The Delta Flyers - Homefront

Episode Date: August 4, 2025

The Delta Flyers is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, Terry Farrell & Armin Shimerman. In each podcast release, they will recap and discuss an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.This week’s episode, Homefront, is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, and Armin Shimerman.Homefront: Sisko travels to Earth when a bombing at a Federation conference is determined to be the work of Changelings.We would like to thank everyone who makes this podcast possible, starting with our Production Managers, Megan Elise and Rebecca McNeill.Additionally, we could not make this podcast available without our Executive Producers:Stephanie Baker, Jason M Okun, Luz R., Marie Burgoyne, Kris Hansen, Chris Knapp, Janet K Harlow, Rich Gross, Mary Jac Greer, Mike Gu, Tara Polen, Carrie Roberts, Sandra Stengel, AJC, Nicholaus Russell, Alex Mednis, Holly Schmitt, Roxane Ray, Tim Neumark, Ian Ramsey, Feroza Mehta, Jonathan Brooks, Matt Norris, Izzy Jaffer, Andrew Cano, Francesca Garibaldi, Thomas Irvin, Jonathan Capps, Chris Garis, Sean T, & Cindy WoodfordOur Co-Executive Producers:Liz Scott, Sab Ewell, Sarah A Gubbins, Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Elaine Ferguson, Captain Jeremiah Brown, E & John, Deike Hoffmann, Anna Post, Lee Lisle, Sarah Thompson, Holly Smith, Amy Tudor, Mark G Hamilton, KMB, Dominic Burgess, Normandy Madden, Joseph Michael Kuhlman, Darryl Cheng, Elizabeth Stanton, Tim Beach, Victor Ling, Shambhavi Kadam, David Wei Liu, Donna Runyon, Nicholas Albano, Andrew Duncan, Randy Hawke, Rob Traverse, Penny Liu, Stephanie Lee, David Smith, Stacy Davis, Heath K., Ryan Mahieu, Kevin Harlow, Megan Doyle, Keir Newton, Mariette Karr, Jeff Allen, & Tamara EvansAnd our Producers:Philipp Havrilla, James Amey, Jake Barrett, Ann Harding, Samantha Weddle, Paul Johnston, Carole Patterson, Warren Stine, Carl Murphy, Jocelyn Pina, Chad Awkerman, AJ Provance, Maxine Soloway, Heidi McLellan, Brianna Kloss, Dat Cao, Stephen Riegner, Debra Defelice, Alexander Ray, Vikki Williams, Cindy Ring, Kelly Brown, Jason Wang, Gabriel Dominic Girgis, Renee Wiley, Maria Rosell, Michael Bucklin, Lisa Klink, Dominique Weidle, Jesse Bailey, Mike Chow, Matt Edmonds, Miki T, Heather Selig, Rachel Shapiro, Stephanie Aves, Seth Carlson, Amy Rambacher, Jessica B, E.G. Galano, Annie Davey, Jeremy Gaskin, Charlie Faulkner, Estelle Keller, Eddie Dawson, Greg Kenzo Wickstrom, Lauren Rivers, Jennifer B, Robert Allen Stiffler, PJ Pick, Preston M, Rebecca Leary, Karen Galleski, Jan Hanford, Katelynn Burmark, Timothy McMichens, Cassandra Girard, Robby Hill, Andrea Wilson, Slacktwaddle, Willow Whitcomb, Mo, Leslie Ford, Joshua Shields, Jim Poesl, Daniel Chu, Scott Bowling, Ed Jarot, James Vanhaerent, Nick Cook-West, Shawn Battershall, Natalie Swain, Brian Heckathorne, Mark Johnson, Nelson Silveira, Ming Xie, & Gordon WatsonThank you for your support!This Podcast is recorded under a SAG-AFTRA agreement.“Our creations are protected by copyright, trademark, and trade secret laws. Some examples of our creations are the text we use, artwork we create, audio, and video we produce and post. You may not use, reproduce, or distribute our creations unless we give you permission. If you have any questions, you can email us at [e-mail] Sponsors:* Check out Mint Mobile: https://mintmobile.com/TDFSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-delta-flyers/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Welcome to the Delta Flyers journey through the wormhole with Quark, Dax, and their good friends, Tom and Harry. Join us as we make our way through episodes of Star Trek Deep Space 9. Your host for today are my fellow Trek actors, Armin Shimmerman, Robert Dunk McNeil, and myself, Garrett Wong, For the complete and exciting version of this podcast, please check out Patreon.com forward slash the Delta Flyers and sign up to become a patron today. You will not regret it. Absolutely. And it's, thank you, Garrett. I hadn't realized our names were song lyrics. They are. Your name is lyrics. This is the Delta Flores podcast, The Musical episode. Welcome. Armin, how are you? I can congratulations on your play extension. Thank you. Yes, we open again. Probably in let's see late September

I don't know which theater it's at yet we're in negotiations with the theater but our play did so well and lasted very shortly and only ran for about two and a half weeks to three maybe and people kept saying you've got to do this somewhere else

you got to do this somewhere else so I decided to help them move it to someplace else and so the four of us will be doing it again and if anyone's in Los Angeles in late September please look us up and come to see the play.

Everyone who's come to see the play really enjoyed it. And a lot of people said, oh, my God, it's closed already? Yeah, well, we're going to reopen. Yeah, that was such a quick run, and I was not able to see it. But I told Kitty, when you guys come back, I'm going to put it on my calendar, and I really want to come out and see it. Thank you. I think you like it.

You know, we're all doing Irish accents. Why did you do it? That's what I want to know. Oh, look at that. I love it. But it's not a deep play, but it's a play that in these bizarre, strange, horrible times, people take solace and comfort them because it's very comforting. It's very comforting.

We should go watch it together, Robbie. That would be great. And also, we've had quite a few of our listeners, our Delta Flyers, listeners, come to watch your play. Yes, they did. And forgive me, I was surprised. One of the patriarch people was there. Patreon people.

Patreon. Sorry, sorry. Patriarch. And I didn't recognize her write-off, but once she said her name, I went, oh, of course, of course. She had brought a couple people with her, and they couldn't have been nicer. So, if anyone out there wants to talk to Rosa Meta. For Rosa Mehta, from Minnesota. Minnesota. Came to Los Angeles.

Wow. Rosa is one of many who came to come see you and support you. If I may, thank you to all those who came, and for all those who thought about, I really do appreciate it a great deal. And I hope you had as good a time as you told me you did have. I hear nothing but great things. So I can't wait for the relaunch and the return of the play. That'll be exciting.

Yeah, they've reported it to us because Robbie and I both do our separate Admiral Zoom calls. And they're always saying, oh, we wouldn't saw her play. It was great. Yeah, people had a great time. For sure. Awesome. All right. We got a couple birthdays.

Okay. This week, we're going to wish a happy birthday to Jenny B on August 6th. Happy birthday, Jenny. Jenny B, happy birthday. Happy birthday, Jenny. And next up, we have Preston M on August 9th. Happy birthday to Preston M. Preston M, happy birthday.

Preston, have a great birthday on August 9th. Do you know I did a series, by the way, that was titled Homefront? Yes, really? Yeah. It was set in the 1940s right after World War II ended and all the soldiers coming home to a small town. It was a fun series lasts a couple of years. Anyway, for this episode, Homefront, here's some poetry.

The wormhole keeps opening like a revolving door. Earth has a changeling. They certainly can't ignore. Nog's school's not going well Joseph is stubborn as hell Earth had better get ready for a war there I go

I like it very good I do I like it and topical and topical but you have me going I thought you were actually when you started talking about

home front the series that you did I thought you were going to break off a home front the series limbrick just seemed like you're about to go to that. And by the way, let me tell you about the show in a limerick form, Armin. Here we go. My haiku for home front.

The changelings reach earth. Siskoto heads to San Fran. Joseph's one tough nut. Okay. You like Siskoto? I like that it's very good. Thank you. Oh, excellent.

I know. Because the other way would have been Odko, which is not as good, right? I mean, that sounds like Petco, and it's just, it's too corporate sounding. So, Cicodo, I like. Cicodo could be like Comoto Dragon. I think that's going to be the high point of today's episode. Thank you. Thank you.

Yes, I agree. Do you have an etymology lesson for us? I do. It's slightly different for me because it's not, I usually do the words that are in the title. Yeah. But I decided Homefront was just, who cared, who cared. Yeah. So I picked another word, changeling.

Oh. Changeling. Oh, good. Okay. I love that. I thought it was Escoto, but no, it's changed. No, I should do that next week. Yes. Changling is one given to change, a fickle or inconstant person, a waiverer, turncoat, renegade, and was originally used, this is the important part for me, was originally used in 1555. And at that time, changeling wasn't spelt the way, well, nothing was spelled the way we know it. Right. But it was spelled C-H-A-U-N-G-E. Whoa.

So that's how our language and spelling has changed over the course of several hundred years. A U in there. Yeah, chongling, chongling. Wow. A turncoat. Interesting. Yeah. Interesting.

Oh, I love, I love etymology, especially anything that lands between like 1,500 and 1,800. Those 300 years to me are just... Language is always morphing. I'm going to show off here. In the 1400s, for instance, English language sounded like this. When that opera with Eschora Souta, the Druth de Marche, to the Rota, and every lane in switch la core, of which vertu, a gendora,

which is the first couple lines of Canterbury Tales. But that's only 100 years before Shakespeare. Wow. Yeah, it's evolved. So 100 years later, it was the language that we read now, with a different accent than we expect, probably. Exactly, exactly. But the pronunciation and the influence were all different.

It's amazing to think about how a language can change in enormously short period of time, 100 years, to go from what I just sounded like what I just said to Shakespeare. When people call Shakespeare old English, I go, no, no, no, it's modern English. Right. Yeah. Okay, thank you for that. Great.

Who wrote this? This is written by Iris Stephen Bear and Robert. Hewitt Wolf. Love them both? We love them both. The two forest animals, wolf and bear. Yes, wolf and bear. I never thought of that, but you're right.

But Wolf and Bear, to me, sounds like an L.A. law firm. Directed by David Livingston. Guest starring, of course, Aaron Eisenberg as Nog, Robert Foxworth as Leighton. Mr. Foxworth was also in Star Trek Enterprise, fourth season episodes of The Forge, Awakening, and Kyrshara. and Foxworth had initially auditioned for the role of Geronigar in Hippocratic Oath, which we've already reviewed, yes. So that was probably where he caught the eye of casting

and then they said, hey, maybe we'll bring him in for this role of Leighton, and so he finally got this, which is great. I like Robert Foxxworth. You know him from other stuff, right? Yeah, very familiar face, yeah. Robert Foxworth is one of the American theater's great actors and probably worked with Renee at ACT for many years. He is an extraordinary actor

and has worked all around the country probably has been on Broadway several times. And I have great reverence for him. I'm happy to say his son, Bo and I are good friends. Robert and I are friends, but not like the way Bo and I are. But he is an extraordinary theater actor. Extraordinary theater actor. Here's some of his Broadway credits,

just a few August Osage County back in 2007 through 9 12 angry men on Broadway judgment at Nuremberg honor Ivanov Kandida love letters the crucible and King Henry the 5th all on Broadway Broadway productions and he did a ton of work at San Diego Globe Theater which is a Shakespeare Festival very illustrious theater all over the country his wife is Elizabeth a was Elizabeth Montgomery. That's right. I forgot about that.

I just, I did know. Did you work with Robert? Robbie M. Did you work with? No, I never did work with him. I was aware of him as a theater actor. That name in the theater in New York back when I wasn't there was a very prestigious name. Yeah, he's a theater heavyweight.

Let's put it that way. Okay. Yeah. And I did work with him in ironically 12 Angry Men. We did a recording of 12 Angry Men and he reprised his role. And I worked. with him on a cartoon series as well. Oh, how funny. Oh, that's great.

Cool. What series? Justice League of America, and I can't remember which episode, but we were there together on the day recording our voices. Okay. Next up, we have Susan Gibney as Benton. Susan played Leah Broms in Star Trek The Next Generation, third and fourth season episodes, Booby Trap, and Galaxy's Child, and also reprised her role of Leo Brahms on, I guess, Star Trek Lower Decks, season three episode. So some Star Trek exposure here for Ms. Gibney. Did she audition for Captain Janeway? You have a feeling that she did, don't you?

Yeah, strong feeling that she was one of the two or three actresses that actually came in and did a screen test. It sounds familiar. I think she did, yeah. And that would have been before this episode. That's correct. That's right. Yeah, that's right.

I think she did. Okay. Also, we have Brock Peters playing Benjamin Sisko's father, Joseph Sisko. Brock also played Admiral Cartwright in Star Trek 4. I just realized, yes. The Voyage Home and Star Trek 6, the Undiscovered Country. So he has played, that's very interesting, that he's played the Admiral, and he's

also playing the Father, because he's not an alien Admiral. You know what I'm saying? So it's his regular face, and now they use his regular face here as the Father as well. so that could be a little confusing for fans. And Brock was very sick when he was shooting this episode up. You can see in the episode that he's... He did look unwell. A little friend.

And I think the writers are aware of that, so they included that in the dialogue. Interesting. Okay. Again, a legend as an actor, a legend. Yeah. And he did a great job in Star Trek 4 and also 6, I felt. Next up, we have Herschel Sparber as Jarsh Inyo, the president of the federation,

residing in an office in Paris, France. As I said before, Herschel and Renee worked together for two years in a Broadway show called City of Angels, and he was the partner of my good friend, Ray Zipho. They were yin-yang. Ray is very short. Herschel is, what, seven?

Six foot nine. Six foot nine, I think we're up. And 300 pounds, yeah. Big guy. So the comedy of, yeah, the big guy and the little guy. Mutton Jeff. Mutton Jeff, yeah. City of Angels is a great musical, by the way.

Kind of a gum shoe story of a detective and film noir style. And I think it ran for two years. And Herschel and Renee and Ray all worth the full for two years. Oh, wow. Yeah, I saw City of Angels back when I was doing this, all my children back in those days. And, yeah, great music. musical. Jim Norton? I think James Norton was the lead. He was the detective. I saw Donna

Murphy, uh, who took over in City of Angels. That's the performance that I saw was with Donna Murphy because Donna was a recurring on all my children at the time when I was doing the soap. So anyway, yeah. So there's a Star Trek connection to City of Angels with Renee and Donna Murphy were both in it. Yeah. Both of you have seen a plethora of Broadway musicals. Are there any musicals that either of you have not seen that you're like, oh my gosh, I need to see fill in the blank. Matilda. Okay.

I've never seen Matilda. Oh, both of them. I would like to see that. Okay. There you go. And I've never seen Le Miz. Wow. Oh, wow.

That's, it's a good musical. Really good musical. I wanted to see the musical runaways back in the late 70s. There was a musical that Liz Suidos developed with a bunch of young actors. playing runaway kids and I never got a chance to see that. I've never seen it. I'd love to see runaways. Did that come out of the public theater? Do you know?

It did. It came out of the public, yeah. All right. We have a co-star. We have Dylan Choffie as the head officer. And that is it for our lineup. If you watch this episode closely, you will see my stand-in, my good friend, David Levinson, appearing without makeup as the waiter in Brock's restaurant. Oh, that's just there all the time.

Oh, that's so funny. it's so funny because I remember the waiter and I remember having a moment where I'm like that waiter looks familiar but it must have been because it's your stand in and I've seen him in life maybe and they finally gave him some lines but and the character's name was broik

that's the fringy that he played but there's David just busing tables how excited was David knowing he did not have to put on any latex my goodness I would certainly have been yes for sure for sure All right, a little bit of trivia. The idea to have Starfleet personnel attempt of military coup was inspired by the 1964 John Frankenheimer film Seven Days in May.

This episode was originally supposed to be the finale of the third season of DS9, with Paradise Lost being the opening of the fourth season. But towards the end of season three, the big wigs of Paramount said that they did not want a cliffhanger finale. So they opted to do something a little bit different. And so the finale was actually the episode, The Aversary, which allowed the producers to sort of give them alternative directions to come into the new season. So there was a change.

Got it. And bring wharf in. Yeah. Yes, and bring warfing. There's a lot of morphing in this episode. Oh, my God. I'm just really surprised by it because I know how expensive that works. Yes.

And there's just, I think I've never seen an episode with this much morphing. Yeah. Yeah, there is a lot of it. I wonder if they got the cost. down after they started doing it a number of times. Maybe it became less, like the first, the pilot episode, those early episodes were super expensive, but then they start to find workarounds or cheaper solutions, maybe, maybe. Makes sense, makes sense.

Okay, so let's dive into the plot of Homefront. Yes. We start off on the promenade. We see that the wormhole sort of undulating, opening, closing, opening, closing. The camera pans over, and we see that Cisco and Dax. are there watching, there's a crowd watching it, opening clothes, but there's no ships coming through. There's nothing triggering it that they can see. Yeah. Um, and Dax fills Cisco in on what's been going on. It's the seventh time in the last two hours. They have a nice walk and talk

where they talk. So immediately I was, I was out of the gate try to guess the director because we don't see the director's name until after the credits. I'm like, oh, I wonder who directed who'd you think it was i thought it looked like a rick colby kind of move at the top but i knew that rick just directed the previous episodes i'm like that's why you said yeah and it turned out it was david livingston but david did a great job this whole opening was kind of a wonder yeah uh that took us until they see odo stepping through an airlock and yeah then dax kind of laughed she thinks something's funny he says like what's what's so funny she goes oh no nothing nothing so we know that there's something between Dax and Odo, right off the top of the scene.

And then Worf calls from Ops. There's a Starfleet priority message. Cisco's got to come right away. Off Cisco goes. And Dax is, she looks very mischievous here to me. Like, I like the storyline of the furniture and stuff. It doesn't really go anywhere, but it was funny to me. But where did it come from, though?

I mean, that's my, and I knew that I saw Arm and go. Makes no sense, but it's a funny comic bit to me. It's very funny. It's hilarious because she's moving it by centimeters, and Odo's so angry. But again, we have no clue that. When did she start teasing him like that? That's my question. And why?

And why? What does she get out of it? What does she get out of it? Nothing. And Quark seems to be in it. So we go to Quarks next. Yes. We start with Quark and mourned in the tightest two shot I've ever seen the two of them in.

But it was funny. It was very fun. because you finish a joke, and then the Andorian says, that's not my antenna, and you wait for a reaction from Morn. And Morn's deadpan, because obviously the makeup doesn't move. There's no expression. But you see his eyes just sort of go up like he's thinking. It was a very funny, good job.

So far, I thought we were going to watch a comedy between the Dax moment. Oh, totally. Like, oh, this is going to be a comedic episode. But so the whole thing of the wormhole opening closing, closing that didn't trigger you at all robbie you didn't think anything nefarious was happening at that at all right because the pejorans thought it was something spiritual like oh yeah prophets are doing something like that yeah i thought it was a natural phenomenon that we were going to discover some sciencey kind of oh the wormholes yeah i don't know i did go to the thought i was like

is it opening and is something cloaked coming through that's what i was thinking you did immediately I did. I was just like, why would it open? But we're not seeing anything. But maybe there is something. That was my first thought. Well, if you thought that, then why didn't Cisco and Dax think that? I think someone should have said something, period. Like, that's just so random. It's never happened before. Yeah. That's all. And they're already on high alert for the Dominion as is. So this is something that they should be looking for. Okay. All right. It's not very smart of them. I have the script of this show in front of me. And just changing the topic a little, but going back, when Odo starts cajoling quark about the moving of his furniture, there is a stage direction here that I think is very funny. Warren knows this is bad news and exits.

So I like really look bad, which he doesn't, by the way. David didn't have him exit. I love that. And I rarely saw those kind of notes. And think about it. Good, bad, and different, Mark was a background performer. So the idea that you have a, you know, text telling what a background performer's thinking and doing is rare, is very rare. There's a big difference on these issues in Canada with the UBCP, the Union, in British Columbia.

And their rules basically say if a background actor is named in the UBCP, the Union, the British Columbia. a background actor is named in the script, then that's a principal actor. If the background actor interacts with a principal actor in a way that furthers the storyline in any way or the action, then that is an actor, not a background actor. And so often we have to be very careful integrating background actors into our scenes because if we cross over those lines,

even if they're not named, like that would have been an automatic Morn described in the script would have been an automatic upgrade. Wow. Without any lines, he would have automatically been up. And as you said, it's an immense close-up, two-shot between two actors. Even if he hadn't been named,

that would have triggered an upgrade for Morn. So, yeah, I wish that some of it, as difficult as it is sometimes as a producer-director up there, we're always walking in eggshells around these things with the background actors trying to make it natural but not upgrade anybody not feature them in any way so that we don't have to pay the money we didn't budget for but it's fair it seems it seems like they've got a rule up there in a way that's that handles that situation very well and we have a precedent on our show which i told mark shepherd many times listen so the precedent

was tiny rome tiny rham plays mayhardoo never said a word and yet got guest star building. Never said it word. As far as I know, there's no action figure doll of Mayhardtou, but there is an action figure doll of Mourne. Of Mourne. Wow.

You had been in the union, Armin, a long time. We've all been in the union. I just served on the national... But you've been active, more active than Garrett or I. In British Columbia, the actors grieve all the time through the union. They go to the union. We get calls literally every other day. We're getting calls about grievances,

mostly from background actors wanting upgrades. Was the union, you know, leveraged in any way by Mark or any of these actors? No, Mark never took advantage of it. You'll have to ask Mark why. I have my suppositions, but can't be sure. But yes, Screen Actors Guild, when it was then Screen Actors Guild,

used to get calls from background people as well. I think it might be slightly, different in in united states versus canada in the united states there was a separate background actors there was screen actors and when they went defunct we this screen actors guilt took on the members of the defunct background and so there probably were rules set up early on in films and early tv because the background actors had some sway and they could ask for certain things or not i don't know if that's true in candid her. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know if there was ever a separate union. I don't think there was. Well, Odo comes in. He's yelling at Quark. Quark seems in on this joke that Dax is doing to me.

He seems definitely in on it. But I was very mad because his furniture has moved two or three centimeters. He's super upset about that. So he's a little type A. He thinks Dax does it while he's regenerating in his bucket. So that means she breaks into his quarters. Correct. Which, again, what now it's possible she got help from quark who can pick a lock but um but she is breaking into his quarters and um true and moving things i i don't mind the moving things it's the breaking into the quarters that gives me pause yeah did anyone ever break into someone's trailer and do something on our somebody took my teeth oh really yeah and i not told you that story oh yes you did you did mention this once before someone broke it took the teeth i told you that i told you that i spent

the night in the trailer a lot. And then one night, a security guard walked right in. She walked in as if she'd gone in there a hundred times before. And when she saw me lying there, she was like, Oh, Garrett, what do you do? I said, I'm just trying to sleep. What are you doing here? I'm just doing my rounds. I'm like, doing your what? You go into each trailer to go do your rounds. So then I started thinking, is she been taking a nap in here? Has she been, like brushing her teeth with my toothbrush? I don't know what's going. I had no clue. I was. I had no clue. I was. really freaked out by that so yeah that is a little bizarre yeah it's odd while otto and quark are discussing rearranging furniture Cisco calls and uh calls odo and they need odo to come to ops

asap so off he goes when we get to ops and uh they're in the middle of a discussion 27 people were just killed by a bomb at a conference uh um including a tholean observer yeah It's a very sober kind of tone in this meeting. They're very much in shock, I guess. This has never happened at a Federation conference like this. 27 people killed. Odo arrives. And then Wharf shows the slow motion enhancement of a vase kind of shape-shifting.

The first of many morphs. Yes, it's the first morphs. So changelings are impervious to bombs now? I don't understand. How did the changeling get out of there? That thing went off with the changelings. in the same room, right? Okay.

Yeah, that kind of doesn't make sense. No. Seems like the changeling would be dead. Unless he was changing so fast that he got out, but it exploded mid-changed. Exactly. Unless this is, because they said this is a bomb of unknown origin. Like they don't know what type of bomb it is.

So maybe it's a bomb that doesn't affect, you know, maybe changelings are somehow impervious to this type of technology or this type of bomb. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, nothing like this has happened in over 100 years. The exact quote from the script is of unknown composition. Unknown composition of that bomb that went off at this conference in Antwerp, Belgium.

I think this is the place where it's... I think so, yeah. Okay. But Cisco says the changelings have reached Earth. So this is not good news. It's a big deal. And it was a lovely racking shot David gave us. He went from a two shot of...

Renee of Odo and Cisco and Rax sent a good one of Cisco. Yeah, David shoots really good-looking episodes. They always look good. He does. And that's the one saving grace after 75 takes per scene. That's right. It always looks good.

It looks beautiful. We go to Odo's quarters and Dax's arranging Odo's sculptural furniture being instructed by Odo and how to move it. I thought, again, the shots were cool, looking through that foreground stuff, all the sculpture, the low angles. Cisco and Odo, we learn, are headed to Earth,

and he does not want Dax coming in his quarters while he's gone. He's very angry at her. Now, you guys will have to educate me. Is this the first mention of the shuttlecraft called Lakota? Yes. It is. Correct. I think so.

Because I don't remember any of the shuttlecrafts having a name, but I could have missed that. Yeah. They were always rivers, weren't they? You talked about the runabout, the runabout shuttlecraft, right? Yeah. Yeah. Well, we lost one in the last episode.

The Orinoco blew up entirely, so they have to replace that. I think the Lakota is the replacement for the Orinoco. Yeah. The Orinoco and Lakota, are those river names? Because they were always using rivers before. Well, Lakota is the language of the Sioux Nation. Maybe Lakota is also a river. I'm always interested in the names of these runs.

There seemed to be a lot of them. There are. It's not like us. We had, we had, what, two shuttlecraft that just, but you couldn't replace yours. We could, so. Oh, we magically did. We blew up, no, we blew up a lot of them. We had, uh, I think we counted.

It was dozens of shuttles that were blown up. I don't know. We replicated more, I guess, but we didn't name them cool names. We didn't have any cool names. No, no cool names. We should start doing that. We should go back and start naming them just to give them. Yes.

Just. All right. We go to Cisco's quarters next. and uh cisco's talking to his dad on a video call there brock his dad's yes joseph is very excited to see him and jake they talk about his sister a little bit what a bad cook she was do we know did we know that uh cisco had a sister before this interesting i don't know they talk about a brother i think but i don't recall hearing about a sister actually hmm i don't know this was the first time I clocked that there was a sister

and that the name was Judith. Yeah. This is definitely the most, if it's ever been implied or referenced a sister, this is the most we've ever heard about it. Of sure, yes. I can't help thinking that

they named her after Renee's wife, but this is the only person, everybody else I would call Judy, but I never called Judith. Judith. There's always Judith. Maybe they did. Well, they talk about the sister, And then Cisco reminds his dad, you know, I'm here, I'm going to be traveling for work.

And his dad's like, I don't care what we do during the day, as long as you're home for home-cooked meals at night. And then they discuss his dad's health. And clearly that's an issue, you know, Cisco's worried about it. He talks about he's gotten some new organ, and pretty soon all his organs are going to be brand new. So he's clearly had some health problems and Cisco's concerned. And Brock looks ill. Maybe it's just my knowing that he passed away, but he looks ill to me. He really does look ill in the episode.

Interesting. Maybe he was playing it. I don't know. Or maybe they made him up in a way that amplified that storyline. I don't know. Could be. Here's my little nitpick. I mean, here they are talking about, you know, you need to go see the doctor.

You haven't seen him in this long. And this is a very contemporary in terms of our time type of theme. Go see the doctor. Wait, go see the doctor. You put it up for so long. But in 400 years in the future, everyone has a tricorder. Everyone has stuff that they can do measure themselves. They can analyze themselves.

They don't have to even go to a doctor practically. It's just very funny to me. That's all right. I saw like later on Cisco is going to say, I talk to your doctor when he gets really mad. Yes, yes. And I thought he could have talked to his doctor from the station. He didn't have to be easily. You don't have to come all the way to earth.

Yes, but it was a long distance call. I see, yes. He didn't want to spend the money. Yeah, that makes sense. You know, Verizon adds an extra surcharge for subspace calls. Well, Jake comes back in, and he says, Dad, did you tell him that we're going to be staying in San Francisco? I like Avery did a little, like he touched his cheek.

It's a great scene, yeah. I have a problem with Avery's performance. I just don't think he was there. Oh. Interesting. He was all over the place to me, but that's kind of par for the course. I feel like often he's a bit all over the place. And it's entertaining to watch, but sometimes it's not on story.

We don't have a choice about which take they take either. That's true. That's true. And it's David Livingston. So, if it's the, forgive me, David, but if it's the 20th take, Avery at this point doesn't care. Yeah. And he doesn't even remember what the scenes about it.

point. You're such a mush. Does it ever happen where a number one on the call sheet has negotiated that they actually get to say, have a say in the edit where they can say like, this is the final take. This is the take we're going to use. Does that ever happen? I mean, the studio owns the show. So there's no actor. I don't care if it's, you know, Tom Cruise. Tom Cruise. Okay. They don't get to. They don't say. I don't think so. Okay. Certainly not in television. There's no actor I know who would have the final final say. But they could be a producer on the show and they could have. have an opinion, a strong opinion. And for the good of the health of the show, the producers in

studio may defer to that actor, even if they disagree, because they don't want to engage the conflict. Got it. Okay. I was going to say about this storyline, it did feel disjointed to me and uneven from Avery. And it surprises me because it is a family story. And for those stories, I've always felt like Avery really focused in. And then this time he didn't. for me some there were moments and then all of a sudden it'd go off in a different direction or it would it was very inconsistent to me okay that's what i saw in the relationship between him and joseph between sus-scott there were times when he was connected but there were great swaths of time when it didn't seem connected agreed well we go back to quarks we see pashir and maz o'brien coming down

the stairs in their bomber jackets their world war two raf pilots uniforms and they're speaking in like old R.A.F. British accents as well, which I found entertaining, but I always have a problem when you're playing a character who's not an actor and suddenly the actors playing these characters start being good actors and acting like R.A.F. They suddenly can do accents and they can play characters and get into it. That always bumps me a little. It's entertaining, but I feel like I'm watching Column and Cid do something rather than Bashir, who's a doctor, and Miles, who's an engineer, just be an engineer and a doctor. Okay, but they're also having fun, and I'm so envious because they were allowed to do that.

And on T&G, they were allowed to do accents. When we did Fairhaven and I requested, can I do an Irish accent? They said, no. I think it's the right choice, though. I don't think Harry Kim is someone who's an actor who, could go around and jump into character just like yeah you know column columnini is a great actor a wonderful actor yeah but miles o'brien isn't he's a every man he's a blue-collar guy so to suddenly have the skill to do accents and take on emotional attitudes it feels i will say they look to me

they look great in that wardrobe they did look good good good job uh bob blackman and making them look so authentic. The little silk scarf there. Oh, yeah. I just loved it. It looks so good. Well, they order some drinks. We learned they're very sad about Clive, which Quark is like, he's a

holodeck character. What's wrong with you guys? Why are you upset about? They're very upset. And then they make a toast to Clive and they start to throw their glasses and very good timing and performances in the, just as the glasses are about to get thrown. Quark's like, don't throw the glasses. Stop it. Quark stops them.

They say that maybe this is about Earth. They want to help. I think it's the only time in Deep Space Nine history where those two listen to Quark. I think that's the only time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, Quark tells them this whole story about Ferengenar's financial collapse.

Yeah, I actually, jumping ahead, way ahead, I think this plays very well with the theme of the episode. Oh. Okay. Okay. I can't wait to hear it. I think this is absolutely the theme of the episode. Go ahead.

Well, I love your monologue about Ferengenar's financial collapse. Yeah, that's part of the theme, too. Yeah. You delivered it very sincere in the honesty and authenticity that you delivered kind of a comic premise in a way, the metaphor of a financial collapse and a catastrophic world war, potentially in Earth. I think this is possibly one of those times when the writers wanted me to do

something else and I disappointed them. Yeah. I'm happy with it. I'm glad you're not happy. I'm glad I think you made the right choice. But I don't think that's what the writers want. Really? Yeah.

Yeah, they wanted you to lean into the absurdity of his, I can imagine. Interesting. I think you made the right choice. And you leaned back instead of in. And did they let you know? No, never during the seven years did they ever let me know that they had qualms about my choices. But after the show was over and, my relationship with Ira blossomed.

He let me know. And I have read some articles as well where he said, Armand didn't always do what we hoped they did. And I responded to Ira by saying, if you had been on the set and told me what you wanted, I probably could have played it that way. Yeah.

But in this case, I'm very happy with what I did. They see Odo. O'Brien calls out to him. They run out in the promenade. O'Brien wants O'Do to stop by and visit his folks in Dublin. That's not in the script. What? No.

Can you read what's in the script? Yes, I can't. Thank you. And I know that Colum's family is from Dublin. Yeah. Oh. Can you start it from the top of the scene? Is that the same?

I take it the Battle of Britain has been won yet again. There's a Spitfire with your name on it. I'm just jumping ahead to where this is. Take Clyde's place in the squad or somehow I doubt it. Look, Oda, do me a favor. If you get a chance, drop by and visit my folks in Killarney. Whoa. So Column changed it to Dublin.

Or I don't have the Golden Rod pages where they changed it to Dublin. But in this script, which is white pages and blue pages and pink pages, it's Calarney. I bet he changed. I bet he said, what's the difference? And it's a little shout out to his family. Sure. Colum is very proud of his Irish heritage when they try to lean in to something comedic about

Ireland or Irish people or the folklore. Stereotypes. Stereotype. He would put his foot down and he had the cachet to say to get them to change it. I think we all did but he used it. Good. Yeah. Good for him. Odo says he'll try to stop

by Dublin and he asked Bashir anything you want me to do and Bashir says no he just wishes he was coming with him and Odo mentions here he doesn't think the human are going to like seeing him on earth, you know. They're not going to be too welcoming to him. But Bashir and Miles wish him luck. And we learn here, Odo says he doesn't believe in luck.

He appreciates the sentiment, but I don't believe in luck. And he heads off through the airlock. We cut out to an establishing shot, I think, of the station. And then into ops, they say the Lakota is on its way. It's departed. and we also learned the wormhole has not opened in the last 12 hours. Kira's disappointed she was hoping that they would have discovered it was the prophets. She'd hoped it was a religious thing and Worf says he prefers the Klingon gods

because they're all dead. They were killed a millennia ago. More trouble than they were worth. I like that comment, that counterpoint with the, you know, the, you know, spirituality of Kira in that moment and worst perspective it's good again I think it's part and parcel of the theme of the of the episode which is a secret about Garrett yes get to the end of this show but I do think they were aware of what they were doing and this is just a cultural difference between between all three of them between a human a Bajoran and a Klingham

hey Garrett have you been traveling this summer oh my gosh so much already. I don't always travel, but this summer's been insane. Trip after trip. You've been doing your impersonation of me. Yes. You know what doesn't belong in everyone's epic summer plans though? What?

Getting burned by your old wireless bill. So while you're planning your beach trips and your barbecues and your three-day weekends, your wireless bill should be the last thing holding you back. Well, that is why I made the switch to Mitt Mobile. The coverage and speed are the same as I'm used to, but the savings. That is the difference. The savings are incredible. Now, I'm saving all kinds of money for when my stepdaughter wants to go back to school shopping.

She's currently at the mall right now as we speak. Well, all the Mint Mobile plans come with high-speed data, unlimited talking tax, and they deliver the nation's largest 5G network. So this year, skip breaking a sweat and breaking the bank. Get this new customer offer and your three-month unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month at Mintmobile.com slash TDF. That's mintmobile.com slash TDF. Up front payment of $45 required, equivalent to $15 a month. Limited time new customer offer for first three months only. Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes on unlimited plan.

Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. Just that simple little one line from Wharf to me is just so funny. It's just our gods are dead. Ancient Klingon warriors slew them a millennia ago. So the actual Klingons killed their own gods. To me, that's very funny. Because everyone knows says, yes, our gods who ruled millennia ago, they're long gone.

That's all they say. They don't talk about how they die, but the Klingon gods were killed by Klingons, which is... Well, in a way, like, the word gods, you know, you could have, a lot of people thought kings were gods. Correct. The king of you... They were definitely thought of as deputy of gods. Yes.

Deputies of God. Yeah. That's all through Shakespeare. All through Shakespeare. And eventually, most kings met their demise when people thought they were. more trouble than they were worth. Okay, moving on. We go to Starfleet headquarters.

There's a nice establishing shot. So I have a question about that establishing shot. Not a complaint, just a genuine question. We have 24th century architecture and a building that I think we've seen before. How do they incorporate the present-day background actors into that shot? I looked at it and went, how did they do that? How did they incorporate live actors into what must have been a green screen shot? I don't know exactly how they did that particular shot.

My guess is they went to the water reclamation plant out there. So you think that's an actual architecture place? No. I think they may have taken part of some architecture, like one little water building off to the corner of the frame, and shot a really wide shot. and then just like you would take scissors, you'd go around the part that you don't want,

you'd cut it out, and you'd put in Photoshop in different parts of that background. So you'd have live actors as long as they weren't infringing on the new part of your image that you kind of cut a mat line around the parts that you want to keep and then you add in all the other parts. I think that's probably how they did. Thank you.

I think it was a combo of a location shot and some extensions, set extensions. Okay. We'd be my guess. We did a thing on Chuck once where we wanted to have, it was a train station, I think, in Prague or something. We wanted something like that, but we didn't have any money on Chuck. And so we built a train platform and we shot it from one end up high

so that the actors, behind the actors, was the ground that we had built a 20, 30 foot, train platform we shot that angle and then Dan Curry who I had brought over to Chuck for visual effects Dan Curry then took a photo of a bullet train and moved the photo so that we didn't have video of a bullet train we had a photo of a bullet train and he made it look like it was moving wow and he took a photograph of the prox station with a glass roof and everything put in all these things you had the moving train he even put in some birds flying inside this enormous hangar and then he shot some extras some background actors on green screen and put them in the photo of the train stage so you had all these moving elements but it was literally the only part that we

filmed were the green screen background actors that were shrunk to tiny people and the platform with our principal actors the 20 foot platform that was it we did not go to Prague we did not But it was an enormous shot that Dan Curry composited in with all these pieces. Some of them he made moves. Oh, I think he even put people inside the train, like walking. So you could see in the photo of the train that was moving in. He put people walking inside.

So it looked very authentic. It was great. Yeah. Having seen all the episodes of Chuck and being a big fan of Chuck, I think Dan Curry did a great job. I really do believe a lot of the locations they were on. I said, wow, did they, a couple of times I thought, did they actually go to Switzerland?

I go, there's no way, there's no way they went there. But it looked great, nevertheless. Those shows were the biggest puzzle I've ever done because the character, our lead character, was a spy, and he had to travel the world. He had to go everywhere. He had to go to Argentina. He had to go to Moscow.

He had to go to Paris. He had to go to Switzerland. How are we going to do that in a $2.5 million dollar budget? How? Impossible. God for Dan Curry. Oh, God. Okay.

Well, Cisco renights with his boss, his old boss, Layton. We meet Bentine, who is late, Layton's adjutant, which is basically like an administrative secretary kind of person, second second in command. But still ranked, though, an officer, right? Yes, I think she's an admiral or commander. I think she's a commander. She's a commander. Right, right. So, you know, not a receptionist.

It's just like a ranked officer. that's ranked officer who is the right-hand person in fact looking at the script adjunct commander oh adjunct commander so high-ranking officer nice okay well they discuss how the grave danger that earth is in here and uh the reason they brought cisco and odo is they hope their experience can help because they know about the dominion they know about this uh the camera quadrant the only ones that have real hands-on information about all of this so that's why they're here bob foxworth did a very good job of checking out odo i i really got the i got both curiosity and and disdain and uh not sure what to make of this um which i would have liked to have seen from some other actors as well now this is scripted

so so he has to play it but i really thought good job bob good job yeah believable and his status the tone of Robert Foxworth's high status as an admiral in someone to be respected and having the power he had. I bought all that. Totally did. We go to Joseph Sisko's restaurant.

Joseph is hosting the whole place. It's like he's throwing a party. He's talking to everybody, working the room. But David's helping. Yes. David's helping. David Levinson. Yes. Yes. Another name lyric. it is part of our musical episode yes

Cisco and Jake arrive dad almost runs into him Jake remembers that Joseph used to tell him about this alligator well that was cool the way that David Livingston shot the opening started on that alligator in the foreground and then it comes back with Jake talking about that alligator and how Joseph told him when he was a kid that the alligator was in stasis and then he set him out to guard

the restaurant at night classic grandpa story it's kind of weird how it's mounted though isn't it it's just sort of like it's got like it's got some rope around the

it's suspended from the ceiling it's a nice place but it's also slightly rustic it's like this so I didn't mind the rope so much you're okay with that yeah I didn't have a problem with that and it helps Jake's story as well

yeah it does I like the story that sounds like something my grandfather would have told me a tall tale like that they sit down uh we learn otto staying back at starfleet that's he's not there he decided to stay back and they immediately talk about joseph's too skinny he doesn't look well and so we feel the conflict immediately because joseph is very stern with him i'm fine you know end of discussion i don't want to talk about this and then nog appears very thin and very physically fit No, I just, yeah, I thought, in that uniform, yeah, he looked, he looks spelt in there.

Yeah, some biceps and shoulders and he looked good. We learn he loves the tube grubs. It's the only place he can get good tube grubs. Yeah. It's a Joseph's restaurant. Jake's happy to see him. I like how Jake pulled that chair kind of sitting backwards on the chair. I like those kind of things that don't feel, they feel natural. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was a nice little nuance. I don't know if that was David Livingston or the actors. When people actually eat food in a scene instead of poke around the salad, you know.

Doesn't he talk about how to prepare tube grubs a little later? Doesn't he say? Yeah, there he goes. He goes, I've been thinking of adding them to our menu. Of course, I'll have to cook them for my human customers. Serve them with a nice remelad, which then I started thinking, I would actually try that then if you cook the tube grubs. Yes, but they have to wriggle as they go down.

that's what did that yeah no i was like why would you cook them no i i'll cook please for me yeah cooked for you okay yeah there are certain uh i think certain restaurants in japan that have live seafood that you eat and it's it's wiggling as it goes down i can't do that i'm sorry i'm sorry no no insects and fish god don't want to eat them bugs not if they're moving No. Not even if they're not moving. I wouldn't eat bugs or... Oh, you wouldn't eat a cricket or another...

Okay. I tried it. It's very famous in a certain part of Mexico. They called them Chapadinas, a little tiny little grasshoppery thingies, I think. And that's what they are. But they're small ones, bigger ones. So they, when some friends went back to Mexico and came back and gave me something to try. and I said, so how do I eat them?

They're like, you can just kind of, like, they're so small. You could do whatever you want. You could put them on some other food. So I actually put it on pizza and I ate it that way. Oh, wow. And it was great. It was just, it wasn't bad at all. I was very surprised.

But you're not going to try it ever. No, thank you. Okay. No bugs for me. Armand, would you eat a bug that was? I don't know. As you were talking, I was trying to decide if I would or not. Right now, I haven't made up my mind.

Okay. We'll check back in with you after the episode. But I'm faced with a bug. When I actually have one in front of me, then I'll let you know. Okay, good, thank you. Jake asked Nog about school, though, and we see Nog avoids the question pretty quickly. He's like, it's fine. It's just school.

So we can tell there's a little trouble in paradise with Nog. He didn't really say hi to Joseph when he came in. It was kind of odd. I thought, wait a minute, this is an older person. You should have some respect for the elders and be like, oh, good morning. And there's a brief moment to that where I thought Brock Peters was a little miffed at this young man just pulling up a chair and sitting down. Oh, really?

I sought for a brief moment and went. I saw that too, Armond. Did you? I did. I was like, wait a minute. Yeah. That's what brought my attention to, like, he didn't even say anything to Brock. And maybe Brock was thinking as that as Brock Peters were like, that's a little bit rude,

that they didn't give him a line. Maybe he was thinking that. Right. Now, it's slightly excused when we understand that, that, that, that, uh, that, that, uh, Nog is a regular. A regular, yeah. But even so, there is that moment that we both saw where he was, you know, you're invading my family or the actor thinking, you know, acknowledge me, you know, and maybe he did in a different

take and didn't in his take. Yeah, possible, but it's, it's quick. He could have said, hey, Mr. S, hey, Mr. you know, Mr. Cisco, it could have been something really quick, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't notice that, but I, it's interesting.

if both of you saw it, I'm sure it was there. We have a little time passing. The customers are leaving. It's closing time. Cisco and Joseph head to the back for some special cognac, so Jake and Nog have a chance to talk. Jake knows something's up here. Nog admits that he feels left out, that the Red Squad are the cool kids, and they just don't acknowledge him at all. So Jake gives him some advice. Just give it some time. You know, you're a good guy to be around, and Nog appreciates that. I am a good guy, aren't I? from Aaron, a very good response from Aaron. This conversation about Red Squad made me think immediately of Nick Licardo. I said, oh, Nick Lekarno, founder of the Red Squad, himself, Robbie McNeil, playing that

character at TNG. That's the guest star, the role that I did on TNG was in the Red Squad. Or was it the... No, it wasn't called Red Squad. You had something else that it was called. But again, it reminded me of that. Nova Squad was ours. There you go.

Nova Squad. Yeah, I thought the same thing. It's like, it's that group. It's that group. Yeah. Nogg's feeling a little better at the end of the scene. We go back to the president's office. We meet the president for the first time.

I did not like this makeup, the dog face makeup. Did not think it. I think it was also in combination with the hair that was the, the whole package was weird. It was weird. And he had to wear gloves. They didn't do hands for him. So he's wearing gloves. It was just.

It almost looks like it was a shower cap thing that the president was wearing. It just looked weird. it was odd. Yeah. And they didn't light it as to take away the defects. It was... So you saw all the lines and everything? I did.

I mean, how could you not see it? They were right there. Yeah. Yeah, not a great makeup. And it did not help the status of this... This is the president of the Federation. Yeah. And I know I like the idea that it's not a human.

That's part of the theme, again, of what I think this episode is. about yeah honestly when you're looking at it the first time you look at it you think this is like a basset hound face it's like a it's like a sad droopy sort of like dog face and i thought wow that is not the avenue that i would have in my mind the president of the federation doesn't look like that so i just got the gut feeling that a lot of uh herschel's performance was a voiceover was not that somebody replaced his voice although i'm not familiar enough with his voice to know for sure about that.

Yeah. But, but, uh, but that a lot of it was ADR, additional dialogue replacement. Mm-hmm. Um, I just got the feeling it. I may be totally wrong. I just thought, I'm not so sure it's syncing up perfectly. Mm-hmm. Hmm.

It did seem a bit off and I'm not sure if it was ADR'd. I'm not sure if it was the makeup made him uncomfortable. Oh. Yeah. It felt strange. Yeah. Huh. That could have been it, too, right?

I mean, we've had stories of guest actors not being able to withstand the rigors of latex application. So maybe that's what he was dealing with. I would imagine the little I know about Herschel that that would not have been a problem. Okay. Could have been. Okay. You know, this actor who plays the president reminds me of John Shuck, who Renee also. worked with in the MASH movie.

I don't know. Something about him when I first, with that dog face makeup and the voice, my first thought was, oh, is that John Shuck? Would that be cool? But it was not John Shuck. John Shuck was on Voyager. He was in the Greek chorus of that episode. Was Boulana?

Yeah, with Balana. Yeah. As a... He was one of the chorus, one of the classical Greek chorus actors. Yes. Yeah, John Shuck was in our show. Not that I want to take anything away from the album. actor that played the role. But I think just because John Shuck did match with Renee, I think that

would have been cool if John Shuck had played that role. Well, as it is, you know, Renee got another friend to work with. Another friend, yes. Yes, exactly. Anyway, we meet him. We get to see this dog face makeup. We see the president does not want to disrupt everybody's lives. He just wants to go slow and not overreact to things. And then suddenly Odo morphs from Cisco's briefcase surprises the president to let him know to demonstrate how dangerous a changeling. And how easy it is for a changeling to infiltrate.

Yep. Yeah, yeah. It's like nothing. It's, it could be anything. Yeah. This is what I think Bantin brings up, that there's no precautions. And you could not only have been,

assassinated, but you could have been replaced, which we'll find out, and then later seeing how easy that is. Yep. The president's shocked. He realizes how dangerous things can be. Cisco advises blood tests of the senior staff and their families. They agree that they have to protect, you know, the progress and peace that they've built here on Earth.

They call Earth Paradise. They use that term a couple of times, which I find interesting. and I question that term, paradise. Because to me, with all the improvements, there's still progress to be made on Earth. It cannot be, even in our Star Trek mythology, to me, that just implies like, we're done. It's perfect, we're perfect.

They use that term a couple times. I didn't like that. But maybe that's their attitude. Maybe that's going to end up helping us, feeding this fueling the story in some way but maybe every time they called it paradise and well imposing martial law is a tricky subject for anybody i can understand why the president doesn't want to do that especially as he's not human to have uh an alien figure impose this on a planet and its occupants its people you'd really do need to think about that

martial law. He does agree to let them take some precautions here. So we cut to Cisco's office. They're testing these phaser sweep things to catch changelings. It sweeps the room and Odo gets stunned. He's a plant. He's a plant. He literally is a plant.

He is a plant. And when the phaser finally catches him, he's like, ouch, that hurt. He's a plant. and a guinea pig is what he is yeah and we learn they've been doing this for a while he's had a few of these jolts and shocks they're trying to find just the right level to catch the changelings and he's like i think uh 3.5 is where you want to be to be on the safe side but i don't want to do this anymore i've had enough shocks and then nog enters as they wrap up their conversation He wants to speak to Cisco privately, and he wants Cisco to recommend him for Red Squad.

See, he should have joined Nova Squad. You're right. Yeah, yeah. If he really wanted to be a cool kid, you should join Nova Squad, definitely. Cisco does mention here, the Red Squad. I never heard of that when I was in Star for the Academy. So my suspicion radar went up a little bit there. Like, wait, are they pulling Knox leg?

sure this will play out yeah yes i'm sure something will happen i just thought avery didn't want to play that scene no i got the same jane did not want to play that scene yeah he seemed annoyed that's that's the best he turned away from nog he's rolling his eyes poor nog yeah not begs in the scene too there wasn't a lot of sympathy for nog's feelings this felt um very dismissive and you would think because Nog, who he's known for years now. We advocated. Yes, he had advocated and been convinced that Nog was, you know, and his son's best friend.

Right. To have a reunion after a couple of months at school, you would think the character would be curious and interested in asking questions, how's it going? Are you doing okay? Oh, I'm sorry, it's been hard. Let me help you. Right. You're encouraging him.

but it was scripted in a very different way. If Cisco is so busy and he is that he can't be bothered with with an adolescent's desire to do better in school, I can get that. Why didn't they give him a line that said that? Yeah, they said, I can't be bothered right now. I've got a really important work. Who let you in anyway?

Yeah. They could have added one extra, and it would have been a quick line. It didn't have to be some long, you know, monologue. I'm busy right now. Yeah. It's just, I'm so busy. I'm so preoccupied with this changeling threat.

I can't, you know, deal with this. He does say I'm busy, but it's, it's a different, but he's sitting down. Sitting down, he's turned away. He's turned away. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it doesn't look busy. No, he doesn't. He doesn't have had pads all over the place, you know what I'm saying,

where he's just like, oh, huh, I'm going through all this information trying to get on top of this. And no, that wasn't there. Well, he says if he has, if he has a chance, he'll help him. Nog is hopeful, but I agree with you. That line, I'll help you, doesn't make any sense out of what you've just seen in the performance. Just go, doesn't look like he's going to help. No.

Yeah, no, I don't believe that line. We do have an establishing shot of New Orleans that looks like it was shot on the back lot, Paramount Backlott, where they put some. New York Street? Yeah. Yeah. Not good. Not good.

There was like a carriage going by. Yeah. Yeah, horse-drawn carriage. They should have splurged the $200 for some stock footage of New Orleans French Quarter. That's all it would have cost them? Probably at that time. $200. Literally.

Like, just get some stock footage of real New Orleans French Quarter. And not New York's back slot. That was not a good shot. Okay. All right. But we go inside Cisco's restaurant. He's folding some napkins. Joseph is talking to Cisco.

He goes, well, look who's here. in, Stranger. Cisco goes, sorry, I haven't been around much lately. Things have gotten a little busy. Is this after hours, or is it, like, if he's folding napkins? Well, was a daytime establishing shot. As I've discussed, I did not like that establishing shot. Right.

It was a daytime establishing, so I assume it's before dinner. Okay. It's the afternoon, probably. Afternoon. But Joseph's folding napkins, Cisco comes in. Look, who's here, stranger? A little tension between them. He's hurt that Cisco isn't visiting enough.

And Jake's off at visiting some school in New Zealand, so he's feeling a little butt hurt. But then Cisco's mad because he said, I talked to your doctor. And you haven't been to see your doctor in eight months. You have progressive arthrosclerosis. Yeah, Avery doesn't get it either. That's, I went, somebody should have told him how to say that. Yeah, I don't, I can't say it. Progressive arthroscopis.

It's heart circulation, something. like that. Yeah. Oh, it has nothing to do with arthritis then. No. Okay. No. Arthur, Jesus. It's hard to even just. It's a build up a plaque in the arteries leading to heartening and narrowing of arteries. So it's a heart. It's a heart formation thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Narrowing of his arteries. So, but it's progressive. It's something he should be going to the doctor more often about. And he's not. And, and Joseph basically says, you know, staying healthy. He's a full-time job and I can't work two jobs. He says, you weren't visiting enough.

And then at the end, Joseph says, how long till you're due back at Starfleet headquarters? So I don't know. This is an odd kind of banter. You know, in this banter, one of Joseph's lines is, Cisco says, you know, Dad, you could come and visit us at the station once in a while. And Joseph says, don't start that again.

Earth's my home. It's where I belong. Besides, what would happen to the restaurant if I went gallivanting around the galaxy, I thought this was a dig towards his son from past baggage of, you didn't follow me into the restaurant business, you went into Starfleet.

What if I was gallivanting around the galaxy? I thought that was a very slight, subtle little dig at his own kid, you know. That was my take on that one. Yeah, conflict is brewing between the two of them. Yeah, it's happening. It's all the old stuff's coming out a little bit, you know? Well, they decide to go for a walk to Audubon Park,

and we go back to Starfleet headquarters, And there's a seagull out in a rock that morphs into Odo. This is morph. Another morph. Yeah. Those are expensive. Especially with animals. Like now you've got to film the seagull.

You need an animal trainer. Animals are always moving. So it's going to be an animated morph. And yeah, that's tricky. They are still, they are in New Orleans, right, where they've established in New Orleans. So Audubon Park is, I wonder if that's a real park in the Louisiana area. But the seagull is in San Francisco. The Seagull is in San Fran.

Autoburn Park was the big park in Memphis when I was in Memphis, Tennessee. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. There is an Audubon Park in a very large Audubon Park in New Orleans. In Nalins? In Nalins, yes. All right, so it's real. It is a real thing.

Cool. And it's not far from the Garden District in that area. So they have a long walk ahead of them. they're going to walk Audubon Park because it's about the size of Central Park. It's a big. It's a big one. Anyway, the Seagull turns into Odo and they talk about how impressive things are, you know, with his morphing and things like that. He says it wasn't very impressive flying over San Francisco, though.

He says, took a little aerial tour of San Francisco. It's quite nice, but not as ancient as the cities of Bayjor. but almost as impressive. So he's a little, I got a little bit of snottiness from Odo in his comments about San Francisco. And I couldn't help but chuckle because I know how many years Renee lived in San Francisco. Oh, that's funny.

Do you guys track when he's, when Leighton says, I doubt that other changelings are wasting their time imidating birds? They don't all share Odo's lack of skill when it comes to mimicking humans. And that's when Odo tracked the fact that, wait a minute, how the hell do you know that kind of a look, right? So that's the beginning. of it. Yeah, his suspicion, and he wants to, Leighton starts to leave. He, you know, Odo kind of

grabs him. And we see another morph. Yeah, his arm sort of morphs a little bit when he grabs him. He starts to link. Yeah, he links. We realize he's a changeling. And Leighton morphs into a seagull and flies off. It's always a seagull. He could play that thing from the seagull from the play the seagull. The seagull. I'm an actor. I'm a seagull. I'm an actor. I'm a seagull. I'm an I think the character's name is Nina. I'm not sure. I think it is. We go to Cisco's San Francisco office.

Leighton and Odo, they're all discussing the changeling, infiltrated Cisco security measures, these blood tests and things, they have to do more. It's not enough. And Cisco says, well, it's all the president will let me do right now. And Leighton says, you know what, he's not from here. He's not one of us. Exactly. And we made Earth a paradise.

Brings that word up again. There you go. We need to protect it. And this is when, as they're starting to get serious about, they've got to step up the security. Joseph has been arrested, Jake says. Jake calls and says, Dad, you've got to get back here.

Joseph's grandpa's been arrested. We go to the restaurant. Joseph is refusing to take a blood test. Cisco is insisting on it. He has Jake do it. Jake does the blood test. Cisco does the blood test. Joseph still refuses.

And Ben sends the others off to eat. He decides to talk to Joseph. And this is a big sort of clash of the titan scene, these two. This was a bit all over the place to me. Benjamin and Joseph basically have a fight here. Joseph said that says he's not Starfleet. He can make his own decisions. Starfleet has no right to tell him what to do,

to take blood tests or anything. They argue, Ben finally, in the midst of this argument, says, why can't you just cooperate for once? Why can't you just do what I ask you one time? And they're arguing, Joseph cuts his finger with a knife. He goes to rinse it. Sisko looks at the blood on the knife. And Joseph sees him looking.

He's very offended at this. He says, you know, you're obsessed. You're obsessed with this changeling thing. And he does say to Cisco, you're not going to catch a shapeshifter with some gadget. So it's sort of this sort of old school way. Like you've got to go with your instinct versus you're trying to beat this thing with gadgets and blood tests and phasers and, you know,

you've got to be more old school, I guess, is sort of his argument. Yeah, that other part of the line that right before you said you aren't going to catch shapesifters using some gadget is there isn't a test that's been created a smart man can't find his way around. Yeah. Then he has a heart attack, which we learned later is not a heart attack, so I'm confused. They said it was a mild stroke, but the way he reacted, boy, that seemed like he was having a mild stroke looks like. Foreignary. It was like, oh my gosh, he's about to, he's on death step is what it looked like. He was performing for the back row of a very large theater.

That's what it was. There you go. Yeah. To me, that did not look like a stroke. Because we learn at the top of the next scene, Joseph, we're, we're, we're. back in the San Francisco office, Joseph's going to be okay. It was just a mild stroke. Hmm. Didn't, that's not what a mild stroke looks like from my experience. Cisco says for a moment he truly thought his dad was a changeling. Sisko realizes like he'd lost trust in his own father.

Like his brain had gotten him so obsessed and so confused that he couldn't trust his dad. But it is, it's not trust. In his position, my feeling is he should have thought that it could have been. I mean, this is why they're testing all the relatives of high-ranking officials. It is that it's that very thing, that love for that person that could affect the person in charge's decisions. I think he was right to distrust his father, as he should distrust everyone. Yeah. I think because his line here.

he says, I don't care if it's reasonable or not these things we're doing, but when a son can't trust his own father, says, but what if it's not your father? You know, and Odo says right after that, that's why my people came here to undermine the trust and mutual understanding that the federation is built on. So you start to see this paranoia, and paranoia and fear can do a lot of damage. Sure can. Can do a lot of damage. And that's what we see starting to happen here. Cisco and Odo both agree they wish they'd never found his people at the end of the scene. We go back to the restaurant. Joseph's serving customers. He's running around this way and that way. And he talks to Jake. He says he's worried about Benjamin his son. He says, I've never seen Ben so tense.

And then suddenly the lights go out in the restaurant. Jake says, take a look at this. The whole block is dark. So everything's out. Power's out everywhere. back in the San Francisco headquarters the power's out there too the door's forced to open Cisco's kind of pulling at the electric door it's an implied attack by the changelings

correct? Okay yes and we learn in the scene Earth has lost power the entire planet has lost all power You imagine that a planet wide blackout my gosh Well I have a generator at my house here

for this. So if you guys... We're coming to your house since you have a generator. We've got a backup generator, so come on over. Yes. We'll be good here. Yes. Yeah, but if the Dominion attacks right now, they're completely defenseless.

We go back to the president's office. The sun's rising so we can see a little bit. Cisco advises a state of emergency. They believe the Dominion came through the wormhole when it was opening and closing. Leighton says they have a plan for this sort of situation. They can use Lakota's transporters, communications, and they have stockpiles of weapons and supplies, enough to, you know, outfit an entire army for the planet.

And the president's very reluctant. And Odo argues, you know, people all over this planet are huddled in the dark right now. They're scared. And if you don't act, if you don't show them, that you're here to protect them, that they aren't alone, then fear's going to take over. and this convinces the president he authorizes a state of emergency this was my criticism for ira and robert hewitt wolf that speech should never have been put in odo's mouth oh that speech should have come

from cisco or from layton the very thing that you're asking a chance changeling to convince the president to do something. Right, right. They're out looking for change. Granted, this is Odo, who also can be replicated, by the way. Yeah. This speech should have come from a humon, not from a changeling. And I went, I understand they have to give Renee, you know, something.

He's in the scene. They can't keep him quiet for the whole scene. I went, no, that should not have come from Renee. That's a good point. I hadn't thought of that, but it's a very good point. And when I look at the script, you're right, that whole line, that whole bit, it could have just been Cisco's line, which would have went right into the actual Cisco line at the end where he says, give us the authority we need, Mr. President, and we will take care of the rest. That would have been his impassioned monologue, which would have made more sense than what was written. He gives them the permission to enact martial law, and we go back to Cisco's.

restaurant there's a candle going jake's mesmerized by the candle um but then he hears something outside here's voices he goes to the window calls grandpa he sees armed starfleet appearing in the street martial law martial law boots on the ground to be continued people there you go part two coming up yeah i don't know how excited armin is about it uh or me i am actually excited because I don't remember it at all. So you get to watch it and take a look at it. Good. Let's talk about the lesson that we're going to learn from this episode. Will that be Robbie for you?

The lesson that I learned was fear can consume you and cloud your thinking. I think the lesson is to be cautious, to have awareness of when you're experiencing those things and try to uncloud your mind. from the paranoia and the fear that you know the which is very difficult to do it's very difficult yeah yeah uh arman what is your lesson for this episode i believe the lesson is the hold that once homeland has on one is deeper than we recognize and that no matter whether you're doing your best or not if you're advocating for your homeland it's going to be a strong stronger impulse than if you're just doing it because it's the right thing to do that that

like a primal attachment to where you were born is stronger than we're aware of and i believe that's indicated in the in the comic scene with with uh with o'brien and um the sheer defending their homeland against the jerrys it's the speech the quark makes about his homeland being attacked by financial crisis and latin says this about the president about herschal sparbors he's not an earthling he doesn't he doesn't know you know i think that's woven yes all through this episode that that love at an end and desire to help your homeland is part of your dna structure Good. Garrett, what about you? Same as yours. You go down that rabbit hole, and it's so hard to not reverse direction.

Be very careful with fear. It's such a dangerous emotion that if left unchecked, it can cause people to do things that are inhuman. Agreed. 100%. Absolutely. Okay. Our Patreon Paul winner for theme slash moral lesson of this episode, as submitted by Andre May, is to quote a brilliant senator from a galaxy far, far away. So this is how democracy dies. Is that a Star Wars quote? It is.

On a Star Trek podcast. It's allowed. It's allowed. It's a good comment. It doesn't matter where it goes from. We don't want to see democracy dying for goodness sake. Okay. It's Starfleet. The good guys who are asking for democracy to be put aside. That's Starfleet advocating for martial law. That's when democracy disappears is where martial law overcomes democracy. This is why Joseph didn't want to have his blood tested.

Not so much that he was afraid of getting the shot or anything. It's just you're invading my privacy. You're invading my rights. That's democracy. And so what I like about this episode and the script, is that they gave both sides, if you're really paying attention, they gave both sides time to present their views about martial law and the invasion of people's privacy and democracy.

Yeah. Well, thank you, Armin, for joining us again, yet again. Thank you so much. And for all of our listeners, thank you so much for joining us for our recap and discussion of this episode. Please join us next time when we will be recapping and discussing the episode Paradise Lost with Terry. Terry will be joining us then.

For all of our Patreon, patrons, please stay tuned for your bonus material and for more Armin Schumerman and for everyone else. We'll see you next time. I'm going to be I'm going to B.

B. B. B. B. B. B. B. B.

B. B. B. B. I don't know.