Spoilers Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

[Osgood]

I've always been a big fan of DS9. I think it's the high water mark of Trek story telling (though SNW is a close second). I really love how they get to spend time developing storylines and characters (including secondary characters like Garak, Nog, and Rom) and capture an entirely different perspective on Star Trek.

My wife was never a big Trek fan, but after getting hooked on SNW, she wanted to watch the older shows. We've been watching them chronologically in-universe (as in starting with Enterprise) and has come to appreciate them all, but she really enjoyed DS9 as well, and wants to rewatch it when we finish (we're in season 5 of Voyager).

Someone mentioned that the the DS9 pilot episode holds up better than most, and I have to agree. One of the guys in my gaming group said he and his wife were attempting to do what we are doing, but gave up on Enterprise based on the pilot, could only get through a couple of episodes of Discovery and TOS--I told him, if you are going to give up on Star Trek based on a few episodes, you may as well just stop right now; other than SNW and Lower Decks, they all take at least a season to find their footing. It really highlighted how people's viewing expectations have shifted so wildly since the 90s (to say nothing of the 60s).

 

[Nutation]

Then, you have DS9. The Federation is sent into a backwater system to play neutral party to a formerly occupied species and their captors. Neither of which wants them there. The station systems are not reliable, the species not satiated or defeated easily overnight, but problems that adapt and change over the entire series run. A lot of this had to do with the rise of serial television over episodic, but at the same time Trek was breaking a mold and moving into telling more nuanced story telling. The moraly grey aspects often appeared to chafe the utopia Gene set up, but I think it goes well beyond that in expectation of an exceptional crew blowing through a straw galaxy. YMMV.

What struck me is that conflict among the main characters was built into the show from the beginning. The previous series didn't have that, other than minor personal friction. This was no longer Roddenberry's utopian vision.

 

[jian]

What part of NZ?

Christchurch.

 

[jian]

Yes, I’d agree with what many people are saying. The Federation characters aren’t in control, they have to deal with the consequences of their decisions with people they see every day, and they have to uphold their ideals in the face of complexity and genuine sincere opposition. They have to come to terms with the idea that the Federation is far from perfect itself and that other cultures view them with suspicion for good reasons, and that much of the time it’s their job to assuage those suspicions even if they’re correct. All of these go against Roddenberry’s original vision but they all make the Star Trek universe richer and more nuanced without losing its optimism. As Sisko says, “it’s easy to be a saint in paradise.”

 

[Willie the Duck]

Heh, I never realised that about Nog's actor. Makes sense in retrospect - you can hide a lot of age cues under all that makeup, and it'd be tough for a kid to sit through its application.

Think also about the child labor laws and how many hours (both per week and consecutive hours) you can have a child work. If you have massively-multiple hours of makeup-chair time (putting it on and then taking it off), you might end up with 1-2 takes worth of time where they can actually do the scenes. That's fine if the guest of the week is a Bajoran child the doctor is treating that just needs to deliver a line about being scared of sickbays. If it is the complex conversations they had Jake and Nog do, you really want hours for them to be able to get them right.

 

[jian]

I’m gonna love that response, because it’s the most thorough I’ve ever received. But I dispute..

He is, from what I’ve watched, the reasonable person on the show, like Picard, like, Janeway, or Chakotay, the center of the show relied on to not be a forking weirdo and represent the reasonable viewer. The avatar dealing with all the other inflexible. And yes you’re right, the Federation is of the inflexible parties on that show.

I feel like your post is a long description of how all the obligate unreasonable people develop over the course of the show. I don’t deny that they do, and probably great for someone with a lot of patience. But doesn’t obscure the fact getting any one of them over themselves and on board with dealing with the emergency at hand was on Sisko or whoever and not something they’d be up for w/o some accommodations. They’re all a-holes. Ferengi chief among them and in every episode.

My point remains, it’s a shorts show of watching annoying people most episodes.

I agree that DS9 had plenty of “alien characters cause conflict by being unreasonable or stupid, Federation PCs sort it out with reason and patience” episodes, but those are the least DS9 episodes - those are far more classic and frequent in TNG or Voyager. When it does happen in DS9, it’s almost always not a regular non-Federation character (who are basically all PCs anyway) causing the trouble and just as often it’s a non-Federation PC helping to resolve it. But I can see how you might get that impression from a couple of atypical episodes, especially in the first two seasons.

 

[payn]

The one missed opportunity on DS9 for me was the Romulan attche for the Defiant. I think that character could have added a lot of insight to Romulans, particularly one out of their homeland. Though, the officer just vanished after 1-2 episodes.

 

[overgeeked]

What struck me is that conflict among the main characters was built into the show from the beginning. The previous series didn't have that, other than minor personal friction. This was no longer Roddenberry's utopian vision.

For me, it was the first series to take Roddenberry’s utopian idea seriously because it ditched the ridiculous notion that everyone just got along all the time.

I discovered Prisoners of Gravity on YouTube a few years ago through an interview with various writers on the topic of Utopia. It looked like my kind of show. For some reason the line that stuck out was from Alan Moore. “Utopia, if it’s going to be anything, is going to be a verb rather than a noun. Utopia is not a state that you achieve. Utopia has got to be the journey towards that state. If you ever arrive at that state of perfection, then you’ve reached death and stagnation.”

To me, switching Roddenberry’s utopia from a noun to a verb, as seen in DS9, is exactly why it works so much better than what came before. And because of the cast, crew, writers, stories, etc it works better than most of what came after.

 

[Zardnaar]

I've always been a big fan of DS9. I think it's the high water mark of Trek story telling (though SNW is a close second). I really love how they get to spend time developing storylines and characters (including secondary characters like Garak, Nog, and Rom) and capture an entirely different perspective on Star Trek.

My wife was never a big Trek fan, but after getting hooked on SNW, she wanted to watch the older shows. We've been watching them chronologically in-universe (as in starting with Enterprise) and has come to appreciate them all, but she really enjoyed DS9 as well, and wants to rewatch it when we finish (we're in season 5 of Voyager).

Someone mentioned that the the DS9 pilot episode holds up better than most, and I have to agree. One of the guys in my gaming group said he and his wife were attempting to do what we are doing, but gave up on Enterprise based on the pilot, could only get through a couple of episodes of Discovery and TOS--I told him, if you are going to give up on Star Trek based on a few episodes, you may as well just stop right now; other than SNW and Lower Decks, they all take at least a season to find their footing. It really highlighted how people's viewing expectations have shifted so wildly since the 90s (to say nothing of the 60s).

I suspect TNG woukd flop these days. You have a handful of episodes to get over or 1 short season if you're lucky.

Wife liked DS9 bit even in 90s you had shows with better 1st seasons than Trek. Eg B5, Farscape, Stargate SG1.

Trekkies might watch anything but casual Sci fi fans won't.

TNG may be coasting on legacy now. Netflix made them widely available and DS9 best Trek isn't exactly a hot take now. SNW is up there as well.

Any show has the odd dud episode but you can't have whole dud seasons now. I asked some trekkues about TNG and they have a curated list of episodes.

 

[payn]

Wife liked DS9 bit even in 90s you had shows with better 1st seasons than Trek. Eg B5, Farscape, Stargate SG1.