Review of DS9 Episode 1.09 "Move Along Home"

I'm in the process of rewatching Star Trek: Deep Space 9 and reviewing/recapping each episode in detail. Join me in my in depth look at the deepest and most complex Star Trek series to date.


First contact with a gaming-obsessed species from the Gamma Quadrant takes a bad turn when Quark is caught cheating them at Dabo. They get revenge on him by forcing him to play a game of theirs in which Sisko, Kira, Dax, and Bashir are the real life pawns that are forced to confront dangerous obstacles in their attempt to "move along home."

This is a frustrating and frankly quite stupid episode. It's memorable due to just how weird it is, but overall it's bad.

THE GOOD

• Sisko's approach to first contact compared to Picard or even Kirk reveals a lot about his character. Picard in particular seems to relish first contact. Sisko seems to dread it. He is definitely not a diplomat and it probably makes no sense that the Federation didn't send somebody better for the job of receiving their first official visitors from the Gamma Quadrant.
• The exchange when Dax wants Sisko to leave her behind and he refuses is the best part in the episode. Their interactions are always so interesting due to their long and complicated history with each other. Sisko was Curzon's mentee, and now he is Jadzia's commanding officer, and that conflicting dynamic is fascinating.

THE BAD

• The whole structure of the game (or lack thereof) is frustrating. Since Quark (and by extension the audience) doesn't know the rules, everything that happens feels totally random and arbitrary.
• More terrible acting from Alexander Siddig
• The obstacles encountered in the game are neither clever nor interesting.
• The revelation at the end that nobody was ever in danger retroactively ruins the one positive aspect of the plot, which is the tension from worrying about what will happen to the characters.
• No O'Brien for the third ep in a row. Jake mentions that Keiko is still on Earth, so obviously he is with her still. Meaney is lucky he got to sit this one out.

THE UGLY

• Why does Sisko have a tricorder? He was sleeping in bed (in his uniform, no less), and wakes up in the game with a tricorder strapped to his hip. Utter nonsense.
• Quark apparently faces no consequences for his actions.
• The conversation between Brennin and Odo while scanning the alien ship provides some clues as to how the game technology works. Brennin implies that it reads like a continuous transporter beam. Most likely, the four players were locked in some sort of sustained transporter field where matter and energy is able to materialize around them and be manipulated according to the requirements of the game. The tricorders read everything in the game as real, so it's not a holosuite or virtual reality most likely, but rather some highly advanced manipulation of matter and energy, like a holosuite but where everything is fully physical rather than holographic.

RATING: 4/10