Progress
(Star Trek - Deep Space Nine episode production code 415)
written by Peter Allan Fields
Now we come to one of Deep Space Nine's worst episodes.
Although the sub plot for Jake and Nog is a lot of decent fun,
the main A-plot is working very hard to turn Major Kira into
a bureaucratic jerk, and resorts to way too many brainless
contrivances to try to achieve that unworthy goal.
First of all, it's hard to see how the Bajoran government and
its energy commission could possibly be in the right here.
It goes beyond Spock's old Vulcan adage of the needs of the
many outweighing the needs of the few. Bajor should consider itself
damn lucky to have a moon with breathable atmosphere,
fertile soil, and no other known sentient lifeforms.
This moon should be set aside for colonization.
Instead, they want to completely
wreck its ecosystem? And for what? Are they so desperate
for "energy" that they can't wait one short year
(how long is the Bajoran year anyway?) to put their
environmentally safe and friendly option into operation instead?
One year (even if a Bajoran year is equivalent to as many as four
Earth years) is not an unreasonable amount of time to develop
a massive energy project such as the ones proposed in this episode,
and compared to the billions of years it took for the moon and
its ecosystem to develop and mature, the right answer here should
be a no-brainer.
To borrow Nog's line of thinking from this same episode,
someone does indeed have a lot to learn about opportunity.
The opportunity for the long term of this moon far outweighs
the outright idiotic desperation of the short term.
We also have to wonder who really has jurisdiction over this moon -
the settlers who live there, or the governments of the planet.
Back in
"Battle Lines",
Sisko was prepared to treat the inhabitants
of that moon as a separate society from the one that had spawned them.
Perhaps the same should apply to the settlers here. It seems obvious
that the Bajoran government and its energy commission have not
reached a fair agreement with all those involved. Sisko should be
warning the visiting minister and the Bajoran government at large
that pushing the desperate version of this project through
would not be helping any application
they may make later on for Federation membership.
Now, big issues aside, next come the production contrivances.
Firstly, can the cast manage to come up with a definitive
pronunciation for the moon's name? I count at least half a dozen
different ones here, with none of them emerging as a definitive
one. This could have used some ironing out in rehearsals.
Even worse, as someone who grew up in a family ceramic tile business,
it pains me to see the sloppy narrative, design, and production work
surrounding that outdoor barbecue with the hexagonal tiles,
which is forever burned into my brain as a symbol of the episode's
idiocy. Hexagons are much more difficult to work with
than traditional squares
when used to fill a neatly pre-defined shape, as is attempted here,
and will involve many more specially cut pieces along the many edges.
Realistically speaking, considering this design, you'd likely end up
with more cuts than full pieces. But we're going to be watching
two ACTORS do this job, so they won't bother with any cuts at any
point. The kiln shape has been unbelievably doctored to show
where they should put each piece beforehand. This is also a job
that calls for a seriously heavy-duty mortar, since the tiles are
thick, and will have to withstand the high temperatures of the fire
when the barbecue is eventually lit.
Instead, it looks as if they are using some light-duty
factory produced mastic glue for thin bathroom wall tiles. They
should at least show the brand-name factory pail it came in when
it was imported from Bajor, instead of pretending that our settler
friend mixed it from the local clay or something. I'd guess the
tiles themselves are also imports, since even if this moon had
its own tile factory, the population prior to evacuation wasn't
large and diversified enough to get demand for hexagonal tiles
higher than demand for square ones - it's too much of a luxury item.
I really laugh when they put the "last" piece in
and say that they're done. Ah, guys?
Do you not see a whole row of small cut pieces missing along
the top? How sloppy do you want your workmanship to look?
Ah well, anything less than a full tile is beneath their
level of inspiration and beyond the abilities of the actors
I suppose. No cutting tools here today. Worse, they give their
tiles no time to set, much less cure, before they think they should
fire up the beast. Whoa!! That's asking for trouble! I'll bet
Kira's tiles will fall off first, since she is NOT putting enough
mortar (pardon me, glue) on tiles of that thickness.
Then she blows the whole useless thing up, and carefully torches
the cottage on all the pre-defined flammable bits. Really silly.
If anything, this episode built a lot of anticipation that
our regular crew would get their act together and get the
energy project on track with the slower environmentally-friendly
alternative that also works for the settler that Kira bonds with.
Instead we waste time watching actors fuss around very
unconvincingly with these tiles on a stove and a set designed
for the torch, and then blunder brainlessly into a stupid conclusion.
How much of the production budget was wasted here, considering that
the next two episodes are bottle shows featuring only the DS9
station itself?
At least our main guest star has an enjoyably written character
which the actor delivers with enjoyable charisma, and Nana Visitor
plays well off of him. Too bad that wasn't enough to salvage
a story that pushed her character so far and so awkwardly into
a stupid direction.
In the Hands of the Prophets
(Star Trek - Deep Space Nine episode production code 420)
written by Robert Hewitt Wolfe
Deep Space Nine episodes improve vastly towards the end of
the first season, until this single-episode finale becomes
an absolute triumph.
Of primary interest is the philosophical territory of pure science
vs. spiritual interpretation, which is very well handled in
this episode, and very organically ropes Keiko O'Brien into
what is possibly the best episode she ever got on Star Trek.
We also get our introduction to the important recurring characters
of Vedeks Bareil and Winn, both of whom make good first
impressions. Louise Fletcher as Vedek Winn in particular
gives a knock-out performance here, very reminiscent of
Nurse Ratchet from "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest",
and always seems to be taking good points that one step too far
to create all kinds of irritability and tension. She's
very well cast, and they made good use of her character by
bringing her back so often to the show in further years.
Sisko also gets a chance to shine as someone with a very good
Trekkian balancing viewpoint, and delivers one of his best speeches
in a very believable and moving scene with his young son,
as well as having a key role in the unfolding plot.
Most of the other regulars are also used well, with Miles O'Brien
heavily involved with several plot strands, and Odo demonstrating
many of his better investigative skills.
And so, season one ends with what is probably the best episode
since the pilot, leaving one hopeful for all the other
great DS9 episodes yet to come....
These Deep Space Nine Season One stories
are available on DVD.
Click on the Amazon symbol for the desired disc format
and location nearest you for pricing and availability:
Region 1, NTSC, U.S.
Region 1, NTSC, Canada
Region 2, PAL, U.K.
