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Re: DS9 S4: The Way of the Warrior

This episode isn't perfect, but it's still kind of a classic. It's among the most important episodes of Trek for what it introduces and what happens next.

There are a couple loose ends that have always bothered me, though:

1) What happens to Martok's son after this episode? Granted, Martok in this episode was a changeling, but what happened to Drex? Given Martok's later role in the series, it's weird that he's never mentioned again.

2) Where's Eddington in this episode -- and where's Rom? This is one of DS9's regular flaws. They have important guest characters who don't show up in episodes where they should (like Penny Johnson around the time the Federation leaves DS9 in 'Call to Arms'). Rom's mentioned in this episode, but he's not in any of the bar scenes.

3) As for Gowron being hard-headed, I always figured that had to do with him being insecure about his lack of warrior cred -- which we see in season 7 -- and the Martok changeling egging him on. I also don't have a hard time seeing the Klingons falling mostly in lockstep, though we know from later that Kurn and Kor opposed the invasion.

4) The only other thing that's always stood out is that the Klingon ships attacking the station seemed to be pretty fragile. In some cases, one torpedo blew up birds of prey.

Re: DS9 S7: What You Leave Behind

Watched this again the other day. So much of it works -- the Bashir/O'Brien stuff is really strong as is the Kira/Odo stuff. My big gripes:

1) Damar should have lived to be the new leader of Cardassia. That would have been more interesting.

2) The creators really needed to pony up some money to Terry Farrell to use shots of her and Worf in the montage. I have a feeling they planned to use those clips, but had to struggle to find stuff without Jadzia.

3) Not having a good-bye scene with Jake and Sisko was a missed opportunity.

4) A line of dialog, even in the scene near the end with Nog and Kira about the Bajor being accepted into the Federation, would have helped things.

5) It's weird that the space battle scenes rely on SO much recycled footage.

6) As Jammer noted, it's hard to believe that ALL of the Cardassian ships were able to switch sides. Maybe some of them could have done that, but were there no Dominion soldiers on any of them?

7) The scene where Odo tries to sneak away was clearly intended to be used earlier in the episode, probably immediately after the party at Vic's.

8) The timing of Winn and Dukat being in the fire caves -- which must have been for weeks, because the battle ended, the treaty negotiations occurred and Worf was in Insurrection all while they were in there -- makes absolutely no sense. This is the biggest failing of the episode.

Don't get me wrong: This is a strong finale, but it was sloppy, too.

Re: DS9 S7: What You Leave Behind

@Nebula Nox: Odo convinced the female changeling with the cure AND because he was willing to go back to the link. There was a line at one point from the female changeling that Odo was worth more to the Founders than the entire Alpha Quadrant (I'm paraphrasing).

Re: Star Trek: Insurrection

I watched this movie for the first time in a few years the other night. It aged better than I expected -- the effects are good, and the actors' performances hold up -- but there are a few things that could have been tweaked to make a decent movie go to very good.

The Picard/Anij stuff is just really dull. I think it was a mistake to give Picard a love interest. It dragged down the plot. More time could have been spent with Picard talking about the moral issues -- particularly with the whole "Federation is old" angle.

As others have mentioned, reverting Data throughout the TNG movie franchise is really annoying -- no more than in this movie.

This one has bothered me for a long time. When the senior staff goes to confront Picard, Riker and Geordi are still in their uniforms. It's almost as if they knew that Picard would choose everybody else to go with him -- or that Picard chose based on uniforms. It makes sense that those two would stay, but why would the others figure they would definitely be going?

Finally, a real issue with the movies is that the roles for the characters is pretty much the same in each movie (particularly after 'Generations'). Picard and Data always go in first, and Worf usually comes along. Riker and Picard are almost never together -- it's pretty clear the creators got bored with Riker shortly after 'Best of Both Worlds' -- and Crusher has next to nothing to do.

Re: DS9 S7: What You Leave Behind

WYLB was a good finale, but it had one glaring plot hole that I could never quite get past.

Dukat and Winn enter the fire caves about the same time that the Federation fleet heads to Cardassia. The battle is fought, everybody returns to DS9, the treaty is signed, the senior staff goes to Vic and (apparently) Dukat and Winn stayed in the fire caves for all that time. It must have been several days.

In fact, I've seen it speculated that Worf's appearance in Insurrection occurred after the battle at Cardassia and before he became the new Federation ambassador to Kronos -- meaning that a lot of time had to pass. So were Dukat and Winn in the fire caves for a few weeks?

I've often wondered if there was some heavy editing done in this episode, anyway. When Quark follows Odo and Kira to say good bye, he has a glass of champagne in his hand, which looks suspiciously like what everyone was drinking at Vic's.

But Sisko left for Bajor during the party at Vic's, and then Kira and O'Brien searched for him in a runabout. It also looks like Odo was going to sneak out of the party with Kira and head to the Gamma Quadrant, but that they had to delay that to involve Odo and Kira in the efforts to rescue Sisko.

Re: TNG S5: The Inner Light

I think Picard's character did change after this episode. I think it changed a lot over the course of the series, actually.

Picard, in seasons one and two, was less gregarious, more formal and generally less interesting. A lot's made in "All Good Things" about Picard finally breaking down the wall between himself and the senior staff, but I think that had slowly been happening for years (the relationship with Crusher, his friendship with Wesley, his role in Klingon stuff with Worf and his de facto mentoring of Data).

I think "The Inner Light" was one of the episodes that changed Picard. Arguably, it should have affected him more, but I think it still kinda works as part of the evolution of the captain of the Enterprise -- which really goes all the way to "Generations."

Picard's reaction to his brother's and nephew's deaths seemed really odd when I first saw it, but I think incidents like "The Inner Light" (and other episodes like "The Perfect Mate" and "Lessons") changed the guy. The loss of his real family probably hit Picard harder in the first movie than it would have in the early days of TNG. He valued family and people more after his years on the Enterprise.

I don't think TNG has aged particularly well in some respects, and I think some of its characters really look one-dimensional in retrospect. Riker, in particular, seemed to regress during the series. Troi was terrible, and Geordi and Crusher were very stagnant.

But Picard and Data (and Worf, until the ridiculous Troi pairing in season 7) evolved a lot over the course of the series. In the end, those two were what TNG was about. Q said it in the finale -- the adventure is to explore the nature of existence. And Picard and Data's exploration still make TNG a very good show.

I view "The Inner Light" like I view "The Offspring." I thought the episodes could have changed Picard and Data more than they did, but I think they were part of both characters' evolutions.