skygiants | (no subject)

There's a way in which I really kind of love that the first few episodes of season six of Deep Space Nine are INTENSE SERIALIZED SCIENCE FICTION, and then that ends and they're like "what do we do now ... uhhhhhh ..... ummmmmmmmm .... whatever, fine, IT'S FANFIC SEASON. Let's shrink the Defiant!"

11. Waltz

Oh my god, Waltz. WALTZ. SPEAKING OF FANFIC. I can't believe this is a whole episode that is just Dukat menacingly screaming "LOVE ME SISKO!" while he alternates between attacking him and tenderly binding his wounds because HE CAN'T DIE YET, NOT UNTIL HE STOPS JUDGING DUKAT AND STARTS VALIDATING HIM.

As someone who is shamefully invested in Dukat and Sisko's ULTIMATE NEMESIS-ITUDE (sorry, Eddington!), this episode was a shining gift, and that's all I have to say.

-- OK, it's not all I have to say, actually. Here's the thing: yes, it's hilariously over-the-top, but it turns out to me there is something weirdly, viscerally satisfying in how every single villain on Deep Space Nine is absolutely desperate to get Sisko's attention and approval. It's not that that's an unusual position for a protagonist to be in -- hi, Francis Crawford of Lymond! -- but it is an INCREDIBLY unusual position for a black protagonist to be in; the usual narrative with a black protagonist is someone who has to constantly fight for respect, not someone whose respect everybody else constantly fights for. Usually I complain when three-quarters of the plots wouldn't happen without everyone being obsessed with the protagonist, but in this case, I LOVE IT, IT'S AMAZING, KEEP IT UP DEEP SPACE NINE. If you want to trap Dukat and Sisko together on a planet for half a season, I'm here for that.

12. Who Mourns For Morn?

Debi and I were like "so what could possibly top Waltz, fanfic-season-wise?" and then we looked at the next episode and were like WELL OKAY THEN.

I mean, if you take out the Morn angle, Who Mourns for Morn is a fairly mediocre Quark-has-a-heist episode, but ... look, I'm an easy sell, I am not ashamed to admit it. Jadzia once had a crush on Morn! Bashir and O'Brien are sworn to keep his seat warm in memoriam! MAYBE HE'S A PRINCE. WE DON'T KNOW. Morn, I am glad you've gotten your narrative due.

(We were both scandalized that Odo spent the whole episode taunting Quark instead of mourning Morn, but eventually decided that Odo must have been aware of the scam from the beginning. HE HAS EYES EVERYWHeRE!)

13. Far Beyond the Stars

...and here we have a very different kind of fanfic episode.

Far Beyond the Stars was actually the first Deep Space Nine episode I ever saw --

batyatoon showed it to me a few years back -- so I was braced for the primary punches. But, you know. A story about the people who never, ever get to be the heroes of their own stories -- a story about how no matter how much things change in our incredibly racist society, they never change enough -- definitely has a certain resonance, right now.

I know that none of the 50s alter egos, in this particular fanfic AU, are necessarily supposed to have anything to do with the actual characters. All the same, Debi's headcanon is that O'Brien's 50's writer character has a Japanese wife, which is why he's so determined to keep his head down and not engage with any of the racism issues and write inoffensive stries about robots. My headcanon is that Armin Shimerman's character is Jewish, and has been under fire from HUAC. And it's reeeally interesting to think about alt!Odo as, you know, someone completely unwilling to overthrow the status quo.

(Also, both of us want the fanfic romance between 50s Michael Dorn and 50s Terry Farrell. On a shallow note: holy WOW, Michael Dorn! Smiling and in a snazzy fedora! Daaaaaaaaamn. I am glad you got to have fun in this episode, Michael Dorn!

I do feel bad for poor Kasidy, who only ever gets to show up on the station to visit her boyfriend when he's having hallucinogenic episodes.)

14. One Little Ship

They shrink the Defiant. That's the whole episode. They shrink the Defiant, and tiny Jadzia and Bashir and O'Brien save the day from a bunch of Jem'Hadar. In a tiny, heroic fashion.

Never change, Deep Space Nine.

15. Honor Among Thieves

Okay, but ... if you're sending a spy undercover to infiltrate a crime ring, why would you send O'Brien? Why would you do that. O'BRIEN IS THE WORST POSSIBLE SPY ON DS9.

I could write a review of the touching bromance/father-son/Stockholm syndrome romance/whatever the heck is going on between O'Brien and the sad gangster who recruits him into crime, but instead I'm just going to take some time to list people who would be more skilled AND more narratively interesting as undercover double agents in a crime ring than O'Brien is:

- I mean, this is ... Garak's actual job ...
- ALSO KIRA'S ACTUAL JOB. Or at least it used to be. Seriously, send Kira! She's an actual terrorist and saboteur!
- AND ODO'S AN ACTUAL SHAPESHIFTER. Plus, Odo loves noir! He's had a rough season, guys. ome on. Let him have this.
- Jadzia Dax never gets to go undercover and it makes me so sad because she would be SO GOOD at it and have SO MUCH FUN
- Jake Sisko! Plucky undercover reporter! I mean, he wouldn't be good at it, but the episode would be hilarious.

The only person I can think of who's actually a WORSE choice to send to be an undercover spy agent would be Julian Bashir ... MORE ON THIS ANON.

16. Change of Heart

BECCA: I love this episode so much! ... omg, Jadzia better not die this episode.
DEBI: ...man, this episode would be perfect, if we didn't know this was the season where Jadzia died!

Fortunately Jadzia did not die this episode, so it remains a representation of fanfic season at its finest -- by which I mean, not that it's over-the-top and ridiculous, but that it's the kind of story that is almost never told outside of fanfic: a story which begins with two people in a stable, healthy relationship, and ends with two people in a stable, healthy relationship, and tells an intense and suspenseful story about those two people together without ever putting that relationship into question.

There's this weird sense in media -- but television, especially -- that stories about people in stable relationships are somehow boring, or not worth telling, and I want to sit everyone who believes that down and make them watch Change of Heart.

17. Wrongs Darker Than Death Or Night

So this is the episode that begins with Dukat calling up Kira on her mother's birthday to be like "HEY GUESS WHAT I BANGED YOUR MOM."

DEBI: ...but, like, why? Why did he call her up on her mom's birthday? Was this ever explained?
BECCA: Um, I'm pretty sure he has a Google calendar alert for everyone's mother's birthdays so he can call them up and tell them he banged their mom. Sisko's up next.
DEBI: Well, he hasn't banged Sisko's mom ...
BECCA: Yet. That's what time travel's for!

Okay, in seriousness, this was ... an interesting attempt at talking about a.) comfort women, a very specific reference that I'm not 100% sure DS9 knew what to do with and b.) the whole double standard and sense of betrayal during an occupation around the idea of "collaborators," and -- it was a very interesting attempt! I think almost everything about it could have been done better, but I -- do appreciate the effort? I think?

18. Inquisition

And this is the one where Starfleet decides that Bashir might be a traitor, and so they send a special crack interrogation squad to hijack him and holosuite him into confessing. To be fair to them, Bashir's been acting surprisingly ethical this season; I'm suspicious too. It's still entirely possible he's been a Changeling the past six episodes.

Anyway, they end by trying to recruit him and Sisko is like "OK, go on, next time they show up, be an undercover spy! Let's do this!"

DEBI: Becca, remember how we spent Honor Among Thieves wishing for anyone besides O'Brien to have an undercover spy story ... except Bashir ...?
BECCA: I REMEMBER.

Come on, Deep Space Nine, where is my Jake Sisko: Ace Undercover Reporter episode? I'M DISAPPOINT.

Actually though our favorite part of the episode is when it turns out that the people interrogating Bashir are part of a SECRET TORTURE UNIT inside Starfleet that wears BLACK LEATHER MURDER SUITS as their uniforms.

DEBI: ... so Section 31 is Hydra?

Our least favorite part is the total absence of Garak. Where'd he go?

Crossposts: http://bookelfe.livejournal.com/416959.html

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

thirdblindmouse

I would love a Dax or Jake undercover episode. One of my complaints about the final seasons of DS9 is the lack of Jake time. He is not a child anymore; they should have more for him to do.

Um, I'm pretty sure he has a Google calendar alert for everyone's mother's birthdays so he can call them up and tell them he banged their mom.

*burst out laughing*

Sisko's up next.

...*laughter turns to awkward coughing*

From:

skygiants

Yeah! The end of S5 had such promise for amazing Jake plots, but S6 has so far tragically failed to deliver.

...

the only way I know how to interpret the end of this comment is to assume that we will now have to spend every episode asking each other "OK, is this the one when Dukat travels back in time to try and bang Sisko's mom?"

From:

thirdblindmouse

Maybe Dukat is Sisko's mom. Did you ever think of that?

From:

sovay

...and here we have a very different kind of fanfic episode.

Everything you mention about this episode sounds fascinating. I do not mean that at all ironically. Can I get slightly more description? Also possibly a picture of smiling Michael Dorn in a fedora?

a story which begins with two people in a stable, healthy relationship, and ends with two people in a stable, healthy relationship, and tells an intense and suspenseful story about those two people together without ever putting that relationship into question.

Every now and then I run into books or movies like that and I'm all for them. Good for DS9, even if it was in the weird plotbunny season.

From:

scifantasy

Ben Sisko starts seeing things, probably thanks to the Prophets. Specifically, he sees himself as Benny Russell, a black science fiction writer in 1950s New York City, part of a stable at a fictional magazine a la Astounding Science Fiction.

Bashir and Kira become a married couple/cowriters (and, like C.L. Moore before her, Kay Eaton aka "K.C. Hunter" publishes under initials and leaves the white male readership to assume she is like them), O'Brien is basically Isaac Asimov (awkward with people, writes about robots), Odo is the John W. Campbell analogue, unwilling to consider that maybe something not white and not male would be nice, Dax is "Darlene" the new secretary ("I read a lot of science fiction," she says, and the response is "bless you, my child, the world needs more like you").

Quark is Harlan Ellison with an attitude problem and righteous indignation about racial injustice, not to mention a hair trigger for being accused of being a Red.

In the meantime, Benny's still a black man in Harlem. Dukat and Weyoun are racist cops, Joseph is a street preacher, Kasidy is his girlfriend the waitress, Worf is basically Willie Mays, and Jake is a street hustler.

Benny gets inspired to write the saga of Space Station Deep Space Nine, but there's pushback from editorial and the publisher about the idea of a black commanding officer.

That's as far as I'll go...it's worth watching.

And: http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/memoryalpha/images/4/45/Willie_Hawkins.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20130213095816&path-prefix=en

Edited Date: 2015-06-24 01:34 pm (UTC)

From:

sovay

That's as far as I'll go...it's worth watching.

Thank you for the additional description; that sounds wonderful. Also that photograph.

From:

skygiants

As we were watching, Debi said (of Armin Shimerman's character), "Of course there's got to be a mouthy outspoken white guy --"

"Yeah," I said, "that is definitely a valid critique, but Armin Shimerman is Jewish -- all the Ferengi actors are Jewish -- so that's one thing; and the other thing is, who's the character on Deep Space Nine who comes in for the most prejudice, and is the most outspoken about Starfleet's inability to respect cultures that don't act human?"

And Odo's tragic flaw has always been his frequent inability to distinguish between "adherence to order and the status quo" and "justice."

From:

scifantasy

Like I said, Harlan. As far as I can remember he never personally dealt with HUAC (he was just a tad younger in real life than this), but he's clearly Harlan.

From:

sovay

-- all the Ferengi actors are Jewish --

Do you mind if I side-eye that fact for a moment?

From:

skygiants

NO, PLEASE, CARRY ON SIDE-EYEING, because that fact is awkward as her. Short, large-nosed, and comically commerce-obsessed? Yep.

I went on Twitter at one point to complain about it -- "I always thought the Bajorans were Star Trek's Space Jews" (though they're as much Space Palestinians as Space Jews depending on which kind of oppression/occupation analogy the writers feel like doing that day) "but now I find out all the Ferengi are played by Jewish actors, sooooo...." Someone else chimed in: "Wait, I thought the Vulcans were Space Jews!" (Mostly because of Leonard Nimoy.) The actual conclusion here is just that space is 100% full of Jews. JEWS EVERYWHERE.

From:

scifantasy

Vulcans: Space Jewish rabbis.
Ferengi: Space Jewish merchants.
Bajorans: Space Israeli Jews.

From:

sovay

Vulcans: Space Jewish rabbis.
Ferengi: Space Jewish merchants.
Bajorans: Space Israeli Jews.

Call me when we get Space Yiddish Theatre.

From:

skygiants

I'M GONNA WRITE THAT STORY.

From:

sovay

I'M GONNA WRITE THAT STORY.

YAY.

From:

sovay

Short, large-nosed, and comically commerce-obsessed? Yep.

Side-eyeing continues.

"Wait, I thought the Vulcans were Space Jews!" (Mostly because of Leonard Nimoy.)

Definitely because of Leonard Nimoy. And Mark Lenard. Don't know about the actress who originated the part of T'Pau. (This question became a small K-hole, the upshot of which is: Celia Lovsky. Viennese actress. Partners included Arthur Schnitzler and Peter Lorre. I can't find any information about her ethnicity or religion, but her theater pedigree is ridiculous. No time is ever wasted reading ten pages out of a biography of Peter Lorre.) Arlene Martel who played T'Pring was also Jewish.

I have some very ambivalent feelings about the extension of this metaphor into the Star Trek reboot.

From:

skygiants

scifantasy pretty much has this covered, so I will just add that Avery Brooks, who plays Sisko, directs the episode as well as starring in it. He knows exactly what he's doing, and is extremely committed to doing it. The first scene with the writer's stable has the editor informing them all that someone's coming to photograph the writer's room tomorrow morning -- so Kay and Ben get to sleep in! ISN'T THAT NICE.

From:

sovay

The first scene with the writer's stable has the editor informing them all that someone's coming to photograph the writer's room tomorrow morning -- so Kay and Ben get to sleep in! ISN'T THAT NICE.

. . . I'm just going to watch this episode if I can find it streaming, all right?

From:

skygiants

That's how I first watched it! You have my blessing.

From:

scifantasy

Netflix.

From:

kd7sov

Section 31 is totally Hydra. Except for the part where it was founded by arguably-protagonisty dudes, which arguably makes it creepier.

One Little Ship is not my favorite episode, or even my favorite from this bunch, but it's one of the episodes about which I have the most (and most-entertaining) childhood memories.

It could be argued that much of what arc Jake gets in Season 7 counts as being an Undercover Reporter.

From:

skygiants

My favorite factoid from going to Memory Alpha for this batch of episodes is that the writer campaigned FOR YEARS to get to shrink a spaceship in an episode. YEARS. I mean, OK, man. You live your dream.

I will look forward to this as much as there is! I'm still sad there was so little of Jake's Intrepid Undercover Reporting in the Dominion occupation arc.

From:

scifantasy

DEBI: ... so Section 31 is Hydra?

Worse. Section 31 is the NSA operating Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib.

Hydra is an evil parasite that intends to kill its host in its hatching. Section 31 intends to keep its host alive...by killing its soul.

As you may have seen from the description I wrote for

sovay (which was almost entirely from memory; I only looked up what Kira's character was named), I love "Far Beyond the Stars." I'm very fond of the pulp period of SF history, of course (which is why I could rattle off the names I did, and check out the Trivial Matters section of Keith's review for the ones I didn't name), and I think it's important that this takes place in '50s New York as a tale of racism...the North may not have had Jim Crow, but it wasn't a land of peaceful Kumbaya singing. Still isn't--Eric Garner anyone?

Edited Date: 2015-06-24 01:42 pm (UTC)

From:

skygiants

Yeah, I definitely think it's relevant that it takes place in '50s New York -- which is also really, really depressingly not as far away from current-day New York as people would like to think.