1.01 “Emissary”
Newly reassigned Commander Benjamin Sisko and his hodgepodge crew attempt to restore a former Cardassian space station into something resembling a Federation outpost, far on the outskirts of Federation space and crewed by a combination of Starfleet and Bajoran personnel. They get way more than they bargained for when a the first stable wormhole in the galaxy is discovered in their backyard, and a showdown ensues with the Cardassians, who are bitter about having to abandon Bajor and eager to claim the new discovery for themselves. But the inhabitants and creators of the wormhole are far more than they seem, and their role in the Bajor-Cardassia conflict will have consequences that stretch for years in the future and indeed beyond the bounds of time itself.
Star Trek: The Next Generation had so much success that Paramount decided not to even wait until it was off the air to begin a spinoff, with season 1 of DS9 more or less coinciding with TNG season 6. Gene Roddenberry having recently passed on, the new series would not be guided by his unrealistically optimistic vision of the future, but rather be a far more human and gritty view of the future. Deep Space Nine is really the most relatable and emotion-infused of the Star Trek shows by far. Building off of what was established in TOS and TNG, DS9 was able to create the deepest and most complex of all the many ST series without being bound by Roddenberry’s overly-restrictive mandates that everyone always get along and Federation society being portrayed as perfectly utopian. What we get instead is a refreshingly honest and wholly human (ironic considering the most human characters are often aliens) depiction of life in the 24th century.
As for the episode’s story, it was brilliantly set up by TNG in episodes like “The Wounded” and “Ensign Ro.” Long before “Emissary” ever saw the airwaves, we were already quite familiar with the worlds of Bajor, Cardassia, and the conflict that has raged between them for generations. This is very fortunate, because the plot of “Emissary” is quite complex, and not having to engage in an excessive amount of world-building allowed the writers to spend more time setting up the characters and their specific conflicts, which are equally as complex as the plot (even more so, actually).
Due to this prior exposition, “Emissary” is able to concentrate so purely on its plot and characters that it ends up being the best ST pilot to date (granted, the bar was not high). The story is not only engaging, but it sets up a conflict that will persist without tiring for seven seasons (and beyond), while also introducing some of the deepest and most layered characters to ever exist in the ST universe. Although its highest points never match those of TNG and TOS, its consistency across seven season makes DS9 equal to those shows in terms of overall quality and it all starts with a pilot that far surpasses “Farpoint” or the various TOS pilots.
THE GOOD
- Using Picard to launch the show was brilliant. The scenes he is in a great, but DS9 takes things to the next level by having Picard be in many ways the bad guy. This is a man we have spent five seasons growing in admiration for, and suddenly our new protagonist despises him to the core. What genius way to simultaneously link these shows together and also distance them from each other. The tone is set immediately: this is definitely Trek, but very different from TNG. The undisguised contempt Sisko shows for Picard, combined with the deep pain seen in Picard’s eyes at the mention of Wolf 359 is just an incredible interaction between two great characters. A million points to the writers (and Patrick Stewart) for these scenes.
- It’s honestly amazing to me how the story threads that are started in this episode are carried through so seamlessly for seven seasons. You’d think that the Cardassian-Bajoran conflict would run its course within a few seasons, but the incredibly complex dynamics of the wormholes, the Prophets, and especially the Dominion allow that conflict to persist for the entire series run without ever drying up narratively. This episode becomes truly brilliant when viewed through the lens of all seven seasons.
- Colm Meaney. He was criminally underutilized on TNG and moving him to DS9 was a great decision to let an all time great actor have a starring role that was long overdue.
THE BAD
- Odo’s makeup isn’t great in this ep. He looks skeletal.
- Nana Visitor is a bad actress and her character mostly annoys me. She’s not as bad as, say, Troi or Neelix, but she definitely is a weak spot in an otherwise pretty good cast.
- I’ve never been a fan of the DS9 uniforms. I think the TNG ones look much better and I wish they had just used those.
- The sequence with Sisko talking to the Prophets in the wormhole drags on for way too long. The episode is great until this point and then it really bogs down with frustrating dialogue and no plot movement. If this sequence had been edited down we might be looking at a 10/10 episode.
- I’ll get into it more as I review more eps, but Avery Brooks is such an awkward actor. He overacts and his delivery of lines is often sharply at odds with the emotion he is supposed to be conveying (like when he seems to be smiling while chewing out a subordinate). From watching interviews and other extra content of him, it’s clear to me that he is simply a weird dude, and that has made it slightly easier for me to swallow his unusual acting style...but only slightly. I think that Sisko is the most well-written of the ST captains by far, but Brooks’ weirdness as a person and an actor makes me rank him slightly below Picard and probably equal to Kirk on the all-time captain rankings.
THE UGLY
- "Never trust an ale from a god-fearing people.” Quark needs to try a Belgian abbey ale!
- Why are the Bajorans allowing Cardassian warships back into their space? I get that Bajor can’t really do much about it, but it seems like a glossed-over point that should have been a major diplomatic issue. There’s no way that, after almost a century of planety occupation and rape, the Bajorans would be cool with Cardassian soldiers taking shore leave on one of their stations.
- There is a lot of effects shots of Odo shapeshifting in this ep. I guess the effects budget must have been slashed for future eps because Odo’s shifting is seen very rarely for the next few seasons.
- Interestingly, in Sisko’s flashbacks to Wolf 359, his Vulcan captain is played by J.G. Hetzler, who would go on to play a starring role much later in the show as General Martok.
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