Star Trek Retro Review: "Paradise" (DS9) | Grab Bag
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- Опубліковано 11 жов 2024
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#startrek #review #startrekds9 #startrekdeepspacenine
Sisko going back into the box is one of his most badass moments in the whole series.
I agree,even better than Picard seeing four lights
My favorite joke of yours regarding this episode was in your Trek Acutally - "You, know i thought Alixis was some kind of cult leader, but its actually far worse. Shes a self-published author."
Sisko: I can't join your cult. The Bajoran wormhole alien cult asked first, so they've got dibs.
Why be a follower when you can be a leader.
"Also they are actual god-like entities with trans-temporal powers and you couldn't even get a professional publishing contract."
Skyrim taught me I can join as many cults as there are daedric princes! Let them fight over who can reap my soul in the end!
@@EclecticFruit "We remember another mortal who performed this feat... " *Everyone looks at Sheogorath*
"Oh, so sorry. We didn´t realise. We respect dibs."
I agree, she did perform spectacularly; I fucking detested the character SO much, and she did the whole job of lawful evil right to the very end. Strong performance start to finish.
Couldn't agree more.
Kirk would have let the colonists decide her punishment; Picard would have given a long speech about humanity's progress, Janeway would have done a lamer version of Picard's speech. Sisko just does the Princess Bubblegum meme "Nope, nope nope nope stop talking go to jail".
And that's why Sisko is the best Star Trek captain.
And archer?
Archer would be a combination of Kirk and Picard with an awkward gazelle metaphor in there while simultaneously dealing with: a lecturing T’Pol, a fascinated Phlox, a pouting and annoyed Trip, and an inevitability somehow wounded Malcolm. Possibly with Liz Cutler dealing with the bug that was biting people.
Kirk would have slept with Cassandra though.
Respectfully i disagree about Janeway. She would have annihilated this entire society.
Have you seen Tuvix or Equinox? Janeway would have just executed her and called it a day. 😅
Alixis is the type of leader who would loudly proclaim her society "the greatest village in the world" even as her son is dragging another corpse out of the hotbox.
Meg: Help me! I'm dying of a routine disease!
Alixis: Shut up, Meg.
I like what did with family guy reference!!! Nice one mate!!!
Yeah, shut up Meg!
Heartily agree about the 'good theatre' aspect of Sisko confronted by an opposite villain. Reminds me strongly of the scene with Weyoun where they discuss the minefield outside the wormhole, and very quickly both become aware that their only mutual goal is 'let's both try to leave this room alive'. Sisko has learned a lot by then about when to stay restrained; he barely moves while Weyoun executes a complicated political dance around him and finally leaves, both of them alive, both of them knowing the war is inevitable.
I really feel for Sisko and O’Brien in this episode. I am also stuck on a planet with shitty politics and no way to beam up and warp back to a post-scarcity utopia.
On that last "doesn't get good until season 3" note - the older I get, the more I appreciate the first 2 seasons of DS9. They're far from perfect and the show is still finding its footing outside of The Next Generation - but I also really appreciate Michael Pillar's perspective as showrunner. Episodes like Duet, Paradise, Cardassians, Necessary Evil, and Sanctuary. You could really tell he was really freeing himself from the Gene Roddenbery storytelling box as he used to call it - and also being very pointed about the indigenous aspect of the Bajorans relating to Palestinians during the formation of Israel and after, Indigenous American tribes, and also diaspora Jews throughout history - and I would have been curious to see where he would have gone with DS9 had Ira Steven Behr not taken over and Pillar went off to help shepherd the start of the more TNG-like Voyager in at the start of DS9's season 3. Certainly, I love Behr's more cynical yet ultimately hopeful view of the Federation that we get in DS9 season 3 onwards - its my favorite Star Trek show for a reason - but I am also curious how Pillar would have molded the show too.
Season 2 DS9 > Season 7 TNG.
Same here. I watched DS9 from the beginning and I always liked it, but as a kid I kinda bought into the "Star Trek shows don't get good until season 3" conventional wisdom by default, and once they got the Defiant, and then Worf showed up the year after that, I was like "Now it's gonna get good!" Watching it now, though, I really like those early seasons, and even though I love the show we got (it's my favorite Trek series, too, as you know), I sometimes wish we'd gotten seven years of the show as it was in the first two seasons.
DS9 was weaker in the first two seasons, but by season 2 the writers had started seriously building up what was to come.
This was a competent standalone episode in that era.
When your weaker first season includes an episode as good as "Duet" you don't have a weak first season.
@@SlimSpida It didn't help them that several Season One episodes were re-used/rejected TNG episodes (Babel, The Storyteller). Terrible way to hobble a show from launch.
11:12 O'Brien says to the colonists: "THIS. IS. MY. BOOMSTICK!"
“IT NEITHER LOOKS LIKE A STICK, NOR DOES IT GO BOOM - BUT THAT’S STILL WHAT IT IS!”
Yeah but "THIS IS MY FIZZ-BRICK!" doesn't have the same ring to it.
"Paradise" isn't always paradise. Even a utopia can be too good to be true to the point of being a dystopia.
Calling them, "...her Unabomber manifestos" is a stroke of eloquence! Well done as always ❤
in my head cannon, when they cut to O'Brian, it was to cover Sysko from giving her the finger lol
Maybe if he had given her the finger, she would have mellowed out.
Star Trek's 'peasant clothing' is my post-pandemic concept of my 'fancy going outside' clothes 🤣
I like that I can see a single frame of a DS9 episode and instantly go "Oh yeah, that one! I liked that one!" most of the time
I always loved this episode, but I feel the ending doesn't quite do it. I think the realization that this was all a lie would have inspired a more visceral reaction from at least some of the community. The question of the needless dead would have persisted and I think there would have been at least few that would have gone with Sisko. However, you make a convincing argument at the end of the video. I don't know that I'm convinced, but I see it all a little clearer now.
Every time you say Sisco and O'Brien .....and you said it a lot, my brain kept anticipating Sisco and Ebert
I can just imagine Avery Brooks staring ol Rog into pissing his pants on camera. I wouldn't dare argue with that man.
"...And I don't give a DAMN whether you found the comic relief amusing. The PLOT made no SENSE!"
Alexis is played really well, and always has this undercurrent of unyeidling zelotry about her. I think there is some commonality in her makeup as a person and Winn that also provides a nice tonal backdrop, even though Winn is still in her early days.
Good stuff Steve! One of my favorite DS9 episodes. So many DS9 episodes hold up well over the years because of their strong foundations as solid stories.
we also dont get a kira/dax pairing too often in the series so its good to see that too
DS9 is so strong that Kira and Dax’s friendship seems obvious even though they don’t spend all that much time together compared to a lot of other pairings
I like the dynamic between O'Brian and Joseph, too. They connect as a couple of everyman engineers, just regular guys who keep getting thrown into insane situations and, rather than despairing over them, just find a way to make it work. That was an interesting dynamic. Especially at the end. I could see O'Brian doing something like that if he, Keiko, Molly, and Yoshi got trapped on a planet.
10:48 Vinod: “The old ‘pie on the windowsill’ trick. Can’t believe I fell for that”
It always bothered me that the colonists stayed after all that happened. Thank you for the perspective that they were ON a colony ship. They had set out TO FOUND A COLONY, with each other. Even though it wasn't on the planet that was planned, and even though there was a crazy cult leader that betrayed them all, it does make sense that they would say, "hey, this is the colony that we founded, let's keep building it. But less crazy going forward."
The best or most convincing villains are the ones who think they're right, for real. And having a clear objective in life is really tantalizing idea, kind of like how most religions fill in empty spaces in life that we cannot find meaning in. Because, sometimes life and some events in life are meaningless, and unfair, and that's hard to accept.
Villains who think they're in the right is also part of why Dukat works as well as he does. He's delusional as all hell but in his own jungle gym of a brain where he can practice all the mental gymnastics he wants he thinks he's the good guy. At least for most of the show's run before he goes completely off the deep end.
What she did was very morally wrong. So therefore she is always the manipulative controlling villain.
@@TexasCat99 Moral is a learnt concept. I mean just take feeding a starving homeless person with a bought ham sandwich. Sure, you gave a homeless a meal, but you bought a ham sandwich, and therefor you supported a meat industry that put entire species through a holocaust and endanger nature and contribute to making humans later on have to endure severe environmental disasters, like extreme heat waves or typhons etc. There is no black and white, things aren't that easy. Every good deed you do might well be bad for someone else, directly or indrectly.
@@Mintylightwhile morality is subjective, there's a degree when moral relativism becomes logically asinine and your argument would be within that territory. The reason why is this is the 21st century, not the 24th, 23rd, or even 22nd century, so we humans, like all other organic beings require organic material to live so without replicators or protein synthesizers we have to raise organisms in somewhat controlled environments for the purpose of consumption; unless you're going to conclude that plant life is lesser than animal life, it's impossible for humans to survive not at the expense of other creatures. The difference between healthy and unhealthy is ecological balance.
In any case, in this instance it's not even a question of conflicting moralities, but ethics, as ethics are the agreed upon rules, standards, laws, etc by a group of people, not simple individual beliefs.
@@seandobbins2231 Also, you have the "after the fact" factor. Like, no one/few would feel morally okay with killing a child, but if you later found out they turned out to be Hitler, Putin or Trump, you would have been in the right to have erased that child for the better of the majority.
I’ve never understood the people who claim the first two seasons of DS9 are bad. Season 1 gave us Progress and Duet, which are both utterly fantastic. Duet is probably a top 10 episode of the series.
I figured Alixsis became bitter about technology because she felt that people were treating her like some kind of personal assistant. "Alixsia, set an alarm for 2:30 tomorrow.,"Alixsoa, what's the weather forecast for tomorrow", "Alixsis, play a classic episode of 'Matlock' on the main biew screen ".
Ironically she had to understand technology well enough to know how to set up the anti-technology field and how to program the ship to fail,at just the right time.
She also can harness magic because she somehow programmed the runabout to nope out of the system without... I guess she could have turned off the field and used one of the communicators to call the ship and set that course. Never mind.
@@katieell4084 Yep. Made a plan to keep Starfleet from finding their missing officers. Part of her villainy.
Alixis: yes, Captain you heard me right, there’s no computers or traffic lights, we don’t fight we all play nice living in my culty paradise.
O’Brien: did you raise a barn on Monday?
Alixis: of course, and soon we’ll raise another.
Sisko: so it’s a neo-Luddite cult, I thought we accidentally wandered into Star Trek: Generations.
O’Brien: oh no sir, unknown colonies of humans living a pastoral lifestyle are one of the commonest sights in the galaxy. There wasn’t a week on the Enterprise where we didn’t run into two or three of them.
Of course there are good things in cults. Like any abusive relationship, they have to draw victims in somehow.
Love that you’re pushing out great political commentary while keeping up with the Star Trek videos - and for my favorite series! Always appreciate your content, Steve!
Alixus is a great villain. So utterly convinced of her rightness an utterly entitled to use other people -- to fully change and reroute their lives, sometimes allowing them to die -- in order to prove herself right. Always a smile, barely raising her voice... horrifying.
Oh, I remember this episode. I got confused at the end because it didn't end as "O'brien and Sisko saves the day and everyone escape that torturous cult." but some people stayed. With scene two kids look at where they left, it made me go "wait this is how it end?". I had to rant and get a second opinion from my partner that he think this is a cautionary tale. Danger of cult and how some people can never escape it because like you said, feeling nostalgic to the cult. And from confusion it became one of my favorite episode.
Love this episode, and it's a great example of how DS9 created good villains. Alixis doesn't have malicious intent, but she's insidious in how her villainy is really just in forcing her own values on other people. It also brings up a weird running theme throughout the TNG and DS9 years, where it seems like the idea of an "ideal" future is some sort of village-based neo-agrarianism.
There's something to be said about a common story archetype being executed well.
💯
Ah the episode that proves the old adage 'no technology without represent.....ology" a well worn trope indeed!
It takes a lot to get me legit pissed off at a villain The nailed it here with Alixus really nails it here, great writing, and amazing acting.
It's the smugness that gets under your skin, kinda like Kivas Fajos
What really got me , is that statistically, there should be a lot of luddite types living in the federation why force this on others? Just pure ego
Speaking of smugness: I want Alixis face off against Kai Winn in an epic rap battle.
This is probably the most positive review I have seen of this episode. My whole issue with this episode is concept of technology. The moment you place a sharp rock at the end of a stick that is technology. The moment you replace said sharp rock with a piece of metal you made, that is also technology. I am sure the colony had to progress in this technological tree when they made landfall. Where does it stop? That magical anti-Trek tech wouldn't stop from them from making gunpowder. It wouldn't stop them from making steam engines. So what is exactly her stopping point? 24th century technology? Mid century 19th technology?
Sisko defeats Anti- Janeway !
"I have never related to him less", made me laugh out loud! Love your work.
I've really been enjoying your videos lately, Steve. Thanks for making them.
Of course a hotbox is really a thing, but it always felt to me like the one in this episode was a nod to The Bridge on the River Kwai (the "commander" of the prisoners--the highest ranking officer--is put in a similar box), but I haven't gone back to watch that movie after seeing Pardise to check if any details line up.
I was also surprised Steve did not mention TBotRK, but a) he may have thought it too obvious to mention, or b) he may not have _seen_ TBotRK. Steve's an intelligent, well rounded guy, but we all have major cultural touchstones that have escaped us. e.g., I didn't read Moby Dick until I was in my 60s.
There's some really powerful historical symbolism in a white person ordering/coercing a black man into getting into a hotbox in the middle of a farm. They were common methods of "disciplining" slaves and black prisoners in the Old South.
As I recall, in TBotRK, the hot box broke the commander.
@@lennierofthethirdfaneofchu7286 That is _not_ my recollection. He certainly looked like s#!+ when he came out, but I don't remember him yielding on anything. Regardless, I'm not going to rewatch it this morning for verification.
The one thing that always bothered me about this episode is how Sisko and O’Brien get into this situation. They find this world with an unknown colony, which O’Brien quickly determines blocks communication. They beam down… and are surprised they can’t communicate with the runabout. Doh!
Not exactly a new thing in Star Trek. They're always beaming down into places where things are off.
They're lucky that dampening field didn't interfere with the transporter when they beamed down.
@@seandobbins2231 When you beam down from your fully staffed starship, that’s one thing. But when you are the only two people in the runabout to a planet where you likely can’t communicate from? That’s like leaving the keys locked inside the car.
Does she turn herself in for the good of the others or because she's a fanatic who thinks she'll get away with it?
Either way, Alixus is risking facing federation punishment... and federation ac
I was surprised at the ending when some of the people didn't want to leave. I guess they want to keep searching for herbal remedies for toxic bug bites. Great review Steve.💙
Thank you so much for the cult analysis at the end! One of my favourite lower-key episodes. (Also, you’re the first time I’ve heard someone else say “is that a duonetic rock?”, haha)
I thought this episode was going to be about Ben Sisko's prowess at craps and, whoo! Let me tell you, I thought "Well, THAT'S problematic!"
I was much relieved to find out it was just about a cult.
Meanwhile some poor freighter has been hailing the station for hours trying to get docking clearance. Who's in ops while all this is going down?
For me the important thing about this episode is that it really helps define Sisko as his own character and not just The New Star Trek Captain (Who We Didn't Even Make A Captain Because Reasons). Kirk would have gotten into a fistfight with Vinod to allow Spock time to solve the problem. Picard would have given a moving speech about personal freedom that would have convinced people to let Data solve the problem. Instead, Sisko gets back in the box. He's not an action hero, he's not a diplomat, but he is unyielding and unrelenting. He doesn't lead by derring-do, he doesn't lead by soaring oratory, he leads by stubborn example. Sisko got back in the f'n box.
I’m not so sure Alixis wasn’t at least on her way towards running sex cult, if not already there. She did send someone to seduce Sisko in order to get him on her side as a carrot before the stick of punishment. That’s not generally something that happens for the first time with an outsider. It may have been a cult within a cult so not everyone on the colony knew it was happening yet, but things were at least trending that way.
I think its like a metaphor or something idk i like starship troopers for the bug shootin
DS9 certainly got 'better' in seasons 3 onward on average I think. But the show was still pretty good in the first couple seasons. There are admittedly some not so great episodes in the first season, but it wasn't anything like TNG season 1 IMO.
1 - Alixus is part Terran, the direct descendant of Dr. Beverly Hofsteader.
2 - How did she plan to spread her 'good word'? If she has this philosophy and wants to show awesome her model village is, what was the plan? Not a lot of holonet coverage on that backwater.
3 - Hopefully, someone checked on them during the war. I would also hope that the Cerritos might be sent to do some of their patented follow-up.
Mariner: NO! You didn't invest all those years here, they were embezzled from you and used to write a prison self-help series!
Boimler: Yeah, but then she got in real trouble. Her books outsold Dianetics, and those people STILL have lawyers at the ready even today.
It makes sense that Alixis would try hard to prevent Sisko and O'Brien from attempting to make their tech work, because she knows the tech suppression is artificial and that they might figure that out. I don't know if this would have been better per se, but another direction the episode could have taken was to not have so many red flags within the community, and have her insistence that the newcomers immediately assimilate seem out of character to the other colonists.
On a different note, I just noticed the parallels between this episode and the movie The Village.
Part of me thinks Paradise should get more love in “best episode” discussions, but, I get it. It’s from when the show was more episodic and finding its footing, and it’s not as steeped in the lore.
But, the nuance of what it’s saying and the striking image of Sisko getting back in the box! That’s right up there with, “There are four lights!” for me.
This is where I knew DS9 was going to be great, and that it’s not even a contender for “best episode” just shows how great the show was.
I may have been soured by recent history or missed a thread in your summary, but I got the impression that the cult leader lady maybe ought to have thought she could still win. As far as she knew the shuttlecraft was disposed of so they had no real expectation of rescue and wouldn't be taking her away any time soon. Maybe there wasn't room in the episode to setup that kind of a tense stalemate, but in either case, what a relief that the cavalry arrived when it did.
One of my favourite DS9 episodes. I have a hard-wired antipathy to anything like group-think. It started with church attendance in childhood. It was bolstered by exposure to such themed TV show episodes in the 70s and 80s. And extended to inclusion of even more benign cliques in work and hobby environments during adulthood.
A quote attributed to Patton nicely encapsulates my gut-level rejection of anything remotely cult-like: "If everyone is thinking the same thing, no one is thinking."
Prior to watching (which I always put up when I make a comment before watching to not make myself look stupid in case it comes up in the video proper): My biggest problem with the episode is the ending. It would have been more satisfying to have the victims of this little dictator leave the planet while calling out the unnecessary deaths that happened under her little... experiment.
So now what do you think? Personally I think Steve addressed your issue quite well.
I'm with Steve. If I'm Sisko and Julia Nickson offers to rub me down with oil.... "Sorry Chief! Looks like we're staying!". But Sisko and the hot box?! I've had a fear of them ever since I was a kid and I found out that they used them as punishment on Devil's Island. Just the thought... 😱
The colony is basically a backwater small town in America's Midwest.
With Right-wing MTG lady saying we don't need that Federation technology, that is magic and feeds us, cures us.
Seems there are a lot of colonies that reject Federation technology and go as far away as they can from the core paradise.
The last moment is great, after the colonists can chose this life -- the two kids that didn't get to choose that life watching as the starfleet officers leave. There's no dialogue. If it were new trek, someone would have spoon fed that moment to you, the watcher.
There have been few characters I have hated more than Alixus.
I like that this just about the only time in star trek where they encounter a deliberately low tech society and it shows the problems with that rather then the whole plot being about preserving this ideal culture from the space british.
Alixus and The Female Changeling are the two most underrated villains in the whole of DS9 and Trek in general.
Sisko going back into the box surely makes a dramatic point... but by paying with too softly presenting torture.
Besides the heat, dehydration and the unbelievable cramps, leaving out how you pee and shit while being imprisoned in such a box and what a horrible literally shithole this box is... No sane human being would go back by free will. Alixus gets away too easily with torture.
I really like the last shot of the episode - the children. So haunting.
i found the episode compelling but also pretty scary as a kid, despite not growing up in a cult or anything. my assumption is that the methods Alixis uses (and that pretty much all cults use) are ramped-up versions of the most extreme allistic behavioural patterns, and as an autist i have a visceral reaction to those.
well, that and living with a disease where i need medication to simply stay alive doesn't seem compatible with their "paradise"
also, is Alixis as a writer the only person afforded the luxury of a more brainy occupation?
I am quite happy for your review of this episode. You have definitely changed my view on it. I was always very upset about the ending with the colonists just staying there because it always gave me the feeling that this ment, that despite all, Alixis was still somehow winning and proper justice wasn’t or couldn’t be served. The actress who portrayed her certainly did a great job in making me hate her character. However your reasoning for them wanting to stay ultimately makes practical sense and makes the ending more bearable for me even if there will always be a bitter aftertaste.
This is Seti Alpha Paradise!
I was surprised that an episode in which a defiant protagonist gets locked up in a hotbox by a cruel authority determined to break his spirit didn't prompt Steve to make a Cool Hand Luke reference.
I don't like this episode because the ending seems to frame the villain as being right despite the wrongness of her actions. Maybe I'm being overly harsh the episode does make her out to be the villain, but the fact that not one of the colonists decides to leave feels like the writer agreed with her notion of 'rural simplicity is better'.
I guess I've soured over the years as this 'rural simplicity' mindset was taken up with abandon by Star Trek: Insurrection and it feels like a conservative streak has invaded the writers of trek in that era of the franchise.
its always the quiet ones you have to watch out for
The first two seasons has some great episodes. Let's not forget that Duet was S1. However, it's obvious they were still figuring out characters and there were plenty of missteps until season 3 when the series gets consistently better.
This one strikes me as a little odd in detail. Aren't these future Federation people "over" their materialistic past? What is this "back to nature" thing? Do people of the Federation need a low tech movement? Aren't they at peace with technology? No genetically engineered post-humans. No underclass of exploited robots. All about bettering themselves and exploring. Alixus position makes more sense to us in our time, but wouldn't it be odd to them? Antiquated?
Well, not really. Yes, the people of the 24th century were "at peace with technology" in a sense, but they also relied heavily upon it. This sort of movement was one to deny the reliance of technology in favor of a "more natural" existence. This is also not new in Star Trek, as there are episodes in both TOS and TNG that cover this concept, though I think TNG did it best.
this episode format is a weird combo of Lone Wolf and Cub and Atlas Shrugged.
Yep. It's a solid episode. The cult are perhaps a bit like the Amish, although the Amish aren't actually as anti technology as they're often perceived to be. They will use technology, they just feel too much of it stops them working together as a community, which is perhaps the sort of philosophy the cult in this episode might adopt now they're able to use it again and their leader is gone.
I'm sure the equivalent of a nerve pinch is standard training in Starfleet Academy, I mean, where else would everyone also learn the hammer-fist maneuver?
Here's my question and massive plot hole...how did Alixis find the planet more than 10 years ago, set up the duonetic field, and cause the colonists get lost on a planet in the Gamma Quadrant 10 years ago if Sisko only discovered the wormhole (and is unquestionably the first one to do so) 2 years ago in 2369?
Why'd they name it that? Are they stupid?
More seriously, I love this episode. Control freaks can go... get the unconditional love they lack. Or something clever
If any StarFleet captain deserved to flip anyone off, it’s Ben Sisko.
Great video Steve, whatever, but here's what I wanna say:
You're fast approaching QUARTER OF A MILLION subscribers... what are you gonna do to commemorate the occasion?
Gangsta rap song?
80s power ballad?
Thrash metal anthem?
Was Sisco crawling back into the box equivalent to Picard's "There are four lights!"?
You're right, there are duonetic fields all over the place.
I always thought this could have been a good TOS episode with Kirk and Scotty in the main roles.
In a world full of people rejecting medicine due to being saturated with woo bs on social media, this episode makes me so much angrier than it did in the 90s
Haven't even watched the video yet and I know Steve is gonna have some top notch commentary on this one
I never knew people thought the show didn't get good until season 3.
Some wackos still think TNG didn't get good until Season 4. (Same with The Simpsons, come to think of it.)
I tend to like the earlier seasons of shows (trainwrecks like TNG Season 1 notwithstanding), since it's clear the shows are still experimenting, figuring out how to make things better, and doing good things for the first time. Once a show finds its bearings, it's usually just a matter of time before they get too comfortable, complacent, confident that any idea would work so it's not worth thinking too hard about it. It becomes less of an experiment and more of a routine.
For an episode called Paradise, I was expecting more catgirl bartenders and pool tables filled with water.
Ahhh yeah... a Star Trek Captain getting tortured episode. The best episodes have torture . Kirk, Picard, Sisko. Good stuff. Nothing tests a Star Fleet captain's character like getting tortured.
Same thoughts on Paradise. It’s a favourite pre Dominion story.
"Resistance"! Thanks for picking a season 2 episode of Voyager, Steve. Speaking of a Star Trek show where the claims that the show gets better in the later seasons are, well, bunk.
This is a good episode, but I can't help thinking that this is one where they wrote Sisko kind of like Picard. It feels like much more of a Picard story to stick to his duty and principles. Duty is important to Sisko of course, but I wouldn't necessarily call it a character-defining trait.
Sisko's a stubborn man. Picard would likely have used his words to set an example; Sisko leads as much with his actions.
When first watching I got the impression that part of the message was this is how most starfleet leaders would behave. In a way one could argue starfleet as a seldom cult that has indoctrinated huperloyalty in its officers but instead of using gaslighting, manipulation and passive aggressive torture, they use sound arguments built on a foundation of strong education and am actually paradise like society to prove it works.
Theres something about the way that communities leader speaks, she sounds like shes forcing herself to speak nicely to people. Msybe its just me, but its unsettling.
I have to say, the cutting away was good, but the cutting away to the runabout is flying away issue gave away too easy that the anti-tech field was fake. Not that I have any idea how it didn't affect itself, since all Starfleet tech is meant to be affected by the field
If it were Knight Rider KITT would also Turbo Boost for some reason
I know this came out first, but this episode is the counterpoint to Insurrection, aka my least favorite Trek movie. So I like this one, and Cisco going back into that box is badass.
That said, the ending doesn't work for me, because a colony of what a few dozen people doesn't have enough genetic diversity to survive.
Now that the colony is no longer cut off from the galaxy, that's no longer the problem it used to be. People who like the idea of backbreaking manual labor can come and people who don't want to marry their cousins can go.
Thanks so much for Star Trek reviews. It’s a bit of escapism that’s important today - perhaps more than ever. I wonder if another channel to separate the ‘escapism’ (yes I know no more political show has ever been but on TV) from the more directly political would be a good idea. Some days even seeing the former president’s name is a challenge.
People like to come down on Sisko for that time he destroyed a planet's atmosphere. But if he'd had that idea in this episode...nah. I suppose there are too many innocent people involved.
The episode did a good job of exploring cult dynamics.
Wait... the runabout flew slightly off target toward a star whose gravity whipped it around and flung it back out another direction... and it didn't go back in time to save some whales? I'm confused. :-)
The first two seasons of DS9 were my favorites. As the show shifted away from Bajor and Cardassia and towards the Gamma Quadrant and the Dominion, I was upset. When they brought in the Klingons in, what, the fourth season, I was outright pissed off. The show was still good and arguably more consistently good than it had ever been, but it still lost something in the process
As for Paradise specifically, yeah, it's good. If I had to knock it for something, I guess it'd be that the episode would have worked just about as well with any of the main cast from DS9 as it did with Sisko and O'Brien. I mean, if Kira and Dax had been stranded with the cult while Sisko and O'Brien looked for them, I don't think it would have changed much.