Current Events > I started watching Star Trek: Deep Space 9

(+) Yeah! (+)

Mainly cause my YouTube has been pumping out 'Recommended for you' clips of it for some time.

Is there anything i should know beforehand?
I feel like these shows often expect the viewer to already be familiar with alot of things from previous shows.
Voyager did that with the Maquis

Like, is the Bajoran-Cardassian conflict supposed to be common knowledge, or are they doing in medias res?

Same with that girl that apparently has a symbiote in her
(Is she like a Stargate Goa'Uld or what?)

Did it receive the same HD/enhanced treatment that TNG did?

No idea.
Watching it on Netflix

I only skimmed through bits and pieces of Next Gen.
Were these Cardssian Wars a big deal?

Not that I recall, also the voyager tie in was crap no one really cared about iirc

The Bajor/Cardassia stuff was touched on in later seasons of TNG but gets 99% of its development in DS9 so you're good. Trills also had like, one or two appearances in TNG and get 99% of their development in DS9.

ROBANN_88 posted...

Voyager did that with the Maquis

DS9 was forced to use the Maquis to set up Voyager. The funny thing is that due to the difference in writing quality, DS9 used them way better and more interestingly than Voyager who pretty much just forgot they existed.

ROBANN_88 posted...

Like, is the Bajoran-Cardassian conflict supposed to be common knowledge, or are they doing in medias res?

ROBANN_88 posted...

Were these Cardssian Wars a big deal?

Not in any show, no. I think by the time of TNG, they'd established a peace treaty and a DMZ and that's basically where DS9 starts off.

TNG established that Cardassia occupied Bajor, but it was mostly used for background of a recurring character named Ro Laren. IIRC, Ro Laren was meant to be in DS9, but they replaced her with Kira.

ROBANN_88 posted...

Same with that girl that apparently has a symbiote in her
(Is she like a Stargate Goa'Uld or what?)

There's one episode with the Trill in TNG, but they're fairly different from how they're portrayed in DS9. For example, the Trill in TNG is one of your classic Star Trek forehead aliens. They were going to have that in DS9 but - and I'm not making this up - the executives thought having a fucked up forehead would distract from Terry Farrel being hot, so she got spots instead.

Probably worked out for the best because Terry Farrel has sensitive skin that probably wouldn't have loved strapping a new forehead on every day.

Oh, and from what I know of the Goa'uld (which isn't much, mind you), they're pretty similar. The main difference is that Trill symbiotes don't completely dominate their host. The purpose of joining is that the symbiote melds with the host so that they're essentially one singular person. When one host dies, the symbiote then carries on the memories of that person to a new host who then inherits them. So Jadzia Dax is both a twenty-eight year old woman and a three-hundred year old worm, combined into a single person.

They're also much rarer than what I believe Goa'uld are. So they won't meld with someone for like espionage or anything like that, Trills have a lengthy screening process and have to do a lot of work to be chosen as a host.

pegusus123456 posted...

They're also much rarer than what I believe Goa'uld are. So they won't meld with someone for like espionage or anything like that, Trills have a lengthy screening process and have to do a lot of work to be chosen as a host.

Well... An episode does reveal that way more Trill are capable of becoming hosts than they let people know! I can't remember exactly why off the top of my head.

ROBANN_88 posted...

I only skimmed through bits and pieces of Next Gen.
Were these Cardssian Wars a big deal?

IIRC to the Cardassians eventually yes.

To the Federation it was more of a minor border war.

Though for both sides it was a very low intensity war most the time more on off skirmishes then a "proper war"

It's mostly background lore then kinda helps set the relationship between Cardassia and the Federation as well as have some character relevance for a character or two and the plot of a handful of episodes. Most the stuff you need to know you would know just watching DS9 though.

The Treaty signed as a result of it actually has rather large implications for a major story arc though but you get the relevant stuff in DS9 itself.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]


I mean, i didn't "skip" TNG.
It was wrong of me to say i skimmed bits and pieces.

I did watch most of it, probably every ep over the years up to late teens, but it was always just "oh, there's an episode on tv, might as well", rather than a conscious effort

The Federation/Cardassian war is brought up in season 4 of TNG, and it's revealed that O'Brien fought in it before joining the Enterprise crew, and still has a dislike for Cardassians as a result, but you don't actually see it, it's more like they created the Cardassians as a new baddie, and rather than spending time giving them an origin/first contact story, they basically just said that there was already a history there and cracked on with it.

Given the timings mentioned in their first appearance (the war has been over for less than a year, IIRC, and the peace treaty is still being worked out) this means that the Federation were at war during the opening season of TNG and not only did the fleet's flagship not take part at all, it never even once got brought up in conversation.

To be honest, as long as you know who O'Brien and Worf are, then for the most part the only TNG lore you need is the Battle of Wolf 359 to get Sisko's situation in the pilot.

There are guest appearances from Q, Vash, Tom Riker and the Duras Sisters, and Gowron has a pretty significant recurring role, but while you would definitely benefit from having seen their TNG episodes, you get pretty much all the information about them you need recapped during their appearances if you haven't seen them on TNG, so you won't be totally lost.

Here's a good list of episodes in TNG that are related to DS9:

Best of Both Worlds: 1 and 2
The Wounded
Chain of Command 1 and 2
Birthright
Ensign Ro

If you want to also get into all of the machinations of the Klingon faction and Gowrons ascension then you can also watch:
Sins of the father
Reunion
Redemption pt 1 and 2

And if you're still looking for more supplemental material you could also watch the Maquis establishing episodes:
Journeys End
Pre-emptive Strike

There's even more stuff you could watch that is stretching it and honestly excessive and not really needed, the TOS episodes:
Mirror Mirror
Trouble with Tribbles
Errand of Mercy
Day of the Dove

Edit: I guess if you really want to split hairs you could also watch the episode where Thomas Riker is discovered too because he makes an appearance in 1 episode of ds9 as a maquis

this Garak guy seems a bit odd

ROBANN_88 posted...

this Garak guy seems a bit odd

Maybe because he was hitting on Bashir.

maybe i don't fully understand all the little pieces of Star Trek right, but how does a Ferengi bar or restaurant stay relevant in a world with replicators?

ROBANN_88 posted...

maybe i don't fully understand all the little pieces of Star Trek right, but how does a Ferengi bar or restaurant stay relevant in a world with replicators?

It's still a good place to hang out, gamble and unwind (oh and the holosuites!)

Also, while replicated food/drinks may be ok, I'm pretty sure there's a difference between the real thing.

Episode 4, a disease is spreading on the station.
they call for a complete quarantine, and yet the bar refuses to close, spreading it all over.

this hits a wee bit different now than i think it did at the time

ROBANN_88 posted...

maybe i don't fully understand all the little pieces of Star Trek right, but how does a Ferengi bar or restaurant stay relevant in a world with replicators?

Replicated food isn't 1:1 to the actual thing in terms of flavor/effect (Example: Real alcohol vs. synthehol; not as easy to get drunk off the replicated stuff.). Think of it as real chicken vs vegan chicken. You can taste the difference. He likely replicates most of his food (to cut more costs for greed obviously lol) but has a lot of real drinks there. Plus, I'm willing to bet Quark has access to illegal food/drink items to profit off of that you wouldn't find programmed in any standard replicator. On top of that, the holosweets he has there (and again, Quark is willing to allow questionable/illegal programs for the right price). You can also gamble there as well.

And that's not even factoring in all the other illegal stuff Quark dabbles in outside of the food industry...

ROBANN_88 posted...

Episode 4, a disease is spreading on the station.
they call for a complete quarantine, and yet the bar refuses to close, spreading it all over.

this hits a wee bit different now than i think it did at the time

Quark is Deep Space 9's cheat code. He is not just unbound but antagonistic to starfleet ideals which allows the writers to do a lot of stories that would be pretty much impossible on TNG. Not just antihero stuff but straight villain stories

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]


No you don't. I skipped TNG and am in season 6 of DS9 and I've had zero issues.

sabin017 posted...

Did it receive the same HD/enhanced treatment that TNG did?

No. I don't think the TNG remaster sold enough to justify more and Voyager and DS9 have problems with CGI assets. Or something like that. Some guy on YouTube has been using AI to enhance a lot of DS( (and a few other scenes from other shows) lately. Not perfect, some can see the imperfections. I don't really notice.

Smiffwilm posted...

Replicated food isn't 1:1 to the actual thing in terms of flavor/effect (Example: Real alcohol vs. synthehol; not as easy to get drunk off the replicated stuff.). Think of it as real chicken vs vegan chicken.

It also depends a little on the episode as to the disparity between real food and replicated, but another caveat is that replicators are not created equal; they have different 'resolutions' that impact the complexity of what they can produce.

A community replicator is like a TV frozen dinner (but healthier), while Quark's is closer to restaurant quality. Quark also imports a lot of delicacy foodstuffs which replicators cannot capture their nuances well.

would replicated flour, then baked manually into bread be better or the same as just replicated bread?

For basic otc flour I don't think there'd be much difference.

I finished it last year. What a great show. Felt like a whole different dynamic.

The Trill symbiotes are closer to the Tokra than the Goauld.

MorbidFaithless posted...

Well... An episode does reveal that way more Trill are capable of becoming hosts than they let people know! I can't remember exactly why off the top of my head.

They were worried that if everyone knew that most Trill were capable of hosting symbiotes that they would end up being bought and sold, and even stolen.

Human Society, as well as some others, I assume no longer have money. And the ones that do, their monitory systems are based around latinum instead of gold, as lafinum cannot be replicated. Latinum, In its pure form is liquid at room temperature, so it is alloyed with gold to create a solid that can be easily exchanged.

ROBANN_88 posted...

this Garak guy seems a bit odd

My favorite character in my favorite Star Trek

mustachedmystic posted...

The Trill symbiotes are closer to the Tokra than the Goauld.

They were worried that if everyone knew that most Trill were capable of hosting symbiotes that they would end up being bought and sold, and even stolen.

Damn

MorbidFaithless posted...

Damn

I may be remembering this wrong, but wasnt Dax stolen once?

mustachedmystic posted...

I may be remembering this wrong, but wasnt Dax stolen once?

Yeah, by John Glover. I don't know why I remember it like that lol.

well, seems like Q gets around a bit

ROBANN_88 posted...

well, seems like Q gets around a bit

Great episode, really shows the difference between pikard and sisko

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

Might also be that replicators are restricted from creating alcoholic substances? No idea just a theory.

Just enjoy it. Its a show that grows a lot. The journey is well worth it. I don't think Star Trek will ever feel as real as DS9 had made it feel. It was lightning in a bottle between the cast and crew. Everything meshed together so well. You're in for a treat. Like every Star Trek from the era the first few seasons are a bit slow but it's worth it to learn the characters.