"Emissary"

DEEP SPACE NINE: Season One
Aired January 3, 1993

I seldom watched DS9 (and even The Next Generation) when the episodes originally aired on Saturdays as a kid, usually my family went to church in the evening or had some type of activity going on like sports, Cub scouts, or anything that kept my parents driving all over town. I attempted to watch all of DS9 in 2010 but my success was short-lived- I only made it through the first season. The episodes seemed to really vary in quality from one episode to the next, though my beloved X-Files started off the same way. I feel like more often than not, the best television series start that way as the writers are working on a formula and even tweaking the characters, among other things. I honestly don't remember much from Season One, and remember even less from this Pilot titled "Emissary", but it holds up pretty well as far as pilot episodes are concerned.

The episode starts in a creative way, and links itself to it's sister series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, by referencing a previous episode from that series which had aired 3 years earlier. Usually in giant outer space battles, they always follow the Enterprise and it's crew, even though many other ships are flying around. "Emissary" reveals an event that happened on one of those other ships- it's captain lost his wife in the battle. Three years later, that captain named Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks) is now being transferred to assist on a space station, and he is joined by his son Jake. Star Trek had always used the phrase "boldy going" in it's introduction, but now DS9 is literally "boldy going" as it not just features the first African-American Starfleet Captain, but he's also given plenty of character depth as a single parent. That's deep stuff for outer space, man. For those viewers who maybe decided to skip TNG and aren't familiar with that series, the captain from TNG who is actually the reason for the big space battle where Sisko lost his wife makes an appearance in this Pilot. Sisko seems to resent Captain Picard, which adds some more depth to his character, because otherwise he was seeming a little "boring" before their scene together. As the episode progressed, Sisko still seems a bit uptight and straight-laced, like a school principal. But unlike Picard, he's given a love for sports while Picard enjoys drinking tea and listening to the symphony.

The other principle characters of the series appear throughout the episode and all of them seem to more depth right off the bat than the cast of TNG. Miles O'Brien (Colm Meaney) was a seldom used character who's now bumped up to the main cast of this series. Jadzia Dax (Terry Ferrell) appears to be a woman, but really she has the memories of a man who is a long-time friend and mentor to Sisko. That sounds really bizarre, but Jadzia is actually a body acting as a host for a space slug looking creature. Okay, that's still bizarre. An even more interesting creature is Odo, played by Rene Auberjonois, who's essentially playing the stern character he played previously on Benson and would later play on Boston Legal, it's just that he's now a pasty-looking shapeshifter. If you're typecast but play it to perfection, like Rene, you might as well work your gimmick. In addition to DS9 giving more of a spotlight to Miles O'Brien, they also decided to give a greater share of the spotlight to an alien race called the Ferengi. Greater share might be underselling the Ferengi since I believe they were a footnote on TNG, but now they're a central element to DS9. They are these little brown creatures with gigantic ears and a nose that looks like a pine cone. Armin Shimerman plays Quark, and he acts as a thorn in the side of Odo, and I recall this will lead to a lot of comedy later on.

Deep Space Nine has comedic moments, much like past Star Trek series, but this one seems darker than any previous series. I'll be honest that I'm ignorant of many details of political events but the tone of DS9 seems closer in nature to a political thriller than that of a space opera adventure series. The reason for the space station setting is that the Federation is aiding in relief efforts to one side of a war between alien races- the Bajorans against the Cardassians. It's like when the US governments have offered aid and turned nations into democratic states, it's just this is an outer space allegory. One of the Bajorns is part of Sisko's crew on the station, while a mysterious grey reptile guy named Gul Dukat is part of the Cardassians. He introduced himself to Sisko and seemed to be tempting the Captain to join his side instead of the Bajorans.

Lots of plot threads already in this pilot with the waring alien races, single father Sisko, but now there's some hullabaloo about a prophecy and "orbs." Sisko is the titular "Emissary" of the prophets and sees them appear to him in the form of his deceased wife, his son, and even Picard. That element actually excites me the most about DS9. This series premiered the same year as The X-Files, and also Homicide: Life On The Street, and while all three of these dramas have radically different settings, they all feature standalone episodes with recurring storylines told across multiple episodes and seasons. Gul Dukat could be the outer space version of the Cigarette Smoking Man....