In the twenty-sixth and final episode of the fifth season of\u00c2\u00a0Deep Space Nine<\/i>, the station faces down an imminent invasion. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch\u00c2\u00a0Star Trek<\/i>.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Well,\u00c2\u00a0Deep Space Nine<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0just upped the ante in a big way. And the best part? I have faith that the writers will follow through on this.<\/p>\n
Let\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s discuss.<\/p>\n
The Inevitable<\/b><\/p>\n
It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s kinda cool to me that both finales I watched this week dealt with the inevitable. Over on\u00c2\u00a0Voyager<\/i>, it was inevitable that the crew face Borg Space. Here, though, the finale opens with the inhabitants of DS9 watching in muted horror as hundreds of Dominion ships pour into the Alpha Quadrant, the\u00c2\u00a0fifth<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0such deployment. Couple this with the opening of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153In the Cards,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s easy to get a sense of the dread these people were experiencing. So, season five ends by dealing with the inevitable: the Dominion War. (See? It gets a fancy title and everything!)<\/p>\n
I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m glad that this is centered around Sisko, too, since it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been such a treat watching him turn into a master strategist. His strategy here: to push forward the conflict by lining the wormhole with a net of self-replicating mines. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a bold and scary plan, one that would essentially bar\u00c2\u00a0all<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0travel between the quadrants without the participation of DS9, so it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not so surprising that the Dominion gets wind of this quickly and responds as fast as they can.<\/p>\n
And the arms race begins.<\/p>\n
Preparation<\/b><\/p>\n
This is a nerve-wracking episode precisely because we don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to happen\u00c2\u00a0and<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0there seem to be a billion possibilities. Will the minefield get finished, or will the\u00c2\u00a0Defiant\u00c2\u00a0<\/i>be disabled (or destroyed) before it completes its mission? What if the Dominion fleet penetrates DS9\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s shields? What if there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a traitor aboard the station? As numerous plots unfolded in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Call to Arms,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I got to watch the ramifications of the decisions that Sisko made. Rom chose to send his wife to Bajor while remaining on board the station, a decision that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s both professionally noble and personally foolish. Keiko and the kids are sent to Earth, which is safe (for now???) from the Dominion. Starfleet revealed that THEY AREN\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T SENDING REINFORCEMENTS BECAUSE THEY\u00e2\u20ac\u2122LL BE OCCUPIED WITH SOMETHING ELSE. WHAT COULD POSSIBLY HAVE BEEN THAT IMPORTANT?<\/p>\n
I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get there. The point I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m trying to make is that the world of Deep Space 9\u00c2\u00a0changes<\/i>. In the span of just 45 minutes, this show manages to make everything feel different, scary, new, and massively uncomfortable. There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an exodus from the station, and once the fighting starts? Well,\u00c2\u00a0Deep Space Nine<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0becomes unlike any\u00c2\u00a0Star Trek<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0show I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen.<\/p>\n
Call to Arms<\/b><\/p>\n
I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t watch\u00c2\u00a0Star Trek<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0for massive, glitzy space battles. I really don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t! Most of my favorite episodes are subtle and don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t rely on any digital effects. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m saying this just to point out how fucking unreal the Dominion invasion is. It is huge. Scary. The sheer scope of it is visually conveyed with some dazzling effects, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s yet another reminder that this episode is unique in the\u00c2\u00a0Star Trek<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0canon. It helps us understand that the station was the true underdog in this battle, which means that the threat that the Dominion posed was believable. Given that this show has also been willing to toy with audience expectations in the past, I also came to readily believe that something terrible was about to happen. How could DS9 possibly hold off\u00c2\u00a0that<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0many ships? How could the\u00c2\u00a0Defiant<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0possibly stay safe amidst the chaos? \u00c2\u00a0And when Dukat ordered the RESERVE ships to come in\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 NOPE. I was prepared for the worst.<\/p>\n
I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll Be Back<\/b><\/p>\n
It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s astounding to me that despite that the end of season five of\u00c2\u00a0Deep Space Nine<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0gave me the most distressing cliffhanger yet, I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t\u00c2\u00a0feel<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0distressed. There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a joy in the potential that seemed hard to describe. How could it be a good thing that Starfleet abandoned DS9, that all the characters were largely split up, that the Dominion and the Cardassians had taken control of the station? As all of this was taking place, I was slack-jawed. How was this happening? But my horror at how the Dominion War was finally starting changed to something else:<\/p>\n
Wonder.<\/p>\n
The writers achieve this through the promise of the future. A good cliffhanger doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t just leave you in the lurch; it gives you a glimpse of what is to come. Or, rather, I should say what\u00c2\u00a0might<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0come. When it comes to television, I especially love it if a finale hints at how the next season will be completely different from the last. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s why I opened this review as I did: I really believe that\u00c2\u00a0Deep Space Nine<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0is gonna commit to what they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve done here. I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t feel doom and gloom because of this finale.<\/p>\n
Instead, I see possibilities. Jake is now a war-time reporter, and we finally get to see him use that writing ability of his. Rom is working as a Starfleet spy in Quark\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bar. Kira and Odo must work together again, despite all the awkwardness, while being under Gul Dukat.\u00c2\u00a0Again<\/i>. And then there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Jadzia and Worf, split up on the\u00c2\u00a0Defiant<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0and the\u00c2\u00a0Rotarran,\u00c2\u00a0<\/i>respectively, who promised to get married when the war was over. But the crowning achievement of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Call to Arms\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is the way the writers position Sisko to be the most important character of all. After designing a way to destroy most of the important technology on the station, Sisko prepares a message of hope for the old inhabitants of DS9 that also acts as a warning to he Dominion.<\/p>\n
This is just a temporary setback. Benjamin Sisko, who mined the entrance to the wormhole, who is the Emissary to the Prophets, who can calculate his way out of nearly any situation, is coming back. And when he does, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to take DS9, too.<\/p>\n
I cannot fucking wait for season six.<\/p>\n
The video for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Call to Arms\u00e2\u20ac\u009d can be downloaded\u00c2\u00a0here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n – I am now on Patreon<\/a>! There are various levels of support, from $1 up to whatever you want! You’ll get to read a private blog, extra reviews, and other such rewards. I POST A LOT OF CUTE PHOTOS, OKAY. Think of it like a private Tumblr blog that only SPECIAL PEOPLE get to read.<\/b> In the twenty-sixth and final episode of the fifth season of\u00c2\u00a0Deep Space Nine, the station faces down an imminent invasion. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch\u00c2\u00a0Star Trek.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[640,614],"tags":[615],"class_list":["post-5918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-deep-space-nine","category-star-trek","tag-mark-watches-star-trek"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5918\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n– I have updated my list of conventions and events for the remainder of the year and much of next year.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Check the full list of events on my Tour Dates \/ Appearances page.<\/a>
\n– My Master Schedule<\/a> is updated for the near and distant future for most projects, so please check it often.\u00c2\u00a0My next Double Features for Mark Watches have been announced here.<\/a>
\n<\/b>-\u00c2\u00a0Mark Does Stuff is on Facebook!<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0I’ve got a community page up that I’m running. Guaranteed shenanigans!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"