The Delta Flyers - The Adversary

Episode Date: May 20, 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, The Adversary, is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, Terry Farrell. The Adversary: The Dominion tricks Sisko into a confrontation with the Tzenkethi that could lead to full-scale warfare. We want to thank everyone who makes this podcast possible, starting with our Production Managers Megan Elise & 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, Tom Paynter, Sandra Stengel, AJC, Nicholaus Russell, Alex Mednis, Holly Schmitt, Roxane Ray, Andrew Duncan, David Buck, Tim Neumark, Ian Ramsey, Feroza Mehta, Jonathan Brooks, Matt Norris, Izzy Jaffer, 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, Shannyn Bourke, Lee Lisle, Sarah Thompson, Holly Smith, Amy Tudor, Mark G Hamilton, KMB, Dominic Burgess, Mary Burch, Normandy Madden, Joseph Michael Kuhlman, Darryl Cheng, Elizabeth Stanton, Tim Beach, Victor Ling, Shambhavi Kadam, Tae Phoenix, Donna Runyon, Nicholas Albano,  Randy Hawke, Rob Traverse, Penny Liu, Stephanie Lee, David Smith, Stacy Davis, Heath K., Ryan Mahieu, Andrew Cano, Kevin Harlow, Megan Doyle, Keir Newton, Mariette Karr, Jeff Allen, & Tamara EvansAnd 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, Claire Deans, 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, Shanyn Behn, 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, Klee Wiggins, Greg Kenzo Wickstrom, Lauren Rivers, Jennifer B, Dean Chew, Robert Allen Stiffler, PJ Pick, Preston M, Karen Galleski, Nicole Brettell, Jan Hanford, Katelynn Burmark, Timothy McMichens, Lindsay Bundy, Dawn Colleen Smith, Cassandra Girard, Robby Hill, Andrea Wilson, Angela Clermont, Willow Whitcomb, Mo, Leslie Ford, Jim Poesl, Daniel Chu, Scott Bowling, Ed Jarot, James Vanhaerent, Nick Cook-West, Shawn Battershall, Natalie Swain, & Brian HeckathorneThank 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

Hello, everyone, and 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, Terry Farrell, Robert Duncan McNeil, and myself, Garrett Wong. For the complete and exciting version of this podcast, check out patreon.com forward slash the Delta Flyers. Sign up to become a patron today. Hello, friends. Hello. Hello. Well, I just wanted to go right to it because right before we started recording, Terry was like, I had a car accident and we're like, what? What happened? Yeah, I'm driving on my way to my parents. Albuquerque has crazy traffic. And it was on Wednesday.

and but I yeah so the traffic stopped but you know I mean you're used to LA so it's like LA 405 driving and I pump my brakes to let the person know behind me like it's bad you better stop quick and I could see that they weren't slowing down so I I started to go towards I we were in the fast lane I started to go left to go into that you know that area the turn lane kind of yeah yeah yeah Well, it's not a turn lane because I was on the interstate, but it's that, yeah, I think it's the emergency vehicle lane. Yes. And so, thankfully, she only hit my back right bumper. Right.

But she was young, and I felt so bad for her. She just, she was all shook up and she was late for work. And I just, at first we're going to take a deep breath. Yeah. And look, neither one of us are hurt. We're both fine. Right. No injury.

Fine. It's just bumpers. That's what they're for. It was just an honest to God. I don't know if she was changing her radio station or, you know what I mean? It was like she must have just glanced and missed that moment. Poor thing. I really felt bad for her. I just because she was so young and she was so shook up. And I didn't call the insurance until today because I was taking care of my dad and his surgery. He's fine, everybody. So everything's great. but she hadn't called it in yet, and it happened on Wednesday. I was in a similar experience to you. I was heading in Santa Monica, going straight through an intersection. And there was a turn lane where someone had their left turn signal on to make a left on Main Street. And just as I was passing them, they changed their mind and decided to come back into the, you know, to go straight. And so they hit my car, my rear left wheel and my rear quarter panel. And I was like, oh, my God.

And I pulled over. And they pulled over. And it was a teenage girl and her boyfriend. And she was really, really upset. And I did what you did. I was like, it's okay. It's just, it's no big deal. And so because she was so upset and apologizing and everything, we took each other's

information. We both had state farm or whatever, you know, we've had the same insurance company. So I thought, no big deal. Like she knows she made a mistake. We'll just put it in. Yeah. When I called my insurance adjuster, they said, well, she has a different story. She said, you tried to cut her off and make a left in front of her.

And I went, what? Yeah, yeah. Why would I make a left? I was going to an appointment. I had my calendar. I was going straight. Like, I was not making a left. And because we had not filed a police report, the insurance company split the blame.

And so I got a ding on my insurance. my insurance went up and I was like I can't believe this girl I was so nice yeah oh you know what I didn't make a police report either because we weren't hurt that's what I'm saying oh shoot everybody it's weird as a cop car SUV drove right by us you should have called when we were outside said it's no big deal from then on not that I've been in any other accident but for two or three years I paid much higher insurance because because that young girl or her father or or mother, whoever, someone said, we can't. Why did you say that?

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, saying to her, why did you say that? Yeah. It made no sense because I knew what I was doing, but the way the accident happened. That also doesn't make sense. The adjuster, it kind of, it's possible, but I said to the adjuster, like, why would I cut her off and run my car in, like, I don't see how it would be physically possible for the adjuster. Justin said, we can't figure, we can't tell.

It could be her version. It could be your version. So we're just going to split the blame. So, file a police, we're at PSA. If you ever in an accident, it's not personal. You just want a record of exactly what happened that you agree on. What are we talking about? What's our show today?

Oh, my gosh. We're talking about adversary today. The season finale? The season finale. Season three, episode 26 of Star Trek Deep Space Nine. adversary. A lot to talk about. Buckle up your seats, everybody. But before that happens, let's talk about birthdays, though. Let's go through some birthdays. I want to say to Rob Traverse, happy birthday on May 23rd, Rob. Happy, happy birthday. Happy, happy birthday, Rob.

Happy birthday, Rob. Happy birthday to my friend Rob. Happy birthday, buddy. Next up, we have E.G. Galano. on May 23rd as well. Happy birthday to E.G. Galano. Happy birthday, E.G. Happy birthday, E.G. And Sarah Thompson, May 25th. Happy birthday, Sarah.

Happy birthday, Sarah. Happy birthday to Sarah. And last but not least, Caitlin Burmark on May 25th as well. Happy birthday, Caitlin. Happy birthday, Caitlin. Happy birthday to Caitlin. Let's hear a little limerick from Robbie McNeil.

All righty. Here we go for our season finale, the adversary. A little poetic art. The big season three finale is finally here. There's a saboteur. Its identity's unclear. Ben gets a captain, Pip. Will he blow up his own ship?

Changelings everywhere. Season 4 will be a big year. Oh. Nice. Thank you. Yeah. We should have ran that as a promo for the show. That's what I was thinking.

That was a good promo. Where were you in 1995? That's your new career. Robbie's going to do promo audio for all the promos of new shows. Promo poems. Okay. Here is my haiku for the adversary. Here we go.

Yes. Cisco promoted a mission to Tenkethi Founders meddling Wow I'm scared now I know the hikus are always a little intimidating They're very they're dramatic

So you could do the longer promo I'll do the quick short promo I'll just be founders medley Does it? But you know what? You usually have a very funny haiku yeah this one was so funny yeah so that was uh maybe it changed poignant how intense that was well because there's a lot of change happening in this episode yes this is the last of a lot of things going on for this episode i thought it was going to be the last of the defiant it

no yeah yeah you definitely felt it was going to be the last of defiant over my dead body this is the last episode where cisco is credited as commander cisco and then after that it's Captain Sisko, right? Yay. This is the last episode where Avery Brooks actually has hair. So this is it. Is it really? Yes.

Well, he has hair, but he shaves his head. Yes, season four premier first episode, it's shaved, right? It's gone. And I think he wanted to do that right from the get-go. Also, this is the first time that we see new sets on the Defiant. Yes. Main engineering, mess hall, an extended corridor set. So they really added a lot more to that defiant ship.

Yes, they did. Right? Yeah. Love the engineering with the warp core in it. That's so cool looking. Because what have we seen before this? We've seen the bridge of the Defiant and the quarters, like one of the crew calls. The cramped quarters.

The cramped little crew quarters. Any other areas that we've seen, Robbie, that you recall? Because I don't remember anything else. Tiny, maybe a little return of a hallway or something. And that's it. Yeah. And this one just expands the story, you know, and our view of. Oh, and TurboLift.

Did you mention turbolift? No, in the turbo lift, yes, there's a turbo lift in this? Another thing, too. Yeah. Yeah. And hallways that are really long. Mm-hmm. There's some.

Jeffrey's tubes. Yeah. There are. And the Jeffries tube similar to what we used in Voyager, Robbie. Yes. With that hard rubber perforated, you know, bottom thing that hurt our knees. This is also the last time that these opening credits that we've been seeing for season one, two, and three, every single episode, they're done. next so the next season season four episode one it's a whole brand new which i'm so excited i haven't

seen that so wow yeah so i don't know until we get to review that yeah next next okay directed by alexander singer singer alec singer as we know him uh the the the silver-haired fox that he is he's so good at what he does we love him written by iris stephen bear and robert hewitt wolf let's talk about guest stars is that right yes yes please Lawrence Pressman as Krugensky. He's Ambassador Krogynski. His first role ever was on a soap opera, The Edge of Night. Do you remember that, Robbie?

The Edge of Night. I definitely do, yes. I do too. Yeah. And one of his very first starring roles in a feature film happened to be on the iconic film, 1971 film, Shaft, which you two definitely. Wow. Shafed.

Pressman was absolutely prolific on stage. He won the Theater World Award. for his Broadway debut in Never Live Over a Pretzel Factory. He also starred in The Man in the Glass Booth directed by none other than Harold Pinter on both the West End and Broadway. And he also co-starred in the original Broadway production of Woody Allen's Play It Again, Sam.

That's Lawrence Pressman. So if you're talking about a theater pedigree background, this man has it for sure. He also played in an earlier episode of D-Space 9 That was season three, and that was second skin. We also have Kenneth Marshall as Michael Eddington. We've spoke about him before. He was at Juilliard, your alma mater as well, Robbie.

We talked about him and being in Juilliard as well back in the day. Jeff Austin as the Bolian, the Bolian Starfleet crew member, the blue guy. Yeah, his earliest credit was a 1979 episode of Barnaby Jones. You guys remember that show, Barnaby. He also played Alos, Robbie, in our show on Voyager in the episode Omega Directive. And so I had to actually look back at that. Can you see that at all? Am I putting anywhere near?

Oh, yeah, he was great. He was very intense. Yeah, that guy. Yeah. Clearly, this guy has played multiple aliens. He's a bollian. He's this alien here on Voyager. And those are our guest stars.

Lawrence is still alive. He's still with us. He's 85 years old, I think. He's a member, though, a connection for this podcast. He's a member of the Anteas Theater Company. That is... Kitty and Armin. With Armin.

Yes, so I'm sure they're very good friends. Oh, my good. Of course they are. Through the theater company that Armin and Kitty both are, you know, big, important people. Wow. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that.

We need to know that, actually. Yeah. I just wanted to say about Jeff Austin, all the actors that come on and have basically under five lines. Excellent work. It's so hard to come in and have such a small part and be such a full character. And he really was. I was with him the whole way.

He was excellent. Yeah, you could have pages and pages of dialogue, but sometimes when you have under five, it's even more difficult to pull off, right? All right. Now, the other bit of trivia here before we get in is this episode was untitled. It did have a working title. It was Flashpoint, but it was entitled for a while until they had a concedure. A contest was held, and the adversary was the winning selection, the winning entry.

What kind of contest did they have? I have no idea. But that's just what I found on the interwebs. Wow. Maybe they just put this, you know, in some type of local paper or something. Who knows? You know, it could have been anything. Interesting.

If anyone knows, let us not. It could have been a contest in the writer's room. It could. Exactly. It threw straws. Amongst the Paramount Studio security guards. They said, you guys come up with anything you want. Doubt it.

This is also the very last time that Alexander Siddig is credited as Siddig El Fadil, his original credited name. He does keep Siddig El Fadil when he directs the season five episode business as usual. So he doesn't use Alexander Siddig when he directs his original name. So that was for you, Robbie. Interesting. Yeah. That's funny. I don't remember him directing.

I must not have been in it very much. Oh, no. I don't remember, yeah. Wow. I really don't. But, you know, some episodes, we did voiceovers. Like you didn't. We're not in a minute.

It was just for calm voice. Exactly. Like you would make one little audio thing and that was it. You weren't even in the episode, right? Yeah. I mean, look at this. I get knocked out and. Yeah, true.

They take me out of the equation again. Yeah. But, you know, I'll tell you what. It's just so funny. Right? But you being knocked out, we've never, ever seen. the underside of your chin before until today. Really?

Well, think about it. We never get that view of you, right? We saw. Oh, well, we don't really want to look up anybody's nose. But we did. We got to see up your nose this one. Our babies may make sure they're clear. I will say, I did feel like when O'Brien says to you, hey, Dax, can you come with me?

I need some help. I was like, yeah, it's going to be trouble. One of them, one of them's going to, something's going to happen. Yeah. I knew immediately. We would have fixed it too quickly the both of us. Yes, yes, exactly. Oh, goodness.

All right, shall we jump into this one? Let's do. Okay, cool. Yeah. Starting with the commander's log, because he's still a commander. He's talking about how the last three years have been the most demanding and rewarding of his career, and he just hopes that the future will hold even greater challenges. And then all of a sudden, we're in the ward room right now, right?

But you skipped over one important part. Important part. He says, this is my final commander's role. Yes, yes, yes, yes. And I was like, what? What the what? I literally was like, that's not possible. I know he doesn't leave the show.

I know. I didn't understand. And then, okay, I get it. Yes, then you get it, right? And they still, well, it's cool because when we're in the wardroom, it's a very tight shot and it's just on Jake. That's it. So you still don't know what's going on.

So they're extending your, what the, what from the earlier commanders log into this scene right and it could be anything i've been wanting to say this to you for a long time dad exactly uh jake says and it's like what does he been wanting to say to him right martha and i are getting back together we're new parents we have a child now something like that or i don't know yeah everyone's there it's it's awesome he's getting promoted jake hugs him kira is is there saying well uh does this mean that i can't disagree with you He goes, no, it just means I'm never wrong is what Cisco says. So it's a, it's a cute little ceremony, basically.

It's very sweet. I did like the detail that Jake was the one that pinned him with the kids. Yes. Me too. Yes. Yeah. Instead of a, instead of a star for. And he's taller than him now.

No, I know. I know. I know. It's so funny to see how fast he grew. Oh my goodness. Bean stock. Yeah. And it's nice because everybody has a little banter with Cisco.

Yes. Everyone comes through there. Everybody had a little, yeah, it was sweet. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Dax does. does. Odo does. Yeah, it's great. Even, even Eddington gets to say something. So, yes. Even Eddington, exactly. When Jake asked if he can take a sip of the, of the champagne, he only lets him have literally a sip. That was it. Because he pulls it away. He pulls it away, which was very funny. I kept thinking, you know, come on. Let the kid live a little. Okay. He's not. But how old is he then? He's got to be 17 or 18, right? Why would he be, why would you stop your? I thought he was 15.

It's illegal in Starfleet. You know the drinking age in Starfleet. Oh, my God. What is it? 35. Okay. Fairfleet. But if you're in Europe, if you're in Germany or France, I mean, you're giving wine to your kids when they're in the single digit age.

It doesn't mean it's a good idea. No, it doesn't mean it's a good idea. But I'm saying, I'm saying Captain Cisco, new Captain Cisco could have let him live a little. I thought it was cute. It was very fatherly. I thought it was cute. Better to be a little protective in that. a specific situation.

They also weren't at home. It wasn't like, you know. And also the ambassadors there. You don't want a drunk son in front of the ambassador. Yeah. Well, you also are, yeah, they're watching your parental behavior as well because you don't want to get judged. He's at work.

The ambassador, the visitor, exactly. Cisco's at work. Right. Now it's not the time to let him have a half a glass of champagne. That's fine. The ambassador, Krogynski, he's there. And he tells Ben, Ben, he tells. Ben, Ben. He tells

Ben. Hey, Ben. Oh, we're in Georgia now. Maybe I've had some Brinks. I'm Ambassador Kajitsky. Now, Ben, I'm in the... Well, now I know how to say it. He tells Cisco that there's been a coup d'etat on the Zincathie homeworld

and that they want Ben, Starfleet wants Ben to take the defiant, go protect the outer colonies over there, so Ben agrees. And now he's a captain, he's going to take this defiant ship, which which Kretensky is very excited to see, by the way. He's heard all about this.

So he gets his assignment, and then he steps back with the crowd and everybody sings for he's a jolly good fellow, which I thought was very sweet. You did? I thought it was a tiny bit healthy. It was a little too 21st century, or 20th century for me. Super old fashion, right? Doesn't Miles sing like old drinking songs and him Bashir?

Yeah, but you know how they made the super, Like the, don't the bejorans clap like this? I mean, sometimes they make the effort. Like that? Like that? That's cool. To do little things that are just a little bit different. I mean, we think about slang words we have today.

But it would have been interesting if Kira had started like a Bajoran. Yes. That would have been more interesting. I agree. Yes. Terry, did you hear what Robbie said? Robbie goes, they sing. He's a jolly good fellow royalty free.

Did you hear that part? He said royalty. No. Because I was going to ask him, is it public domain to sing? So it is. So it was royalty free for them to sing that. There you go. Oh, yes, of course.

Yeah. They didn't have to pay anything for that. Well, that's like on someone to watch over me, the episode I directed of Voyager. Yeah. Bob Picardo and Jerry Ryan sang, you are my sunshine. My sunshine. Royalty free. It is royalty free.

I remember the conversation. It took them a while to pick the song because they didn't want to pay a royalty for a well-known. known songs. So they found really old-fashioned. Well, you can't blame them. The money needs to go on the screen as much as possible. But you end up with a lot of those old cheesy songs. Yeah. Yeah. We go in the engine room next. We go in the engine room of the defiant. The new engine room. Woo. Yes. And it felt very TNG to me. Very like, I didn't get TNG. Did you? Really? I did. Yeah. Okay. All right. I got TOS lines in a way. Sorry. I get why you say that. I get why you say that. Maybe because it's just that we're so used to the space station, which is so Cardassian and very different than Starfleet, that this felt suddenly like, oh, we're in real, yeah, TNG lines, yeah, the same color palette, you know.

That's so kind of Cardassians, a little on the Gothic spectrum. Yeah, right? Yeah. Yeah. But the interior of a lot of the Defiant is very Voyager looking with gray and metal and like that. I love that you say that, but how about that your show's a little defiant-looking? Honest to Pete, you mix it up all the time. Our show, our ship is very defiant-looking. It is. There you go. It really took its cue from the Defiant. The Defiant came out at the beginning of season three, right?

Mm-hmm. Oh, we came out. And we came out. The beginning of season three. No, no, at the before. It was all the same time. No, it was the same time. It was the same time.

Because NextGen had two years before you guys came. Right. We were with NextGen for two years. Okay, but set design had the same sensibility. That same sort of like... But they were making the Defiant and... They were the same teams. They all talked to the people.

They duplicated what the Defiant was on Voyager and Voyager on Defiance. It's the same thing. You're right. That's what else. Okay. Yeah, but it was that great construction department that gave us those great gifts every year. Those plaques. It was the same construction.

So the same people doing the painting and the plastering. Miles goes to work and Ben leaves. And while Miles is working on finishing up some things, he hears a noise. I thought Alex Singer did a great job in immediately setting the tone. This is going to be a suspense. There's somebody on the show. Oh, yes. Because it even ends with this, you know, you're over there with Miles.

He looks around, you see his POV pan slowly, and then he goes back to work. And then it cuts to this sort of. subjective shot, which is someone's P-O-V that we don't know who's in there with. Correct. Yes. But we don't see something. Nope. But it's just that creepy.

Yeah. Why would the camera be there? Yeah. I mean, why would we see someone else's point of view? Right. If there wasn't someone else there. It's messing with this already, for sure. And who wants to say this?

Which one? The next thing coming up. The first captain's log. It's the very. Very first captain's log. There's a lot of captain's logs in this episode, I have to say, more than the average Star Trek Show. We just want to make sure everyone knows he's a captain.

Exactly. We're giving you the memo several times in different colors. Yep. This is the only that I know of, the only captain's log that doesn't begin with captain's log started blah, blah, blah. It begins with my son the writer thinks I should say something profound on this occasion. He even offered to write me a brief. brief statement. But I told him I take care of it myself. As it turns out, the only thing that I

can think of is begin Captain's Log. So he ends it. He ends it with Captain's Log, Start 848, 960.9. That's never the order. Usually it's Captain's Log, blah, blah, blah, and then the talk. So I love that they flipped it around. I think it's cool. Yeah. I think that's good writing, how they did that. And just the way it was worded, I kind of kind of felt like it reminded me of, what's the show that Bob Bacardo did right before Voyager with the kid? And he played Coach Cutlip. Wonder Years.

Yes. You know how Wonder Years has that voiceover of the adult talking about him as a kid, kind of, that's kind of what I got from that in a way. Yeah. Yes. We're in a turbo lift next. First time we've ever seen the turbo lift on the Defiant. My goodness, yes.

And I will say it's a great scene with Dax and Cisco. They talk for a little while. But I thought to myself at the end of it when they got off the turbo lift. I'm like, that ship's not that big. Like, why did that turbo lift take? That was a long ride for a pretty small ship. Unless it was traveling sideways. It just kept circling around like that.

But you can't tell. Like top to bottom, it would take you about six seconds to get from the top to the bottom of that ship. Yeah. Turbo lifts go sideways and up, right? They do go sideways. Correct. They do. If you look at a little map.

So maybe it was going from the back of the ship to the front and then turning and maybe. I want to tell you, I remember doing this scene. It was kind of me doing a play on Avery, how he talked to me sometimes, just me, Terry, when we'd be in the turbo lift. And he'd kind of like, if he was trying to kind of cajole me, he would kind of get in my face and be kind of like, what's going on? Tell me. Oh, funny. I was mimicking. Him doing what he would.

how he would table's with you. Yes. That was really fun to watch back because it made me smile and I felt like it just made me really miss Avery as a friend in seeing him because he picked up on it. It was playful for both of us.

And it was just, I just really miss him. I miss him. So you surprised him with that the way you were doing it. But he picked up on it immediately. And he continued to play. Of course he did. And he continued to play with you there. I loved it.

Yeah, it was sweet. But I just loved that scene. And I love that he said with about, with Cassidy Yates, that the first thing he'd want to do is take her to the seventh game of the 1964 World Series. And I was like, you do like her. It's like, oh, my God, how cute is that? That was a great. And she's such a cutie anyway. I mean, I don't mean that in any kind of disrespectful way.

It's just her face. She's cute, pretty cute. And that together, it's this, there's some sweetness about her that I think is perfect for him. And she's capable and strong and all of those things. But it's like you can see her kind of melt with him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I know.

So the whole thing when you're cheering after the 1964 World Series and you're like, it was a real rom-com moment for me. I'm like, this is just like a rom-com movie right now. Yeah, it worked. Yeah, it worked well. We go to the bridge of the Defiant. I did notice the crane move. They pulled back all the way from the back of the bridge to the front. And I did notice, I would call it a squirrely crane move because it kind of.

Oh, it had a wobbly? Fished around a little bit. Yeah, it wasn't that stable. It wasn't that stable. And I remember, we didn't use cranes a lot on Star Trek, at least on our show. We didn't until a few seasons in when the gripped of, department got a crane from the 1996 Olympics leftover garage sale that they had. And then we had a nice lightweight crane and we started using it a lot more. But this was before all that. And I don't

know. They're probably really expensive, huh? It's time consuming. And they used to have these giant old 1950s like Chapman cranes that were heavy. So I noticed that on this shot. And it was Alex Singer directing. He's old school. So for him, a Chapman crane is like, oh yeah, that's the standard whereas it was it was already getting outdated they were just too big and heavy right robbie aren't there like dPs or certain crew members that own their own cranes that they rented out to the production as well rent back yeah rent back to production yeah yeah called a kit rental for those keeping score that's your kit they're actors yeah yeah they're actors have their own trailers and rent them back to the production there you go there you go yeah that's

smart too i used to tell a crew what i'm producing hey you guys The game we're playing is the studio has all the money and it's our job to get it. Right. Like, we want to spend all that money. We don't want to, we want to put it on screen. So if you've got a tool,

if you've got a way to make the show better, let's get that money. Bring it in, yes. Yeah. Perfect. Okay. We don't want to be under budget. Right.

Ever. But are you, let me ask you this. Are you saying that you would not have used that crane shot if you were directing this episode? It was a little swirl to me. It's too much movement than for you, right? Yeah. Okay. They get the ship ready.

We're on the bridge. They get it ready. They remind us of weapons again. And at this point, I'm like, oh, there's going to be a big space battle, which there wasn't, by the way. No. There was a big changeling battle. Yeah. They keep talking about all this weaponry and things like that.

Well, we have to set it up that way because of the coup d'etat. Yes. Yeah. What is a full complement of photon torpedoes? Two and a half on the defiant. two and a half it's a small ship no i don't know a lot more than us we have three they use that terminology all the time where captain says i want a full compliment of photon torpedoes but they never say how many a compliment is like what and robbie just said

because they know well they know it already but we don't know it as the just viewing audience like what is a compliment is that it's a lot to look it up yeah google it is it made up or is it a real thing. No. I mean, like, does the USS Enterprise have a full complement of missiles? Did they say that in the Navy? Yeah, I don't know. I don't know either. Are you looking it up, Robbie? I am. Okay. Okay. The Defiant class starship, like the USS Defiant, carried a total of six torpedo launchers. They were distributed as four forward and two aft launchers capable of firing both quantum and photon torpedoes. Okay. The forward launchers were located in the hall just ahead of each warp, nacelle in dorsal and ventral pairs. The two aft launchers were tucked near the back of the end

of the warp nacelles. But still doesn't say compliment. Six. Well, that is a full compliment. What? It can, it has six. Does that just mean you're fully loaded? Yes, I think so. Okay. Now, are we in the Jeffries tube? Yes, we are. Hmm. What's happening in there? Oh, O'Brien is working and he hears a thud. He does. And yeah. And honestly, That's when I thought, oh, no, what's going to happen to Chief O'Brien? This can't be a coincidence that he's alone. And once again, and he, doesn't he turn to look in one direction? And he looks back the opposite direction and suddenly Bashir is there.

Yeah, yes. And Bashir said something about, he was using his extension course training to connect his diagnostic console to the Medbay power grid. And I just thought, we've never seen him in this situation before. No, it just made me really suspicious. Yeah, did it? Very suspicious. And it also, I didn't even know there were extension courses at Starfleet. I didn't know that you could just as a civilian, just, I'm going to go take some extension.

I'm just going to pick up some. Yeah, what? The extension is one cut above the learning annex for those of you know what that is. Okay. You're going to the community college. Starfleet. But every time I saw a UCLA extension class, this lasts for like, it's like a three-week class. That's it.

Yeah, they're really short. So he learned engineering how to do that stuff for the engineering things that he does in three weeks. And the three weeks is three classes. Yeah, exactly. It means once a week. What's a week for two hours? It meets once a week for an hour and a half, you know, it doesn't even have the two hours. But O'Brien checks his work and O'Brien's like not bad for an extension course.

Right. And then we go do to do back. yes but it is funny because he asked him why didn't you answer me because he called out right and he said because i had a spanner in my he had a tool in his mouth that he was crawling along with which we they talked that in extension they say if your hands are full just put it in your mouth okay don't worry about your teeth he learned that from extension courses so i guess dr boucher would take care of dental work as well yes we never dress that do we oh No, where is it?

Who is the dentist on D.S. Who cleans their teeth? Oh, my word. Do they ever go to the, they just have a machine that just goes, I don't think I've ever mentioned dentist and Star Trek in the same sentence. I don't think I have either. Gynaecologist, I'm not going to doctor this year. I'm telling you that right now.

He does everything, right? He does it all. He's a handy man. He's a handy doctor. We're in the mess hall right now. Eddington shows up. Sisko's there. and Eddington says you wanted to see me

and he was like, yes, Ambassador Kujensky, he doesn't need to be in harm's way if this turns into a combat mission. Eddington's like, okay, I get it. But then this scene takes a weird turn for me because Eddington is just, he starts saying this stuff like, you know, I wanted to be a captain,

but I'll never be because of gold uniform. So it gets a little creepy in a way. It's stocky in a way. It's a misdirect. Yeah, I don't know what's happening. He's a captain. He is definitely red herring in this. He plays that red herring role well, because we don't know with the way he delivers his lines. You're kind of like, huh? Seems a little threatening. Yes, a little bit like, are you going to stab Captain Sisko right now? Like, what are you going to do? Dude, like it was just weird. I was thinking he was too casual. It felt like too. Intimist talking to the captain. Like, you haven't been around long enough. Okay. You haven't earned that right to. Yeah, too familiar.

Yeah, and he doesn't, he's not senior staff, and he doesn't, hasn't had these connections that the rest of us have made with each other. Right. So it seemed like an odd thing to be the first kind of intimate conversation and to have, have it be about wanting to be a captain just felt kind of weird. Like he, like he's not like he's young, young, like he just knew from Starfleet and put his foot in it. it wasn't appropriate but he's young he doesn't know this man is old enough to know better than to have this crazy conversation with cisco yeah yeah it seemed a little closer than we've seen them ever be yeah i didn't pick up on that until you just said that so thank you thank you for that i didn't even see that angle huh he's too familiar guy now yeah yeah and that felt

icky to me got it and cisco at the end says dismissed mr eddington he doesn't call him lieutenant or commander. I think he is a commander, right? Yes. Yeah, he calls him commander early. I think we made our point. Yeah, and then he calls him Mr. Eddington at the end. You think that's a, what do you think that?

A little bit of a, you've overstepped. Oh, your place. A little bit of, yeah. Oh, wow. Look at this. Okay. Yeah, love it. We do have a captain's log next as a space shot of the Defiant Flying By.

It's Captain's Log, Star Date 489, 662.5 for those keeping score. He says we're 12 hours from the border. I haven't been in this area since the Federation Sankathie War. Being back here brings back a lot of memories, most of them bad. But here's my takeaway. For the first time in Starfleet history, Star Trek watching history, as the defiant flew by and I heard the sounds of the engine, it sounded like a internal combustion engine to me. But I thought, wait a minute, it's in space. Is there any sound? You wouldn't hear anything.

No. I think we've talked about this with like space battles before, where you hear the explosions and you really wouldn't hear it, right? There's the vacuum of space. Would there be fire? There's no oxygen. So how would there not? Exactly.

You need oxygen for fire, right? Exactly. But we still see it in the battles. We always see that in every battle. Yes. Whether it's part of it. Trek or Star Wars, it's always fire and explosion. Yeah. And isn't

that to make it more relatable for us? I think so. I think it's Hollywood. More dramatic. Of course. It would be anti-climactic if you just... If it was just a bunch of steam. No sound. It was like a little... Yeah.

Well, it's kind of like electric cars now. They've added like noises when you put them in reverse. There's a little, be, beep, beep, or some sound because the electric cars are silent. Nobody, everybody's used to hearing, you know, engines rumbling. I have to look around with my Prius to make sure, you know, that I see that there are paying attention. Or I just kind of go, hey, make sure I make eye contact.

Well, I think on the Tesla, you hear it kind of, they put it in like a rev sound. It goes, cool, when they start backing out. It's not like a beep, beep, beep, but it just, there's like a little audible digital sound that goes, all right, like that. I don't know how else to, is that right, Robbie? It's annoying. a really good sound. You did.

Thank you. It's nice. When the Defiant flies by, it should be going, Beep. And then when it backs up. Yes. Exactly. But not, though.

It was like an engine sound. I don't know why I noticed it in a space flyby, but it really bugged me. So it was a combustion engine sound off of like a race car, like an F1 race car. Yes. Okay. Got it. We're on the bridge now. Odo here is a distress call, the Tsenkethi are attacking.

You hear all kinds of, oh, just distressed and stuff going on. And then all of a sudden, silence, you don't hear anything. So now basically everyone thinks, they're all dead. They're all dead. Yeah, so more suspense, more mystery. We don't know what the hell is going on. We've lost contact. They try to reestablish.

Nope, they're gone. We have another captain's log, supplemental. Lots of them. Lots of captain's logs. Well, now that he's a captain, he's going to use up a lot of that log now just to just explain that he's still the captain, right? You remind us as an audience. He's a captain's log supplemental. We've been unable to reestablish contact with Berissa Prime.

Therefore, I have no choice but to assume we are at war with the Tzhenkethi. All right. Look at this. We're at war. That's what we think. That's what we think. And when they've talked about torpedoes, a full compliment. So we're going to have a big space battle.

Yes, yes. I'm looking forward to it. So now we are on the bridge. Still on the bridge. We're still on the bridge. We're still on the bridge. And it is, isn't it kind of crazy, though, that just this ambassador tells Cisco and Cisco doesn't talk to Starfleet? I mean, this is kind of a big deal.

Yeah. Yeah, I was going to say that in my, my summary thing. Yes. I was like, wait a minute. This whole thing is hinging on the fact that they don't ask anybody else. True. And it's war. War is serious. War is talking to Starfleet. You would want like a whole report. War isn't just like, yeah, right? You would want orders, not just from an ambassador.

Who's our backup? But this is the scene where he says, where Odo says, we're having trouble, Captain, getting through to Starfleet Command. So they're trying to get orders and just give the information. But maybe before we left the station. Before we left the station. It would be the best to really get some advice. I thought the same exact thing. You know, kids, this is the thing. You need to talk to your parents before you leave, not when you're far away in trouble, okay?

Exactly. Trust but verify. Yeah. We do know that Kira tells us that Ulysses, because Cisco asks, are there any other starships in this sector? Yes, the Ulysses. They're on some type of, you know, mission studying something. So, but if they're going to get here on full warp, 20 hours, that's how long it's going to take. So not a lot of backup right now.

20 hours a long time. This is the scene where Miles O'Brien goes to fix something and says, oh, Dax, I could use some help. I was like, they're in trouble. Not because of me. No, but he goes and does stuff by himself all the time. All the time. When does he ever say, I'm going to need a buddy?

So here's the deal. Usually in life, you talk about the buddy system, always have for scuba diving for going out in public you know have someone that you're with but when it comes to miles o'brien the buddy system means okay instant um whoever's going with them just chaos is going to have you yes yeah okay all right we go back to our our brand new jeffreys tube in the defiant we've never seen this before i mean we saw it earlier than the scene but yes i'm just excited to see all these jeffreys tubes and ladders and all kinds of things anyway we're in the uh jeffreys tube we now

see a bunch of cables. It was a behind the panel shot that Alex said. So you see all these white tubes, you know, that I never saw before. And they're growing. They're kind of like... That's the part that's upsetting.

Yeah. It's like they're alive. Which reminds me of the last of us. Yes, exactly. Yes. Like a virus growing in the tubes. Yes. It was very last of us esk. Was that practical or CGI? they did the insert of one tube going in and connecting, it was clearly to me, they filmed it.

When they filmed it, it was already connected. Oh, and they pulled it slowly out. And then they reversed the film. So it looks like it kind of goes going in. Okay, we've seen the whole craziness happening. Yeah, they close it up. They go to check some other command systems and we go to the engine room. We show us to go.

But we have to say that he tries to fix it there, but there's a force field around all of this stuff. Oh, that's right. Yeah, so he hurts himself. Yeah. That damn force field. Right. Yeah. And we show Cisco who says, you know, can't we get around the force fields or get around them in the force fields?

And Cisco says, we have a saboteur. And Miles reluctantly tells Cisco, it's nothing. And Cisco's like, everything's important. And he says he saw a Jillian the other day. But this bumped me, though. He said, the other day I saw Julian in the in the tubes and he's never in the tubes. I was like, wait, the other day? Isn't this the same day?

Oh, I didn't think of that. I was like, didn't they just leave less than a few hours ago? He doesn't say the other day? He does. Yes, he does. He says, well, I did see someone crawling about one of the Jeffrey's tubes the other day. Oh, no. This goes who?

It was Julian. The other day, maybe when they were filming it, it was another day, but not when, and I stick up for, I'm like, are you accusing Julian and no one's accusing anyone of anything. Sisko says, and I say, wait, I think I have a better idea. Right. Which was us going to, we're going back to the bridge and have a group meeting. Dax comes up with this idea of scanning everybody for Tetraim particles. If you were in the Jeffries tubes, you would have been exposed to Tetris. Particles so they can figure out who was in the Jeffries tubes if they just scan people for Tetram particles.

So they scan Cisco first. He's clear. They scan Kira. She's clear. Then they go to Julian, which we all expect is going to be, yep, he's got Tetran particles. That's clear. Yeah. That made me happy.

That made me happy too. But confused. Me too. But then they scan the ambassador and he gets flagged. He's got tetran particles. And there's this great pregnant pause where it's like, uh-oh. The ambassador has the uh-oh. I have the uh-oh.

And then whoosh, he goes up into the ceiling. Like you couldn't even caught him if you tried. Yeah, like a tornado up there, though, right? It was like, dumb. He's a jumping changeling. Yes. Hey, Garrett, have you been traveling this summer? Oh, my gosh.

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See Mint Mobile for details. So a little bit of trivia, this shot of Kajensky morphing into a changeling and escaping through that ceiling vent was one of visual effects supervisor Glenn Neufeld's favorite shots from the entire seven seasons of DS9. Really? He was really proud of it. Of course he is. That was great. He loved it. It was great. Whenever we see Odo morphing and changing it's always kind of gooey and like kind of moves it moves very fluidly this was like a bouncing i don't know yeah a whirling dervish is what it was like yeah very different yeah well after the bouncing changeling jumps up into the ceiling yes we come back and um they realize that's a changeling Cisco also mentions that they've the ship is now cloaked like they've lost control of

of things on the ship. Yeah, those little, those tubes have infiltrated every system, correct? So they have no control. Yes. Yep, they're losing control. The helm isn't responding in this scene, Dax says, because they're still at warp, they're cloaked. They can't stop. It's being controlled

by the changeling. And the weapons array have been activated, Kara says. Yeah. Armed and ready to fight. So they got to go to the mess hall to talk about it, and they need to build a set. So they built a mess hall. another new set

which explains the bottleneck show that that I got that you just got exactly we got to build another set on the Defiant Terry gets this for this episode basically this mess hall scene is almost like a briefing room scene it's like they recap the status for the audience in themselves right so they haven't been able to find the changeling

he's not going to leave. Odo knows he's still here. He's not going to leave until he completes his mission. Cisco mentions the Dominion's hoping to start a war between the Federation and the Sankethi. And they realize that they haven't seen a trace of the real ambassador or his remains anywhere. They're also nervous about the actual transmission that they heard. They're unsure of whether or not that's valid. Was it real or not?

They don't know any of this now. Odo says maybe the real ambassador never came to deep space. base nine at all. So this was a, whatever, a saboteur, even from the beginning. So everything he said could have been a lie. Right. And instead of going on some mission to protect, you know, Starfleet colonies, they could start a war.

Yeah. So they kind of recap all of that. Cisco says confine all non-essential personnel to their quarters. And Odo does mention in this scene, he says, you know, with a changeling, sensors aren't going to help. You're not going to be able to find a changeling with sensors because. Because if you scan, if he's a rock, if Odo turned into a rock and you scanned him, you would get a rock. Right.

The DNA looks like a rock. Yeah. I know that's what they say, but that seems weird to me. Like, really? You can't scan. Well, you know what? Stay in your Voyager lane. Oh.

Maybe on Voyager your sensors could scan different. You didn't have a change thing, but we did. That's true. Oh, my God. Have there been changelings on any other Star Trek series except DS9? Yes. Yes. Where was it changeling?

In Picard. So they put them, but they draw upon what happened in DS9 into Picard. After this recap in this new mess hall that they just built, we go to a corridor and there's some security teams getting organized. Crew members are escorted into the cabins. We see Bashir going into Sick Bay. He says to his escort, this may take me a one. while. And I just thought to myself, what? What may take him? Yeah. Why? Why does he even, I don't know why he even has a line there. He has food poisoning or he ate something not so good. That's true. I may be in there

for a while. Yeah, he's going to be in there for a while. Yeah. All right. So now we're in, it seems like a weapons locker, but it also seemed like maybe the sick bay. Yeah, it was a sick bay, Robbie, that they threw all the weapons on top of them. Yeah. They didn't have enough room. You know what? this is the deal. They made, they overplan things because, like, they made these huge corridors, this massive engineering room, this huge crew quarter area, all these new sets. And they were like, gosh, we have no room for weapons locker. So we'll just lay them on the infirmary.

Yeah, no weapons cachet area. So we'll lay them on the sick bay bed. That's what I saw. I also felt like, so they're pulling these weapons out of storage, but yet they have a full complement of photon torpedoes. So they know they're going to battle. Why wouldn't they be armed and ready in case the bad guys beamed onto the defiance of them? So they should have already had them with them?

I think so. Okay. Well, or this is the moment now that it's happening. Right. Yeah. Well, the interwebs talks about these are the first phaser rifles that had triggers on them in Star Trek, which I did not know that. I don't know if that's really. Why would they have triggers?

Why would they pull them out of storage from some other show? Buttons, like phasers usually you touch. a button to phaser somebody not a trigger so oh sorry why yeah who knows I don't know they needed to spend more money that they saved on dax's last episode you know what they look like to me bazookas they're thin but at the front they poof out like a bazooka does you know oh because the photon torpedo goes through there some kind of yeah mini photon torpedoes yeah rocket launcher is what it looks like yeah but you see them shoot them right yes of course it's like a little teeny ball of light that goes powerful.

Right, but they, they, what they did was they tampered down the, the, the energy level, right? So it's just like, and it goes slower. Was it Eddington or Odo? One of the two describes the whole thing. They talk about like a widespread, right? It's going to shoot a beam that's a widespread, but it won't damage the ship. Right. So they've, maybe that's why they designed them.

They explained that. Yeah. Because otherwise there was a sort of. They're shooting into the ship. The walls would be exploding. Yeah. While they get all these weapons, Oda refuses a weapon, though. He says in the scene, I've never harmed a changeling or taken a life, and I'm not going to start now.

And I thought, again, whenever characters say things that I'm never going to do that or I've never done it, you're going to do it, which. Thank you for the setup. Yes, exactly. Oh, no. They're interrupted. They're interrupted because we hear O'Brien calling for. a security team in the engine room immediately. So everyone hightails it over to the engine room all the way across the Defiant,

which we now know is a football field or a couple of football fields. It's massive inside. It takes a while in those slow turbo lifts, extremely slow. Anyway, they get over there. There's Dax. It's out cold and we're looking up her nostrils, I think. We don't even know it's Dax. We see a chin and nostrils.

It could be anyone. You're out. And you got carried out by a bunch of stunt people. Yeah. They did carry you out. It took more than one guy. I have a lot of muscles, apparently. When people are, you know, injured or knocked out in movies and you see one person carrying a body.

That's BS. It's like, it's really hard to do. Like the firemen's carry thing. Firemen have to practice that a lot. And it's still not a sure thing that they're going to lift the person. Yeah. And they sling you on their back. Yeah.

They don't try to hold you like you would a kid. Right. It's not possible. So I think they had four or five people on you to carry you out. That's the only way you can really do it in real life. Yeah. And then I could relax so it didn't look like I was helping them. Yeah, exactly. Which is so great too because they're really, that also is another nugget of, oh. When you see someone like holding, you know, holds out and they're passed out and you see their feet walking. You see their feet moving as they're walking out with their heads out like they're knocked out. Guys, watch when someone's supposed to be dead to try to see if you see the actor breathing. Yes, all the time. Me too. That's it. I'm glad I'm not alone. I'm glued to the screen.

I actually, I lean closer to the screen. I'm like, are you breathing? Are you breathing? Okay, that was funny and kind of crazy. That was. You're doing that. I liked it. Let's continue.

Well, they take her off to sick bay. O'Brien's very worried. He calls for a damage control team. Yeah. Well, she has a concussion. clearly yeah severe a severe one yeah yeah he's he's very worried i liked that i like that he was upset i know sweet well i mean dax is the original crush of his too so there you go always gonna have a sweet place in his heart for dax well we go to the bridge uh bashear fills them in dax is still

unconscious he's giving her given her cortical analyptics to stabilize her condition which is of course what you do, cortical. Of course. I did that all the time. So Bejir says it's going to be, it'll be a day or two for Dax to come back to work. Cisco's like, well, is there any way to speed up this process? And Bashir says, this is the thing that he always says, I could use a neural stimulator, but that might cause irreversible brain damage. I've heard him say irreversible brain damage so many times in this series, and it's

wonderful. I don't recommend it. So not good. That's the way to keep Dax away from, you know, having to, that gives Terry a little bit of a vacation. She doesn't have to be on the set one. That's right. She's often some... I'm at home. Yeah. Terry's in home. Terry Farrell's back at home. In the Hollywood Hills.

Yeah. Character's unconscious. There you go. But this is where Cisco as a captain now, he says, I can't be a part of starting a civil war. If they can't fix the ship, I'm going to have to destroy the defiant. And I thought to myself, no way. You just built

all these new sets. You just killed he just built a mess hall he built the sick pay he built the corridors the turbo of the the warp cord you're not destroying this ship oh I would love to say little did you know Robbie they did

but I can't say that I was shocked yeah yeah so you didn't believe it in a second when he said no no but it's a nice captain move it's a great it's a very good captain move yeah move okay yeah all right

later on they're all assembled still in the bridge a little bit later and Cisco is addressing the crew. I did see Dennis Madelon dressed with his short hair cut there. Yeah. No, he had a wig on, I think. Oh, was it a wig?

Yeah, because Dennis has been long hair. Yes, it's a wig. But it looked good. It looked great. It looked good. It looked good. It looked good for this. Yeah.

Yeah. So we see him in this master shot, right, where he's on the bridge. But we also get to see him a little later, too. Yeah, we do. But I expected that we would see him in a big fight, which is not exactly how we see him. Well, mm-mm. Later. Yeah, but it's not a big fight.

Usually when we see Dennis, it's like a, you know. There's a lot of moves. A deal. It's a bar brawl. It's actually kind of nice that he just sort of had the chance to do something with Avery without it having to be, you know, he got to play a crew member. Yeah. Yeah. For sure.

I'm happy for him. He calls for systematic sweeps of the whole ship with everyone partnering up, the buddy system. keep your partner in sight, he says, so that nobody turns into a changeling. And he does say to them, anyone who doesn't have a partner, if you run into anybody without a partner, that could be the changeling, so take them to the brick. So they're very paranoid here. Everyone's partnered up and Kira is with the Boolean partner? Yes.

Okay. And he's nervous. Yeah. He's very nervous. But what I found kind of crazy is they just did this whole test, they're partnered up, and he still doesn't trust her. But aren't they all okay at that particular moment? Hadn't they all just done that blood test?

Yeah, it seems like he's a little paranoid and grumpy with her. And I'm not sure why exactly. Right. I kind of like the performance. He's scared. Me too. I like the performance. That isn't.

But I just thought it was odd that we just came from everybody making sure they're partnered up. And then anybody who doesn't have a partner is going to the brig. Yeah, I wonder if there's some history with Bolians and Bajorans. Maybe they were partnered up and they don't really get along. I don't know. Another question for our fans. But the Bollion says, he goes, what if the changeling's not out there? What if he's one of us?

And Cisco goes, that's why everyone will be in teams. Keep your partner in sight at all time. So they already are risking the fact that their partner is the charity. So that's why he's the one that said it. That makes sense. I'm forgetting the setup. Okay, great. That's all right.

Yeah. So the first quarter shot is basically Kira and the Bolian. And she's like, let's go. He's like, after you. And she's like, oh, you don't trust me. And he's like, nope, I don't. She's like, I know how you feel. Yeah, that's.

Yeah. Yeah. So a lot of paranoia here, basically. Right. We go in a Jeffrey's tube next and we see Eddington fire a shot down the tube with that new setting that they're on that's not going to damage the ship. Right. Didn't that look cool?

It did look cool. Yeah. And it was like, wow, that's a long way that that light went. Yes. Yeah. What a cool moving flashlight in a way. It's like, yeah. Illuminate everything all the way down. Yeah, it was like a flare. It was beautiful. Yeah. Eddington's sweating a lot. Did you know? Yes. Yeah. Which is part of the story, right? I was like, is that the key? They're going to figure out the changeles don't sweat. Terry, Terry, instead of Eddington, are you okay if I'm, I call him Red Harrington.

Sure. Okay. Just checking. Sure. Thank you. Red Harrington, yes. Well, Sweety, Sweety Eddington. I'm going to call him Sweety Eddington.

Sweeting Eddington. Sweeting. Sweeting. Sweeting. Sweetington says to Odo, he says, you know, put yourself in the changeling positions. You know, where would you hide if you were a changeling trying to hide on the ship? And this is where Odo sort of admits that he doesn't understand his. own people.

It's so kind of heart-wrenching. It is. It was this very kind of vulnerable moment there, I thought. Yeah. Because he says, I wouldn't know. I'm not him. But that's something that a human would say to another human. But as someone who's a changeling, they all kind of share the same, you know what I'm

saying, that great pool or whatever, that they all regenerate in together. So they can feel each other. I feel. So, you know, it's just a right. It's just a reminder of how disconnected he is from the people. Yeah, and I think his first reaction is sort of what a lot of people do when they don't want to admit who they really are, that's especially somebody as guarded as Odo. Denial?

And then when Eddington says, well, you know, you just kind of want to brush it off, I wouldn't know, I'm not him. That could end the conversation with some people. But Eddington goes on to say, he's one of your people. Can't you put yourself in his position, try to anticipate his next move? And that's where Odo, I thought it was so sweet that they wrote in, that he was like sort of, he has to just admit. He doesn't understand his people that well. And it makes sense because we all know, Eddington doesn't, but we all know that he didn't grow up around his people. And it was really overwhelming when he met them.

Yeah. Very sad. I didn't take it that way until you guys brought that. up so now I could see what you're talking about for sure I feel yeah for Odo yeah a lot of Odo's character too is like covering this bravado and this sort of yeah very vulnerable character underneath yeah yeah and so when he shares that vulnerability we all kind of feel like oh you want to hug Odo you want to yeah he's carrying around a lot for sure well we go into another new set the Jeffrey's Tube ladder set we've never seen this before either

How many new sets did they build for this episode? And I've got to say this. We've never seen this set. And I've never seen an extreme close-up of Dennis Madelone's face either. Like, most of the time, he's always, I'm like that. Boom, he's right there. Well, he's climbing down. Cisco's climbing down.

They get down to the bottom. They both look down different corridors. And that's when Dennis Madelone is grabbed by a tentacle and banged into his head is slammed into the side of the thing. into the wall and he's knocked out and is he knocked out or is he killed I don't know

let's just say he's coming to hang out with me yeah in the clinic okay he's done he's done because I thought when he was on the ground and Cisco was touching his for his vitals

because he doesn't say Cisco says nothing his eyes are open so I was like oh he's dead then you know that's what I thought I said and that made me say maybe I was like maybe Don't kill Dennis.

Oh, we'll see him again. We'll see Dennis. It's pretend. Okay, thank you. It's pretend. We're in the corridor. Cisco's called and told him that the change links in Jeffrey's tube 7A heading to the lower deck. So they meet there in a corridor.

Comes out of the tube. And a phaser shot just misses Cisco. And we realize that he's in the middle of a standoff in the scene. There's the boleon at one side of him. Kira comes around the other side. They've got their weapons drawn. Kira Eddington is there. The Bolian, Cisco, we realize, is bleeding.

They've all got weapons drawn. And then we look down on the ground. We see he's bleeding. They realize maybe blood. They have an idea. Maybe blood is the key to who the bad guy is. So they call Bashir. And I wrote down, they call Bashir.

What does he say at the end there? He says, Dr. Meet us in the mess hall immediately. I wrote down, there's going to be a blood drive. Everybody's going to give blood. And that's where I got mixed up. I jumped ahead in my brain about the blood drive. I did. Yes.

Well, we go to the mess hall, and they are going to have a blood drive in the mess hall. And very slowly and suspenseful, Bashir goes and takes blood from each of them. Bolion's good. Kira's good. Eddington's. Wait a minute. What? And did you see the switcheroo?

Yeah. So he took it. from his own body, right? And then he switched it and then showed it as Eddington is what he did. And he had two vials in his hand in the insert as he sort of turns and does a little switcheroo off camera. Yeah. But everyone like Eddington is the goo guy. And the first time I did not see this switcheroo.

Oh, really? Oh, okay. Yeah. So I was like, what is going on? I know. The sleight of hand was good. Yeah. Also, the standoff with the weapons was a very John Wu sort of.

moment with Cisco holding the two guns out. I love that. Yeah, it was great. That was cool. I liked also the slow tempo of that scene, taking the blood. Because it just created this, like, you got looks from everybody, like, you know, suspense beats. Yeah. It's like the same thing with the tricorder.

We're drawing out the suspense. Yeah. Who is it? Alex did a great job. This scene, according to the writers, this scene was inspired by the 1951. by the 1951 film, The Thing from Another World. Now, this storyline or this theme has been shown in other adaptations. There was a short story in 1938 called Who Goes There?

That's the earliest version of this type of story. Then the 1951 film, which the writers of DS9 said influence this episode. And of course, the 1982 John Carpenter film The Thing. I think we all remember that movie. of us when that came out. That was very suspenseful and no one knew who was who in that one. So paranoia was something that the writers were interested in exploring because it was something that was rarely seen in the Star Trek universe. Wow. Yeah. I just looked up the thing from another world, 1951, Howard Hawks directed, was in the heyday of those monster movies, the B Monster

movies. Because there's a town in Utah called Canab, K-A-N-A-B. And it was a place where a lot of monster movies were shot back in the 50s and 60s. And I was hoping that that movie thing from another world was shot in Canab. But it wasn't. It was shot in the ice and cold storage company in Los Angeles for interior scenes so that they had cold breath for the movie. It was shot at the R-K-O-N-C-E. ranch in Encino, but they also went to Glacier Park, Montana and Cutbank Montana and filmed some of the big exterior scene, which just reminds me of like back even in the 50s, like sci-fi monster movies, they would go to great locations and film the, you know, the Arctic

scenes or the desert scenes or whatever. I feel like we were a little jipped in the 90s with our Star Trek shows because I wish we had gone to like Montana. or Utah or some, you know, really great location. It would have been so cool. But we never did. We went to Griffith Park or, you know, Malibu or something. Money. Money.

Otherwise, build a studio in Utah because you guys have so many different topographies. There's a studio right in Park City. There's four sound stages right down the road. Really? Let's make a show. So we're about to put Eddington in the brig. They're in the corridor. Then all of a sudden, bam, boom, a door opens up, and there's sparks flying, and it's basically Bashir inside with the force field of this other room going, get me out of here!

And then that's when we realize Eddington is not the changeling. It is actually Bashir in the corridor, yeah, who then turns into another swirly, bouncy thingy, and he's gone. There's a phaser fire by Cisco, which misses, and now we have a missing changeling. on the loose now. Yep. And Odo's chasing him up into the, into the nooks and crannies of the defiant. Yes.

So we go back to the bridge and Cisco, he mentioned it before, but now he's going to start the auto-destruct sequence. It's a whole process. Kira's got to also confirm the computer's like, we need a, you know, backup. Back-up authorization. Correct?

Yes. It's like a two-factor authorization. They're already doing that before they made it a real thing in this day and age. Yeah. But how about 10 minutes? 10 minutes is a countdown. Because that's like no time at all.

Where are we? So we're all going to be blown up? Well, it's funny. Yes, but they did 10 minutes for one of the reason, though, because they have 12 minutes before they get into Tinketti space and the shooting begins. So the carnage will begin in 12 minutes. That means they're going to start the war. So they're going to blow it up before it happens.

All I could think about was like, you've set this auto-destruct sequence. and now you're just sitting there. You're not doing anything. You can't do anything to stop this change. So you're just knowing that you've got 10 minutes to live. And you're all,

it was terrifying to me. But Terry brought up an interesting point. Terry said, that's not a lot of time. So if they know they're 12 minutes from destruction happening, he should have said, set this auto-destruct for 11 minutes

and 52 seconds or 55. Whatever it is, 11 minutes. You know, give them a little bit. much time as they can get so they can solve this before they all die. To give O'Brien more time. To give O'Brien more time to solve this before they all die. Here's another comment I'll make about the 10 minutes.

As we move forward here, there's only maybe like less than 10 minutes of the episode left. Correct. They kept jumping time. Like the computer would say 10 minutes, seven minutes. And it was only 30 seconds later. Four minutes left. Wait, what? I think this clock is broken.

Like, it's, yeah. It was, I mean, I'll mention it as we get into the specific scenes, but like, within a scene, it would go from, you have, you know, eight minutes left or whatever. And then 10 seconds later, you're like, six minutes left. Where do two minutes go? Auto-destruct is set. And the red alert does come on, which I love Red Alert on that, on the Define? Define? I think it looks great.

Yes. Looks awesome. Cisco does call Miles, O'Brien. Miles says he might be able to shut down. the change leaves force fields, but it's going to turn off their force fields too. All the force fields will be beyond. And we also learn that Dax is still taking a nap. I'm just looking at this scene. And okay, so, so red alert comes on. He says, set the countdown for 10 minutes. And he says, Mark, red alert starts 10 minutes, right? Literally, here's how many lines go. Sequence initiated

auto-destructed in nine minutes, 55 seconds. Right. So let's go to Brian. O'Brien here. I could you some good news. How about this? I might be able to shut down the force fields and gain access to the sabotage system. The only problem is we may lose our force fields too. Now it's seven minutes. That's one from 10th. Seven minutes. That's been literally nine minutes and 55 seconds to seven minutes in a span of 15 seconds. How long did it take me to read those lines? 15 seconds. Three minutes disappeared. Yeah. This clock is broken. It's a minute. And then Cisco says, just tell me how long it'll take. Engine room. You be O'Brien. Well, I guess it'll have to be less than seven minutes, won't it? How did that happen? Did they cut out part of the scene? That'd be my

suggestion, chief. Just go out. Oh my gosh. Maybe they cut out dialogue or something, because that's too fast to go to lose three minutes. I'm sorry. Here, then it goes, Eddington says, Dr. How's Lieutenant Dax? Bashir goes, still unconscious. The changeling gave her enough sedative to keep her under for days. I thought she can stay at home in her bungalow for days. And how about I had a severe concussion and now it gave me a sedative? A sedative. Yeah.

So it went from you bidding not to get the wall. Yeah, I thought it was just a concussion and now I've got poison in my system. They didn't track that, Robbie. The writers told him like they missed that entirely. Oh my gosh. I managed to filter most of it out of her system, but she'll still be out for another a few hours. So that was good that it went from two days to, but that didn't track at all.

Because how do you go from a severe concussion to I can't get it out of her system? Yeah. You know, the name of this episode should have been no sense of time whatsoever. Because clearly, or science or medicine. Or science or medicine, no. Back in the engine room, O'Brien's working. There's an engineer in there with him. They're working on whatever's going to get rid of all these force fields.

Yeah. Now we've got six minutes left. Odomorphs in. Surprise. And he said, or Odomorphs in says, where's the changeling? I lost him in the conduits. And then another Odomorphs in.

Yeah. Odo two morphs in. Yes. I made a note, it seems like O'Brien and this engineer are pretty calm considering the bad guy is right there. One of them is right in front of him. Thousand percent.

And why would Odo say, where's the changeling? I don't know. He's a changeling. I don't know. It just sounded like a weird choice. So that's the fake one, correct? The guy that says that.

I don't know. I think the first one is the fake one. Yeah, the one that says, where's the changeling? I lost him in the conduit. That's the fake one. And then the real Odo's know. Yes, because why would Odo say that? He wouldn't say that.

But what would we call this other entity? Where's the bad guy? The bad guy. Where's the bad guy? I lost him in the conduit. Yeah, so I guess you don't really have a choice. Where's the evil bad guy? Where's the bad guy?

The bouncy, swirly, changeling, that's what it, the bouncy swirly guy. Where's Mr. Meeny, Meanie Bobini? Where's the ambassador turned bad guy? I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. And by the way, changelings don't need any DNA to turn into something. They can just think it and it happens, right? It's amazing.

Where's the founder? Where's that? Because they're founders, too, right? That would have been a better word. Yeah. Yeah. Founders are basically really, really. They're changelings.

Advanced 3D printers. That's what they are. Well, Changeling is the name he was given by his doctors in the Alpha Quadron, right? Changes is not a word that... It was a mythical thing.

Remember we learned from... Or shapeshifters or any of that. Yeah. But it's derogatory. From the... That holographic community that we visited. Yes. And that little girl bonded with Odo.

Yes. And part of it was, she said, I've only heard of Changeling's and fairy tales. Right. That was their word. Did she use changeling in that? Yeah.

She did. Okay. Interesting. Interesting. All right. Well, we go back to the bridge. So we know one of those changelings founders is a bad guy, but we don't know which one. And O'Brien's not worried.

He's just working away. He's like, I've got work to do. I don't have time to figure out which one of you. But he had to be calm because how do you do that kind of work? And be all frantic. You can't. Yeah. Good job, O'Brien. We go to the bridge. We learn that they have no way out. The escape pods aren't going to work. So they're dead. They're going to be dead.

And how long? Four minutes, says the computer. Wow. Look how fast. Yeah. It's really fast. Yeah. Well, that took a long time to go from seven to four versus the 10 to seven. Yeah. It took a little longer. It took like almost a minute. Whose job is that to kind of track time? Isn't that the script supervisor's job to kind of go over the script and say this isn't making sense? Yes.

Yes. Especially with time. Yeah. The script surprise are usually times of the script. We go back to the engine room four minutes. Miles initiates this warp core field breach though, which deactivates. It works what he was trying to do. Deactivates all the alien force fields.

One of the otos hits the engineer. Yeah, because he had the phasers on both of them. Yep. He hits the engineer first. Then he hits Miles, knocks him out. then one of the otos grabs the other otto and they're locked in the struggle and uh and that's where we see the bad guy finally for the first time we see which was a different actor you know you could see the makeup fit different it didn't look like like odo anymore it looked more like the ambassador

well because it was it was the ambassador exactly it was um mr pressman thank you yes but he does have a little bit of a dialogue there, right? Where he's got his hand in his midsection, his energy hand, whatever. Yes, and they're grappling, they're wrestling a bit around the warp core. Right. And they're locked in this struggle. He tells

the ambassador changelink says, you know, join us. You should be on our side. Right. Odo basically morphs his body inside the founder, kind of grabbing him and tosses him against the warp core where he just gets fried.

Right. Right. And just before he dies, he whispers something to Odo. And then he dies, Rosebud. And that was the end of that. And Odo says, I don't think so. Oh, that is. So let's talk about the production behind the scenes here for this scene, this fight scene.

This fight between Odo and the other changeling was extremely complicated to put together due to all of the morphing effects. Steve Oster, the producer, he pointed out that. Angel of a man. Oh, I'm sorry. Angel producers. Yeah, producer and angel on Earth, Steve Oster, points out that there are more morphing shots in this short fight scene than in the entire third season of D-Space 9. So that's how intense this morphing was.

Rene Obarjeunois and Lawrence Pressman filmed the scene as normal, the fight scene of the choreography, and then each actor was required to film the scene separately by themselves, while they would have to look at a monitor and match their moves exactly in order to ensure that the effects would work properly. Can you imagine that to actually sit there and grapple with air and make it look wide? That would be a lot of work. Oh, God. Just a headache. A headache. Very cool. Everything's restored. Cisco is pretty calm. I think Cisco did a pretty good job this entire episode. He didn't freak out once. So that was nice. So O'Brien says to Cisco, control to helm. She's all yours. He basically says, let's turn around. Let's get out of here. Take us

away from the settlement, which they almost eliminated. They're about to demolish those people, but they got saved because they turn around. And then the auto-destruct sequence is aborted, and everything is good. So they're going home. Yes, I like that Kira Noreis, first officer. I concur. She's like, stop the clock. That's kind of funny because that's not a code.

It's not a code. She should have said, Kira Norese, they always have like a, you know, Kira 1, Alpha, A two, whatever, something like that. Yeah. Abort sequence. Yes. She just says, I concur. I concur, which is not an authorization sequence.

It's like a layman thing to say. Yes, yes, it is. We have another captain's log supplemental, which, thank God, we haven't had a captain's log in a while. They made it back to the station, though. But he's concerned about Odo because he says, Odo hasn't spoken a word. Yeah. Yeah.

Yes, very sad, Odo. We go to the ward room. We realize that the real ambassador wasn't ever there. he was on vacay he was on a vacation what of course yeah on risa dax's favorite place to go my favorite vacation yeah he was going to on a vacation on risa the coup never happened Cisco's going to order a full captain's report and otto comes in and he tells Cisco some very important news for a season three finale he says captain there's something you need to know the changeling before he died he whispered something to me cisco says go on otto says he said you're too late we are

everywhere bum bum bum yes so there's changlings everywhere i can't wait to see what happens with this yes so that idea basically plays upon what their initial idea for this episode was so this episode initially was supposed to have a cliffhanger ending it was wasn't supposed to end as tidy as it does here, a cliffhander, a cliffhanger ending involving changelings on earth. Changelings on earth. So the story was set, yes, to introduce a Joseph Cisco, so another Cisco family member. And it was to take place at Starfleet headquarters. And the end of the cliffhanger had Benjamin Cisco declaring that the founders had infiltrated the very heart of Starfleet. So they were already in Starfleet. But then, for unknown reasons, the Paramount

brass nixed the idea, and they said, we don't want a cliffhanger ending. So the writers pivoted and came up with a story about a changeling wreaking havoc on the defiant instead. Well, that makes sense. Yes. I mean, if it's suddenly on Earth, now we've unleashed a whole another can of worms. Right. And it takes us out of the Delta quadrant and the whole thing that we've been setting up this entire three years. of us protecting the delta quadrant right right the delta quadrant you mean the alpha quadrant you're in the alpha quadrant yeah yeah sorry you guys are my sci-fi nerds yeah but the alpha quadrant through the wormhole is the gamma quadrant yeah that's what you're thinking wow okay

yeah but the whole comment of we are everywhere is giving it's foreshadowing that they have infiltrated so basically the writer didn't give up. They've come through the wormhole. They're all over the place. The writers did not want to give up on that whole idea of infiltration of Starfleet. It doesn't happen that way in the future evidently from what I read, but there is some infiltration that will happen. Oh, I was hoping for lots of changelings. But I'm sure there will be changelings everywhere, but I'm saying the idea of it happening at San Francisco, I think, was, you know, they didn't follow that storyline. Yeah, interesting. Yeah, very ominous, right? We don't know it's going to have. Yes. Season three. Oh, my goodness. Complete. My lesson, we talked about a little

bit before, but is verify beyond one person's story. That's an important lesson for all of us. Like, we can hear someone's story, and it may be true, and we should trust, but verify that that's really the story, especially if it's going to be a strong response, like full complement of torpedoes and let's go fight a battle you don't want to just listen to one ambassador tell you oh yeah this is what you got this is what's going on you've got to do it they should have to starfleet yeah okay and i think even in life like you know i hear gossip let's say about somebody and i might have a strong reaction but before i act on that i should make sure that the gossip or the story I've been told is true. It may not be true.

Or it might be true. Put it in perspective, you're hearing one person's side of it. One person's side, yeah. Yeah. Your lesson is do your due diligence on your own when you hear something. Terry, what is your lesson for this episode? Mine's very similar. First of all, be skeptical. But in what I found that bothered me about this, and it's ironic that commander Cisco's becoming Captain Sisko and he's taking it the word of an ambassador, which is not another world later, right? Just staying in the Star Trek world. I just, it really bothered me that he didn't write away, not to like make it out like the ambassador was telling stories, but check in with Starfleet and find out the protocol because that's what we've done in the past.

And it just, it was a big, what? When I was watching it, it just didn't make sense to me. Well, yeah. Yeah. And he didn't even say the ambassador's name in that situation. He said, ambassador. And that bothered me too. It was like, why aren't you saying his whole name?

And where is he from? And why are we hearing? I just felt like we didn't sit down in the wardroom and have a plan like we have in other episodes. And it's like, this is a mission. And we're starting. It just was missing. some elements that made me feel like it was moving forward in a professional way. You know, this is a professional setting and it's military and you don't start,

you don't go off to a war situation because an ambassador told you something. Right. That's a very valid point. My lesson is similar to you guys. I'm going to go with that. Just do your due diligence. Otherwise, my only other lesson is, It's never Julian. That's all. Okay. Our Patreon poll winner for the theme moral of this episode is submitted by Alex Ray. We are at our most vulnerable when we no longer trust each other.

True. All right. Well, we've come to the end of the episode. Thank you again to Terry for joining us and recapping and discussing this episode. Thanks, Ter. Thank you, guys. Thanks for having me, brothers. Yes.

Join us next time when we will be recapping and discussing the episode, The Way of the Warrior with not only Armin, but Terry again. Terry will be there. Woo-hoo! And one other person, a special guest host. Ooh. Who could that be? Mm.

None other. I think I know him quite well. I think I do know him quite well. So I'll let you announce it. Who will that be? Oh, my goodness, the one, the only, the fabulous, the most incredible Klingon ever, Michael Dorn. Oh, my gosh. That's going to be so exciting.

For all of our Patreon patrons, please stay tuned for your bonus material and more Terry. This is a B. Bhopal, Bhopal, Bhopal, B. Burt

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