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selenakThe first six episodes of DS9's sixth season was something never tried on Star Trek before (though it had been done with other shows). They really have to be seen directly after the other, make no pretensions at all at being comprehensible to newbies and are fantastic for the long-time fan. For that reason and others, they remind me a bit of the first six episodes of Babylon 5's fourth season.
Trek-wise, it was a new thing to have the cliffhanger of the previous season not resolved in the first one or two episodes of the new one - and even after six episodes, the audience is very aware that just one admittedly major issue - the occupation of DS9 - is over. But the war with the Dominion, the other long-term change ushered in by season 5's Call to Arms, is anything but. Within the space of the six "occupation" episodes, we have, since the ensemble is split up, several separate storylines which intersect only in the last, Sacrifice of Angels. Some of the ensemble - and guest stars - don't really get much to do - Jake, Quark (until the last two), Bashir, O'Brien, Dax, Garak. Don't get me wrong - they all do have their moments, like Miles and Julian quoting the Charge of the Light Brigade (which btw isn't exactly a compliment to Sisko, since as far as I know what happened to the Light Brigade is partly due to an idiotic commander bent on his own glory). But the meat of character development and action is reserved to Kira and Odo on DS9, and Sisko and, since he does get one half of an episode (Sons and Daughters for himself), Worf with the army. As far as guest stars go, I even have a stronger sense of Nog during these episodes than I have of Garak (which during first broadcast disgruntled the Garak fan in me, but all was forgiven when In the Pale Moonlight came along). On DS9, or rather, Terok Nor *g*, Dukat, Weyoun, the Female Founder, Ziyal and Damar are much more important to the storylines than Jake, Quark, or, with the exception of his capture as a MacGuffin, Rom.
(This is not a complaint, just an observation. It completely makes sense, given the story they had to tell.)
Kira's "When I was in the Resistance, I despised people like me" epiphany, in itself a powerful moment, reminds me of a question the show never really answers - what is Kira's take on Odo's time on Terok Nor before the Federation arrived? Because by her definition, Odo was a collaborator. Dukat appointed him, he worked for Dukat, for years, and Things Past in season 5 made a point of demonstrating that Odo's famed "I was an impartial servant of justice" stand wasn't uncompromised. Now of course Odo wasn't a Bajoran, but he did define himself, at that time, as Bajoran more than anything else.
While Odo's past with the Cardassians, and Kira's attitude towards it, is an open question, the present-day action addresses the topic of loyalties head-on. Ever since The Die is Cast, we knew that Odo, despite having chosen Kira and his life on DS9, still had a powerful longing for the Great Link. In season 6, this is finally brought to the fore and combined with another long-running storyline, his frustrated and at that point unrequited love for Kira. In Children of Time, we saw Odo wipe out 8000 people to save Kira's life, an act at the same time appallingly selfish and selfless… and well in tune, if you think about it, with the Founder's take on the solids. They're "little", can't see what's really important, and if they are an obstacle, they're to be removed. What Odo does from Behind the Lines onward, considering this background, isn't really surprising, though it shocked me at the time. And no, I don't think we can blame the Female Founder. She didn't take his free will from him. The experience of linking might be an incredible rush - and for the first time is presented with explicit sexual connotations - but isn't hypnosis. There is manipulation, granted, but imo the reason why she's successful with it is that she's absolutely sincere in her manipulation. She - and the Link - does care about Odo, she's absolutely convinced it's for his best to come home, and, as she (prophetically) says to Weyoun, rebukingly, she would give the entire Alpha Quadrant to get Odo back. The one mistake she makes is mentioning Kira's arrest to Odo. Because note that nothing previously was enough to shock Odo out of his newly discovered Changeling bliss. Not Rom's impending death sentence, not the fact that Jem'hadar reinforcements were about to come through the wormhole, and certainly not the fate of the Alpha Quadrant. All of this was troublesome but he pushed it aside, until he heard about Kira. And then he acted.
(This is why the aftermath as far as Odo is concerned is one of my few complaints about DS9. Imo, it would have been far better if he had spent the rest of the season slowly rebuilding his relationships not just with Kira but with the rest of the station, and done some serious self-examination. Because he betrayed them all, and came through not for them or for some conviction Dominion rule was wrong, but out of love. At the very least, he should have taken off in search of a soul before… sorry, wrong fandom. Anyway. Making Odo one of the gang again and letting him hook up with Kira before the year is over was far too easy. If it had happened in season 7, after the earlier mentioned slow rebuilding andquest of a soul soul-searching, it would have still been in time for Odo to make a genuine sacrifice with his decision in the series finale and would have been a better resolution to his actions in season 6.)
While we're at storylines I like during these six episodes, with an aftermath I don't, let's take a look at Dukat. (You knew this was coming.) It's his last hurrah as a three-dimensional character; ever afterwards, the writers hit us over the head with the fact he's EEEEEEEVIL, with poor Marc Alaimo having to twirl his imaginary mustache. Mind you, the "why don't I have a statue?" speech (complete with Weyoun's priceless "this guy is nuts" expression) is already foreshadowing of what was to come, but that kind of hubris still is within three-dimensional parameters and balanced by the fact Dukat is still allowed to show other emotions. His last scene with Ziyal is very Lear and Cordelia, and it occurs to me Cordelia might well have been the inspiration for Ziyal's character. Kira finds it incredible that Ziyal forgives Dukat for having left her to die in In Purgatory's Shadow, but again I'm reminded of Garak who didn't just forgive Tain a direct assassination attempt but risked everything to save him, twice. Garak, as much as he and Dukat loathe each other, would have understood Ziyal, I believe. He would also have understood that there came a point where Ziyal had to act against her father while still loving him. Just as Dukat, when this was revealed to him by Ziyal, did not stop loving her. To Kira, who either loves or hates, this is incomprehensible.
Lear and Cordelia parallels aside, Dukat here resembles more a Christopher Marlowe character than a Shakespearean one; fondness for language and speeches, growing hubris into megalomania, defeat and loss of a beloved person, breakdown in madness. If only that had been the end.
Damar, previously something of an indistinguishable spear carrier, grows into one a bit more fleshed out Trusted Lieutenant during these episodes. With hindsight and Farscape experience, he's the Braca of the ST universe (though he becomes something different later): very loyal towards his superior, deeply resentful of people said superior cares about/is obsessed with who don't appreciate it (Ziyal, Kira), or of people who seem to slight his superior (Weyoun, the Founder). Not stupid, either - it's Damar who comes up with a way to get rid of the mine field. And certainly seethingly jealous when it comes to Ziyal. As far as I'm concerned, he doesn't just kill her because he sees her as a traitor, or a millstone around Dukat's neck, but because she's a competitor for Dukat's attention in his eyes.
Speaking of characters getting fleshed out, I have to agree with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
hobsonphile about the Jem'hadar from Rocks and Shoals. We had individualized Jem'hadar before, even tragic Jem'hadar - the one from Hippocratic Oath comes to mind - but the Third in this episode certainly is the most haunting and memorable. Seeing him and his people die in a senseless fight - which he knows to be senseless, and which Sisko knows to be senseless - evokes Wilfrid Owen and other WWI poets. And episodes like this are why DS9 managed to carry a war arc without ever glorifying war.
Sisko successfully appealing to the Prophets to save the day in Sacrifice of Angels does have its parallel in B5's intervention of Lorien and the other First Ones, but probably because the relationship between Sisko and the Prophets, as well as the connection between Bajor and the Prophets, has been set up from the show's pilot onwards, I find it works better. Interestingly, Sisko's phrase - "you even allowed them (the Bajorans) to build an entire religion around you" - indicates that despite his own increasing turn towards mysticism, he at this point still has some Starfleet rationalism left. And with hindsight we also can see that the writers already knew how they were going to let him end, what with the "no rest on Bajor" prophecy and Sisko's earlier longing for a house there. Sisko demands, and gets, a miracle, but no miracle comes without a price. (He really should talk to Sheridan. Though a 20-years-time limit versus becoming awormhole alien Prophet - hm, don't know who of the two had it better or worse.)
Last but not least: as I said, of all the guest stars in the storylines not on the station, Nog appears most present to me. I like the continuation of O'Brien's mentor attitude towards him (hey, Miles even tries to curb the swearing!), Nog's lingering distrust towards Garak, and the fact that as he says he's not just a Starfleet cadet, but a Ferengi (and hence knows how to procure Saurian Ale illegally on a Starbase). We really see him mature all through the show. Go Nog!
As if Caligula hadn't been disquieting enough...
Emperor Napoleon
Which French Napoleonic general are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
There really must be something imperial inside...
On a lighter note:monkeycrackmary has written another delightful Pirates of the Carribean fanfic, here.
Trek-wise, it was a new thing to have the cliffhanger of the previous season not resolved in the first one or two episodes of the new one - and even after six episodes, the audience is very aware that just one admittedly major issue - the occupation of DS9 - is over. But the war with the Dominion, the other long-term change ushered in by season 5's Call to Arms, is anything but. Within the space of the six "occupation" episodes, we have, since the ensemble is split up, several separate storylines which intersect only in the last, Sacrifice of Angels. Some of the ensemble - and guest stars - don't really get much to do - Jake, Quark (until the last two), Bashir, O'Brien, Dax, Garak. Don't get me wrong - they all do have their moments, like Miles and Julian quoting the Charge of the Light Brigade (which btw isn't exactly a compliment to Sisko, since as far as I know what happened to the Light Brigade is partly due to an idiotic commander bent on his own glory). But the meat of character development and action is reserved to Kira and Odo on DS9, and Sisko and, since he does get one half of an episode (Sons and Daughters for himself), Worf with the army. As far as guest stars go, I even have a stronger sense of Nog during these episodes than I have of Garak (which during first broadcast disgruntled the Garak fan in me, but all was forgiven when In the Pale Moonlight came along). On DS9, or rather, Terok Nor *g*, Dukat, Weyoun, the Female Founder, Ziyal and Damar are much more important to the storylines than Jake, Quark, or, with the exception of his capture as a MacGuffin, Rom.
(This is not a complaint, just an observation. It completely makes sense, given the story they had to tell.)
Kira's "When I was in the Resistance, I despised people like me" epiphany, in itself a powerful moment, reminds me of a question the show never really answers - what is Kira's take on Odo's time on Terok Nor before the Federation arrived? Because by her definition, Odo was a collaborator. Dukat appointed him, he worked for Dukat, for years, and Things Past in season 5 made a point of demonstrating that Odo's famed "I was an impartial servant of justice" stand wasn't uncompromised. Now of course Odo wasn't a Bajoran, but he did define himself, at that time, as Bajoran more than anything else.
While Odo's past with the Cardassians, and Kira's attitude towards it, is an open question, the present-day action addresses the topic of loyalties head-on. Ever since The Die is Cast, we knew that Odo, despite having chosen Kira and his life on DS9, still had a powerful longing for the Great Link. In season 6, this is finally brought to the fore and combined with another long-running storyline, his frustrated and at that point unrequited love for Kira. In Children of Time, we saw Odo wipe out 8000 people to save Kira's life, an act at the same time appallingly selfish and selfless… and well in tune, if you think about it, with the Founder's take on the solids. They're "little", can't see what's really important, and if they are an obstacle, they're to be removed. What Odo does from Behind the Lines onward, considering this background, isn't really surprising, though it shocked me at the time. And no, I don't think we can blame the Female Founder. She didn't take his free will from him. The experience of linking might be an incredible rush - and for the first time is presented with explicit sexual connotations - but isn't hypnosis. There is manipulation, granted, but imo the reason why she's successful with it is that she's absolutely sincere in her manipulation. She - and the Link - does care about Odo, she's absolutely convinced it's for his best to come home, and, as she (prophetically) says to Weyoun, rebukingly, she would give the entire Alpha Quadrant to get Odo back. The one mistake she makes is mentioning Kira's arrest to Odo. Because note that nothing previously was enough to shock Odo out of his newly discovered Changeling bliss. Not Rom's impending death sentence, not the fact that Jem'hadar reinforcements were about to come through the wormhole, and certainly not the fate of the Alpha Quadrant. All of this was troublesome but he pushed it aside, until he heard about Kira. And then he acted.
(This is why the aftermath as far as Odo is concerned is one of my few complaints about DS9. Imo, it would have been far better if he had spent the rest of the season slowly rebuilding his relationships not just with Kira but with the rest of the station, and done some serious self-examination. Because he betrayed them all, and came through not for them or for some conviction Dominion rule was wrong, but out of love. At the very least, he should have taken off in search of a soul before… sorry, wrong fandom. Anyway. Making Odo one of the gang again and letting him hook up with Kira before the year is over was far too easy. If it had happened in season 7, after the earlier mentioned slow rebuilding and
While we're at storylines I like during these six episodes, with an aftermath I don't, let's take a look at Dukat. (You knew this was coming.) It's his last hurrah as a three-dimensional character; ever afterwards, the writers hit us over the head with the fact he's EEEEEEEVIL, with poor Marc Alaimo having to twirl his imaginary mustache. Mind you, the "why don't I have a statue?" speech (complete with Weyoun's priceless "this guy is nuts" expression) is already foreshadowing of what was to come, but that kind of hubris still is within three-dimensional parameters and balanced by the fact Dukat is still allowed to show other emotions. His last scene with Ziyal is very Lear and Cordelia, and it occurs to me Cordelia might well have been the inspiration for Ziyal's character. Kira finds it incredible that Ziyal forgives Dukat for having left her to die in In Purgatory's Shadow, but again I'm reminded of Garak who didn't just forgive Tain a direct assassination attempt but risked everything to save him, twice. Garak, as much as he and Dukat loathe each other, would have understood Ziyal, I believe. He would also have understood that there came a point where Ziyal had to act against her father while still loving him. Just as Dukat, when this was revealed to him by Ziyal, did not stop loving her. To Kira, who either loves or hates, this is incomprehensible.
Lear and Cordelia parallels aside, Dukat here resembles more a Christopher Marlowe character than a Shakespearean one; fondness for language and speeches, growing hubris into megalomania, defeat and loss of a beloved person, breakdown in madness. If only that had been the end.
Damar, previously something of an indistinguishable spear carrier, grows into one a bit more fleshed out Trusted Lieutenant during these episodes. With hindsight and Farscape experience, he's the Braca of the ST universe (though he becomes something different later): very loyal towards his superior, deeply resentful of people said superior cares about/is obsessed with who don't appreciate it (Ziyal, Kira), or of people who seem to slight his superior (Weyoun, the Founder). Not stupid, either - it's Damar who comes up with a way to get rid of the mine field. And certainly seethingly jealous when it comes to Ziyal. As far as I'm concerned, he doesn't just kill her because he sees her as a traitor, or a millstone around Dukat's neck, but because she's a competitor for Dukat's attention in his eyes.
Speaking of characters getting fleshed out, I have to agree with
hobsonphile about the Jem'hadar from Rocks and Shoals. We had individualized Jem'hadar before, even tragic Jem'hadar - the one from Hippocratic Oath comes to mind - but the Third in this episode certainly is the most haunting and memorable. Seeing him and his people die in a senseless fight - which he knows to be senseless, and which Sisko knows to be senseless - evokes Wilfrid Owen and other WWI poets. And episodes like this are why DS9 managed to carry a war arc without ever glorifying war. Sisko successfully appealing to the Prophets to save the day in Sacrifice of Angels does have its parallel in B5's intervention of Lorien and the other First Ones, but probably because the relationship between Sisko and the Prophets, as well as the connection between Bajor and the Prophets, has been set up from the show's pilot onwards, I find it works better. Interestingly, Sisko's phrase - "you even allowed them (the Bajorans) to build an entire religion around you" - indicates that despite his own increasing turn towards mysticism, he at this point still has some Starfleet rationalism left. And with hindsight we also can see that the writers already knew how they were going to let him end, what with the "no rest on Bajor" prophecy and Sisko's earlier longing for a house there. Sisko demands, and gets, a miracle, but no miracle comes without a price. (He really should talk to Sheridan. Though a 20-years-time limit versus becoming a
Last but not least: as I said, of all the guest stars in the storylines not on the station, Nog appears most present to me. I like the continuation of O'Brien's mentor attitude towards him (hey, Miles even tries to curb the swearing!), Nog's lingering distrust towards Garak, and the fact that as he says he's not just a Starfleet cadet, but a Ferengi (and hence knows how to procure Saurian Ale illegally on a Starbase). We really see him mature all through the show. Go Nog!
As if Caligula hadn't been disquieting enough...
Emperor Napoleon
Which French Napoleonic general are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
There really must be something imperial inside...
On a lighter note:
monkeycrackmary has written another delightful Pirates of the Carribean fanfic, here.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
;-)))
Date: 2003-12-06 03:16 am (UTC)Marshal Berthier
(http://quizilla.com/users/montebello/quizzes/Which%20French%20Napoleonic%20general%20are%20you%3F/)
Re: ;-)))
Date: 2003-12-06 06:32 am (UTC);-)))
Date: 2003-12-07 12:41 am (UTC)Sorry, I don't know why that is, but I keep forgetting that you do not know me that well. ;-)
So here are some explanations on that part:
It means that I love to organize things. Parties, trips, other peoples lives (tried that with my first long time girlfriend, it did not work ;-) ) Can't help it :-). Must be a compensation for the fact that I have some difficulties organizing my life.
It also means that some friends think of me rather as a casanova- which is really not true - ; although I have to admit that I happened to love two women at the same time once. But this was long ago, and not really as nice an experience as some of my friends might think it was. (It took me some time to even realize it myself ...).
But that is why I may end up being pushed out of a window.
Well, all this is quite different today, anyhow. Easier and more complicated at the same time, if you will ...
Furthermore it is true that one of my big weaknesses is to be indecisive. For example, I can spent hours looking for a restaurant in which to dine if there is more than one restaurant at a given place. Things almost ended in disaster, once, when I wanted to have dinner in chinatown, London.
And finally, although I am a, as
What it does not mean, however, is that I am married or anything like it. ;-)
F.
no subject
Date: 2003-12-06 03:35 am (UTC)Hm. I have noticed a trend in your quiz answers *g*. I was Marshal Bessieres, whom I'm afraid, being English, I've never heard of. The key word for him was "reliable" which is the story of my life...
Great DS9 review. I can't really comment too much as I haven't seen the episodes for too long but, as you know, I hated Dukat's Season 7 arc as much as you did so have you seen anything so far that would explain it?
well, I guess...
Date: 2003-12-06 10:47 pm (UTC)In terms of "behind the scene", I dimly recall Ira Behr in season 5 or 6, as well as in the DS9 companion, interviews in which he expresses disgust with the female fanclub Dukat had at the time because Dukat was "a Nazi". Given that Behr was one of the producers and head writers I'd say it's a good bet he had the idea to clarify once and for all Dukat was EEEEEVIL.
Or it could have just been that they needed an invididual for Sisko to fight at the end of the show, though why Kai Winn couldn't have been that invidual, given that her relationship with Sisko had been established just as early on and that her own storyline leading her the the Pagh Wraiths was very well thought of and left her a three-dimensional character, I don't know.
Re: well, I guess...
Date: 2003-12-07 03:59 am (UTC)I agree that Kai Winn would have been a better person for Sisko to fight but I'm not sure they would have gone with that on the grounds that she was a middle-aged woman and might not have appeared as dangerous.
no subject
Date: 2003-12-06 08:51 am (UTC)Always bugged me, especially when she wrote of her own mother as a collaborator. *cough*victimoftheregime*cough*
no subject
Date: 2003-12-06 09:19 am (UTC)Odo, as opposed to these women, had the opportunity to just walk away without having to fear he'd starve, or that there'd be reprisals against his family. He wasn't a Bajoran citizen, either, or a Cardassian, for that matter. Nobody forced him to remain as Security Chief.
no subject
Date: 2003-12-06 09:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-06 03:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-06 10:38 pm (UTC)