This Place Where I Belong: Deep Space Nine: Season Five

How much do I love season five of Deep Space Nine?

It has everything going for it - battles, treachery, death, big character developments, the Dominion and, most importantly, Martok.

Yes, I'm a fan of the most Klingon of Klingons to the point where I would have trouble deciding if he or Sisko is my favourite Deep Space Nine character ahead of Weyoun and Garak; First COntact Day can't come soon enough so I can meet the man behind the prosthetics himself, JG Hertzler.

Anyway, where did I finish - yes, that's it, Broken Link. Wow. Big finish there huh? I remember sitting with my dad when the revelation over Gowron spilt from Odo's lips about what he'd experienced in the Great Link and spending days trying to work out what it would all mean - was Gowron dead? If so for how long? What had happened? How were they going to stop the Klingons and reveal him as a Changeling???

No fear because the veritable Powers would unleash Apocalypse Rising on us for the season opener and for my dad seeing a ton of Klingons punching seven shades out of each other as well as Sisko, O'Brien and Odo made up with full foreheads was worth the price of admission alone. It's not as explosive as The Way of the Warrior and you do get a softer start in the storytelling as the crew go undercover to expose the Changeling infiltrator plus provide us with further insight into the wonders of Klingon Kulture. Playing the long game overnight does make this episode feel a lot longer than it is with all the serious action happening in the last five minutes but this is a slow, steady buildup as everything gets put in place. Shame of the story is that while we get the reveal and it's a cunning little twist that will come back later in the year, the show is upstaged by the fantastic episode that follows it; The Ship.

Simple in execution, the 100th Deep Space Nine episode gets shockingly overlooked against Redemption and Timeless as I discussed in our 100th post yet it perhaps has a stronger twist than Apocalypse Rising manages. Claustrophobic, tense, tinged with the sadness of losing a comrade and topped with Dominion sliminess it's a top story, well-written that, again, has echoes that will reverberate further down the line.

I can't say that for the subsequent Looking for par'Mach in All the Wrong Places. A Klingon episode that falls flat nay stumbles first and then falls flat. Attempting a sequel to season three's nicely played The House of Quark was never going to be easy and while adding Worf into the mix might make it a tempting offering I didn't connect in the '90's or now. Average season fodder that doesn't really affect anything else around it. I suppose the same could be directed at Nor the Battle to the Strong as it does tie back into the Klingon war arc which is coming to a close following Apocalypse Rising but it's more than just a military story. 

What my re-watch has made me realise is how much development went into Jake Sisko once Cirroc Lofton matured. The Muse isn't mind-blowing but it pushed the character onwards after the legendary The Visitor and here we get to peel back another layer and expose his fears and find out just how much he isn't nor will ever be Starfleet material. I admire the writers for their line on making Jake terrified of the ugliness of war and highlighting his cowardice because it makes him more human. This story really made me appreciate Lofton and the contributions he made to the show. Allowing him stories like this was a master stroke and Wesley never got anything this good to work with on The Next Generation.

The Assignment however leaves me fairly cold. It's not risen in my expectations over the years and even with the introduction of the Pah-Wraiths it's not the most endearing hour of my watching time. I like Keiko and Miles but Rosalind Chao doesn't make for electrifying viewing even when coupled up with Meaney. Luckily the arc that flushes out of this into the sixth and seventh seasons bore better material which would ultimately end up in What You Leave Behind. I do sense that this was a filler episode at the time with the Pah-Wraiths as a nice idea but with no vision to take it any further.

Happily though it gets the season to Trials and Tribble-ations marking 30 years of Star Trek. Worryingly it's now 48 years of age which makes this episode 18 years old in its own right.  It's utter indulgence from start to finish and a solid, very clever, episode. In fact on this rewatch it was one of the few that light up the start of this season. Truth be told season five has a very average kick off aside from The Ship and the 30th anniversary story with Let He Who is Without Sin next up and the Necessary Evil semi-sequel, Things Past dropping next. The former makes me want to curl up and hide and even worse is that I don't think I minded about it that much back in 1996. Now I do and I found it slightly uncomfortable to watch if a little sexist and very dated. Things Past is a firmly-based Odo story again looking back to his days under Cardassian management in near-monotone effect. The vehicle to send them back is ok but the way in which the story unfolds as opposed to the narrative flashback of Necessary Evil isn't as effective.

The Ascent too keeps Odo in the frame but this time alongside Quark and marks a route into much more character-centric episodes than the ensemble affairs that opened the '96-'97 series. I never rated this one but with some degree of middle-aged maturity I can see that it's a platform for Auberjonois and Shimerman to play out the sparks of their bromance with the benefits of some rare location filming (I say rare but this is the third location-based ep this season after The Ship and Let He Who is Without Sin). This pairing is always watchable and with an average script and story they still pull out a great and watchable show.

Rapture welcomed the new First Contact greys and blacks with Sisko not getting to grips with combadge placement until Darkness and the Light. I know this isn't a big hit with a lot of people as it returns us to Bajoran society (second time this year) and the role of the Emissary. I really enjoy this one. I've watched it a few times over the years and I think the whole archaeological aspect appeals to me. Kasidy's return after her incarceration in season four's For the Cause is underplayed against Sisko's monolithic obsession. I also becaome more aware this time around of how all these Bajoran storylines are starting to link together and become as prophetic as we may have been promised as far back as Emissary and the set up of season one. The real killer moment is Sisko's resolute determination to stop Bajor from entering the Federation. For the first time there is a real sense that the conflict we have had suggested since The Jem'Hadar, the season two finale, is just around the corner.

Indeed that realisation is half-played out in the season's brilliant, near-perfect two-part entry which is only a hop and a skip away in the season - By Purgatory's Shadow and By Inferno's Light. As a split story and a 90 minute movie it's spot on every step playing every key secondary figure from Weyoun, Dukat, Garak, Gowron and Martok onto the board and showing that they are just as important as the main cast. Setting up an apparent invasion that then turns out to be the invasion of Cardassia is a shock to most but even when I knew the plan it didn't detract from the setup, the second-guessing and the preparation for what could be coming through the wormhole. For character development it's one of the best ever action-orientated episodes to do so, adding more layers to Worf and claustrophobic Garak as well as, later, Martok. What's not to love. 

It also feels that this is a staggered storyline opened in Apocalypse Rising with the restoration of the Khitomer Accords by Gowron through this double and then leaping straight into one of my all-time favourites and the best season-closer ever, A Call to Arms - but more on that one in a bit.

That Dominion storyline still isn't that evident. Everyone talks about it; a lot but when it comes down to it there's not a lot seen on screen save for key points in the season. That doesn't make it a bad year in any way though. The arcs are well-paced and later two-thirds of season five are magnificent. Even the Ferengi episodes aren't that bad this year. 

Kenneth Marshall's return in For the Uniform is Eddington's finest moment as he toys with Sisko in a way not too dissimilar to a certain Khan Noonien Singh in Star Trek II using historical literature as his beating stick. Once more it's the more emotional Sisko that makes this so watchable and I've lost count how many times I've sat through this one. In my mind I can never be sure how much of this was Brooks acting and how much of it was him genuinely being seriously p***ed off with the punchbag. There is the two-episode holographic communicator and one of our few chances to see the refit Excelsior Class which also add to a great episode. Probably not on everyone's chart but for me it's one of Deep Space Nine's most intense episodes ever. I recall talking about this one for weeks after I saw it for the first time. Blaze of Glory which turns up in the last handful of the season's episodes nicely ties up the Eddington arc but I felt then as I do now that it could have been so much more. It is very much a one-on-one but the spark that we saw in For the Uniform doesn't leap from the screen and while I enjoyed it I feel Eddington deserved a stronger sendoff even if here he does go out as a hero.

Thinking that I've forgotten to mention the Kira-heavy The Darkness and the Light and The Begotten off this? Sorry - for a second I did. The Darkness and the Light is a return to the Shakaar resistance cell we finally met in season three but their gradual demise through the episode didn't concern me. Kira's capture was well realised and the imminent danger to her unborn child at the hands of a slightly deranged Cardassian is chilling to the core if somewhat wrapped up more quickly than I can sneeze. Her tormentor remains hidden for a great deal of the time, playing in the words of the episode title although exactly which one is in which category is the true debate here. Again, I find that years on the more cerebral episodes, the ones with a lot more base in character carry much more weight for me and The Darkness and the Light is certainly one of those.

The Begotten brought Odo's penalty of being a solid to an equally speedy conclusion and if that kind of sentence for murder was in place in the real world we'd all be dead by now. Watching Rene Auberjonois play with a jar of semi-solid goo isn't what I signed up for and the fact I could remember bare seconds of this episode this time around makes me believe I didn't care for it when it was originally aired. James Sloyan is good as Mora Pol but even he can't pull this one out of the "Average" bin.

I was holding back mentioning them to go alongside A Simple Investigation, Business as Usual and Ferengi Love Songs. Now I seem to remember season five being way better than it was on this revisit as sporadically throughout the year there are some slow-burners I'd forgotten and those five sit firmly in that category. The addition of Steven Berkoff did raise at least my interest for a few minutes but at this stage in the game any offhand episodes seem to badly detract from the main Dominion thread and seem a bit out of place. That's not to say I don't, 20-odd years on, appreciate the writing and the subtexts here but you do get the sense that there's a chunk of season padding to make the 26 episode quota. Imagine if they did make a new Star Trek show now and restricted it to the more popular 13 episode run?

Luckily the season spills out a gem dead centre with the two part In Purgatory's Shadow/By Inferno's Light. As with last year's The Way of the Warrior it's a game-changer and significantly impressive for it's Bashir twist as well as the return of Martok who would continue as a semi-regular for the remainder of the show's seasons. How I missed the huge significance of this two part story back in the '90's is beyond me. I suspect that having the wonders of foreknowledge of seasons six and seven helps a lot. This one sets up the Dominion/Cardassian alliance and ramps up the danger level, pre-empting the darkest season close in the whole history of Star Trek bar a certain Borg one from The Next Generation. Watching this one as a single movie is a nice experience and for once the pacing works across the full 88 minutes without a second-half slump which was a particular failing of Picard's Enterprise in later years. For once the second part might actually be my preference.

Season five keeps them coming with Robert Picardo guesting in the surprisingly clever and character redefining Doctor Bashir, I Presume. Alexander Siddig might not have liked the redirection but it does bring in the often-mentioned genetic enhancements a la Khan Noonien Singh in a more positive light and would lead the arrival of the "Jack Pack" in season six. Bashir's English parents might not be the best actors on the planet and that had been my one memory of the episode for years, even moreso than Doctor Zimmerman's letching over Leeta. It's a good piece for Picardo to stretch and become one of the few actors to don all three uniform shades during his tenure and play a slightly more flexible character than the Doctor on Voyager (barely) however it is all about Bashir and Siddig adds more to the role than ever. I would go as far to say he's the most developed character in the seven years of the show and to think how annoying he nearly was in Emissary.

Having already mentioned a few slow burners mid-season the year closed on an explosive run starting with Soldiers of the Empire. Now my dad was always one for the Klingon episodes and they could get bogged down with all that honour and chest-beating, totally avoiding any decent character evolution and plot but in this one, we tick all the key boxes and it has to be said it's down to the return of Martok who is perfect against Worf and is the regular counter that character has been needing since the midpoint of The Next Generation. It's easily become one of my favourite Klingon episodes that cemented Martok as one of my all-time Star Trek favourites. 

Recalling the VHS that this episode came on, it was a double-winner with the second ep being Children of Time. At the time it was a classic but since I think it gets hugely overshadowed by the more emotion-kicking The Visitor. Children of Time is one of my all-time favourites. Not for the Kira/Odo relationship reveal but more for the dilemma itself. We know they are going to survive but the how and the ultimate decision NOT to change the course of time are more Deep Space Nine curveballs. This isn't explosions, twists and turns but good, character-defining TV solidly performed. It does, at the end, slightly miss the edge that The Visitor found but I'd pick it to watch anyday.

Season Five also introduced us to another Nor Class space station. With a bit of a camera tilt we were on Empok Nor and being hunted by Cardassian sleeper soldiers and then by a rogue Garak. Good thing there's Nog or O'Brien around in that mass of not-seen-before security folk and engineers or it would have been a total bloodbath. Nice, edgy, dark stuff that means Andy Robinson got to chew the scenery and go full out evil/psycho on drugs. Also this episode raised the question as to why Deep Space Nine only rarely got to use the First Contact rifles while Voyager seemed to have a plentiful supply of them and also some nifty other pieces of weapon tech. We would return to the slanty station for season seven's religious cult episode Covenant.

Closing off the boxset were two Dominion episodes. The first being In the Cards with Jake hunting for the perfect gift for dad with the assistance of Nog. Wrapping in Weyoun, the bizarre Dr Giger and the Kai made for one heck of a weird setup but somehow it works and makes this a great, calming story with some comedic turns, which acts to mis-step us all into a false sense of security right before Call to Arms. 

This is how to do a season finale, easily on a par with The Best of Both Worlds and showing how you go down fighting until the bitter end - Voyager take note. Sisko truly flourished in season five and the speech he gives on the steps of the Bajoran temple before he beams away to the Defiant is one of the series best, emphasising his links to the station and just how far we've come since the reluctant Commander Sisko grumped his way though his first few days looking for a quick way out. The VHS cover in the UK was even different to emphasise the importance of the episode with Jem'Hadar and Cardassian ships attacking the station as, literally, everything changed. One of the best to finish the year, one of the best not-a-cliffhanger cliffhangers, one of the most infuriating fade-to-blacks of all time. Oh - and there's that magical moment where Dukat gets his hands on the baseball...we too know Sisko will be back. All round, every second of Call to Arms has something to love, another piece to add in and we really do get to understand what this station oand the Bajoran people have come to mean for the defeated Starfleet crew. Five out of five.

My favourite season of Deep Space Nine and by default, Star Trek, is a close toss up between five and six. Five packs a ton of character with the most intense build up in anything the franchise has ever done and ever would do. It started out with layers of suspicion and the potential that the Dominion may have infiltrated further than we thought and left with the very future of the series in balance. Twist in there some major character revelations, the introduction of two of the show's best recurring characters in Martok and Weyoun (proper) and magnificent standalone episodes and you know it's a winner. While we knew the station would be returned to Sisko, it was a very real case of just how long that would be. The best thing was that season six  was going to be just as strong. It could well be said this was the year that got it right from start to finish, solidly maintaining the back-story while managing, somehow to build the existing main cast and enhance the stories of several recurring characters. Season Five cemented without doubt that Deep Space Nine was the best of the franchise and like Sisko, there is no other place I would rather be. It's the place where my love of the series firmly belongs.

Was season five of Deep Space Nine the perfect year? Was there a more quintessential season of Star Trek?

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Actions and Reactions: Deep Space Nine: Season Four

The Visitor, Hard Time, Broken Link - just three of the golden episodes that graced the fourth year of the increasingly impressive space station series.

By this point when I first watched the show I was absolutely questionning how I could ever have considered turning it off back in the "dark" days of season one. Then someone reminds me about Move Along Home and I nod, sadly.

But lo, the crew were too late and the Founders were everywhere - or so Odo declared at the end of The Adversary. Odd thing is that they're so damn good at hiding we barely see them all season as just about everything else steps into play.

It's impossible to discuss season four without talking about Worf - which is why I dedicated an entire post to that thread a while ago - and while I can now slip out of that stranglehold, it has to be said that Deep Space Nine would have been an incredibly different show if it wasn't for his arrival post-Generations. The tone changes, the lights are darker and there's a little bit more growling going on as soon as he steps into Quark's and lays out Martok's son, Drex (and we never saw him again did we...?). There's no escaping that Deep Space Nine is the show which shows up the faults in the universe and instead of paving over them it decides that making those faults a bit more obvious is the answer. Hey, they confront a lot and a lot gets resolved.

Opening with the unpresidented double-length The Way of the Warrior, it was a season that meant to cement the show in our consciousnesses, even if they did initially rely on a certain Klingon to do that job. The premiere was and still is a thrill ride every step of the way and the closing battle scene demonstrated that the game had been stepped up. The episode is one of the best and most gripping and one of only two book adaptations that I own, the other being the pamphlet thick Trials and Tribble-ations. No other season opener packs as much in or attempts to set as much in place as The Way of the Warrior and nor does any after it try to.

But it's best not to dwell or laud over Worf's transfer because this is a season which ensured that every single one of the regular cast excelled - and some in ways that we didn't expect. He does take centre stage for The Sword of Kahless but gets slightly upstaged by the mesmerizing John Colicos as Kor in his second of three appearances and again in Sons of Mogh which brought back brother Kurn and Rules of Engagement.  The Visitor for one covers that perfectly. Coming straight after the season opening The Way of the Warrior no-one expected the tour de force that oozes from every line and shot of this beautiful episode. I've watched this more times than it's been repeated on TV and each time I love it a bit more. For me this is better than The Inner Light, more gut-wrenching than The City on the Edge of Forever and Tony Todd hits every emotional button in his arsenal to make this one of my top ten Deep Space Nine episodes of all time. 

Back in the day it was all about those fascinating glimpses into the future - Morn at the bar, Dax and Bashir married - but as I reach the middle of my thirties with children of my own it resonates in a very different way. Not that I expect to be sucked out of time and revisit my son every few years for ten minutes, but I do value family a lot more than I ever did before. For me The Visitor will always be one of the best.

As for Jake, Cirroc Lofton gets both this episode and later, The Muse to have a stretch of his acting wings. Both are a decent weight and steer clear of the more light-hearted occasions we might have seen him in before. I was never that keen on The Muse in the 90's because there's no big action beat and nothing significant to the overall arc happens (unless you count that Jake writes Ansolom which was mentioned in The Visitor) and now I do see it as a character piece to give Jake a bit more maneuverability after the earlier episode's success. I like The Muse now because Lofton and Meg Foster seem to work well and having carried these, Nor the Battle to the Strong in season five would really raise my admiration for Lofton's abilities on the show which made him a more rounded and able character than Welsey ever was in The Next Generation. The same can be said for his partner in crime, Nog, whose arc potentially is a mirror to Worf's early years in the fleet as the only Klingon. On the flip of that I actually utterly hate The Muse because Lwaxana is back and if there's one Troi I really detest....

While Lofton got to expand the role, Bashir appeared more constrained, attempting to cure both the Jem'Hadar of ketracelwhite addiction in Hippocratic Oath and then a mystery Blight (also linked to the Dominion) in The Quickening. While I could say that it limited the doctor I find both of these brilliant episodes. Namely with the former because it failed to pacify the Jem'Hadar which The Next Generation had done with the Borg in I, Borg and Voyager would attempt with Species 8472 in In the Flesh. 

Addicted or not they were born to fight. Hippocratic Oath does add to the Jem'Hadar backstory significantly and on this viewing it refreshed a bit of Jem'eral knowledge (jeez...pun out) as well as giving me an "ah" moment when the O'Brien/Bashir ruckus happens towards the end. It's a big tick box because even after four years of their relationship flourishing Deep Space Nine could still remind you that not everything is always sweetness and joy. Things happen and people do have different attitudes and not every week can we skip merrily back to the station. 

Probably the big winner for Siddig this year was the brilliantly entertaining Our Man Bashir. Genius and one of those episodes alongside Far Beyond the Stars which let the cast stretch their acting legs a little. Total nonsense but magnificent from start to finish and certainly a lighter moment ahead of the Earth-centric mid-season two-parter. Brooks chews it up as Doctor Noah and Garak's role as the sidekick and some of his words of wisdom are perfect as the spy gets to play his role once more.

Kira of course ended the season pregnant with the O'Brien's child in Body Parts to hide Visitor's real life pregnancy and that would play a part in her onscreen appearances the following year. In season four we have more material which seeks to change her mind about the Cardassians, in both Indiscretion and Return to Grace both eyeing up her relationship with the ever-changing Gul Dukat. The introduction of his half-Bajoran daughter, Ziyal wasn't that necessary but her flourishing friendship with Kira and Garak in later stories again forces the major into a position where she has to examine her opinions of the former occupiers of Bajor. Being Dukat though it's never straight-forward and both these stories add dimensions onto the already multi-layered villain of the series. 

Kira's tales for this season don't give her much more room to go except on that Bajor vs Cardassia line which she's been dragging along for four years. Luckily, again, season five would rectify that to some extents. That's not to say that Kira wasn't key to the season; far from it as Visitor is one of the best actors in the show but you do feel her role was cut down to allow Worf more screentime since he does her job for Starfleet.

An example of that is Worf's new position as alternative commander of the Defiant when Sisko is away (Paradise Lost) which would have been assigned to Kira a year earlier. It does make more sense for a Starfleet officer to command a Starfleet vessel but his appearance in the series makes it more evident at this time that Worf and Kira are effectively playing the same part. That two-parter throws a lot of questions in the air and also means that the later Section 31 make a lot of sense. Starfleet admirals are reknowned for being a bit mental right back to the days of Kirk and neither are conspiracies anything new after, well, Conspiracy but knowing about the ever-creeping shadow of the Dominion makes you forget all those possibilities. Earth is a realistic target and to be fair you do realise how much of a sitting target it might well be. Robert Foxworth's Admiral Leyton  isn't the typical slightly unhinged senior officer we might have expected and his argument even seems fairly reasonable especially when you look at what the Breen accomplish in season seven's Penumbra. Deep Space Nine always excelled at instilling a wave of paranoia over its viewers in these darker Dominion days and the Homefront/Paradise Lost duo are are shining example I enjoy year on year. Barely set on the station itself, it's a Sisko story which adds weight to the occasionally sidelined captain and also looks at the bigger picture surrounding the imminent threat from the Changelings and their brethren from the Gamma Quadrant. A great double-header though and not even a season-closer.

Talking of Kira, season four was the last time before Enterprise's In a Mirror, Darkly, that we got a decent Mirror Universe episode. Both Resurrection and the final season's The Emperor's New Cloak were tedious, dull episodes which offered much and gave nothing in return. The Mirror Universe in the first three Deep Space Nine takes are great, fun and totally indulgent with Garak sucking up to Regent Worf here and the alternative Kira playing everyone like a fiddle where she can. 

The problem after here is that the ideas seem to dry up and giving us a Mirror Bareil and later allowing the Ferengi across the dimensional threshold were two unforgivable errors of judgement. Given that Little Green Men, The Bar Association and Body Parts are decent Ferengi episodes which mix humour with enjoyable plots and a point, making them into bumbling cross-universe sales merchants was a step too far in my opinion. Here the Mirror Universe is a real threat; there's danger, anyone could end up dead (and does). Maybe they just ran out of good people to kill off?

The quality of the season does dip a little and my thoughts on that have remained the same since '96 as Crossfire (another Bajoran Kira episode),The Bar Association, Assession and Rules of Engagement are average but none that I would speedily revisit. They are still a cut above average The Next Generation and good Voyager and if they were in the first couple of years of this show would have been seen as early classics. The Bar Association does have a welcome return for Leeta but it's drippy Ferengi stuff which I find difficult (but not impossible) to handle. I saw Rules of Engagement originally on a first cut VHS with all the running times still on the screen and marvelled at the clever talk-to-camera techniques used as part of the evidence against Worf. It's a fresh way of telling courtroom drama in Star Trek as it's been pretty standard if you look back at The Original Series' Court Martial, The Menagerie or The Next Generation's The Measure of a Man or The Drumhead all of which are variations on that theme. I admire that these asides do make it different and memorable but not in the same category as others that surround it in the year such as the subsequent and brilliant Hard Time.

The much vaunted annual hit-O'Brien-when-he's-down episode is the best of the lot; more cerebral than Whispers, more twisted than Visionary and probably Colm Meaney's top Deep Space Nine performance ever. O'Brien is utterly taken apart, lives another lifetime in minutes and becomes a different man by the end of the story. Bitterly though he's absolutely fine the following week as if nothing had ever happened (two episodes actually as the next one is in the Mirror Universe). I would have liked to have seen this resonate a bit further down the season but the relationship between Ichar and Miles is believable to the core and the brutal finale and the lifetime of punishment it in turn would provide is heart-crushing.

But what of the captain, what of Sisko? It is a Ben-lite season oddly with only For the Cause marking out his niche in the fourth year. Yes, he's around all the time and The Visitor is big on the Family Sisko but this late season entry is key to the character's development as I noted in another post recently. This starts a key arc and the descent of Sisko into his deepest darkest emotions which will travel through the troubles of For the Uniform and emerge kicking and screaming in In the Pale Moonlight. I never thought much of the Kasidy/Eddington/Sisko interwoven story however on this run through I realised just how important and damn good this one is. It jumped a lot of places in my favourites list. The duplicitousness of virtually all involved is delicious.

Which leaves only a couple of episodes to digest - To the Death introduces one of the greatest recurring characters ever in the form of Jeffrey Combs slippery and silver-tongued Weyoun who we thought would never turn up again but was so awesome he did and meant that the Vorta ended up being clones to cope with the issue (clever clever) and is one of those rare episodes where action takes presidence over everything else from the off. Add in a bit of Deep Space Nine destruction with one of the pylons getting blown up and it has a lot of memorable if simplistic high points plus the return of the long-dead Iconians and their rather useful gateways. It's a personal guilty pleasure episode and nice of the rebel Jem'Hadar to wear different coloured uniforms to distinguish themselves.

And finally. Broken Link. In the deep space tradition it's full of ongoing threads and repercussions playing to every strength of the show and once more ticking every box possible - and adding a couple in. I admit I do look forward with enthusiastic hunger for the season finales of Deep Space Nine. There are massive highs in the mid-season but you can't beat one of their not-a-cliffhanger cliffhangers which every season from The Jem'Hadar through to The Tears of the Prophets does with aplomb.

Odo, like Sisko got a quiet season but that "No Changeling has ever harmed another..." bit from The Adversary was never going away. The Dominion have skipped in and out of season four just as they managed in season three but their stamp is all over Broken Link more than it was the previous season closer. Broken Link is not a massive action packed, explosive jaw-dropper and much more character focused, more explorative of cause and effect than anything else. It reminds us that there is no getting away from events which has been the big winner in the trail of Deep Space Nine. For me it's not the best season finale in the seven years of the show but it still leaves you with a shiver, with a terrible fear that it's going to get worse and that, once more, nothing will be the same again...which can't be possible...again...can it?

Season four is again a step forward for the show and I can't fault it's efforts. The arcs are more rounded and you can see that there is payoff. No good deed goes unpunished here and everything has a consequence. Deep Space Nine never stepped away from showing its characters in a varied light. Here in season four that's most evident and maybe Worf's arrival just pushed some more dirt under those already grubby nails. No-one comes out of year four looking like a saint even though they may have entered the year decidedly on the more honest side of life. Season four sees a lot of information set in place, as subtle a buildup as the previous year but this time there is an sense of imminence to proceedings. Seeing little of the Dominion works in the opposite manner as every conversation leans towards them, by leaving them out they are felt even more.

Worf's arrival too might have seemed convoluted at the beginning but as the year grew on it became clear he was a better fit for the conflict-rife Deep Space Nine than the polished corridors of the USS Enterprise. He might take the occasional trip back but here Worf's links to the Empire could be explored much more deeply and the introduction of Martok as a semi-regular in the following year would have an even bigger effect on the Klingon as would his relationship with Dax. This does mark the mid-point of the show however as I've pointed out before it feels as though it's a fresh start, a stronger start with much more idea of where events will lead - the year felt like it was the first with a full roadmap from day one.

Now let's talk season five to see if that gets edged any further.

How did you rate the fourth year of Deep Space Nine? Was it the best, average or failed to deliver?

Deep Space Nine: Season Three: Step Away from the Changeling

For me the third season of Deep Space Nine is the turning point in quality.

I enjoy watching seasons one and two but with the third year the show came into its own whether by chance, design or because it knew it had to with The Next Generation finishing the previous year. Deep Space Nine was now the flag-bearer for Star Trek on the small screen and expectation was high. Very high. After all Sisko had declared at the close of The Jem'Hadar that the station would need to be ready for any attack from the Gamma Quadrant...

The overall quality of the show is much steadier and there is a tighter focus and a clearer sense of direction. While season two had dropped in references to the Dominion with infrequent irregularity that viewers easily blinked and missed, this year stepped the reveals through the 26 episodes. This made for much easier viewing, not having to wait a full season for the payoff that you might or might not have remembered and allowed for a steady buildup to The Adversary. I much prefer the way that the producers phased season three, giving us milestones to reach which acted as pieces to the larger "puzzle" of the year.

The Search started that trend immediately, announcing Odo's people as the Founders of the Dominion and killed two birds with one stone - we knew where he was from and got the brains behind the whole operation in one. Opening the year with another multi-part story as with The Homecoming, The Circle and The Siege was a masterstroke to beef up the series and introduce some key new features. I missed this on it's UK VHS launch day and spotted it randomly in a local shop a week or so after it came out. I'd not seen The Jem'Hadar by that point either so ended up watching them out of sequence - my next purchase was that aforementioned season finale!

Aside from the new briefing room we also gained a new Starfleet security chief and a Romulan. One of those managed to become a decent recurring guest cast member while the other faded into obscurity as a character. It's only when you watch this episode back that you recall they had someone specifically to look after the cloaking device who vanished after only a pair of episodic appearances. Dropping the Defiant off at the station to defend the sector allowed better storytelling that couldn't be achieved on those suped up shuttlecraft, the runabouts and providing her with a new phaser effect truly stuck the mid-digit up at the established laws of Star Trek. Watching those shots of phaser fire slam into the Jem'Hadar ships gave me literal jaw-drop. It's the moment that changed my views on this show and the whole franchise. Hooked for life.

But season three isn't just about that. The characters seem more real, Sisko has become a stronger, determined (and angrier) leader and less of a builder; it's as if everyone woke up on the right side of the bed for the first time in two years, smelt the raktajino and decided it was time to make a difference and do what this show was supposed to have done from Emissary - be unique and challenge the Roddenberry philosophy. There's a different feel here and even Odo seems to have become grumpier for the season kick-off. Luckily that only lasted until the second part of The Search or it would have been one very long, annoying year.

Season two had managed to pull the threat/hint of the Dominion out for a full 26 episodes and there was no chance of repeating that kind of temptation without fans going up the wall so instead it's a season of dangled carrots with sooner payoffs. Defiant is the prime example to hold in case here. The fleet being built in the Orias system and Riker's target would eventually be revealed as a secret armada constructed as part of a Romulan/Cardassian intelligence service alliance to destroy the Founders homeworld in The Die is Cast. That Romulan presence which we have on the Defiant at the season opener is revisited during the intelligence debriefing that happens during Visionary and again leads into the events of the two-parter Improbable Cause opens a few stories later. Those in turn spiral into The Adversary and by circumstance into The Way of the Warrior and then Homefront.

The budget was splashed out for The Die is Cast, making it the most strategic episode of the year although the limited battle scenes in the second half are nothing in comparison to the events in the following fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh seasons. I recall there being a lot made of those sequences as they took six months (reportedly) to film using miniatures. Odo's torture was one of the most uncomfortable moments of the show's whole run but was incredibly watchable since it pushed the dark aspects of Deep Space Nine even further. It would have been beyond any of our thoughts in The Next Generation for one of the recurring cast to be as multi-faceted as Elim Garak, truly one of the greats of the franchise and pairing him with the constable provides an uneasy, distrustful duo.

One thing that The Search, Heart of Stone, The Die is Cast  and The Adversary all have in common which threads the season through is the "No Changeling Has Ever Harmed Another" line. From the start of the year you just know that it won't take long for this one to be broken and with the sporadic mentions akin to the name-dropping of "the Dominion" in season two it hits a crescendo with the season finale. It never got that good a press back in the 90's but I really loved it then and do just as much now. The fallout from that would rear it's head in the fourth season closer, Broken Link illustrating the importance of Odo within the main plotline. It's most definitely the tag of the year but in comparison to the subtlety of the Dominion references in season two this one is made a lot more transparent.

That said, I don't think this year is overpowered with Dominion stories and that's an intelligent move as many would have expected the opposite after the doom-and-gloom foreboding that closed The Jem'Hadar. It also establishes the Dominion up as more calculating, political and devious than the Borg or the Klingons sets them up as a very different kind of foe. But the not-so-Dominion-dominated season allows for some diversions into the cast, gearing them up for the darker upcoming events while also closing off some lose threads.

The average Equilibrium gets a payoff in the same year with the later and better role-changing Facets revisiting the buried Trill host personality of Joran Dax among others. To that point, it's one of Avery Brooks' best and most sinister performances although it's all over and done in a matter of four minutes. Maybe these were hints at the darker tones of the Sisko character he would draw out in seasons five and six.  Facets is a mix of light-heartedness and personal revelation for Dax and is a better shot than the Equilibrium mystery.

For the captain though the beard arrival in Explorers did move the character forward and I couldn't imagine that scene in the holding cell possessed by Joran without it.  Originally Explorers bored me to tears but on my recent run through it does have it's moments - perhaps it's that I'm now in the father role now myself that it struck a chord but not as much as The Visitor. The CGI ship is a wonder and I only sat and watched Explorers shortly after I'd received the model from the Eaglemoss collection. It's a rare, lighter story for the pair and when you look back it's amazing how much more hopeful this year is.

Aside from the The Search, The Abandoned, the two-part obliteration of the Tal-Shiar and Obsidian Order and the brilliant season finale, The Adversary, (recently covered in its own post), this year does allow us to explore the build up to war and the behind the scenes machinations much more than we got to with the expected arrival of the Borg in The Next Generation. While the preparations for that happened off-screen, it seems that here on Deep Space Nine we get to see it warts and all. Beside that we do get some momentous character segments into the pot too.

Maybe the biggest losers this year are the Cardassians and the Bajorans with only three episodes from the season highlighting the former's existence in the franchise; Civil Defence, Second Skin and Destiny and Life Support, Explorers and Shakaar for the latter. Of those six it's Second Skin the easy standout with another superb performance from Nana Visitor and some sublime dialogue between Sisko and Garak as they head to Cardassia to rescue her. This is one of those great moments I mentioned just a paragraph ago and one I had totally forgotten about until recently. In fact I love it so much I'm reprinting it here.

SISKO

We'll be travelling under false transit documents prepared by Starfleet Intelligence. Mister O'Brien's reconfigured the shield harmonics of the Defiant so that, on long-range sensors, it'll appear to be a Kobheerian freighter. We leave in three hours. 

 Garak weighs his options, then reluctantly takes the dataclip from the desk.

GARAK

Fine. I'll go along on your little fool's errand. But I want one thing to be perfectly clear... I have no intention of sacrificing my life to save yours. If it looks like we're in danger of being captured... if there are any signs of trouble at all... you're on your own. 

SISKO

Mister Garak, I believe that's the first completely honest thing you've ever said to me. 

GARAK

How perceptive of you, Commander. 

It might seem like a knock-off version of Face of the Enemy from The Next Generation but this does make a more compelling story and frankly I never found Troi a convincing officer to kidnap given her position on Enterprise.

On a second watch through Destiny was a little more interesting and I've been finding the Bajoran elements easier to follow and comprehend (the benefit of middle age I guess!) but there are lows to the year. It's still 44 minutes that isn't up to the bar; nor is the slushy political/romance Life Support which does at least see the exit of Phillip Anglium as Bareil. I was never a fan, he was way too mediocre a character and his mirror version killed Resurrection in season six dead. For one of the few times in Star Trek I didn't mind that he was being written out. Anyway, Louise Fletcher's Kai was always going to win and this one does act as a reminder as to why Starfleet is hanging around in the first place. We'd have to wait until Rapture in season five though for Federation admission to be pulled from stasis.

Actually, while I'm droning on about poor episodes, what was the crack with Meridian?!

Giving column inches to that one, directed by Jonathan Frakes and penned for the screen by Mark Gehred-O'Connell (who also wrote Who Mourns for Morn?) is sacrilege in itself. One thing Deep Space Nine seemed to do badly at this stage was romance. Whether they got any better is also a debate for another time, but the drippiness of both Meridian and soon after the kissy-kissy-fest that was Fascination were again low marks for the series. I know for sure that Meridian is an episode I would shelve alongside Voyager's Threshold and The Next Generation's Justice. Shoddy, poor and we know Dax will never leave the crew (at least not at this stage and for this guy...).

Talking of second watchings, there are a ton of great moments and stories here before you think I'm season-bashing. Defiant was class and made up for Frakes having to direct the trashy Meridian (which has more mentions in this post than any other ep oddly).  I do chastise the writers for not showing the USS Defiant taking on the Cardassians onscreen and instead placing us in a command station with Sisko and Dukat but this episode is much more about seeing Tom Riker back, stripping those beard pieces off and going hunting. I must've watched this one more than a dozen times over the years and it still holds it's own. Why Tom Riker never got a third outing is criminal but here the relationship he has with Kira makes you want to see more of Frakes' slightly different transporter twin.

Fascination which followed it was an OK Lwaxana episode (and I'm far from a Troi fan at the best of times) and her last but one if memory serves. Comedy never seemed to fit with this show which is why I never took to the Ferengi shows (see below) and felt Lwaxana was a bit out of place on the station. For note the Bajoran festival of gratitude would also show up in Tears of the Prophets. 

Moving swiftly along though we have one of the great unexpected classics of the show in Past Tense. Set on Earth rather than the station which in itself is more than a little unusual, it gave Avery Brooks a real chance to spread his wings and channel a little of his inner demon in 21st Century San Francisco. Again, one of my earlier Deep Space Nine VHS purchases (UK volume 3.6 for the record), Past Tense was a revelation and showed just how far the show could go and that Star Trek hadn't lost it's abilities to touch on issues - and closer to home than usual in some respects. The story was helped by a great guest cast especially during the claustrophobic siege in the concluding part and those little aside comedy scenes as Kira and O'Brien try to locate the missing Sisko, Bashir and Dax (who's wardrobe is exceptionally bizarre). Avery Brooks is magnificent here as the replacement Gabriel Bell and commands Past Tense from start to finish. Brilliantly realised, Deep Space Nine could hit where it hurt.

And what of the others? The House of Quark, Distant Voices, Prophet Motive and Family Business? Average again I'm afraid. I recall seeing promos for the Bashir 30th birthday episode which saw him delve into his inner psyche thanks to an attack from a Lethian but the actual story didn't work as well as I hoped. Nice makeup, great chance for Siddig to spread his wings but not a patch on some of his later work in Our Man, Bashir, Dr Bashir, I Presume or Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges. But it's a start and a few levels above his shadowy (read shaky) performance in The Passenger.

Then there's those three Ferengi shows. I could just leave it there but they are worth a couple of lines. Quark-Ferengi stories were my least anticipated. I found the humour forced and weak and the aspects they explored cringeworthy. Have my thoughts changed? No. Grand Nagus Zek is a quirky character once or twice but after that I preferred scraping my nails on a blackboard - and equally as dubious was the introduction of Quark and Rom's Moogie. Total gagh. That's all I can say. I really, really tried but these kind of stories were rock bottom for Deep Space Nine and fortunately they were few and far between, moreso with the oncoming war. Saying that I did enjoy The House of Quark both in the '90's and now. It's an unusual mix of Ferengi and Klingon but seeing Gowron attempting to understand Quark's financial records and just being utterly confused is priceless.

I love Shimerman and Grodenchik as actors and their roles in other episodes are brilliant especially where they act as the audience onscreen, passing judgement and opinion on the events unfolding but the Ferengi dominated stories tend to be the weak links. I would suspect this is because it usually comes down to greed and strained humour , the latter of which Star Trek generally never excelled. Shimerman and his Ferengi co-stars would get some better material in season four with Little Green Men but it would only be a small break from the norm.

Twenty years on, the 1994-1995 season has stood the test of time well and I'm certain it's better than I remember it. Heart of Stone, Destiny and Explorers were definitely stronger than I thought they were but I was really itching for the later part of the year and more than that, season four. The stand out pieces were Past Tense and The Search for me but I would be hard-pushed to pick a standout single-length story. Even writing this I'm debating how high up I would place Visionary with its clever little time travelling twist that rivalled the one in Voyager's Deadlock. Character-wise, Garak was a show stealer on more than one occasion as he would be every year but also kudos go to Nana Visitor particularly for Second Skin and Rene Auberjonois for all the work as Odo coming to terms with the fact that his people are the Dominion's Founders - and when he harms another, boy does he do it well.

Whatever you say, season three is still a mark up in quality and placed all the key players for the advent of war. Just a minor issue of some Klingons to sort out first though I believe....

What are your memories of the third season? Was it a turning point or are we just spouting gagh? Why not drop a line below...

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