The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From JRPoole on 2008-10-15 at 1:53am:
  This one just isn't working for me. The melodrama at the beginning of the first part with Riker and Troi hashing it out over Picard's death is badly acted and written. The psyonic resonator turns out to be exceptionally lame. The pain/control devices have been done to death. James Worthy's klingon character is just lame.
  
  That said, there is some memorable stuff here. Data's interaction with Worf is well-done. And there is some good intrigue on a plot level.
• From Orion Pimpdaddy on 2008-11-25 at 8:22pm:
  They did all this work, in two episodes, to assemble the artifact, only to find a "gun" that takes 10 seconds to fire. I felt let down.
• From tigertooth on 2011-01-05 at 1:55pm:
  So what would have been the downside if Data had just ordered that the Enterprise fire on the pirate ship and disable it? I think I have to side with Worf on this one.
• From Robert Koenn on 2011-06-22 at 12:29pm:
  I was somewhat let down by the second half of this episode. The first 3/4s of it were fine and continued with the first halfs exciting plot and fair amount of action. However the ending was a big let down for me. As was stated in another review, the "ultimate" weapon was a real let down and the Vulcan peace versus war morality from Picard just came out as extremely lame. The Vulcan woman's reaction was totally out of place and I almost expected to see her go into a childish rant about it throwing it on the ground and stomping on it. Again, the plot line devices are just too convenient and everyone beaming into the cavern at the end seemed too convenient. So this one only gets a 6 rating from me.
• From dronkit on 2014-03-13 at 3:41am:
  "my name is actually T'pol and I'm a member of the [vulcan security]"
  
  o.O They were taking lots of names from these episodes, lol
• From Axel on 2015-03-08 at 2:41am:
  The only thing I don't understand about this two-parter is why Picard would end up in the hands of these mercenaries in the first place. You'd think that tracking mercenaries who are stealing "Romulan" artifacts would be dangerous enough that he'd ask for some backup, or at least let someone know what he's doing. The rogue nature of this episode's premise is a little out of character for Picard.
  
  That aside, it's one of the more enjoyable two-parters. There are a lot of twists and turns, and plenty of intrigue once Riker shows up on the mercenary ship. I really liked watching Riker and Picard try to play different sides of Baran, and also liked the Data-Worf subplot. Adventurous and compelling...nicely done.
• From jeffenator98 on 2019-08-01 at 5:21pm:
  Robin Curtis from Star Trek 3 is in this one.
• From Jack S on 2024-03-02 at 7:27pm:
  A fun, adventurous episode for sure. The ending was a little odd. While Talera was focusing the resonator on Riker or Worf, couldn't Picard have tried to grab it from her instead of standing there watching while she tried to kill them? It seems like the resonator has to be focused on a particular person to work, so Picard could have done something to neutralize her.
  
  Former L.A. Laker "Big Game James" Worthy playing the Klingon Koral was great. Most athletes don't do well in acting gigs, but this was a perfect character for him: few lines, and mostly intimidating behavior. I love when he pours the bloodwine on the floor!

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Pete Miller on 2006-05-22 at 3:31pm:
  I'm surprised that eric didn't take off more for their dropping of the Dosi race, never to be seen again.
• From Bernard on 2010-10-12 at 12:58pm:
  Since revisiting Season One episode 'Nagus' and thinking it was one of the strongest episodes of that season I looked forward to revisiting this one. It didn't disappoint.
  
  Simultaneously blending the exploration of more ferengi social structure, teasing out another tidbit about the dominion and creating a plot twist nicely, this episode is excellent.
  
  I love the part where Pel is revealed and Zek cries out! Brilliant stuff.
• From Wes on 2012-12-01 at 2:08pm:
  Notice in the scene above the bar where Kira returns the earring to Zek and then Quark and Pel come up, that you can see the tape on the floor marking where Kira was supposed to stand.
• From Dstyle on 2013-09-09 at 2:36am:
  There were Pakleds at Quark's! I only wish we could have overheard a bit of their conversation.
• From Dstyle on 2013-09-12 at 2:59pm:
  I feel silly now that I got so excited about seeing Pakleds at Quark's: as I continue to watch this season, I've been seeing Pakleds all over the station. Perhaps they were around the station in the first season or earlier in the second season and I just didn't notice them, but I always love seeing them: they're such a fascinating and absurd species. What are they doing at DS9? Looking for things? Things they need? Things that make them go?

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Pete Miller on 2006-05-24 at 2:04am:
  Once again, this episode has very blatant duality between the bajorans and the jews. They are secluded in ghetto-like areas on the stations. Odo refers to bajorans that would sell out their own people to the cardassians, similar to jews that sold out their friends and families to the nazis. I wish they would just come out and admit it.
  
  The ending was abrupt and incomplete. I wanted to see the rest of the flashback
  
  PS- what's up with the obsession with Morn?
• From JRPoole on 2008-12-08 at 4:17pm:
  Why in the world did some one give this a 1?
  
  This is one of the strongest episodes to this point in DS9. It's a stand-alone, but it does a great deal of work in fleshing out both Kira and Odo's characters and their relationship with each other. It's cool to see the station as it was under the Cardassians, great to see Kira in the underground, and the mystery of the plot works well.
• From djb on 2009-01-12 at 7:34am:
  What is with Rom's rogue tooth? It's really distracting.
  
  And, good question: why point out every time Morn appears?
• From Kethinov on 2009-01-12 at 8:04pm:
  It's like Where's Waldo. Cataloging every Morn appearance is like a weird little game for me.
• From Jens-Ivar Seland on 2009-08-02 at 8:55pm:
  Morn (or someone very like him, the focus is unclear) appears at 35:14, passing behind the guy who leter tries to kill quark in the infirmary.
• From Pemmer Harge on 2010-03-14 at 7:07pm:
  One of the very best episodes of Deep Space Nine. This sort of thing doesn't happen on the other Trek shows and episodes like this helped DS9 establish its own identity. The show got more consistent in later seasons, but it only rarely matched this level of quality. I rate it a 10.
• From Bernard on 2010-10-13 at 5:24pm:
  Excellent episode. Wonderful performances by Nana Visitor and Rene Auberjonois. The further insight into Odo's character is most welcome and the revelation at the end is executed superbly.
• From John on 2011-09-10 at 2:48am:
  Pete raises two stupid points.
  
  The first: "this episode has very blatant duality between the bajorans and the jews". I think you mean to say that this episode has very blatant PARALLELS between the Bajorans and the Jews. Duality implies they have opposing, or at least complementary, characteristics. There is a duality between the Cardassians and the Bajorans, for example.
  
  The second: "what's up with the obsession with Morn?" Morn adds a bit a regular levity to the otherwise dark tone of the show. Also, some people just happen to like Morn because he looks like a friendly turtle or something.
• From Matt on 2012-06-07 at 7:23am:
  I can fault the series for some unfortunate parallels between Jewish stereotypes and Ferengi mannerisms, but the similarities to Bajoran characteristics had not occurred to me.
• From Dstyle on 2013-09-09 at 3:07pm:
  An excellent episode: love the dark, shadowy noir style, complete with a femme fatale, a complicated mystery, and Odo's voice over. I almost wish they had used some of the angular Cardassian architecture to create a Venetian blind effect in some of the scenes, but that might have been just a little too much.
• From Rob UK on 2013-11-10 at 11:31pm:
  Great episode for all the reasons you all mentioned so i'll not repeat them but i can't believe the biggest thing you have all missed,
  
  This is a blatant and continuous and excellent homage to Feter Falk as the character Columbo in regards to Odo being an investigator in the modern day parts where he is investigating (he is a master now like Columbo) compared to his first venture investigating, he even drops the famous line (27m53s) "Just one more thing ......." when talking with the widow in modern day and then he begins to question her on seemingly irrelevant details which she points out just like every previous victim of Columbo would whilst slipping a detail he was chasing at the same time dropping her guard taking him for a simpleton, add to this the continuous hand mannerism and the only thing he left out for the perfect Columbo impression was Peter's squint to hide his false eye. This was what made me go 9
• From Abigail on 2021-06-07 at 6:09pm:
  I just rewatched this one and really enjoyed it. It was neat to see the station under the Cardassians and get some character backstory, too.
• From Luke on 2022-08-03 at 8:55am:
  The voice of the female guest star sounds IDENTICAL to that of the Voyager Borg queen, those inflections. However according to IMDB it isn't her. Strange.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From FH on 2009-02-04 at 9:45am:
  Sito is not a new character. She was in Wesley's team at the academy in "The First Duty".
• From askthepizzaguy on 2010-08-10 at 5:56pm:
  I thought that the actor that played Taurik went on to play a vulcan on Voyager, Vorik.
  
  Vorik is basically a Taurik clone. Similar to Tom Paris and Locarno being a clone.
• From MJ on 2011-04-25 at 10:04pm:
  This is one of the best episodes of the seventh season of TNG, and is probably one of my top 10 for the whole series.
  
  First, the concept itself is unorthodox. Not many television shows put their main casts in a side role and make the story revolve around a bunch of characters, some of which haven't been introduced before. It works, too, because the actors and actresses pull it off and we still see enough of the main cast-it's just that we see them through the eyes of junior officers. The writing is perfect because we instantly get a sense of the characters and their relationships with each other.
  
  I thoroughly enjoyed the plot, including Picard's testing of this young ensign in order to prepare her for a dangerous mission, with the added benefit of having some nice continuity from TNG: The First Duty. Worf was well written in this episode too. His bonding with Sito was both believable and a nice fit to the overall story.
  
  This one gets a 10 from me.
• From L on 2013-05-02 at 4:02am:
  Genuinely moving at the end, and great to see the view from other members of the crew. I like how we were kept in the dark as much as the characters were, which is how it must be for 98% of the crew every time a red alert or an emergency is happening.
  Incidental personnel aren't usually privilege to exposition, unless Picard does a weekly 'This week on the Enterprise' public announcement wrap-up.
  Sad to know we won't see any more of the perky Cardassian. Loved the way Whorf and the Captain helped to build her up.
  
• From L on 2013-05-02 at 6:34am:
  Oh crap. I meant 'perky Bajoran'. Embarrassed apologies.
• From Quando on 2014-01-27 at 9:55pm:
  I just watched this episode again, and I think it is my favorite of the whole TNG series. I love that we get to see a "crisis of the week" in a way that the crew would actually experience it -- learning bits and pieces here and there but never really knowing exactly what is going on, even when it is over. I also loved the somewhat parallel but different dynamics between each of the senior officers and their corresponding junior officer counterparts (Riker/Lavell, Beverly/Ogawa, Geordie/Taurik, Worf/Sito). Lavell being terrified of Riker, but trying to kiss up to him, and Riker eventually realizing that he was being too hard on Lavell, possibly because he saw some of his own young self in him. Worf personally vouching for Sito and trying to give her more confidence and an opportunity to succeed, only to see her killed and feel like it was partly his fault (note how he protectively stands next to her when she is sitting in the observation lounge meeting the Cardassian). Geordie getting over his pride and annoyance with a show-off newbie and Taurik learning a little about how to interact with humans without coming across as a jerk. Letting the senior officers interact with new characters in the crew who are somewhat more developed than the usual "redshirt" extras lets us see old, familiar characters in a new light. Also, the ending of the episode is sad but perfect. The crew has to presume that Sito is dead based on some pretty strong circumstantial evidence, but in the end nobody really knows for sure what happened - and we the viewer don't even get to see it from our usual third person omniscient point of view. We get to see no more that the crew does, and even the senior officers don't know (indeed, there are no shots outside of the ship in the whole episode). Very true to life. My only complaint is that with the exception of Ogawa (IMO the least interesting of the four), we don't get to see any of these interesting characters ever again. I would have even liked to see a whole episode about Ben, and how he ended up tending bar on a starship. But this was the last TNG season, so I guess time had kind of run out. Even so, this is a really great story about the people on the ship and how they act and react to each other, and for that reason I give it a "10" and my vote as the best episode of TNG.
• From dronkit on 2014-03-14 at 6:58am:
  Another favorite episode for me, when I saw it the first time years ago I loved it, seeing new characters developed, a civilian and lower rank officers, and I loved the new reformed Zito and her destiny was so sad.
  
  Anyway I came to say: Troi playing poker?!? She should be banned!

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Goblin on 2009-01-29 at 1:44pm:
  I thought this episode was really boring actually. I don't think that this deserves anwhere near as high as an 8.
• From schn on 2010-11-12 at 11:49pm:
  I get that this episode was meant to show someone walking away from Starfleet, but that is very easy to do when you have super powers.
• From MJ on 2011-01-05 at 5:37pm:
  I hated this episode.
  
  What bothers me is the politically correct, New Agey brand of spirituality the episode gives the Native Americans. While trying to make them look like the good guys here, this “magical, mystical Indian” portrayal is just as racist, and just as inaccurate, as the “barbarian-savage” portrayal you got from early white sources in the Americas. The American Indian belief systems varied widely from tribe to tribe, and also the way the Indians interacted with nature was just as varied across the Americas. The notion that they were like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before the white man’s arrival is patently ridiculous. And, now enter one of TNG’s strangest characters, the Traveler, and his vague explanations for how he taps into the raw energy of the universe to do what he does, all of which is apparently on par with what the Indians believe, and all as part of some journey of self-discovery for Wesley? Where is the usual TNG in all of this?
  
  Well, it’s there, actually. It’s just interwoven with all this PC stuff. It could be a really good episode that tackles a meaningful, real-world problem: whether it’s right for a government to force people from their homes for the “greater good” of a peace settlement. But that takes a backseat to the Wesley plot. I thought "The Ensigns of Command" did a much better job with this problem.
  
  I can appreciate what the episode was trying to do. It’s the Seventh Season, and TNG needs to tie up all the loose ends. Last we saw of Wesley, he had gotten in trouble at Starfleet Academy for participating an illegal dare-devil stunt, and was subsequently held back a year. Not exactly a good finale for a character who played a major role in several seasons of the show. And, I do like how Wesley has a bit of a chip on his shoulder here, not bouncing back all fresh and perky after a miserable year at the Academy being shunned by his classmates. I even like the idea of him becoming disillusioned with Starfleet and wanting something different. It just didn’t seem this was a good sendoff for the character.
  
  Maybe what bothers me the most is that Wesley will actually be exploring the Galaxy in a far more significant way than Picard and crew, which takes something away from their mission and storyline. Their ship, with all its technology and its highly trained crew, won’t get nearly as far as this boy wonder hopping around higher existence with the Traveler and possibly some Indians. It’s ultimately unsettling because at the end of “All Good Things” we’re told that amazing new discoveries are what await Picard; seems Wesley’s the one actually having all the fun. I never liked the Traveler to begin with. As superior life forms go, the Q Continuum was TNG’s stroke of genius. This Traveler just gets in the way of the whole plot and adds a “feel-good” element that TNG would be better off leaving alone. Science fiction is not science, but one of the things I’ve always appreciated about TNG is that at least they have plausible explanations for some of what goes on.
• From Trekstar on 2011-01-31 at 5:31am:
  This episode makes me cringe. I never actually hated Wesley Crusher, but every so often he would say or do something so lame and so cheesy. I think the character wasn't fully developed because the writers didn't know what the hell they wanted from him. Not only do they give him the dumbest lines in this ep., but they give everyone else dumb lines when they are around him. Like the eye rolling crap that Data says when he sees Wesley for the first time. I personally wish they would have made Wes angrier and angrier in each ep he did, then have him(with the help of his time traveler friend) become a Darth Vader type bad guy. Sweet lil Anakin becomes Darth Vader; sweet nerdy Wesley Crusher becomes...something! Oh well, they instead wrote this masterpiece. One last thing, the traveler really bugs me. I guess they are going for a mystical feel to this guy, but to me he seems too creepy, like a pedophile who's been lurking in the shadows, watching Wesley grow into a man so they can skip off into other realities together. The point: I hate this episode, and I hate the way they said good bye to Wesley Crusher!!!
• From John on 2011-02-06 at 11:30pm:
  I have to agree with others that this episode definitely exploits a stereotype to tell its story. One thing I hate about this episode (and this extends to Voyager episodes about Chakotay) is the cheesy flute music. Why has this one musical form been used as a meme for all Native Americans? Are we supposed to believe that all the people who first populated the Americas listened to one style of crappy music? It's utter nonsense, and basely false.
  
  Another thing for which the writers ought to be ashamed is referring to the settlers as "Indians". This happens repeatedly, and each time it makes me cringe. This is the 24th century -- by all other indications, humanity has moved beyond these dated and racist terms. Why not just call them "settlers"? That is, after all, what they are.
  
  I really don't like this episode. The only thing that redeems it at all for me is that Wesley finally goes away.
• From Dorvan on 2013-08-12 at 12:59am:
  This episode was written as my 13th birthday present by Ron Moore. Most of it was based on a conversation my mother had with him about Star Trek failure to include Native American characters. For the most part I liked it and it was a good send-off for Wesley...However I did have a huge problem with the cliche Native American stereotype. Picking on Picard because of something his ancestor did. I am sure that with any good research you can link anyone to a bloodthirsty ancestor. Dumb. That flute is annoying…vision quest is the answer to everything…we speak to the bear...all they need was a catch phrase like Hackuchimoya…
  
  This episode would have been better off with some actual research into Native culture.
• From Keefaz on 2017-02-21 at 10:15am:
  A pretty feeble episode. Amazingly ham-fisted treatment of Native American culture. I thought we'd agreed not to refer to them as 'Indians' decades ago, so how this slipped into the script is beyond me. And the episode works on two different levels of bullsht in that the quasi-Native American rubbish about spirit animals (incidentally, how could a Klingon or Vulcan be a spirit animal, no different to a parrot, as claimed here?) turns out to be a fabrication by The Traveller.
  
  Best scene: a fight breaks out which could, potentially, reignite a Federation-Cardassia war and Wes and The Traveller just stroll off, beatifically, into the sunset.
• From Mike on 2017-07-29 at 11:08pm:
  After Nechayev's first meeting with Picard, she walks out of the observation lounge, stops, and thanks Picard for making her feel welcome. I was kind of hoping she'd slink back to the table, grab some Valarian canopies, say, "just going to take a few of these for the road" and then leave. I mean she didn't eat a single one after Picard went to all that trouble!
  
  Wesley's douchebaggery is a little hard to stomach in this episode because at times it felt very overdone. But, it's fitting for his character after we last saw him get reprimanded for a daredevil stunt at the Academy. The scenes with him and the Traveler were also a little tough to get through, and the one where they casually stroll away from the battle in the village was just awkward. As mentioned above, it feels like the Enterprise's experiences will pale in comparison to Wesley and the Traveler.
  
  That aside, the rest of this episode was well done and explored a relevant issue. In the 1990's, with the production of "Dances With Wolves", mainstream U.S. society was starting to take a look at the country's history of dealings with American Indians. The historical undertones of this episode reflect that effort and give us yet another example of Star Trek's forward thinking on these issues.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From JRPoole on 2008-12-26 at 6:05pm:
  This two-parter is perhaps the best DS9 offering to this point. Good stuff.
• From JJ on 2010-08-03 at 6:20pm:
  There is a problem here: the Zeppelite ship canrun at warp 9,8.
• From John on 2011-01-08 at 6:54am:
  I love Sisko's speech: "The Problem is Earth..." I love what he says, and I love the way he makes Kira shut up. Kira needs to shut up more often in my opinion.
  
  Here we see the emergence of Sisko as a total badass -- fantastic.
• From Bernard on 2011-04-05 at 2:58pm:
  Solid episode that finishes off the set up from the first part nicely. Unfortunately it doesn't do much more than that.
  
  I too enjoy Sisko's 'the problem with Earth' speech, I also enjoy Dukat who has been a joy throughout both parts.
  
  "What's that phrase? 'Shoot to kill'?"
  
  The Maquis, are an excellent addition to the Star Trek universe and stories will make very good use of them over the next few seasons.
• From Hugo on 2011-11-12 at 10:35pm:
  Not too fond of Avery Brooks' acting in this two-parter, and he is totally outplayed by Dukat. Sisko just comes out as a whiny, grumpy tight-ass.
• From Hugo on 2011-11-12 at 11:10pm:
  I also like that Dukat comes out as not only a villain, and it nuances the image of the Cardassians. On the space battle - it was ok, but felt a bit like a computer game at times...
• From Matt on 2012-06-10 at 8:00am:
  Did anyone catch Hudson's Shatner-esque delivery of the heading towards the end of the episode?
• From Bronn on 2013-07-05 at 6:01pm:
  This was an excellent two part episode and represents the very best of DS9-there's a very complicated issue here and you can sympathize with all sides, even with what Dukat is trying to accomplish. But the Maquis storyline always bugged me because if you're setting up something complicated, it deserves a good resolution.
  
  Obviously you can't resolve the Maquis storyline here because it's still setting up Voyager. But it fails to reach a real resolution at any point. After taking direct action here to stop the Maquis, blowing up some of their ships, Sisko and the DS9 crew are largely going to ignore the Maquis for the next few years, save for a couple of episodes per season. They're more concerned with the Dominion. In the end the Maquis is going to be gobsmacked completely off screen by the Dominion. It's this loose thread that's dangling for a long time that never was completely pulled into place, so it got lopped off when they ran out of stories to do with it.
  
  I feel that Federation leadership takes a bit of unjust blame here. There's degrees to which I can understand them being out of touch, but they're dealt a rough hand. First they finally managed to sign the peace treaty with the Cardassians and setting up a DMZ. This was apparently a fair enough deal with both sides having to concede colonies. They tried to relocate their citizens, but those people refused to move and said they're rather live under Cardassian rule than give up their land. So they leave them...and then they blame the Federation when the Cardassians treat them like crap in attempt to make them give up their lands. Then the Federation is stuck in a position where they either have to go to war, or attempt to police their citizens who start their own shooting war. The Federation breaking a peace treaty with the Cardassians would open a whole new can of worms for them because of their treaties with the Romulans and whatever tenuous agreements they had with the Tholians.
  
  What I wanted to come out of this, at some point, was Starfleet policy to retain some clarity. Either they would go to war to protect their citizens, or they would disavow responsibility for them completely and tell the Cardassians to use their own discretion in dealing with the Maquis. We never got a real resolution to the Maquis situation on Voyager either, since the fact that there were Maquis crew members there mattered for maybe 4 episodes.
• From bodner on 2014-02-14 at 5:59pm:
  @John
  I thought Kira's speech to Sisko was way more brave, to school her superior officer about Cardassians like that.
  Siskos speech to her was most cowardly, he should have said that to the admiral not someone who agrees anyway.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Orion Pimpdaddy on 2006-10-21 at 3:00am:
  I gave it a 4. There is just not much here. Garak is a fascinating character, but most of the airtime here is spent on scenes with him physically suffering and acting out of character. There are better "Garak's past" episodes than this.
• From Mr. Lincoln on 2007-11-29 at 7:45am:
  This is a very enjoyable episode, and a good introduction to Garak's past (although what we actually learn is up for questions at this point).
  
  For the record, the Morn appearance is immediately after the scene with Bashir and Jadzia when they are discussing her plant. Immediately before the scene where Quark meets with Garak. I enjoy how Morn is looking sad after he realizes Quark's is closed.
• From djb on 2009-04-06 at 5:36am:
  I liked this episode a lot. I'm coming to really like Garak's character.
  
  I think the episode title may be a reference to Larry Niven's "Ringworld" series, wherein the main character, Louis Wu, is an ex-"wirehead," i.e. he used to have some kind of "wire" implanted in his brain that directly stimulated his endorphin receptors. Just a thought.
• From Bernard on 2011-05-06 at 8:40pm:
  This is a very difficult one to judge. I think Robinsons performance is fairly good but not all that others have made of it. The performance however does not necessarily make the episode and in this case it does not quite do it.
  
  There just isn't any payoff here. It just sets up Garak for more stories... and that's great! It just makes this episode fall into the 'above average' bracket.
  
  I'd give it a 6 or 7 but at least it's good enough to keep up this late-season surge of good episodes.

No fan commentary yet.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From endlessmug on 2006-10-07 at 5:25am:
  The first episode of Voyager was better than I thought it would be. After hearing so many people talk about how horrible the show was, it actually had a pretty good start.
  
  (And on your note about Locarno/Paris: I also hate when they don't reuse a character when it's played by the same actor and basically acts the same. Would it really hurt to put in some continuity into the show?)
  
• From Avril on 2006-11-22 at 3:11pm:
  In regaurds to Nicholas Locarno, they originally wanted to use the charactor but they would've had to pay royalties to the writer of the original episode everytime Paris was on screen. So instead they used the same idea but a different name to avoid this.
• From Jeff Browning on 2011-10-22 at 11:06am:
  Dear Kethinov:
  
  Concerning DS9: Emissary, you state:
  
  "Probably the most remarkable first episode for a Star Trek series ever."
  
  Concerning this episode you state:
  
  "This is probably the best of all the pilot episodes."
  
  OK, you're up. Which is it? Which series has the better pilot: Voyager or DS9? I would readily admit that either is superior to the pilot for either TNG or TOS. TNG's pilot, TNG: Adventure at Farpoint was OK, but not great in my view. TOS's pilot (which I suppose would be "TOS: The Cage) was bad.
• From Kethinov on 2011-10-22 at 5:04pm:
  Voyager's. But DS9's was my favorite until Voyager's aired.
• From wes on 2012-01-13 at 5:36pm:
  It seems a problem of continuity that Tuvok is called "Lieutenant" and not "Commander," while his rank is Lt. Commander. This is a bit annoying to me for two reasons.
  
  1) Lieutenant seems to be the most overused rank on Voyager, especially among senior officers.
  
  2) Every other officer of any Star Trek season with the rank of Lt. Commander has been addressed as "Commander" and not "Lieutenant."
  
  This seems to demean Tuvok's rank more than anything. It's unfortunate.
• From Brian on 2013-09-11 at 12:15am:
  Actually, the reason they didn't use Nicholas Locarno as a name was to avoid paying royalties to the guy that came up with the character.
• From Edwin on 2014-08-07 at 11:06pm:
  To correct one of your factoids, Quark is actually the second character to appear in all three 24th Century Trek series, the first is the Cardassian Gul Evek who is briefly seen in the pre-credits sequence of Caretaker. He had previously appeared in several episodes of TNG Season 7 and DS9 Season 2.
• From Axel on 2015-06-07 at 3:59am:
  Say what you want about Voyager, but I think they are the only Star Trek series to have a pretty solid first season. It took TOS and TNG quite a while to get it right. DS9 and ENT started out decently but really didn't get good until late first season. Voyager did a great job and I think this is without question the best pilot in Star Trek. Fantastic premise, fantastic two-parter and very well executed. I like Janeway's speech about the two crews working together and continuing the mission while also searching for a quicker way home. Sets up the series nicely.
  
  On a side note: Gul Evek has also appeared in all three Star Trek series during this time. He was in this, he was in DS9: The Maquis and Tribunal, and he was in both TNG: Preemptive Strike and TNG: Journey's End.
• From Nightangel on 2017-02-14 at 8:47am:
  Just to let you know, the reason why they didn't use Nicholas Locarno is because then they would have to pay royalties to the writers of the episode of TNG that he was featured in. So... they created Tom Paris as a replacement... giving him the exact same backstory as Locarno, and even hiring the same actor.
• From Ensign Obummer on 2022-02-02 at 8:43pm:
  So about the royalties thing, while it is true that writers back then got these royalties...from the various interviews and statements from the actor about his role Tom Paris it seems they wanted to make a similar character and only later decided to use the same actor.
  It is a fun rumor to say they changed the name to save what... 10 grand ? per season, but I think it is not true.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Jim on 2008-09-19 at 2:49pm:
  Stranding a few hundred people to save an entire species? I think this is a no-brainer, and it boggles my mind that people question it. 'oh, let's kill off an entire species so we don't have to make a long voyage' Amazing.
• From JRPoole on 2009-01-07 at 10:38pm:
  I've decided to make my slow progress through Voyager as it originally aired in tandem with DS9. Though I'm familiar with the concept and the characters, I haven't seen very much of Voyager, so this is a little bit of a blind run.
  
  The pilot is much better than I thought it would be based on my perceptions of the series. Like DS9, this is a new, grittier Trek. While I still think DS9 has the best set of characters in all of Trek, the crew of the Voyager is interesting and, for the most part, well-done in this first episode. I think this may be the best premise for a series in the franchise as well: a crew thrown together 75 years from home in the most truly alien part of the galaxy we've seen yet.
  
  While I still give the nod to the inaugural episode of DS9 as the best pilot in the franchise, this is a close second, and I'm looking forward to the series much more than I expected.

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• From wartorn on 2011-08-18 at 2:40am:
  I want to explore a few interesting things mentioned in the review. To start with, were the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki "much less destructive and much more appropriate than the Metreon Cascade?" Were the two wars "quite a bit different?" Well, there really isn't enough information in this episode about the Talaxian conflict to determine for sure, but there may be more similarities than differences.
  
  There are a few things to consider here, the first being the raw numbers. Neelix mentions that more than 300,000 were killed by the Cascade. The combined total from both Hiroshima and Nagasaki were roughly 250,000. So, going by the numbers alone, the Cascade did more damage, but the atomic bombings were in the same order of magnitude. It's not like comparing apples to oranges... maybe like comparing oranges and tangerines.
  
  Of course one has to take into account the environmental damage. The Cascade completely changed the atmosphere and climate of the colonized moon, leaving a poisonous cloud that lingered for at least 15 years. The atomic bombings affected the quality of the air, impaired agriculture, and created a long-term drinking water problem in the area. Significant, but not quite the same as a full-out nuclear winter.
  
  So here is another interesting question: were the U.S. atomic bombings of Japanese cities "more appropriate" than the deployment of the Cascade? It is really quite impossible to determine, but perhaps not... Although Jetrel's side was described as the "invaders," we don't know what circumstances precipitated the occupation. Indeed, Neelix explains that he thought his side's reasons for going to war in the first place were unjust, "not worth dying for," which makes one wonder about the supposed "invasion" they suffered as a consequence. We learn also that the "invasion" was actually an unconditional surrender, precipitated by the deployment of the Metreonic Cascade.
  
  There is also the matter of Jetrel's explanation for targeting civilian populations as opposed to military or deserted targets - "the full force of the weapon had to be demonstrated." We're not told explicitly why, but presumably to cause surrender and immediately end hostilities.
  
  All of this is pretty much a point by point description of the circumstances around the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It's quite possible that the Talaxian side was an aggressor, as Japan was, (hence Neelix' noble/cowardly draft dodging), and it's quite possible that the subsequent "invasion" by Jetrel's people was more like the U.S. occupation of Japan.
  
  All of this makes the episode even more poignant and fascinating. It's my personal opinion that America has long since thoroughly wiped the entire unpleasant episode from its collective memory. There is really very little remorse felt about it. It was necessary, it happened, it stopped the war, it helped stop Hitler, end of story. Of course, Japan never forgot it, and there remain deep sensitivities about what happened. Perhaps the difference in perspective is best demonstrated by Japan's censoring of the American action rpg game Fallout 3. Their objections were about a side-quest in which you explode a nuclear bomb in the middle of a city, and also about one of the regular weapons available to the player: a tactical nuclear weapon called "Fat Boy" - the same name given to the plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki on August 9, 1945.
  
  Perhaps we've put it all behind us a bit prematurely? This Voyager episode recalls our attention to those tragic events.
  
  - - -
  
  Most of the focus of the episode is actually on the question of the role of science, with Jetrel portraying a classic Ellulian technocratic scientist. At one point he presents an argument that usually goes unstated, but is very present in the modern world: "If it can be done, it must be done. Science is bigger than man, technological development is intricately tied with the search for truth and knowledge, and thus any scientific pursuit has a kind of intrinsic value. It is wrong, and in any case impossible, to try and control it."
  
  The way Jetrel states it, and the way Neelix responds to it, one is a bit torn and sees both sides of the picture. Good work on the part of the show's producers. The fact is, this is not a nutty, fringe mad scientist idea, and not something that is obviously true, but something humanity has been battling with for at least several hundred years. We've been wrestling with this question of science, technology, and its role and purpose internally, as individuals, in academia and in philosophic texts, and in various political arenas.
  
  Regrettably, I think Jetrel (and the Ellulian point of view he represents) is right about one thing: no matter what we think of it, no matter the moral arguments we bring to the table, no matter how guilty or righteous people feel about what they're doing, technological development is not really something we *do* - it's more like something that happens to us, more like an evolutionary process that we have little real direction over. "One discovery leads inevitably to the next." It's difficult to really argue with this reasoning, when you consider the history and sociology of science/technology.
  
  When scientific discoveries are made and technological innovations are born, no one can possibly foresee where they will lead eventually. It's really a much more complicated problem than the obvious questions of something like the Manhattan Project or human cloning. These things *seep* into society one tiny step at a time (linked with undeniable conveniences and amenities, outright improvements even, lifesaving advances in medicine, etc...) - by the time some kind of danger or threat or controversy is recognized, it is already here, it's already on the way down.
  
  There is some room for human agency, of course, but it has its limits. These things engender their own societal responses - for instance, 1) there are test ban treaties, 2) ozone depleting compounds are made illegal, and phased out, and so on. But we must admit to ourselves that our ability to truly understand and respond to what we ourselves create... is limited.
  
  To quote Jetrel, science is indeed much bigger than man, but this is something that should give us pause rather than glee. It would seem as if something has gone wrong, has gone quite thoroughly backwards. What started as a human project, something we do, engage in, for the sake of both our innate curiosity and our desire to improve our lives, has turned into something we really can't not do, something we serve, and worship, unknowingly, to ends and consequences we cannot possibly foresee.
  
• From Jeff Browning on 2011-10-22 at 4:22pm:
  I enjoyed the comment bt wartorn on this episode, and I agree with much of it. I believe however that there is clear and convincing evidence that the attack on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was not justified, and was actually an atrocity and a war crime.
  
  I say this despite the fact that my father served in WWII, much to my pride. I admired my father's service and I do not say this to denigrate the honorable service our soldiers gave in WWII.
  
  However, on the subject of the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, history ie very clear. The Japanese emporer Hiro Hito had already transmitted his intention to unconditionally surrender to Allied forces prior to the American decision to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki, much to our shame.
  
  Unfortunately, he issued his decision through the Soviet ambassador. The Soviets intentionally failed to transmit the message on to the Americans because they wanted the nuclear bomb to be deployed in combat as a live test to the weapon. The Soviets had spies at Alamagordo and were watching the Americans with great interest. They certainly did not want the Japanese offer of surrender to succeed.
  
  Nonetheless, we had many advisors to Pres. Truman, including Oppemheimer himself, who urged the President to not drop the bomb on the Japanese people. We had all of the intelligence we needed to know that dropping the bomb on Japan would accomplish nothing militarily.
  
  In this respect the events of Americans dropping the nuclear bomb is hauntingly similar to the Metroen Cascade described in this episode.
• From Rick on 2012-12-26 at 11:13pm:
  I urge people reading the above post not to take it as the factual information that it purports to be. The majority view is that there was no surrender. People like the above poster are certainly free to argue to the contrary but to present that argument as the clear truth is reckless at best and disingenuous at worst.
  
  Aside from that, do you really think that if Japan was close to surrendering before the first bomb, they would wait for a second?
• From Mike on 2017-07-26 at 1:32am:
  Ethan Phillips said that he watched the first season of Voyager as it was airing and then didn't really watch it after that. He didn't say why (that I know of) but one wonders if he figured this was a good way to remember his character on screen. It's certainly one of the better, if not the best, Neelix episode in the series.
  
  James Sloyan, who plays Jetrel, is one of the better recurring guest stars in all of Star Trek. He plays Admiral Jarok in TNG: The Defector as well as future Alexander Rozhenko in TNG: Firstborn. He was also the Bajoran scientist Dr. Mora, who "discovered" and experimented with Odo, in a couple DS9 episodes.
  
  I agree the parallels with the atomic bomb dropping are a bit heavy handed. But, it raises that question people have discussed since the atomic bomb's invention, and even before with the invention of poison gas used in WW1: is it desirable, or even possible, to "cordon off" a branch of scientific knowledge because you're afraid of where it might lead? The implication that someone else would have invented the weapon eventually, and the reasoning that you do the research regardless of how some wish to apply it, were notions that added some depth to the issue.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From djb on 2009-11-15 at 8:39am:
  A DS9 version of TNG: Disaster! Awesome. It was a little disappointing to see the Defiant practically incapacitated so easily, but they made up for it. Always nice to see Jem'Hadar ships destroyed too.
• From Krs321 on 2011-03-28 at 12:26pm:
  I was really hoping for a sonar ping sound while running the 'active scan'.
• From Jeff Browning on 2011-11-02 at 2:07am:
  Although it was difficult to tell with all that makeup, the Karemma representative, Hanok, was played by James Cromwell, a very well known star from many films and TV shows. It would be hard to identify a single work that Cromwell is most known for, he has been in so many. He plays the farmer in the movies "Babe" and "Babe in the City". He is a major character in the movie The Green Mile. Also a major character in the movie Star Trek: First Contact (where he plays Zefram Cochrane). Also a major character in the Movie I Robot. He also appears in TNG: The Birthright Parts 1 and 2 as Jaglom Shrek and TNG: The Hunted as Prime Minister Nayrok. A very, very well known actor in other words. Here, it is pretty hard to recognize him, but his voice is quite unmistakable.
• From Gul Ranek on 2012-12-28 at 8:30pm:
  As the review says, a Star Trek submarine episode. I also liked it a lot (season 4 so far has been more or less perfect as far as storytelling goes).
  
  The only thing that slightly annoyed me was when Bashir "absolutely had to" close the door on Deck 2 because it was so crucial for the ship, and ran out to get Dax, drag her into the turbolift, taking his time to shut the door, which took more than 30-40 seconds, while nothing of consequence happened to the ship. He could have easily grabbed her and dragged her back with everyone else, but the writers obviously needed to get him and Jadzia to be alone...

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From David in California on 2007-08-03 at 5:26pm:
  Just saw this episode for the first time last night and I liked it very much. I read in one of your BSG articles that you think Dr. Who is "silly". (I think it's enjoyable whimsical space fantasy--I don't like all my sci-fi to have the same tone. I still respect and enjoy your more "hard SF" reviews here, however. :) ) But I just want to note that it's so clear this episode was inspired by the widely noted "classic" 1976 episode "Robots of Death". The look, voice, and manner of the robots, the way they seem "innocent" and gradually are revealed to be homicidal, their relationship to their "builder", etc. are too similar to be coincidental, IMO. You mention similarity to the Cylons, but see this acclaimed Dr. Who episode and you'll quickly see what I mean.
  
• From plus on 2011-08-25 at 10:09pm:
  This was an absolutely charming episode. After the cool, slightly creepy teaser, the rest of the episode runs a little like a fairy tale or fable,
  but it works remarkably well. The robotic species here is almost like a placeholder, a symbol for artificial, sentient life more generally. This is
  evident even in their lack of definite features, and their generic "tin man" appearance.
  
  When I first saw/heard them, I braced myself for a painful, unbelievable episode, but my fears were quickly dissipated. It immediately became clear that this episode takes a different tone, a decidedly "non-hard-sci-fi" tone, in order to do something very important: to directly address the
  ethical issues around artificial life.
  
  I completely agree with the other commentator and with the show's producers - there's nothing wrong with that at all, especially if it's done as
  elegantly as in this episode.
  
  As the reviewer describes, the nature of the robots is revealed slowly, piecemeal, leading the viewer to develop a sympathetic understanding of
  their condition. This sympathy is then challenged with the revelation that they killed their creators, and are now engaged in endless conflict with each other.
  
  I would argue that this does not mean that they're "genocidal megalomaniacs." What it does mean, is that creating sentient artificial
  life is a deadly serious business, with huge ethical implications.
  
  Early in the episode Janeway asks Torres, "Who are we to swoop in, play god, and then continue on our way without the slightest consideration of
  the long term effects of our actions?" At the end of the episode we are led to pose the same question to the now deceased builders.
  
  Are the robots really to blame for what happened? They were created, programmed to fight and defend themselves, given sentience, and then once their purpose was up, threatened with decommission, extinction, death. Was it not sensible for the sentient "service units" to defend themselves?
  
  It would seem it was the builders who first "played God" without fully appreciating the consequences of their actions. Consequences which led to their own destruction, and decades later to a renewed ethical dilemma for Torres, and a serious threat for Voyager.
  
  A well conceived episode, and very well executed.
  
  Interesting tidbit: The robot asks Torres about artificial lifeforms on her society. Torres responds that "there is only one sentient artificial lifeform," referring to Data. Somehow the Doctor isn't considered in this category! Is that because he is finally being accepted as a full-fledged "honorary human" member of the crew? Or because his condition is as bad as ever, and he is simply not considered... at all? It's probably the former, or perhaps a total slip by the writers of this episode.
• From onlinebroker on 2012-03-12 at 7:13pm:
  I don't see how the prime directive applies here at all and found the discussion about it totally misplaced.
  This is a warp capable species making a request.The federation helps those all the time to get new members!
• From TheAnt on 2013-09-20 at 6:53pm:
  This if the (in)famous 'Pulp' episode of ST Voyager.
  
  It have all the pulp mag elements.
  Including the fact that the robot do look pretty much like any film about robot invasion or flying saucers of the 1950-1960 period.
  
  The stage for what is to come is found already in the teaser which is in black and white, with signal noise pretty much like an old TV set in the period.
  
  So what make this pulp?
  Robot who kidnap a female, and carry her in it's arms. Robots who have killed their creators.
  And in one of the final scenes. Torres exclaiming 'My god what have I done' in an oft repeated Frankensteinian manner and then she stabs the prototype to death.
  
  It is amusing as a concept, but it does not work entirely well IMO.
  
  

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Jason on 2009-10-24 at 7:23am:
  Great episode. "You're even more insidious than the Borg -- at least they tell you that they're going to assimilate you!". But it's too bad about Eddington; I liked him. At least his plot was well enough hatched that he got away safely to the Badlands.
• From MJ on 2011-01-14 at 8:08pm:
  Several episodes of TNG and DS9 have dealt with the Maquis now, and they’ve all been very, very good. It’s a dilemma that is relevant to the real world, in situations like the Middle East peace process. What’s great about these episodes is how powerful the Maquis point of view is always portrayed. These are not truly terrorists, they are ordinary men and women who are convinced tey are doing the right thing for their well being. But you can also understand the Federation’s point of view.
  
  This might be one of the best Maquis episodes yet, if for no other reason than Eddington’s very well written speech to Sisko. Hell, he almost had me ready to join the Maquis, even knowing they don’t really exist! But this episode hints at a greater theme, a disturbing one, at least for Star Trek fans. The Federation has always been the “good guys” in TOS and TNG. It’s a group of aligned planets whose goal is to explore the galaxy and make peaceful contact with new worlds, and to protect the fundamental rights of its members. DS9, for all its other faults, is really the first series to explore the darker side of the Federation, and it’s a very compelling theme. For the first time, we see covert agencies, we see attempted military coups, we see naivety in government…and we see a distant bureaucracy unable to grasp the demands of its former colonists. The Federation that Gene Roddenberry conceived is shown in a very different light in DS9. I don’t know that Roddenberry would have approved, and I don’t know if I really do either. But whatever the case may be, it certainly is fascinating, and it strikes a powerful chord: after all, isn’t America supposed to be “paradise”? And don’t we have our darker side too? This is what separates DS9 from other Trek series, and in my opinion, what ultimately makes DS9 worth watching.
• From peterwolf on 2013-12-03 at 5:15am:
  Kiras interference with the Ziyal and Garak romance was absolutely unnecessary. Her charater shown as being a tough woman is overdone too often for too many times. Physically she does not fit into the role. It is total nonsense that she could fight Klingon or Jem Hadar warriorrs in hand-to-hand combat. Only Dax, who is much more athletic and trains constantly with Klingon combat prorgrams could stand a chance against such opponents.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Remco on 2009-02-12 at 2:54am:
  Damn, this is a scary thing for Star Trek to do. Janeway kills an innocent life form. I really like Tuvok and Neelix, but Janeway's act of involuntary euthanasia to improve the situation of two other people is just morally wrong. It brings to mind some Nazi imagery. They systematically killed elderly and handicapped. For the good of the country, they argued.
  
  I wouldn't be too disturbed about this if Star Trek wasn't always about an almost perfect world, certainly where Starfleet is involved. This final decision is something you'd expect to happen in Battlestar Galactica, not in the highly moral world of Star Trek.
  
  So, while this was an excellent episode emotionally, I have to question what the creators think of the moral issue. Do they think forced euthanasia is somehow justified in certain circumstances?
  
  Maybe it's more acceptable to people who support the death sentence, which I don't. But hey, we're all biased.
  
  Hard to rate, this one.
• From JRPoole on 2009-03-24 at 4:04am:
  Wow. If I'd known ahead of time that this episode was about a transporter accident fusing Neelix and Tuvok, I may have skipped it because it has all the makings of a really bad episode. As soon as Tuvix appeared on the platform, I was ready to give this one a zero.
  
  However, they pulled it off. I like this episode precisely because the ending is uncomfortable. There really isn't a right decision here, and Janeway, to her credit, made a very hard choice. It's all too often that Trek is too moral for its own good, and it's nice to see an episode that presents a moral decision as a real challenge, not something that seems obvious from the beginning.
  
  The only real quibble I have here is that there's no time to get Tuvok and Neelix's reactions to the incident. Nice work all around-especially by Kate Mulgrew, who acts this one perfectly--and definitely one of the best Voyager outings so far.
• From Mark McC on 2009-06-06 at 11:12pm:
  Having seen the synopsis before watching this episode, I was prepared for a lighthearted affair. Boy, was I wrong!
  
  I disagree on the portrayal of the Tuvix character. I was expecting him to be a conflicting mixture of the two personalities but the combination of Tuvok's cool logic and subtle humour and Neelix's over-the-top emotional outbursts and irrating cheerfulness seem to have cancelled each other out. Tuvix to me was a bland character with little personality and no appeal.
  
  I'm not sure what to think of Janeway's decision at the end. I may be wrong, but haven't we seen transporters being used to duplicate material before now (I'm thinking of duplicate Riker here) ?
  
  If so, surely they could have found a way to restore Neelix and Tuvok while keeping Tuvix. Tuvix certainly didn't contain every molecule of both Neelix and Tuvok's bodies (he was definitely shorter than Tuvok) so the transporter must have had to replicate their bodies using Tuvix's DNA as a starting point. Why would this need to be a destructive process at all?
• From siukong on 2010-08-09 at 7:38am:
  Most of the time in Star Trek I'm willing to suspend my disbelief when it comes to other species being virtually identical to humans. In this case I can't really let it slide though. I tell myself that if I'm accepting teleportation I should accept anything, but as someone with a biological background I just can't. Hybrids just don't work that way.
  
  The writers would have us believe that Vulcans and Talaxians - two species separated by thousands of light years - are so anatomically similar that something like this could happen with absolutely no complications. Which brings me to the second reason I dislike this episode: Janeway's final decision. If some sort of organ incompatibility was forcing her to bring back Tuvok and Neelix it would make sense, but as it stands I don't get it. It makes Janeway out to be very inconsistent. She apparently finds things like suicide and capital punishment to be abhorrent, but not this? This feels very out of place in context with the values espoused in the rest of Star Trek.
• From penguinphysics on 2010-11-07 at 5:51am:
  Just one question: How many lungs did Tuvix have and how many did Neelix have when they were separated?
• From Pete on 2012-01-31 at 11:18am:
  To siukong, did you ever see the ST: TNG episode "The Chase"? It basically makes it canon that all humanoid races in the galaxy are created from the same stuff and was populated by an "elder race." TOS' "Return to Tomorrow" also kinda hinted at this. On this basis, it's not that difficult to accept that such a merger as Tuvix could occur.
  
  I see your point, though.
• From peterwolf on 2015-06-26 at 3:04am:
  THe whole story is ambiguous and comes to an inevitable end, in which both Tuvok and Neelix have to be restored. Something is wrong 9n the storyline. It seems that both Neelix and Tuvok have become quite weak and even cowardish when to decide to split or not to split. Certainly, it was the wrong approach for the story that janeway akes the tough decisions. It would have been much better, if Tuvix had decide on its own to split in the two persons again. Thus, Janeway showed no strength but mercilessness, which leaves just bad feelings afzer the episode. Wasted opportunities.
• From Rick on 2017-04-28 at 12:34am:
  "In this episode, Janeway blatantly breaks the Prime Directive when she murders Tuvix."
  
  What? What does this action have to do with the Prime Directive? And please dont try to say that Tuvix is a new species and blah blah blah. This isnt related to the Prime Directive.
• From Mike on 2017-07-04 at 1:42am:
  This episode has an interesting parallel with DS9: Facets, when Odo and Curzon Dax decide they prefer to remain a single being. OF course, the main difference is that they are ultimately convinced to separate again, whereas "Tuvix" is separated involuntarily. But the fundamental problem remains: whose decision is it, really? Does the hybrid being have the right to continue to exist when the two beings that are part of the hybrid never had the intention of making the union permanent?
  
  All the talk about murder and the ridiculous Nazi comparisons made above are pretty much out of line to me. Janeway was making a very tough call, and I love how the episode leaves you conflicted and not at all morally satisfied at the end. Judge all you want, but it was a difficult decision. Had Janeway agreed to allow Tuvix to remain, she'd have been overriding the desires of two people, neither of whom entered this arrangement voluntarily and certainly would have preferred to continue living their own lives.
• From Martin on 2020-01-22 at 2:55am:
  Loved the episode
  Just one ditail: transporters can copy a patter and replicate it. We've seen that sort of thing in TNG episode where Ricker is splitted in to two identical people
  what about copying Tuvix's pattern, separate it and bringing both tuvok and neelix, but also keeping tuvix life? 3 people could've been saved, not only one or two, exclusively
  i'm i wrong here ?

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From captsulu on 2011-09-07 at 6:24am:
  "The virus plot may have been something of a cheap excuse, or a lame plot device..."
  
  You hit the nail on the head.
  
  This episode lost points as far as I'm concerned the moment the Doctor mentioned the word "virus." Why was it even necessary, plotwise? It wasn't explained very well at all. How is it actually transmitted? How does it "disguise itself as a memory engram?" All of this virus business is just hurried and rushed and crammed into the final few minutes of the episode.
  
  Quite unnecessarily so. They could've just let it go with the initial premise, let it be a genuine repressed memory that has resurfaced because of present associations (the nebula back to Excelsior, when Tuvok failed to save Dmitiri, back to childhood, when he failed to save mysterious human girl).
  
  That would've been quite adequate, no hurried bizarro virus plot twist required.
  
  Seeing Sulu in command and the old style uniforms and stuff was cool... but not cool enough to let this lame virus thing slide.
• From packman_jon on 2012-06-16 at 4:20am:
  "Trials and Tribble-lations" for Voyager - in my mind. Well, at least in the terms of people in the TNG-era talking about the TOS era. Some fun moments, but not as strong as that famous DS9 episode.
  
  I really wish I had a count on how many times Star Trek 6 is referenced directly or indirectly in the TNG era since that move came out!
• From McCoy on 2017-08-06 at 6:38pm:
  Remarkable scenes: JANICE RAND!!! How could you not mention her?

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From onlinebroker on 2009-11-10 at 4:55am:
  cool episode to watch, but what about the final revelation, a shapeshifter, just sitting there waiting to die? No attempt to shapeshift his way outta there, as an insect, or an impersonation? or at least fight?
• From rpeh on 2010-07-31 at 11:17pm:
  On a first watching, this episode is brilliant. The trouble comes when you watch it again.
  
  Why did the Jem'Hadar not beam around as they have done in previous episodes? Why did the Founder not attack from within?
  
  The ending is very good, and managed to offset Worf being a bit of an insensitive idiot during the main plot - he MUST have been more sensitive towards humans after his spell on the Enterprise, surely?
  
  All in all I give it an 8.
• From MJ on 2011-01-21 at 7:53pm:
  In my opinion, this is one of the better DS9 episodes. First, it has a twist that is hard to spot. Everything leads you to believe the Dominion wants this ship back because of something about the ship itself: some new piece of equipment, or perhaps some kind of special cargo. The female Vorta gives no real clues about why they want the ship back, and you can only sense the frustration of the DS9 crew trying to find the "item" having absolutely no clue what to look for.
  
  The character interactions are well written and well acted. O'Brien and Muniz, of course...the good-natured ribbing, the camaraderie, all of it is very pleasant to watch. For having never seen Muniz before, I was very convinced that he and O'Brien were good friends with great respect for each other. The interactions between Sisko and the female Vorta...they show the essence of diplomacy: trying to get something you want without giving up too much or revealing too much to the other side. And I loved the moment when Sisko lays it down to his crew, telling O'Brien and Worf to quit their fighting and putting a lid on Dax's unhelpful wisecracks. That was a great moment because it was one of the few times when it seemed Dax's "special friendship" with Sisko did not make him/her exempt from the chain of command or Starfleet duty. The interaction between O'Brien and Worf: true, Worf's insensitivity was a little hard to swallow, but I wasn't too bothered by it since it was believable. But their conflicting views on Muniz, and especially their bonding at the end as they "guard" his body, were a nice dimension.
  
  Initially, I was a bit perplexed about the crew's ability to get past the death of the runabout crew and the science officer who beamed down with them, but all of this is resolved at the end when Sisko is clearly shaken to the core by all the deaths on this mission. Avery Brooks did awesome here; the emotion in his voice was very convincing.
  
  The "bombardment" of the surface by the Jem'Hadar, and its shaking up of the crew, was interesting. Shell shock is very real, and the fraying of nerves that accompanies random, continuous, and extremely loud and shaky bombing was a nice battle fatigue element that is typically missing from Star Trek fight scenes.
  
  Overall, a favorite of mine.
• From ChristopherA on 2020-11-24 at 5:54am:
  I found that this episode really strained my suspension of disbelief, trying to make myself believe that the Jem’Hadar, with all their warrior training and superior technology, were unable to come up with any effective attack plan at all to handle the tiny handful of humans and just chose to let the changeling die. If I get past this, though, I thought it was a decent episode, with a good sense of being under siege, and a good twist ending to the mystery.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From siukong on 2010-08-31 at 5:31am:
  I don't necessarily see your beef with this episode as that big of a problem. In espionage, sleeper agents often have to ignore smaller opportunities that arise in order to achieve success with their long-term objective. Changeling-Bashir probably didn't want to blow his cover and risk losing the chance to cripple the Federation, Klingons and Romulans all in one fell swoop. That act would achieve a lot more than just killing a single Starfleet Captain and/or Bajoran major.
• From Christopher Wright on 2011-12-13 at 3:50am:
  I actually didn't notice that the real Bashir was wearing a different style uniform (but I am no Sherlock.) I know from reading the other reviews that uniforms are HUGE to the owner of this site. Speaking of uniforms, why is it that in the Star Trek universe, no one is EVER removed of his/her uniform when taken captive? Does that even make sense? I mean, it would have prevent Kirk's escape from the Klingon jail world (moon?) in ST VI. I guess that such questions shouldn't be asked - like when Ben Affleck asked Michael Bay on the set of ARMAGEDDON: "Why is it easier to train oil riggers to be astronauts than to train astronauts to be oil riggers?"
• From Wes on 2012-04-10 at 1:19pm:
  The staging when Sisko calls for battle stations makes me laugh. And it's not just in this episode. But when he does, Bashir moves forward, out of the picture and Kira moves from one side of the central console to the other. Would there really be that big of a difference in the controls from one side of the central command console to the other?
  
  I mean, I totally see why they do it. It has nothing to do with the function of the consoles. It adds a dramatic, moving element to the shot in what would otherwise be a very boring shot following a command for battle stations (like on the other star ships we're familiar with).
• From Lee on 2012-04-10 at 1:31pm:
  I actually like the fact that they use different uniforms for the different Bashirs, and that's not because I am too stupid to realize the difference between them :p
  
  I think it adds to the shocking moment of realizing that one of our main characters has been replaced for such a long time (the uniforms have been changed for quite a while). For that reason I also like that the real Bashir isn't shaved :p
  
  But I think the changelings behaviour seems a bit too suspicious, I mean, he didn't act like that in the episodes before, but here he acts too "evil", almost like in a cartoon for children. I think it would've been much more convincing, if the fake Bashir would've acted just like the normal one, not with the dramatic music and looking around like a suspicious bandit.
  
  But all in all, it's a great two-parter and it's on my list of favourite episodes!
• From dronkit on 2014-04-21 at 2:23am:
  An almost suicide "reconaissance" mission to find prisoners in the heart of the dominion and they send a petty runabout insted of the Defiant?

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From formborg on 2011-09-18 at 10:06pm:
  This was a great little episode with a number of highlites and redeeming features.
  
  It explores the nature of the Borg and raises some interesting propositions: is a benevolent Borg collective possible? And is imposing such a collective on others - in the name of planetary peace and/or one faction's survival - morally justified?
  
  I liked also how Chakotay's skepticism and then surprisingly positive experience of being linked was portrayed.
  
  Another small thing was the good use Chakotay and (forget her name) make of the "after-effect" - the linked love scene. One can only imagine what it would be like to touch someone and simultaneously feel both sides of the experience, literally. They probably had the best sex in the galaxy, perhaps the universe.
  
  A small question mark I have about this episode is Janeway's readiness to "upgrade their security systems." Isn't that just a euphemism for arming one faction among many? Without even much deliberation or contact with the other groups in the conflict? Perhaps it doesn't fall within the prime directive because many of the "new collective" group were former Federation citizens. On the other hand... it still seems applicable. In either case, Janeway seems a little all too willing to share technology and weapons. I suppose it shows Chakotay's influence. Janeway's famous for her principles, but sleeping with her first officer can get you exclusive access, and do wonders for your cause, it would seem. (To be fair, perhaps the critical factor is *linking* with her first officer. Janeway explicitly asked if Chakotay detected any malice or ulterior motives, and he said he did not. Still iffy though.)
• From Lee on 2012-04-08 at 5:23pm:
  If some of the Borg were assimilated at Wolf 359, then how did they get back to the Delta quadrant? The Borg cube was destroyed! Maybe a sphere travelled back...
  
  But other than that I like this episode. It doesn't make the Borg look less awesome than in TNG, which happens in later Voyager episodes. The idea of a disconnencted collective is cool!
  
• From peterwolf on 2015-07-07 at 10:25pm:
  The idea of the powerful Borg collective is the deepest fear of America: Communism. However, in this episode a different type of collective is presented. Indiviuals may join sometimes for the good of the community, e.g. when it is threatened, and it seems that the link is not permanent. Overall, this approach appears to be more acceptable than the true Borg collective. The exBorg unity looks a bit like the kibbutz communities. The episode itself is very well done with many important and serious issues. High above the Voyager average until now (I know that some very good episode will follow).

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From JR on 2012-06-12 at 6:25am:
  I've never considered myself a trekkie by any means, but I always liked TNG re-runs and the movies, and watched Enterprise when it aired. With netflix carrying all the shows, I have really caught up and just have the rest of DS9 and Voyager to finish.
  
  So, even though I never really thought of myself as a trekkie, I've seen a lot of it and the Eugenics war timeline given in this episode seems really screwy compared to the rest of Trek.
  "The admiral: "200 years ago we tried to improve the species through DNA resequencing. And what did we get for our troubles? The Eugenics wars. For every Julian Bashir that can be created there's a Khan Singh waiting in the wings."
  
  As soon as I heard that line my mind started crunching numbers. The admiral is saying that the Eugenics Wars happened in the mid 22nd century. However, I thought the Eugenics wars were time stamped by TOS to be in the near future of the 1960's, meaning around the 1990's. I took it to mean that genetic experiments during the then present day 1960's would lead to 20-30 year old superhumans that took over the world in the 90's before being deposed. That was before WWIII of the mid 21st century.
  
  Any ideas on this? Just an error and the admiral should have said 400 years? I figure the writers did not want to confuse the non-trekkie audience by keeping the Eugenics wars in the 1990's since that would have put it in the "present/past" when this was made in 1997.
• From Hugo on 2012-09-08 at 9:35pm:
  JR - this was was a screw-up by the writers - there is a comment by Ron Moore quoted on Memory Alpha.
• From Selador on 2013-06-11 at 11:01pm:
  I have a feeling a certain someone has a problem with this episode since the 16 zero fan ratings doesn't really make sense otherwise. Was there no way to implement a one vote per ISP voting system?
  
  A fantastic episode and classic trek - a great sci-fi moral conundrum, excellent characterisation and a nice sub-plot. Also wonderful moments of humour. Gets a 9 from me.
• From Kethinov on 2013-06-12 at 4:56am:
  I do some filtering to prevent multiple voting. But there's nothing I can do about someone with access to 16 different computers on 16 different IPs.
  
  If you like, I can start taking credit card and passport info before accepting a vote. ;)
• From Ant on 2013-09-12 at 10:03pm:
  This one is a filler if I ever seen one where DS9 go cheap soap opera. One of the few episodes where I strongly disagree with Kethinov.
  
• From Gaius Gracchus on 2021-11-18 at 10:44pm:
  Great cameo from Robert Picardo as Dr. Zimmerman/EMH, great Rom B-plot. And Alexander Siddig absolutely knocks this one out of the park, such pathos in the scene where he breaks down in anger at his parents for giving up on him, and the response from Fadwa El Guindi tops it off.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From John on 2010-03-17 at 3:49am:
  I think their decision not to show the viewer the battle with the Jem'Hadar was a good one. It left that battle to the imagination of the viewer and saved time which could then be spent on things like character development. Yes, it could have been a cool battle, but subtracting a point because they used a perfectly valid storytelling device that happened to omit material you personally wanted to see is a little overboard IMHO.
• From Kethinov on 2010-03-17 at 4:14am:
  I've always felt that it's sort of anticlimactic that they didn't show the battle. It's a legitimate payoff to the buildup to expect, I think. That's not to say this is a bad episode. It's certainly fantastic. I just think a more roaring climax would have served the story better.
• From Harrison on 2013-02-23 at 6:34pm:
  One of the very best Klingon episodes, with lots of rich cultural detail.
• From Bronn on 2013-07-17 at 7:14pm:
  Beautiful episode. Martok is the gold standard when it comes to Klingon characters. He's three dimensional, and he's well-rounded enough that it makes the Empire seem functional. Without seeing a character like Martok you'd wonder how the Empire ever held together-they have no patience to do things like basic maintenance on their ships, they get bored with administrative tasks, and they prefer to attack head-on rather than provide any consideration of strategy. But DS9 decided to find a way to make Klingons seem more balanced without ruining their previous characterization, and this episode is the highlight of Klingon story-telling.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Pete Miller on 2006-07-10 at 12:30am:
  What a wonderful episode! I loved every bit of it, both the comedy and the serious. Personally, I found the moment between Jake and Sisko at the end more moving and sweet than anything in "The Visitor"
• From JR on 2012-06-12 at 5:48am:
  I liked this one quite a bit. Jeffrey Combs was great as every character he played. It was years after I watched Enterprise during its run that I realized he had played so many roles. Its such a shame Enterprise only managed four seasons...it would have been great had they made him a regular on that bridge.
  
  My only gripe with this episode: I can't imagine many things being easier to replicate than a glossy piece of cardboard.
• From OmicronThetaDeltaPhi on 2014-02-11 at 9:47pm:
  @JR
  
  As any serious collector of baseball cards could tell you, a copy - no matter who accurately rendered - can never replace the real thing. Even if the two objects are physically indistinguishable, the original has a history and an emotional value which the copy simply does not possess.
• From Zorak on 2016-06-14 at 4:04am:
  I have to agree with the general positivity toward this episode. It was a gem. I love when Star Trek mixes the serious with the mundane in such a tongue in cheek way.
• From Gaius Gracchus on 2021-11-23 at 3:25am:
  Great, light episode in the midst of a buildup to the all-out Dominion War arc.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From chrisw357 on 2006-06-17 at 1:01am:
  Some fans may not know this, but Morn's name came about because of his role as a bar regular. It's an anagram for Norm, the bar regular in "Cheers". :D
  
  Goodbye, sweet Morn! :(
• From Christopher Wright on 2011-12-21 at 1:52am:
  I wish the writers of Enterprise were as good as the ones for DS9...they would have also realized that gold was worthless to the Ferengi and Capt.Archer could have never used it to lure them in that god-awful episode.
• From hugo on 2012-12-21 at 7:16pm:
  great episode! Not too fond of the seductive lady, but the other characters were great - especially the alien brothers!
• From Zorak on 2016-06-23 at 5:01am:
  Wow. Morn's name really is an anagram and intentional reference to Norm. It's so obvious. I don't know how I never realized it.
  
  
• From Mike on 2016-10-27 at 4:48am:
  Re: Zorak,
  
  And, to make it even more fun, Morn's corner spot in Quark's bar is similar to Norm's corner spot in the Cheers bar.
  
  My favorite exchange:
  
  Quark: Why would the Royal family of Luria give Morn that kind of money?
  
  HAIN: He was the Crown Prince.
  
  Quark: Morn was a prince?
  
  HAIN: You didn't know?
  
  Quark: Morn was a prince?
  
  HAIN: That's what I'm saying.
  
  Quark: Morn was a prince.

No fan commentary yet.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Pete Miller on 2006-11-05 at 5:18am:
  Absolutely my favorite episode of Voyager so far. i too was convinced that it was a stupid mirror universe episode, but it turned out to be much more. Not only was it original and hilarious at times, but it also made huge statements about society and revisionist history, even dangerously skirting the whole issue of Holocaust denial. Overall, it was a true 'Star Trekkish' episode, and those are the best kind! Bravo to the writing team for this one. The only voyager episode so far that even comes close is distant origin.
• From David Chambers on 2010-09-09 at 9:22pm:
  I was amused to notice that the actor who played the scientist Quaren (Henry Woronicz) also played the Voth scientist Gegen in 'Distant Origin'. He seems to have cornered the market for playing unconventional scientists!
• From Tallifer on 2011-04-17 at 6:33am:
  Holy cow!
  
  This one rates 11 out of 10.
  
  The revisionist re-creation of Voyager and her crew is exciting and darkly humourous. "Shut up, Hedgehog!" one shouts at Neelix during a meeting. Janeway ordering the use of biogenic weapons on a massive scale; Chakotay and Harry as psychotic interrogators.
  
  The subsequent historical investigation and discussion was interesting and intelligent. One is reminded of the constant re-examination of the American civil war as well as the soul-searching by Germans about the two world wars.
• From packman_jon on 2012-07-10 at 3:23am:
  Brilliant episode. Tallifer touched on it a little, but I'll add more. This episode makes a nice portrayal on how people have twisted history to be used as propaganda for their own uses - not to mention how people can't accept reality.
  
  On an unrelated note, dang! Janeway looks great with more black colors! ;)
• From Lee on 2012-07-29 at 12:44pm:
  I actually loved the ending scene with the doctor going on another journey to the alpha quadrant. I always thought a whole series of the doctor travelling through the delta quadrant in his little ship would have been awesome!
• From Rick on 2013-01-05 at 6:52pm:
  Huge missed opportunity in this episode. When that female arbiter retorted, "It's always about race!" I was immediately disappointed that they didnt get jesse jackson or rev. sharpton to play the role. Wouldve been perfect.
• From Dstyle on 2015-06-16 at 2:54pm:
  In the doctor's version of the simulation the Kyrian rebels invade engineering, and after a brief confrontation Tuvok reports to Janeway that the raiding party has taken Seven of Nine and "one of the injured crew members" hostage. Seriously? I know this "injured crew member" is not one of the seven or eight characters we're supposed to care about on this show, but for the purposes of the story couldn't you at least give him a name? How about "Ensign Jones." There, see? That was easy. Or are we worried the audience might think, "Ensign Jones? Do we know him? Who is that?" If that's the problem, use a minor named character like Vorik or something. There are only 150 people on board Voyager anyway (well, 147 now, since three are dead)(oh just kidding, no one cares about them!) and I'm pretty sure after four year everyone knows each others' names.
  
  I know the red shirts are a tried and true Trek tradition, but on Voyager I find the nameless extras to be frustrating. This isn't TNG's Enterprise, where crew members can come and go at each space station stop. I mean, I get it, I do: I understand that we, the idiot box viewing public, can't realistically be bothered to care about more than the core cast, but at least pretend the in-universe officers care about the entire crew!
  
  It's a minor complaint, to be sure, and it doesn't seriously hinder my enjoyment of the show, but I do find it irritating each time it happens.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Dio on 2009-02-05 at 5:17pm:
  This one got a 9 from me, really enjoyed seeing the young officers trying to fill roles of mature officers. After hearing about "Luna" I wanted to see a shot of it, perhaps to see the girl reunited with her family, oh well. Still, very well done and one of my favourites!
• From MJ on 2011-01-31 at 4:56pm:
  The most interesting scene in this episode to me is when the escape pods are leaving the Valiant. We're used to seeing escape pods get away successfully in Star Trek, but the Jem'Hadar ruthlessly target and destroy some of the pods; others don't get away in time and are consumed by the exploding ship. I think this scene was reinforcing the brutal dose of reality these cadets got. It's as if their mistake was pursuing them even in the end, denying them of the chance to learn from it.
  
  But all the other lessons about the cult of personality, the arrogance of youth, and the danger of the group mentality are aptly explored and upheld here. Nicely done episode, including some interesting moments between Jake and Nog.
• From Christopher Wright on 2012-01-19 at 1:53am:
  I agree with the other comment how it was a dose of harsh realism to see escape pods being destoyed, but having only one escape (the one with our heroes) was a little too contrived. Anyone else wonder why the secret battleship even allowed their pod to survive? I mean was the dominion captain like, "oh well, we missed that pod with one torpedo, better let it get back to federation space with knowledge of our top secret ship."? Other than the plot holes like that a very well-acted and entertaining episode.
• From McCoy on 2017-03-03 at 4:44pm:
  Hm... J.J. Abrams obviously didn't saw this episode before filming his first Star Trek film. If you give a ship to cadets, you can expect nothing more than a disaster.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Wes on 2012-02-25 at 9:31pm:
  I don't know about this for a last episode of the season, but I thought the ship was awesome. The outer hull design seems similar to how the crew ends up designing the delta flyer.
• From Rick on 2013-01-06 at 8:34am:
  Wait, let me get this straight. They traveled all the way back to borg space and then only picked up 300 light years on the return trip? So the whole Kes thing is now irrelevant, and they are right back where they started before that?
  
  I originally understood the situation to mean that they picked up 300 light years from where they were when they started using slipstream. This would imply that in an hour they traveled over 10k light years but who knows, the message about 3mos was fake. Either way, both ships traveled over 10k light years to get back to borg space. So what the heck is goin on here
• From SilverDragonRed on 2013-10-11 at 4:20pm:
  The mystery that this episode fell apart as soon as you hear the 'recording' from admiral windbag in the magic meeting room. His stated speed of 240,000 c(60,000 lys in 3 months) doesn't gel with the actual demonstrated speed of the Dauntless: 15,768,000 c(15 lys in 30 seconds). So, the reveal that Arturis had planned a trap for him wasn't really shocking. It was neat to see a species that didn't view the Borg in the same way as the rest of the galaxy.
  Kethinov, the return trip to Earth with quantum slipstream would take 2 days at most.
• From Jadzia Guinan Smith on 2015-06-14 at 5:22pm:
  Somehow, I don’t think they went “back” to Borg space. I think writers were just sloppy in how they used the term “Borg Space.” It seems to refer simply to a region of space where all of the civilizations have been assimilated by Borg, rather than what we saw in Unity, Scorpion,etc., where it seemed they were talking about the Borg’s native space or headquarters, or something to that effect. So, I think it’s intended that Voyager is now 300 light years closer to the Alpha Quadrant since the beginning of the episode. Of course, my interpretation creates an equally large problem: encountering a region of space so deeply affected by the Borg and their conflict with Species 8472, after Kes threw them “safely out of Borg space” so many months ago. It’s all a confused mess, which makes it hard for me to give the episode quite the high marks that Kethinov gave it.
  
  But, I must say, the quantum slipstream is super cool. And, I like the idea that in the conflict between Borg and Species 8472, there are those who would have struck a “bargain with the Devil” a la Janeway, but they would choose the opposite devil to bargain with! It reminds us of the moral and tactical messiness of war. The other thing I like is the development of Captain and Seven’s relationship. It’s a nice tension between mutual exasperation and respect; of conflict and harmony (or at least the aspiration to harmony).
  
• From Dstyle on 2015-07-01 at 3:38pm:
  Voyager fires photon torpedoes while they're in the slipstream! Those torpedoes must've been going awful fast!
• From tigertooth on 2016-11-10 at 2:34pm:
  Mostly good, though I didn't like when Janeway confronted Arturis. They surprise him with a full security detail, but still can't stop him from pulling off a panel, pulling a big lever, and then erecting forcefields. Geez, I guess when he said early in the episode that some species have physical strength and some have strong mental capabilities, he was talking about himself in both cases. Seems they could have gotten around this if he had just issued a voice command.
  
  Also, I hope Seven never gets trapped by a forcefield again. If all it takes is a little tinkering with a filament to get through one, then she should always be prepared to repeat the trick.
  

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From MJ on 2011-02-25 at 6:18pm:
  A decent two-parter.
  
  First, this Romulan ploy to hide weapons on the Bajoran moon seems a bit forced. I know the Romulans are supposed to be the deceptive chess masters always looking to one-up the Federation with some clever ploy, but it seems out of place here considering the Romulans are already at war with the Dominion. And Kira would be much more believable if she was just a tad bit anguished over this whole situation rather than arrogantly sure of herself through the whole thing. Ever see the movie “Thirteen Days”? In the real world, I’d imagine Kira is losing some sleep over something as significant as the Romulan Empire building up weapons on her homeworld’s moon. Instead, she acts more like Maverick at a game of poker. I don’t buy it.
  
  Sisko’s mission to find the Orb of the Emissary and his false vision was enjoyable. I’m usually not a fan of this Emissary story arc, but this is one of the rare times it was well handled and intriguing. I like the idea of explaining Sisko’s connection to the Prophets by having him be a descendant of them; it grounds the story a bit more and removes some of the supernatural. And I always LOVE when Brock Peters guest stars. He’s a fantastic actor.
  
  The third subplot, where Worf and the DS9 comrades go on a mission to get Jadzia into Sto’Vo’Kor is the best, though. I like the petty bickering between Bashir, O’Brien, and Quark, especially over the mess hall incident. And Worf’s apology is a nicely done scene. Their destruction of the shipyards was a very good action sequence, and made for a fine plot addition.
  
  In the end, the three subplots work well together; I even like the occasional flash to Damar and Weyoun.
• From Lt. Fitz on 2012-07-05 at 5:02pm:
  The whole Trill thing is weird.
  
  It seems a bit unfair that keeping a symbiont alive can entail what seems to me to be the enslavement of a Trill host. She didn't want to host Dax? Then it should have died. I mean, Ezri already had a life. She was in Starfleet, for goodness sake. She obviously wasn't planning to be a host. Now she is stuck with the symbiont. And, why didn’t they just put the symbiont in Stasis until they could find it a willing host?
  
  Also, it has been established that when symbiont and host are put together, they basically become a new person. Shouldn't that new person have to be reconsidered for Starfleet? It's not the same Ezri after all. What if Dax had ended up in a Trill like Joran?
  
  I know. It's a TV show. I'm probably thinking it through too much. :)
  
• From Lt. Fitz on 2012-07-05 at 6:17pm:
  I don't get it. I watched the very first episodes after watching this one, because it seemed to me that the prophets were being very inconsistent. In the first episodes, the prophets don’t know what linear time is. They don’t seem to know what Sisko is. They even conclude that he must be destroyed! He has to argue with them to save himself! Now, late in the series they are written to have reached far across the quadrant to take control of a human woman to produce Sisko himself. Making Sisko what exactly? A human/prophet hybrid? The son of the gods? The savior of the wormhole? To do all this, it seems to me a species needs to have a pretty firm grip on what linear time is. It’s clear that the writers have gone too far with the whole emissary thing. Throughout the series it seemed like they were really pushing to go too far with it, and in this episode, they finally did it.
  
  I now understand why a lot of Trek fans had problems with DS9. It was mostly working for me when I could frame the prophets as a difficult-to-comprehend race of aliens that the Bajorans were mistaking for gods who must have been inadvertently interacting with the Bajorans simply because their planet was in the vicinity of one end of the wormhole. But now, I don’t know what to think. Their nature is so inconsistent and unclearly defined that they have become completely inconceivable to me. When a story includes such opacity, it strikes me as carelessly written. Even the most bizarre circumstances in the previous series could always be explained in general scientific terms within the rules of the Star Trek universe as it had been defined. But in the DS9 universe, literally anything can happen and no explanation is required. DS9 definitely took Star Trek from science fiction to space fantasy, which is a bit of a downer for me since I greatly preferred Star Trek being science fiction. If I wanted space fantasy, I could always turn to Star Wars.
  
  This is not to say that I dislike DS9. I generally like it. But, as I read someone else comment, it’s not really Star Trek. I just wish that it would have remained consistent within its unique universe, but it idn’t.
  
• From Hugo on 2013-02-13 at 7:56am:
  I was a bit disappointed with the events on the Rotarran - I was expecting there to be some point where Bashir and Quark would be useful for the completion of the mission - now they were just passangers. The Chief, on the other hand, got to contribute...
• From James on 2014-06-05 at 11:45pm:
  Seems like someone is sabotaging your rating system. All of seas 7 episodes have an inconsistent amount of zero votes. I really doubt that seas 7 is so hated that the majority of people would give all the episodes a zero. So, for this season I think I'll depend on YOUR ratings for my guide. Someone obviously has a lot of time on their hands. Too bad they are using it to skew the results on, IMHO, the best Star Trek review site on the Web.
• From Axel on 2015-05-11 at 4:46am:
  Maybe it's just me, but the Romulan decision to defend their hospital with torpedoes seems perfectly justified. If I were in their place, I wouldn't trust the defense of a crucial hospital facility to the antiquated ships the Bajoran militias use. Maybe they were a bit too secretive about the whole thing, but it's not exactly an act of war. Kira and the Bajorans come across as unreasonable by demanding outright that the Romulans remove the weapons rather than work something out. I guess you could explain it as the Bajorans having deja vu about an outside power starting a military occupation in their space, but that part of the story didn't really work IMO.
  
  Still not sure what to make of this whole Prophet/Pah-Wraith thing. I agree it gets a little carried away in Season 7, although in this particular episode I think it made for a good plot.
• From McCoy on 2017-03-05 at 2:06pm:
  I really liked return of Ben Russell. Seems like the writers know that their idea of Sisko being Prophet is silly. After all Russell is insane during writing this story:)
  I'm probalby in minority but I regret they didn't kill Jadzia earlier. Never liked her irritating behaviour. In this one episode Ezri is better written, performed and more interesting character than Jadzia in previous six seasons alltogether.
• From ChristopherA on 2021-04-26 at 4:41pm:
  I found the plot on the Rotarran excessively silly. It just seemed rather unrealistic for Quark, in particular, to go on a suicide mission he cannot contribute to, just because he thinks it would vaguely honor Jadzia’s memory. He never really seemed all that obsessively smitten with her before. I could believe Worf, but it just really came across to me as though O’Brian, Bashir, and Quark mainly went along because they knew that the scriptwriters wanted them to go and weren't really going to kill them, so it was worth a little inconvenience in honor of Jadzia. And it was also pretty silly that Quark was allowed on the bridge during combat, where he served no purpose other than as a distraction.
  
  I felt the idea that Sisko was basically descended from one of the Prophets was weird and pointless, it didn't seem to serve any purpose other than to pad the runtime. I don't see how this in any way improves over the more straightforward assumption that he is an ordinary man, and the Prophets picked Sisko to be the Emissary purely because they can see outside of linear time and knew he was going to be the right man in the right place at the right time for their purposes.
  
  Aside from this, though, I did kind of enjoy how Sisko took some time off to visit the restaurant and go on a holy quest, the episode did have a sort of grandiose feel to it.
  

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From MJ on 2011-02-12 at 9:16am:
  There have been quite a few DS9 episodes that took on too much, and had to suddenly tie up an otherwise good episode. This one did very nicely, though. I didn't think anything was resolved too quickly between Ezri and any of the others. Interesting that Garak was the one chosen to be her first serious counseling effort aboard DS9, and his problem is a big one. His breakdown as he realizes what is truly bothering him is wonderfully acted, as only Andrew Robinson could.
  
  I thought the reconciliation between Ezri and Worf was handled perfectly. It involved few words, and Worf right to the point with expressing his feelings, but without being too vulnerable, which is exactly how you'd expect him to do something like that. You can understand his pain, too. It's confusing for him: in his culture, the custom is to honor a loved one who is dead, and Dax doesn't quite fit in to the typical situation.
  
  All of this explains the deeply cutting remarks to Ezri made by both Garak and Worf. That, combined with Sisko's "tough love" would certainly push a person.
  
  I know that when DS9 was on the air and in the years since, there have been mixed fan feelings about Ezri Dax. Many people became attached to Terry Farrell and Jadzia, understandable after six seasons. But I really like the introduction of Ezri Dax. The character gives the show a chance to explore another side of Trill society: what it's like when a host isn't prepared for the symbiont, and is flooded with centuries of memories...not to mention having to face many of the people one of the previous hosts knew. And fresh-faced, perky but humorously befuddled Ezri is a good choice for this new host.
• From Krs312 on 2011-09-22 at 12:49pm:
  I also think that Ezri is a more interesting character than Jadzia.
• From Rob UK on 2023-12-08 at 10:57am:
  Personally i've always struggled with both Jadzia and Ezri Dax, even back in the 70's we all knew what a Mary Sue was (if you don't belive me go and watch Police Academy 1 and pay attention to the name of the new mayor), never mind in the 90's when this was produced.
  
  The Trill symbiote makes an almost plausable excuse for why any female who gets one can take on any modern man of any race both physically and mentally at the drop of a hat no practice needed by channelling the very convenient multi talented previous hosts (they become like Cartman trying to play Ronin and end up with all the powers). This even applies in direct hand to hand combat against multiple mighty klingon warriors trying to gut her, where actually Klingon warriors are dying all around her but these weaklings have no chance for she has the powereth of previous male hosts inside her.
  
  Am i just too old and jaded now hahahahahaha

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

• From Damien Bradley on 2013-03-03 at 1:41am:
  I liked this episode quite a bit, except for one scene: the music scene. I'm sorry, but no matter how genetically enhanced your brain is, you don't sound like that after a near lifetime of not speaking, let alone not having your voice trained. That scene was painful.
  
  Aside from that, it was some great character development (even so late in the series) for Bashir. I feel bad for him. Aside from his short-lived relationship with Leeta, he's been pretty lonely, and now he finally meets a woman like him, whom he can really relate to! Too bad she has no experience with relationships, and yes, he did move awfully fast and make a whole lot of assumptions about what their relationship would look like! Rather presumptuous. But understandable, given his character and given how lonely he's been.
  
  The episode reminded me of the movie "Awakenings," where several catatonic patients are given a treatment that temporarily allowed them to function and interact. I was afraid that this episode would end the same way, with Sarina returning to her original state. I thought that her not returning to her original state, but not staying on the station, was a good middle ground. The moment when Bashir is talking to her while she was pretending to be unresponsive, and then her responding to his "do you love me" with "I don't know!" was quite touching.
  
  One little note: maybe this episode was produced before the scientific consensus was that the universe will actually expand forever rather than collapse inward on itself. Or maybe in 400 years there will be new evidence for the "Big Crunch?" Or, maybe Jack is onto something the rest of us aren't? Funny either way.
• From Selador on 2013-09-22 at 4:17am:
  Oh wow. This episode has 10 written all over it. Just superb. So many beautiful scenes and the overall story was immense. I think I might like this even more than In the Pale Moonlight.
• From Dr. Philip Channard on 2015-06-10 at 12:07pm:
  Sarina reminded me of Tiffany from Hellraiser.
• From lumzi23 on 2017-01-22 at 11:09pm:
  Gotta disagree with Damien. The music scene is one of my favorite scene in all of DS9 (or even in all of ANYTHING!) It was amazing.
• From Scott Nolan on 2018-10-23 at 12:41pm:
  Sarina is played by columnist and frequent “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” panelist Faith Salie.