Sunday, October 24, 2010

Deep Space Nine, season 1

Picard, q, o'brien, keiko, lursa, b'etor, and troi (no, the other one) - no other TREK got so much first-season love from established franchise characters...or needed it. If you accept that DS9 is the most flawed TREK, you can relax enough to appreciate the occasional gem.
FOUR-STAR EPISODES: 0
AVERAGE EPISODE RATING: 2.5
-Emissary ***

A pilot that scores as legitimate sci fi. In a far corner of the quadrant, the Federation assumes command of an abandoned cardassian space station at the planet Bajor, which has suffered a brutal occupation. Starfleet and non-Starfleet must work side by side, with alien ships coming and going. Inside a stable wormhole, a race is discovered which experiences time as a single moment. Commander benjamin sisko must convince them that we are no threat, while explaining how anticipation, reminiscence, hope, and loss inform human life. Flawed...but with many four-star elements. Guest star patrick stewart (as picard and locutus) hits the right notes, compelling yet not show-stealing. Not as "Up With People" as earlier TREKs, with sisko a damaged, grieving single parent. Plenty of pilot-itis too, with kira's hair, quark's nose, and odo's look rather embryonic.
-Past Prologue ***
A "former" bajoran terrorist asks for asylum, and bajoran first officer kira must decide where her loyalties lie. The callow, eager doctor bashir has suspicions about the tailor garak, the station's lone cardassian. Plus...lursa and b'etor!
-A Man Alone **
Security chief odo, the sole station holdover from the cardassian regime, is a shape-shifter who has never met another of his kind. He's also the prime suspect in the death of a murderous criminal. Keiko starts a school. Rom (max grodenchik - BRUCE ALMIGHTY, SISTER ACT) debuts, his voice a far cry from what it will become.
-Babel ***
A lethal, verbal gobbledygook-inducing plague left by bajoran terrorists eighteen years earlier accidentally gets loose aboard the station.
-Captive Pursuit ***
The first alien from the gamma quadrant (scott macdonald - ENTERPRISE, AMERICAN CRUDE) arrives through the wormhole, followed by hunters. O'brien befriends him, and tries to teach him self-determination. A stellar meditation on cultural relativity.
-Q-less ***
Q and vash (jennifer hetrick - 500 DAYS OF SUMMER, CIVIL WARS) show up on the station after she refuses to be his companion any longer. Bright and bursting...anything with john de lancie is a must-see, i say.
-Dax ***
Jadzia is put on trial for a murder her former host allegedly committed, thirty years before. If not for an obsequious homage to monogamous marriage, this one is knocking on four stars.
-The Passenger ***
A criminal dies in bashir's arms. Is he really (or only mostly) dead?
-Move Along Home **
A game-loving species visit from the other side of the wormhole. Quark underestimates the seriousness of their game...or does he? The senior staff find themselves pawns. If the puzzles had been better thought out, we might have had something.
-The Nagus **
The grand nagus comes for a visit...and dies, leaving quark the supreme ferengi leader. Can wallace shawn (MY DINNER WITH ANDRE, THE PRINCESS BRIDE) save the ferengi from flaccidland? Probably not.
-Vortex **
A shady stranger tells odo of the existence of others of his kind...and takes him on a wild goose chase.
-Battle Lines **
Sisko, bashir, kira, and Bajor's spiritual leader (camille saviola - THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO, PENN & TELLER GET KILLED) crash on a moon on the other side of the wormhole, and find themselves embroiled in a local war between factions who come back to life after even the most brutal murder.
-The Storyteller **
Bashir and o'brien try to cope with an emergency in a superstitious bajoran village. Dreary and desultory. The only thing keeping it from one-star is the B plot, in which jake and nog crush on a teenage bajoran leader...the writing is equally feeble, but the chemistry is nice.
-Progress ***
Kira must convince an old farmer to abandon his home, because the provisional government needs the land cleared. Brian keith (FAMILY AFFAIR, HARDCASTLE AND MACCORMICK) is understatedly brilliant, offering one of the greatest guest turns in TREK history.
-If Wishes were Horses ***
People's imaginations come alive! Or wait...are these figments non-corporeal aliens? They should have left an idea this juicy to a cable series, of course. But not bad TREK, as these things go. One star added for making the greatest baseballer ever, NOT come from 20th-century Earth.
-The Forsaken **
TNG's lwaxana (majel barrett - WESTWORLD, EARTH: FINAL CONFLICT) visits, and hounds odo for some lovin'! An electronic alien child, visiting ambassadors...an awful lot of balls in the air. In all fairness, majel actually became a fair actor after a few decades' practice.
-Dramatis Personae **
The command staff mysteriously become power-mad, plotting alliances and assassinations.
-Duet ***
The performance of harris yulin (GHOSTBUSTERS II, THE HURRICANE) as a suspected war criminal is scenery-chewing the way it was meant to be. This is a tricky take on issues of great subtlety...and it absolutely works.
-In the Hands of the Prophets **
A bajoran religious leader begins a boycott of the station's school, for not teaching religion. The most sexually-repressed, quease-inducing teaser in TREK history. With all this holiness and anti-humanistic monogamy, this should be one star...but the writers were striving for something meaningful, and succeeded a tiny bit.

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