Since 2020, the Secret Hideout Trek shows on Paramount+ have shown us the fates several of the characters from the twenty-fourth-century spinoffs: TNG’s Jean-Luc Picard, William Riker, Deanna Troi, Wes Crusher, and Data and Voyager’s Seven of Nine on Picard (with TNG’s Worf, Beverly Crusher, and Geordi La Forge to be seen in the upcoming third season); Voyager’s Kathryn Janeway and Chakotay on Prodigy; Riker and Troi again and Voyager’s Tom Paris on Lower Decks.
Conspicuously absent from that list is anyone from DS9 (though Quark has been mentioned more than once on both Picard and LD), but this week’s LD makes up for that lack in spades, and it’s my favorite episode of LD so far. (Note, this doesn’t mean it’s the best. Just that it’s my favorite, which is as much my love for DS9 as anything…)
SPOILERS VIOLATE THE RULES OF ACQUISITION
Mind you, the only characters we see are Kira Nerys and Quark, voiced by Nana Visitor and Armin Shimerman. There’s no indication one way or the other of who else might be serving on the station or elsewhere, which is good, as it leaves things open for future productions to do what they want.
I like the fact that Colonel Kira is still in charge, and of course Quark is still running the bar. Picard and LD both established that Quark’s has franchises all over the Alpha Quadrant, which provides one of the funnier jokes in the episode, as Mariner gives Boimler, Tendi, and Rutherford a hard time for wanting to visit Quark’s, as it’s just a chain restaurant, but they retort that it’s the original…
In general, the show does an excellent job of mining humor from what is actually a perfectly reasonable Trek plot. I mean, if you just describe the plot straight-up, it would make a normal Trek episode: The Karemma are coming through the wormhole to try to normalize trade with the Alpha Quadrant following the Dominion War. Originally intended to support the Vancouver, whose captain was going to negotiate, Freeman instead has to step in and conduct the negotiations. The Karemma are outraged to learn that Quark is using Karemma tech for his shiny new “Quark 2000” replicator, and they kidnap him. However, Tendi, Rutherford, and a DS9 officer named Masc (more on him in a bit) are on the Karemma ship delivering gifts from the Federation, and have to save Quark’s life.
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Wild Massive
In the end, once they discover that Quark was being arrested rather than kidnapped, they make a deal where the Karemma get a percentage of Quark’s profits and everyone’s happy. Well, except for Quark, who has to share profits, but it beats being put in a Dominion prison…
On its own, that’s not funny, but this is still LD and still a comedy, and so a great deal of it is played for laughs, starting with Freeman’s frustration with the whole thing. First she’s annoyed by having to step in at the last minute and with no prep time, and then everything goes sideways. Boimler, meanwhile, is cleaning up at dabo, and Quark is always good for a laugh.
They even manage to come up with a running gag for Kira and Shaxs that works. Kira and Shaxs know each other from their days in the Bajoran Resistance, because of course they do, and the running gag is each of them insisting that they owe the other one for saving their life, with a constant stream of reminding each other of life-saving events while fighting the Cardassians. (“That one didn’t count, we were both locked up!”) It’s still true to both characters, without diminishing their lives as terrorists or what they were fighting for, and still funny as hell.
Masc is also a lovely take on what TNG established about Worf: that he was raised by humans rather than in the Klingon Empire, and knows what he knows about being Klingon from study. Masc, though, flips that on its ear: he, too was raised by humans, in Cincinnati, Ohio, but the only studying he’s done of Orion culture is from holonovels. (“The bad ones, too—the ones with boobs on the cover.”) We don’t find this out until after he’s spent the entire episode talking—endlessly—about being a pirate and doing piratical things and such like. He goes on at appalling length about it. The routine actually wears thin pretty quickly, but the payoff works, because he’s gone on so damn much that when the Karemma ship heads to the wormhole, Rutherford immediately suggests that Masc take over the ship, pirate-style.
Which Masc absolutely cannot do because he’s a faker. Luckily, as we learned in “We’ll Always Have Tom Paris,” Tendi is a total badass, and she takes over the ship in very short order, delaying their entry into the wormhole long enough for DS9 (which has been hit with a Karemma EMP) to recover and tractor them back.
The other end of the plot is showing more of the growing relationship between Mariner and Jennifer the Andorian. Jennifer takes Mariner to meet her friends at their salon. Mariner’s teeth already hurt because they call their little party a “salon,” which is a kind of weird talent show-cum-slumber party type thingie. Mariner is struggling to get through this pretentious nightmare, and then when the power goes out, everyone panics. Mariner wants to take charge and kick ass, but she’s worried that Jennifer will get upset if she yells at her friends. Except, it turns out, Jennifer finds her friends to be just as super-annoying as Mariner does, and was looking forward to watching Mariner tear them apart. So she cuts loose, giving orders and stunning everyone to conserve oxygen. (They made candles, and with the power out, the candles are sucking all the oxygen out of the room…)
I keep going back and forth about this plotline, because I enjoyed the hell out of it, and I had to seriously examine why. After all, just two episodes ago I ripped “Room for Growth” because Delta Shift didn’t act like what people in Star Trek’s future should act like. Yet here I am loving the absurdity of the salon and sharing Mariner’s eye-rolling reaction to it.
After a while, though, I figured it out. Delta Shift were being selfish and mean-spirited. Jennifer’s friends were just being pretentious. I don’t have a problem with people in Star Trek’s future being pretentious, because it’s a harmless quality, and one that doesn’t come across as nasty.
It’s a little extreme for Mariner to stun them all and enjoy it so much, but we already know that Mariner’s damaged, and we’re kind of stuck with that.
Ultimately, what we’ve got here is a fun story that’s also a nice little love letter to DS9. It starts with the opening, where Freeman order Ransom to delay their docking at the station so she can read up on her mission, and Ransom orders the conn officer to fly slowly around the station—thus enabling them to re-create DS9’s opening credits. The sets are all nicely re-created in animation, and the music and sound effects are all right out of the show. It’s a beautiful thing.
Random thoughts
- The title of the episode is one of the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition, which were first seen on DS9. In this case, “Hear all, trust nothing” is Rule #190, first cited in “Call to Arms.”
- The Karemma were introduced in DS9’s “The Search, Part I” when the Deep Space 9 crew was trying to learn more about the Dominion. Quark did several deals with them, including a very profitable tulaberry wine deal.
- Interestingly, even though DS9 is supposed to be a joint Starfleet/Bajoran station (and Masc is definitely assigned to the station), all of the officers in Ops are wearing Bajoran Militia uniforms.
- Pursuant to that, one thing this episode establishes is that Bajor has yet to join the Federation in 2382, which is ridiculous. Mike McMahan and the gang are likely taking their cue from the show-runner of DS9’s latter era, Ira Steven Behr, who didn’t want Bajor to join the Federation for reasons passing understanding. (See my rant on that subject in my rewatch of the DS9 finale “What You Leave Behind.”) It’s also likely that Sisko is still with the Prophets (also mentioned during conversations last week between Mariner and the conspiracy theorists).
- Speaking of Sisko, his baseball still lives on the station commander’s desk. That baseball was given to him by an entity posing as baseball player Buck Bokai in DS9’s “If Wishes were Horses,” and it became an important symbol of Sisko’s presence on the station in “Call to Arms,” “Sacrifice of Angels,” and “Tears of the Prophets.” Kira grabs the ball and tosses it around at one point in this episode.
- The Karemma mentions a tailor shop, which is meant to be a reference to Garak’s shop, though Garak was back on Cardassia at the end of the Dominion War. Maybe he sold it to someone….
- We see Morn sitting at the end of the bar in Quark’s. Which is as it should be.
- Mariner blackmails Quark with a copy of the holo-recording of Kira’s body with Quark’s head, from DS9’s “Meridian.”
- I was dreading some manner of comeuppance or reversal for Boimler after he kept winning at dabo, but no, he just wins a crapton of money because he’s Bold Boimler now, and Bold Boimler is awesome.
- Visitor and Shimerman both do superlative work reprising their iconic roles. I especially love how effortlessly Visitor gives us a Kira who’s unquestioningly in charge of the station. And Shimerman’s comic timing remains perfect.
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Yeah, as a DS9 fan, I’m just grinning ear-to-ear.
It’s good to see that Station and Bajor sector finally get some needed love in the current era.
Seeing Quark and Kira again is like checking in with old friends! And I think that it’s wholly appropriate that, in bringing back the Dominion for the first time in 23 years, Lower Decks focuses on its least important canonical member race.
I don’t know. Maybe my expectations were too high because of the hype but I wasn’t overly impressed with the episode. I think the humor just didn’t work for me here. Plus, while I figured we’d see Kira and Quark again, I was hoping for at least one other cameo (besides Morn).
It was great seeing that Kira is still in charge of the station. But in her Bajoran uniform? So, I guess this means that Bajor decided not to join the Federation. It’s a tad disappointing but does jibe with Ira Behr’s “Bajor is able to stand on its own” idea.” Maybe Bajor has protectorate status without being a full-fledged member? Or maybe it’s a Bajoran station but they allow a contingency of Starfleet officers to serve there? (I think that may be it since Ops was populated by all Bajoran officers) Also, while I am glad that my theory that Kira and Shaxs knew other from the Resistance was correct, the “I owe you for saving my life” bit got old REAL fast for me.
I really wanted to see Mariner on Deep Space Nine more. I wanted her to walk the promenade and give the tour like she did on Starbase 25. But no, she was stuck on the Cerritos in a B-plot that I really didn’t care about. But I guess I can understand why she wasn’t on the station more, it was Tendi’s moment to shine.
I know he was supposed to, but OMG, Masc annoyed the heck out of me!! The way he kept going on and on about Orion piracy, I knew something was up. I expected him to be a changeling or someone trying to entrap Tendi into doing something illegal. However, I understood once he explained. He must’ve studied Orion culture the same way Worf studied Klingon culture–unfortunately his source material wasn’t great.. By the way, when we first met Tendi, I assumed she’d been raised on Earth. I’m really impressed with her now–the way she defied her family to join Starfleet.
I feel bad for Quark. Sure, he exploited Karemma tech for his own gain, but still–75% of everything his franchise earns goes to them?? Seems rather excessive. I guess now he’s going to have to work harder to earn more money for himself. Well, that and hide some of his earnings.
Kira greeting Mariner put a smile on my face. She likes her!
I may be just a simple country lawyer I mean fan, but I think Bajor not joining the Federation was the right choice. DS9 was the first Star Trek show to really pull back the curtain and examine some of the darker aspects of the reality of the Federation, and Bajor remaining independent really drives home the idea that while Federation membership brings a lot of benefits to a lot of people, it’s not necessarily for everyone. It also tied in with Sisko’s arc of going from a loyal-if-somewhat-unhappy Starfleet officer to fully embracing his role in Bajoran culture, and helping to protect Bajoran interests.
And really, I’m not sure Bajor would be a good fit for the Federation. It’s a deeply religious planet, and the show’s depiction of the Federation has shown time and again that it has at best an uneasy relationship with religion. It’s a planet that just recently got out from under another Alpha Quadrant power and is still working out its post-occupation identity.
And while the franchise, both then and now, has not really gotten to the point of fully deconstructing the exploration-and-colonization model that Star Trek was built on, I’m not sure that the show ever really demonstrated that Kira’s initial skepticism of Bajor joining the Federation was unwarranted. And if any Star Trek commander would be in a position to understand that skepticism, it would be the man who had a deep connection to his own people’s history with colonial powers.
As a fan of color with my own colonial trauma I have some sympathy for that perspective. Bajor and the Federation are good friends. Maybe they should stay that way.
Rutherford did mention talking to a reporter while he was upstairs dangling his feet over the balcony, so I think the implication was that Jake was up there.
Masc was a fairly good dig at Trek’s tendency toward species essentialism. I’ve often said we should see more aliens raised in Earth culture and humans raised in alien cultures, since logically a 200-year-old egalitarian multispecies civilization should’ve had a ton of immigration and cultural intermingling by now, instead of every human being from Earth, every Vulcan being from Vulcan, etc. Here we finally get an alien native to Earth, though he still feels he has to conform to the stereotypes for his species. It’s particularly amusing that he’s from Cincinnati, not only because it’s my hometown, but because it echoes a beat in my last Trek novel Living Memory in which McCoy makes a stereotyped assumption about the beliefs of an Andorian Starfleet officer and she counters, “For your information, Doctor McCoy, I was born and raised in Cincinnati.”
And it’s nice to get clarification on the Orion pheromone issue. Tendi clarifies that not all Orions have them, which is consistent with what I posited in my novels, and is of course the simplest way to reconcile ENT: “Bound” with other portrayals of Orions.
@5/ChristopherLBennett – I think that the fact that not all Orion women have those pheromones was already established in “We’ll Always Have Tom Paris” last season.
Christopher: thank you for the reminder of the Jake reference, which I totally forgot to mention. Also, when Masc said he was from Cincinnati, I immediately thought of you……
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@3/Iacomina – Actually, Star Trek: Discovery has already beaten Lower Decks to the punch on this, as a DSC episode last season featured a Founder as a guest character (in the late 32nd Century, no less).
@8/TheBandsawVigilante
Debatable, since it’s not clear that the Changeling is a Founder, or whether the Dominion even still exists, but point taken.
I loved everything about this episode. I was trying to approximate who might still be aboard the station, considering many of the characters dispersed in DS9’s final episode, but Dr. Bashir and Ezri should still be around, and Nog, though for obvious reasons, they’re not likely to include him. I didn’t see the Defiant docked at the station, so that might explain the dearth of Starfleet personnel. I suppose Jake might still be around, depending on how soon after the DS9 finale this episode is set, but I can’t see him living there permanently if he knows Sisko is gone indefinitely. Jake is prime to make an appearance, though; they could encounter him just about anywhere if he’s out and about being a journalist.
I just read an interview with Mke McMahon and he confirmed that Bajor is not in the Federation. He said he’d watched the doc “What We Left Behind” and he wanted to respect Ira Behr’s vision that Bajor not join the Federation.
Mary: That’s what I figured happened. I truly wish McMahan had pulled a Nick-Fury-in-Avengers and elected to ignore the stupid-ass decision, but alas.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
I agreed that DS9 ending with Bajor still not in the Federation was a major mistake. The original mission of the show was not completed. However, I could see Bajor choosing to stand apart until Sisko returns, and having Starfleet personnel serving on the station being symbolic of a promise to keep the two entities intermingled until that happens. But that is purely head canon, especially since they seem to have totally done away with the continuity of the novels that started with Avatar.
@13,
Same.
I respect Behr’s legacy with DS9, but that’s one storytelling decision where I, without hesitation, think he made the wrong call too.
I think this parallels the experience of imany from mmigrant communities. First gen: come and live and work like hell for survival. Second gen: Assimilate/acculturate and run like hell from the parent culture. Third gen: Come back and get all the book knowledge of the culture their parents ran away from, and become super immigrant. (Speaking from experience? Who? Me?)
wow. this column enhanced my tv viewing pleasure by about 300%!
likely because DS9 is by far my least watched Trek show, to the degree that I simply do not recognize it’s anythings.
i do not want to have to have indepth recollection of any ST saga to appreciate LDs, i think that’s kinda the point while at the same time they make their shout-outs.
that’s that.
@@.-@, I agree with your sentiments.
Just because the show started with a goal of Bajor joining the Federation, doesn’t mean that it can’t change by the end. There’s no set rule in storytelling, let alone real life, that says viewpoints can’t change over time. That was the beauty of DS9. It allowed time for things and characters to change and grow. It allowed us to see the perspective of people not in the Federation in depth, and how they were just as important.
For all the reasons you listed it makes more sense for Bajor to be a major ally of the Federation, rather than a member.
Quoting from https://trekmovie.com/2022/09/21/interview-tawny-newsome-previews-bananas-star-trek-lower-decks-episode-strange-new-worlds-crossover/
I found Ira Behr’s idea of why they shouldn’t join the Federation silly. The Federation isn’t going to be oppressive to religion, it’s a celebration of all cultures.
Certainly the Vulcan religion is alive and well.
Picard even makes a speech at the end of the TNG episode “Reunion” that the Federation and Starfleet respects the cultures and practices of all their member worlds. Worf doesn’t even spend one minute inside a cell for murder, because it was culturally sanctioned. Trying to say the Fed would try to homogenize Prophet worship out of Bajoran culture is ludicrous. The Federation is not the Borg.
Honestly, I’m hoping that Lower Decks just decided to have the status quo for Bajor be what it was so they could use the familiar Bajoran Militia uniform designs. Picard is several years (IDK the exact number) past this so hopefully they’ll throw us a bone on the future of Bajor and a couple key players. They weren’t afraid to name drop Dukat and Sisko, even though it was in the alt timeline.
While they seem not to be having it join the Federation, I see no reason why Kira would be in a Starfleet uniform if Bajor joined the Federation. Where’s the assumption all preexisting militaries and local planetary forces are subsumed into the Federation?
Presumably the Bajoran militia would continue to exist.
@21/CT Phipps
One of the DS9 eps did say that the militia would have to be absorbed into Starfleet
@17/Mido128: “Just because the show started with a goal of Bajor joining the Federation, doesn’t mean that it can’t change by the end.”
Agreed. It’s not much of an arc if the characters have exactly the same goals and priorities at the end of the arc as they had at the beginning. Bringing Bajor into the Federation was Picard’s assignment to Sisko. But Sisko grew and changed over the series, formed a close relationship with Bajor, and came to understand it better than the Starfleet officers giving his marching orders.
I don’t know if I agree with the idea of keeping Bajor out of the Federation, but I intensely disagree with the idea that a series has to end up fulfilling the goal stated at the beginning. Sometimes the whole point is that the characters started out with the wrong goal, e.g. if the heroes’ mission was to destroy a ruthless enemy but they end up choosing to make peace with them, or if the heroes were just mercenaries trying to make a buck but they end up becoming champions in a larger struggle for freedom.
@22/Mary: “One of the DS9 eps did say that the militia would have to be absorbed into Starfleet”
But that was during the war, wasn’t it? Maybe in peacetime, there’s less need for that and the Bajoran Militia was allowed to remain separate when Bajor joined.
I’m bucking consensus here, but this episode didn’t really do it for me, despite being a huge Niner. Maybe my expectations were too high going into it, but I just thought it was “okay.”
Mariner’s subplot could literally have happened in any episode, and just happened to be sandwiched in here. I actually saw a link that Tawny Newsome had to beg the showrunner to rewrite the ending to let her go onboard, because the original plan was that she wouldn’t even venture onto the station at all. This is insane, when you consider the show had already established she had a past assignment there. It’s storytelling 101 that the breadcrumbs that you drop eventually get paid off, which made this episode (almost) a giant tease for her. I did *like* the forward movement of her relationship with Jennifer…just not here.
The stuff with Tendi (and Rutherford tagging along) more directly happened on DS9, but the plot with the tryhard Orion could again have happened anywhere. It’s also treading ground with Tendi’s character we’ve seen before, since it’s already been established that she comes from a piratical family. Thus there’s really no character arc here, it’s just Tendi barely tolerating someone incredibly annoying until she snaps.
I was just expecting more from the DS9 side of things I guess than what we got. More interaction between the Lower Deckers and some familiar faces for sure. Certainly not Kira – she has more important things to do – but they could have brought back someone like Rom who was appropriately low-status to deal with them. Even little things (like where’s the fat Klingon waiter? Where’s the joke about self-sealing stem bolts?) I was expecting to be set up didn’t happen.
Ultimately, I enjoyed it, but I feel like it was only about as good as the average Season 3 episode (which I’ve been enjoying less than Season 2, last week’s episode excepted). Which is to say, fine, but strangely unadventurous and somewhat of a step backward from what they’ve done before.
The only other “hopeful” thing regarding Bajor’s status is that maybe they are going to be going with the Star Trek: Online timeframe which makes Bajor’s joining of the Federation be in the 2390’s (I think) and since Picard has been using ships from Star Trek: Online, they might be taking some broader world building items from them as well. That was one thing that I was disappointed they didn’t take from the relaunch novels was to bring Bajor into the Federation relatively shortly after DS9’s finale, even if using a cynical reason of “The Federation has to rebuild after the Dominion War” because the whole reason for Bajor not joining in Season 5 was due to the visions Sisko received from the Prophets basically describing the initial invasion during the Dominion War and taking of DS9 with the need for the non-aggression pact. “Bajor must stand alone” is not something that needed to last forever, it just had to happen at the time.
I can take or leave the Federation timeline, but I still hate the implication that Sisko never came back. It’s an insult to Avery Brooks, who insisted on adding that promise in the last episode, because he did not want Ben to be yet another absent black father.
It’s funny that back in the first season, Mariner complained about Jennifer being “the worst. Then when they started dating I was like “Mariner realizes she was wrong.” But now we see that, no, they’re just equally awful to their “friends.”
It’s wonderful that these two horrible people have found each other.
@23:
One of the DS9 eps did say that the militia would have to be absorbed into Starfleet.
Yeah, the Relaunch novels explored that during Bajor’s Worlds of DS9 novella (after Bajor had joined).
I remember it made me wish we’d seen this dramatized on screen.We’ve seen Federation member worlds countless times. But the franchise has never really explored in depth the logistics of a world joining the UFP and, once the honeymoon ends, having to figure out logistics like that.
It was a missed opportunity for on-screen world building.
It’s the same reason I loved Mr. Bennett’s Rise of the Federation novels, for showing the inaugural UFP member worlds having to figure out those very logistics and setting the template/stage for what was to come for later members over the next 200 years.
@26/Cybersnark
That really bugs me too. I loved what they did in the relaunch novels how he returned a year later. But, no it’s now five years and he’s still gone!
I can understand LD not wanting to change it. He’d be changing someone else’s intention just for a one episode cameo. And it’s not like he can come back “yesterday” without altering the timeline.
I don’t get it. Why bother having Kassidy get pregnant if you know Sisko is going to go with the Prophets? It was ludicrous.
Christopher: I don’t agree with anything you said in comment #23 at all.
First of all, it was established in “Rapture,” which was the fifth season and before the war, that the Bajoran Militia would be absorbed into Starfleet.
Secondly, your argument would hold water if the notion of Bajor joining the Federation had even come up in the closing arc, but it didn’t. It wasn’t even addressed at any point in the finale, except insofar as they put Kira in a Starfleet uniform, which I honestly thought in 1999 was a clever bit of foreshadowing to Bajor joining the Federation. But no, they just ignored it.
If they had actually addressed the matter of Bajor joining the Federation at any point in the closing arc, then I could buy your argument, but as it stands, this was just bad storytelling. “Rapture” established that Bajor needed to stand alone in these dangerous times, but with the war over, that time had passed.
It’s Behr’s comments in the What We Left Behind documentary, where he basically gave a middle finger to the notion of Bajor joining the Federation, that makes this all worse, because it completely misreads what the Federation is supposed to be.
Like I said in my rewatch of “What You Leave Behind,” that episode mistook the end of the war for the end of the show, and it also failed a basic storytelling tenet. The first episode established that Sisko’s goal was to get Bajor ready to join the Federation. That he didn’t succeed in the goal isn’t the problem, it’s that the goal was never even a factor in any of the storytelling that is the problem. (Well, that and the culmination of his role as Emissary was to tackle Dukat into a pit of fire. Gah.)
Anyhow, on top of all this, it’s worth mentioning that Sisko’s actual fate is still unclear here. There was speculation last week and we see that Kira’s still in charge of the station — but we don’t know his actual status. It’s possible he came back but isn’t in Starfleet anymore or isn’t in charge of the station anymore or any number of a dozen other possibilities. I’m glad they left it open.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@29/krad
Anyhow, on top of all this, it’s worth mentioning that Sisko’s actual fate is still unclear here. There was speculation last week and we see that Kira’s still in charge of the station — but we don’t know his actual status. It’s possible he came back but isn’t in Starfleet anymore or isn’t in charge of the station anymore or any number of a dozen other possibilities. I’m glad they left it open.
Technically, it was addressed last week when the Truthers demanded to know what happened to Sisko and Mariner said he’s working hard in the Celestial Temple. However, it could be agued that Sisko’s return was classified and not common knowledge.
@29/krad: “Christopher: I don’t agree with anything you said in comment #23 at all.”
You don’t agree that it’s acceptable for characters’ goals to evolve and change over the course of a series? Because that’s the point I was actually making, that simply saying “He didn’t fulfill the goal he was given at the start” does not, in and of itself, constitute a problem. As I said, I don’t actually have an opinion on whether or not Bajor should’ve joined the Federation. I just don’t agree that it was somehow obligatory to end that way just because it started that way.
Okay, yeah, it would’ve been better if they’d addressed the issue in the end, but surely it’s an exaggeration to say that single oversight on their part completely invalidates everything I said.
I felt Kira staring wistfully at the Bajoran wormhole was a fantastic bit of acting/animation because no fan of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine needed to be told that she was thinking of Sisko as well as mourning the fact he hasn’t come back yet.
@32 – not just Sisko, but Odo too. I expect she’s spent many a moment hoping for him to come back through the wormhole.
@32/3:
Exactly. That’s a subperb bit of non-verbal storytelling (and one that works both for DS9 and non-DS9 viewers of LD).
I still hate the bug eyes but kudos for how the likenesses of Kira and Quark were really on point for such minimalist design.
You’re missing an “of” in the first paragraph of the post: “have shown us the fates several”
I appreciated Tendi and Mesk [edit] being very different shades of green from the perspective of alien races having a wide variety of skin tones just like humanity, although it irritated me how they clashed when they were together onscreen. Considering it now, I wonder if the choice was made partly as a meta contrast between the bright green Tendi serving on a well-lit ship (a cartoon one, no less) to the darker, rather matte hue of the guy stationed on DS9.
I was less surprised by the satisfaction Mariner got stunning all of Jennifer’s friends than by the glee Jennifer showed watching it happen.
Couldn’t it be interpreted, should the viewer so choose absent in-story verification, that Bajor has joined the Federation yet most Bajoran DS9 staff remains part of its own service rather than Starfleet per cultural identity, even if it’s no longer purely militarily independent, cf. the Vulcan Science Academy?
I think that Ira Steven Behr is a very good writer, but I think that he thought that that “Federation as Borg” analogy was a great deal cleverer than it actually was. I don’t necessarily agree that Bajor should be in the Federation, but it’s difficult for me to imagine why they would not be at this point.
While we love the Federation, it’s also possible Bajor just decided to become it’s own allied power to the Federation and is spreading out on its own. Which is an interesting twist as I’ve always felt “The Federation expands relentlessly outward” has its own unfortunate implications.
Maybor Bajor’s treaties with the Klingons, Romulans, and other Dominion allies prevents it from being a full Federation member.
Or maybe in 200 years when Sisko comes back, he finds out they took his word as religious law and he’s like, “No, you dummies! I didn’t mean forever!”
The thing is, though, that the Federation has been consistently depicted as being willing to drop everything and bugger off the moment that a planetary government asks them to, even when it’s clearly contrary to their strategic interests. The claim that they’re imperialist seems like a reach.
@37/C.T. Phipps: The thing is, the Federation isn’t supposed to be just one nation or culture expanding imperialistically. It’s supposed to be a pluralistic alliance of different cultures that share common ideals. The shows don’t always do a good job of showing its diversity, but it seems invalid to equate partnership between equals with assimilation.
I’m so glad they brought Morn’s voice actor back for this. Really clinched the nostalgia for me.
Mr. DeCandido, according to this episode’s subtitles (which I use because I’m hearing impaired), the Orion who was raised in Cincinnati is named MESK, not MASC: https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Mesk
Well, in the wake of the episode’s premiere and discussion, Beh’rs sticking to his gun re: Bajoran membership.
Again…Ira, I love you as a TV writer. You, Michal Piller, and Ron Moore all influenced my dream of working in the industry…but I’m sorry, but you made the wrong call on this one.
@24: Presumably Rom’s still a bit busy ruling Ferenginar!
Mr. Magic: What boggles my mind about that quote is that, of all the great things he did with DS9, that that colossal misstep is what he’s proudest of………
Sigh.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@44,
Yeah, it really is a bizarre choice for proudest moment out of all of DS9’s accomplishments.
Maybe he was trolling?
I’m okay with Bajor deciding the Federation isn’t for them, but they should have addressed the issue in the DS9 finale. Maybe a scene in a council room with the different parties arguing or something. I would take that over… sigh, the fire cave grudge match. Yeesh.
Anyway, one way or another, it needed to bookend the series.
I feel like the last episode of DS9 had much bigger problems than them not discussing Federation membership. Honestly I felt like the show had grown way beyond that initial mission statement. But I would have taken an entire episode about them discussing the topic around a table over what we actually got.
Anyway, the actual episode of Lower Decks was pretty funny, though I would have enjoyed it more if more DS9 stars had cameoed and they made it sort of an unofficial reunion.
@48,
I think Keith put it best: The Writers Room mistook the end of the Dominion War for the end of the show.
If I remember right, Ron Moore was the War’s biggest advocate in terms of pushing for it to continue as long as possible.
And at the time, I was fine with that. It added to the drama and tension of the series ending with this final, apocalyptic confrontation.
But now in hindsight over 20 years later…More and more, I’m wishing now that they’d wrapped it up earlier in the Season so there would’ve been room to explore the immediate post-War fallout and tie up loose ends.
It’s kinda like Jonathan Hickman’s Fantastic Four, or Mike Carey and Peter Gross’ Lucifer. Both comics runs had their big, explosive climaxes, followed by 6 month+ denouements/codas to cool down and tie off the final threads. Those were the right narrative moves.
Part of it is also how the franchise was never really able to explore the post-War fallout outside of DS9.
VOY spent its last 2 Seasons in the Delta Quadrant and intentionally eschewed any references or nods during AQ-centic episodes. Nemesis used the War as part of Shinzon’s backstory (and by implication a motivation for the Romulan Navy’s support of the coup), but that was it. Even Picard hasn’t acknowledged it (something Michael Chabon said was imposed on them by TPB to make it new viewer friendly).
@48/Mr. Magic: I felt the war should’ve ended in the season 6 finale, with the final season being the aftermath. I’ve long felt that the consequences of a war after it ends are far more interesting and important than the actual fighting itself.
As for how TV series handle finales, I’m impressed with the way Japanese tokusatsu (superhero/FX) series like Kamen Rider and Super Sentai handle it. American shows like to keep every plot thread going throughout the season and then just cram all their resolutions into one huge, cluttered finale, which is often too superficial because there’s just too much stuff to deal with at once. The Japanese shows tend to parcel out the climaxes over the last few episodes of the season, wrapping up each of the major story arcs and defeating the various main villains one by one, then winnowing it down to just the final, central confrontation in the finale. The recently ended Kamen Rider Revice went a step farther — the fate-of-the-world crisis was resolved in the fifth-to-last episode, and the last four episodes focused on resolving the core characters’ personal conflicts.
@48,
I felt the war should’ve ended in the season 6 finale, with the final season being the aftermath. I’ve long felt that the consequences of a war after it ends are far more interesting and important than the actual fighting itself.
Yeah. For all the many faults of Babylon 5 ‘s final Season, at least it was fun seeing Sheridan and company trying to preserve the peace they’d forged and getting the ISA up and running.
Does the dialogue actually state that Bajor had not yet joined the Federation? Or is that an inference from the Bajoran uniforms in Ops?
Because if the latter, it is much more open to interpretation: It’s possible that Bajor has joined the Federation; that the Bajoran security services are now a Federation member-world service; and that in peacetime and with Bajor now recovered from the Occupation, local Bajoran authorities retain jurisdiction over the Bajoran system and the wormhole.
Seeing now that CLB made a similar point in #23.
I always felt that by the end of the series, Bajor *had* been brought into the Federation, but allegorically rather than literally. This was done by having our Bajoran separatist character, under the tutelage of her initially-resented Starfleet superior, set aside her personal feelings and embrace the universalist humanism of the Federation, saving the galaxy in the process…
Why is Bajor not joining the Federation seen as a bad thing or a wrong decision? There’s any number of planets that retain their independence despite having cordial relations with the Federation.
I see the objections as being similar to “American Exceptionalism”. Basically, “we’re so great, why wouldn’t everyone want to be just like us?”. Perhaps Bajoran took a vote and narrowly decided not to join. Or perhaps it was overwhelmingly against. Either way, isn’t that what the Federation supposedly stands for, letting planets choose their own path?
I prefer that Bajoran didn’t join up. It’s obviously not what people were expecting and that’s a good thing. If we get “It’s your job to bring Bajoran into the Federation” in the first episode ” and “Welcome to the Federation” in the last, that predictable and boring. Better to stand it on it’s head.
As to the episode itself, some fun bits but noting really groundbreaking. About the only new character bit we have is learning more about Jennifer.
I really, really liked this episode for a number of reasons … scratch that, there was only one thing in this episode that I disliked and that would be Jennifer enabling Mariner’s worst tendencies.
I don’t mind the notion of Mariner’s new girlfriend bringing in the Rogue Ensign to set the cat amongst the pigeons quite so much as the fact that she was 100% on board with her honey-bunny tasering* an entire room-full of fellow officers who are also supposed to be her FRIENDS – it’s exactly the sort of nasty comedy that finally persuaded me to drop HARLEY QUINN for good after two seasons of friendly ambivalence.
Hopefully Mariner & Jennifer are just being set up as a bad influence on each other, because if this sort of thing becomes more than a one-off my opinion of this show is likely to take a nosedive.
*Not a typo: I tend to equate the effects of a phaser on stub with that of a modern taser gun – it’s NOT a comfortable experience and Jennifer the Andorian absolutely delighted in seeing it inflicted on a roomful of people she calls her friends.
I hope they drop her like a hot rock on thin ice and don’t pick her up again.
For the record, I like the idea of Bajor eventually joining the Federation, but I’m uncomfortable with the tone of those posts stating their outrage at the notion that the planet might prefer to do so in it’s own Good Time or simply not feel obliged to do so at all.
If an opinion wouldn’t pass the “Smell Test” in-universe (and saying that Bajor MUST join the Federation after all they’ve gone through together most certainly would not, for it suggests a rather frightening sense of entitlement on the latter’s part), it’s perhaps a good idea to rethink your commitment to that opinion in Real Life.
We’ve kind of gotten off-track here, and it’s my fault, for which I apologize, but I mainly want to say this: my biggest issue isn’t that Bajor didn’t join the Federation in the DS9 finale, it’s that it was never addressed one way or the other in the DS9 finale because — as I said when I rewatched the finale on this site, and as Mr. Magic quoted upthread — they mistook the end of the war for the end of the show. I’m fine with Bajor not joining the Federation as a story choice, but it wasn’t a story choice, it was just ignored and we’re going on inertia….
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
It takes talent to write an episode that works both as an homage to DS9 and also as a Lower Decks story. This one manages both with stellar results. An insane amount of separate plots that somehow don’t detract from each other. Every single thread and every single character gets to shine, and no one overstays their welcome either.
Admittedly, it took me a while to recognize Shimerman’s voice as Quark. Almost as if it took him a while to get back to that tone of voice and speech pattern. Early on, it didn’t even sound like him. But by the end, it was classic Quark. On the other hand, it’s as if Nana Visitor never left after 23 years away from the role. I LOVED her banter with Shaxs. Very reminiscent of her friendship to Furel and Lupaza.
Loved Bold Boimler’s lucky streak at Dabo. Mariner had a pretty good romcom plot to deal with, with a spectacular phaser stun party at the end.
But the real star was Tendi and her tale. I loved seeing her increasing annoyance at Masc’s attempts at being a ‘badass Orion pirate’. It placed me in a position that was completely unprepared for the twist. Masc’s breakdown was probably one of LD‘s funniest moments to date. Very much akin to Worf’s outside views of Klingon society. And at the same time, what a tour de force of voice acting. The way Masc sounded almost pathetic while crying. Reminded me a bit of Zapp Brannigan’s faux crying to seduce Leela on Futurama.
I don’t know if this was necessarily the best LD episode, but it’s definitely up there. And as @krad put it, it could also be a favorite of mine. There was definitely a grin in my face that lasted 25 minutes.
Regarding the Bajor/Federation membership debate, I feel that after the events of DS9‘s Rapture and the subsequent Dominion War breaking out, there was little to no room to go back to that premise. Not surprisingly, Shakaar never reappeared after the baby arc. And any Bajor stories dealt mainly with Winn and the Pah-Wraiths. The show’s focus had shifted completely. To go back to that issue, they’d have to resolve the war long before the show’s ending. And obviously the war wasn’t going to end until the series finale. Obviously, a lot of people assume Bajor’s membership is a key point of DS9 especially because that’s how Picard determined the order to Sisko in the pilot. Could the show have gone back to that premise? It could have, but it would have required a massive retooling of that final season.
I wonder about the rest of the DS9 crew. Kira and Quark were of course expected to still be there, but I wonder about the rest of them. Rutherford made a reference to a reporter, and I do picture Jake still being around. Nog probably not. His career would likely place him on assingment elsewhere. We know where Odo, Worf, Rom, Leeta and the O’Briens are. I’m guessing Garak sold the shop, given that tailor line. He’d probably need the money to finance rebuilding what’s left of Cardassia Prime.
And Sisko is somewhere close by, probably still with the Prophets. I imagine Kasidy is waiting at home on Bajor with their son (whenever not ferrying cargo or catching games on Cestus III). That leaves Bashir and Dax. I imagine Dax would be in heavy demand for counseling, dealing with officers processing Dominion War trauma, across the fleet, and Bashir would easily accompany and fit his duties alongside her.
@57:
Not surprisingly, Shakaar never reappeared after the baby arc.
IIRC, it was also a combination of creative conflict and production logistics.
Behr wasn’t happy with Shakaar’s return in “Crossfire”, feeling they’d mishandled the character.
Duncan Regehr was also living in Canada at the time and expensive and uncooperative schedule made it
But I agree: “Rapture” was the point of no return for Bajor’s presence in the series narrative. But shifting the focus to the Pah-Wraith was a misstep. As CLB’s stated, ending the War in Season Six might have been the better choice in retrospect; it could’ve opened up this refocusing.
Quoth Eduardo: “To go back to that issue, they’d have to resolve the war long before the show’s ending. And obviously the war wasn’t going to end until the series finale. Obviously, a lot of people assume Bajor’s membership is a key point of DS9 especially because that’s how Picard determined the order to Sisko in the pilot. Could the show have gone back to that premise? It could have, but it would have required a massive retooling of that final season.”
Yes, it would have, and it would’ve been for the better. You’re talking like the way the show ended was written in stone and inevitable, and I tell you as a professional writer of three decades’ standing, bushwa.
It’s not required that the war wasn’t going to end until the series finale, it was a choice, it wasn’t the only choice, and that choice was, I think, a mistake. It could’ve ended mid-season with a big-ass story arc and then the season could’ve concluded with several episodes of denouement and recovery — which makes for more interesting stories anyhow — that included addressing (one way or the other) Bajor’s entry into the Federation.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@56 – I have no problem with some storylines being wrapped up in a big bow at the end of a show. There will always be unanswered questions.
I see Bajor as somewhat like Finland after WW II. Finland had a hostile USSR on their doorstep and they didn’t join NATO in an attempt to appease their larger neighbour. It took over 75 years before Finland decided to join NATO.
Bajor has lived under Cardassian occupation for decades, had a very few years on their own, albeit it with a Federation presence. The the Dominion War. What’s wrong with simply deciding to take some time to let things settle down a bit before making up their mind.
The only thing I wanted to point out was that not only did “Bold Boimler” not get a comeuppance, but that it basically explained WHY he didn’t get a comeuppance; he was risking nothing. His beginners luck was essentially entirely tied into the fact that the profits meant nothing to him; he was playing purely for fun, and just about any professional gambler can tell you that the only way to win is to be able to not care if you win.
@60 That’s a fine explanation for Bajor’s independence (and you could add to it that possible resentment of Federation’s standoffishness during Cardassian occupation PLUS the big economic stick of the wormhole). But I think it’s a valid point that it should have been there as a story and not just dropped into the ether.
Grey: excellent point. Although I personally have found that when I gamble with no stakes I tend to be more reckless and stupid than I do when there’s real money involved…..
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@60 / 62:
I agree, that’s a really nice analogy/take on Bajor not joining the UFP immediately after the end of the Dominion War. Givne what we saw of post-Occupation Bajoran politics and society, I’d buy it.
“Note, this doesn’t mean it’s the best. Just that it’s my favorite, which is as much my love for DS9 as anything…”
This is THE best episode so far. :) Every part is perfect. the nostalgia factor, the story, the development of people and relationships etc. The reference to the DS9 intro at the beginning to get some time was super funny as well. :)
Regarding Bajor and the Federation – i see reasons for both joining and not joining, so i personally don’t see any problems seeing it as an ally, but not a member.