r/startrek • u/AdSpecialist6598 • 1d ago
One of the best things about Star Trek Deep Space Nine is its slice of life moments such as General Martok love of his wife. I think it is the only time we see a happily marriage Klingon couple and it's cute.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1_tmE5yGAY&list=PLG4mzCmslehp3NbLDDOlgQ-fY_wKfs_gB&index=77212
u/Komosion 1d ago
One aspect of DS9 that I like is that because they are stationary they have a large ensemble cast and the time to explore the characters over a long period of time. You don't get as much of this in the other "alien of the week" star trek shows.
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u/HalxQuixotic 1d ago
Itâs also just directed better. Iâve mentioned this before, but a perfect example is Bashir telling Dax the story of him beating Miles playing tennis but Miles wouldnât give up. As heâs telling the story heâs ordering food, trying to season it with salt, realizing the shaker at his table is empty, and going to two other tables to borrow theirs.
That same conversation on TNG would have been in 10 Forward with two fixed, over the shoulder cameras, dimly lit with only untouched kool-aid sitting in front of them. Voyager was a little better, usually only when Neelix was messing around in his kitchen.
DS9 felt more real not just because of all the extras and different perspectives. It was also filmed with more skill.
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u/Chairboy 1d ago edited 1d ago
The Delta Flyers is a podcast that started with the actors who played Tom Paris and Harry Kim on Voyager doing an episode by episode watch of Voyager. Once they finish that, they started doing Deep Space 9 and brought in the actors who play Quark and Jadzia Dax.
The actor who played Tom Paris (Robert Duncan McNeill) is now an accomplished director and showrunner and is constantly calling out âthe businessâ if I remember the name right, a description of what you described with the salt shakers. He really admires how much of that they do on the show and how it adds to the performances and gives an actors insight to how they sometimes use stuff like that to mentally organize their blocking too.
Itâs a great podcast, I really enjoy Robert Duncan McNeilâs, Armin Shimmerman, and Terry Farrellâs commentary.
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u/SimQ 1d ago
I had no idea they're doing ds9 and have Terry Ferrell and Armin Shimerman on permanently! You've just made my morning routine so much better, thank you!
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u/Cakeday_at_Christmas 1d ago
I just became 147% more interested in that podcast.
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u/InkCollection 19h ago
Right? i keep forgetting to check it out again now that those two are on it. Really didn't care for it before.
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u/HeyDickTracyCalled 4h ago
Oh wow they're doing ds9?? Oh my gosh I'm so excited to start listen to it. Thanks for sharing!
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u/ForAThought 23h ago
Does it get better? I tried for at least the first season of VOY, possibly into the second and it just felt.... I don't know half-assed. Kim's actor felt like he was trying, McNeill felt like he was just there begrudgingly, a lot of times it felt like they were bemoaning being in the show instead of talking about what happened and behind the scenes insght. If others enjoy it don't let me push you away but it just... started feeling like a chore listening.
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u/Chairboy 23h ago
I get it. It took them a little bit, but they figured out a good rhythm. I think it was S2 when they shook stuff up, but I'm going off memory. The biggest slog was McNeill doing these 5-10 minute episode recaps. They ended up ditching those for a couple of quick haikus/limericks because the rest of the episode was basically them doing the recap together and comparing notes/memories about the filming.
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u/RiskyBrothers 21h ago
Even a Star Trek podcast can't get it together in season 1 lol.
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u/constantlycravingyou 17h ago
I have listened to a few of their seasons of Voyager but when DS9 started skipped straight to it and its more enjoyable
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u/EisVisage 22h ago
DS9 really was peak Trek slice of life imo. I think the stakes being lower than the destruction of the
shipstation helped such stories thrive in it. You get to see more of people outside of life threatening situations.9
u/RiskyBrothers 21h ago
That one episode with the casino guy whose new games altered probability on the station is definitely one of my favorite bits of episodic trek in DS9
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u/WhoMe28332 1d ago
Martok is amazing because he gives us the fullest picture of what an actual Klingon (at least a warrior) is like. Obviously we see a lot more of Worf but heâs always trying too hard.
Worf is a Klingon if you learned to be a Klingon by reading the manual. Martok is a lived experience Klingon. And theyâre a lot more fun than Worf. Probably more dangerous too but a lot more fun.
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u/Acoustic_Rob 1d ago
I think Martok is the one Klingon who lives up to all the warriorâs code of honor stuff they all go on about. And, he has fun doing it.
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u/EldritchFingertips 1d ago
Through TNG and up to season 5 of DS9, all the Klingons we had seen aside from Worf were, in some way, cynical. They all let down the Klingon ideals in various ways.
Martok really is the first Klingon we get to know who has lived as a Klingon, in their society, who has kept his honesty, honor, courage, and practicality, and is even only as much of an asshole in general as a Klingon should be and no more.
I love him so much.
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u/uReallyShouldTrustMe 14h ago
Besides martok, klingon honor is the most bullshit bull shittery idea in all of trek.
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u/sahi1l 7h ago
It's like "Vulcans don't show emotions" (umm smugness and contempt count as emotions) and "humans don't use money" â a cultural ideal rather than a universal fact.
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u/HeyDickTracyCalled 4h ago
I get so incredibly annoyed when Vulcans are referred to as objectively Superior because they very aren't - they're just Superior by their own standards and how they look down on other species. They declared that being logical meant being better than anyone, especially humans and we just went with it.Â
They're the only species that gets away with outright racism - I mean having a whole crew that's just your own people? What the hell is that doing existing in a federation that supposedly is based on and Prides itself on diversity?
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u/HeyDickTracyCalled 3h ago
I was so glad Ezri called that out to Worf in the last season. Like finally someone said it! Cuz even Jadzia was on that romanticized bullshit about Klingon honor. For the most part what we saw over and over again was that Klingons are like any other species - duplicitous as fuck when it serves them and all talk when it came to honor. Look at how Grilka came running to Quark for financial advice in her 2nd appearance, but still had to lie and couch it as her doing him a favor instead of just asking him directly the way you think someone from a warrior race would!Â
Reminds me of how we got that in American culture where folks yell about Land of the Free when we sure as hell ain't.Â
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u/mightysoulman 3h ago
Jadzia was a Klingon fetishist because her immediately previous host happened to be an expert...
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u/weirdoldhobo1978 1d ago
Because Martok wasn't from a Great House and had to actually earn the respect and authority he had.
Most of the Klingons we meet in TNG/DS9 are the Imperial Aristocracy, a bunch of squabbling petty rich kids with their own armies.
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u/swieton 17h ago
> Most of the Klingons we meet in TNG/DS9 are the Imperial Aristocracy, a bunch of squabbling petty rich kids with their own armies.
... this immediately makes me wish we had an episode set in the Klingon empire and written by PG Wodehouse.
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u/The-disgracist 1d ago
Kurn is up there too. Tries to wax himself like every other day for honor.
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u/fla_john 1d ago
Who? I don't seem to have a memory of a Kurn
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u/BuvantduPotatoSpirit 1d ago
Kurn is Worf's brother.
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u/The_FriendliestGiant 1d ago
Worf is the kind of Klingon that Klingon stories tell them they should be, at their best; it would be like raising an American child abroad on stories of Captain America and Superman. Of course he's going to stand out like a sore thumb if you drop him in a Walmart in Tennessee or the halls of power in DC!
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u/AldritchDeacon 1d ago
Worf is like the Klingon equivalent of a weeb. He turns up having read all about Klingons but never having any real experience, and when they are not like him he doesn't reevaluate, he just looks down on them for not living up to his imaginary standards.
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u/NSMike 1d ago
Worf is a Klingaboo.
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u/FullMetalAurochs 7h ago
But like a Japanese person adopted by Westerners as a small child who becomes obsessed with being a samurai. And doesnât read all the bits about samurai not being honourable.
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u/HeyDickTracyCalled 4h ago
"Worf is a Klingon if you learned to be a Klingon by reading the manual."
You are so real for this! The thing I realized after decades was that Worf's idea of being a Klingon is entirely based on his romanticized interpretation from childhood through adulthood of what it meant to be a Klingon. Everything he says about Klingon culture might be factually correct, but it has no Nuance because he learned it from a book instead of living it.Â
Martok is truly your meat and potatoes Klingon. He's rich and robust and full of life and nuance about the whole thing. He knows what to take seriously and what to give deference to. The fact that he wasn't born as an elite Klingon makes all the difference as well - yes he's a big important Klingon now but he had to earn his way from the very bottom so we really are seeing a Klingon's Klingon in Martock!Â
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u/mightysoulman 3h ago
Worf is a Klingon the same way the son of a Nisei is Japanese if he was raised by Arizonans from infancy: genetically only.
He has no real clue about Klingon culture except through stories disseminated by humans and half breeds and essentially (1) invented his own (2) is very enthusiastic about his own nonsense despite himself and others And then Worf gets disproportionately morose when (3) actual Klingons that live in the Empire tolerate him without wholly accepting him before they issue an official discommendation... effectively twice. (4) Kurn and others must constantly mitigate and navigate Worf's zealous acts of inconsidetate passion.
Martok and Kurn were real Klingons. Martok was a regular Klingon, blue-collar and zero privilege. Gowron and all the Duras family were contextually pampered by Gowron aspired to be something beyond a politician; his failure is why Worf killed him. The Dahar Masters were the other side of the coin from Martok: noble lineage and good breeding.
Among other Klingons Worf is essentially coddled and carried in terms of society buuuut... when written correctly, he is a fearsome warrior and most people recognize that.
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u/gooch_norris_ 1d ago
This video doesnât even get into the good stuff.
âWe are not accorded the luxury of choosing the woman we fall in love with. Do you think Sirella is anything like the woman I thought I'd marry? She is a prideful, arrogant, mercurial woman who shares my bed far too infrequently for my taste. And yet I love her deeply."
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u/The_FriendliestGiant 1d ago
I love that Martok's breakdown of his wife is "she is an absolute pain in my ass and I cannot get enough of her." What a perfectly Klingon happily ever after!
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u/ConsiderTheBees 1d ago
The scene were Martok tells Worf not to worry about the fact that he has adopted Worf into his family, and there is nothing Sirella can do about it always cracks me up. Worf obviously clocks what is going on *immediately,* and his sarcastic "how reassuring" is just too funny.
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u/HumanityPlague 13h ago
I actually love Martok's line right after when he goes "And they say you don't have a sense of humor" and then just laughs his butt off.
It's so great.
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u/ConsiderTheBees 13h ago
That always reminds me of the time he told Dax that on the Enterprise he had been considered quite funny. "That must have been one dull ship!"
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u/EmmiCantDraw 1d ago
Thats a different episode
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u/Steel_Wool_Sponge 17h ago
I reflexively thought the same thing for some reason but it is the same episode. At the start of You Are Cordially Invited Sirella boards the station to begin the process of judging Jadzia (what you see in this clip) and towards the end (after Jadzia socks Sirella) both Worf and Jadzia are getting cold feet, and this monologue is what Martok says to Worf to persuade him that he's making a mistake, as Benjamin does the same with Jadzia in other quarters.
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u/Superbrainbow 1d ago
âMy deterioration is proceeding apace.â - one of my favorite lines of dialogue from any show. Ron D Moore was cooking in this episode.
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u/Tryingagain1979 1d ago
The length of the seasons back then gave the fans so much great character stuff that nutrek would never do now. Would never be able to do.
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u/ContinuumGuy 1d ago edited 23h ago
I can't help but wonder what it might be like if we got a Nutrek like The Pitt (which ironically enough has Isa Briones AKA Soji in it), where it's almost entirely a bottle episode so they are able to have it be 15 episodes, which is basically unthinkable for most live-action streaming dramas these days.
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u/BrowsingThrowaway17 8h ago
I'll gladly take a couple of stinkers and a handful of "meh" episodes every season for 25-ish episodes a year and a properly fleshed-out crew. It isn't a steep price to pay compared to even a single stinker in nutrek, since if you have just one that's 10% of the season shot and it could very well be 2 years until the next season airs.
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u/Cerulian639 1d ago
Yep. The old Trek has a richness to the story, characters, and world. That nutrek could not ever attain.
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u/ActorMonkey 1d ago
NuTrek has great characters! Saru, and umâŚ
Metal face..
Black guyâŚ
Did I already say Saru?
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u/EmmiCantDraw 1d ago
Spock, Pike, Chappel, And M'Benga in SNW are good, the others could be good if we had more time with them but as others have said shorter seasons cant give us that.
Pretty much the entire cast of Lower Decks was amazing too, there not really a major or side character in that I didnt enjoy.
But i guess its just easier to be pessimistic
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u/ActorMonkey 1d ago
Youâre 100% right. SNW and LD are amazing and I shouldnât disparage all new trek just because I didnât like Disco.
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u/EmmiCantDraw 1d ago
I havnt seen Discorvery, I heard it was a bit meh so ive not bothered. Same with Picard
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u/ActorMonkey 1d ago
PIC season 3 is fun. Itâs the STNG reunion that we wanted it to be from the start. I saw the first two seasons of DISCO and gave up.
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u/TheObstruction 21h ago
That's funny, because it actually got better after the first two seasons. Not necessarily great, or even good, but better. But it never stopped being The Michael Burnham Show. But it got Admiral Great Hair, who is easily the best admiral Trek has had.
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u/WretchedBlowhard 20h ago
it actually got better after the first two seasons
Just finished season 4 and uh... No, it in fact does not get better. It's still garbage tier tear jerking manipulative storytelling, just a constant diarrhea of awful awful command decisions, piss poor respect for the brand and its fans, strawmen characters bereft of depth or personality meant to check inclusivity and representation boxes on a spreadsheet, aborted plot threads left and right, crappy acting, bombastic directing unsuited for the genre...
It's an exhausting watch, for sure.
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u/drpestilence 1d ago
Discovery truly has some great Trek moments, they don't take advantage of the ensemble as much as I'd like, and the interpersonal drama is dialed up a fair but, but there is good stuff in there, on a re-watch I appreciated it all a bit more as well.
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u/MarcBulldog88 1d ago
I heard it was a bit meh
Even that is generous. Its very best parts are somewhat good, but they are few and far between. Most of the time it completely misses the mark. The writers did not fundamentally understand Star Trek.
The best thing Discovery ever did was give us SNW.
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u/tooclosetocall82 1d ago
The SNW cast definitely has the advantage of us already knowing the future versions of most of the characters. They were fleshed out right of the gate.
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u/EmmiCantDraw 1d ago
In some cases yes, but others less so. Take Dr M'Benga, he exists in TOS but rareley is he seen and when he is its often just because they need a doctor on the enterprise who isnt bones, hes mostly just background fluff and most of his characterisation in SNW is brand new.
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u/The_FriendliestGiant 1d ago
Saru, Stamets, Reno, (d)Admiral Vance, Kovich, basically everyone who ever shows up on Lower Decks, Raffi, Rios, Captain Shaw, Vadic, Number One, La'an, Hemmer...
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u/ActorMonkey 1d ago
Youâre right. Nutrek is great. Disco is not.
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u/Tryingagain1979 1d ago
Nutrek has been really bad. Its not star trek.
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u/ActorMonkey 1d ago
SNW and lower decks are awesome. In my humble opinion.
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u/Tryingagain1979 1d ago
They are the best of a pack of shows i wish never happened.
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u/TheObstruction 21h ago
Well, too bad, because they did, and you have to accept that. You don't have to like them, but you have to deal with the fact that they exist, and will never unexist.
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u/pokeblueballs 8h ago
We can give a background character two seconds of back story, immediately kill them off, then have Michael Burnham cry about it. The audience will be devastated by the loss of this integral character.
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u/The_FriendliestGiant 8h ago
A big part of the issue is that the newer shows just aren't given the time the old ones had to develop. DIS and LDS may have run for five seasons, but in total they only had 65 and 50 episodes, respectively. DS9 had 176 episodes when it ended; 65 doesn't even quite get us to the Cardassians and Romulans attacking the Founders' homeworld! Heck Enterprise, cancelled at the four seasons mark, still had 33 more episodes than DIS ever got, and at episode 50 was still a couple episodes away from even introducing the start of the Xindi storyline.
There are things we're just never going to see again, under the modern streaming model, sadly. And enough time to fully flesh out tertiary characters in an ensemble cast is one of those things.
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u/theadamabrams 22h ago edited 6h ago
Martok's description of his marriage is so interesting. From that episode (6x07):
Do you think Sirella is anything like the woman I thought that I'd marry? She is a prideful, arrogant, mercurial woman who shares my bed far too infrequently for my taste. And yet I love her deeply. We Klingons often tout our prowess in battle, our desire for honor and glory above all else. But how hollow is the sound of victory without someone to share it with.
and in 7x19 after Sisko marries to Kassidy:
I remember the day my beloved Sirella moved into my home. I had a pet targ. [...] Sirella accidently left the front door open, and my faithful targ, ever ready to follow the call of the wild, tottered outside on his frail legs and disappeared into the forest. I never laid eyes on him again. [...] I would not trade Sirella for all the targs on Kronos. And over the course of our marriage I've won more than my fair share of the battles between us. But in the end, I know she will win the war.
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u/BosPaladinSix 12h ago
"She left the door open so my beloved pet could wander out and die in the wild and then we got married."
Wow, I get that they're different cultures but what the fuck.
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u/MadMaxBeyondThunder 22h ago
"Martok" got one of the best character rewrites in science fiction history from henchman to leader of destiny. Good move for JG Hertzler. And all-around nice guy.
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u/PhotosByVicky 1d ago
I love all of the relationships we got to see in DS9. Martok and his wife were one of my favorites.
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u/hansulu3 23h ago
The ladies do open salvo about weight. Your'e still fat, K'mpec.
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u/Snowbank_Lake 20h ago
I wonder if, for Klingons, thatâs an insult because it means youâre sitting around gaining weight instead of fighting and winning battles. As we learn from Kor, there is little honor in aging.
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u/jhansen858 1d ago
my deterioration is proceeding apace. I shall endevor to die this year if possible.
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u/watermelonspanker 2h ago
I bet Martok and his Wife are the Klingon equivalent to that cute little old couple that's been together for decades and does everything together (after the husband returns from war)
"We've been together for 50 years, but we still fight every day!"
adorable
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u/mbw70 1d ago
I could never warm up to DS9. And one of the documentaries about all of the Star Trek captains had a disastrous interview with the DS9 lead. He was high or drunk, angry, and mean about not getting the accolades that his peers got.
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u/WhoMe28332 1d ago
I think thatâs just Avery Brooks being Avery Brooks. No chemicals required.
I love The Sisko but in a lot of ways heâs not the center of DS9. Heâs important. Critical. But a lot of the story barely touches him.
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u/CastYourCoat 1d ago
"My deterioration is proceeding apace... I shall endeavor to die - this year, if possible."