Comment Stream

Re: DS9 S7: Seventh Season Recap

"@Peter G.
Tue, Mar 5, 2019, 4:50pm (UTC -6)
Re: DS9 S7: Seventh Season Recap

"I didn't miss Bajor not joining either. In fact I'd call it a feature, not a bug. Putting aside the fact that it would have had to be tossed in as a brief mention, which wouldn't do it justice, there are series-based reasons why I think it would have been bad to have them join on the end of a war."

For some reason, I have in the back of my head that the reason Bajor wasn't in the Federation was their "cast system"

Can anyone else elaborate? .... disprove?"

You are correct that the return to the caste system, implemented by the other "Emissary" was dropped by the end of that episode, when they consulted to the prophets and found out that Sisko was the true Emissary.

The reason Bajor did not join the Federation was that Sisko new that Bajor would be the first target of the Dominion invasion, and likely be destoryed, if they were Federation members.

Remaining independent allowed Bajor to sign the non-aggression pact with the Dominion, keeping it relatively safe while the Federation fought the Dominion.

Re: DS9 S6: Profit and Lace

I just rewatched it for the first time in a long time and I didn't hate it like I did the first time.

I always liked the ACTING Grand Nagus" running gag and Worf's comment that it might not be such a bad thing if the Dominion conquered the Ferengi.

I thought the idea of selling women's rights on the idea that they would be great for the economy, as opposed to it being the right thing to do was very clever.

Re: TNG S5: Darmok

To those who say there was an underlying, normal Tamarian,language that the metaphors were based upon, if there was, why would they use metaphors that they know the aliens they never met before would not understand, instead of speaking in plain Tamarian?

If I was trying to communicate with some who only speaks Japanese, and I had a translator app, like Google translate, I would speak or type in as directly in plain English as possible, instead of using American specific metaphors or references that the Japanese speaker would not understand.

The idea of 2 strangers learning to communicate and cooperate had great potential, but it was totally spoiled by the absurd Tamarian, metaphor only language.

Re: DSC S1: The Vulcan Hello / Battle at the Binary Stars

I only watched "The Vulcan Hello" and thought it was horrendous.

a) The acting was horrible. I normally don't even notice what many people consider to be "bad acting" but it was blatant here. SMG was by far the worst offender. I liked her on TWD, but she seemed like she was reading from cue cards. The terrible writing that had the characters trying to be formal and glib at the same time probably didn't help matters.

b) The retconned Klingons were an abomination. Do we really need a THIRD, totally different version of the classic Trek race? The looked like Xindi Reptilians. Between their un-humanoid appearance, their oddly slow speech and the stupid subtitles, they came across more like an impersonal force of destruction (like a pack of wolves, a deadly virus, a storm, etc.) rather than morally accountable beings that you could have feel anger towards.

c) The mutiny was probably the least believable plot point in the history of Trek (a history that includes mirror universes, bodies being taken over by aliens and a captain and one of her officer being transformed into giant salamanders and mating).

It is inconceivable that a commander would assault the captain she served under for 7 years and supposedly loved and admired, because she thought she knew better how to handle a situation.

Mutiny is something that is either committed:
1) By dastardly subordinates seeking to grab power.

2) In the gravest situations. - The captain is about to commit genocide, or is violating Federation treaties, or has gone mad, or has is under the control of an enemy, etc.

If officers used Mikey's standard, there would be mutinies every other day.

d) I hate that they went out of their way to give the female lead a male name. It might be a minor annoyance, but I think it is a symptom of one of the biggest problems with show. The creators are focusing way too much on being different rather than on being good.

e) None of the characters were written in a way that made me care on iota about them.

Re: DS9 S5: Business as Usual

I think some posters are missing the distinction between war and genocide.

Selling weapons for war is much more morally ambiguous than selling a virus that will be used to kill 28 million men, women and children.

An arms dealer could at least rationalize that his conventional weapons will be used mainly in combat as opposed to against civilians. He might even convince himself that if he helps balance out the military power between the 2 sides, a peace agreement might come more quickly.

Also, weapons are used for legitimate defense about as often as for aggression and can also be used to fight genocidal tyrants, as in the case of the Bajorans.

Genocide, on the other hand, is unambiguously and horribly evil.

Quark was willing to lay down his own life to save the lives of 28 million strangers, so I don't think he got off that easy.

As for the cost of the cargo bay, I think that was just Sisko's way of getting a pound of flesh from Quark for selling arms on DS9 in the first place. It seemed reasonable to me.

Re: DS9 S4: Rules of Engagement

I would give it 3 stars.

My main problem with it was that the Klingon prosecutor seemed to contradict himself and flip flop about Worf's behavior and Klingon heart.

He accused him of intentionally destroying the transport because of his "Klingon heart" but then mocked him for mourning of the innocent people he believed he had killed and claimed he was not a true Klingon.

If Klingons don't mourn of intentionally or accidentally killing 441 innocent Klingons then why would they bring up Worf on charges? Wasn't he just being a good Klingon by intentionally or recklessly killing all those innocent people?



Also, if Klingons are that violent that they kill inmcoents and feel no guilt, then are there really any "innocent" Klingons or are they a species of monsters and killing them no crime at all?

As others have mentioned, Odo's discovery was a cop out that allowed Worf's actions to go unjudged. This seems to be a common thing in Trek legal cases. Dax's hearing about whether she should be held responsible for the crime of her prior host was renedered moot when Odo discovered that Kurzon was innocent.

Re: DS9 S1: Dax

A bit of trivia. In an episode of "Northern Exposure", that aired 3 months before "Dax", Anne Haney, who played the arbiter, played a judge presiding over a very similar extradition hearing.

In that case, Chris was facing extradition back to West Virginia on old charges. His defense was that he had changed so much since moving to Alaska that he was no longer the person named in the arrest warrant. A similar defense to the one used to defend Jadzia.

Re: DS9 S1: Past Prologue

@Luke
I had no problem with the Duras sisters. Using immediately let the audience know they were trouble. I loved the scene where Odo disarmed them. Also, bringing in TNG viewers was a good thing. Without viewers we might not have gotten seasons 2-7.

Good point about no mention of the Celestial Temple. Have a major trade hub in the system might be seen as a mixed blessing to Bajorans, but cutting off or destroying their gods would seem abhorrent.

Regarding the impact on Bajoran indepence, the Cardassians had apparently decided the cost of continuing to hold on to Bajor was too high. The discovery of the wormhole changed that equation dramatically. The Federation would not stay in a system with no strategic importance if its presence was unpopular.

Re: TNG S4: Galaxy's Child

Add me to the "Geordi comes off as a creepy, obsessed stalker" list.

At the time the show aired, there really wasn't any real life parallel. Now with social media and other technology we are getting closer to where someone could create a virtual reality version of a person he/she had a crush on or an obsession with.

You would think the evolved humans of the 24th Century would have had developed a good code of holo-ethics that would forbid such behavior.

He essentially appropriated her 3 dimensional image, her voice, and and his approximation of her personality and used it to create a virtual version of her for his own fantasies.

I think she had every right to feel violated and even more reason to think Geordi was pathetic and creepy.

I think Geordi had at least as serious holodeck issues as Reg Broccoli...I mean Barclay.

Re: DS9 S2: Paradise

I liked the episode. I thought the actress who played Alixus was a convincing cult leader/dictator being both persuasive and creepy at the same time.

I agree that she was let off way too easy by the colonists. She kidnapped them and was directly responsible for the deaths of many of their friends and loved ones. She was guilty murder through depraved indifference to human life. I could see some of the colonists/cult members remaining loyal, but many would have wanted to tear her and her son to shreds.

I enjoyed Sisko's defiance of her tyranny, especially when he got back into the box.

I do think it was unrealistic that she would need to go to the lengths she did to establish her low tech lifestyle. Why didn't she recruit like minded people?

Also, lots of people in the Trek universe ate unreplicated food, including Sisko and his family. The Bajorans were farmers and Picard's brother still grew grapes at the family vineyard.

It seemed clear that a low or lower tech existence was possible within the Federation.

Re: ENT S2: Regeneration

Great episode. I enjoyed the nod to "First Contact". I don't think it busted the Trek timeline, though I do get the point about no 24th century pre knowledge of the Borg. But it is always fuzzy to me what people affected by timeline shift would and wouldn't know, especially when it has been altered so many times.

Anyway, the time travel episodes are all pure fantasy as opposed to sci fi to me as I concur with the determination of the Vulcan Science Directorate that time travel is impossible. There is no past to go back to because it only existed when it was the present. Same goes for the future.

Re: ENT S2: Marauders

Moving the settlement down the road, to set a trap, shows that Captain Archer must have "Blazing Saddles" in his DVD collection. I'm surprised he didn't send the Klingons an exploding CandyGram.

Re: ENT S2: Carbon Creek

I liked this episode a lot. I enjoyed the low key humor. I thought the choice of velcro as the technology sold to pay the tuition was brilliant. It was an invention that an investor could immediately recognize as valuable, yet so harmless and low tech that it wouldn't contaminate human culture. Very logical.

Re: DS9 S6: Far Beyond the Stars

Very good episode. The roles of the DS9 cast (especially the ones normally covered in makeup) were great fun and well done.

However, it is a CRIME that Louise Fletcher (Kai Winn) was not in the ambulance when Benny was taken to the psychiatric ward. Having the actress who won an academy award for playing the evil psych Nurse Ratched as a recurring character, how could they not use her in that scene?