DS9 Flashback: Indiscretion

A villainous heel at the start of Deep Space Nine, the character of Dukat was gradually softened over time. Perhaps the apex of "maybe Dukat isn't such a bad guy" came in the fourth season episode "Indiscretion."

Major Kira has a lead to the location of a ship of Bajoran prisoners that crashed and was lost years ago during the occupation. But she's forced to chase down this lead in the company of Dukat, who has a secret reason of his own for pursuing the ship. Meanwhile, Kasidy Yates and Benjamin Sisko broach the subject of moving in together... but his awkward reaction to the idea threatens the entire relationship.

Two freelancers brought the show this story inspired by the western The Searchers, and the script was assigned to Nicholas Corea (whose idea for "Hippocratic Oath" had also just been purchased -- but assigned to a different writer). It's a significant episode for Kira, and Nana Visitor gives an intense performance. Still, this is really a Dukat story, rounding him out as much as other far more sympathetic recurring characters like Rom or Keiko. He quotes a Bajoran Kai from memory. He admits to falling in love with a Bajoran woman, and fathering a child with her.

Still, Dukat doesn't come off that warm and fuzzy. He suggests that Bajorans benefited from the toughening up they received during the Cardassian Occupation. His love affair came while he was married to another woman. And his stated intention is to kill his illegitimate daughter when he finds her. His change of heart in that is suspect too; it's unclear how much of what he's doing is because he thinks it will impress Kira into having feelings for him.

By this point, Nana Visitor had repeatedly declared to the writers that she thought such a relationship impossible, finding a particular advocate in staff writer Robert Hewitt Wolfe, who agreed Kira would never consider a romance with Dukat even with a "gun to her head." Still, the writers found it fun to let Dukat think, for his part, that such a connection might be possible -- probably entertained by the swaggering gusto actor Marc Alaimo brought to the performance. He's certainly fun in moments, including the key scene in which he sits on a thorn, Kira briefly lets her guard down, and the two enjoy a true laugh that oh-so-briefly forgets who each of them are to one another.

That such a pure, natural moment appears in the episode may be a testament to having an actor as the director -- this was the first of several Deep Space Nine episodes directed by Next Generation actor LeVar Burton. This may not be the Star Trek series Burton was most familiar with, but he really seems to grasp the relationships here -- not just the adversarial one between Kira and Dukat, but a nice moment of friendship between Kira and Odo (who wishes the Major luck, against the odds).

Burton also injects both fun and honesty in the B plot involving Sisko and his "big step" with Kasidy Yates. Everyone from Dax to Bashir to Quark gets to weigh in on his poor choice of words. It all essentially comes down to Benjamin simply being wrong -- something William Shatner's ego would never have allowed for Kirk on the original series, nor would Gene Roddenberry's benevolent parent conception of Picard have allowed on The Next Generation. Sisko ultimately has a reason, though; he's nagged by fear over how he lost his wife Jennifer. Avery Brooks and Penny Johnson Jerald are both great in this episode, not only making the argument seem real, but reveling in the moments of playful banter too. (All is forgiven in the end, though Sisko pointedly does not receive a kiss.)

Other observations:

• Character actor Roy Brocksmith plays Kira's informant Razka Karn. Sci-fi fans may know him from Total Recall, while Star Trek fans will recognize him (despite the makeup, thanks largely to his distinctive voice) as Sirna Kolrami from The Next Generation's "Peak Performance."

• The filming on location for the crash site really adds a lot to this episode. Sure, Star Trek has visited this desert location several times, but it feels especially oppressive here -- no doubt because it was reportedly over 100 degrees during the filming.

• The Breen had been mentioned before on the show, but here we see them (or, at least, their "Princess Leia disguised as a bounty hunter" environmental suits) for the first time.

Ultimately, I can only like "Indiscretion" so much, as I'm limited in my interest of rounding out Dukat as a more sympathetic character. Still, it's a fairly solid installment. I give the episode a B.

Caller ID

Not long ago, I was at a friend's house and noticed a huge box of old audiobooks on the coffee table. (Remember CDs, folks?) Judging a book by its cover, I took notice of one on top of the pile called A Monster Calls.

Published in 2011, A Monster Calls is the story of 13-year-old Conor O'Malley. By night, he's haunted by nightmares of a monster coming inexorably for him. By day, he's trapped with feelings he can't express as he deals with his cancer-stricken mother. The story takes a fantastical turn when a giant tree monster really does come for Conor -- but not to physically threaten. He has three tales to tell the boy over the coming nights, and once they've been told, Conor will be obligated to tell a story of his own. But that prospect is far more terrifying than any monster could be, filling Conor with a consuming dread.

Not one but two friends both praised the novel, and so it went into my stack. (I opted for the written version over the audiobook.) When I did pick it up, I was first greeted with a foreword that contextualized the story itself. A Monster Calls is written by Patrick Ness -- but the core of the story was conceived by another writer named Siobhan Dowd. She herself had cancer, and passed away before she could write the book. Ness was approached to write from Dowd's notes, by the two writers' shared editor.

The result is a story of powerfully dark tone and heavy emotional content. It's a credit to both writers. Dowd's influence can be felt in the solid structure. This reads like a fairy tale -- and in the tradition of the original classics, it's a dark one. In the writing itself, you get Ness' contribution. He vividly writes from the perspective of a single character, making you feel his pain.

Still, A Monster Calls is not a relentlessly bleak story, as my description has probably made it sound. There is catharsis and release here, realization and hope blended with the darkness. Still, there can be no question that this story will most powerfully affect a reader who has known cancer up close. And for someone like that? Well, it might be TOO intense a read to consider.

I would give the book a B+. It's a compelling story with a compelling back story of its own creation.

DS9 Flashback: Hippocratic Oath

It's not typical for the production of a television series to be scrambling right at the start of the season, but "Hippocratic Oath" was a special case for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Bashir and O'Brien are captured by a group of Jem'Hadar whose leader, Goran'Agar, wants their help. Somehow, he has been freed from his dependency on the drug ketracel-white, and he wants Bashir to figure out how to do the same for his men. This puts two friends at odds, Bashir seeing an enslaved people who need medical help, O'Brien seeing a dangerous menace that might be unstoppable if their "leash" is removed. Meanwhile, Worf has difficulty adjusting to life on the station -- and specifically, in not being the chief of security. He watches with growing frustration as Odo tolerates the clearly criminal activities of "the Ferengi bartender," Quark.

This script with a pivotal role for Chief O'Brien had already been developed when Colm Meaney (exercising a contract that allowed him time away for movie roles) informed the producers he would not be available at the time they'd planned to film it. Late in prep, this episode was pulled forward (and "The Visitor"was pushed back). Actor Rene Auberjonois, assuming the director's chair for the third time, was openly negative about the experience at the time, calling the episode "difficult" and feeling he "wasn't ready to go." Years later, though, he'd call it the standout among the eight he directed for the series.

I think you wouldn't know of any troubles from watching the results. Indeed, Rene Auberjonois really seems to come into his own here as a director. He'd already shown himself to be good with performers in "Prophet Motive" and "Family Business"; here he demonstrates real skill with the camera as well. The opening shot is a long, single take that tracks Quark around the bar until landing on Worf at a secluded table, telegraphing the dynamic that will play between them throughout the episode. Shots of Bashir and O'Brien as prisoners have a wonderful depth of field that shows their guards, and a great profile shot of the two of them literally portrays their opposing viewpoints. Clever use of fog and camera lenses suggests a humid environment unusual for Star Trek. Visually, the only moment that doesn't work is the runabout's oddly gentle crash landing; otherwise, it's all very effective.

It helps that Auberjonois working from an intriguing script. It came from fusing two ideas together: one of Jem'Hadar trying to free themselves from their addictive drug (from outside writer Nicholas Corea), and one of O'Brien and Bashir taking opposing sides in an alien civil war (from second season intern Lisa Klink). Klink was given the assignment to combine the two, with The Bridge on the River Kwai as a narrative touchstone. (When is it okay to help the enemy? When do you draw the line?) Her rewrite was so well-received that the Deep Space Nine writers showed it to the staff at Star Trek: Voyager, which led to Klink joining that show full time.

It works well because each of the two characters has a strong and sympathetic point of view. Bashir is a doctor compelled to help where he can. O'Brien has a history as a soldier who recognizes the Jem'Hadar as the ultimate soldiers, people would show Bashir none of the mercy he's showing them. The Jem'Hadar characters are intriguing too. Goran'Agar effective conveys the idea of a "religion" in which gods are known to exist; you still never meet them, but you know they aren't waiting for you after death. Arak'Taral doesn't want to be cured if it means becoming weak. Still another Jem'Hadar is eager to die for his fellow soldiers, an attitude drilled into him by the Vorta. It's a quite compelling moral tapestry, and it ends on an interesting note -- with Julian and Miles' friendship actually damaged by the experience. (But not permanently, of course. This is Star Trek, and these are lofty, Starfleet humans.)

The Worf subplot is fairly predictable, but it is a nice way to use the series' newest character. No, he's not going to come in and take over security just because that's what he did on the Next Generation. He's going to have to get used to the way things work on this show/station. He does come off a little dumb not seeing the forest for the trees here, but this headstrong conduct is consistent with the Worf we've known, and it further stresses this show as a place with shades of gray. Using a Next Generation character to highlight Deep Space Nine's mission statement is smart writing.

What isn't great writing, though, is a truly uncomfortable "gay panic" moment at the start of the episode. O'Brien is talking to a sympathetic Bashir about a marital dispute, and the Doctor twists his words to observe that it seems he wishes Keiko were a man. O'Brien's recoil in horror may have been worth a laugh in 1995, but it lands with a dull thud in 2019.

Other observations:

• Actor Robert Foxworth auditioned for the role of Goran'Agar, but the producers liked him so much they wanted to save him for something meatier. (That would end up being a two-part episode later in the season.) Scott MacDonald had acted through makeup on both Deep Space Nine and The Next Generation, and was seen as a reliable choice here.

• Previously known only as an "enzyme" (in "The Abandoned," an episode whose events are actually mentioned here), the Jem'Hadar drug ketracel-white gets its name for the first time.

This episode would be stronger still if the audience weren't so far ahead of Worf, or if the rift between Bashir and O'Brien had played out a bit in future episodes. Still, it's a compelling little story that I think deserves a solid B.

Out of Body Experience

I think one of the reasons I haven't watched at least some of the "classic" movies I've never seen is because their endings are so famous. Sure, there's more to most stories than mere surprise, but if a movie is famous for a big twist at the end -- and that big twist is widely known -- you have to ask whether there's anything else there worth your time.

I recently took a chance on such a movie: the 1978 version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The story of alien "pod people" slowly replacing all the humans in San Francisco is widely known for its atmosphere of paranoia... and its final scene involving Donald Sutherland. Is there anything else there worth your time?

In my opinion, not much. There is an intriguing cast here. Donald Sutherland is wielding his full gravitas to make the movie seem serious. Veronica Cartwright is playing the same sort of shrieking basket case she'd play to great effect one year later in Alien. Jeff Goldblum is here in one of his earliest roles -- and already "Goldbluming" all over the place. Leonard Nimoy is cast in a conscious tweaking of his famous role as Spock, here playing a psychologist trying to rein in everyone's wild emotions.

But the good cast doesn't make for a particularly engaging story. In the way of many 1970s movies, Invasion of the Body Snatchers is slowly paced. But unlike, say, Halloween, this slow buildup doesn't do a particularly good job of ratcheting up tension. It's more an extended exercise in strangeness. Things are weird in this movie before and independent of the invading alien doppelgangers. There's a scene in which the main character spends a good deal of time telling the setup to a joke... only to be interrupted and never deliver the punch line. Character relationships seem strained and odd above and beyond the intended atmosphere of paranoia. What exactly is the connection between Sutherland's character and Nimoy's? Why is there such a rivalry between Nimoy's character and Goldblum's? Why is Nimoy wearing a weird leather (driving?) glove for the whole movie?

For the languid pace the movie sets most of the time, it's frustrating how the plot suddenly advances through implausible leaps in logic. Why does some random guy in the street know who "they" are and that "they're coming"? How does Cartwright's character reach the insight that they're up against aliens? Or that they can be fooled by hiding your emotions? There are a lot of dots left unconnected by the movie, logic abandoned in favor of atmosphere. And yet that atmosphere isn't entirely effective in my view. The movie isn't tense when it's meant to be tense, and isn't scary when characters react as though they're scared.

The one element I can praise without reservation is the design of the creatures. There's a lot of great gross-out effects used to bring them to life, and excellent sound design by the always-wonderful Ben Burtt. But pretty much everything else in the movie left me cold.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers may be considered a sci-fi classic (in both this version and the original), but I found it a boring watch. I give the movie a D+. It was my time that was truly snatched.

City of Oh God!

BoardGameGeek may be a highly regarded internet resource for gamers, but I've seen compelling commentary that argues its users rate with a bias toward complex games. I recently got a firsthand example of it playing Teotihuacan: City of Gods.

Teotihuacan is a game I was excited for, as it comes from designer Daniele Tascini, who created one of the best of this decade in Tzolk'in: The Mayan Calendar. Teotihuacan was a return to the Mesoamerican theme, and even brought back one side mechanic from Tzolk'in. But otherwise, it was an entirely new design I was really interested to check out. Our first play was pretty rocky, marred by a small but critical misunderstanding of a rule, plus a bunch of procedural hiccups. Figuring we'd worked the kinks out, we played again on a later occasion... only to confirm this game is no Tzolk'in.

The main mechanic of the game involves players using dice without ever rolling them. Instead, dice are the player's pieces, moving clockwise around the board to land on eight different action spaces. After executing an action, you increment the value of the die upward by one. Most actions work better the higher the die value you have. They also work better for having more of your dice in one space -- though you must take the value of the lowest die in the group into account. Going where other players have dice carries a price -- you must pay 1 unit of the game's currency for each player (including yourself) already on an action space you choose. But you can build currency by skipping your action when you land somewhere, taking 1 for each player (including yourself) already there (plus one).

Somewhere in the core of that is an interesting system for an action game -- slightly different from others I've encountered, but still fundamentally familiar. But unfortunately, also in there is just the first example of what makes Teotihuacan tough to play: it's nearly impossible to take your complete turn without forgetting to do something. You'd be surprised how often, after actually doing the action you selected, you forget to raise the value of your die by 1. You'd think, "oh, well then maybe I should raise the value first, then do the action" -- but that just makes for confusion. First, you're supposed to take your action according to the value when your die lands, not after it increments. And even if you can straighten that out, you'll wind up asking yourself (after executing a particularly complex action) "wait, did I already promote this die or not."

Then you start to pile on the other mechanics. Whenever a die reaches value 6, you reset it to 1, move it to the start space of the board, and take one of five possible rewards. You then also increment a round marker, which has to be moved at the end of the last player's turn each round -- plus whenever this "ascension" to die value 6 happens (thereby shortcutting one turn off the game). Then there's the pyramid you have to build, with its spatially challenging symbol-matching and a separate progress track. There are the tokens you can use to decorate the steps of the pyramid. There's the strange housing mechanic that looks strong early, but has fizzled out both times we played for the players who focused too heavily on it. There's a set collection mechanic involving tiles scattered around the board. There are influence tracks for three different gods (the mechanic loosely taken from Tzolk'in). There's the "technologies" space that grants you bonuses for taking other actions around the board -- if you remember to use bonuses. There's a whole mechanic about locking dice on exclusive action spaces within the spaces.

Have your eyes glazed over? Mine did. I mean seriously -- take a look at the game board! I would say it takes as long to explain the rules of this game as it does to play it... but that would be a false claim, as the decision making is so complex on your turn. As long as the explanation takes, it takes even longer to play it. And part of the reason it takes so long to play is that it's nearly impossible to remember everything you have to do on your turn. You took the pyramid building action? Great! So because you matched a red symbol, did you remember to step up on the red god track? How about the pyramid construction track? Did you use your building bonus from the technology track? Did you promote your die? Ooo, you ascended to 6, so which bonus do you want to take? Through more than one game, and dozens of turns in each, we never managed to get very good at tracking it all. On all but the simplest of turns, it seemed inevitable that you'd forget something -- it was only a question of how much later you'd realize it, and whether you could or should catch up later on whenever you did.

It also feels as though understanding this sprawling system even 1% better leads to a 50% gap in the scores. A player can easily run out to a lead that's difficult to catch... and the length of the game makes that a particularly unenjoyable state for all involved. The scoring over the game's three overarcing phases actually decreases instead of escalating. This makes early points especially important, and makes it extra hard to close the gap in the final turns.

Yet for all these rather substantial flaws (in my view), Teotihuacan has cracked the Top 100 Games on BoardGameGeek. And this would seem to be because it has a complexity rating approach 4 out of 5 (which is about as high as games ever get, since it's an averaged rating). Even accepting a bias toward complex games, I really don't understand rallying so much around this particular game.

I wanted to like Teotihuacan very much. I even suspect that if you sweat about half the mechanisms and rules out of it, there would indeed be an excellent game in there somewhere. But as it stands, I simply can't imagine ever playing it when Tzolk'in is available as an alternative. Perhaps another game will put this "incrementing dice as worker placement" system to better use, thereby truly removing the one comeplling reason to consider playing it. Regrettably, I give Teotihuacan a C-. It's simply too much game.

DS9 Flashback: The Visitor

I am one of the many Deep Space Nine fans who considers "The Visitor" the very best episode of the series. At least, that's how I remembered it; we'll see how other episodes fare as I continue rewatching them. One thing's for sure: the episode itself is as moving as I remember.

It's decades in the future. Jake Sisko is a recluse visited by an aspiring young writer who wants to know why he published so few works. He relates the sad story of his life: losing his father as a teenager... only to then discover his father was not killed, but had become trapped in subspace, forever beyond his reach.

According to the people behind the scenes, they didn't know until the fan reception that they had made an enduring Star Trek classic here. They did like the idea brought to them by outside writer Michael Taylor (who would later join the Voyager writing staff), a story that portrayed familial love in the exceptional and transcendent manner normally reserved for romantic love. They liked how Taylor ran with show runner Ira Steven Behr's suggestion to add a future framing device to the originally chronological tale, coming up with the J.D. Salinger inspired gimmick of a recluse who randomly agrees to give an interview to a high school student who happens to turn up at his house. They all felt that staff writer René Echevarria had done great dialogue punch-up in his rewrite of the script (work which Taylor praised).

But there was some scrambling in prepping the episode that may have distracted them from fully appreciating what they had at the time. Originally, the next episode, "Hippocratic Oath," was meant to be filmed third in the season -- but it heavily featured Chief O'Brien, and Colm Meaney was going to be unavailable for the week. The two scripts were swapped. with the directors kept in the same slots. The O'Brien-light "The Visitor" would be filmed third (but still aired second). This crunched the prep time for both directors, giving David Livingston less time to prepare with this story (and taking the opportunity to direct this classic away from actor Rene Auberjonois).

Then there was the challenge of finding an actor to play old Jake Sisko, when it was decided there was no credible way of aging actor Cirroc Lofton into his 40s and then 70s. That, at least, was a problem handily solved with Star Trek veteran and wonderful character actor Tony Todd. He studied past episodes to try to match his performance to Lofton's, and also drew on some very personal memories. The aunt who'd raised him as a child had passed away only three months before this, and Todd found this script a wonderful opportunity to channel and process those feelings.

Great as Todd is (and he is), Avery Brooks and Cirroc Lofton are every bit as great -- and that's what makes the episode truly work. Lofton first must convey Jake's grief, as every character from Dax to Kira to even Quark make poignant efforts to try to help him move on from the apparent death of his father. Then the real tragedy of the episode is introduced: that it's impossible to move on when the person you're grieving isn't really gone. Meanwhile, Avery Brooks must show Benjamin trying to hold his head high, to be a good father and be strong, begging and pleading for Jake to live his own life.

That story arc is powerful enough to make this an exceptional episode, though there are many other wonderful elements at the margins that make it better still. From the "dark and stormy night" opening to Ben's final, anguished declaration that he's okay now, every moment of this episode is full. Even the few lighter moments work, especially the glimpses we get of the future: Quark gets his moon, Morn takes over the bar, Nog makes captain, and Bashir is wearing the too-perfect high-waisted pants of an old man.

The few criticisms I've heard of this episode seem easy to me to dismiss. Some have said the "it was all a dream" ending undermines what we've just watched. But Benjamin Sisko remembers it all -- and it's a truly painful memory he has to carry, watching his son throw his life away and then ultimately kill himself so that he might live. Others say this story feels close to the Next Generation episode "The Inner Light," it its depiction of an entire life lived in 40-ish minutes. Setting aside the fact that both episodes can be exceptional, there's at least one truly significant difference: here, we know more of the people involved, instead of having a main character surrounded by strangers. (And plenty of the other characters get wonderful small moments in "The Visitor.")

Perhaps the element that nudges this episode to the head of the pack for me is how the act of writing itself is written into the tale. I find pathos in the way Jake sets writing aside for other things in his life. But I also find comfort in the notion that it's "never too late." Jake has written just one novel, but it's regarded as a masterpiece. And at the end of his life, he returns to writing.

Other observations:

• David Livingston really did luck out with the late script swap here. He said in an interview: "'The Visitor' is the best piece of material I've ever been able to direct, in terms of the script."

• This episode was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, and was in exceedingly good company with the movies Apollo 13, Toy Story, and 12 Monkeys. All lost to the Babylon 5 episode "The Coming of Shadows."

• It's a bold move for this episode to paraphrase Ferris Bueller's life philosophy to "poke your head up" and "look around every once in a while" so that you don't "miss life." Thoughts of Bueller could have torpedoed the drama in a moment, but the sentiment lands delicately.

• I think it's smart to name Jake's novel a nonsense word like "Anslem," so that the title isn't freighted with extra meaning in this story. (I understand that a tie-in novel would later say that it's Bajoran for "father," which I think makes it too on the nose.)

• Tony Todd isn't the only significant guest star in the episode. Young Melanie, who knocks on his door in the middle of the night, is played by Rachel Robinson, the daughter of Garak actor Andrew Robinson.

• Nog isn't a major character in this episode, though seeing that he made captain just as he'd hoped is a lovely and resonant moment. I call it out because actor Aron Eisenberg passed away just this past weekend at age 50. From the outpouring of love I've seen from Star Trek fans across the internet, it's clear his character was an especially relatable and beloved one.

We'll see if any episode in the back half of Deep Space Nine can knock "The Visitor" off its lofty perch. It's going to be tough. Certainly, it's my favorite episode to this point, above even any Next Generation episode, and it deserves the most enthusastic grade A that I could give.

Let Saigon Be Saigon

Earlier this week, I got to see the national touring production of Miss Saigon during its two week run here in Denver. Inspired by Madame Butterfly, it tells the story of a soldier who falls in love with a local during the Vietnam War, leaving behind a son he discovers years later and must return for. More centrally, it's the story of the mother who must survive a war zone and brutal regime while raising a child, holding out hope that the man she loved will one day return.

When it comes to big stage musicals (on Broadway and in London), The Phantom of the Opera kicked off a big, ostentatious era of elaborate spectacle. ("We're going to crash a chandelier on the stage right before your eyes!") That era peaked with Miss Saigon's "hold my beer" presentation of a freaking helicopter hovering above the stage in a pivotal scene. If you know one thing about Miss Saigon, it's that helicopter moment. Not any song from it, not any of the characters, probably not even that its an adaptation of Madame Butterfly -- but you've heard about the helicopter. It might be nice to be free of the burden of that knowledge, because the play is a bit of a slog to get that scene. Or at least, to get to the second act.

Unlike many musicals, which build an elaborate and entertaining situation in act one and then lose momentum in act two, Miss Saigon sort of meanders around for most of the first act before finally starting to get interesting. The first hour or so is a forgettable love story not made any more interesting by the setting, featuring a bunch of repetitive and interchangeable songs of the romantic leads singing their feelings emphatically into each other's faces. Only when time jumps ahead for the final stretch of act one, following main character Kim as she tries to protect her child Tam from the horrors of her life, does it start to engender interest.

Then after intermission is when things really get going. Side characters step more into the spotlight, delivering a moving act opener about who and what American soldiers left behind in the war, tracking a devious character known as the Engineer as he tries to scheme his way out of communist Vietnam, and exposing the complicated feelings of Ellen, the woman who married soldier Chris after the war (only to learn along with him of his secret love child).

And, of course, that helicopter scene. Dead center in Act Two is an extended flashback to the final evacuation of Americans from the embassy in Vietnam, an amazing and over-the-top scene that puts a dozen actors trying to scale a fence as a freaking helicopter (complete with whirring blades) hovers above the stage for people to jump into. It's awesome -- it literally inspires awe. (Though the emotional content of the scene really lands too.)

The touring production spared no expense in making that moment (and several other big set piece numbers) a feast for the eyes. Still, I had been ready to pan the entire show as of intermission. It was the second act that really saved it. Emotional, raw, and complex, it was everything that the shallow, cliche first act was not.

It's possible that the casting and not the show was at least partly to blame. Actor Anthony Festa, who played Chris, had a fine singing voice but zero charisma. With act one featuring him heavily and turning on his character falling in love, the show was a repetitive bore. Emily Bautista, as main character Kim, had more personality -- but still sort of just had a bag of two or three moves she repeated throughout the show. (Let's just say that the poor little kid who played her son Tam is likely to develop hearing loss from her constantly mashing his head against hers and belting her songs straight into his ear.)

But with act two featuring Red Concepcion as the conniving Engineer, J. Daughtry as Chris' guilt-driven friend John, and Stacie Bono as Chris' wife Ellen, the show really took off. Those three actors all took their secondary characters and made moments more compelling than anything featuring the leads.

With a more tightly edited first half, I think I'd have found Miss Saigon one of the more moving stories I've seen on stage in a while. As it was, I'd say it works out to about a B. If you're a fan of big, spectacular musicals, you may want to catch it before it leaves town (or if it comes to yours).

DS9 Flashback: The Way of the Warrior

Season four of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine kicked off with a two-hour episode big in length and content. It fractured the Klingon/Federation alliance, presented the biggest battles (both ship-to-ship and hand-to-hand) the show had ever depicted, and introduced Worf as a main character on the series.

Looking to "help" against the Dominion, the Klingons bring an uninvited armada into Federation space. With invasive and belligerent practices, they're soon threatening civilian ships, spoiling for a fight at every opportunity, and plotting to invade Cardassia. Worf is brought to the station to give insight on his people, but it may be too late -- an end to the Klingon treaty with the Federation seems inevitable.

Hollywood is littered with tales of bad executive interference in movies and television shows. But here's a case of an executive doing it right. The ratings for season three of Deep Space Nine had gone down, so the Paramount executives directed the show to do something to shake things up. No specific mandate; that was left up to the creative team. The writers considered options, ultimately focused on the cryptic changeling brag from "The Die Is Cast" (that the Federation and the Klingons wouldn't be trouble for the Dominion much longer), and decided a good shake-up would be to make Klingons villains again. Show runner Ira Steven Behr pitched this to executive producer Rick Berman, who "yes and"ed the premise by suggesting that Worf, from The Next Generation, be added to the series as a main character.

The writers were careful, not wanting Worf to swoop in and take over the show. (Much of the existing cast had the same concern, with Nana Visitor in particular concerned that another warrior type on the series might be bad for her character. But she later commented that Kira was so much more a "loose cannon" than Worf that that never happened.) They wanted Worf to fit into the established mix, and as one of the less polished, more conflicted characters of The Next Generation, it seemed like he would.

Much of this two-hour episode is spent showing exactly how Worf will fit in, putting him in interesting scenes with various established Deep Space Nine characters. O'Brien tries to make him feel at home by inviting him to a dart game (his powerhouse throwing technique making for a good laugh). He's eager to meet the new host of the "honored" Curzon Dax, and Jadzia gets to display her understanding of Klingons by drawing him out of his shell (and just maybe already expressing some romantic interest). He's put on notice by Odo, who makes a point of telling Worf that nothing escapes his notice -- but also that he understands what it's like not to fit in with your people. And Worf also has meaningful conversations with Sisko about his loss of home and purpose, and how Sisko too once considered resigning from Starfleet.

It's not just about how Worf fits in on Deep Space Nine, though -- there's plenty of red meat thrown to The Next Generation fans too. From the moment he appears (in a dramatic boot-to-head camera move), he's playing all the hits. He drinks prune juice, makes short and pithy quips (to Kira, of her holosuite princess outfit: "nice hat"), drinks and sings, fights with his established holo-goons, reminisces about past successes (battling the Borg), mentions his son (back on Earth again, it seems), and chooses his personal code of honor over what would be more expedient. That's our Worf!

Yet just as the writers wanted, Worf doesn't "take over." Plenty of other characters get great moments in the time this two-hour episode allows. We see the advancement of Sisko and Kasidy Yates' relationship. Dax and Kira share a moment of relaxation with a steamy holosuite program (featuring Speedo-clad Trills) and get in their shots in hand-to-hand combat with Klingon invaders. Odo comes before the battle to warn Bashir to be careful, but it's Bashir who saves Odo's life later in a key moment.

There's fantastic use of recurring characters too. Dukat is, as always, both opportunistic (switching allegiance to the new civilian government of Cardassia) and whiny (indignant at his rescuers' precaution against changeling infiltration). Gowron is back, flashing those distinctive crazy eyes, and positively giddy and the prospect of war. And then there's Garak: sharing drinks with Odo and backing the constable up in a Klingon dust-up on the promenade (and paying for it later), bantering with Bashir about his own likability, and being used by our heroes to secretly funnel classified information.

Garak's best scene in this episode was a late addition. Director James L. Conway had been maintaining such a fast pace during filming that the episode was going to come in short, so the writers created a new scene: Quark and Garak commiserate over being stuck with the Federation as their savior -- using root beer as a metaphor. Actors Armin Shimerman and Andrew Robinson reportedly fought with the director over how much to play the scene for laughs vs. subtext, having to call down the writers to back up their instincts. They did, and the result is a brilliantly coy and knowing scene for both characters, one of the more memorable of the season.

But if Conway maybe almost missed this great moment, rest assured that he captured many others. There's lots of fantastic staging and camera moves, including multiple uses of a split diopter (a lens trick that allows two objects at different distances to be in focus at the same time). The combat and stunts in the big finale where the station is boarded are exceptional. And we get the largest Star Trek space battle yet, with a juiced-up station and Klingon ships of every style yet created in the franchise. (This scope was achieved by using commercial model kits and even Hallmark Christmas tree ornaments for the far background!)

Other observations:

• At last, Sisko settles into his final look. The producers were reportedly ready to wrestle Paramount supervisors into allowing Avery Brooks to shave his head, but it turned out all they had to do was ask and they got the yes. (Sisko's off-duty clothing evolves here too, reflecting a brighter and bolder personality.)

• The new opening credits sequence features more ship activity around the station, a more up-tempo take on the theme (with more prominent percussive elements), and cast changes -- besides the addition of Michael Dorn as Worf, Siddig el Fadil opted to change his "stage name" to Alexander Siddig.

• Martok is introduced here, though not originally intended as a recurring character. He does make an impression, though, with his acute paranoia and pushing Klingon customs to the extreme.

• There's a great exchange about the possibility of a changeling-influenced revolution on Cardassia, with both Odo and Kira weighing in with the perspective of their experiences: Odo agrees that's exactly how his people would topple the planet, while Kira notes that a civilian uprising on Cardassia would never have worked with the Obsidian Order around.

• When Martok dismisses as fake the sensor readings indicating Deep Space Nine's upgraded weaponry, his choice of words exactly mirrors the first episode of the series, when such readings had been faked.

• Illustrator John Eaves designed a number of new Klingon ships to potentially use in this episode, but construction of new models was ultimately deemed too expensive. His concepts sat around until, years later, one was developed as a 22nd-century Klingon ship for the series Enterprise.

The Paramount executives got the shakeup and the ratings boost they wanted from the episode, and fans got a hell of a start to the fourth season. I give the double-sized "The Way of the Warrior" an A-.

A Fall Head of Steamboat

For the last several years, I've spent a winter week up in Steamboat Springs, skiing and enjoying board games with friends. But here's a change of pace: this past weekend, my husband and I went up there with two friends for a fall weekend getaway. And it turned out there was plenty to do there, even without the snow.

We headed up Friday afternoon, stopping about halfway for pizza in Frisco at HighSide Brewing. Though it hasn't been open all that long, HighSide has already become a favorite stop on the way back from skiing. It delivered again, with a delicious blood orange and vanilla Berliner Weisse that I enjoyed with a great white pizza.

We arrived in Steamboat just past sundown, setting up at the condo we'd rented for the weekend. It was in a perfect location in the center of town, with almost everything we wanted to do in easy walking distance. We made use of that right away, trying the whiskey at Steamboat Whiskey Company (not great), and then chasing that taste away with appetizers and drinks at a bar and restaurant called Laundry.

Before bed, the four of us completed the final game of Pandemic Legacy: Season 1 campaign, which we've been slowing working at for more than a year. It was a nice, memorable setting for that final momentous game. (As for the game itself? Well, I suppose I'll have a blog post about that in the not-too-distant future.)

The morning brought more gaming (after breakfast at Creekside Cafe), and then a return trip to the Crooked Key escape room. It's been a favorite stop of ours on every ski trip; we've been back again and again. They're now running a new game that's more scavenger hunt than escape room, Key to the City: S.K.I. This game sends you out into Steamboat Springs itself, carrying a backpack loaded with combination-locked goodies, and armed with an app on your smartphone. You have to hike around the city, solving clues to lead you to actual locations, and learning a bit of Steamboat history along the way. We enjoyed the hunt (and finishing with the third best score/time out of 100+ teams to play it so far was icing on the cake). The only downside? We've now done every room/game that The Crooked Key has to offer, so we won't be able to go back during this next winter's ski getaway.

We'd picked the right September weekend to be in town, because that afternoon we were able to go to Steamboat's OktoberWest event. At the ski resort, right at the base of the gondola, dozens of breweries were pouring a huge variety of beers. A Beef Cook-Off event was part of the fun too, with several delicious options from tacos to stroganoff to fancier presentations than you'd ever expect to see at a beer fest. And all of it was sprawled around a beautiful landscaped creek that had secretly been hiding there under the snow every time we'd been there to ski for the past several years. Great fun, and oh so tasty.

After returning to our condo, we'd planned to get in another game before dinner, but were rudely interrupted halfway through by a citywide blackout! A blown transformer literally took out everything, but fortunately our next evening plan was both outside town and didn't require electricity: a visit to Strawberry Park Hot Springs. I've written before about this nice place to relax and soak away your aches. It's maybe not quite as satisfying if you don't have post-ski pains to work out, but it's still a lovely spot to stargaze (even with a full moon spoiling half the sky).

Sunday morning began with some sweets from Powder Day Donuts. Then, after checking out of our condo, we played a round of disc golf. Thunderhead Disc Golf Course is a 19-hole course right on the very same mountain as the skiing. It begins right next to a closed-down-for-summer ski lift, and takes you over a mile all around the area, through very long and challenging holes. We were all exhausted by the end of it, but we'd had a great time. And despite it being only the second time I've gone disc golfing this season -- for the first season in years -- I posted a score I could be fairly proud of. (Better than I averaged back when I was going regularly!)

Our last stop was at our favorite Steamboat brewery, Mountain Tap. Delicious garlic knots and pizza, a passionfruit beer my husband loves, and a solid saison for me (extra refreshing after the long hike of disc golfing) was a nice capper to the weekend before starting our drive back down to Denver.

In turned out there was just as much fun to be had in Steamboat Springs even without the skiing. It was a great short getaway right as summer is coming to a close.

A Bit of Good Lucky

When the movie Logan Lucky raced through theaters a couple of years ago, it seemed like several friends were interested in seeing it. It also seemed like nobody I knew actually did. It fell off everyone's radar almost immediately, mine included. But I recently caught up with the movie and found, if not an absolute gem, at least a fun romp worth a look.

Made by director Steven Soderbergh, very consciously in the model of his Ocean's Eleven remake, Logan Lucky is a heist story with less glamorous trappings and less professional characters. But it has all the knotted-up plotting, clever twists, and fun scheming you could ask for in a heist movie. When Jimmy Logan is let go from his construction job in North Carolina, he's desperate for money. With the help of his brother and sister, he hatches a plot to steal money from Charlotte Motor Speedway during a NASCAR race. The colorful characters he recruits for the job are a sort of redneck proxy for a typical heist crew, and shenanigans ensue.

There's something both refreshingly new and utterly familiar about this movie. It hits all the expected notes of a heist film with ritual-like commitment. The unusual cast of characters makes the this feel different at times, though the formula is essentially unchanged. It's like going out for a style of food you like, but to a new restaurant you've never visited. You order your regular dish, and it's pretty much exactly what you'd expect. Maybe not quite as good as you get at your favorite establishment, but good enough to satisfy.

Part of the similarity is that even though the characters seem different on paper, even though they clearly need the money more than a George Clooney or a Brad Pitt, they don't act all that differently. Their scheme is impossibly clever (not that we'd have it any other way), and executed with clockwork precision. Even the utterly gonzo performance from Daniel Craig (playfully mangling a Southern accent), is pretty much in the mode of the Don Cheadle character from Ocean's Eleven.

But it's hard to complain too much about the movie not being "different" enough, because on the few occasions it tries, it gets awkward and less effective. A subplot about the main character's daughter entering a talent competition has misplaced Little Miss Sunshine vibes, while a tacked-on epilogue about an FBI agent investigating the heist falls flat (even as fun as Hilary Swank is in the role). That said, a screwball scene devoted entirely to complaining about George R.R. Martin's writing pace is perhaps the best scene of the movie -- so at least one of the departures does work.

Ultimately, it's a really simple equation. Do you like heist movies? Do you like Channing Tatum, Adam Driver, Daniel Craig, Riley Keough, Katie Holmes, Seth MacFarlane, Sebastian Stan, and/or Hilary Swank? If yes, then you'll be entertained by Logan Lucky, even if it doesn't become a favorite movie. I give it a solid B.

DS9 Flashback: The Adversary

For the third season finale of Deep Space Nine, the show served up a heaping helping of paranoia with the suspenseful "The Adversary."

On his first mission after promotion to captain, Sisko takes the Defiant into Tzenkethi space, responding to a coup on the homeworld. But the ship is sabotaged en route, locked into a lethal attack pattern that will devastate the planet and provoke a war if it can't be stopped. It's the work of a changeling infiltrator on board the Defiant -- and the crew has only a few hours to find it.

The writers of Deep Space Nine were reportedly crafting a cliffhanger to end season three of the show, but then were redirected at almost the last minute by the higher-ups at Paramount. They shelved their plans involving a changeling infiltration of Earth (to come back to later, in season four) and came up with this smaller scale story of being trapped aboard the Defiant with the enemy.

The results are quite effective, a claustrophobic tale of suspense and suspicion reminiscent of John Carpenter's The Thing (right down to the blood test for determining who isn't human). Paranoia isn't normally a tool in Star Trek's kit, but the episode rises to the occasion. Director Alexander Singer (with clever editing) employs unusually lingering takes to foster suspicion, and encourages slightly "off" performances from the actors, whether they're really themselves (the historically traitorous Eddington) or actually a changeling (as Bashir is when we see him on two different occasions; it's subtle work by Alexander Siddig).

The treatment of Eddington here is especially fun. The writers knew that faithful viewers would be suspicious of him, even though they make no mention of his double-cross in a previous episode. In fact, Eddington has a long and honest scene with Sisko where they discuss promotion, the command track, and career ambition. Fans nevertheless expressed certainty in the hiatus before season four that Eddington would be revealed as a changeling. In response, the writers resolved never to make him be a changeling, and would ultimately make him a Maquis to outmaneuver the audience.

"Who's the changeling?" isn't the only game played with the viewers. Sisko's opening log entry makes it sound -- for a brief 10 seconds or so -- like he's leaving the station or dying or something. Instead, he's being promoted. This change was an "it's just that easy" moment of the writers asking executive producer Rick Berman if they could do it, and getting a simple "yes." As staff writer Robert Hewitt Wolfe put it: "Whenever people would do articles about Star Trek they would talk about the three captains: Kirk, Picard, and Janeway. We were like, 'Screw that! Sisko's just as much a star of the show, and he's saved the Federation's cookies often enough that he deserves the title.' Personally, I wanted to make him an admiral."

In other ways, the script isn't going for surprise at all. Everything Odo is going to do throughout is carefully telegraphed in advance, as he reminds us he doesn't use weapons, he's never killed anyone, and no changeling has ever harmed another. The climatic final fight, with twin Odos and changelings violently reaching into each other to attack, is inevitable and satisfying. (And the dying changeling's threat a nice setup for the future, despite not being an explicit "cliffhanger.")

Other observations:

• Though Kasidy Yates isn't in this episode, Dax asks Sisko how their relationship is going. It's a very different thing, having the lead of a Star Trek series in a continuing relationship.

• Speaking of different, I'm not sure what the advantage is in having a previously unmentioned alien race as the Macguffin/target in this story. Seems like there could have been more tension if the Defiant had been heading for a Klingon colony, or the Romulan neutral zone, or some such.

• Fun touch that Bolian blood is blue.

• The Defiant gets several new sets for this episode, including engineering and the mess hall.

• The shot of Odo throwing the other changeling against the warp core -- a camera move with a CG morph -- would have been ridiculously difficult and expensive to achieve at the time. They cleverly cheated it by filming that moment in widesceen, then panning across that locked-off image (in the 4:3 television format of the time) to create the motion.

With its different tone and clever setup for future storytelling, "The Adversary" is a solid season finale. I give it a B+.

Season three of Deep Space Nine marked a big step up in the series' quality overall, though I think it did this more with consistency rather than particularly standout installments. No season three episode approached, for example, the excellence of season one's "Duet." Yet fully half of the episodes I graded a B+ or better in this rewatch. My picks for the top five of season three: "Second Skin," "The Die Is Cast," "The House of Quark," "The Adversary," and "Past Tense, Part II."

Next up, season four and the arrival of Worf!

DS9 Flashback: Facets

Even though Deep Space Nine was more character-driven than the Star Trek series before it (and I think it remains the most character driven of the Trek shows to this day), most of its episodes still turned on some external sci-fi premise. Still, every now and then, there would come an episode born solely of the characters. One such episode was "Facets."

Jadzia Dax enlists her friends to help her in a Trill ritual. Each of them will telepathically assume the identity of one of Dax's past hosts, allowing Jadzia to meet and interact with the disparate parts of her personality. Meanwhile, Nog takes his entrance exam for Starfleet Academy.

The inspiration for this episode came from a 1970s TV movie titled Sybil, which starred Sally Field as a woman with severe multiple personality disorder. Show runner Ira Steven Behr thought this would be an interesting lens through which to examine Dax. But staff writer René Echevarria struggled to develop the idea at first, as the idea of a traumatic event unlocking Dax's past memories had been done earlier in the season with "Equilibrium." His solution was to invent the Trill ritual that would bring past hosts forth... and yet the story still wasn't coming together. It would give actress Terry Farrell some meaty roles to play, but there wouldn't be much drama in it. Dax needed to interact with her past hosts to get at anything interesting. At last, he hit on the idea to have the other members of the cast play Dax's past hosts.

It's a nice gimmick, and the results are fun to watch. Sure, there are a few issues with it. It doesn't make sense that Jadzia doesn't already know the answers to the questions she wants to ask of Curzon -- they're her memories, after all. It's also a bit extreme (but necessary) that this form of telepathy works seamlessly on non-Trills.

And then there's the fact that there weren't enough female characters in the main cast to embody Dax's three female hosts. Quark is thus roped into playing Audrid, in a not-entirely successful comedic bit. (Don't blame Armin Shimerman; it's just that the sequence seems to be more about shaming Quark that helping Jadzia.) For Emony, Echevarria wanted to use Keiko O'Brien, but when actress Rosalind Chao was unavailable, he had to scramble for a plan B. A ham-fisted line of dialogue implying a friendship between Dax and recently introduced dabo girl Leeta was stuck in, and Chase Masterson got to appear on the series for a second time.

Those aspects of the writing might be a bit bumpy, but they're easily forgiven to get to the fun of seeing all the regular actors briefly take on other roles. Nana Visitor gets to play a doddering old woman with pearls of wisdom to drop, Colm Meaney gets to play a buttoned-up bundle of nerves, and Alexander Siddig gets to turn up the swagger to maximum. All their scenes were reportedly longer and trimmed for time, but the montage-like presentation is still fun.

The episode ramps up when Avery Brooks appears as the psychopath Joran Dax. This sequence was apparently filmed twice, after the producers reviewed the first day's footage and found Brooks too creepy for the generally light episode. What made it into the episode is still a fun channeling of The Silence of the Lambs with Sisko as Lecter and Jadzia as Clarice.

Things escalates again when Rene Auberjonois gets to take on the role of a Curzon who blends consciousness with Odo. It's a gregarious performance that's assisted by wonderfully subtle makeup and great costuming. It's nice to see a version of the man Benjamin Sisko called friend, and to have them interact. It's also nice to see Jadzia stand up to Curzon for washing her out of the Trill initiate program... though the truth behind that turns out to be icky. Curzon chose to cover up a sexual impropriety by punishing a powerless young woman... and then Jadzia actually forgives him for it. It might have been more interesting for her not to forgive, and for Dax to hereafter be at odds with this part of herself. Still, there is some nice character growth here, with Dax gaining the memory of shapeshifting from Odo, and Odo gaining appreciation for human indulgences from Dax.

There's even more character growth happening in the B plot of the episode. Nog fulfills his dream of being accepted to Starfleet, but his father Rom grows even more. He stands up to Quark on behalf of his son, paving the way for episodes in the near future where he would stand up for himself. It's great to see how far all three Ferengi characters will go in this episode: Nog to reach his goal, Quark to try to thwart it, and Rom to support it. It's a sweet and engaging side story.

Other notes:

• Oo-mox was always good for a laugh when these episodes were new, but it plays gross every time in this day and age. Want to get something out of a Ferengi? Molest him!

• A much neater bit of gender politics occurs in the scene where Lela (inhabiting Kira) explains how to be a successful female politician in a male-dominated landscape.

• There's a fun bit of old Star Trek continuity when Curzon/Odo orders a tranya at Quark's. He even gets a drink that looks similar to the one shown in the original series episode "The Corbomite Maneuver."

• Nog's cadet uniform has pockets! Garak does do good work.

• This marks the first mention of root beer as a distinctly "hew-mon" drink -- a reference that would pay off wonderfully in a couple more episodes. 

• I guess Verad wasn't joined with Dax long enough to make it into this ritual.

This episode does take a little while to get going, and does stumble a couple of times. But the second half is really great, and the pleasure of seeing the actors in different roles is fun throughout. I give "Facets" a B+.

Welcome To...

Pretty much everyone has played (or at least heard of) Yahtzee at one point or another, right? Well, it's now the touchstone for one of the more suddenly popular game subgenres: the so-called "roll-and-write" game. Though most of these games use dice, others use cards, and still others more mechanisms. The core of filling out a worksheet/scoresheet of some kind as you play the game is the foundation of the gameplay. I recently got to play one of the hot, new games in the category: Welcome To...

Welcome To... applies the theme of a 1950s housing development to the genre. If that sounds a bit technical, well, it is if you distill the game down to its elemental level. Each player is given a sheet that shows three neighborhood streets. In each round of the game, you fill in an address number on one of the houses, and use a special power for a secondary action -- installing a swimming pool, building a park, or skirting around the game's central rule that all houses on a street must be placed in numerical order.

Each round, three options are presented to all players, each one a pairing of a specific house number to be written in, and a specific power that goes with it. Each player picks one of the three pairs. Then three new pairs are revealed. Repeat the process until the game ends. Because multiple players can choose the same pairing, and each player is simultaneously making a choice for their own housing development (worksheet), the game shouldn't take much longer for a larger number of players. Indeed, the box cheekily promises you can play with any number of players up to 100 (the number of worksheets included in the box, I assume).

Essentially, the game is probability management as strategy. You're often faced with the choice between taking a power you really want that comes with an address number you really don't, or vice versa. If you're a veteran gamer, the rules don't seem that complex. There's a lot to remember at first, and reminder cards summarizing the various effects would have been nice, but you do quickly catch on to what you're being asked to do.

But beneath the surface, I felt the game had a number of flaws. Well, not "flaws," perhaps -- but my feelings about the game dropped measurably as we marched toward the end. First of all, it's actually not as easy as it should be, if the true intention is to support a large group of, say, 10-ish players. Different players will always need reminders of how different things work. Some players will quickly take to the spatial puzzle; others will need more time. That's totally fair, and yet the pressure you feel if you're the one person making nine others wait for an explanation? It's stressful.

Even if everyone is on roughly equal footing, there's a deeper issue I have with the game. Though it includes randomness, it's actually 100% deterministic. Each round, three random choices are presented -- but all players get the same three choices. That never changes. Now sure, a game like chess is 100% deterministic too -- but one player's choices there are not the same as the other player's choices. The unsatisfying conclusion of Welcome To... is that there will be a winner, and every other player will know that if only they'd made the exact choices that player made, they could have shared a tie victory. It strips away the already thin fiction on the game, making it feel like competitive "filling out a spreadsheet." I'd much prefer restricting the game to just 2-4 players, and having each player make a choice in sequence (so that each player's options are different each round).

Would I rather play Welcome To... than Yahtzee? Absolutely. But I wasn't especially enamored of it. I'd give Welcome To... a C+. If I owned a copy, I doubt I'd ever exhaust the 100-sheet pad it comes with.

Something Comes in Threes

Over the past several months, I wrote about the book Something Like Summer and its companion book, Something Like Winter. Each book tells the tale of one part of a gay love triangle, and I found both enjoyable. But of course, as a triangle has three sides, so this story has a third book: Something Like Autumn.

This story revolves around Jace Holden. It opens on him as a teenager in 1990s Missouri... and, more specifically, on his suicide attempt when he decides he can't face coming out of the closet. When he survives, things take a turn for the better, though still with bittersweet moments along the way. The book follows Jace through his first real romance, then continues over a nearly 15-year period to connect with Jace's true love, Ben, from the first book of the series.

This series continued to deliver for me. I found this an interesting installment, despite the fact that the character of Jace came off as the least interesting in the other two books. He was a bit of a cipher with an unrevealed past, and almost too understanding and good to be true. Finding out about that past felt inherently compelling to me after two other books, and learning why he is the way he is -- how he got that way -- proved more engaging than I might have expected.

"Winter" was really woven in and out of the moments set up in the first book, "Summer." This book, "Autumn," more successfully stands alone. The book is almost two-thirds finished before any overlap with either of the previous books occurs, and is stronger for it. This is a new tale, separate and accessible whether you'd read the other books or not. And it's also quite different from those earlier books in how it addresses the issue of suicide. (It's clearly more personal to author Jay Bell, a fact you can sense in the writing even before you reach the afterword, in which he discusses just how suicide has figured in his own life.)

That said, as compelling as I found the bulk of the book, I was less drawn into the final third. Once the story intersects with events detailed in the earlier books, Jace's perspective seems less interesting. There's not a lot here that wasn't already covered previously (sometimes twice), and learning of Jace's background is more than enough to illuminate his behavior without you having to revisit it. The context is already given, and stepping through familiar events one by one isn't as engaging. (Perhaps it would be better to read this installment of the series first? It certainly feels like you could read the three books in any order, and it might be an interesting experiment to see how people react to the characters differently depending on which book they read first.)

Still, I found Something Like Autumn to be an enjoyable book overall. I'd average it out to... "something like" a B+. Together, I'd give the trilogy a similar mark. It's a credible love triangle of the sort that's been put down countless times for straight people, and not so often for gay people.

Though perhaps I need to put "trilogy" in quotes. The "Something Like..." series actually continues for many more books, albeit with different characters. I have enjoyed Jay Bell's writing enough that perhaps I'll check the next one out at some point. Either way, I'm glad to have gone this far.

DS9 Flashback: Shakaar

Writers on any television series that produces 20 or more episodes a season don't always have the luxury of working a story until it's "right." Deep Space Nine, like other Star Trek series at the time, did a whopping 26. And yet, on occasion, an idea would get to simmer on the back burner until it was "cooked" properly. One such episode was "Shakaar."

The death of the leader of Bajor's provisional government leaves a power vacuum into which Kai Winn strides. Acting as both spiritual and political leader of her people, she seeks to reallocate precious resources for the good of all Bajorans. This includes appropriating farming equipment from a small community that happens to be led by Shakaar, a former hero of the Resistance. Winn recruits Kira, who was in Shakaar's Resistance cell, to persuade him to give up the equipment voluntarily. But Shakaar is more persuasive to Kira that she is to him, and resisting illegitimate power is in their blood. Meanwhile, Chief O'Brien is enjoying a hot streak at the dartboard.

When I say that this story had time to simmer until it was just right, I have to make a notable exception for the B plot of O'Brien's lucky run at darts. If that last sentence of my recap felt like it came out of nowhere, rest assured that the story is no more natural in the episode itself. It really shouldn't even be here; the A plot is quite compelling and could easily have been expanded to fill the surprisingly large amount of screen time the B plot takes.

I suppose there is fun in seeing everyone from Sisko to Dax to a snooty Vulcan (played by veteran character actor Sherman Howard) take on an "in the zone" O'Brien. And it's quintessential Quark to try to make a profit on it. But there's no real point to the story; O'Brien is simply hot until he's not. And there are certainly no meaningful stakes to it. Cutting back and forth between it and Kira's story line is jarring every time.

Fortunately, the Kira story itself is quite engaging. And this, apparently, was the part that took time to iron out. Almost a year earlier, a story had been pitched about a museum on Bajor being protested for its waste of valuable resources. It was a debate on the values of culture vs. survival, but wasn't really working to anyone's satisfaction until staff writer Ronald Moore suggested a way to make the conflict more personal for the main characters: by injecting a power-grabbing Kai Winn into the plot. Conveniently, it was also a way for Kira to really confront Winn over her role in the recent death of Bareil.

Winn is deliciously oily in this episode, once again thanks to a wonderful performance by Louise Fletcher. Winn interrupts Kira's mourning prayers, gets in a veiled dig at how little she knew Bareil, and yet still coerces the Major into helping her. Once she's in power, she's impulsive and easily provoked, embracing the role of autocrat. She's not a master plotter, though. She declares martial law (costing her popularity), seriously overplays her hand against Sisko and the Federation, and ultimately gets outflanked politically by Kira and Shakaar. It's an exciting story arc -- sown with perhaps a touch of cautionary warning for real-world politics. (As Odo observes: the price of giving people choice is that they sometimes make the wrong choice.)

The character of Shakaar was envisioned by the writers to be recurring, so they cast a familiar Trek actor, Duncan Regehr (who had, in the previous season, given his all to the laughably hokey role as Dr. Crusher's sexy candle ghost in The Next Generation's "Sub Rosa"). Though Shakaar was also imagined as a potential romantic interest for Kira in the future, it's their friendship and history in the trenches that plays well here. He's smooth under pressure, level-headed, and has pretty good chemistry with a number of characters from the honorable and pious Furel to the uneasy rival Lenaris. He's certainly a more intriguing presence, right out of the gate, than Bareil was.

The episode was the first to be directed by Deep Space Nine's regular Director of Photography, Jonathan West. His eye for camera placement is clear throughout. Winn and Kira's first scene together is a tense confrontation of extreme closeups, even though the characters sit apart on opposite sides of a table. The final showdown between Shakaar's band and the rival Bajoran forces is a well choreographed mix of shots.

The episode also benefits from some fantastic shooting on location in Bronson Canyon. Establishing shots at Shakaar's farm lend a sense of reality to the place. (More scenes were planned there, but it grew too cold to shoot them at night, so they were finished in a studio instead.) The flight and pursuit sequences near the end, filled out with lots of extras, are among the best non-space action on the show to this point. And if the "Star Trek caves" look a little different this episode, well, that's because they actually filmed this time in a real cave!

Other observations:

• Furel's story of why he hasn't obtained a replacement for his arm is a lovely bit of character building. When you promise your gods your life, and they only take your arm, you should consider it a bargain.

• If medicine is so advanced in the future (and Bashir in particular so skilled), why can't O'Brien's chronically weak shoulder be more effectively healed?

• Staff writer Ronald Moore (who did much of the writing here despite Gordon Dawson's official credit) noted that unlike much of the Klingon language on the show, which was crafted more methodically by linguist Marc Okrand, he invented the Bajoran language heard here -- and basically he just made it up to flow lyrically and loosely feel right in the moment.

• Show runner Ira Steven Behr was a bit critical of this episode, feeling that it ended abruptly and would have been stronger had it not been so pressed for time overall. All the more reason to have junked the pointless O'Brien subplot.

This isn't the first time Kira has had to deal with a stubborn Bajoran farmer. But her personal connection here, and the use of Kai Winn, makes this a stronger episode. If only that B plot didn't drag the whole thing down. Averaged out, I'd say "Shakaar" deserves a B.

It's Back

You don't make the highest-grossing horror movie of all time without getting a sequel. And fortunately for that movie, It, a sequel was actually quite natural, since the first film adapted only half of Stephen King's original novel. It: Chapter Two now picks up the action in Derry, Maine 27 years later, as the monster of the first film -- not dead after all -- emerges from hibernation. The seven friends of the original, now adults, must reunite to finish the creature once and for all.

This sequel has plenty of thrills and scares, and a lot of good elements about it. But it's not quite as good as the first movie, and that starts with the source material itself. The "fight It again as adults" section of the book was always weaker. The kids felt so outmatched, felt like they had to overcome so much more, and experienced more visceral fears than the adults. And the ending of the book was rather unsatisfying (something this movie has great fun with). With all of that baked in from the start, it was inevitable that this new movie wasn't going to be as good as the first.

Yet it does have its moments. The casting is absolutely brilliant, with every single one of the actors (both the more famous and the less) being extremely credible adult versions of the child actors in the previous film. Particularly strong are James McAvoy as Bill (still haunted by the death of his brother), Bill Hader as Ritchie (whose reflexive snark yields most of the movie's biggest and best laughs), and James Ransone as Eddie (who still feels the most adolescent, and thus still has the most to overcome). But Jessica Chastain, Isaiah Mustafa, Jay Ryan, and Andy Bean too -- all have good moments in the movie, and all are dead ringers in look and demeanor for the kids who played their characters before.

The scares are hit and miss. Some moments really work, particularly the scenes that isolate Bill from the rest of the group, flashback to scares in the kids' pasts we didn't see before, and one scene that plays much like the first film's storm drain scene (showcasing actor Bill Skarsgård's creepy work as Pennywise). The scenes that depend more on CG are less successful, with some of the creatures so strange as to be more silly than scary.

The most effective moments are actually the most human ones -- Bill facing guilt, Stan coming up against his limitations, Ritchie confronted with his own deep secret, Eddie realizing his own strength, and more. But then, the scares are really what we're here to see. So the movie is a bit at war with itself, trying to serve a lot of narrative masters (and bloating to a run time of nearly three hours as a result).

And a couple of the human moments are quite discordant. One is the violent scene that opens the film, and the second is an early scene revolving around the character of Beverly. They're scenes not about supernatural horror, but about the "evils men do." Both scenes have been defended by cast and director as "important," key parts of Stephen King's original novel -- but I think there's a key contextual difference. The giant novel was, of necessity, split into two movies. What became the first movie provided a great many more horrors visited upon the characters by people, not Pennywise -- attacks by bully Henry Bowers, various abuses of the children by their parents (Beverly's being most traumatic), casual cruelty of Derry residents from the librarian to passing motorists. If one considers It as an entire piece, these two scenes in It: Chapter Two are very much thematically linked to the story. But separated out, as the only two such moments in a three hour film, they stand out as quite different from the CG-driven, supernatural horrors -- and they feel gratuitous as a result. Simply depicting violence that is true to life does not make it "important," not unless you're offering comment or catharsis on it -- which I don't believe this movie is.

Overall, It: Chapter Two is still worth seeing for those who liked the first movie. But it is a step down that I'll note by stepping the grade down to a B.

A Foolish Endeavor

As promised, after working my way around a few other books, I circled back to the Dresden Files series to follow-up my good experience with the first book. In the second installment, Fool Moon, author Jim Butcher picks up the action a few months later. It sees Harry Dresden get tangled up in a series of murders taking place each month at the full moon. A werewolf would seem to be the culprit... but there's more at play than it would seem.

Having set up the world of the series in Storm Front, you'd expect the sequel to settle in more with a story less dependent on exposition and set up. Fool Moon both fulfills and thwarts that expectation. On the plus side, many characters set up in the first book reappear, and their relationships with the main character continue to evolve. There's a satisfying blend of episodic and serialized storytelling -- this isn't a television procedural where all the characters reset to zero for each new installment... but neither do they grow in the leaps and bounds that would be more appropriate to a close-ended series. It's good to have back police officer Karrin Murphy, crime boss Johnny Marcone, and comedically temperamental spirit Bob.

The new characters that populate this tale aren't nearing as compelling. Much of the story revolves around Tera, a woman who is supposed to be mysterious and strong-willed, but still manages to come off mostly vacant and sexualized. There's a gang of werewolf characters who are unfortunately too ill-defined and interchangeable to leave much of an impression. The only one to stick out much from the (heh) pack does so more for his conspicuously youthful name (Billy) than any sort of personality that pops him off the page.

The plot is less breezy and straightforward than book one. While complicating the narrative isn't an inherently bad choice, here it takes the form of a great deal of exposition about the rules of werewolves in the Dresden Files universe -- how many types there are and what are the differences between them. Some of it is necessary information for the story, and the rest is likely smokescreen to make things less predictable for the reader. But the whole comes off as a pretty thick brick of a lesson that you need to assimilate to follow the story.

So overall, I didn't find Fool Moon to be as fun a read as Storm Front. Still, it was far from a slog. I flew through it quickly -- and with enough goodwill left on the other side -- to be interested in continuing the Dresden Files series. But again, as after book one, I'll probably read a few other things before coming back to it. I'd say Fool Moon is a B-. In a series of more than a dozen books and counting, if this is one of the weaker ones, it's not so low a mark.

DS9 Flashback: Family Business

While Ferengi-centric episodes of Deep Space Nine tended to be among the more light-hearted and funny episodes of the show, they would from time to time include more serious themes. "Family Business" was one of these, a light romp containing a healthy dose of family conflict.

Quark is in hot water with a "liquidator" from the Ferengi Commerce Authority. His mother Ishka, back on the Ferengi homeworld, has been earning profit! A female! If he can't secure her confession and restitution, he's on the hook both financially and socially. Meanwhile, Jake Sisko is trying to set his father up on a date with freighter captain Kasidy Yates... and he's engaged in a whispering campaign with half the senior staff to talk her up.

Behind many a sibling rivalry is a fundamental difference of outlook on two different parents. We learn here that this informs at least part of the friction between Quark and his brother Rom: Quark loved his late father and has always seen his mother as disrespectful and trying, where Rom saw his father's shortcomings and admired how his mother stepped up to close the gap. Quark couldn't wait to leave home, and hated how his mother coddled Rom; Ishka knew Quark didn't need as much help, and thinks he was too hard on his brother. It's a compelling background upon which to hang this fun little tale -- and more authentic than most Ferengi stories.

But there's plenty of comedy played here, to be sure. Ferengi society is fleshed out in more detail than ever before, and it's all great fun -- from the constantly rainy conditions on their homeworld, to the doors you have to crouch through even to enter a high-ceilinged room, to the bribe you must pay a law officer to learn of the charges against you, to the way house guests are expected to pay the host and sign a waiver.

To help bring the funny, they cast SCTV veteran Andrea Martin as Ishka. Director Rene Auberjonois (helming his second episode, and second Ferengi-centric one) suggested her for the part, after someone else's half-hearted suggestion to cast Grand Nagus Zek actor Wallace Shawn in drag was rightly dismissed. Auberjonois warned her that the makeup demands would be extensive, but all the same, it seems Martin was not prepared for old age troweled on top of the normal extensive Ferengi makeup, nor the extra pieces required for the nude scenes. Martin would decline to return to the role, leading Ishka to be recast in later episodes.

Bigger than Andrea Martin (to serious Star Trek fans, anyway) is that this is the first episode to feature Jeffrey Combs in a recurring role, as he plays Liquidator Brunt for the first time. It's a delicious, sneering performance that shines brilliantly through the makeup. His final exit line, "I sincerely hope I never see any of you again," feels like a great joke; they'd be foolish not to bring him back.

Meanwhile, the B plot about Sisko meeting Kasidy Yates is pretty fun -- and brings the third significant recurring character this episode introduces. It's entertaining to see the whispering campaign Jake has engaged in for Kasidy, and how Dax and O'Brien in particular are totally sold on her before Ben has even met her. There's a risk that talking up a character like this sets us up for disappointment, but actress Penny Johnson is endlessly charming and immediately likeable. It's no wonder she's continued to show up on television in the decades since this role, from 24 to Castle to The Orville and more. Her personality shines even bigger than her hairstyle in this episode, which is saying something. It helps that the writers have made her character a perfect match for Sisko, from her independence to her quick wit to her love of baseball.

Other observations:

• Sisko's beard is looking "normal" now, after the not-quite-final introduction in the previous episode

• Another new runabout is introduced this episode (the Rubicon), with a great joke by Kira about how it's good that Earth has so many rivers to name these things after.

• Rene Auberjonois is slowly gaining confidence as a director. Many of the shots in this episode remain conventional, locked-off "proscenium" style angles, but he does go handheld with the camera for the fight between Quark and Rom. And his skill working with actors continues to serve well as his technical skills catch up; the performances here are all solid.

• Maybe Quark missed his calling as a Liquidator. He finds money hidden by his mother that Brunt missed. (Not to mention how quickly he cracked the financial scheme in the Klingon Empire back in "The House of Quark.")

I give "Family Business" a solid B. It may not be among the very best Deep Space Nine, but for all the important characters who debut here, it's certainly essential. And quite fun.