When Kira learns that a Bajoran war hero long thought dead is in fact being held in a Cardassian prison camp, she's mounts a daring rescue. With Bajor's government cratering to the influence of a nativist faction, she hopes this hero, Li Nalas, can unite the people. But Li is reluctant to be the figurehead the Bajorans need, as he's not really the hero any of them thinks.
Though this three-part episode is clearly a Deep Space Nine kind of story, it began as an idea from Jeri Taylor, head writer of The Next Generation -- which she originally intended for that show. Deep Space Nine head writer Michael Piller (and Taylor's former boss on Next Gen) appropriated the idea for the newer series, sensing how good a fit it would be. The story was expanded to three episodes, with a different writer taking each part. Ira Steven Behr developed this first chapter, and put his stamp on it by changing the nature of the legendary Bajoran at the heart of the tale. While Li Nalas had originally been conceived of as a reluctant hero, Behr felt it would be more compelling to make him a mistaken one, whose initial act of bravery had been totally misconstrued and blown out of proportion.
Behr and the rest of the writing staff also infused this story with a lot of political and social commentary. All incarnations of Star Trek have produced their share of thought-provoking and topical episodes. But even just this far into re-watching Deep Space Nine, I'm struck that this series may have the most staying power. This Bajor story line feels so "ripped from today's headlines" that it could just as easily have been part of Star Trek: Discovery. The government is losing stability after the departure of a key leader, and we're told that many Bajorans now feel that politicians can't get things done. In the Circle, there's a small but riled group stoking racist and nativist inclinations. They wear masks instead of white polo shirts and wield spray paint rather than tiki torches, but the parallels are pretty damn strong.
Because this story is unfolding over three episodes, there's a lot of time spent on fun world-building too. We see Kira pray, learning that the Bajoran prayer stance (appropriately) is arms-up like some sort of endurance test. We see how Li Nalas' earring comes into Quark's possession, giving us a taste of the criminal underworld in the Star Trek universe.
Fun though all that is, script writer Ira Steven Behr uses the time to dig into the message as well. A subplot about Jake's date with a Bajoran girl ends in a sober conversation between him and Benjamin. The girl's father breaks the date because Jake isn't Bajoran, leading to a meaningful talk about racism. It's not white actors in sci-fi makeup wringing their hands and wracking their brains over how this could be; it's between two people of color, a resonant talk between a father and son.
There's also plenty of time spent developing this story arc's great guest characters. Li Nalas is built up not only by Kira's praise, but by the fact that both Sisko and Bashir have already heard of him. Late in the episode, Li gets a lengthy and poignant monologue revealing how his heroism is a legend blown out of proportion. (It's filmed smartly, too, with Li staying in foreground focus the entire time as Sisko offers out-of-focus counsel in the background.) To embody Li Nalas and deliver this monologue? The show was able to nab Richard Beymer, Tony from West Side Story himself.
Beymer was arguably not even the "biggest get" of the episode, though. Frank Langella appears as Bajoran politician Jaro Essa. It's an uncredited appearance; Langella reportedly took this role for his kids, refusing a big paycheck and prominent billing. As his role is more significant in the subsequent chapters of the story, though, I'll dive into that more then. Rounding out the guest cast, we get Marc Alaimo's return as Gul Dukat. I feel like it's somewhere right around this episode where the series stopped calling up Alaimo because they'd already developed makeup for his face and starting calling him up because they wanted to do things specifically with his character.
Despite the time spent establishing significant guest characters, the episode finds plenty of great moments for the regulars. Odo and Quark spar in their fun and characteristic way. Dax serves as an effective intermediary between her two friends, Sisko and Kira -- after a great verbal exchange where Dax's advice is to "give Kira the runabout," we get a great non-verbal exchange in which the permission is given and graciously accepted. Kira learns not everything involving a Starfleet officer will necessarily be a fight; when she tells O'Brien that they will "come back with Li Nalas or [not] come back," his solemn acceptance catches her visibly by surprise.
The production also clearly chooses to blow out the budget on this three-parter, planning to tighten the purse strings later to make up for it. There's filming on location for the Cardassian prison camp, and an extensive (and effective) action sequence shot there.
Other observations:
- Late last season, Sisko's trademark baseball was added his desk. I believe this is the first time we see him playing with it as he tries to think.
- When the Circle steps up their attacks to physical assault, Quark is their first target. The meta reason for this might simply be to give Armin Shimerman more to do in the episode. In-universe, it's interesting that they go after a Ferengi and not one of Bajor's "Starfleet interlopers." Is it that the Ferengi are more obnoxious? An easier mark? Is the Circle not quite ready to poke the Federation straight in the eye?
- Though Deep Space Nine would later get into even more serialized storytelling than this, those episodes wouldn't generally end with a "To Be Continued." Indeed, Star Trek as a whole would not again attempt a three-part episode like this until late in the run of Enterprise.
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