(no subject)
Dec. 22nd, 2013 05:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiants"But why did you post your last Deep Space Nine entry TWO EPISODES before we ended Season Two?" said Debi.
"I don't know!" I said. "I've been doing eight episodes per! I'm a creature of habit! I'M AWARE IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE."
But I'm still doing eight episodes per, because that's about the amount of time I can go before I forget all my thoughts on the first episodes in the batch. So it goes.
25. Tribunal
I was expecting something more exciting for the penultimate episode of Season Two than yet another "SOMETHING AWFUL HAPPENS TO O'BRIEN" episode, I gotta say. In this episode: something awful happens to O'Brien! The Cardassian justice system makes no sense! Odo gets to be DETECTIVE LAWYER PREACHING ABOUT INJUSTICE, which is just about Odo's favorite thing of all time! I'm glad somebody had fun.
Also, wouldn't everybody on DS9 know by now that nothing good ever happens when an old friend turns up out of the blue? They're ALWAYS A TERRORIST. Or in this case I guess a fake terrorist.
26. The Jem'Hadar
Okay, I know the fallout from this episode is super important for the overall mytharc of the show, but can we please instead talk about Sisko and Jake and Nog and Quark on a camping trip? Can we talk about Quark deciding that he is going to go on a LIFE-CHANGING FIELD TRIP WITH SISKO at all costs?
And then can we talk about Quark calling Sisko out about how gross he is about Ferengi? The thing about Sisko that we have come to realize is that he loves alien diplomacy in theory, but he has this unfortunate inability to be non-judgmental about Weird Alien Cultures, which is hilarious given that the entire premise of Starfleet is basically "Don't Be Judgmental About Weird Alien Cultures." Sisko always judges! So he's all about accepting alien cultures, until they're Ferengi and they're looking for profit, or they're Klingons and they're being violent, or they're Cardassians and they're being dicks.
Anyway. Life-changing field trip with Quark and Sisko. Of course I'm not unhappy about the introduction of the Jem'Hadar or anything, but I could also very happily have had a whole episode of this.
1. The Search, Part 1
This is very much a Part One episode, isn't it? Odo almost loses his job because a Starfleet officer shows up to replace him and is really pissy, and then the entire cast heads into the Gamma Quadrant for alien negotiations, and that's pretty much all that happens until everything goes horribly wrong. All the interesting stuff happens next episode.
2. The Search, Part 2
THE INTERESTING STUFF. Odo and Kira find some other Changelings! This is deeply poignant, of course, but also hilarious because the Changelings are SUCH HIPPIES and Odo is . . . the opposite of a hippie. "BE THE LEAF, ODO." So Odo then spends hours furiously posing as a leaf and wondering what the hell that even means. BLESS.
Meanwhile, everybody else is back on a dystopian AU of Deep Space Nine that of course turns out to be a mass hallucination triggered by the secretly-evil Changelings. This mass hallucination is FASCINATING, featuring as it does:
- Garak being the most dashing super-spy you ever saw and then dying in Bashir's arms (this bit is all clearly from Bashir's subconscious)
- Special Romulan Extra ALSO dying tragically, and she's so pissed about it; I expect she cornered everybody else after this and demanded to know why she got downgraded to redshirt in their psyches
- that poor new security officer who temporarily replaced Odo being the BIGGEST ASSHOLE EVER SEEN. Since all any of the characters have seen him do in real life is introduce himself in a polite and friendly way -- actual quote: "I am here on DS9 to make friends! :D" -- this is both hilarious and poignant to me. He just wants to have a great coworker relationship! AND EVERYONE IS SUBCONSCIOUSLY COMPLETELY CONVINCED HE'S A DICK. He's going to be so confused when everybody else gets back and is like "ugh, how COULD you!"
3. The House of Quark
This episode begins by talking about the effect that probable-war with the Gamma Quadrant is having on the station's economics, which I really appreciate! And then it's all KLINGON HIJINKS WITH QUARK. Which are actually really great -- Quark gets to be super competent and save the day with badass accounting and stellar diplomacy!
Debi and I also spent the whole episode though going "where is Jadzia? Jadzia would LOVE this plot! Jadzia loves Klingons!" I mean, obviously if Jadzia had known about everything that was happening, she would have swooped in, married Quark's fake Klingon wife herself, defeated the bad guy in single combat, and then just spent the rest of the show as Head of the House of Dax. Which would not have been bad, per se. Just different!
Eventually we had to develop a whole complex headcanon for what everybody else on the station was doing for this whole episode, in which:
- it's Sisko's birthday, so the rest of the crew wants to give him a stress-free day
- then Jake and Nog get into trouble on Bajor ("where is Nog for this whole plot while his dad and uncle are hanging out with Klingons?") and so Jadzia and Kira have to go bail them out without letting Sisko find out about it; this is why they have that one weird scene where they rush out without meddling with O'Brien's personal life (Jadzia LOVES to meddle with people's personal lives!) also why Odo disappears halfway through the episode
- meanwhile Garak and Bashir are having an incredibly long lunch in which Bashir -- having presumably been sworn to secrecy about the highly potentially inflammatory hallucinatory hijinks of last episode -- is promptly like "OH GARAK, YOU DIED IN MY ARMS! BUT I CAN'T TALK ABOUT IT!" and then spends three hours talking about it.
This other episode that was happening at the same time as the episode we were watching would also have been a good episode to watch. I feel that's worth noting.
4. Equilibrium
This is the one that starts out with a RIDICULOUSLY CUTE TEAM BARBECUE, and Sisko is trying to teach Odo to cook, and Kira thinks this is the most adorable thing IN THE WORLD, and so do I. The entire episode would be worth it for this scene.
I mean, the rest of the plot, in which everybody goes to the super creepy Trill homeworld and Jadzia finds out that she has a secret extra murder personality, is okay too, I guess. Except I'm always kind of ehh on episodes where Jadzia spends the entire time unconscious on the operating table. Also it has the same problem as the last episode, sort of, except that instead of Jadzia being missing when she should be all over that, it's Kira who's missing for the entire rest of the episode. Like, yes, Sisko and Bashir are both close to Dax and have reasons to be concerned for her health, but SO IS KIRA! Come on, show!
Also, you all know that after this episode Jadzia goes around trying to convince everybody to play her extra personality's musical stylings ALL THE TIME. He was a misunderstood genius!
DEBI: And Sisko's just like, "ugh, Jadzia, STOP, this sounds like something a psychopathic Trill would write!"
5. Second Skin
This episode is RIDICULOUS. Okay, this is the one where Cardassians kidnap Kira and do their level best to try and convince her that she is secretly an UNDERCOVER CARDASSIAN AGENT and everything she knows about her life is a lie, and Kira is like ". . . look, if you were going to try and make this at all believable, it would be a season finale and not a random midseason episode. YOU'RE GONNA HAVE TO TRY HARDER."
Meanwhile, Garak gets pulled in by Sisko to come to the rescue, and is so bitter about having to be heroic in an episode where Bashir is not even there to appreciate it.
But it's worth it for Kira's new fake Cardassian dad, who is AMAZING, and sells the entire premise with his powerful dad feelings. Kira clearly wishes he were her real dad by the end of the episode, and so do we. I hope he comes back in another episode.
My favorite bit is at the end of the episode, when Cardassian Dad warns Kira not to trust Garak, and Kira is like "aw, it's awkward advice . . . about something I already know . . . and it's a little bit embarrassing to both of us that you that assume I don't . . . wow, WHAT A DAD MOMENT. THIS IS THE BEST FATHER-DAUGHTER EXPERIENCE I'VE HAD IN YEARS." It's adorable! It's like the Cardassian spy version of trying to talk to your daughter about birth control.
6. The Abandoned
The great thing about this episode was that -- for the first time this season since the pilot -- it really felt well-balanced! Like, everybody who should have been concerned in this plot about a foundling baby Jem'Hadar showing up on DS9 appears at exactly the right time for them to appear in it!
For example: Quark NOPES out as soon as the cold open is done, because he has zero interest in babies that cannot yield him a profit.
Jadzia and Bashir are only interested in babies insofar as they are relevant for SCIENCE.
Sisko is ADORABLY CHARMED BY THE BABY -- the fact that Sisko's entire internal monologue is taken over by "baby baby baby baby baby!" as soon as one turns up is my new favorite thing about Sisko -- and then NOPES out as soon as it becomes clear that the baby is about to turn into a metaphor for how fast children grow into terrible teenagers and you lose control over their choices. SISKO IS HAVING NONE OF THAT. Sisko has his B-plot about Jake and his poetry to get back to.
And then Odo takes over to have feelings about foundlings and science experiment children, which we had been waiting for him to do the start, and it's GREAT. You can WATCH all of his awkward dad instincts, long-dormant, switching on over the course of the episode. ODO. <3333 What a great Odo episode in general. Kira bringing Odo flowers in his room! ODO PUTTING THEM IN HIS BUCKET.
DEBI: UGH, ALL RIGHT, WHATEVER, I'm on board this ship now. THAT DID IT. >:(
And then I laughed cruelly, because I had been on board since the flashback noir episode in which Kira was a femme fatale, and I was so glad to be no longer alone!
"I don't know!" I said. "I've been doing eight episodes per! I'm a creature of habit! I'M AWARE IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE."
But I'm still doing eight episodes per, because that's about the amount of time I can go before I forget all my thoughts on the first episodes in the batch. So it goes.
25. Tribunal
I was expecting something more exciting for the penultimate episode of Season Two than yet another "SOMETHING AWFUL HAPPENS TO O'BRIEN" episode, I gotta say. In this episode: something awful happens to O'Brien! The Cardassian justice system makes no sense! Odo gets to be DETECTIVE LAWYER PREACHING ABOUT INJUSTICE, which is just about Odo's favorite thing of all time! I'm glad somebody had fun.
Also, wouldn't everybody on DS9 know by now that nothing good ever happens when an old friend turns up out of the blue? They're ALWAYS A TERRORIST. Or in this case I guess a fake terrorist.
26. The Jem'Hadar
Okay, I know the fallout from this episode is super important for the overall mytharc of the show, but can we please instead talk about Sisko and Jake and Nog and Quark on a camping trip? Can we talk about Quark deciding that he is going to go on a LIFE-CHANGING FIELD TRIP WITH SISKO at all costs?
And then can we talk about Quark calling Sisko out about how gross he is about Ferengi? The thing about Sisko that we have come to realize is that he loves alien diplomacy in theory, but he has this unfortunate inability to be non-judgmental about Weird Alien Cultures, which is hilarious given that the entire premise of Starfleet is basically "Don't Be Judgmental About Weird Alien Cultures." Sisko always judges! So he's all about accepting alien cultures, until they're Ferengi and they're looking for profit, or they're Klingons and they're being violent, or they're Cardassians and they're being dicks.
Anyway. Life-changing field trip with Quark and Sisko. Of course I'm not unhappy about the introduction of the Jem'Hadar or anything, but I could also very happily have had a whole episode of this.
1. The Search, Part 1
This is very much a Part One episode, isn't it? Odo almost loses his job because a Starfleet officer shows up to replace him and is really pissy, and then the entire cast heads into the Gamma Quadrant for alien negotiations, and that's pretty much all that happens until everything goes horribly wrong. All the interesting stuff happens next episode.
2. The Search, Part 2
THE INTERESTING STUFF. Odo and Kira find some other Changelings! This is deeply poignant, of course, but also hilarious because the Changelings are SUCH HIPPIES and Odo is . . . the opposite of a hippie. "BE THE LEAF, ODO." So Odo then spends hours furiously posing as a leaf and wondering what the hell that even means. BLESS.
Meanwhile, everybody else is back on a dystopian AU of Deep Space Nine that of course turns out to be a mass hallucination triggered by the secretly-evil Changelings. This mass hallucination is FASCINATING, featuring as it does:
- Garak being the most dashing super-spy you ever saw and then dying in Bashir's arms (this bit is all clearly from Bashir's subconscious)
- Special Romulan Extra ALSO dying tragically, and she's so pissed about it; I expect she cornered everybody else after this and demanded to know why she got downgraded to redshirt in their psyches
- that poor new security officer who temporarily replaced Odo being the BIGGEST ASSHOLE EVER SEEN. Since all any of the characters have seen him do in real life is introduce himself in a polite and friendly way -- actual quote: "I am here on DS9 to make friends! :D" -- this is both hilarious and poignant to me. He just wants to have a great coworker relationship! AND EVERYONE IS SUBCONSCIOUSLY COMPLETELY CONVINCED HE'S A DICK. He's going to be so confused when everybody else gets back and is like "ugh, how COULD you!"
3. The House of Quark
This episode begins by talking about the effect that probable-war with the Gamma Quadrant is having on the station's economics, which I really appreciate! And then it's all KLINGON HIJINKS WITH QUARK. Which are actually really great -- Quark gets to be super competent and save the day with badass accounting and stellar diplomacy!
Debi and I also spent the whole episode though going "where is Jadzia? Jadzia would LOVE this plot! Jadzia loves Klingons!" I mean, obviously if Jadzia had known about everything that was happening, she would have swooped in, married Quark's fake Klingon wife herself, defeated the bad guy in single combat, and then just spent the rest of the show as Head of the House of Dax. Which would not have been bad, per se. Just different!
Eventually we had to develop a whole complex headcanon for what everybody else on the station was doing for this whole episode, in which:
- it's Sisko's birthday, so the rest of the crew wants to give him a stress-free day
- then Jake and Nog get into trouble on Bajor ("where is Nog for this whole plot while his dad and uncle are hanging out with Klingons?") and so Jadzia and Kira have to go bail them out without letting Sisko find out about it; this is why they have that one weird scene where they rush out without meddling with O'Brien's personal life (Jadzia LOVES to meddle with people's personal lives!) also why Odo disappears halfway through the episode
- meanwhile Garak and Bashir are having an incredibly long lunch in which Bashir -- having presumably been sworn to secrecy about the highly potentially inflammatory hallucinatory hijinks of last episode -- is promptly like "OH GARAK, YOU DIED IN MY ARMS! BUT I CAN'T TALK ABOUT IT!" and then spends three hours talking about it.
This other episode that was happening at the same time as the episode we were watching would also have been a good episode to watch. I feel that's worth noting.
4. Equilibrium
This is the one that starts out with a RIDICULOUSLY CUTE TEAM BARBECUE, and Sisko is trying to teach Odo to cook, and Kira thinks this is the most adorable thing IN THE WORLD, and so do I. The entire episode would be worth it for this scene.
I mean, the rest of the plot, in which everybody goes to the super creepy Trill homeworld and Jadzia finds out that she has a secret extra murder personality, is okay too, I guess. Except I'm always kind of ehh on episodes where Jadzia spends the entire time unconscious on the operating table. Also it has the same problem as the last episode, sort of, except that instead of Jadzia being missing when she should be all over that, it's Kira who's missing for the entire rest of the episode. Like, yes, Sisko and Bashir are both close to Dax and have reasons to be concerned for her health, but SO IS KIRA! Come on, show!
Also, you all know that after this episode Jadzia goes around trying to convince everybody to play her extra personality's musical stylings ALL THE TIME. He was a misunderstood genius!
DEBI: And Sisko's just like, "ugh, Jadzia, STOP, this sounds like something a psychopathic Trill would write!"
5. Second Skin
This episode is RIDICULOUS. Okay, this is the one where Cardassians kidnap Kira and do their level best to try and convince her that she is secretly an UNDERCOVER CARDASSIAN AGENT and everything she knows about her life is a lie, and Kira is like ". . . look, if you were going to try and make this at all believable, it would be a season finale and not a random midseason episode. YOU'RE GONNA HAVE TO TRY HARDER."
Meanwhile, Garak gets pulled in by Sisko to come to the rescue, and is so bitter about having to be heroic in an episode where Bashir is not even there to appreciate it.
But it's worth it for Kira's new fake Cardassian dad, who is AMAZING, and sells the entire premise with his powerful dad feelings. Kira clearly wishes he were her real dad by the end of the episode, and so do we. I hope he comes back in another episode.
My favorite bit is at the end of the episode, when Cardassian Dad warns Kira not to trust Garak, and Kira is like "aw, it's awkward advice . . . about something I already know . . . and it's a little bit embarrassing to both of us that you that assume I don't . . . wow, WHAT A DAD MOMENT. THIS IS THE BEST FATHER-DAUGHTER EXPERIENCE I'VE HAD IN YEARS." It's adorable! It's like the Cardassian spy version of trying to talk to your daughter about birth control.
6. The Abandoned
The great thing about this episode was that -- for the first time this season since the pilot -- it really felt well-balanced! Like, everybody who should have been concerned in this plot about a foundling baby Jem'Hadar showing up on DS9 appears at exactly the right time for them to appear in it!
For example: Quark NOPES out as soon as the cold open is done, because he has zero interest in babies that cannot yield him a profit.
Jadzia and Bashir are only interested in babies insofar as they are relevant for SCIENCE.
Sisko is ADORABLY CHARMED BY THE BABY -- the fact that Sisko's entire internal monologue is taken over by "baby baby baby baby baby!" as soon as one turns up is my new favorite thing about Sisko -- and then NOPES out as soon as it becomes clear that the baby is about to turn into a metaphor for how fast children grow into terrible teenagers and you lose control over their choices. SISKO IS HAVING NONE OF THAT. Sisko has his B-plot about Jake and his poetry to get back to.
And then Odo takes over to have feelings about foundlings and science experiment children, which we had been waiting for him to do the start, and it's GREAT. You can WATCH all of his awkward dad instincts, long-dormant, switching on over the course of the episode. ODO. <3333 What a great Odo episode in general. Kira bringing Odo flowers in his room! ODO PUTTING THEM IN HIS BUCKET.
DEBI: UGH, ALL RIGHT, WHATEVER, I'm on board this ship now. THAT DID IT. >:(
And then I laughed cruelly, because I had been on board since the flashback noir episode in which Kira was a femme fatale, and I was so glad to be no longer alone!
no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 12:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 01:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 01:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 02:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 02:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 05:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 08:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 08:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-24 03:22 am (UTC)"What babe?"
". . . ANY BABE babies are the greatest *____*"
no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 02:31 am (UTC)"It's like the Cardassian spy version of trying to talk to your daughter about birth control."
no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 02:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 03:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 03:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 05:21 pm (UTC)I... would totally have watched the other episode happening at the same time of "House of Quark."
Also, Kira's fake Cardassian dad is THE BEST.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 06:55 pm (UTC)And he's SO GREAT. Instant jump to Favorite Cardassian status, for me. Like, Garak is fun and all, but he can in no way compete with Cardadssian!
no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 06:12 pm (UTC)Eventually we had to develop a whole complex headcanon for what everybody else on the station was doing for this whole episode
Well, now I'm torn, because I love "House of Quark", but I want both of these other episodes too.
I'm always kind of ehh on episodes where Jadzia spends the entire time unconscious on the operating table.
Have you noticed how at least half the episodes Wikipedia marks as "Jadzia-centric" are episodes which Jadzia spends incapacitated? It was of great annoyance to me when I was trying to research clips for a vid about Jadzia doing things.
And then I laughed cruelly, because I had been on board since the flashback noir episode in which Kira was a femme fatale, and I was so glad to be no longer alone!
Betrayal! Odork OTP forever. >:( (But I do love their friendship.)
no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 06:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-23 06:51 pm (UTC)And ha! As Debi said, we have neither of us AT ALL abandoned the beauty of Odork. (We just watched this morning the episode where the station's on lockdown and Quark and Odo spend the whole time locked in the security office. PRICELESS.) Everyone in Starfleet has a space boyfriend and a space girlfriend! I mean, it's only fair for Odo to have an epic romance with Kira, given that Quark also has his One True Love Cardassian Resistance Fighter .... um.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-24 01:23 am (UTC)Also, Odo putting Kira's flowers in his bucket just makes me all warm and squishy inside. TEAM ODO/KIRA. WITH BONUS PINING.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-24 03:21 am (UTC)I was so busy laughing about Odo's psychological dependence on his bucket I almost missed it! AND IT'S SO BEAUTIFUL.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-24 03:27 am (UTC)I KNOW I ACTUALLY JUMPED UP AND SCREAMED WHEN CARDASSIAN DAD TURNED UP AGAIN.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-25 11:59 pm (UTC)I WILL AWAIT THE RETURN OF CARDADSSIAN WITH ANTICIPATION!
no subject
Date: 2013-12-26 12:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-24 05:19 am (UTC)Tribunal was the one that prompted my "O'Brien eps just aren't that interesting" post.
he thing about Sisko that we have come to realize is that he loves alien diplomacy in theory, but he has this unfortunate inability to be non-judgmental about Weird Alien Cultures
I love this about Sisko. He tries to toe the line, he really does, but he's just such a raging judgeypants!
Also, babies! It makes me wish we could have had more Sisko with baby Jake, because that would have been adorable.
And on the subject of adorable and babies, a big AWWWW to Kira's fake Cardassian dad.
Basically, I'm with you on everything, and I have to catch a train so I can't elaborate more than this!
no subject
Date: 2013-12-26 12:01 am (UTC)SISKO IS THE RAGIEST JUDGYPANTS OF ALL. It's kind of constantly hilarious to me. We spend a lot of time each episode screaming "CHECK YOUR PREJUDICE, SISKO!" at the screen.
no subject
Date: 2016-05-09 08:46 pm (UTC)Debi and I also spent the whole episode though going "where is Jadzia? Jadzia would LOVE this plot! Jadzia loves Klingons!" I mean, obviously if Jadzia had known about everything that was happening, she would have swooped in, married Quark's fake Klingon wife herself, defeated the bad guy in single combat, and then just spent the rest of the show as Head of the House of Dax. Which would not have been bad, per se. Just different!
I CAN'T BELIEVE JADZIA LITERALLY GETS TO DO THIS
no subject
Date: 2016-05-10 03:22 am (UTC)