The Delta Flyers - Soldiers of the Empire

Episode Date: May 5, 2026

The Delta Flyers is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, Terry Farrell, and Armin Shimerman. In each podcast release, they will recap and discuss an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.This week’s episode, Soldiers of the Empire, is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, and Terry Farrell.Soldiers of the Empire: As first officer on a mission to search for a missing Klingon vessel, Worf plans a risky manoeuvre when he realises Gen. Martok is too afraid to lead.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, Andrew Duncan, Tim Neumark, Ian Ramsey, Feroza Mehta, Jenny Cordina, Ryan Mahieu, Izzy Jaffer, Francesca Garibaldi, Jonathan Capps, Chris Dellman, Sean T, Cindy Woodford, Tamara Evans, & Shawn RobbinsOur Co-Executive Producers:Liz Scott, Sarah A Gubbins, Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Elaine Ferguson, Captain Jeremiah Brown, Deike Hoffmann, Anna Post, Cindy Ring, Lee Lisle, 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, Randy Hawke, Penny Liu, Matt Norris, David Smith, Stacy Davis, Heath K., Andrew Cano, Robby Hill, Kevin Harlow, Chris Garis, Jeff Allen, & Londyn HenningAnd our Producers:Philipp Havrilla, James Amey, Jake Barrett, Ann Harding, Trip Lives, Samantha Weddle, Paul Johnston, Carole Patterson, Warren Stine, Carl Murphy, Jocelyn Pina, Chad Awkerman, AJ Provance, Brian King, Maxine Soloway, Heidi McLellan, E & John, Brianna Kloss, Dat Cao, Stephen Riegner, Debra Defelice, Alexander Ray, Kelly Brown, Sarah Thompson, Gabriel Dominic Girgis, Renee Wiley, Maria Rosell, Dominique Weidle, Jesse Bailey, Mike Chow, Matt Edmonds, Miki T, Heather Selig, Steph Davies, Stephanie Aves, Seth Carlson, Amy Rambacher, Jessica B, Annie Davey, Jason Eberl, Jeremy Gaskin, Sarah Dunnevant, Charlie Faulkner, Estelle Keller, Eddie Dawson, Lauren Rivers, Jennifer B, PJ Pick, Preston M, Rebecca Leary, SnazzyO, Karen Galleski, Jan Hanford, Katelynn Burmark, Cade Solsbery, Timothy McMichens, Cassandra Girard, Andrea Wilson, Slacktwaddle, Willow Whitcomb, Mo, Leslie Ford, Jim Poesl, Scott Bowling, Michael Jones, Ed Jarot, James Vanhaerent, Nick Cook-West, Kilian Trapp, Kit Marie Rackley, Gordon Watson, Andrew Golden, Damien O’Donnell, Michael Bourguignon, & Patricia WelschThank 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 Quince: https://quince.com/tdfAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Hello, everyone. 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 Nine. Your hosts for today are my fellow Trek actors, Garrett Wong and Robert Duncan McNeil, and myself, Carrie Farrell. Hi, hi, good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Good afternoon. in your bright, shiny faces. Or good night or good, yeah, whatever time I did. Oh, that makes me think of kindergarten.

What was that song, bright, shiny faces. You're all in your places. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't remember. Joy. Good morning to you. Good morning to you. We're all in our places with bright shiny faces.

Was that in? This is the way we start a new day. Oh, my God. clearly did not go to the same. What grade was this? When did this song happen? It makes me think of kindergarten. Yeah.

So it's early, right? Yeah. Oh, okay. Like, super early. Right. Yeah. That's definitely American because my, for me, you know, first grade until. Bermuda, right?

Bermuda. So British school system, they do not sing that in the British school system. They're not as happy as we are. They're too serious. They're very serious about school. Maybe that was like, was it toxic positivity. Back in the 60s, it was like, you know, we're all. all going to pretend we're happy all the time.

Up with people. Joy, joy. Do you remember up with people? Do you guys remember up with people? What was that? Yes. They like traveled around. They came to my school.

We did that play. Yeah. And it was a play and they had like a traveling group. I don't know. It was like positivity. They didn't visit British schools. No. No, because you weren't happy.

But in a way, I think it's good that we had that to survive. I have to tell you guys. British grade school. was the hardest thing. It's so formal and traditional. No, this is what they would do. They would say, this is your homework for tomorrow. The teacher wouldn't teach you about it beforehand.

He would, you are forced as a student to try to figure it out on your own for the next day. So my parents told me when I came home from school, I immediately started doing homework. I would stop for dinner. Then I would continue to do a homework. So I did probably five hours of homework every night, something like that. Crazy. I was the opposite. I would wait until the morning and I'd get, go on the bus, and I'd be doing it on the bus.

Oh, my gosh. It was like, by the seat of your, okay. Such a procrastinator. I didn't get to have that. That, okay. Did you walk to school five miles barefoot in the snow? Yes, exactly. Exactly.

Actually, I think it was a mile, but two miles to high school. So before I got my license, that sucked. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. I was in great shape, which is. So I got down the diamond run. But also, it was crazy enough at 15 to take.

It was an elective, but I took an elective where all we did was run. What? All we did was run for an hour. Did you get a grade for that class? Yes. And I, of course, got an A. Of course you did. Well, we'd sprint and then run and then jog.

But it was all about just conditioning. Wow. Have you heard of such a thing, Robbie? No. Oh, that's pretty cool. I took the elective napping class. You did. No, no, no, no.

No, no, no. I know that's, you're funny. But in all seriousness, Robbie, what a bizarre. Study hour? Yeah, study hour. What bizarre elective did your school offer? I mean, every school has one thing that people are like, oh, that's kind of. Well, the first thing that pops in my head, so in high school, they had this class called impact, and it stood for something.

You had to take a test. And if you were considered like extra smart or something, you got in this class where you could do self-directed studies. Wow. Is this high school? High school. Yeah, because there were colleges like that too. My mom did that. You do one class and it was super intense.

And you could pick what you studied. You could kind of come up with your own plan for the semester. And then you would do a report at the end of that semester. It was very progressive. No, but it was the class that smart people, if you got in, you knew that you could kind of wing it and make it up because you were deciding what you wanted to study. How do you know so much about this if you weren't in this elective class? I was in the elective class. I got in.

Because you're so freaking smart. I was okay. I looked at them from far away and went, oh, hi, smart people. You're like my son. I'm not smart. and then breezes through and you're like, I'm sorry, you're not smart, but you don't study really and you get AIDS. I'm not quite sure how that works. I did not study well.

I did not do homework. I was bad. Matt, no, Max would wake up first thing in the morning and rush through it. But here's the thing. He's the kind of guy in high school. He would mathematically figure out, you know what? I don't really need to study that. I can get a D and I'll still get a B in the class.

Oh my God. He's that guy. He can already see the Matrix. Which used to freak me out. But it was like, actually, it's really smart. It's clever. It is. It's very clever.

It's clever. I feel like I was clever in school. Yeah, I bet you were. I know that I was smart, but I was clever. I think you have to have a certain amount of intelligence to be that clever to. Yeah. And be relaxed about it because he's relaxed about it. I would be, ah. Impact. That's so cool. It's called impact. It was an elective. And you could come up with

your own study. Of course, I always studied theater or something like that. And you could also get out of other classes if you got a note from your impact teacher. If you went to the teacher and you said, hey, I've got to go, I want to go do this thing around my study. Can you write me an excuse? And so you could get out of a class. Oh, my God, dude. I did that all the time. Oh, it was great. Oh, I loved impact. You couldn't do it until you were a junior in high school.

So I did it my junior and senior year. Yeah. I left at the end of my junior year. I left in the middle of my senior year. Dropouts. Twinsies. I stayed. I stayed.

I should have dropped out like you do. I wish that I had stayed. I got my miss. Me too. Yeah. Me too, especially. So I'm okay then. At the time, I felt like I was missing out.

Yeah. me too. And they're all bonded. To have your senior year is a really bonding. You have so much time off. I am. You talk about colleges and all of serious, real things. Yeah. I'm sorry that both of you. Yeah. I'm sorry that both of you did not have that experience. Yeah, you probably still have friends from all of that. I just went to my 40th high school reunion. So this was this past year. What's cool is there was a dude that showed up that left our school after junior year to go. to another school. So he didn't, he didn't even graduate with us, but he showed up. His name is Duran Jones. I used to give him a shout-out. He actually came to Vegas with his wife. He was here for convention. So I met them for breakfast.

We have a birthday. It's Heidi McClellan's birthday on May 7th. Heidi, happy, happy birthday. Happy birthday, Heidi. Oh, my gosh. And so close to it's the beginning of spring, right? Yeah. It's May. It's May. The lusty month of May. Happy, happy, happy, happy, happy, happy birthday to Heidi. McClellan! Happy birthday to you. May is a wonderful month. It is the best month to visit a lot of places, I think, in the world.

I love, wonderful. Spring. Oh, yes, spring time. Wundaba, as they say in Germany. Well, happy birthday, Heidi. Here is my lemurik for Soldiers of the Empire, a Klingon whose heart has grown cold. thought his bravery and courage had grown old. Yet Worf helped him see who he still could be.

Then his Klingon warrior spirit took hold. I freaking love that. Soldiers of the Empire. Truth bare and honest. Strikes our ego hard. Forcing action to protest. Victory sings the bard. Ooh.

Victory sings the bard. I like that. That's nice. Dope. Thank you, sir. You really are a poet. I thought Armin might like that. Armine would like that too.

It's from the Witcher. That's where I watched the Witcher so really when it first came out. And that that guy who's the bard, this is one of those poems where I started to think really hard about it. And then I thought, don't. Yeah. And then I just wrote that down. But honestly, it was one of those lucky, oh my gosh, I did that in 15 minutes. Yay.

I know. Mine came quick this time, too. Isn't that great? Here's my haiku for soldiers of the empire. Martok enlists Wharf. Dax joins the rescue effort. Wharf joins House. Martak!

Wow. Love it. Thank you. Nice. I had to make it very theatrical as well. Oh, that choked me up at the end. Did it? A little bit, yeah.

Thank you. I know both men, so you know what I mean? There's that duality to knowing the actors personally for decades. We also have a Patreon-submitted poetry winner. One of our new segments that we started last episode. I like this segment. I like this segment. Oh, and I get to read it.

You get to read it. Yes. Patreon-submitted Poetry Winner. Submitted by Faroza Meta. Broken Warriors. Caution. Ressels with Custom. Honor is restored.

Whoa. Nice. For Rosa, very nice. I like that a lot. I like this. I like this. Caution. I like this.

I like this. I like this. Yes. Great. Thank you for Rosa. Yeah. Thank you for Rosa. That was great.

And thank you to all of you who added this. I know. Get around. We'll try everybody's poetry skills. Yeah. It's pretty cool. It's fun. Yes.

This, episode was written by Ronald D. Moore. Now let's just give you, let's just give you a little bit of background here. Ira had requested that Ron Moore write a story. That was a Star Trek episode, but with all Klingon characters, it was also very important to Ron Moore that each Klingon was given an individualized personality and look. You know, general. Yeah, how the prosthetics were, the wigs, what they were wearing, because if you noticed, there's a blonde Klingon. There's a red-headed female Klingon. They really short-cropped-haired

Klingon guy. His hair was like... The shorter hair, right? The shorter hair, yeah. That was weird for me. You know who that is, probably? I didn't realize this until I started... I watched the episode and then did the reading of it afterwards.

I had no clue. That's Rick Worthy. Oh, my gosh. That's Rick Worthy. I never put that together. Ron's original idea for this episode was for Worf and the crew of the Rataran to answer. a distress call from a Klingon colony. When they arrive, they find all of the inhabitants missing.

Nearby is a lake surrounded in a mysterious fog, and when they approach it, a boatman appears, and takes them to the entrance of Gretor. Once inside, they meet a friend of Martox who wants them to take him with them, and then they meet War's father, Moog. There were a number of reasons that this particular story never made it into production. Firstly, Iris Stephen Bear felt that the episode was trying to accomplish too much, showing both the realistic day-to-day operations of a Klingon bird of prey and a mythic journey to the afterlife. Bear also felt it was too late in season to do such a philosophical show

dealing with life, death, and hell. Which is funny because the episode before was overly ambitious, Robbie, in dealing with depression and dementia and everything. So I find that kind of humorous. Yeah, they're kind of in a area of the season where the writers are trying to do too much. Yes. And they're exhausted like we're exhausted. Yeah, they really are.

Yeah. I mean, they get to go home earlier than us, but it doesn't mean they don't go home and continue writing. And keep working. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But the funny thing is, is he did get to use that afterlife story later on Voyager. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, we did. Barge of the Dead. Do you remember that episode? The Klingon Afterlife One? And it was written by Ron Moore. Oh, how funny. Yeah. I think a lot of our episodes, and I haven't watched enough of your show to feel those details,

are really ambitious. And we don't have enough time to really get into the story in a way that would be satisfying for us when we're watching it back. We want more. And maybe that's one of the reasons people. keep tuning in. They want more. They want to know more. I feel that way when I watch shows. Yeah. And they're good shows. It's just,

but you didn't go. Deep enough. You didn't go for the gold. You touched on 10 different ideas, but yeah. This episode was directed by our friend Lovar Burton. Guest stars, David Graff as Leskitt, Rick Worthy as Cornyn, Sandra Nelson as Tavana. Aaron Eisenberg. Yes, she was.

Aaron Eisenberg is Nog. J.G. Hertzler is Martok. and co-stars Scott Leva as Ortecan. We'll jump right in. So we start off in the infirmary, and I have to say, this was a oneer. This whole opening scene was one shot. I went back and watched it. I was like, there has to be a cut in here.

It's a long scene. I mean, not long, but it's a real. I didn't even clock that. Yeah. Me, I didn't either. It can only pulls out. That shows you how smooth that was. It pulls back in, and then it pulls out again.

but it's a two shot through the whole thing. LeVar Burton is smooth. It was very smooth. I will say, though, you know, usually an opening scene, you want to grab the audience's attention. And by making it a oner, I felt like it was a little flat, if I'm being honest. Wow.

As we go through, there's a lot of scenes that are either oneers or one direction, and everybody's sort of like in a, like the theater sort of facing the same way. So different from what you've known what you've known LeVar to do in the past, what you're saying, right? But what I love is that he is creative and draws outside the box. Yeah. And he has an intention with every episode. So it's not like he has a formula that you're always seeing the same thing. It seems like he really used his opportunity on Deep Space Nine to check out how we, yeah, experiment how, what,

what works and what doesn't work. And I really admire that. What I admire is, Terry, when you said, LeVar is smooth. Because when you said that when you extended your vowels on smooth, I immediately went to the music video for Michael Jackson's smooth criminal. And I just imagined LeVar in that version dancing around to smooth criminal. That's all. A little sidebar. Okay, wacky. I know. Okay, well, in this scene, this winter scene, we learned that Martaq got hurt pretty badly, according to Bashir, could have bled out. But Bashir has fixed him right up. And he and Bashir bicker in the scene a bit. But in the end, Martak thanks him at the very end of the scene and heads out. And they had a bit of a laugh. I like that. Yeah. Yeah. When Bashir scolded him about the blood on the carpet. Yeah. You can see the Klingon kind of push back and pride here. And

But he gets a call that he's got a Kling on High Council phone call. He's got to go take, so he leaves. And then we go up to the bridge. It starts with Wharf working under the console and then comes up to reveal he's talking to Nog. Another scene where there's no coverage. It doesn't go back to Wharf. It stays on Nog, which is very funny because you see, you hear Wurf giving instructions off camera, and Nog's literally like ringing his head.

hands. He's so frustrated with it was so cute. I think wow, he did such a great job in this scene. Yeah, yeah, Aaron is so good. Yeah, it was really his scene. He stole it. Yeah, he did. It was funny. It was cute. It was

Yeah, Martak arrives. The High Council has ordered him on a mission. Worf learns and then Nog awkwardly leaves in the scene. That was hilarious. Can I just slip out between you guys? That was just so, but that was so Aaron, though.

That's something like Aaron would say to me, if you know Aaron off camera, that's Aaron. Yeah, it definitely was. So he's graduated. Is that right? Because no one ever said there was no celebration. There was no mentioned in any episode. No, just graduated Starfleet Academy. And all of a sudden, he's working on the station now.

And they call him cadet. So is he like on leave or furlough? I don't know. I think in the scene where he was assigned as a cadet, he was assigned. to DS9 because remember he had the Cisco scenes and he was so he's maybe this is his apprenticeship residency yeah that's what I would get yeah residency is a good thing all right his summer internship that's what he's doing

yes exactly something station nogg leaves we learned that wharf injured Martak that it wasn't on the holodak they were both kind of covering for the fact that they were actually fighting and we learned that the battle cruiser Bamoth is missing and Martak is going to go find them and he asks Worf to join him at the end of the scene. To be his first officer and the look on Michael Dorn's face on Worf's face. Oh, the pride was just blasting at us through his eyes. Yeah, we go to Cisco's office.

Cisco wants to know why Worf wants to go so badly. And Worf explains it wasn't in his official report, but at the prison camp, Martok saw him fighting, saw that he was ready to give up and just let him. himself be killed, that Worf was ready to give up. And Warf says he gave me his warrior heart. He could see what I was doing. And he gave me the strength, the fight, and not give up from a look. And I remembered that from that episode. Yeah. And I thought that was great. That's what happens when you know somebody so well, they can read your mind or you're both so connected in whatever you're

doing that you don't even need words to know what somebody's doing. Yeah. Doesn't he call it? He calls it something like... A moment... Yeah. Tovadok. Yes. I think I wrote it down in here. Tovadock.

A moment of TikTok is what he had. Yes. A moment of clarity where... A moment of clarity between two Klingons without words. Yeah. Wow. Powerful. Worf is invited to be his first officer, not just his first officer, but Martak says,

my friend, too. So we really see the bond that's in the response. between the two of them. Yeah, so when Worf explains this, Sisko relieves him of his Starfleet duty and assigns him to detach service with the Klingon, so he lets him go. Cisco at the end of that scene says, Kapla. And Worf responds with Kapla back. That was the first time I ever heard Cisco say Kapla, that I remember. Yeah, I think so. I almost feel like Cisco had more like wing on energy in his kopla than even Michael did. Yeah.

Yeah. Maybe Michael was kind of like. Yeah. I like this interaction now in this episode between Cisco and Worf. Yeah, I did too. Because let's face it, there have been past episodes where Cisco is screaming and yelling at Worf and just pissed off or not yelling, just giving him dagger eyes, you know, just for, it just, it's so nice that he's, you know,

kind of bonding in a way. He's respecting what he's doing. Yeah. And he's a culture of Clemonds. And the character himself is allowing Worf to go off on this non-Starfleet mission. Because let's face it, he is Starfleet. I mean, that would be like somebody in the U.S. Army going, okay, I'm going to go fight for this other foreign country. Yeah.

I'm going to be the French army for a couple of weeks and I'll be a French soldier. So that's. And also you have to, you're relieving duty. you have to relieve me from Starfleet. Responsibility. Exactly. So now he doesn't have to abide by Starfleet principles or regulations, right? Which Dax reminds him later.

We go to Quarks next, but Quark is not in this scene. Kira comes in. She's got the new duty assignments while Wharf is gone and nobody likes it. Well, Dax explains it's not a vacation for Wharf. She explains how Klingons are ruthless on their ship. there's always, you know, they're always jockeying for power and respect and it can get rough. And that's when two rough clings. And I'm serious in this.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She, you talk about it like they're a bunch of pirates. You describe them as a gang of ancient sea pirates. Who says that? Dax says that?

Miles does actually. Oh, Miles does. Okay. But remember, her closest host, previous host was Curzon, who was in rapture over the Clingons. He lived it. He loved it. He, you know, was a passion for him to be with the Clingons.

Yeah. So she has that. Oh, yeah. I love that about that. Yeah. That it's just she shifts without effort into Curzon's point of view. Right. Yeah.

And they talk about like why they. could, you know, try to take seniority or, you know, that they, that they advance in rank by killing someone else or challenging another Klingon on the, on the ships. And the reasons they could do that is dereliction of duty, dishonorable conduct, cowardice. So you're already kind of setting up cowardice is definitely a thing that, that you'd be taken out for. Yeah. And I really noticed that the second time I watched it. I was like, ah. right now that makes sense yeah all the dots are connecting here well a couple of rough clingons enter otto's following behind them uh and otto tells everybody uh you know i for now these guys are

okay but look at that one guy he's wearing a necklace of cardassian neck bones did you see the necklace the like oh i did later yeah yeah i noticed it right away i thought it looked weird But I didn't put it together, obviously, until Odo says something. Neck bones. They were on this. Yeah, it's disgusting. It's like be walking around with, you know, when they would shrink heads. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. But if I missed it entirely, I feel other people missed it entirely, which means it wasn't focused or wasn't shot in a way that was supposed to be presented. No, in a way. They were trying to set them up a certain way of surviving multiple Jim Hidar attacks, right? So they haven't won one, but they've survived. which makes them toughened and hardened.

And that's one of the reasons, one of the things I was not satisfied with this episode. He felt the introduction of that crew was not as, had as much guavitas as he wanted to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There were a lot of wide shots,

a lot of wide, like medium shots, not even wide, like just kind of medium in the middle shots. Like three or four people. Yeah, or Worf in the middle and everybody behind him. Yeah, as opposed to some real close-ups. It was all very kind of middle of the road, which would be a criticism I have of the way that this episode was shot.

I felt like there wasn't a variety of, you know, moments that were intensely emotional or right inside in somebody's head. It was all kind of in the middle. That's my feeling generally about it. Yeah. So there's some rough-looking Klingons around. And we go to the airlock. This is where Wharf is heading to the Rotaran. I love this scene.

Yeah, awkward goodbye scene. Dax is following him. He says, okay, well, goodbye. And then goes in the airlock. And Dax walks right in behind him. Basically, she's coming. He's the new science officer on the, she's cleared it with Marks.

He goes, I do not want a long goodbye. Right. Yeah. Okay. I wasn't planning on it. And then he doesn't even say anything. He just pauses for a minute. And then he just a little awkward.

He says, good. He goes like, good. And then he just walks away from you, right? It was like, yeah. But it was sort of like a comedy, like, I don't know, bringing up baby. It felt very kind of comedy-driven in that old-fashioned way. Yeah, but it's refreshing. It is.

You guys are fun to watch this relationship. It really is fun to watch. Yeah, so Dax is going to be the new science officer. She said she'd clear it with Martok and Cisco. It's like, why didn't you tell me? And she goes, well, it's more fun this way. I know, right? Yes.

So, Dax. Yes. And she's excited. She's like, we're going to have fun on this mission. Yes. We go to the Klingon Bridge. And Dax is at her station, but she notices a couple of Klingons staring at her. She turns around and goes, boo, and scares them and they jump back.

So she's not afraid of these Klingons. She's not intimidated by these pirate Klingons. We meet Tavana, this female Klingon, who I loved. Yeah. Yeah. She was great. It also was great to have another woman with me. Like, yay, I'm not just with the boys.

Yeah. And it's tough as a guest star to enter off of a hearty laugh. You know, that brings you into the scene. You better be bringing it. You better be there in the very first moment present and bringing it. Or else you're never going to catch that wave, that surfing wave. You know, you can't. I think they all jumped on.

Oh, it was nice. Yeah. Yeah. She was particularly great because very different personality than the, rest of the crew. They're all kind of grumpy pirate. She seems more approachable. I thought she was great. And also, she's engineering and I'm science. So we're women in a male predominant of patriarchy of Klingons, but we're tough enough, but we still have our femininity. It's not like we're hard, but we are tough. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I just want to very quickly, just to go back to the boo,

Your comments, Robbie, about how middle of the road choices of shots right there, it was too far back. It's got to be, you know, if the boo wasn't as effective either because of how far back it was, it just seemed like, why would you do a wide shot of that? It's so dark in that ship. Come closer. Yeah, it was super dark. Dax's face. I want to see Dax's face go, boo, where I get scared because, like, I want to be scared as the audience, too, which brings. Yeah.

Yeah. And if he just went in tight on you, that darkness. would have, you know, that would have been elevated. Yes, exactly. So I don't think there was any coverage. It didn't land on me. No coverage. You turned, we were on your back when you said, boo.

It really was small. I bet it was. The set. Yeah, I bet it was. I liked that Tavana knows of Curzon Zach's because of her mother. But he really loved, in a biblical way,

Tavana's mom, it sounds like. And quite a lot. In a biblical right. What did she say? He was taken by her. Yes, Kurson was very. Kurson was taken by many people. And she says so was my mother.

So that was a great bonding, a commonality between the two of us, a nice little joke. And I think that was important. Yeah, I do too. To have that connection. Yeah, I do too. Well, Worf comes in, takes control of the bridge.

He wants a mission plan. Cornyn gives the, The pad with the mission plan. Yeah, everybody's very disrespectful. Tosses it. Yeah, Worf's trying to be very traditional. And this crew is just a mess. The crew seems very unruly.

Yeah. We learned that they've had no victories at all. They lose every battle. And Worf says he's going to restore honor to the ship. That's when Martak comes in. Very traditional Klingon captain taking charge of this bridge. They go through these sort of, you know, normal Klingon traditions.

Martak says he wants to go around the nebula to avoid the dominion, doesn't want to have to confront them. Leskitt is very rude, I thought. And Leskitt in all these scenes, I wish they hadn't done this. He's leaning back. Yeah. And it looks like an episode of the office where he's at his station. Yes.

Yeah, too casual. Leaning back. He's got his pot belly hanging out. He's like, whatever. Yeah. Yeah, like a pirate. Yeah, but I wish I would have been lean forward. Physically, I just wish he'd lean forward and was ready to like rebel or something as opposed to just the lazy, you know.

Oh, I like that idea. You know what's so crazy, Robbie? That is such an easy fix, isn't it? It's just the angle of posture is all it is. Yeah, that's all that needed to be changed. But in your head, the intention needs to be. we've been here through all of this and you guys are coming in a little holliana super happy and you are way out of sync you're not you know you're not taking the temperature of the room

yeah well leskets very rude he's leaning back very disrespectfully with his pop belly hanging out and uh martyx says no let's go around the nebula so uh we can tell that the crew's not behind it Worf starts singing in this, as they head out. Worf starts singing, sets up this rhythm by hitting the console, and Dax joins in, then the rest of them join in, but not very enthusiastically. They're not into this. Can I say something really fun?

Yeah. Before we did this scene, and we had an area where we could sit, you know how sometimes they had the big benches? Yeah. We had benches out. So all of the Klingons and myself, And they had someone teaching us this song. I thought I would never forget it.

Cannot remember it. Even watching it, it ticked me off that I couldn't just recall it. It was so much fun and super bonding for all of us. And I think we shot it very close to the beginning of the shooting schedule because that made us all feel like a team. Yeah. I mean, it must have been singing it for like half an hour while they were setting lights because it was a lot. A little trivia on this. Yes, tell me.

The Warriors' anthem first heard in the CD-ROM adventure Star Trek Klingon, which also featured J.G. Herzler, though not as Martak, enters Star Trek canon in this episode. Of the scene when the Ratarin crew break into song, Assistant Director B.C. Cameron said, quote, everybody sang, all the background players, the extras, the crew, we had big cards with these Klinganese words written on them for the actors to read. For days, that's all you'd hear on stage, people singing this battle song. Yes, yes, yes. It was a really fun episode to do. They were all great actors. Everybody

was game. It was really great. And then of course, LeVar always has this very calm, yeah, upbeat, positive. And he smelled like lavender as he always did at that time. And it was just, it was so much fun. He is so classy. He was a smooth shoot. Yeah, he's a classy man. We go to the Klingon mess hall next. Dax comes in and pulls an officer out of his seat, one of the Klingons, throws him, you know, on the ground, throws him back to the back of the table.

She's a badass, basically. Okay, I'm sorry. The logic, I didn't understand this. Because the whole thing is thrown out because this is my chair. And I'm like, wait a minute, this is the first time you guys sat down to eat. How is that even your chair to begin with? sit there before. It's probably like casting goes at the head of the table and science.

So there's probably a tradition. It's a hierarchy of the rank is what it. Okay. That makes sense. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. I loved getting to do that because that was so curs on.

It was cool. It scared me. Then you get into the food. We learn that dinner is stewed bot rat liver. What? And I'm game for it. How about that? I'm like, it doesn't taste for it doesn't smell for us.

It doesn't smell very. Which means you've already eaten that in the past, Curzon. So you've had it. Yeah. Well, Dax tastes it. It says it's not very fresh, bot rat liver. But with a little blood wine, it would be delicious. Lescott says, we don't have any blood wine.

She goes, oh, really? Well, I brought three barrels aboard before we left Deep Space Nine. So she's, you know, impressing this rowdy crew a little bit with. I'm trying to. to I'm trying to get a... Trying to bond. Yeah. She's not only...

Yeah. She's not only the science officer. She's the party officer as well. How do you get on the good side of a Klingon? Blood wine. Blood wine. Yes. And plenty of it.

Yeah. Next scene is in the Klingon Ready Room. Martak thinks the crew stinks. And Worf understands that defeat by the Gem Hedar over and over is creating this sense of defeat for everyone and Martak says he thinks they just expect to be defeated now. So Worf and Martok decide we need a victory and they want the crew to be prepared. Worf says, I will prepare them. I promise you. So it seems like Martok and Warf are both trying to, you know, change the attitude. On the same page. On the same page, trying to change the attitude of the crew. Next scene is in Klingon Mess Hall and

the blood wine is everywhere. Everybody's. Got blood wine. It's flowing. Tavana tells Dax's battle story. And Leskitt chimes in again. He's bitter. He's tired of losing. He's lost his pride, his honor. And then Tavana insults him. And Ordecan says Dax is here because of Wharf. They're a couple. And that's the only reason she's here. Dax says, no, it's an honor to serve under Martok. So again, trying to boost the. the morale of the crew. That's when Lescott insults Martok. So Dax starts insulting Leskitt. Everybody's insulting everybody. It's like a bunch of your mama jokes in this scene. Wasn't it a little bit?

Like everybody's taking a shot at everybody. And Dax even gets drawn into it. I think I scold him mostly. Yes, you do. Her cut is, she goes, on this trip, my bed is as empty as yours, Lusket, except mine is empty by choice. Yeah. And that's what everyone was like, ooh.

Yeah, that is an insult. Your mama. Well, yeah. Yeah. Yes. So everybody's insulting everybody. Cornyn thinks that the ship is cursed, though. He's the serious one.

Cornyn is very ominous about his bad luck description of this. He's very, he's the heavy in this scene. Well, off of Cornyn's ominous description of their bad luck, Worf makes a call to all of them. He says battle stations. There's Gem Hadar ahead of us. So everybody heads out to the bridge. Up on the bridge, we learn they're cloaked.

Martak lets the Gem Hadar go. We see their ship, but he lets them go. And the crew is not happy about that. Really stupid move. Well, it is because it's a patrol ship. It's not a battle cruiser. It's a patrol ship. Easily defeated by a Klingon bird of prey.

Which is exactly what the crew needs. They need that. They need to win. They've already talked about it. So at this point, when you guys are watching this, are you feeling that Martak is gun shy, that he is, like, what do you think? Why is he being this way? What are you two thinking as audience members when you're watching? I think he's, my sense was he's going to be right.

He's going to be smart. He's being smart and these guys just want to fight. They're being reactive. Right. But there was no payoff to that later, though, was this? There. No, no, which is unfortunate. So I'm thinking it was the abuse in that Dominion prison camp that broke him that made him just a kind of a shell of gun shy. He's gun shy. He's gun shy. I think he's a little gun shy. He's been way more cautious. Overely cautious. He doesn't he can't pull the trigger. For a cling on. Yeah. He's acting like a human. Yeah. Yeah. He's acting like a Starfleet officer actually. Yes, he is. Exactly.

Yeah. And Dax even tells Worf privately, she pulls him to the side, tells him that she thinks that was a mistake. Yeah. She says, look at the crew. Their morale is horrible. Yeah. We're in trouble, basically. Yeah.

And you've got to do something about it, Worf. I couldn't do anything about it. He has to. Yeah. So I have to be honest to Worf. So Worf can be honest to Martak. Yeah. Well, the next scene, we go in the ready room.

We're mid-scene. So Worf has brought this up what Dax was mentioning, and Martak's very angry about it. Worf is questioning his judgment here. Martok asks Worf, and Worf says he has his full support. You know, Martak's starting to question Worf's allegiance, yeah. After Worf says, you have got my full support, Martak says, and mine too, I will not fail you either, Wharf. So a little bit of a worth testing it out. trying to bring this up, but it doesn't go well.

So he backs off and says, I'm 100% behind you. Back in the mess hall, Dax goes in to get a drink. But Lescott appears to be stoking some kind of rebellion here. He's just ranting on and on about the hollow projections from the Kardashians, censor ghosts. Everything was a game with the Kardashians. And it would be an honor to kill the Kardashians. He wants some blood.

Leskis trying to rile everybody up. He's bloodlust. Yes, he's got bloodlust. Well, he talks about how the Kardashians are, at least, they have a, you know, they have a code. I did like these points he made. Yeah, he did. Whereas the Dominion, the Gem Hadar, they're just, they're not even, they're machines. They're not even, they have no honor.

They have no code except for they're just there to fight. That's it. They were engineered that way. And he's, comparing the Kardashians to the Klingons. In a way, yes. They have a purpose. They have a code. Correct.

Yeah. And he does say that the Gem Hadar, the future. And Martak fears the future and, you know, fears the gemhidar. And they start bickering. Daxa shut up. She tells him to shut up. Yeah. Shut up, let's get.

It's like a teen drama almost. It's great. Yeah. Yeah. Shut up. Let's get. And I used to say that with Michael Dorn. It was so funny.

Did you? Shut up. And he goes, you shut up. In that voice, you guys would do that? Yeah, it was crazy. Nana started it. It was hilarious. That's funny.

So if I walked up to Nanah and said, shut up, she'd get it then? Well, I don't know. From you, she might go, that's so rude, Garrett. Oh, I don't know. Maybe she'd be on it. Maybe she'll laugh.

Try it in Vegas. I will. Mm-hmm. I'll do it to Michael as well. And then if she doesn't react well, say Terry told me. Terry told me I could. It's Terry's fault.

Terry's fault. Terry's fault. It's fault. It's fault. Well, the end of the scene, Leskets got everybody riled up. He says Martak fears the Gem Hedar. That's why we didn't attack them. Martok fears them.

And that's when Cornyn attacks Leskett. There's a big fight here. Ordecan tries to break it up. Cornyn's trying to throttle Ordecan. Wait, so Leskets being beaten down by Cornyn? Not Hortican. I confused. Okay.

Leskitt is the blonde Klingon. That's kind of ponchy that leaves back? No, Leskett. Yes, that's Leskett. Is Leskett the one with the... The blonde hair? The bones. He has bones around his neck?

He's the one with the bones. Oh. Well, Cornyn and him are kind of buddies. They're the ones that come on to the station and are in corks, right? Yeah. They're the first two clean on T's. For insulting the captain, then Ordecan gets involved and Cornyn turns on Ordecan now. and is beating up Ordecan.

And that's when Dax takes her phaser out, stuns them to stop the fight. And that ends the fight. But yeah, it's basically the pirates are all fighting each other. But Ordecan is getting beat down too at the end. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I just want to say it felt to me like, okay, I stunned, but that the fight should have

continued and then cut to us being in the, because I had so much blood on the next scene and my hair was tousled. It seems like that when helping someone to the infirmary, yeah, the blood, but I looked disheveled. A bit of a logic. And then I'm magically perfect in the next scene. Yeah, it would have been better if the staging

had gotten you physically involved in the fight and in the middle, we don't know who won the fight. Right. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So we don't discover really what happened until, yes. Until Worf comes to see if she's over.

That frustrated me. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's the next scene. We're in a corridor. Warf comes to see if Dax is okay. Dax is very frustrated about all this. She thinks the crew needs a leader or they are going to explode.

And Worf defends Martock in the scene. Dax says what happened in the mess hall could happen all over the ship. And if you think the blood looks bad on me right now, wait until the decks are dripping with it. So she's really raising the stakes here. Like, this place is going to explode. bad and Martak's got to do something about it. I was just thinking about what Terry was saying. You're right.

If that fight kept on going to the end, you didn't see the end of it, but the last part of it is maybe you pulling the phaser and shooting it, but you don't know who gets hit and then you go to the net, you know, there's a lot of waste. Even that. Yeah. Oh, my God.

Okay. Sorry. Yeah. Well, we go back to the bridge after Dax and Worf talk in the corridor. Dax gets a distress signal. Wharf alters course to go help. seven light years away. Well, they found it.

It's the Bamoth. Yes, exactly. They were attacked by the Gem Hadar and lost main power, heavy casualties, at least 30 survivors. 30 survivors in need of assistance. Yeah. Well, Worf heads to go help them, but he's going to have to go tell Martak what's going on.

So he gives Tavana, makes her in charge of the bridge. Tavana goes over to Dax and tells Dax if things go. south here. Stick with me. So they're already dividing up into like factions and factions, yeah. Yeah, and she's the only one, she and I are the two that have Parma Kais on this ship. That's right.

I don't think anyone else does. Just want to, yeah, nobody, well. Well, I imagine not. Not from what we see on the bridge. Right. Well, Cornyn comes in and Tavana says stations. And then he starts to head towards her or the captain's chair and she... I think

he's trying to head toward, what's the guy's name? Leskett. Leskett. Leskett. I think he wants to start the fight again. Yeah, that's what I thought it was. He was going to go and start more beef with Leskitt. Like, okay, there he is.

Now I'm getting one more shot. And she's like, you're done. Station. Yeah. Yeah, it's good. We go into the ready room and Martak thinks this is a mistake. He thinks it's going to be a trap. But Worf says we shouldn't make any premature judgments about what is going on here.

We should go help these people and see, or at least, or at least look into it and try and help them. Because that's our mission for God's sakes. Yeah. Martuk sort of agrees. He dismisses Wharf, and we've got a wharf log here, Rotarin combat log. He says the 53rd day of the year of Calus, 999.

So he's using Klingon dates instead of Starfleet dates. I like that. Yeah, very cool. And he says we've reached the Cardas. border and begun our search for the Bermoth. That was kind of cool. Is it then that I start, I see them in my, I can see a impulse? Yeah, there's sort of like a fritzy screen and then you get clarity and it is the Bimath. You say that it's just inside the Cardassian territory. So it's just across the border,

which we're not supposed to go in there. Martuk says, no, we can't cross the border. That was like flipping me out. Are you kidding? Well, they're right there. Why are we sitting here waiting? Just go get them and let's get the hell out of here. What?

He really took on, Martuk really took on a persona of a Starfleet captain thinking, well, my orders are I cannot cross in at all. I'm not going to do. Not cling on. Not cling on. Someone needs to smack them upside the head. It's like the Dominion camp just squeezed all the cling on out of Martok.

Yeah. Poor Marta. Yes. And then he gave his warrior heart to wharf. He's missing all of it now. He's missing his warrior heart. He is. He needs to give it back to him. He does.

But again, like Robbie, at this point, I'm still thinking, okay, he's wise. He's making the right decision because, yes, it is a trap. I believed it. I said they left him alive because they want more Klingons to come in so they can get killed, obviously, or attacked. So I felt the same way. I understood that. I understood that. But when we got there, it wasn't like.

I could detect anybody, right? Anyone around, yeah. I guess they could have been cloaked. But that was our mission. That was our mission. And it's right there. They don't have, Gemadar don't have cloaking technology. So Dax is right.

And you're right to be frustrated because it's literally like saying, that person's having a heart attack, but they're on the other side of that sidewalk. And we can't walk over there. Exactly. They're across the street. They're right there, literally. Well, Wharf gets pushy in this scene.

He tries to get Mar-Tock to. you know, they're right there. He's saying all of this and Martak just explodes. In front of everyone, right? This is in front of everybody. Yeah. Well, Worf explodes at Martok and then Martuk explodes even bigger to Wharf. And then doesn't he exit?

Yeah. Then he says anybody who challenges my orders as captain will be charged with treason and Martok leaves. But he says, Warf, you have the bridge, which made you laugh. I'm like, really? You get all huffy and you're like, Warf, you have the bridge. I'm going to set it up so that you can disobey me now. Bye.

Like that. So it was very, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Dax goes to Wharf, asks, what are you going to do? And Worf says, I'm going to have to challenge Martak for command, I guess. He's at a crossroads. He's got to decide, you know.

Does he take the Starfleet kind of follow chain of command path? Or does he take the Klingon path and challenge Martok? And he says, I'm going to challenge him. But challenge means kill him. That is what that means. Not could. He says, I will have to kill him if the general doesn't step aside. Yeah.

Okay. So a little later, we're still on the bridge and Corny and Lescott are talking privately. And Tavana takes out her disruptor pistol. So it looks like things are, you know, this could be the blood dripping from the decks, as Dax described it. And Cornyn and Lestkett approach Wharf. They say Mar-Tox a cow. word. Dax calls Ordecan. She does a little typing because she can tell things

are about to go down. Did you clock that? No. I'm sorry. I didn't know what she was doing it. Yeah. That's why I'm bringing it up. Okay. Ronald D. Moore once commented on this scene saying, quote, Dax was actually sending a message to Ordecan, warning him of the impending mutiny. Ordecan shows up on the bridge a few seconds later with two other armed clingons. Yeah. The cutaway to Dax didn't read as well on camera as we had hoped. And now,

Ordecan's arrival is a bit mysterious, which I thought, I'm like, what's happening? Like, are they going to, who's doing that? And who are these guys? Did they just beam onto the ship? That's what I was thinking when I watched it.

If it was shot differently, with different choices of camera angles and whatever, tightness of lens, you could have relayed that, right? I didn't even know I called Ortecan. Yeah. Probably needed a shot out in the hallway, just a close up coming off of his pad or something.

Or shared look between me and him when he comes on board. And says, let's go. If you had intercut that for a second, you'd know who she was typing to. But we see her typing, Dax calling somebody or doing something. But it's a bit confusing. It's ambiguous. I'm typing what?

I could be typing just to find out more information. He needed the other side of that. So Worf decides to disobey Marta, commands them to go rescue the bomb. off, Martaq comes in right away. Yeah, because it's battle stations. Worf says battle stations. Yeah.

Worf challenges his command. The fight goes on a while. It looks like Worf's winning at one point, but then Martok ends up stabbing him in the stomach. And suddenly the crew is cheering Martok because he won that fight. So they're all behind Marta. And they were telling him, you've got to get rid of Martok. And this all happened in like 30 seconds.

Yeah, exactly. So they went from kill me. Martok, yay Martok. Yeah. Yes. Fickle. Tavana says that a Gem Hadar ship is approaching now in the middle of all this. And Martok takes a beat

and he goes, battle stations. So that fight with Wharf has turned things around for Martak. He's got the Klingon fight in him now. Yeah. And he calls for battle stations. Dax is trying to get Worf to the medical ward to, you know,

take care of his injury. That's a big turn in this scene. It all happens very quickly. Very quickly. And then we don't see anything. This is my big beef. I paused it because I'm, this is. Did we miss something? Do we skip something? Well, yeah. Suddenly we're on the space station and I paused it and it was, oh my gosh. Battles over. Yes. We should have seen all of it. There was no chaos for us. Exactly. But 42 minutes, not enough time. Yeah, but then you should maybe Leskitt could have complained less. Like cut some of that shit out. It was poignant.

He did it. Okay. But maybe it's like, and how did you not see that you're making such a meal out of the complaints? But we have no payoff as an audience to see them. To see them be brave and see them win and celebrate the win. Yes. Against the Gem Hadar. I didn't even realize they killed the Gemadar or battled Gemadar until Martak mentions it later.

So, Robbie, that's budget consideration then. Yes, it's too much. Oh, 100%. For that battle is impossible to throw in here. But we needed it. Yeah, let's remake this entire episode. When we go back to the space station, first thing we see is Bashir complaining about the intelligence business, basically.

Just I got to read all these reports. And he's complaining, complaining. And he says to Miles, you don't really care, do you? And Miles goes, no. which I love it was one of my favorite moments in the whole episode. Yep. Yeah, it was very funny. Nope, don't care.

And then O'Brien says vessels decloaking 15 kilometers off the station. It's the Rataran. So it's Martok's ship. We missed the battle. Martuk says they rescued 35 survivors and request permission to beam them directly to the infirmary. He also says, arrange for 15 barrels of blood wine to be waiting for us in the airlock so we can celebrate our victory of the Rataran over the gem Hidar. So yeah, we missed it all.

Oh, really? That happened? Yeah. Well, I kept thinking, did you guys think this? Dax brings three barrels on board the ship, which seems that's tons of blood wine. And then the general request 15 for one. Well, they rescued 30 Klingons. Oh, they need that.

Yes. I'm sorry. Pardon me. You're right. 30 additional clean ones need blood wine. Yeah. Well, and also I imagine that when Dax brought the three, it was just for... That one night?

The people on the bridge. Oh, just the senior officers only. Yeah, senior officers only. Yeah. I see. Thank you. Yes, she was targeting a specific group of people. Well, we go to Quarks Cafe next.

It's Martak and Worf. And Martak is very grateful to Worf. for reminding him of his duty as a warrior. And Martak asks him to join his house, basically. He says, you're still wearing the crest of the house of Moog. And Warp says, yeah, it's a sentimental gesture. Jad Zia calls it a sentimental gesture. But he offers to replace the house of Moog with the house of Martak.

So a very sweet and moving gesture here at the end. But I felt like this bond had not been played out on this ship. I would have liked to have seen more of that relationship and what they each offer each other and they need to learn from each other and less complaining, like you said. And I think that what I like about this is at least we get to, it's revealed what it through this whole episode, but the journey that Martak takes, but especially. this end sharing. He's a very evolved Klingon Martak. Yeah. And we didn't get to see enough of him.

He just kept leaving the bridge in this episode. Yeah, which I don't understand. Yeah. My lesson is everyone needs someone to remind them of who they truly are now and then. Hmm. I love that. All of us. All of us need to be reminded of who we are.

We forget who we are sometimes. That is very true. That is very true. Get lost in our stories, negative thoughts. Mine was, the best kind of friend tells you the truth. I like that. Because it's scary. That's when we create real connections with each other in intimacy, in relationships.

And I haven't always been good about that. I've been afraid of saying my mind a lot of times. because or telling the truth because I don't want to upset someone. But my deepest relationships are the ones that I'm brave enough to say. Yeah. I got to talk to you about this. Yeah. I mean, there are times when I have felt like I'm going to lose this friendship over saying this out loud.

I kind of prepare myself that that's going to be okay because it's more important for me to say what I see. And I can't say most of the time. I can't think of a time where it didn't really pan out, but I'm wondering if that's us holding on to positive and letting the negative go because it doesn't really matter. But the people I care the most about those tend to be, the thing that those kind of conversations bring us closer because we trust each other. Yeah. Yeah.

I just started getting deep in thought after you said yours. Yours reminded me of the Marianne Williamson quote. Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. My other theme or lesson is the Nike motto. Just do it. Just do it.

And that's in reference to the general. Well, our Patreon poll winner for the theme moral of this episode is submitted by Craig Maine. Always, in capital letters, listen to Jazea. Thank you. She is usually a few steps ahead of Wharf. Yes, she is. Garrett, you have honorable mention theme moral.

Yes, I do. Honorable mention for theme slash lesson slash moral as submitted by Lori Ulster. Lori Ulster says, you can teach someone an important lesson without stripping them of their dignity. Great. Great lesson.

All right, everyone. Thank you for tuning in to our recap and discussion of Soldiers of the Empire. Thank you to Terry for co-hosting once again with us. Thank you, Terri Fair. I love you guys. So much fun. Always.

I love you back. Yeah, thank you. Yay. And for all of our Patreon patrons, please stay tuned for your bonus material. For everyone else, we will see you next time and we will be recapping and discussing the episode, Children of Time,

and that would be with Terry as well. All right. Yay. Thanks, everybody. Well, my ratings go to something like this. I think the acting, for the most part, I thought was really good. I give it a 7.5. But you give me a 10, right?

I give Terry a 10, 11. Give Terry gets an 11. Well, I think it was a little mixed bag, to be honest, in the acting department. But overall, I thought, you know, the acting was good with what you were given and how it was staged and shot. So I give it a 7.5. Direction, I give a four. I think it's a little below average. It's not the best that LeVar has done.

And the writing, I also give a four because I don't think this is the strongest writing. So there you go. Okay. My rating for acting was a 10. Wow. Because I love my pals. directing was hard because I love with the actors I give Lavarra 10 but I agree with you about how it was shot

I think that was I would say a four and a half I think he could have told the story in a way that we got more out of it if it was shot with more close-ups and more movement more coverage, but there wasn't as much movement either. It would have been nice if there was a handheld. It was the last one. Writing? Writing.

Oh, writing. Yeah. Not the best written episode, is it? Well, you know what for me? Yeah, we've already talked about all of that. I would say probably if I want to say five. I really want to say higher because I love Ron Moore. There's no payoff.

No. I mean, yeah, the payoff at the very. very last scene, but no payoff with, I think the battle was really missing. We needed to see it. So acting, I give it a 7.9, not as high as Terry's 10, but higher than Robbie's. Direction, I give it a five. And then writing, and I love, I love LeVar. And I think this is very inconsistent for what we've seen from him. So I must add that as an asterisk, asteris to my five. And writing, I, see, I'm not. See, I'm not. Not judging on payoff. I'm judging more on just dialogue and interaction. I think it's better than

I'm ranking it higher than you guys. 6.3 for me. All right. So overall, real quick, I would rate this episode at a 5.1. Okay. I want to say 7.8. I had 8, 5 the first watch, but then I moved it to 7.8 because it bothered me about the ending. But getting to know Martok better and the relationship with Wharf, I think is, especially for people who are Klingon fans, a big deal. Huge. My overall rating, I'll give it at 7. It's excellent character development for Martok for sure. And the fact that they had an all Klingon episode is, minus Dax, is shocking to me,

that they even did this. And great, because I'll be honest, every time people ask me, what alien would you play on Star Trek? I always say Klingon. I never say anything other than Klingon. So it's nice for all the Cleveland fans. I think you'd be a good Romulan. Romulan, sure.

Thank you. Overall, from our majors, captains, admirals, and profits. I've got it right here. Wow, I'm so curious. What does it say? Acting 8.93? Oh, my goodness. Writing 8.07, directing 8.87.

8.87. And overall, 7.37. My winner is Wharf. He gets the win for all kinds of reasons, but he's the winning character for me. Honestly, think it's both. I think it's Worf and it is Martok. Mine's Martok. And then the survivors of the Bamoth, they got rescued. I'm sure they're pretty happy. So they're winners too. The Patreon poll winner for the winner is submitted by Tim Newmark, the crew for winning and Worf for joining the house of Martock. Aw. Honorable mention for the winner category,

as submitted by Andrew Kaplan, is Klingon Bloodwine. I like that. Very funny, Andrew. That was very popular in this episode. Loser time for me is the Gem Hadar. I actually have to agree. My loser would be Bashir for having to be the intelligence officer and something that he does not like at all.

Yes. Our Patreon poll loser is submitted by Penny Liu, and that is the Gem-Hadar warship. Yes. Gem-Hadar. Yes. The Gem-Hadar. Honorable mention, loser, submitted by Amy,

Julian, Miles, and others who had to take on Worf's duties. Yes. Yes. Agreed. I give the makeup department the win on this one because of all the Klingons and the variety of Klingons and things like that. Yeah. Me too.

Oh, really? Hair and makeup. Oh, nice. Yeah, I wanted to do the camera lighting, but then I thought about it when I watched it the second go around, and I could see a lot of the smoke. Oh, really? And I wanted to see things a little more clear.

It was one thing to be dark, but I wanted it to be a little more clear. So I could see people and see what's going on. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if you're going to make it that smoky, make it a little lighter inside there. If you're going to, right?

If you're going to keep it dark, say it a bit. Don't do that much smoke. So, yeah. Use more silk screens. And it doesn't make sense to have that much smoke in a bridge anyway, does it? I mean, it's an operating. Exactly. It's an operating bird of prey that has no damage to it. Why would it be

smoky inside? Make up for me too. Patreon production shoutout poll winner is submitted by Alex Ray. Wardrobe. There were multiple types of Klingon uniforms rather than just the standard that we've all seen many times. Agreed. Yeah.

Yeah. Excellent. The battle scene. It has to be the battle scene. I mean, they keep talking about doing, we've got to fight, we've got to win. And then the whole thing that they've been complaining about, they don't even show us. And that's why the payoff is so important in this episode. Yeah. Absolutely agree with you.

That's your missing scene? Yes. It's a thousand percent. Yeah. A million percent. Yeah. I agree with you guys. That would have been great.

That would have been great. But my comedic, it's not a missing scene. It's an add-on to the scene where Dax is following Wharf into the shuttle, right? And then he doesn't know she's coming along. And then right when she says, I'm coming along, she does that thing. Remember that movie that Jim carries in where he's about to be in bed with the gal? And he does this one move. And his whole, what he's wearing just comes right off.

Yes. It was with Jennifer Aniston. Yes. Yes. So in this, in my idea, when Dax says, I'm coming along, she does this move and her entire Starfleet uniform disappeared. It just comes off and she's wearing full Klingon armor under like the full, everything Klingon. Oh, I like that. You remember that move, right? Yeah. Oh, I love that. Yes. Do you like that? So that's my modified scene. Thank you. All right. Our Patreon poll missing scene winner is submitted by Scott B. And that is at least some of the battle between the Rortort. And the Gem Hadar ship.

Amen. He's humble. He just wants some of the battle. He doesn't want all the battle. Just a little bit. Just a little bit. A little taste of battle. Just a little bit.

Appetizer. Honorable mention missing scene is submitted by Alex Ray. O'Brien finishes working on phaser rifles and is informed he also has to do Dax's extra work. Another new section we've got is what were they up to? Quark and Jake edition this week. They were both not in the episode. I have Quark was setting up arrangements for new businesses now that he has his license back. That happened in the last episode.

Oh, good note. Yeah. I like that idea. I have, Jake is helping babysit Kira Yoshi while Kako has night classes for adults. I'm going to say that Quark was visiting Mugi. Moogie and checking up on whether or not things are going well with Grand Nagas. Our Patreon poll winner for what they were up to is submitted by Nicole Bertel. Jake invites Quark to a baseball game since his dad is too busy and Nog is off limits with Starfleet.

Quark starts betting on which baseball team will win to pass the time. He ends up liking baseball saying humans, you are sentimental and all that, but you do know how to have fun sometimes. That's really great. Annie Davy asks, when you were traveling in your car, do you sing along to songs on the radio? If you do, what songs do you sing? I would add I dance. I like move in my car as I'm singing.

Oh, nice. I do love to sing in the car. If I'm by myself, I play really loud music, which sometimes when I get back in the car with Rebecca and the stereo pops it on, it's like, bah. Aren't you shocked how loud you made it? Yes. Yes. But I usually have the windows at least partially open because the weather's usually so nice. Even if it's cold here, the sun is so intense that you get hot inside your car.

I don't think it matters to me. What do songs do I sing? Every single one that pops up. I mean, it doesn't matter. I like them all. I usually sing songs that I remember from my childhood, like high school favorites and things like that. Yeah, when you know all the words. Songs from the 70s.

It's weird. I'm not a lyrics person, no matter how much I listen to music, which is a lot. I don't retain lyrics at all. Very rarely. So there's only a couple songs that I would. So I'll be honest. It's you two with or without you. I know the lyrics to that and maybe two other songs.

That's it. of all the songs ever written. Wow. No, but I love music, you know, but I just don't know lyrics. Kit Marie has a question. Kit Marie from the UK says, Terry, how did you approach playing a character who is so competent and integrated into Klingon culture that she can navigate their politics better than most Klingons?

That's a compliment. Huge. Thank you so much for that compliment. Very much, Kit. I really appreciate it. I think because we're in season five. at the end, and I've been playing this character for such a long time. In the very beginning, it was clear that I had a passion for the Klingons in my, you know,

the Bible breakdown of who my character was. So that's something that I experienced really early on, I think my character very often breaks the rule of not solving things from a past host. Like the very first episode they called Dax and I was on trial and Anita Tandro, I was protecting her because Curzon was having an affair with her while, and she was married to some high person in her culture. And I can't remember the whole storyline. But I defended her by protecting her honor, which you're not supposed to do when you switch hosts. So because I got to play that scenario many times, this was like a juicy piece of meat for me. There was so much for me to be strong and forthright about and defending my Parma Kha'i, defending Martakai, and my relationship to the Klingons.

I think she just has it integrate. So how did I approach it? It's the history of how I'd played the character. And I think for all of it, being a big sister and being very close in age, but being treated like I was much older than her, gave me this part of my personality that wants to take charge, take care of things. You don't have to worry about anything because big sister's here and I've got my big girl pants on. You know, there's just the thing about it. that. And so that's kind of integrated into who I am. And I just use that in those situations to empower myself and the character. Next up we have Alex Ray, who says, Kira reassigns Worf's responsibilities in this

episode. In filming a TV show, how do actors and the crew support another actor slash crew member when they need a break slash go home early slash feeling sick? And how has this changed over the years? I can say on our show, you really support them by showing up. And it's like a, we're like this warrior team. So we make up for the difference. You just change the scenes, change around what you're filming. Change the schedule usually. If somebody has to leave.

If it's that extreme, then you, yeah. But you don't, there's no, there's just a matter of everybody. getting even closer, like when we have an earthquake or whatever, in your neighborhoods, everybody starts to take care of each other. It's that kind of feeling. It's a crisis in, it's a crisis that's happening to the entire show. So everybody pulls together. I also remember, like, in scenes with when sometimes you'll have actors that are just having trouble remembering their lines. And I often will see other actors generously saying, hey, do you want to run lines? You want to, why don't we? While they're like,

You want to run through the lines or you want to, you know, I think that those little ways of kind of helping each other as opposed to the big. It's a huge. Yeah. The little stuff can really make a big difference. Getting someone tea, taking it to their trailer. Because many of us still worked when we were sick. You had to be really sick not to go to work. Scott Bowling asked, did it hurt this story that we didn't actually have the scene when Martak gave Worf his warrior heart?

We did see it. We did in the other episode. They talk about it. But yeah. Well, we saw it when Warf was ready to give up and then they made eye contact. Yeah. If we didn't actually see it, it's in my mind that I saw it. See, I didn't clock it to be perfectly honest.

Now I want to go back and watch that now. So I want to see if that was actually there. I'm sure there was a moment where they looked at. I think there is a moment. I remember that as well. Okay. But if there's some Klingon tradition that's got a name, it would have been nice if that had been built up a little bigger and that we could have seen that same moment here, that same kind of shot or whatever. Oh, tie it in.

Yeah, that it goes into slow motion or something for a second and they just look at each other and we're pushing in in slow motion as they connect with that. Right. Starting with Prophet Tim Newmark, who says, did the Props Department have a low budget for? for this one? It seemed to me that Worf's outfit looked like a modified baseball catcher's chest protector. That outfit took me out of this episode just a little bit.

Oh, interesting. I did not clock that, but I'll look at it again. I've seen him in this outfit before, and that's really a lot what my Klingon outfit looked. Same colors. I think maybe, I'm guessing, but not having

the sash on. Yes, because you talk about that in the episode. Yeah, that maybe that threw you off from the costume because he normally wears a sash with it like he did in the end. Yeah, I think you're right. Prophet Jenny Cordina, who says, to me, this episode gets at the important role of helping someone whose lost confidence find their strength again. In your own lives or careers, have you ever had someone who helped you through a moment like that? or have you been that person for someone else? Yes.

It's happened many times. I think none of us get through life without a little help. Absolutely. Cheerleader feeling. Yeah, both ways. It's happened to me. But also it's actually so many times that I, especially when you're working or when you have crisis happening in your life or in a friend's life.

So, yeah, this repeats many times. When I hit a real rock bottom 10 years ago or so, I remember going through my phone, I was like, who can I call about this? I got to talk to somebody. And I remember scrolling and scrolling and scrolling and scrolling, I don't know who, like everybody in my phone, I would have to catch them up so much to. You know what I mean? Because I had not leaned on people. And I was like, and then I ended up calling someone. And they jumped right to it.

And we're like, you don't have to explain anything. And it was the biggest lesson for me and relief to go, oh, I don't need to be the strong one all the time. I don't need to present a perfect facade. I can present my flaws and my failures and my mistakes. to more people because I do have good friends. And it was someone who showed up for me and literally met me within hours. And we had a great conversation and we met in person and we talked through some stuff. And it was such a cathartic experience.

And I don't give that person's name because I don't want to put it all on that person. It was for me to learn that I don't have to pretend with the people. people that care about me, that I can be all of myself, the good and the bad. And it was a great lesson that he gave me and that I learned. So yeah. That happened to me too. Yeah. That very thing. And it surprised me the person that showed up for me. But yeah, I think that's what's kind of great about it. It's the people that surprise you. Yeah. Yeah, that really show up. And I think to Jenny's question, the importance of helping people who've lost their confidence or their strength or knowing who they are. I mean, it goes back to my lesson about the episode.

It's like sometimes we all need somebody who can remind us of who we are. It's not even about the person giving us an answer, you know, but it's about knowing that someone's going to remind me of the good part of myself. Yes. And all of myself, I guess, the true part, you know. Yeah, yeah. Because good people make bad choices. Yeah. They do.

We all do. I was really, really just depressed about career, acting, everything at one point. And I was, this is after Voyager was done. I just, nothing was happening. There was a writer strike. Auditions weren't going well. And I was very depressed. And I was sitting, I ended up getting on a plane.

And it just happened that the person sitting next to me was Jeff Bridges. and I just I kind of open up to him yeah and he was very nice and I said listen man I'm just feeling and you know and he was the one that sort of kind of prop me up to help me find my confidence a little bit he's like a giant teddy bearer he really you know what he should he's like the actor whisperer is what he is like he can or a human whisperer he was able to yeah yeah they're really down to earth yeah yeah and I appreciated that he didn't hold he didn't have any airs about him at whatsoever. One of the most humble movie stars I've ever met.

Prophet Faroza Meta, Minneapolis, Minnesota asks, what do you think of the bromance between Wharf and Martok? I like it. I like it. I do too. Yeah. Actually, I love it. It's like he needs a son and Worf needs a dad figure.

So, or father figure. So there's this mutual respect. I feel like they're very much on the same wavelength of how they see the world. And they teach each other. So they're great. And this episode is especially great because up until this episode, it's Worf going, I'm team Martak. And it's Markov going, I'm team Warf. I love you. I love you. And now there's a little bit of this happening. There's tension. There's, there's some head budding, you know, and of course, a stabbing as well. So there's a lot of things that are going on here that kind of helped this relationship become more three-dimensional, I think, or more a deeper relationship.

All right, Prophet Cindy Woodford says, I imagine you've all had opportunities to take leadership positions, both personally and or professionally. What are some steps that you would take to change the mindset of a demoralized team? I mean, I think that Martak and Wharf's strategy initially was a smart one. We need to, you know, find a way to give them a win to build up their confidence. And I think that's a great strategy of, you know, find something that's very achievable. that the team can do together, that they will succeed. We believe and know they will succeed and give them a win. And also remind them of wins that, you know, the good parts. Like a pep talk, like reminding you of your strengths, reminding you of possibility,

and that I'm behind you and I've got you. I think when you feel a little taken care of by the leader, the coach, whoever, who reminds you that you're valuable to them. So I would say, I would tell the team, you're valuable to me. Each one of you has something that nobody else can bring to this, you know, that kind of pep talk. If I was the leader of a demoralized team, I mean, the same things that you guys are saying, I would obviously do those things. But I would also, I would also inject humor into whatever I was saying to them because I feel like if you can make people laugh. Lighten up. Yeah.

Yeah. All of a sudden, when they're laughing, people are less like, meh, like, you know. But I also remember when I was in acting class at UCLA, I remember everyone was really just like, in a just bleh mood. It was, you could just feel it. Like everyone's very heaviness about them. And the acting teacher was like, I don't like the energy in here. Everyone, get up. We're leaving the classroom.

We're going to run around the quad three times. And I was like, what? I am not going to do that. I remember I said, I'm not going to do that. And she says, why not? I said, because it's silly. She's like, well, maybe that's what we need right now, a little silliness, you know, to get up and just get some air and just get some, your blood pumping. So, yeah, so I find that humor is a way to do that without having to run out and do that.

You just get a move. Yeah, but to change, it's like having a baby. When you're, it's such a drag when you can't just change the environment to change their mood. Right. Yeah. Like if when Max was fussy, sometimes I'd walk out in the cold. and he go but then they get to be old enough

that it's like oh dang that doesn't work anymore but then we get older and we know that's a good thing to do to just shake off whatever's going on that's really smart teacher to take you guys around the block you could walk it you don't have to run

yeah that's true that's true all right next up we have prophet Chris Hanson who says in Star Trek the undiscovered country the 1991 film it was established that Klingon blood is pink. So why were the stains on Jedzia's uniform and the blood on the Dikhtach red?

My guess is that you couldn't read the pink on camera. Yeah, or it might look like Peptobismol. Yeah, they usually tried to really be on top of that. Last but not least, Prophet Nikki T. Nicky Bits. I once heard someone joking that in a healthy, relationship, one partner has to fear the other. Do you think that there's truth to this? And if so, who fears who and Judziah and Worf's relationship and why? I've never heard that. I've never heard.

I would say respect each other. So if you respect each other, it's not fear, but respects that drives you to make different choices so that you have your other partner feeling proud of you. But if you're going off of this question, who fears who? between the two. With Judziant, oh, I think he fears me 100%. Yeah, he fears Dax, for sure. He fears that you're going to lose his Klingon opera tapes or whatever. I think he knows how smart Dax is. And he cannot predict, she's unpredictable. Yes. And I think those, I don't think it's about fear. I think it makes him, oh, maybe it is fear because scares fears. I think he is the one that's more unstable in their relationship.

Correct. Because she has no fear about being herself. Right. And I think he has guards around who he is and how he feels. And he sticks to the rules. He's already displayed fear, jealousy, all kinds of stuff. We've already seen Worf go through the ringer when it comes to relationships with Jenzy. And why is because I'm pretty sure she...

is the best thing that's ever been in his life for him. Yeah. So there's also fear of losing you, too, then. 100%. Yeah. That's why there's the jealousy. Yeah. All right.

Thanks, everybody for joining us this week. So much fun. Terry, thank you for joining us and co-hosting with us. No. Oh, I love it. Yes. Thanks to our Patreon patrons. All of our supporters, you guys are awesome.

Join us next time when we will be reviewing Children of Time with Terry once again. I'm so excited. But everyone, you're very lucky. You're getting a double feature of Tare Fair. Thank you. I'm very lucky because I get a double feature of the two of you and all of you. Thank you for supporting all of us. We love this so much.

It's so fun. All right. Thanks, everybody. We'll see you next time.