The Delta Flyers - Ties of Blood and Water

Episode Date: April 21, 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, Ties of Blood and Water, is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, and Terry Farrell.Ties of Blood and Water: Despite remnants of pain and a revelation of betrayal, Kira tends to the dying Cardassian dissident Tekeny Ghemor. 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, Nicki T, Roxane Ray, Andrew Duncan, Tim Neumark, Ian Ramsey, Feroza Mehta, Jenny Cordina, Izzy Jaffer, Francesca Garibaldi, Jonathan Capps, Chris Dellman, Chris Garis, 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., Ryan Mahieu, Andrew Cano, Robby Hill, Kevin Harlow, Chris Garis, Jeff Allen, & Londyn HenningAnd our Producers:Philipp Havrilla, James Amey, Jake Barrett, Ann Harding, Samantha Weddle, Paul Johnston, Carole Patterson, Warren Stine, Carl Murphy, Jocelyn Pina, Chad Awkerman, AJ Provance, Maxine Soloway, Heidi McLellan, 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, Luke Pacha, & 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] Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This April the 25th, there's a March. It's called Purple Stride, and it's a benefit for pancreatic cancer patients and their families and their loved ones. We have a campaign. It's called Team Trek made up of myself and Kitty and Jonathan Frakes and John Billingsley and Carlos Cotto. And we hope that all of you out there would be interested enough to take a look at our campaign to raise money for pancreatic cancer.

you can go to www.wpurplstride.org slash team trek. And there you can see all the information, you can make a contribution, and we would very much appreciate it. And more than just us, all the people who are affected by pancreatic cancer,

the third most mortal cancer out there, would appreciate it. So please think about it. Please go to that site and contribute if you can. And if you can't, tell other people about the march on April the 25th, Purple Striders. There are 50 marches around the country. Just being part of that march is a huge benefit for all the people who are suffering from pancreatic cancer.

Thank you so much. 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 9. Your host for today are my fellow Trek actors, Terry Farrell, Robert Duncan McNeil, and myself, Garrett Wong. Wow, you had some dramatic pauses there before each name. I was like, who else is going to be on this? It's us.

Oh, it's us. We're just so excited to see each other. I know, I know. Hi, guys. Hello, Robbie. Have you noticed my hat I'm wearing today? Yes, I thought it was Wonder Woman at first, but it's not. It's from your fan club.

It's from my fan club back in the 90s, random flight. I've got the official hat that they made up. That's the original hat they made up? This is from the 90s, yeah. They made it up for the club members because I wore baseball hats so much. They made baseball hats. All right. Let me be a little descriptive for those who are listening to the podcast, okay?

Robbie's hat, it's basically a red hat with a black bill. Now, the very center, he's doing a Vana White. Yeah, he's doing a Vanna White. The very center, the actual logo, it's a com badge. It's sort of a delt. It's got the Star Trek Chevron with two wings kind of coming out of the sides of the Chevron. Gold wings.

On top of that. So it's a silver comb badge or chevron with gold wings. And then it says random flight above each wing. wing, random above one wing, flight above the other. Super cool. You got why random flight, they took RDM, my initials, and made a word out of it. Oh, that's where the D is capitalized. That's how the D is capitalized.

Yes. And random flight has, you know, officially shut down at the end of our series, but Ethan Phillips has kept it alive in spirit. and he wears the buttons from the club that I gave him. He texts me constantly about the news of the club, and he has kept it alive in spirit. I love it. Yeah.

I love him. He's so sweet. Such a sweet man. We got birthdays. Yeah, we do. Stephanie Aves, April 20th, is the special day that Stephanie was born. We're celebrating you, Stephanie. Happy birthday.

Happy birthday, Stephanie. Happy birthday, Stephanie. Woo-hoo. All right. Next up, let's say a big happy birthday to Ryan Mayhew. April 24th is his birthday. Happy birthday, Ryan. Ryan Mayhew, happy, happy birthday.

Happy birthday, Ryan. We also have Shamba V. Katum on April 26th. Shamba V. Happy, happy birthday. Shambavi, what a beautiful name. Happy, happy birthday to you. Shamba V. I miss you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, Shambavi. Poetry time. Brubi with your limerick, please. Yes, here we go. I've got a nice limerick for ties of

blood and water. Goes a little something like this. Gimore arrives with a need unmet. He shares secrets he could never forget. Galdicot was self-assured, making sure the truth was obscured, Kira healed the pain of her deepest regret. Very nice. Wow. Thank you. Thank you very much. This one I tried to get a lot of story in there.

So it's not, I like the ones that are simpler, but I got a lot of story. You did. You did. And I really like it. I like it when you kind of like mix it up. Sometimes you're more just about the theme. And other times you cover more ground. So this is a ground.

I felt like I had to cover ground here. There was a lot going on. I actually felt like I needed a pre-production meeting. Well, I watched it twice, and there are moments where I thought, I wanted to call you guys. And can we talk about it a little before we're doing it? Really? To help me with writing my poem. Oh.

Because it felt like I really related to not the particular situation that Cura's in, but that holding your secrets so far down that you don't even see what you're keeping from yourself. And then when they get revealed, it's like, it kind of takes your breath away. And then healing can begin. I want to hear your poem. Okay. Yes, with that little intro, I really do. You cannot imagine the amount of paper all over my living.

room right now. Drop it on us. Lay it on us. Let's hear. Lay it on you. Ties of blood and water. Unique familial bonds of love. Shamefully, we hide our truth. Are we worthy of forgiveness, even love? Events crashing us into our secrets, excruciating shame, pain, forcing deep contemplation. Contents of our vault uncontrollably spilling. courageously accepting our actions, our fragility, we resolve to see ourselves as we are, flawed, complex beings. That's beautiful. You're a poet.

Oh, my gosh, thank you. It's beautiful. Thank you. I think I like your poem better than the episode. I think we're actually done with this recording, actually. Thank you, everybody. It was wonderful. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, and good night.

That was really, really good. Really? Thank you. Yeah, it was. Yeah, it was really good. Exceptional. Good job. All right. Let me round off this. I'm super excited about the haiku. Here we go.

The haiku is the caboose to this poetry train. Here we go. Gimore will pass soon. He has secrets to divulge. Noree doesn't run. I really like that. Thank you. Thank you.

Teleplay by Robert Hewitt Wolf. Story by Edmund Newton and Robin L. Slocum. Directed by Mr. Avery Brooks himself. And let's go through our guest stars. Lawrence Pressman as Gimor. Marker Limo as Golda Kott. Thomas Kupachi as Kira Tobon. Now, interestingly enough,

Kapachi's done them all, it seems. He did team. in 1994, Voyager in 1996, and then was hired to play the father to Kira Norese in 1997. So he kind of... Can I ask, is this the only time we see him as her father? Yeah, I don't remember seeing him before. We did not see him before. This is the first time we've seen his, her father, right?

Right. I do not know if he appears in another flashback in the future. Okay. I wish he could have said more to her. Oh, yes. then don't leave, right? Don't leave. Don't leave.

It'd be great, yes. And writhing in pain. Yes. Next up on guest stars, we have William Lucking as Farrell. And the lovely Jeffrey Combs, our friend, as Wayune. Co-star, one co-star. Rick Shats as a medic. A little bit of trivia here.

Robert Hewitt Wolfe drew inspiration from his own life experiences when writing this episode. Quote, it was probably one of the more personal things I've ever written. It's about Kira trying to take care of this guy. while he's dying and remembering how she feels like she let her real biological father down. She missed his death by a few hours and I missed my own mother's death by a day. I had finals at school. She told me to stay through finals and she passed away from cancer while I was gone. It's something I've always regretted and I thought that it was an interesting story to tell.

It was tough for me to write to tell you the truth. It was very personal. Oh, that's so heartbreaking. Yeah, I can understand Robert Hewitt Wolf really struggling. And I think that's maybe why I struggle with this episode, if I'm being honest, I'll spoiler alert. I think that this episode has potential for some real depth. And I don't know that I felt it for a number of reasons. I don't know that I felt it.

I don't know if Robert Hewitt Wolf, because it was so personal, sort of would only go so far with the writing. I don't know if the direction supported the depth and the complexity being torn, the internal experience of this kind of regret and shame and all of that. I agree with you, though. Yeah, I feel a little bit like this episode to me under-delivered on the promise of this story. And when you've experienced it, your expectations are higher. Yeah. Because you know how it felt.

Yeah, I think so. I think so. One more piece of trivia before we jump into this episode. Sir Rock Lofton does not appear in this episode. Although, where would he be in this one? I would say, just to relate my story as an 18-year-old losing my mother, Jake lost his mother as a child. Yes.

Yes. There's a great place for him in this episode. Yes. Oh, I forgot about that. How could I forget that? I just didn't think that all the way through. Yeah, it's those kind of things that I think are missed opportunities. And anyway, like a combo between Kira and Jake.

Is that what you're saying? Like a little interaction between those two, yeah, talking about his loss of his mother. Even just seeing Avery, Cisco talked to his son about maybe what Kira's going through. Sure. Maybe Jake's looking for Kira for a reason for school project or something. Right. But somehow involved. Jake talking to someone.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for that. I, that's a great eye opener. Okay. So this episode starts off. We're kind of in the hallways and the airlock.

Kira is taking Dax and Wharf to go meet Gimore. And she's catching them up. And this felt like a bit for the audience here. Like it felt a little blatantly like instead of doing a recap, we're going to have Kira go, you know, this is important, Dax. Yeah. Gimore led the dissident movement against Cardassio's Central Command. And now the Duccott and the Dominion took over, there's no better qualified.

No one better qualified to lead the opposition. Like, it's just literally backstory. Yes, simple exposition. Yeah. And I have to admit, you know, you're walking them down the hall. And Avery, right out of the gate, chose to be on your backs. and the camera's following you guys. And I was like, why?

I can't see her face. I can't see anyone's reaction to this information. So that immediately, I was like, oh, I wish we had been on the other side and been ahead of them so that we could see their faces. And anyway, that kind of bugged me a little bit. This is your very first scene. This is the scene that should pop as a director. And you're right. it was awkward.

And then as it continues, it was even... Yeah, it's a teaser. But again, that's what's supposed to catch your interest, you know? And when it's not directed, where it's not blocked very well, it's not shot very well. It's... And I'm not typically not a nitpicker, but this annoyed the heck out of me. Especially the reveal of Gamor was, okay, so you can see them in the distance? Like, what are you doing?

Like, this is not the way you kind of... You got to create tension. Well, I really thought. too, that especially because being reminded of second skin, I really wish there would have been a tiny recap. Yeah. It felt like a recap in the dialogue and they should have just done a recap. It would have been more emotionally impactful. Yes, it would remind us.

Yeah. Because also we're watching them very tight together. Yeah. So it's easy to remember. But if you are watching this back in the. day, it would have been a long time between these episodes. Mm-hmm. And it would merit the reminder.

And what if you missed that episode? Yeah, and they could have done it in a, to Garrett's point, in a flashy teaser, this is the opening of your show. You could have done something where they're walking and Kira's not saying anything. And Dax and Worf are asking questions. Yes. Who is this guy? Thank you.

You know, who is this guy? Was he a good guy or a bad guy? and then flash to a flashback. And they keep walking and you don't hear Kira say a word. And then, you know, Worf says, well, wait a minute. If he was part of a dissident movement, then what, what about this? And flashback and flashback and flashback. It could have been much more dynamic.

Pop, pop, pop. That is so awesome, especially because they used that in the storytelling of her having flashbacks. So that also would have been great in the teaser to just have us be in her mind. And I felt like. Kira's overly effusive kind of welcome of him. The warmth was beyond warmth. It was like they were the closest, you know. But then it's revealed they haven't spoken for a long time. And they found information about each other from other people. If they're that close, how are they not in constant contact? Yeah, I got confused. I literally for a second had to pause it and go, wait, I had to remind myself like, did I miss something? because I know that he, I remember when that episode Second Skin happened, but I didn't remember

them being that close or like fun warmth, you know, it felt like they had a history that I'd missed. Yeah, it was giddy. Yeah. I didn't like the tone of that. Right. So if there was a progression from Second Skin to this episode, it would have been nice if they had Laura's Pressman just have small scenes with her. Yeah.

In between these two episodes. Yeah, that would have helped. Well, they have this warm reunion and Dax and Gimore, you know, head off. And we cut to Gimore's quarters where Kira's showing him his quarters. Well, Daxon Worf head off. Yes, Daxon Worf head off. Just for the people who are listening. Yeah.

When you say the red carpet line, you're trying to make a joke with her, right? You're trying to make a joke with her. Yeah. I don't even know if that landed on her because her, like, her dachson. This is important line was not, it was, it wasn't acknowledging as a joke. What that telegraphs to me, her not getting the joke, is that she's all of this over excitement. There's nerves underneath it. Oh, okay.

Well, that's, no, okay, that explains things. Yes. Yeah. Thank you. She's nervous. She's overcompensating. Yep. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. Yes. Okay. So we're in Gimore's quarters and Kira's showing him around. And in this scene, she assures him that they're going to find his real daughter. She checked with Bajoran security. There's no leads yet.

He thinks that she's dead. But she says no. If she's alive, she's been undercover on Bejor for so long now, it's just hard to find people. Like 10 years? Like that. Yeah. Yeah, but also. Over a decade.

Yeah. As a parent, I would, there's a point where you'd have to start letting go because, well, especially what you're about to. reveal about him. Yeah. But that's not the main reason why he's here. He's definitely there because she asked him to be there. Isn't that the whole? Yeah. Yeah. She, she's got a plan for him to come to the station and counter Dukot and all this Cardassian dominion propaganda. And he ends the scene saying, no, that's not going to work because I'm dying. I wonder if he found out after they'd already made

plans. Maybe. Or maybe he wanted to come tell her in person. Exactly. I think that's part of it, but I think it might have been a serendipitous thing, even though they don't explain it. Well, he's got a Cardassian syndrome called Yarram-Fell syndrome, whatever that is. Yeah, which is crazy because that's the name of someone who I used to be very close friends with back in the day. His first name, Yarram. Yeah, it's just as a name. So when I heard the Yarm-Fel syndrome, I'm like, What? I have a new friend named Yarek. Yarrick. Yarrick? Oh.

Mm-hmm. Huh. Yeah. I'm going to start calling Robbie Yerabi from now on. So just throw the... And in Hamlet, he talks to the skull and says, alas, poor Yorik. Yorik. Yorik. Yorik. Yes.

We cut to the infirmary. Bashir tells Gimor, he's very sick. And he's not sure how much time he has left. He's run a bunch of tests. But he said, I can try some treatments. It may help. And Gamora is very sorry that he can't help Kira with her plans. And Kira says it's fine. Don't worry about that.

You need to focus on getting well. So we can see that Kira, you know, now the priority is his health. But listen to the denial. Yeah. We need to focus on you getting well. He has a terminal disease. So she is living in the denial of what we're about to uncover through the whole story. Yeah.

It begins here. I will say I'm impressed with Pressman who plays Goumore. I mean, it's difficult for an actor, I think, to play terminally ill. It's not easy, because it's a state of being, not a real, you know, but he does it well because he is off a little, compared to his, when we saw him in the prior episode, on Cardassia, at Second Skin, he's a much more alive and full of life character. Vibrant. That's exactly the way.

And this actor totally, the minute he walked on the station, I said, wow, he's going to die. And he just took on that persona, the energy of it, everything. So I just want to give kudos to Lawrence Pressman. You know what? Absolutely. If I was, you know my rule about characters dying in shows if they cough early in the episode? Yes. That's my rule.

I would have had him cough. Have one cough. He gives care a hug when he first gets there. Right in the turbo lift. Right in the turbo lift. Yeah, in a hallway. Absolutely. But hey, Garrett, let me just ask you,

haven't you been very sick ever where you thought? Yeah. Yeah. So you recall that. Yeah, that's probably what I mean? Substitute with those things just to try to make it possible for you not thinking of it being so difficult.

Right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And it just seemed like- You definitely don't have coffee that day. Right. Yeah. It just seemed like Presbyn was, that it was painful to even speak.

And that's, you know, that's a good job. He did a good job. Yeah, no, he's a very talented actor. I wasn't trying to diminish that. I'm just trying to offer to you. It's not impossible for you to go to the same place. Yeah. Oh.

You could do a story like this. Why not? Okay. We could do a podcast episode where you appear to be sick and you're coughing a lot. Yeah. And then everybody's going to think at the end of the podcast episode, oh no, Garrett's going to, he's not going to make it to the end.

And then you surprise everybody and you're like, I was just acting. I'll be like, so Robbie, excuse me, Robin. I was just acting. I'm not sick. Okay. Okay. Well, we go to the next scene. Yes, we're very relieved.

Back to our story. Back to our story. We're in the captain's office. As Cisco is giving a captain's log when he is interrupted, O'Brien calls. He's got a call from Duccott. So he takes the phone call. Cisco kind of teases Duccott about his title in this scene. Duccott says, no, I prefer a goal.

It's more hands-on than legate. He even proposes other alternatives, like president, emperor, first minister, but he just prefers goal. He's so humble. So humble. Emperor Ducat has. has a ring to it. Yes.

And Cisco responds, how about Dominion Puppet, which I like? Yes. Yes. Wasn't that great? Yeah, it was. Ducat wants Gamoire.

He knows he's on the station. He wants him. Cisco, basically at the end of the scene, says, we don't have a treaty with you. Any kind of extradition treaty, so don't get your hopes up at the end of the scene. And he hangs up on him. And he hangs out.

Yeah. That's awesome. Did you like Avery's kind of very stern, Cardassies never agreed to an extradition with Bayjore or the Federation. I did. You shouldn't get your hopes up. I did like that. He kind of did a little.

Actually, I did too. Yeah. It was like he hardly ever gets to have that kind of playfulness. Yeah. So in this situation where he really has Goldaqat by the. By the things. Mm-hmm. By the parts.

Mm-hmm. By his Cardassian spheres. So he can feel free to do that. Yeah, I liked it. It was fun. It was classic. Yes, and he's already been the bad guy. Yeah.

And he didn't get in trouble for it. Yeah. So now we got a little spice on Cisco. Yeah, we do. We go to Gimore's quarters again. Gimore now is holding Yoshi, baby Yoshi, and the baby is not crying. But could you tell that it wasn't really the baby until the one shot? Yes.

Well, I was going to say, because you mentioned it doesn't cry, and then I said, said it doesn't cry when being held by aliens. Worf held the baby. It stopped crying. When he handed the baby to Jake, Jake is human, it started to cry, handing it to, so it's always... It's funny. It's like the opposite of Armin's theory in real life.

Armin said babies would always cry around Ferengis or Klingon makeup. Klingon makeups. Oh, really? But in Star Trek, babies only cry around humans. They terrify babies. Oh, I'm so glad I was an alien. That would have made me feel really sad. The one thing that he did say, he said, of a certain age,

if you're a super newborn, you don't cry around aliens. But once you get older, then you cry around aliens, like one, two years old. Holy cow. I cry around humans. Humans terrify me. Yeah. Right? You hide it well.

Thank you. So the baby's not crying. They discuss Kira having kids. in the scene. Gimore and Kira do. Kira takes the baby to put it down in the other room. And Gmort does mention in the scene he knows about Shikar.

So we realize that they've been keeping up. He's been keeping up on her, you know. And anybody that has new ones about her. Yeah. To other people. Yeah. And not to each other. That felt like, I wish that was.

It felt like off-camera story that we missed. Yeah. And kind of a cheat, a little bit of a cheat. I would have rather had like, remember the last time I told, remember when we. We talked about Shakar and. Yes. Or maybe she could say, oh, I forgot. I told you about that, you know, or something. But just so that there'd be at least interminant contact instead of finding out through other people. Yeah, that feels. It felt like a cheat. Yeah. It doesn't feel like an authentic. connection. Yeah, I agree. I found this seem to be interesting because it is Kira Norees, introducing her father, who's not her biological father, to her son who's not her biological son. No, interesting. Yeah. Very interesting. Yeah. So idea of family.

You need familial connections. Right. Family that's not blood. Yeah. So, yeah. Well, Kira does tell Gimor that Dukot wants him extradited in the scenes. and this is where he suggests that he share his secrets. It's tradition for Cardassians before they die to tell a family member kind of their secrets. The skeletons in the closet. About their enemies so that their family member can go after their... I actually like that idea. That was cool.

Yeah. Yeah, interesting. It's called Shrital, the Cardassian tradition of Shrital. But it also shows that he's treating her like family. Yes, 100%. Be my daughter. Yeah, it's an honor. Yeah.

Oh, yeah, I like that when he said be my daughter one more time. Yeah. Yeah, very sweet. We go to captain's office. Cisco encourages Kira to listen to these secrets. So now we see that she's not sure if she wants to take on this responsibility. But Cisco says he could share a lot. He could give us a lot more intelligence on Cardassia than we've gotten in five years.

And Kira's nervous. She says, I don't know. I don't know if he's chosen the right person. What if I get too involved or I don't ask the right questions? And she suggests maybe he can talk to a counselor or even Odo. Yeah. But Cisco says, no, he wants, he doesn't want to be debriefed. He wants to talk with someone important, basically.

That will be with him until the end. Yeah. And then we see her first flashback with her. Well, how the scene ends, she definitely has emotional eyes. Just a little watery in her eyes to see the conflict. And then we flash to, we go to the flashback. First time we're seeing a flashback of her with her actual father. Yeah.

And he's injured. Badly. Yeah. Well, we don't know who it is. It's some injured man. And then she goes over to him and she says, father, father. And that's when we realized, oh, my God. That's her dad.

And then we go back to the office, right? Exactly. Because the flashback happens. Then we see the emotion. Right. The flashback happens when they're still, he's still talking to her. She has the flashback, right? Because then he takes her out of the flashback by saying, are you up to it?

And she's like, oh, I have no choice. I'm always got. And that's where you see her emotion. Yes, that's where we see the tie of her real father and her surrogate father, really. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, we go back to Gimore's quarters. It looks like a hospital room now. They've set up all this medical equipment.

And Bashir is explaining to Kira the painkiller machine instructions here. Can I have one of those machines, please? I mean, that's awesome. I just want to have a button just to feel okay. Give me the happy juice. I think you have to have a terminal illness to have to get a morphine drip? Yeah. I don't think.

Gosh, darn it. I know. And you know what? It might not really work. So that's true. I don't know if you want that machine. You definitely do not. That is not a machine you want to know a lot about.

Yeah. All right. Well, Bashir gives the instructions and says you can call for a nurse if you need any help. He takes off. And then immediately the first thing care does is try to give him some water and she spills it all over them. You can tell that she's nervous about this responsibility. She can't even give him water. It spills.

I honestly, though, I was thinking, why don't they have a straw? Yeah. I mean, okay, maybe not everywhere else, but. You're going to dump it on this man laying in bed. It's like, come on. Yeah. It's such a easy fix. It can be metal.

It can be futuristic metal straw. Yes. Exactly. I have plenty in my drawer right now. Yeah. But in 1990s, I don't think they even made that back then. So, yeah. Okay.

Well, he starts to share some secrets. And then he's got some pain. She pushes the button, gives him some medicine. And she has another flashback here. And this is back to the Bajoran resistance where her real dad, Taban. Is it Tobon? Yeah. Well, it looks like that.

Yeah. T-A-B-N. It doesn't look swishy. Yeah, I can't, I don't know if it was Tabin or Taban. Tabin. I think, I don't know if anyone said it. Well, if there's two vowels with only one consonant in the middle with the first A, I don't know.

Word play man. Word play man. I don't know. Oh. Cabin. God, while we rely on. Okay. Let's go off of watching.

Don't make us have to call Armin. Kira Noree. So the emphasis should be on the second syllable, then. of the first name. Taban, then, I would say. Ah, wordplay wins. Well done. But it's probably giving some points. Let's go with Taban. Taban, her father. Ten points for Gawa. So Gimore's in pain in the present. And then that pain triggers her memory of Taban, who's in pain, her father, her real life father. And he says, Norese, don't leave me. I was such a fool. I tried to talk to the Kardashians. They were setting fire to the village.

And Kira's so angry. She says, I'm going to make them pay for this, I promise. But Taban does not want her to leave. This is where I wish there was some more dialogue from this point to the rest of the flashbacks with her father. Yeah. Something more intimate. Because he feels like he's on his deathbed.

And then I think also if he was talking about something intimate, that would also increase the amount of pain and explain the running from the emotion, running from the reality. Yeah. If he tried to talk about her as a little girl or some memory, something very personal. Yes. I remember the first time I was proud of you and something like that. Something like that would have been really nice to build that relationship a little more deeply.

So we're invested. But maybe that was part of. of what was a little scary for Robert. Yeah. When he was writing it, this would have been very difficult. He said it was difficult for him to write. Yeah.

Well, he says, stay with me. He says he doesn't want to be alone. And then we come out of the flashback, back in Gimore's quarters. He's asleep now, though. And she ends the interview. He must have just fallen asleep. He's been talking while she's been having this flashback.

And he's asleep. She turns off her recorder. And we go into the captain's office where Keir's talking to Cisco. I thought she was great in this scene. They were sitting very close. It was very simple. And her voice sounded like authentically tired, which I'm sure. Nana had just had a baby a few weeks before.

She probably was exhausted. She actually sounded like she lost her voice a little. Yeah. It did. She might have. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Two kids under five? A baby? Yeah. And Buster was still, I mean, they're like toddlers under five. Yeah. Yeah. She must have been really tired. I think this is the first episode where Nana is wearing her normal, you know,

Yeah. I know just that right away too. And she looks amazing. Oh, God. Yeah. She takes such good care of herself. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, she fills Cisco in on what she's learned so far. Sisko says, great start. And then Bashir calls and says come to Gomor immediately, Kira. I was worried. It was over now. We go into his quarters. He's really bad.

But she quickly starts asking more questions. Well, he asked for that. He says, ask me questions. I don't have much time. Yeah. And she says, you were talking, reminds him. You were talking about the Supreme Tribunal. Mm-hmm.

Let me just quickly read a little thing about Lawrence Pressman, the actor that portrayed Gimore. Oh, yay. Gimor. You tease this. Yeah, this is from Star Trek Monthly. and the title of this article is so cute. It is back for Gamoire. Okay.

So Lawrence Pressman was impressed by Avery Brooks' direction of the episode. Pressman commented, quote, Avery's a man who keeps to himself, not somebody who chats easily, but as a director, he was right there and extraordinarily helpful. Somebody said to me, Avery talks like jazz.

It's true. He does. What's more, it's brilliant jazz. wonderful stuff. He gives you images and he does it through eye contact with you so you get the feeling of what he wants. He gave me a lot of courage. It would be so easy

to go the wrong way with the character. He pushed me constantly in other directions, then pushed me even further in that direction. You can't ask for anything more than that. Wow. Glowing review by Mr. Pressman of... I would say, yeah, he's graded eye contact

and visual imaging. But You don't have like an intellectual conversation with him about something. Yeah, it's more abstract maybe. Yeah, yeah. But if you don't get the abstract, so I remember kind of hanging. You're like, you want it faster? Yeah.

Yeah. So you're saying faster? Like really trying to assimilate what he's or process what he wanted. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. So you're super focused when you work with him. I bet. You have to be.

I've never been more tired. than when I was sitting in the back of a town car at a convention. It was just me and him being driven to the airport. And I'm sitting here just, I'm like, what did he just say? What did he just say? Can I call it? Can I phone a friend? Can I? Can I?

I need help. Oh, my gosh. I was so tired. Just trying to understand. Deep conversation with Avery when you're tired, probably no, bueno. No, no. I was tired from trying to understand him. So I wasn't tired sitting in a car.

I was like, and you're saying, I was thinking so hard. Like, what did that mean? What did that mean when he said the bird landed on the puddle? You know, what does that mean? You know, I couldn't figure it out. You have to relax. You do. He's someone you have to really relax and trust.

Yes. The harder you try, the worse off it is. Yourself. Yes. Trust yourself and relax. Like a golf swing. You can't, can't try to hit the ball hard. You can just relax. Yeah.

Yeah. But, yeah, developing self trust is not always easy. but doable. Yeah. Okay. Well, this next scene in ops, speaking of Avery, he did a very ambitious kind of steady cam shot that pushed in on the lift as Cisco comes up. And he steps off the lift with lift asking status report.

And the steady cam shot just sort of followed Cisco around up there in Ops. It was very ambitious. I'm not sure if it was as successful as giving the sort of energy that he, he was going for. I'm not sure if that was, uh, that worked as well for me. But it was a tricky shot. I do want to say that moving all around, getting Dax's lines, Worf's lines, O'Brien's lines. The camera had a lot of movement to it. And where I was sitting is it where I normally sit and it's a part of ops. If you're in his office, it's stage left. It was wild. I'm like, where am I? Am I on the defiant? I don't remember it looking like that. Yeah. Until he's, I started when

he said to battle stations and then we moved. That was the only time I knew where we were. And it's too bad. We don't use that panel more often because it looks super cool. Yeah, it did look cool. It did look cool. Well, we learned that a Gem Hadar battleship is approaching. It's Dukot.

And he wants Gamo and he wants to know what Cisco has decided. Dukot pops on screen. In a super polite way. Yes. I eagerly await your decision. Well, I have guns pointed out your station. Do you like the battle cruiser? It was huge.

It made the DS9 station look tiny. Yeah. Do you think that was a mistake? Well, I mean, we see it coming through. Yeah, probably, yeah, in terms of perspective. Yeah, we did see the battle cruiser come through with a bunch of other ships through the wormhole in a prior episode, but not a close-up like this. Yeah, this is a cool shot. I will say the Gemha Dhar is supposed to be the most brutal, the warriors that you don't want to mess with, you know.

But I'll be honest, they're ships with all their nacelles having the pink color. I keep thinking, these are the aliens that are the breast cancer awareness aliens. They're sitting there. That's all I can think of because pink is totally associated with that charity. You're talking about breast cancer checks, checking for breast cancer. And you're wearing pink right now, exactly. I'm representing. You're representing the.

Well, that's nice of the Dominion. The Dominion is actually very conscientious about, you know. Very socially conscious about that. Yes. Yes. So, yeah. I forgot that a battle cruiser, of course it's huge. It's big. It's got to be big.

But it's not supposed to be bigger than the station. You're saying it looked probably like it looked like it was. It looked bigger than the station to me. Yeah. And there was even a Starfleet vessel flying by the station that looked small. It looks small. Yeah. Oh, was it a runabout, though?

No. Oh, a different vessel. Yeah. Well, I must have blinked. Yeah. Well, we cut into the captain's office and we meet Way Yun 5. Oh, my gosh. What?

Is this like Marine 5 kind of? I mean, it's sort of like the iconic Wayun, this one. It's great. You know why? It's great. He is so. His face is so beautiful, too. That makeup and the violet eyes.

She looks younger. He looks younger than the other wayune that he played. Well, he's new. He's the newest one. And I, you probably both saw this as well, but he's more, oh, God, he's more bubbly. He's more like champagne in this one. And I love it. He would love that.

He would love that. He would love that. He called champagne and bubbly? Yes. Who wouldn't? I'll tell him when I see him next time. Yeah. We'll have to tell him.

We'll pay for the bottle because. All right. A little bit of trivia. This episode introduces William 5 after his death and reveals that the Vorda clone themselves. a premise which was created specifically so Jeffrey Combs could reprise his role. Iris Stephen Bear explains, quote, when we first saw Jeff Combs do the role into the death, we were wishing we could find a different ending to the episode

because we really didn't want the character to die. But we couldn't think of anything. The next thing you know, they're out in Griffith Park, shooting the fight, and he's dead. I knew immediately that he had to come back. There was no way he couldn't. So there we know. Well, that's what's great about science fiction.

and you just introduce a clone. And yeah, it's like on soap operas when there's a twin. Yeah, there used to be back in the day a convention that was half-sci-fi, half-soap operas. Really? Yes. Oh, that's- Wow. I thought that's perfect,

because those two worlds are the only two worlds where you can create anything, anything. Anything you can die and come back to life in both. I like fantasy too. Yeah. I would say I lean towards that, like Game of Thrones, things where there's magic. Yeah, but you can die and come back to life and fantasy as well.

So, right, so sci-fi fantasy and soaps. And Broadway musicals. And Broadway musical. Wow. Thank you for me. I wonder if these all are connected. Comedy, drama. Well, yes, Cisco does mention in the scene, I saw you die.

And Waye-un explains here that the border, or DuCott explains, the border of good at cloning. DuCott says he wants more to come back because this new Dominion judicial system has cleared Gimore, he says. And Cisco's like, no, I think he'd prefer to stay here. And Dukot says, well, let's go ask him. Or Wayun says, let's go ask him. So off they go.

To Gomor's quarters. Gomor says, no, no deal. Because of the dominion. Duccott says he can find his daughter. You know, Duccott's going to be a nice guy. She's heard he's alive. Then why didn't you bring her with you? Yeah, he just doesn't trust Duccott, which I don't

Because he's lying. He's a liar. He's a liar. And Wayune's a clone. Why do you think, I'm going to, this is questions for both of you. Why do you think Duqat wanted Tekonis so badly? What was he going to do with this dying man in his Jim Hedar battle cruiser? I think he was, he was the resistance to Dakot.

He was somebody who people trusted and they should. This is a trophy on the wall for him then, if he could take it. Well, also spilling the secrets, he knows that this is what's happening right now. Well, he's a Kardashian Goldaqat knows he's going to give somebody his secrets. And if he sees Kira as his daughter, who else would he be telling? So it's a chess move. Which is like one of the worst people in the universe he could be telling is Kira. Right, right, right.

Okay. Well, Gimore says no. Absolutely not. I'm not coming back. And Dukot says, well, we'll be docked a few more. days if you change your mind and then we have a montage of can i interrupt yes um when this finishes and they leave yeah kira goes over to goodmore and pets his head his yes his wig his wig um her look with a smile kind of bothered me okay oh because he's still dying and that had to be

painful for gomore to even hear that load of hooey that I'm not swearing that load of hooey that um decat was spewing yeah you know I mean that's still he's still talking about his flesh and blood and I just felt like it was a I don't think it was necessarily her choice but I thought it well I wonder if that was an Avery pitch you know that seems like something Avery might pitch because Avery all often looks for the opposite choice that you would expect. Some teachers do that.

Like, you want to find your spin on it. Do the opposite of what they're asking for. But that doesn't always serve the scene and the storytelling. And we're storytellers. So this smile happens as she's petting his head. Is that the point? It's like a look of satisfaction. She saved him from, I'm guessing it was, she saved him from GoldaCott taking him.

I see. And she's happy he didn't buy into it. it. Right. But it still felt tonally off. Yeah. Didn't feel connected to the truth of the scene they just played. Right. Yeah. Okay. Okay. We have a montage of Gimor getting sicker and sicker and Kira doing more and more things. Ultimately, she ends up asleep at his bedside at the end of the montage. I'll say in that montage, often when there's some camera movement, when the camera's sort of pushing in or panning, montages work really well. That feels like a film language of time passing.

These were just locked off shots that sort of dissolved. And I missed the movement. I wish there had been some action and camera, you know, panning and seeing her coming in and out. I agree. You know, I wish there had been a little more to that. The montage felt a little awkward to me. Well, most montages do have that type of movement.

you would say intentionally intentionally for the passage of time like robbie said yes yeah this one had i don't think it had any it was pretty much locked off that's why it felt so weird and a couple shots were repeated yeah yeah some shots were repeated well we go to corks cafe next um and kira's up on a on a balcony sort of you know lost and thought you lost in thought perfectly said lost in thought Quark offers her a drink, a bjornail or something stronger. How about a black hole? I like that drink. I want to have a black hole.

I don't even know what it is, but I just, that name. It's like a kamikaze. I love it. I would definitely try a black hole. That's like the warp core breach from the Star Trek experience. Yes, exactly. Oh, my gosh. I had a cocktail thing with J.T. on the cruise.

Oh, yeah. The very last one was like six kinds. of rum. Oh my gosh. Six kinds of rum in one glass together? I'm serious. Well, I'm, no, I'm being hyperbolic, actually. But it was like, wow, strong alcohol.

Yeah. Very strong. It was repulsive. Wow. Maybe that's a black hole. I think so. That's your black hole. Yes.

I can't remember what it was called now. It wasn't black hole, but that would have been a good name for it. Yeah. Well, Cork, uh, it tries to be. be a little empathetic, although he does, I wish they didn't write him the line where he says, you look terrible. Not that I mind. I like my women a little rumpled. Oh. It was not a good line for quark.

I think this scene, if I have a missing scene, should have been more of him having empathy for her. Yeah. And maybe it starts out and then he realizes that she's in a bad place. Maybe there's a little connection there with her to. instead of. Yeah. So that he, because then he gets to, jumps into the warm Yenik's milk or Yenick milk. Mm-hmm.

And it's, I don't know, it's an opportunity for connection here. Just in the last episode, we were talking about how Hork has done so many nice things, good heroic things. And still, a lot of characters, including Kira, are not very nice to him. And this would have been a great opportunity for him to. do something nice that she notices. Yes. And grow beyond this sort of Kira constantly, you know, Tipper tat.

Yeah. Childish. And he is nice. Especially what this is about. Yeah. This is about revealing your truth. Real stuff. Who you really are.

And he's making a gesture. And not so far away. Yeah. She was so far. They were so far away. Yeah. I would have liked it better if she was sitting in a corner at the bar and it's late at night and he's closing.

up. Yeah. Yeah. More intimate. Yeah. Yes. Closer. That nobody else can hear them, but we can see it happening. Yeah. Not so far away that we're doing a far away two shot. So I'm not in the scene. It's not intimate. And it's kind of all over the place. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It didn't really land this scene. The only thing I get out of the scene is I want to know what an an yik looks like. Is it is it Bajoran? Is it a Bajorn cow? Is it a Cardassian mammal? It looks like a llama. I imagine it looks like a yak and a llama. So it's a cousin of Ensign llama? Yes, I think so. Yes. Here is quarters next. Dukot arrives suggests that maybe she has it all wrong this whole story. She's on the wrong side of the story. And he brings up

the Kiesa Monastery massacre in the scene. He gives her a pad. He slides it to her, which I like that blocking. Doesn't want to get too close to her. I actually like this scene. I did too. And I like that they had the cup with that drink in it. And clearly she'd been drinking it because she was very relaxed. Mm-hmm.

That telegraphed to me. She was relaxed until she got up in his face. She just got up in his face. Is that what she threw at him? Yes. Oh, God. Warm milk. Well, she drank it.

There wasn't anything in it. It looked like it hit his head. but then when they cut to it did and then hit the wall. This is how not with it I was when watching this. I thought he handed her one of those information tubes. You know those like two, like you know those things? They're just they look like a test tube. Yeah.

Yes. With liquid in there that they only use on DS9. I thought he slid that across the table. And I thought that's what she threw at him. And it broke. No, no. And then when she started reading the pad, I'm like, oh. Where'd the pad come from?

Where'd that come from? Yeah. I was so confused. The pad is what he drops on the thing. He puts the pad on the table and slides it to her. He thought he slid it to. And she throws the yak milk. Yeah.

You were probably taking notes looking down at your paper. You're right. You're right. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. It happens. It does.

Well, he gives her this pad, says that she can verify everything. She throws the cup at him. Hits his head, which I thought, was that on purpose or an accident? It looked painful. I think it was purpose. Yeah. Yeah. She gets up in his face.

though, right up in that 50-52 shot. She says she will make sure that he pays for all of this. That felt very threatening and like a, like, we're going to see some of this later on. That was, that was intense. It was. And I loved what he said. Maybe, but not today. Not today.

Yeah. Yeah, I really love that scene. Yeah. Yeah. And after he leaves, she picks up the pad and starts to read it. Oh, no. We go into Gimore's quarters. He needs Kira calls for her, but she's read the pad and the story and that information.

She is angry. She's not nice to him. He's distressed. He doesn't just need her. He's distressed needing her. We haven't seen him yell for her before. Yeah, exactly. Yes, he's very vulnerable here.

But she's angry. She says she knows about the monastery. And he tries to explain it was war. He says, you know, they were hiding weapons for the resistance, weapons used to kill my friends. And it was war. It was easy to hate each other during war. But he says to her, he admits, you weren't monsters. I know that now.

We were the monsters. But it's not enough for Kira. He doesn't reveal his truth because he didn't want her to hate him. Yes, exactly. And so we've got two people that have deep secrets because they're afraid. they won't be loved if they share them. They won't. They've lost their honor.

Yeah. With each other. And at this point, I assume that he was an officer or higher rank or older, but you don't know until later what the real story is. And it's interesting that he doesn't share that. He doesn't try to make excuses and say, well, I was just 19. It's not my fault. Or it was, you know, I didn't even, he doesn't make any of those excuses.

Nope. Which I thought was very honorable of him. Yeah. For sure. We go to Quarks. Wayune is playing Dabo in this scene. And doing very well. He loves Dabo.

He, oh my gosh. The screen time, the lack of lines doesn't mean anything when it comes to Jeffrey Combs. He steals the scene every time. He's a powerhouse. Oh, my gosh. He's a powerhouse. Yeah. Well, Wayun loves Dabot, not so much.

Cisco enters with Kinar meant for Gammar. So he's got a bottle of this Kinar. And he tells Dukot, here, let's drink some of this canar. Dukot doesn't even touch the bottle. He pushes it with his. No, thank you. Cut your hand in the cookie jar. Cisco says this is poison.

Duccott declines. Cisco says it's poison and accuses Duccott of attempting to murder Gamoire. And then Wayun drinks it. Like he chugs it. He just throws the entire. He doesn't just drink. He chugs it. He's like, yes.

Just so funny. This is where we learn that the way un is immune to most poisons. But he's able to taste it, the Vorda, or all immune to most poisons. He tastes it, though, and he says, yes, it's quite toxic. So he confirms. That's so great. I would have liked if he dipped a finger, he's like, yeah, it's quite toxic. And then it then takes a shot of it at the end.

Just to show everyone he can do it. Yeah, Wayune steals the same. Every time. We go to the promenade. Odo is pacing in front of the Bajoran shrine as Kira steps out. He's waiting for her and says that he looked at the file of this massacre and Goumour was only 19 years old. And he was only one of 400 soldiers that were there. And according to the file, he might not have even fired a shot.

Yeah. I love this scene. Yeah, Odo's very clever. We needed this scene with him. Yeah. Yes. And he's so grounded and natural. and the way he delivers this, really good.

Very tender. Yeah. And he does say if it really mattered to you, you would have looked this up yourself. You know, it's true. Yeah. I thought that was an interesting line. Yes.

You know, I'm a K.O. Shipper. Kira Odo. K.O. Shipper. Yeah, me too. I like the way Odo ends the scene, too, when Kira asks, you know, what are you trying to say that I should go back down there? And he goes, oh, no, I wasn't saying that at all.

Are you? He sort of asks. He lets her make the decision, which is great, which is such a good friend thing. He doesn't say like, you've got to do this. Kara says he lied to me. I thought he was different, but he's just like the rest of them. And Odo, is he really? I've seen his file too.

That part. It's, I think I would have liked that to trigger her more. into the contemplation. Like you wanted to see more contemplation on her face in this scene? Yeah. Is that what you're saying? Well, just that he lied to me. Is he?

Or, I mean, he's just like the rest of him. She knows he isn't. She knows that. Yeah, it's almost like this is her way of getting out of being there at his death. Yeah. She found a way to like, oh, I can get mad at him. You were part of the army that just, just, killed those monks.

So she's maybe a little defensive? Yeah. The feelings are too impossible. We go out of this question from Odo. You know, are you saying you should go back down there? And she has a flashback. Her father's dying. We're back in the caves.

Farrell returns. And not the singer, but the character, Farrell. And not me. My name is Farrell. And Farrell says they found the Cardassian soldiers that had shot her father, basically. that it attacked them. And Kira's like, I want to go. Great.

You found them. I want to go get revenge. She tells her dad. She's going to make them pay for what they did. And he wants her to stay. He's like, no, no, don't go. Don't go. And she says, I'll be right back.

And the actor, Farrell, he, that look on his face telegraphed everything. Like, you can't go with us. But he, well, he says. But I love that he, you can see it in his face. totally see it because she says, I'll go with you. He goes, wait, are you sure? And she says, I know the area. And Farrell goes, well, so does Gant. So does Gantt. And she comes out and says it. They didn't shoot Gant's father. They shot mine. Even more reason for her not to go. Yep. Jerry, what a great name. That would have been. Ferell Feral. Use your last name in

Feral Feral Feral. Feral. Feral. That would be scary. That would be so scary. Well, from this flashback, we cut back to the present and we're in Kira's quarters. She's putting candles in front of a shrine as Bashir arrives and says he's going to die in less than an hour. That was our commercial break right there. But the scene continues and Bashir begs her to go. You know, you need to go. He needs, he wants to see you. And she says, no.

And Bashir says, I think you're making a mistake. another good friend yeah i like that shrine i know she's stood in front of that shrine before but it looks like that's an updated one to me it looks new let's hope in season five it got updated but what i'm seeing as well is she still hasn't had time to contemplate and process all of this no she's interrupted at the shrine now she's interrupted for her meditation at her shrine in her in her own quarters. Right. She still hasn't processed.

I mean, I would say to your point, Terry, that you brought up maybe for Robert Hewitt Wolf, it was a little too hard to write the script. And he admitted in the quote you read, Garrett, there is not a scene in this episode where she comes out and processes her guilt and shame from her biological father. There's the missing scene. We need to see that. And it's like cheating. Yeah.

I thought she did process it a bit in her monologue. No, but when you really face something that guts you, I know because I have. It's just, it's, there's a release of pain. Yeah. That you're processing that you didn't process when it happened. Okay. You know, there is, right, Robbie? Yeah, yeah.

It's missing that, it's like gutteral. It's like the answer. It's like the ambit. animal in you is just in so much pain. Those are super introspective, dark, honest, painful. It's just so excruciatingly painful to go through that you don't just pop up or have this calm that I'm done with that now. It's not like that. This reminds me I directed my first episode that I directed at Dawson's Creek was about Dawson avoiding his feelings about his father's death in a car accident in the previous episode. And the whole episode is about every other character is having a very

emotional memory and they're processing their sadness and their grief. And Dawson doesn't process it until he goes to get some milk at the store. And the guy at the counter says, oh, your dad was here. The night that he died in the car accident, he was here. And all he did was talk about you, Dawson. And the story that this guy, you know, the salesman, the guy at the little market, tells about his dad, the last thing, it's the last thing that Dawson knows of his father was that he was bragging about how proud he was of his son and said all these nice things. And Dawson goes out to his Jeep and cries hysterically. Yeah. Because he finally is dealing with his feelings. Yeah.

And that's a story, that episode of Dawson's Creek. Okay. Has a story of avoiding, avoiding, avoiding. Yes. And then finally, and I told James Vanderbeek, who sadly we lost recently. Yeah, so sad. So sad. But I told James Vanderbeek as we were doing that episode and prepping it.

I said, James, this is all about avoiding grief. But it will only work if you experience the grief in the scene. And we talked a lot about grief and about how to play that. scene and he did a phenomenal job. And I think that story worked because of that structure. Avoid, avoid, avoid. Yes. Boom.

You know it's there. And that's what's missing in this episode for me. Yes. You need the emotional bomb. Catharsis. So the cathartic scene is what you need. Yes. You do not get that from her monologue tearing up at that end.

That was not a cathartic scene for you then. It didn't go far enough. Either of you. Okay. No. But it was in the right direction. And I think it should have happened before. It should have happened before she goes.

to see Gamoire for the last time. This story is a powerful story, but it's very intellectual. And I think it's because maybe Robert Heut-Wolf could not go there himself. He said it in the quote, you read, Garrett. I don't know that he wanted to go there. Yeah, so maybe you should have written it with another writing partner to help with processing of that. Yeah. Maybe.

We do have a flashback. This is basically Cura returning with Feral after they've gone out to find the Cardassians that roughed up the village and shot her father and they got some payback. They were able to, you know, take out five skimbers, 15 Cardassian soldiers dead. You know, they talk about that. But also, this is also the scene where Kira is told that, isn't this right? Where, yeah, she finds out her father. Yeah, she died right before she got back.

Yeah. That he was calling for her name right before he passed. And I'm sure that dropped like a bomb on her. She's on autopilot in that flashback. Yeah. Get another raid party together. I want to hit those Kardashians. She's just business, business.

She doesn't even want to have a memorial in the next scene. She's digging a grave. And Farrell offers to organize a funeral, a memorial where everyone can say a few words about her father. And she says, no. No. There's nothing left to say. So again, denial, denial, denial. Mm-hmm.

She can't. It's too painful for her. her to face. Yeah. And we come back to the present. Kira goes to Gamoor, lays her head on his chest. I wrote down, um, close up, Kira. Where's the close up? That would have been nice. So if it was in between her last flashback of her dad, this would have been a great place before she goes to Gimor to have her break down in front of her shrine that she has in her room. If we've gone back to the present, She just breaks down alone in front of the shrine to Gamoire. And then in this Gimore's quarter scene where she comes in and lays her head on his chest,

it would have been nice to see a close up of her. Yes. It literally was one shot over him. We hear her off camera say. No, we don't even hear her, do we? Yeah. He says, I thought, I didn't think you would come. And she says, well, for a while there, neither did I.

Off camera, she says. Off camera, right. But the angle is from above, right? They're shooting down on them. them, right? And she lies her head down. And I first thought she's listening for his like his heartbeat or something like that. And then that's it. You don't see any close up of her reaction of her of her lying on his chest, which is, would have been great. We don't get any emotion from her flashback scene. She's in denial and says, I don't want to

feel my feelings. And we don't feel her emotions here when he's done. He dies. We jump. We jump. We jump over all the emotions. emotions that it's like the script avoids and is in denial as much as Kira is. And so we only see as much as the denial is holding that space with the pain underneath it. Yeah. Oh, my goodness. The script is in as much denial as the Kira. Oh, my goodness.

Well, we go to the infirmary, Bashir ends his file recording. Gamoire, Gmore's died off camera. We didn't see a close-up. We didn't see it happen. He tells Kira, they're done here, and she admits that she didn't want to face her father dying in the past, and she didn't want to face Gimore dying. But she said she wanted to get it right this time. She has a long speech about that, which was beautifully done. Yeah.

But it didn't quite, at this point, I feel like we had missed a lot of story, and now she's just talking about what she's. She now it's exposition again. Yeah, we didn't see it happen in the story. We hear her talk about it. And it's a visual medium. Why are we not experiencing it through watching the characters go through it? Yeah. Still, it's very well written when he says, when she starts talking about he's forcing a breath and then another, she started counting them, the number of them.

And then he was forcing, he fighting for every last second. And then when she says, I don't even think he knew I was there. Shear's response, he knew. You gave him what he needed. I just, I love that writing. So I think, even though they'd be better to show it, but the writing was good. No, no, no, don't take away that speech at all. That's, I think that's great.

But we needed to see her close. We needed to experience Kira having her breakthrough. Her catharsis. In her room, privately in front of her shrine, the breakdown happens there. Then she's able to lay her head on. on Gimore's chest, close up on Kira's face, still wet from her breakdown, teary eye from earlier. Black tears. Yeah.

Mascares tears. Yes. Like sloppy cry. Yeah. Okay. And I think even to use my Dawson's Creek reference, even when the characters themselves, like here, they've given Kira the awareness to have this long monologue with Bashir. and she's got this awareness of, you know, I could have stayed longer, but I was, you know, there was so much pain and so much death. I didn't want to face it.

And I ran. She's got a lot of self-awareness. If they'd put all those thoughts in Bashir's mouth and had her feeling it. And Bashir saying, you know, it makes sense why you didn't want to be there with your father. You were in too much pain. You had seen death everywhere, Kira. And she goes, you know, if someone. Someone else can say it.

And she could feel it. Like part of it. So you're saying like make that speech a conversation between the two of them. Or have someone else say, I can see you. I see you, Kira. I see what you're doing. And have them say it to me. Then you let her feel it in that moment as she's hearing someone else call her out on it.

And why not Odo again, right? Yeah. And not even have Bishir do that. go see her with Odo telling him what it was just nothing. It was all over. And then Odo could talk to her about her process. Also brings them close together. Again, these characters that ultimately end up together.

Yeah. It's necessary to have intimate scenes that build their relationship. Yeah. I think the same thing. We assume a lot with Judzia and Wharf. And there could have been little tidbits of intimate. scenes, not just physical, but real deep. But real vulnerable emotional scenes. Yeah. And we have some, but we should have had more to, would have filled the space more so that we accept those relationships,

not based on some kind of, we're telling you they're in love. This is how you're supposed to think about them. But let the audience decide as they watch. Yeah. Well, we go to the captain's office next. Dukot and Wayun are there with Cisco. Dukot says it. It's very sad. But the good news is that he embraced the new Cardassian government at the very last minute just before he died. And Cisco says, that's not what happened. And Dukot wants the body. But Cisco says, I'm sorry.

The funeral has already been arranged. And we cut down to the Bajoran resistance area where Kira buried her biological father. and she's buried Gimor right next to her biological father. I love that. Yeah. And no words. We just know it. No words.

I like that gravestone. But I would have liked to see her face again. Yeah, that's true. They didn't show her face. It's almost hard to believe that she didn't win an Emmy for the show on any given show that she's done. Yeah. And then you don't give her close-ups.

Yeah. That's weird. Did that last scene, Terry, look like a fantasy, to me it looked Lord of the Rings-ish to me that last scene because of the gravestones were very, they were different looking. They were circular. They looked like there were some type of elvish runes written on them in a way. So to me, it was very Lord of the Rings-ish setting.

Did it feel too out of the rest of the story? Did that take you out? No, it didn't. I'm just saying because you're a fan of fantasy. Did you feel that as well? I'm asking you. Did you get that at all? Yeah, I felt there was.

a peaceful, ethereal. Yeah. Yeah. I really liked it a lot. I thought it was a perfect. It was a beautiful. Yeah. It was a beautiful last thing.

But I do wish we had an angle on her, especially when she's doing her Bajoran, whatever the ceremony she was doing over the grave. Let's talk about the theme slash lesson slash moral Robbie McNeil. I wrote down, if you get a second chance to do the right thing, take it. I love that. Thank you. I really love that.

Cherfer. Be brave enough to take inventory and move forward with that information to be a better person. I just want to reference Robbie's lesson. I find it interesting. My moral from the last one was, and I said Spike Lee's 1989 film, do the right thing. You have do the right thing in this one now. That's funny. You doubled it.

That's funny. I like what you wrote here, though, Gary. it's very funny. Oh, yes. If the universe gives you lemons, make lemonade, is what I said. If the universe provides you lemons. Our comedy. Always, yes.

Our comedy for the show. Yeah. I love lemonade. All right. Well, you have the Patreon, Paul Winter for theme slash lesson slash moral of the episode, dare fair. I'm so honored. Submitted by Penny Lou.

Facing the death of a parent is a traumatic experience, and everyone handles it differently. That is true. Yeah, amen to that. Thanks, Penny. Yeah, thank you, Penny. All right, well, that is it. We have come to the end of this episode. Thank you, Terfair, for co-hosting with us again.

Always. Yes. Join us next time, everybody, when we will be recapping and discussing the episode Ferengi Love Songs with Armin. And for all of our Patreon patrons, please stay tuned for your bonus material and a little bit more. tear fare for everyone else. We'll see you next time.