive isn't just an excuse for apathy.

The Federation runs on a strong mindset of "we have the superior culture and its our duty to spread it around to the heathens throughout the universe" Everyone else they meet is barbaric and horrible in some way, even their allies are generally flawed. Take the klingons. Sure they have a strong sense of duty and honor which is to be respected, but they are so violent with everyone else and each other!

There is certainly a sense among some in Starfleet that their way is the best way--particularly in DS9, where we get to see things from the viewpoint of sympathetic "outsiders" much more often--but isn't that pretty much universal? If you don't think that "your way" isn't superior in some way--morally or pragmatically--you'd be doing things some other way. However, the Federation really doesn't do much to spread their philosophy beyond diplomacy and imposing a few hard limits on who is eligible for Federation membership (and if you're going to be indignant about the Federation's zero tolerance on new members with "compulsory, hereditary caste-systems complete with untouchables" I guess that's a whole other debate.) That really doesn't bother me too much.

The fandom has often pointed out how often the Prime Directive is broken on the series, but it's important to point out what we don't see. When it's a single sentient species faced with extinction due to forces largely beyond their control, and the Federation can save them without otherwise influencing their culture, that's when Starfleet might break the Prime Directive. Even then, that might be an exception rather than the rule--just ask Worf's (human) brother. Where the Prime Directive seems consistently obeyed is where it prevents the Federation from essentially exporting its values to less developed civilizations. The Federation doesn't "save" less developed situations from social or political systems that it finds backwards or destructive, even with empirical evidence that this is more than just a moral judgment. Heck, in TNG's very special episode about drug addiction, even with a pair of interplanetary species with some formal relations with the Federation, the Prime Directive substantially restricted what Picard could do to interfere with their internal politics.

Or even the Vulcans. Sure they are logical and brilliant and have a strong moral code, but they are so COLD and dispassionate and dont seem to understand that there are times when you have to toss logic aside to do whats right!

Umm, I know a lot of folks treat Enterprise like the last two movies of the Matrix Trilogy and suppress the memory like a childhood trauma, but the Vulcans were one of the four founding species of the Federation. By pretty much every measure, the Prime Directive is a product of Vulcan.

Starfleet is mostly human primarily for meta reasons: Human or near-human extras cost less. Within A-canon, I think it's been implied that humanity tend to be prolific explorers, meaning that they would be eager to join the exploration corps of the new interstellar state. This same drive also explains why humans seem to have settled a disproportionate number of the colonies within the Federation.

Spoiler: Beta-canon aside

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Within B-canon, one series (this was a great series, and I'm annoyed that I can't remember the name of it at all) explored some other in-universe explanations, namely that systemic or institutional challenges prevent a lot of the more exotic species from serving in Starfleet or interacting with the rest of the Federation as freely or as frequently as others. At least two of the founding species of the Federation were seeded by the Progenitors--possibly all four, since they're all carbon-based humanoids who can survive in the same general atmosphere and temperature conditions--so it's unsurprising that many Starfleet ships are designed to keep humans, Vulcans, Andorians, and Tellerites alive and comfortable. However, if you take a species such as the low-gravity officer from that one episode of DS9, or a Horta, or someone who breathes methane and finds oxygen toxic, or requires much higher or lower temperatures, and you'll have serious issues. You can have something like Kosh's encounter suit to allow these species that would allow everyone to meaningfully interact in important instances--such as the Federation council meeting in person. However, even with Starfleet's palaces in space with their seeming lack of space- and resource- scarcity, it just seems needlessly complicated, even dangerous, to have something like a starship with 50% of it's habitable space designed for low temperature humanoids and 50% designed for high temperature, high pressure acid-loving methane-breathers.

Its very rare to see an episode where the failure of the federations culture is a factor.

I would argue that this is basically Voyager. A lot of the on-screen and implied negative consequences comes from Janeway religiously adhering to the Prime Directive, trying too hard to have Voyager travel through lightyears of foreign territory without "interfering" and pretending that Voyager's mere presence in the Delta quadrant wasn't a catalyst for events that created winners and losers among the local powers. This hasn't been touched in A-canon (mostly because Enterprise and Nemesis murdered that version of Trek not long after Voyager ended), but in the novels, the finale of Voyager was pretty much treated as the epitome of Federation cockiness backfiring in a big way. Basically, blowing up the transwarp hub was the Borg's Pearl Harbor. While the Federation was previously just an interesting collectable worth diverting a cube or two to assimilate, after Voyager wrecked their hub and destroyed countless ships and drones, the Federation became an existential threat.

Generally they have a "we know best" attitude even though its not always being shoved directly in our faces. "You are doing it wrong, let us fix you" might as well be the earthling federation motto.

Again, you might be overgeneralizing from Dr. Bashir, who showed up pretty much lampshading the Mighty Whitey trope in the pilot, got called out for it (repeatedly), and pretty much had this attitude treated as a major character flaw despite the fact that--sometimes--he actually was right and managed to perform a minor miracle where everyone else failed.

Plus, I think we're getting pretty close to the arc where, as you would say, "the failure of the federations culture is a factor" in a huge setback.

Spoiler: Spoiler

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Sisko is the only ranking Starfleet officer who has ever seen the Prophets as anything but quirky aliens worshipped by somewhat backwards people, and he took a long time to get there. Admiral Ross pushes Sisko to essentially stop humoring the Prophets and the Bajoran religion and to act against what the wormhole aliens advise him to do. As a result, the Allied war effort suffers a serious setback, Jadzia dies, and DS9 can no longer make jokes about rough sex.

In general, DS9 is pretty good about showing that Federation principles are admirable, but they're not always the best way to do things. The series has shown repeated instances where somebody blatantly contravenes Federation principles and is condemned by one or two of our protagonists as a bad, bad guy, but their actions turn out to be pivotal to our happy ending.

Spoiler: Spoilers

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The Romulans only join the war effort due to Obsidian Order style lies and assassination--Federation "hey, can't you see we're all in this together?" diplomacy had repeatedly failed at that point even with the Dominion on their doorstep. Section 31 created and deployed a genocidal bioweapon to wipe out the Founders. Bashir et al regard them as essentially monsters and war criminals, yet without being able to bargain with the cure, the Dominion most likely would have kept fighting even after the fall of Cardassia. Sisko is only able to diminish the Maquis as a threat by using WMDs on civilian populations. Granted, it wasn't like he was nuking cities--he used a contaminant to gradually render a world uninhabitable, so nobody should die unless that pretty much want to martyr themselves. Still, even Worf was giving him a "WTF" look at that point.

Your observation may have been more accurate for TOS or TNG, but I think DS9 did a really good job at taking a much more skeptical look at the Federation and Gene Roddenberry's utopian ideals, while Voyager at its best points explored the idea that Federation principles weren't necessarily strong enough to endure intact when not implicitly backed up by a ton of economic and military power.

[Traab]

DS9 was the series that changed it yes. It helped that this was a long term series in a single location whereas all the other series were fixing the problem of the day then moving on. As for vulcans being part of the federation I know, I more meant the humans of the federation. Iirc, it gets brought up a LOT (by humans) how amazing humanity is now that its ended its wars, poverty, blah blah blah. Basically, they think they are amazing because they finally got their *^%$ together and stopped trying to destroy themselves so now its time to go teach those other aliens how to live. Every culture not federation human is seen as backwards, barbaric, or just wrong in some way, even as they condescendingly let all these other people live their lives despite not being as awesome as them. The thing is, I make it sound like its this awful in your face thing, but it generally isnt. Yes there are episodes of the various series where picard rants about how amazing people are, generally to Q, but mostly its just an inference because every other race they meet is having a problem that the enterprise, which is 90% human at least, gets to solve by being superior in some way.

[Xyril]

The thing is, I make it sound like its this awful in your face thing, but it generally isnt. Yes there are episodes of the various series where picard rants about how amazing people are, generally to Q, but mostly its just an inference because every other race they meet is having a problem that the enterprise, which is 90% human at least, gets to solve by being superior in some way.

Actually, I find the more noteworthy episodes to be the ones where Picard "rants" about how humans/Starfleet/the Federation aren't inherently superior just for being human/Starfleet/the Federation and that the only claim you can have to being good (or even decent, for that matter) people is that you actually try to be better. Hell, that's literally part of his speech to Q as well. Just look at the Drumhead, or either of the two episodes where he basically has to defend the rights of sentient androids.

I mean, I get the point that you're trying to make, but the way you put it now, it's such a weak point as to be nearly meaningless in how you view a series. By your own standards, Hercule Poirot is a Belgian savior who travels the world solving the mysteries that the local detectives are too savage and backwards to figure out on their own. The whole White Savior trope (or this sort of Mary Sue-adjacent trope applied to any group) is obnoxious precisely because it's awful and in your face. Take away that aspect of it, make sure the problem is set up in a way where you basically have to turn off the logical part of your brain to believe that the "savior" can solve a problem the "natives" can't, remove the implication that the problem-solving talent is rooted in [color]ness, and you basically have a story where the protagonists go around helping people who need help, a.k.a., a lot of episodic stories. In other words, when you write the story well, then Hercule Poirot is a superior detective because he's the Belgian Sherlock Holmes--and not just because he's a Belgian--and I find absolutely nothing offensive about that sort of story.

The Enterprise is the flagship of the Federation. It's able to attract the some of the best people in a wide range of fields--science, medicine, diplomacy, archaeology, and of course combat. (Also, they're not necessarily 90% human.) It has access some of the best technology developed by all the species in the Federation, as well as the resources provided by the economic output of probably thousands, if not millions of people. (I have no idea how Federation taxation would even work.) It's able to solve problems because the Federation took the effort to find talented people, train them to solve problems, equipped them to solve problems, and then sent them out into space to solve problems for anyone who asks for their help. Why is it so hard to believe that they might be good at solving problems, and that it has nothing to do with some sort of subtle, human-supremacist agenda?

For the record, your description of the Enterprise is pretty much how I would describe Johns Hopkins hospital. It's been pretty consistently ranked in the top few in the United States. It's 90% American (actually, that figure was entirely pulled out of my ass, but it's probably about as accurate as your Enterprise statistic), though I'm sure a lot of the "Americans" are naturalized citizens or permanent residents. It doesn't travel around solving problems, but I'm sure a lot of its staff does. Also, people fly in from around the country and even overseas to get treatment there. So by your reasoning, it's pretty much a monument to American imperialism.

As for me, I prefer to have a more optimistic take.

[Yora]

Again, you might be overgeneralizing from Dr. Bashir, who showed up pretty much lampshading the Mighty Whitey trope in the pilot, got called out for it (repeatedly), and pretty much had this attitude treated as a major character flaw despite the fact that--sometimes--he actually was right and managed to perform a minor miracle where everyone else failed.

A point I mentioned in the recap but forgot to bring up in my review was the moment where the locals tell him "We know your type. We don't like your type around here. And we got plenty of ropes around."
That scene shows that the writers had an awareness of how some people use their claims of their superior science to exploit people in vulnerable situations. That's good, I liked that. But since this is Bashir and he's actually honest, it is all right.

[Lord Vukodlak]

I always felt "Dear Doctor" was the most justified.

In most Prime Directive episodes, there's never any downside to intervention beyond a very abstract idea that maybe it's just that species' time. These are situations where, for example, geological forces will prematurely tear a planet apart, wiping out all life unless Starfleet intervenes. In "Dear Doctor" we actually saw a concrete example of these abstract principles at work. Out of the two sentient species on the planet, the sick one was the dominant species. The other species was treated as something between a slave and a second-class citizen. The dominant species seemed to sincerely believe that the subordinate species was intellectually less complex on a biological level and basically built a society where the Menk had a place. I wouldn't call the dying species bad guys--I think it was explicitly noted that most dual-sentient worlds ended up in slavery or extinction for one race--but Phlox noted that they greatly underestimated the intelligence of the Menk, and that it was very likely that being treated essentially as pets were stunting their development.

Sure if you believe Doctor Phlox's ridiculous claims about evolution, sure the Menk might evolve into something more once the other race dies out. OR they might die too much like many(but not all) domesticated species can't survive without humans. What if the only reason the Menk are developing a higher intelligence is because of exposure to Valakians language. Or maybe the Valakians will notice the Menk are immune decide its their fault and exterminate them out of spite.

For the episode to have actually worked the immediate cure should have required harvesting something from the Menk. Now with further time and research they'd able to develop a cure that would work without harvesting from the Menk but Phlox and the Enterprise can't stick around for a decade help

And then they give that information to the Valkians and urge them to move cautiously and not sacrifice the Menk. The framing device can then be Phlox looking back years later and noting that the Menk are instinct. Having been harvested to the last to cure as many Valakians as possible, but now their are signs that the cure wasn't permanent and the Valkians may face the same issue again in a few generations.
If they were going to do a proto-prime directive episode it should have been them interfering and it all blowing up in their faces and making things worse.

[Yora]

The Prime Directive is nonsense. It's text is never specified and it simply says whatever would cause the most drama for a given episode.

I think the most common consensus is that it forbids to A. make contact with planets that have not developed the capacity to visit other spiecies by themselves and B. get involved in the internal politics of non-Federation worlds. And the intention is to avoid causing social disruptions by suddenly introducing new technologies or taking sides in conflicts. It seems that only few Prime Directive conflicts ever actually treat it that way.

[Yora]

S4E25: Body Parts

O'Brien is worried because his wife went on a scientific expedition to the Gamma Quadrant with Kira and Bashir. Quark is unusually cheerful after his trip to Ferenginar, but actually his doctor doing his insurance checkup told him he only has one week to live. One of the things that bothers him most is that he's going into the afterlife with considerable outstanding debts. Rom suggest auctioning off his remains, but Quark thinks no collector would ever want to pay for a piece of him. Rom is not willing to let his brother go out like that and insists that he puts up an auction.

The shuttle returns from the Gamma Quadrant with severe damage and Bashir requests that Kira and Keiko are beamed to the infirmary immediately. They had an accident and Keiko got injured, and to save her child Bashir had to move it to Kira as a surrogate mother for the final weeks. Keiko should be back to normal soon, but there would be huge unnecessary dangers in returning the child back to her.

The auction for Quark's remains only has a single bid, which just happens to be the same amount as Rom's savings. Quark thinks his whole business career was a total failure but suddenly he gets another huge bid for the remains. He thinks the only one who knows him and has such money would be the Nagus, but Rom has doubts that he would pay that much for Quark. Quark is afraid that the bid could be withdrawn and decides to sell immediately.

Bashir comes to Quark because he got a message from a Ferengi doctor to tell him that he misdiagnosed Quark. Rom is excited that Quark won't die. Quark is excited that he can sue the doctor. In the night he is woken up by someone ringing at his door and it turns out to be Brunt, FCA. He has bought Quark's remains with a specified delivery date, and he has now come to collect. Quark agrees to return his money and add a bit for damage compensation, but Brunt isn't having any of it. He wants Quark dead. Or he could live in the eternal shame of dropping out of a contract.

Quark decides to go to Garrak and hire him to kill him. As quickly and painless as he can make it do.

The O'Briens are both trying their best to help Kira with her sudden advanced pregnancy, since she never expected to have a child and they already went through the whole thing before. They also offer her to move in with them until the child is born, so she'll always have someone around to help with things.

Garak is going through all kinds of assassination options with Quark in the holosuite, but seeing all of them getting done himself gets freaked out by them. He wants to die without knowing it's coming and Garak thinks he knows just the way to do it, but that requires Quark not knowing what it is and when it will be done. This obviously does not work out to give him an easy peace of mind. He goes to sleep and finds himself in the golden halls of the Divine Treasury, where is is welcomed by the first Grand Nagus who looks just like a really old Rom. ("That's because this is your dream, you imbecile!" - "Ah, that explains why this place looks so tacky.") The Nagus tells him not to kill himself for some book of business advice. They are only called the Rules of Acquisitions because nobody would buy Suggestions of Acquisition. It's even in Rule of Acquisition 239: "Never be afraid to mislabel a product." Then Brunt appears to remind him of the consequences of breaking the rules. "What are you doing here? This is a private vision!"

Quark goes to his bar where Brunt is hanging around to tell him to take his money back and be gone. Brunt has just been waiting for that and proudly announces to the whole crowd that the bar is closed and all Ferengi are forbidden to do any transactions with Quark, and then slaps a big seal of confiscation at the door. All he has left is his shirt and his pants, and Brunt will be coming back for those in the morning. Bashir and Dax come by to gift him some bottles and glasses they don't want, and Sisko brings new furniture to equip the bar. And Quark is actually really moved by it.

--

Pretty decent episode. They probably had the final episode for the season worked out and budgeted and then had to put another episode together with whatever resources they had. The only real special effect is when Quark watches himself getting killed by Garak, and that was a really simple compositing shot in which the second Quark isn't moving or interacted with. It's another silly Ferengi episode and while still not as fun as those were in season one, this is a lot better than the last couple ones.
It's very okay as an episode and doesn't do anything terrible, and it even has some really funny moments. But as a whole this is a bit of a filler with little real substance.

Jeffrey Combs is just amazing on this show. Brunt and Weyoun are nothing alike and you really have to listen hardly to hear the similarities of their voices.

As ways of working pregnancies into the shooting of a TV show go, this is clearly one of the more creative ones. It doesn't really conflict with the characters or the setting so far, and lets Kira getting back to the way it was before without burdening her with a baby. Still always felt a bit silly to me. I'd probably just have Kira shipped off to Bajor for half a season as producer myself, but this is also an option.

[Rodin]

Jeffrey Combs is just amazing on this show. Brunt and Weyoun are nothing alike and you really have to listen hardly to hear the similarities of their voices.

...I had no idea. Holy cow. That's some seriously impressive acting right there. When other characters have surgery to appear as are made up as other races, you can clearly tell who is under the makeup. Brunt and Weyoun being the same actor absolutely blows my mind.

This was another episode I was looking forward to, just for the "assassination" scene. It's Quark at his absolute funniest, and I love how exasperated Garak gets.

I didn't remember anything else from the episode, and after watching I understand why. It's not that it's bad, there's just nothing memorable.

[Lord Vukodlak]

...I had no idea. Holy cow. That's some seriously impressive acting right there. When other characters have surgery to appear as are made up as other races, you can clearly tell who is under the makeup. Brunt and Weyoun being the same actor absolutely blows my mind.

In truth Jeffery Combs is the real Changeling in StarTrek.

S4E25: Body Parts
As ways of working pregnancies into the shooting of a TV show go, this is clearly one of the more creative ones. It doesn't really conflict with the characters or the setting so far, and lets Kira getting back to the way it was before without burdening her with a baby. Still always felt a bit silly to me. I'd probably just have Kira shipped off to Bajor for half a season as producer myself, but this is also an option.

The reasons producers jump through hoops to cover this is, removing a character for a season can screw up everything the writers have planned, negatively effect the ratings of the show by the characters abstinence and probably most importantly it'd be super illegal. Cutting her from the show for half a season because she got pregnant would violate the 1978 "The Pregnancy Discrimination Act"

For bonus points Nana Visitor(Kira's actress) was at the time of this episode married to Alexander Siddig(Dr. Bashir). So he got her pregnant both in universe and in real life.

[Rodin]

For bonus points Nana Visitor(Kira's actress) was at the time of this episode married to Alexander Siddig(Dr. Bashir). So he got her pregnant both in universe and in real life.

Gives a lot of added comedy to that scene where Kira is telling Bashir it's his fault she's pregnant.