Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Ties of Blood and Water Rewatch
June 6, 2016 6:41 PM - Season 5, Episode 19 - Subscribe
Kira gets an offer of help from an exiled Cardassian, but finds herself challenged both by his past deeds... and by her own. Plus: Ol' Blue Eyes is back! (No, no that one. Not him, either.)
Join Memory Alpha in this episode's shri-tal:
- This episode is a favorite of Nana Visitor's; "I like playing the truth of things. I love that they did this with my character, that they wrote that Kira isn't Miss Perfect Saint. It wasn't about her not loving the person she cared for. It was about 'This is tough.' And that it required more of her than she had at the moment. And it was a learning experience for her."
- Lawrence Pressman was impressed by Avery Brooks's direction of the episode. Pressman commented "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, its 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 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".
- For Robert Hewitt Wolfe, the most important scene in the episode is the scene where Kira introduces Tekeny Ghemor to Kirayoshi O'Brien; "This is her family. The father that is not her father. The baby that is not her baby. That's Kira's family."
- This episode reintroduces Weyoun after his "death" in "To the Death" and reveals that the Vorta clone themselves (a premise which was created specifically so Jeffrey Combs could reprise his role). As Ira Steven Behr explains, "When we first saw Jeff Combs do the role in "To 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."
"Still calling yourself gul? I'm surprised you haven't promoted yourself back to legate by now."
"I prefer the title 'gul'; so much more hands-on than legate. And less pretentious than the other alternatives: president, emperor, first minister... emissary."
"How about Dominion puppet?"
- Sisko and Dukat
"'Wha..."
"Oh, my... that is quite toxic, isn't it?"
"Are you... insane?"
"Oh, Vorta are immune to most forms of poison; it comes in handy when you are a diplomat."
- Dukat and Weyoun (knowingly drinking a glass of poisoned kanar)
"DABO! That is dabo, isn't it?"
"I don't see why you insist on playing this ridiculous game."
"I like games."
- Weyoun and Dukat
"You are really enjoying this, aren't you? Hm? All your sick little games."
"I must admit, I do get a certain... perverse pleasure out of it."
- Kira and Dukat
Join Memory Alpha in this episode's shri-tal:
- This episode is a favorite of Nana Visitor's; "I like playing the truth of things. I love that they did this with my character, that they wrote that Kira isn't Miss Perfect Saint. It wasn't about her not loving the person she cared for. It was about 'This is tough.' And that it required more of her than she had at the moment. And it was a learning experience for her."
- Lawrence Pressman was impressed by Avery Brooks's direction of the episode. Pressman commented "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, its 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 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".
- For Robert Hewitt Wolfe, the most important scene in the episode is the scene where Kira introduces Tekeny Ghemor to Kirayoshi O'Brien; "This is her family. The father that is not her father. The baby that is not her baby. That's Kira's family."
- This episode reintroduces Weyoun after his "death" in "To the Death" and reveals that the Vorta clone themselves (a premise which was created specifically so Jeffrey Combs could reprise his role). As Ira Steven Behr explains, "When we first saw Jeff Combs do the role in "To 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."
"Still calling yourself gul? I'm surprised you haven't promoted yourself back to legate by now."
"I prefer the title 'gul'; so much more hands-on than legate. And less pretentious than the other alternatives: president, emperor, first minister... emissary."
"How about Dominion puppet?"
- Sisko and Dukat
"'Wha..."
"Oh, my... that is quite toxic, isn't it?"
"Are you... insane?"
"Oh, Vorta are immune to most forms of poison; it comes in handy when you are a diplomat."
- Dukat and Weyoun (knowingly drinking a glass of poisoned kanar)
"DABO! That is dabo, isn't it?"
"I don't see why you insist on playing this ridiculous game."
"I like games."
- Weyoun and Dukat
"You are really enjoying this, aren't you? Hm? All your sick little games."
"I must admit, I do get a certain... perverse pleasure out of it."
- Kira and Dukat
There's a lot of good stuff about this episode, but let's be real, all of it is totally overshadowed by Weyoun! He's back and slimier than ever. Can we put Weyoun and Dukat in a buddy sitcom? Put them in a ship and throw it 3 million years into the past with no hope of return. Bring Sisko along for good measure.
posted by 2ht at 4:18 AM on June 7, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by 2ht at 4:18 AM on June 7, 2016 [3 favorites]
50 Shades of Grey DS9 style.
This is a great episode, and is brilliant as a sequel to the earlier Ghemor/Kira episode. To have him turn up and be dying and have only Kira to turn to, and in a way she has only him, and how they have to overcome so much to be together at the end, especially Kira.
The whole thing builds nicely, from the pleasant start and how Kira introduces him to Kirayoshi, and there in the background it Dukat being slimy and devious and you are just waiting for it all to go wrong. And then there is all the flashback stuff, and it leaves you wondering where it's all going, and then bam! Kira's dad dies while she is away avenging him. Cut back to the future and now Kira is in a mess, and manages to overcome her feelings after talking to various people about it all. Both Odo and Bashir are great in their roles here as well (for all the stick he got in the first couple of seasons, Bashir has become a complex and pretty well acted character.)
And in the background is Dukat with his new buddy, new Wayoun. Man, the two slimiest guys around are almost walking around DS9 holding hands!!
The direction is great, Sisko is not only a great captain of DS9, and a great cook, he is also a damn fine director!
Finally: I love the dialogue (part of which is quoted in the FPP) between Kira and Dukat.
posted by marienbad at 8:09 PM on June 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
This is a great episode, and is brilliant as a sequel to the earlier Ghemor/Kira episode. To have him turn up and be dying and have only Kira to turn to, and in a way she has only him, and how they have to overcome so much to be together at the end, especially Kira.
The whole thing builds nicely, from the pleasant start and how Kira introduces him to Kirayoshi, and there in the background it Dukat being slimy and devious and you are just waiting for it all to go wrong. And then there is all the flashback stuff, and it leaves you wondering where it's all going, and then bam! Kira's dad dies while she is away avenging him. Cut back to the future and now Kira is in a mess, and manages to overcome her feelings after talking to various people about it all. Both Odo and Bashir are great in their roles here as well (for all the stick he got in the first couple of seasons, Bashir has become a complex and pretty well acted character.)
And in the background is Dukat with his new buddy, new Wayoun. Man, the two slimiest guys around are almost walking around DS9 holding hands!!
The direction is great, Sisko is not only a great captain of DS9, and a great cook, he is also a damn fine director!
Finally: I love the dialogue (part of which is quoted in the FPP) between Kira and Dukat.
posted by marienbad at 8:09 PM on June 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
I thought they did a nice job at letting Kira actually look exhausted in this episode. So often in Trek, the show's belief in the need for women as eye candy overrides all naturalism (I remember watching the broadcast of the TNG episode where they went to Tasha Yar's planet and her sister was meant to be some kind of resistance fighter, and her hair was so perfectly styled I just burst out laughing. Like, were they in a war for hair products?).
posted by oh yeah! at 8:05 PM on June 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by oh yeah! at 8:05 PM on June 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
The whole thing builds nicely, from the pleasant start and how Kira introduces him to Kirayoshi, and there in the background it Dukat being slimy and devious and you are just waiting for it all to go wrong.
Yeah, the first couple times I saw this one, I remember that unusual but effective sense of "I have no idea where this episode is going." It's part of what maintains interest in what could have been a real snoozer of an episode. It's nice to read the synopsis for an episode, worry that it'll be dull, and have DS9 surprise you by transcending the story's limitations; I just watched the second episode of season 7 and it did the same thing. (This is also why I always skip "The Muse", because it's one of DS9's rare failures in the "please-don't-be-boring" department.)
I remember watching the broadcast of the TNG episode where they went to Tasha Yar's planet and her sister was meant to be some kind of resistance fighter, and her hair was so perfectly styled I just burst out laughing. Like, were they in a war for hair products?
Ah, the '90s. The only thing that allowed me to give a glimmer of a benefit of a doubt to her whole look was her strong resemblance to Linda Hamilton, who connotes "badass" to me thanks to Terminator 2.
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 5:15 AM on June 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
Yeah, the first couple times I saw this one, I remember that unusual but effective sense of "I have no idea where this episode is going." It's part of what maintains interest in what could have been a real snoozer of an episode. It's nice to read the synopsis for an episode, worry that it'll be dull, and have DS9 surprise you by transcending the story's limitations; I just watched the second episode of season 7 and it did the same thing. (This is also why I always skip "The Muse", because it's one of DS9's rare failures in the "please-don't-be-boring" department.)
I remember watching the broadcast of the TNG episode where they went to Tasha Yar's planet and her sister was meant to be some kind of resistance fighter, and her hair was so perfectly styled I just burst out laughing. Like, were they in a war for hair products?
Ah, the '90s. The only thing that allowed me to give a glimmer of a benefit of a doubt to her whole look was her strong resemblance to Linda Hamilton, who connotes "badass" to me thanks to Terminator 2.
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 5:15 AM on June 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
One of the very likable things about this episode is that they resisted the temptation to tip it over into blatant melodrama. Kira could have very well decided that maybe they should give Ghemor over to the Cardassians, and a less-canny show might have taken that route, with a last-minute change of heart and a subsequent mad dash to the airlock, but they didn't and I'm very glad of that. It's also an episode that aids Kira's character arc development with that of other characters'; Odo has had his own regrettable decisions during the Occupation, and Bashir his own problems and anger toward his parents.
It's also very interesting to see not just Weyoun and Dukat aboard the station so soon after the near-destruction of the Bajoran solar system, but how they interact with each other. Weyoun is really turning on the charm offensive, and he's making Dukat look even stiffer and surlier by comparison--which may be the point; whether it's to undercut Dukat's authority, or to set them up as a good cop/bad cop diplomatic duo, or some combination thereof, is yet to be seen. And Dukat is just as dickish as ever; he's acting as if he's already got the station back.
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:06 PM on June 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
It's also very interesting to see not just Weyoun and Dukat aboard the station so soon after the near-destruction of the Bajoran solar system, but how they interact with each other. Weyoun is really turning on the charm offensive, and he's making Dukat look even stiffer and surlier by comparison--which may be the point; whether it's to undercut Dukat's authority, or to set them up as a good cop/bad cop diplomatic duo, or some combination thereof, is yet to be seen. And Dukat is just as dickish as ever; he's acting as if he's already got the station back.
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:06 PM on June 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
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There's some precedent: Gaddafi, Papadopoulos, Mariam.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:31 PM on June 6, 2016