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Given that Bashir is maybe my favorite DS9 character, I'm really hoping that this special episode of his doesn't totally torpedo his character.
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Aug 25, 2015 20:31
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Kenzie posted:The only time I can remember enlisted personnel was that DS9 episode where the Defiant was chasing Jem'Hadar ships in the atmosphere of some gas giant. There were enlisted engineers with actual speaking roles, and O'Brien tells Worf to ease up on them and stop yelling at them because they weren't officers and haven't been to the academy. Muniz!!!! 
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Aug 25, 2015 21:17
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Tarkus posted:Even as a kid I found it strange that they didn't have small one-person (or computer controlled) war ships that would fly out of the larger craft to confuse and inundate the opposing ship(s). Also the design of their flashlights were loving stupid, holding them overhand must be a bitch. Because Navy ships don't do that, and Starfleet is The Navy In Space. I always felt Star Trek battles were almost ludicrously dignified, just dainty laser beams exchanged between two slow moving targets. DS9 actually gives space battles some meat, a lot of speed and explosive kick. The Defiant is such a cool loving ship. I loved the DS9 episode where Sisko and the crew are stuck on a crashed ship and have to deal with a tense standoff with the Jem'Hadar. So loving intense. Also, I was really worried about Odo when they turned him into a human but I'm so glad they did, he's so much more engaging now that he likes to drink and eat and gets boners. Rene Auberjonais may actually be the strongest acting performance on the show at that--Odo is played with a perfect blend of rigid authority and awkward vulnerability and he's incredibly fascinating for a character who is more alien than literally any other Star Trek alien regularly featured. He's a great character, and I love his bro-mance with Quark. Oh man, and the episode where Quark and Odo climb a mountain together is fuckin' choice.
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Aug 26, 2015 01:57
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The Prime Directive is pretty simple, I thought. Don't give warp technology to primitive societies or indeed elevate their tech in any meaningful way. It's important because you already have loving savages like the Klingons running around in warp ships we don't need MORE of them.
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Aug 26, 2015 04:08
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skasion posted:Starfleet doesn't have ground troops. It is a star fleet. the official fiction is that it is not even a military organization, but is for science, diplomacy and exploration. They're not exactly the loving space marines and the point is made surprisingly early and often in TNG and DS9 that they're really unprepared for a shooting war with other galactic empires. Both series take an oddly hawkish attitude to the federation given the supposedly lovey dovey utopian universe of Trek, the writers are repeatedly beating the drum for the fleet to nut up and get some big guns even as a lot of the characters insist that they didn't sign up to fight wars. From a dramatic point of view this makes sense as everyone loves the escalating drama of a war story, and it can be seen as a sort of unintentional geopolitical allegory for the waning of the optimism and end-of-history thinking that accompanied the end of the Cold War. The fact is, though, the Federation exists and thrives BECAUSE it has the biggest, baddest guns of anyone else. Their weapons are always shown as just as good if not better than the alien of the week's best. The mirror universe Federation is enslaved and destroyed BECAUSE they dismantle their armory.
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Aug 26, 2015 18:43
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I generally like to think that Star Trek doesn't show the scale of its actual wars, due to budgets and its high-minded ideals, but basically the ground war scenes as i saw in the episode where Jake goes to the planet under Klingon attack seemed pretty reminiscent of poo poo you'd see in Warhammer 40k. Just huge numbers of guys getting shredded apart. Hell, I love that the Defiant is apparently quite capable of destroying an entire planet by itself--or certainly eliminating its capacity to sustain life.
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Aug 27, 2015 22:16
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skasion posted:Or just...make Dune Yeah, if Showtime just adapted Dune into a 12-episode series, then went on to get some good TV writers to write original follow-up seasons, it'd be excellent.
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Aug 31, 2015 13:03
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Omi-Polari posted:Oh Dune is the best book ever. I'm just saying that I'm lolling. Better yet, make a Foundation miniseries and then have a Dune miniseries follow it, because Dune is basically Frank Herbert spending a few decades of his life arguing that Asimov was wrong in thinking that having future-predicting space wizards being in charge of everything was a good idea. I want a robot Asimov and a cloned Frank Herbert to fight.
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Aug 31, 2015 17:40
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Yeah Red Dwarf is probably better than TOS.
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Sep 1, 2015 13:21
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shadow puppet of a posted:It is the official position of this thread that these two should have gotten together. I am confused. What is the timeline here? I assumed that DS9 took place after TNG was finished, and its timeline goes further than TNGs what with the presence of Worf and O'Brien. Is this not the case? Bajor isn't even part of the Federation yet and I'm like, balls deep in Season 5.
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Sep 1, 2015 22:43
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Delsaber posted:DS9 begins somewhere around the Chain of Command two-parter and runs parallel to TNG (and later Voyager) from there. I guess there were Bajorans in Starfleet for quite a while before that because Starfleet goes through so many redshirts they'll take anyone with a pulse. I'd say that doesn't make sense and only Federation citizens can join Starfleet but I guess that's not true, they let Nog in and Fereginor is definitely not part of the Federation. Worf kind of is an exception to the rule too, but I reckon that he was an "experiment" by Starfleet to see how well Klingons can be integrated. I like how Nog is a lovely little gently caress-up kid but somehow in one possible future rises easily to the rank of Captain and doesn't age a single day.
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Sep 1, 2015 23:21
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Fister Roboto posted:Bajor isn't a part of the Federation at this point, but anyone can join Starfleet regardless of citizenship apparently. Perhaps...service guarantees citizenship?
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Sep 1, 2015 23:56
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Legit, though, O'Brien is maybe the only character in the TNG-era trek who feels like a regular bloke, y'know? At least he's got normal people problems, like a wife getting posessed by a space ghost or ...well, okay, he has ridiculous problems but he always seems affable and ordinary, and he drinks beer not whatever synthhol nonsense. He and Bashir actually get legit plastered together in the greatest scene in DS9.
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Sep 3, 2015 17:57
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Tiberius Christ posted:Not tonight Miles, I haven't seen you in six months Literally the most heartwrenching scene in the show. O'Brien has got to be backed up for days. If he isn't loving Bashir on the side, the man's balls must be bluer than those weird blue aliens who show up all the time.
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Sep 5, 2015 00:49
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shadow puppet of a posted:Skip the one where Jake gets molested by that space molester woman. Its creepy. Yeah, wow, that episode sort of just ends with everything hunky dory but it feels like Jake should have had some kind of...long-term damage from that? Also, that episode is probably the most Doctor Who DS9 gets, and it has quite a few Doctor Who-like episodes.
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Sep 5, 2015 23:25
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So I just saw "Doctor Bashir, I Presume?" and I can certainly see that it's a pretty weak episode. It raises a lot of interesting implications--I thought it made no sense for the Federation to be against genetic enhancements until they mentioned the Eugenics War; then I thought it made no sense for Bashir not to be disintigrated on the spot and two years in cushy Federation prison on Earth sounds like a slap on the wrist for doing what amounts to rolling a dice on whether you're going to make Super Hitler or not. Still, if this is all they do with it and kind of let the fact that he's a genetic super human (which, again, feels like it would be par the course in Trek's universe) slide, it won't really ruin much else. The big problem was, this adds an unneeded wrinkle to Bashir's character right at the point where it feels like he's found his own feet and his own voice. It implies a sort of psychological instability that could be interesting, but unless they intend to make Bashir go villainous in the last season, it all seems forced and needless. The B-plot about Rom stealing the huge titty Dabo girl from Voyager's Doctor was a little better. Also, what kind of tone did they want this episode to have? It's played quite straight and serious, but features the most cartoonish possible circumstances in which Bashir's parents stupidly reveal their super serious crime.
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Sep 8, 2015 18:12
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EvilTaytoMan posted:My favourite Quark moment is when he out-logics a Vulcan. Of all of the distressingly many romantic conquests of Quark, that one was my favorite I think. Any episode where Quark convinces an alien that being a money-grubbing rear end in a top hat is actually the best way to go through life in the universe is simply beautiful. He goes to meet God and tries to sell him on the concept of greed.
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Sep 9, 2015 19:06
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Evil Sexy Kira is probably the most consistently entertaining Star Trek character ever. She is so evil. And so sexy.
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Sep 10, 2015 05:40
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Maybe Q isn't as powerful as he claims to be? I mean, if I was a highly advanced alien, I'd probably lie to a lesser life form about what I can do too. "Oh yeah, I'm like all-knowing and poo poo, whatever. Not like you can ever disprove it. Blah blah magic powers blah blah humans are not worthy, y'know the drill." Sisko punches Q because Q is a little dipshit who in his extreme arrogance would never even consider the possibility that a mere human would actually dare to strike him. He's not the Judeo-Christian God, he's like...Hermes or something. Kind of a little shitheel divinity who gets into trouble now and then when he underestimates a mortal and/or tries to gently caress their wife.
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Sep 10, 2015 17:25
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Captain Sisko is actually the best captain in all of Star Trek.
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Sep 18, 2015 20:04
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DS9 has pretty realistic politics, yeah. poo poo's changing all the time, today's enemy is tomorrow's ally. It's like Metal Gear Solid 3 in space
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Sep 19, 2015 06:06
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The Dominion were gonna blow up an entire star system to take out every major Alpha Quadrant fleet in one fell swoop, that's pretty harsh io
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Sep 20, 2015 23:45
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Death to all gross slime monsters
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Sep 21, 2015 00:04
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Man, Season 6 is so cool. Sisko and crew off on a space ship, the station's under Dominion control, Kira has weird and creepy sexual tension with Gul Dukat, forgets that she used to be a terrorists for a few episodes, then fails to be a terrorist for awhile... I really dig the power politics between the Vorta, the Jem'Hadar and the Founders. The Dominion is honestly the most interesting "villain" I've seen in a Star Trek...well, anything, really. They're cool, they're well-designed, and the stuff you don't know about them is usually on purpose. My girlfriend and I were debating as to why a Vorta comes along with every Jem'Hadar. I explained it was more like a Roman situation, with the Vorta being rich noblemen who buy armies and the Jem'Hadar are the conscripts too poor to say no. Then we discussed whether the Vorta or the Founders are actually responsible for making the Jem'Hadar, and I reckoned that the Founders probably don't actually DO anything in regards to controlling their empire. They lead from the shadows, and I reckon that the Vorta are probably the ones who created the Jem'Hadar, and the Vorta--being genius genetic manipulators--are the chief source of the Founders' artificial military might. The question neither of us could answer is how the Founders earned the Vorta's unwavering worship and loyalty.
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Sep 21, 2015 22:04
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But that begs the question of HOW the Founders could do all this stuff while remaining unseen. They have no visible technology--no space ships on their world, no buildings, no infrastructure. If there's any realism to Trek's scale, then you'd need a planet, maybe several planets, devoted entirely to the breeding and manufacture of Jem'Hadar and Vorta. How did the Founders build all this stuff? Weren't they persecuted by the rest of the galaxy so bad they became hermits? Do they possess a biotechnology that we don't ever see, or do they somehow birth the Vorta out of their gooey slime pool ocean? shadow puppet of a posted:Everyone has weird creepy sexual tension with Gul Dukat. My girlfriend thinks Cardassians are kind of hot and I guess this explains it then.
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Sep 21, 2015 22:30
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Chomp8645 posted:Keep in mind the Founders relocate once within the series already, so there is no reason to believe the planet we first see them on is their home world. In fact since it's a specifically hard to find planet inside a nebula it almost certainly not their place of origin. It is a retreat for them, a place where they can pool in seclusion, not a seat of power. For all we know their home world (or other worlds since it's implied their home world is long gone) are technological wonders with enormous facilities. Since Dominion territory is not well explored in the series it's hard to say, but it seems to me that judging the Founder's infrastructure by their pool planet would be like judging American military power by looking at G.W's ranch. That makes sense, although I rather liked the idea that the Founders' strategy was entirely in basically using other creatures to service their own goals. It'd be kind of symbolic--the Federation's strength is that it treats other sentient beings as equals, even their enemies. When the Klingons, Romulans and Federation come together, it's a really huge moment--three enemies who had at various points been in full out war with each other are now allies, brothers in arms, standing together against a new and alien threat and also those loving spoon-headed rear end in a top hat. The Dominion see people--solids--as tools, as lesser beings. So, they have the power of super science and fanatical servants but the Federation wins because they have the power...of friendship. I still wish that Garak had loving vaporized their entire planet. Stupid slime monsters.
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Sep 21, 2015 22:59
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I definitely get a 40k vibe from the Dominion, although it also seems to suggest that there's a buffer zone of "unoccupied space" between the Dominion and the Wormhole. Like, a bunch of aliens come through the wormhole and they only know of the Dominion as this huge authoritarian force nearby, but never particularly present. Then again, it could be that the discovery of the Wormhole prompted the Dominion/The Founders to just finish taking over the Quadrant. I dunno, I have to see how the war ends, but I do not expect the Dominion to exist anymore once Captain Sisko is through with them. They did find Odo on a space ship, come to think of it, so they must have some kind of vessels they send out. Actually, wasn't Odo one of a crop of young Changelings dispatched to "explore the stars"? He's the only one who had returned, but I'm surprised they hadn't brought in another one to act as a foil to Odo. Or is that what the implication was of the little baby Changeling Odo adopts at one point?
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Sep 21, 2015 23:57
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There's a lot of idiotic debate over this slave race thing, so my two cents: Obviously you can't craft the perfect obedient race without some risk of it falling out of your control. Bear in mind, the Jem'Hadar are physically strong and have a militaristic culture. There's no sex, no music, no creative outlet except for the arts of war. If left to their own devices, the Jem'Hadar would basically become soulless Klingons, rampaging the galaxy in search of new foes to slaughter. They were never designed to be a functioning race, but they are sentient nevertheless, and that's the biggest danger with them. The Jem'Hadar know and respect combat, fighting, and they seem to have a concept of honor, since all of these are programmed into them to make them happy to go out and die for the Founders. When the Jem'Hadar jailer comes to respect Worf, it's simply his programming reacting to a circumstance the programmer's didn't expect. That's why the Vorta vaporizes him. He's essentially "glitching". Now, look at the example of the Jem'Hadar serving the Vorta who orders them to their deaths. Sisko and him even talk about it--both know that this is a suicide mission for the Jem'Hadar, but his programming, his genetic loyalty, is too strong even for his reason and logic to supercede it. It demonstrates that the biological controls are not perfect, but ultimately they are adequate. The Jem'Hadar will never NOT be horrifying genetic murder machines. They will never have a peaceful society, they will never have art, music, or anything else. They are fundamentally flawed, by design. Their flaws are designed with multiple safeguards to ensure they can be controlled. Basically, if you breed the deadliest Pit Bull in the world, you'll keep it on a chain, and you'll make it wear a muzzle unless you want it to bite, lest it strike out at your hand instead. The Founders are well aware that the Jem'Hadar are a double-edged sword, and that is why the Vorta exist, to act as a buffer between them. If something happens, it is the Vorta who dies, and the Vorta don't have to worry too much about death 'cause they are clones.
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Sep 22, 2015 18:53
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Tujague posted:I didn't read the rest It can't be done. You could make a perfectly obedient race if you make a immobile drone that does nothing at all. If you give a species the ability to DO stuff, like kill a million dudes, then at some point it's going to occur to that species, even if it takes a dozen generations to do so, that maybe it could also kill you. You can't prevent genetic mutations, accidents, external influence, or anything of that nature from eventually tainting the purity of your creation. The only thing you can do is attempt to create fail-safes to prevent anything that you can't predict. Without omniscience, you are always going to be vulnerable to something you don't yet understand.
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Sep 22, 2015 19:13
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Tujague posted:I dunno, I get the feeling that no matter how many bags of doritos I eat, somebody else already scarfed down the magical one that literally transformed him into Le Wise Goon Who Can See Beyond, who can authoritatively state which elements of Star Trek Brand Fantasy TV Show of Made Up poo poo obviously can happen and what elements obviously can't happen on loving philosophical grounds Why is it that Bronies are the ones who are always upset by my posts? Am I the anti-Brony?
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Sep 22, 2015 21:50
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Tujague posted:It's sort of bumming me out watching you guys flail around and and frantically try to land a sick burn on me with anything in reach so let me just help you out here So you kept the avatar for 3 years? Okay.
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Sep 22, 2015 22:03
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Tujague posted:Hey, you're getting better at this whole "I am Lord Wise Goon, arbiter of what is true and obvious" horseshit Hey thanks! Always nice to get a compliment.
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Sep 22, 2015 22:27
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How did Data, a robot, catch the "super horny, suicidally horny" space virus again? Like...I mean...how?
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Sep 29, 2015 00:46
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Bashir is great. I just met Section 31 on DS9 and...well...let's just say that for all the genetic engineering poo poo they keep shoehorning in, I'm loving the extra stuff they give Bashir to do. Making him a spy seems great, although I'm kind of confused--there's only one season left, but they keep introducing new elements and stuff even now. Did they think the show would keep going on or will there actually be a decent ending to this whole saga?
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Oct 5, 2015 15:38
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Tujague posted:My beef with the Jem Hadar was about poo poo that literally happened on the screen during a TV show and 100% didn't require me to thoughtfully stroke cheeto dust out of my neckbeard while having an Archimedes-esque epiphany about human nature and reality that is hidden from the un-fedora'd neurotypicals You are a sad, strange little man...and you have my pity.
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Oct 5, 2015 16:13
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Germstore posted:clinically speaking what the gently caress is your problem? Assimilation into the Brony hivemind. Resistance is magic.
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Oct 5, 2015 18:39
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To be upset about Star Trek is illogical.
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Oct 6, 2015 16:28
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Tujague posted:You say this to people in real life, don't you? Would you feel better if he'd said neigh?
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Oct 6, 2015 16:32
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Nondescript Van posted:DS9 has been much more enjoyable since I found a guide telling me what episodes are poo poo. Now I can watch an entire season of content in 4 hours. The only bad episode is "Julian Bashir, I Presume?"
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Oct 6, 2015 16:41
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EvilTaytoMan posted:My guide told me to watch Babylon 5 instead. Oh that's a good choice too Watch them both
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Oct 6, 2015 17:11
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