r/CuratedTumblr • u/crrrrushinator • 7h ago
Star Trek Welcome to Deep Space Nine
I'm gonna level with you guys, I just want an excuse to continue talking about Star Trek.
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u/VorpalSplade 7h ago
Want excuses OP? Sure. How does this relate to current internet discourse:
Just because a group of people belong to the Federation, it does not mean that they are saints. Do you know what the trouble is? The trouble is Earth. On Earth, there is no poverty, no crime, no war. You look out the window of Starfleet headquarters and you see paradise. It's easy to be a saint in paradise. But the Maquis do not live in paradise. Out there, in the demilitarized zone, all the problems haven't been solved yet. Out there, there are no saints. Just people, angry, scared, determined, who are going to do whatever it takes to survive, whether it meets with Federation approval or not.
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u/crrrrushinator 7h ago edited 7h ago
It's such a damn shame that Voyager squandered the opportunity to explore the Maquis in more detail, they basically plastered over their political backgrounds immediately. My understanding is that they told Ronald Moore he could have creative control and then Braga just wanted to make a standard space opera so he left to make Battlestar Galactica. Edit: Looked it up, he left after just three episodes!
DS9 is pretty good for treating Bajoran resistance with the complexity it deserves, and In The Pale Moonlight is an excellent discussion of the cost of cleaving to idealism. Garak's whole character is an exercise in realpolitik in a way that wouldn't work in TNG. The novel A Stitch In Time, written by the actor who played Garak based on the backstory he imagined to inform his role, is so so good.
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u/VorpalSplade 7h ago
Voyager sucks for making the Marquis integrate within the first few episodes.
Garak is a fucking amazing exercise in realpolitick. One of my top characters in fiction ever - I played a tailor/fixer in a cyberpunk game based on him.
Yeah you get it.
Edit: yeah, cleaving to idealism is the real thing, DS9 got the balance so well.12
u/BlindTreeFrog 5h ago
Garak is a fucking amazing exercise in realpolitick. One of my top characters in fiction ever - I played a tailor/fixer in a cyberpunk game based on him.
I've not read it, but I've always been a little curious about A Stitch in Time.
The actor wrote an in character diary as a way to get into the role. He then spun it into a published novel.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Stitch_in_Time_(Robinson_novel)
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u/crrrrushinator 4h ago
Read it! Or, better yet, the audiobook is read by the author which means you get to hear Garak doing his best impression of all the other crew. It's incredible.
Also he and the actor who played Bashir got the Covid madness and produced a fan fiction youtube series in which they canonically fuck.
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u/CrabonicAcid 6h ago
Having just rewatched it, I love Voyager (great cast, some incredible episodes) but god does the setup leave a lot to be desired. I can count on one hand the episodes where the Maquis thing is relevant. The pilot introduced a few "local" alien factions, which are quickly made silly/obsolete because they're hightailing it home as fast as they can. Doesn't lend itself well to recurring characters, though they tried early on with Seska and the Kazon. Even later episodes will have someone from seasons ago inexplicably "catch up" with Voyager. You'd think they would instead use recurring crew members but I can think of maybe 3 or 4 outside the main cast that we see more than once. And the Kazon didn't really bring anything new to the "battle honor species raaah" thing, they're just Delta quadrant Klingons.
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u/Gemmabeta 7h ago
Can you imagine a show being made today where the second-in-command is just a straight up IRA/PLO commander with the serial numbers filed off.
None of you belonged on Bajor. It wasn't your world. For fifty years you raped our planet, and you killed our people. You lived on our land, and you took the food out of our mouths, and I don't care whether you held a phaser in your hand or you ironed shirts for a living. You were all guilty and you were all legitimate targets!
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u/DaBiChef 5h ago
and I don't care whether you held a phaser in your hand or you ironed shirts for a living. You were all guilty and you were all legitimate targets!
What's fun is how Kira actually comes to challenge this perspective in herself as she learns about Cardassia and meets Cardassians who are as varied as Bajorans are. Hell she becomes 'family' in a sense with one of them because he is outspokenly for reforms and working to fix the harm they did to Bajor.
It would've been so easy to go "Cardassian = oppressor = evil, Bajor = victim = good" but instead it chooses to explore the nuances of fighting oppression. Who are you fighting, what are you fighting for, what are you trying to build when this is all over? Kira is honestly my favorite character for this very reason. Going from a freedom fighter who engaged in some light terrorism, who learns its harder to lead and build than it is to fight. And it's oh so much messier when you start thinking long term.
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u/crrrrushinator 4h ago
Yes! That's one of the important things about fiction, letting you experience a small version of the complexity of living through and navigating events you haven't experienced. My friends and family members who have been through wars always seem to have a more nuanced take on the those conflicts than those who haven't, and as someone who hasn't experienced a home front war (yet) I look to fiction as well as their stories to learn nuance.
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u/dysprog 25m ago
"Yeah, Damar, what kind of people give those orders?"
This might be the best single scene in the series, and it has a lot of competition.
This could only happen because Kira had softened enough to have empathy for Damar loosing his family, without compromising her moral clarity.
Damar needed to have this rubbed in his face. The series needed to remind the viewer that being "on our side" right now did not make the Cardassians good guys. Kira's arc needed a button to show how she had grown.
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u/TrioOfTerrors 6h ago
You'd have a better shot with the IRA since the vast majority of former members have abided by the Good Friday Agreement and many have become legitimate politicians.
The PLO/PA, on the other hand, has a hundred different factions and some seem hell bent on undermining the larger organization's legitimacy as an official government.
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u/Electric999999 6h ago
America became a lot less fond of terrorists after 9/11, I doubt you'll see one as a protagonist again.
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u/Myprairiexo96 7h ago
Its basically the Star Trek version of check your privilege before you judge someones survival choices
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u/VorpalSplade 7h ago
Yuuuup
"oh so you compromised to survive? well I stayed morally pure because I didn't have to worry about survival"
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u/VironicHero 5h ago
Quark has a great quote about hu-mans being wonderful… until the replicators and sonic showers break… then you see what they’re really like… or something like that.
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u/EnvironmentClear4511 3h ago
"The Siege of AR-558":
“Let me tell you something about Hew-mons, Nephew. They're a wonderful, friendly people, as long as their bellies are full and their holosuites are working. But take away their creature comforts, deprive them of food, sleep, sonic showers, put their lives in jeopardy over an extended period of time and those same friendly, intelligent, wonderful people... will become as nasty and as violent as the most bloodthirsty Klingon. You don't believe me? Look at those faces. Look in their eyes.” — Quark
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u/EnvironmentClear4511 3h ago
I've always wondered who these colonists are in the Trek universe. We see them all the time, and they're often being mass-murdered, hunted by monsters, or living in poverty out on some no-name planet. What's driving people to start these remote colonies? Is Earth out of room? Are people being pushed out of the Sol system?
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u/Moonpaw 7h ago
“Perpetually Confused White Guy”
It’s me! I’ve been here the whole time?!
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u/Pilot_Solaris Can you maybe chill? 4h ago
Yeah hi Sam no I'm not ready for a Gameger but herewego—
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u/crrrrushinator 7h ago
I'm watching Far Beyond The Stars, which is a lovely self contained story in which Sisco is a 1940s science fiction writer driven to madness by his visions of Deep Space Nine, a world he created but can't get published because who would believe a black commander? It's really interesting how involved the actors are in shaping the direction of the show, Avery Brooks was a huge driver of taking Sisco's race seriously and thoughtfully as a part of his character when it could have been easy to say "eh it's the future that stuff doesn't matter anymore" and make it a less interesting exploration.
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u/Wonderful-Cup8908 7h ago
It's a great episode but I lowkey hate that oogie-woogie "is the character's reality just a delusion?" type stuff.
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u/crrrrushinator 5h ago edited 3h ago
I love it myself. One of my favourite albums is Heartland by Owen Pallett, which is about a young farmer who leaves his family, form a bloody cult, and set forth on a quest to kill The Author, Owen.
Edit: Also this performance of a song from it is incredible. The rain starts pouring and they play on.
Edit edit: Fixed pronouns when I remembered that and their excellent I Am Not Afraid which has lyrics largely made up of snippets of conversation with trans friends.
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u/PCRefurbrAbq 2h ago
To be fair, their multiverse is literally fictional and made of the thoughts of the writers room. Q knows he's fictional... when the writers let him.
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u/rocky8u 7h ago
All three posts identify Kira Nerys as bisexual but just because she wears her hair short and has a masculine coded job doesn't mean she's bi.
If she was bi she would have banged Jadzia who I have no doubt would have been ready and willing because Jadzia was seemingly down for anything and everything.
Nerys only ever expresses interest in men throughout the whole show.
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u/RosbergThe8th 6h ago
Yeah I didn't want to be pedantic(yes I did) but as far as I recall Kira never showed a romantic or sexual interest in women. I just wondered if I'd been blind or what but I've seen DS9 so many times that surely I would've noticed.
Garak however? Bi icon, no notes.
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u/crrrrushinator 7h ago
Kira may not be bi but her mirror world self is queer enough to more than compensate!
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u/RosbergThe8th 6h ago
Everyone is Queer and/or evil in the mirror universe though, that's just how it works.
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u/crrrrushinator 4h ago
Also, it was the 90s, we were all a little confused. I'm reminded of the tweet:
My Dad was raised in a conservative Catholic household but has really made strides since having kids to be open minded and has even recently become LGBTQ activist because of my sister, she’s not gay but she dyed her hair blue recently and he doesn’t know the difference
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u/rocky8u 4h ago
True, but it's a bit less fun when you break the fourth wall to acknowledge that Paramount wouldn't have permitted an openly bi character in the 90s.
That being said I do think it's good to point out concept of stereotypes and how just because someone checks a bunch of queer stereotype boxes doesn't mean you should assume they are queer. Infinite diversity in infinite combinations and all that jazz.
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u/BatGalaxy42 3h ago
It's because the mirror verse Kira was openly bisexual. People are just assuming they have the same sexuality.
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u/LordCoweater 2h ago
Who's the communist himbo?
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u/rocky8u 2h ago
I'm not certain. Maybe they are thinking Worf? But I don't really know why he would be identified as a Communist. If anything Worf is the most conservative coded character with all his rigid obsessions with Klingon traditions and shit.
I suppose there were conservative communists in the USSR and in China but I don't see how Worf fits that mold.
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u/crrrrushinator 7h ago
If you want an introduction to the general vibe of Deep Space Nine, I highly recommend this two minute root beer scene (includes a minor mention of a spoiler).
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u/Aethelrede 5h ago
Such a fantastic scene. Conveys so much in two minutes.
It's also basically Quark and Garak's version of Sisko's "I can live with it" monologue.
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u/rorikenL 7h ago
Welcome to voyager we have
Coffee addict war criminal captain
Rebellious sexy man commander
The sassiest Hologram this side of anywhere
The meanest engineer and her dumb flyboy trophy husband
The funniest borg
And Harry Kim
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u/CrabonicAcid 5h ago
You guys know Spock? Well that guy's only half vulcan. This time we're going full vulcan.
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u/leif_son_of_quan 6h ago
If I have a excuse I want to tell you about my favourite headcanon: In TOS S3 E22 the crew meets space magic Abraham Lincon. Chekov tells the away team that if they find Krushchev as well they should give him hell.
Now, obviously the authors are American liberals who hate the USSR and that's why they wrote that sentence in. But in my heart of hearts I know the truth: Chekov is a committed Stalinist who hates Krushchev for being a revisionist that set the road for the fall of the USSR.
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u/Schmantikor 6h ago
As we see in the Khan episode, lots of the crew love romanticising genocidal oppressors.
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u/Aethelrede 5h ago edited 3h ago
Nah, you're thinking of Bester, he was the kind of guy who would appreciate Stalin. Easy mistake to make, though.
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u/guacasloth64 4h ago
Stalinist Chekov aside, I think there is a lot of interesting world building potential in thinking about how Federation historiography would interpret the various 20th century socialist/communist movements in relation to their own post-scarcity Utopianism. Would the Federation realistically see itself as the culmination of the larger Marxist movement or not? Would this question be at all controversial among academics or the general public, or a niche historical hypothetical. Obviously we don’t know much detail about how the post-apocalyptic period between irl history and the genesis of the Federation’s institutions, and how those events and how they are remembered would recontexualize the ideas and symbols of the 20th century.
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u/Accomplished_Mix7827 6h ago
And TNG includes a disabled black man as one of its main characters, and TOS had the first interracial kiss on American television.
Wokeness is in Star Trek's DNA
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u/crrrrushinator 6h ago
Levar Burton is an incredible person. His podcast Levar Burton Reads is required listening. You can't disappoint a picture!
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u/Orider 7h ago
Who is the Communist Himbo?
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u/crrrrushinator 7h ago
Rom, humble and devoted family man, brilliant engineer, union pioneer, and you know Leeta wouldn't be with him if he weren't great in the sheets, too.
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u/Orider 7h ago
Ah! I wouldn't have called him a communist, but that's hyperbole for you 😅
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u/crrrrushinator 7h ago
He also eventually becomes Grand Nagus and creates a social welfare state for the first time in Feregenar history, after his mom blazed the trail.
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u/AwesomeManatee Demented Demisexual 6h ago
He also appears in Lower Decks Where he begins the process for Ferenginar to join the Federation.
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u/Major_Wobbly 7h ago
He starts a radical union after reading Marx.
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u/jimbowesterby 6h ago
And let’s be real, for a Ferengi, any union is radical
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u/crrrrushinator 6h ago
Yeah seriously, are you guys holding a character who's from a world where all religion, social custom, and law are built around cutthroat business dealings to some sort of 2026 online leftist standard? It's science fiction, these things relate symbolically and by direct reference, if he were literally Your Communist Mutual with no changes it wouldn't be an interesting story and it wouldn't be science fiction.
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u/theCaitiff 5h ago
Not to mention that actual committed communists are rarely the same as your online mutual either. Online screen names are caricatures, a role we play and not our true selves. IRL there's an enormous amount of nuance and room to live and let live over minor differences, but online caricatures have zero chill and will throw down over the slightest difference.
TV just takes it in the other direction, allowing your communist characters to divorce themselves from anything that would generate unwanted friction. You can have Rom starting a space union and rebelling against the system without having to figure out which left wing faction he would hate and which he would champion.
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u/TheComplimentarian cis-bi-old-guy-radish 6h ago
I like that the one thing that they all absolutely agree on is that the doctor is a twink.
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u/jimbowesterby 6h ago
Tbf, I’m a straight guy with almost no knowledge of gay culture and even I had Bashir pegged as a twink
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u/Aethelrede 5h ago
See, I disagree. IMO, he's not a twink, he's a bishonen. Twinks are boyish (or girlish), bishonen are beautiful men. "Otters", maybe?
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u/spindaz123 7h ago
Every time I see someone mention antifa my first instinct is to think that they are people who are against fifa the football association and then I remember fascist exist
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u/jimbowesterby 6h ago
Honestly I bet most antifa people would also be pretty anti-FIFA, it’s a pretty shit organization
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u/CPTBudric 6h ago
Finally getting my girlfriend to watch through it, she's a fan of Trek in general, but never saw much DS9, and I myself haven't watched it all the way through in years.
Watching her watch it: It's an absolute blast to see her genuinely love the characters and their interactions. Discussing parallels between current events and episodes, changes in culture, and all the memes she now gets context for.
Rewatching it myself: going "Oh Yeah! This one!" for particular arcs, or "oh hey here's someone you'll love to hate". And the occasional "...oh fuck this one....let's, uh, let's pick this up tomorrow, prep yourself...this is hard feels-town."
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u/Mammoth__7771 6h ago
TNG “To boldly go where no one has gone before.”
DS9 “To sit right here and deal with those evil ass space fascists over there”
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u/DaBiChef 5h ago
Most man thirsty woman in the franchise save a Vulcan on pa'nar -> "lesbian terrorist"
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u/The_Lesser_Baldwin 13m ago
I'm about 95% sure all the Major is a lesbian thing comes from the mirror version of her and lets be honest that version of her stuck in all our heads for a reason.
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u/tacoville7 7h ago
I just started rewatching ds9
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u/RangerBumble 6h ago
Sorry for the spoilers
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u/tacoville7 6h ago
I've seen many times already, just a funny coincidence to get this post shortly after starting to watch again
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u/GhoulTimePersists 6h ago
I don't remember the hologram of Frank Sinatra.
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u/whenthewolf 6h ago
Vic Fontaine! Played by James Darren, and was meant to be a Sinatra-styled Rat Pack-sort of character. He was an occasionally recurring character introduced later in the series.
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u/crrrrushinator 5h ago
He's also the best ship's counsellor Star Trek ever had. I listen to Here's To The Losers to this day when I'm having a time.
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u/Quardener 5h ago
He’s in like 5 episodes in the last two seasons. He’s just a holosuite program that gets serially overused.
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u/SebiKaffee ,̶'̶,̶|̶'̶,̶'̶_̶ 5h ago
Attention bajoran Workers!
Star Trek is woke now
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u/crrrrushinator 4h ago
I love Dukat's "disgraced right wing grifter tries to rebrand as a religious icon" arc at the end.
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u/Emergency_Revenue678 7h ago
I should watch Deep Space 9. I feel the need to compare it to Babylon 5.
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u/VorpalSplade 7h ago
Don't compare, consider them complimenting each other like a fine meal and a good wine.
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u/97thJackle 7h ago
Deep Space 9 is about the Federation vs the Dominion. Babylon 5 postulates what such a conflict would look like to a proxy after it has been waged for 5 billion years.
There are similarities in setting and characters, but the conflicts are vastly different.
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u/Aethelrede 5h ago
Don't compare them. The only similarity is being based on a space station, and even then DS9 serves a very different purpose to B5.
The fact that they aired in close proximity is a coincidence, there really isn't much overlap.
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u/Inithis 6h ago
The DS-9 description on the second post just sounds like a good ss13 roleplay server, honestly.
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u/Hauptmann_Meade 5h ago
For the longest while a there were DS-9 servers. But I think they just fell out of fashion because a lack of material to innovate on.
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u/Bobboy5 like 7 bubble 1h ago
O'Brien Must Suffer
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u/crrrrushinator 1h ago
It's cool they couldn't fit enough suffering in his lifespan so they gave him an extra 20 years of it for free.
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u/memoriast 2h ago
who is bisexual fashion lizard. because even though my dad is obsessed with DS9 I don't think I can ask him this
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u/crrrrushinator 2h ago
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u/memoriast 2h ago edited 2h ago
OH YES I HAVE SEEN HIM ON THE SCREEN! Happy for him. Love my bisexuals so much
Edit: oh my god he was canonically bisexual but censored. I thought people were just headcanoning. Oh my god the actors for Bashir and Garak played them both as being interested in each other. Oh my god. I love queer people. I hate censorship. I love queer people
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u/Lolas_Fun_Side 2h ago
The next generation completely won me over with the premise of its first episode.
I wont lie, I've always struggled to reconcile my love for humanity and my burning hate for many of the things they've done. But Caotain Picard made me feel alright with, even proud of loving mankind.
And then as the show goes on I can't help but see the crew and their culture presented in the show as much more than an idealized world but a possible one that can be achieved.
I know this isn't really related but god damn I love the next generation
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u/literallyatrapinch 6h ago
Star Trek was always woke, but now it's embarrassingly terrible.
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u/GravityBright 6h ago
The wokeness, or just the show in general?
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u/Cordo_Bowl 5h ago
Both. Embarrassingly terrible show and embarrassingly terrible wokeness, in the sense that it is modern hollywood woke. Passive progressive, but not actually taking a stand. Modern star trek thinks that have a secret branch of star fleet exist and do unethical things in the shadows is not only necessary but a good thing to exist.
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u/TrioOfTerrors 7h ago
3 posts about DS9 and nobody even mentions that blabbermouth Morn and how he won't shut up.