DS9 Flashback: In the Cards

One episode away from the season five finale of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. The writers were about to knock over all the blocks, dramatically changing the show and not returning to normal until several episodes into the sixth season. So they decided to serve up one last bit of goofy fun before things got heavy: "In the Cards."

Morale is down on the station as war with the Dominion seems imminent. Jake Sisko is determined to cheer up his dad, and has his sights set on a 1951 Willie Mays baseball card as the way to do it. With Nog's help (and latinum), he tries to buy the card at auction. But when a peculiar scientist named Dr. Giger outbids them, they begin striking a series of elaborate deals all around the station to get the items Giger wants in trade. Meanwhile, Kai Winn comes to Captain Sisko for advice on how to deal with Weyoun in an upcoming diplomatic negotiation.

Star Trek has done its share of comedic episodes, some of them great. But sometimes the formula is to pair a dramatic "A story" with a lighter "B story" -- often to mixed results. This episode inverts that formula, making a comedy of the "A story" and pushing the serious stuff into the "B story." It's very odd... but it mostly works.

Jake and Nog have gone on a bartering adventure before, but this one has a specific goal in mind, and thus higher(-ish) stakes. Jake pulls out all the stops to guilt Nog into helping him, pointing out that Nog owes his entire Starfleet career to Jake's dad. And while Jake gets obsessed (to a point that he'd rather his dad think he got drunk and yelled at Kai Winn than spoil the surprise!), he is able to explain the obsession in a way that feels true: his father has always been there for him. They have been through a lot together, and Jake wants to show he cares.

Some of the trades Jake and Nog wind up making are more enjoyable than others. Sweet talking O'Brien is just fun. Writing Kira's speech and enhancing Worf's opera recordings each play to the pair's different strengths in a clever way. But Nog sneaking into Leeta's bedroom -- while she's sleeping! -- to steal Julian's teddy bear back is pretty creepy. (And apparently was only included because show runner Ira Steven Behr thought that Kukalaka was a ridiculously stupid name when they first gave it to the teddy bear. This only made the other writers want to mention it again as much as possible.)

The story plays out almost like a parody of a Star Trek episode, in a rather fun way. A veteran Star Trek actor, Brian Markinson, plays the quirky Dr. Giger. And at first, Giger seems like any other Trek scientist with promising technobabble -- until you hear his theory that death is caused by cellular boredom. (He's not entirely crazy, though. Take his fear of spreading germs by shaking hands.) When Jake and Nog try to get Odo to take it all seriously, he throws them out of his office; a serious character like Odo has no place in a story like this. And when Weyoun gets in on the action and actually abducts Jake and Nog, Jake spins a fantastical science fiction tale about timeline pollution and Starfleet Intelligence... which is enough to convince Weyoun that the first, real story was the truth.

Yet as broad as it all is, the B story manages to not clash against it too harshly. The plot is a direct preamble to the Dominion war, with Kai Winn worried for Bajor in the coming conflict. Sisko pledges he'll do anything to protect Bajor... and begins proving that here by actually working with Kai Winn and giving her good advice.

Though Kai Winn isn't really in many scenes, it's a good episode for her. After she was made quite sympathetic earlier this season, here she's vulnerable and accepting of our hero Sisko. She also turns her trademark condescension on another villain. When she grabs Weyoun's ear and declares "we are nothing alike," you practically want to cheer for her. (Weyoun also takes abuse from Sisko, who dispenses with diplomacy to tell him off in their first scene together.)

Other observations:

• This is the first episode directed by actor Michael Dorn. There isn't a lot of flashy camera work, but every character (save Dax) has at least a small scene, and Dorn seems quite capable of getting a good performance from his cast mates. (However, some non-speaking actors during the auction scene really exaggerate their nods as they make silent bids. Among Hollywood's more arcane rules is that a director is not allowed to give specific direction to a single non-speaking performer in a crowd without triggering a bump in their pay.)

• The parody of Star Trek gets most explicit when Jake talks about his lack of money, and explains that humans now "work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity." Script writer Ronald Moore directly lifted the line he wrote for Picard in First Contact, saying in an interview that "I take great glee at mocking my own work."

• There's a prominent shot of Sisko playing with the baseball on his desk. It's probably here because it reinforces why Jake wants the baseball card so much, but it's also reminding the audience of this item in advance of its symbolic role in the next several episodes.

• Giger's catch phrase about the "soulless minions of orthodoxy" makes me smile every time. At first, it just seems like a random insult, but with repetition, it begins to seem as though he perceives an actual league of adversaries: the Klingon Empire, the Borg Collective... the Soulless Minions of Orthodoxy.

• But the "lions and Gigers and bears" joke is just a bridge too far for me.

"In the Cards" is hardly all-time top Deep Space Nine, though it does feel like the right thing for the series as it heads into a run of serious, epic episodes. I give it a B.

Key Viewing

If the Marvel Cinematic Universe kicked open the door to every superhero comic being potential fuel for film or TV adaptation, The Walking Dead did the same for comic book series outside the superhero genre. Years ago, when more people were buzzing about The Walking Dead, a friend loaned me collected volumes of another series she loved very much: Locke & Key. Time got away from me, I needed to pack for a move, and I wound up returning them unread. But every now and then, Locke & Key would pop up in conversation.

Recently, it's jumped back into the mix -- this time in the form of the Netflix series adaptation that debuted in early February. It's the story of a family looking for a "fresh start," by moving into the old ancestral house once shunned by the father. There they begin to discover a series of magical keys with a broad range of powers... and a malevolent entity trying to seize the keys from them. It's ten one-hour episodes of fantastical ideas, family drama, and action/adventure.

This is a wildly fun premise, and quite open-ended. No doubt the series is taking much of its inspiration from the original comics, but it feels like at any moment, the writers could introduce pretty much any complication they want by simply inventing another key and adding its magical powers to the mix. It sort of takes the freedom of a "monster-of-the-week" sci-fi show, while then living with the consequences of each new development in the way of a more serialized story.

The show is also unusual in that it heavily features kids without truly feeling like it's aimed at them as the audience. There are three children in the featured Locke family, a boy and girl in high school (Tyler and Kinsey), and a younger boy (Bode). They're the real stars... but with the show's rather intense action, occasional violence, and suspense, I doubt I'd let a kid as young as Bode actually watch the show.

The series does a great job of incorporating the fantastical -- both visual effects and plot points -- without letting it overwhelm the drama. At its core, Locke & Key is a show about this family, its dynamic, and the traumas they've gone through. Carlton Cuse, one of the show-runners of Lost, is a co-creator here, and it has a similar dynamic: this show is about the people and not actually about the magic keys, just as Lost was about the people and not actually about a magic island.

But Locke & Key isn't without its shortcomings. It is rather predictable. I mean, you won't necessarily anticipate what new magical power might randomly be added in the next episode... but once you've seen it, you probably won't have a hard time extrapolating where the story is going to go next. It isn't exactly a problem that you can guess where the story is headed, but the show itself is often played for surprise, even though it rarely manages to pull one off.

The plotting also often relies on someone acting like an idiot in order to keep things moving. While most of the characters act rationally, as you could imagine they might in this wild situation, one person always has to do something stupid to introduce jeopardy, unravel a smart plan, or lead to the next narrative development. Thankfully, the characters at least take turns wearing the Idiot Hat -- it seems at first like it's always going to be young Bode, but then Kinsey and even the mother Nina take turns. But yelling at your TV screen about stupidity is very much baked into the DNA of this show, and you simply have to get over that to enjoy the ride. At least the characters are all rather likeable when it's not their turn to wear the Hat.

All told, I think I'd give the season of Locke & Key a B+. I enjoyed the ride enough that if they do decide to make a second season, I'll be there for it.

Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 2

I have thoroughly enjoyed the first season of Star Trek: Picard. I found it a graceful gymnastic routine that balanced many competing elements, and featured some truly great moments. But it did not stick the landing -- and it wasn't one of those "little hops that's going to be a deduction." I thought the finale was a big ol' face plant. (As always, SPOILERS follow.)

With Soji helping her sister Sutra build a beacon to call in destructive alien synths, the clock is ticking. Our heroes must stop Sutra, persuade Soji to relent, and stall the coming Romulan armada. And another ticking clock in the background: Picard's brain condition, which threatens to kill him at any moment.

I felt about this season finale the way I've felt about many of the classic Stephen King books I've read over the years -- I'm left trying to figure out how much a bad ending compromises my enjoyment of the whole. Right now, the sting is harsh, but it will probably settle out like my take on those books: it was worth the time to take the ride, despite the disappointment.

There were a lot of moments clearly meant to pack emotional punch, but they wound up feeling pretty hollow to me. Many tears were shed over the "death" of Jean-Luc Picard, with Michelle Hurd and Alison Pill in particular muscling up their performances as Raffi and Jurati to sell the moment. But "Chekhov's Golem" had been set up for us so prominently and explicitly in the previous episode that I found it impossible to be swept up in the feeling. For the death of a character we've known for over 30 years to have any shot at resonance, I think one of the other Next Generation characters needed to be there -- Riker or Troi (or maybe even Brent Spiner at least, as Alton Soong?). The scene didn't play out as a fitting end. Because, of course, it wasn't. It was the moment before Picard's expected return. It seemed structured to be the death of Spock in The Wrath of Khan. It played like the death of Kirk in Star Trek Into Darkness.

But then, perhaps the flatness shouldn't have been surprising; Picard's death came after other characters also met their ends in underwhelming ways. After twirling her figurative mustache all season, Narissa Rizzo was dispatched abruptly by Seven of Nine -- who hardly ever interacted with the Romulan agent before this. She did it "for Hugh," which may be the way the audience feels about it, but hardly seems like an emotion Seven would have. Did Seven and Hugh ever even meet? Or would she feel this way avenging the death of any ex-Borg after her history with her adopted son?

After Sutra was set up in part 1 as the big planet-side nemesis to be overcome... Soong just walks up to her, pushes a button, and she collapses. Okay, I guess that's it then. Then there was another unceremonious ending for Narek. What even happened to him? I believe the last we ever see of him, he's being pinned to the ground by a couple of androids -- we get no resolution there, no final meeting between him and Soji, no nothing.

It seems there wasn't time to show us any of that because the episode was interested in bringing in other elements to also not resolve them very satisfyingly. After we parted with Riker a few episodes ago (in the season's best hour), he returned in command of a fleet to... do pretty much nothing. Rather than having him beam down for Picard's ostensibly final moments, he warps away to escort the Romulans out of Federation space. We have recent evidence that putting Riker and Picard together can effectively pull on the heartstrings; why not do it?

Instead, the reunion we get is Picard with Data. The real Data, reconstituted and trapped inside a computer simulation. Yes, this was all telegraphed from episode one, both with Picard's opening dream sequence, and Jurati's casual mention that any android's consciousness could in theory be recovered from a single positron. But it didn't feel especially needed. It's true that Data had an unsatisfying death in the terrible Star Trek: Nemesis. But 5 minutes of screen time was hardly going to be enough to "fix" that. It's barely even enough time to get through the technobabble of why Data is here, or get over the uncanny valley of visuals trying to make Brent Spiner look 20-30 years younger. Of all the stumbles throughout this episode, I do at least feel like I know what they were trying for here -- I just don't think they got there.

All that's to say nothing of the hasty conveniences in the plot. The alien synths turned out to be a dog that didn't bark; turn off your phone call to them, and I guess they just assume it was a butt dial. In part 1, we were told the colony of synths had only 10 orchids remaining. It sure seemed like a lot more this week. In part 1, a synth handed our heroes a fancy widget. This week, it would turn out to be a veritable magic wand capable of doing anything the narrative required -- from impossible repairs to inventions-on-the-fly.

And if you're going to have near-magic that strains credulity, why not use the "magic" already planted in the Star Trek universe? How was La Sirena flying again after a spectacular wreck and not the Borg cube, expressly known for fantastical regenerative powers?

Indeed, writing-wise, I'm hard-pressed to point to anything in the episode I thought was strong. The banter between Raffi and Rios, perhaps? The drinking scene between Seven and Rios? Certainly, I can say the actors were giving it their all -- as they have been all throughout the season, the performances were wonderful. Visual effects too, even if this finale was relying on that overmuch.

I hope that before now, I've made clear enough how much I've enjoyed season one of Star Trek: Picard -- clear enough to now earn the place to be a curmudgeon at the end. I'm not one of those "defending the old guard" Trek fans whining that the new Star Trek "isn't Star Trek." But I am saying that this season finale was a big disappointment. I give it a C-.

All that said... we now seem set up for "the Adventures of La Sirena" for a potential season two. Or really, whatever direction the show wants to go in next. I love the characters, and I'd love to see more of them. It may be a while before we get a season two, but I'll absolutely be looking forward to it. And hoping that whatever glitch in the system led to this finale gets worked out by then.

Hang On a Second

The Lego Movie (and spin-off, The Lego Batman Movie) were both fun romps that hit the target of being good for both kids and adults. A sequel was inevitable... but was not alluring enough to draw me out to the theater during the original run. (Ah, a more innocent time: when you could go out somewhere public, but chose not to.)

The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part picks up five years after the first film -- as many years as have passed in reality. The world of Emmet and Lucy has transformed into a Mad Max style "Apocalypseburg" that's constantly fending off attacks by enemies from the "Systar system." Hanging over everyone is the fear that if peace cannot be reached, "Ar-mom-ageddon" will destroy the world completely.

In the original Lego Movie -- (um... five-year-old SPOILER warning, I guess) -- the big surprise moment was revealing the Lego characters' connection to the real world, in which a father and son were clashing over how best to play with toys. It was a small but surprising bit of pathos injected into the middle of the hijinks, just the right amount of sentiment to hide inside the fun. That can't be repeated here for surprise, of course, so The Lego Movie 2 just leans into the fact that its audience knows about the real world, winking constantly with wordplay and playful references. This mostly works, particularly when comedy genius Maya Rudolph appears as the kids' Mom.

The stuff inside Lego world falls far short of the first movie, though. There isn't really much of a character arc left for Emmet or Lucy, so this movie fills the space with nonstop gags. Sure, some of them are funny. But the overall effect is just hyperactive and loud, a fire hose with no one holding onto it, spraying chaotically all over the place. ("Sure, it's a movie for kids," I hear you say. "You don't have to flash something new on the screen every .7 seconds just because you think a child is watching," I reply.)

One returning element from the first Lego Movie works like gangbusters, though -- the song "Everything Is Awesome." The earwormy hit from the first movie is chopped and remixed and parodied here to great effect. It's also one-upped, as the movie strives to outdo the original with even more songs. The appropriately named "Catchy Song" is a deliberate attempt to manufacture what "Everything Is Awesome" did accidentally (and nails it), while the end credits song "Super Cool" hilariously breaks the fourth wall to describe its own function as an end credits song.

Still, that might all amount to a reason to buy the soundtrack more than a reason to watch the movie. Where The Lego Movie felt like a good movie for all ages, The Lego Movie 2 felt much more like a movie a parent endures because their kid wants to watch it. Needless to say, not having any kids who forced me to watch it, I was quite disappointed. I give this sequel a middle-of-the-road C.

DS9 Flashback: Empok Nor

The Deep Space Nine episode "The Darkness and the Light" previewed a taste of Bryan Fuller's eventual Hannibal-style creepiness. But before joining the writing staff of Star Trek: Voyager, he'd sell one more idea to DS9 -- one that pushed even more into the horror genre, "Empok Nor."

Parts of Deep Space Nine are breaking down, in need of replacement Cardassian parts that can't be replicated. The solution: travel to the abandoned station Empok Nor and scavenge for what's needed. But the Cardassians are known to booby trap their facilities when abandoning them, and a particularly diabolical trap awaits: killer soldiers acting as sentries, infected with a xenophobia-enhancing drug that also compromises Garak. Soon, he and Chief O'Brien are on opposite sides and determined to kill each other.

The road developing this story was a little bumpy. The original pitch involved Worf and Garak finding a derelict ship, but the decision was made to pair Garak and O'Brien instead -- perhaps because branching out with Garak, rather than just playing all his scenes with Bashir, had begun to pay dividends. The ship was changed to a Cardassian station to make production easier (more on that later). But the first draft was still a dud. Show runner Ira Steven Behr felt it lacked character and meaning, and actor Andrew Robinson was quietly cringing -- always living in the shadow of his breakout role as the Scorpio Killer in the movie Dirty Harry, he was reluctant to portray Garak as a psychotic murderer.

The version actually filmed seems like a vast improvement. It plays up O'Brien's soldiering past (inherited from The Next Generation, and often shied away from by Deep Space Nine), and isn't so much a story about "Garak going crazy" as it is about "O'Brien having to face his own inner darkness." If Robinson still had any reservations about the story, he doesn't let them get in the way of a good performance, as Garak pokes and prods O'Brien at every turn in an effort to unleash his demon.

In filming the episode, they really pushed the envelope beyond what Star Trek usually allows, embracing many horror movie tropes. There's lots of handheld camera, dim lighting pierced by flashlight beams, lens flares (well before J.J. Abrams ever touched the franchise), and tight close-ups that restricts our view of the environment. Empok Nor converts the regular DS9 sets into a haunted house, from obvious changes like the lighting to more subtle changes like swapping out the regular carpet for a drab grey.

Story-wise, we get a big cast of victims for a "cabin in the woods" style narrative that will kill them off one by one. They have personalities, different skill sets, and a range of temperaments from nervous to aggressive, but they are here to be killed off and heighten the mood. Nog is cast as the abducted friend whose rescue motivates the final confrontation (amid a mass of hanging bodies). O'Brien faces down the killer, relying on his own ingenuity to triumph. Amid these horror staples is this character revelation for him: the man he has become really is a better person -- it's his newer skills as an engineer that save him, not the soldier background he wants to forget.

Other observations:

• Much is made of the board game of Kotra, and what it says about Cardassian culture compared to, for example, Ferengi values. It's interesting to ponder whether the enduring popularity of chess says something about the human race.

• They raided the props and costuming from First Contact for this episode, using the movie's phaser rifles and spacesuits. But there's at least one great original prop in this episode too: the dessicated body of a dead Cardassian.

• It's unfortunate that the music here isn't allowed to be as daring as the visuals. This episode is written like a horror movie and looks like a horror movie, but it has fairly typical Star Trek music -- which, as limited by Rick Berman's intractable tastes, is largely forgettable.

• A minor moment in this episode turned out to spark a bit of controversy. One of the minor characters, Amaro, uses the racial slur of "spoonhead" in referring to Cardassians. Though Bajorans had used the word before, it had never been spoken by a Starfleet officer -- and probably never would have been written for one, given what everyone could imagine Gene Roddenberry would have said. But this line of dialogue wasn't actually in the script; it was created later on an ADR stage as "walla" to flesh out a scene, and wound up being fully audible in the final sound mix. Behr and Berman did catch it, and debated removing it... but ultimately decided that it underscored the tension of the situation: the character was forgetting himself and cracking under the pressure. As another staff writer, René Echevarria, put it: "It was racist. But it was also very real."

"Empok Nor" is a fun break from formula. Perhaps it could have broken more from formula and been more fun still as a result, but I still give it a B+.

An Avenue to Adventure?

Over the past couple of months, whenever I mention the show Avenue 5, I'm invariably answered with "What's that? I've never heard of that." Then I begin to explain that it's the HBO sci-fi comedy about a space cruise liner that's knocked off course and left with a three-and-a-half-year journey home. I get that far or less, and I'm invariably answered with "Oh yeah, I've seen stuff about that!" or "The one with Hugh Laurie?" It seems people are aware of Avenue 5. But few are actually watching it. Are they missing out?

Maybe? It depends on where your bar is set right now.

It's easy to paint a less-than-glowing picture of Avenue 5 if you compare it to other things. It comes from creator Armando Iannucci, the man who made Veep and its British antecedent, The Thick of It. Those shows were master classes in cringe humor, hilarious satires about inept government (from a time when that actually played as satire, anyway). Both shows are, to be completely honest, much funnier than Avenue 5.

But they're also completely different. The trappings of unqualified people in positions of power still permeate Avenue 5, but the show is not "Veep in Space." It's a strange satire stew with bits of Veep, Star Trek, The Love Boat, and more all simmering in the broth. It feels distinctly like its own thing as you watch an episode.

And what it an episode like? Well, I'd say it's only laugh out loud funny here and there -- though I do have a smile on my face throughout pretty much every half-hour episode. It's definitely a showcase for a spectrum of funny people to do their thing. It's also distinct in that much of the cast isn't previously known for being funny before this.

I mentioned earlier than Hugh Laurie is the one everyone seems to know is in this. He plays Captain Ryan Clark, the ostensible calm eye in the storm of the show -- but with humorous facets to his character that are revealed in short order. The show is built to use the authoritative parts of his character on House, the comedic chops he displayed in Veep, and (extremely minor spoiler here:) both his native British accent and his facility with an American one.

For outright comedy, you get Josh Gad as a pompous billionnaire visionary, skilled improv performer Suzy Nakamura as his cutthroat right hand, an extra dry Zach Woods (hopping straight from Silicon Valley to this) as the hilariously unqualified head of customer relations, and Rebecca Front as a literal "Karen" making trouble aboard the ship. For science fiction pedigree, you have Lenora Crichlow (from Being Human) and Ethan Phillips (from Star Trek: Voyager). Continuing the parade of performers you'll likely recognize from other places: Nikki Amuka-Bird (Luther), Andy Buckley (the U.S. version of The Office), Himesh Patel (Yesterday), and more. The cast is stacked.

Avenue 5 did intrigue me from the first episode, and I was rewarded for staying with it: it did get steadily funnier throughout the season. I was happy to hear it was given a season two to follow its just-wrapped 9-episode season one, and I plan on being there in the future when it arrives. I'd give the series a B overall. If your TV series dance card is especially full right now, that might not be good enough to make the cut. But I find it's always good to have a light half-hour in the mix, and Avenue 5 fit that bill nicely for a while. You might want to check it out.

Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 1

When I saw the title of the latest Star Trek: Picard, it wasn't the Latin that threw me. (Star Trek has a long, proud history of obscure Latin titles.) It was the "Part 1." Does "Part 1" even mean anything in a 10-episode season that's completely serialized? It turns out: kinda, yeah. By no means did the episode stumble, but I did find it noticeably incomplete (and therefore just a little less satisfying) than other episodes this season. (Um... as always with these Picard reviews: SPOILERS.)

La Sirena arrives at the secret homeworld of the synths, where it's promptly taken down by a local defense system -- it, Narek's pursuing fighter, and the arriving Borg cube (!) all crash land on the planet. After confirming the survival of their friends on the cube, Picard and his crew discover a thriving village of androids... and one human, Altan Inigo Soong, son of Data's creator. Revelations follow: Altan asks Dr. Jurati to help develop a neural transfer that can place human consciousness in an android body, Soji's sister Sutra is able to learn the true message of the Admonition, and the village decides on a deadly response to the coming Romulan armada.

To me, much of the "part 1"-ness of this episode came from the elements that got short shrift here, apparently to set up part 2. The story of the Borg cube was the biggest example. After great concern over whether Elnor survived the crash, we learn that he and Seven are doing fine in a rapid-fire little scene. The characters don't remix into different groups after reuniting -- it's just a quick "hey, s'up?" and then everyone goes back to their own stories. It almost felt like the show didn't know what to do with the Borg story line anymore; yet it's far more likely the writers know exactly what they want to do, and had to mark time a little before the season finale.

Meeting Alton Inigo Soong (we knew his father, prepare to die?) seemed a bit off in spots to me too. Set aside that the revelation of a secret son (which really doesn't comport with what we knew of Noonian) who happens to also be a cybernetics wizard (fine) feels quite convenient at this point -- I'll take the convenience to give Brent Spiner a role to play. It's his behavior toward Jurati that felt a bit rushed. Yes, he throws her a little shade over her killing his long-time friend and partner Maddox, but is able to pivot awfully fast into what he needs from her. Maybe living among androids for years has changed the way he processes his own emotions?

Things also seemed unclear surrounding Narek -- though here, I think, because the writers intended it to be a little murky? We see Sutra enter his cell for an up-close-and-personal confrontation... but then a few moments later, it's Saga who Narek has murdered to escape? So, Sutra is using him, letting him loose in pursuit of her own evil, right? I guess we'll find out next episode?

So yeah, there are some rough spots here in my mind -- though some of those could easily be smoothed out by what we see in the coming Part 2. Still, I also found plenty to like in this episode. Bringing Picard's terminal illness back to the forefront of the story led to several great scenes. (Indeed, pairing him with Elnor seemed to be the reason to travel to the Borg cube before going to the city.)

Picard's relationship with Raffi was especially strong here; for a time, she complies with his wishes not to treat him differently, but then finally must express her feelings for him. And, once again demonstrating that this is a different Picard than the man we knew on The Next Generation, Picard expresses his feelings in return. I love how convincingly this series has played this relationship and its history in just a handful of episodes.

The plot twist surrounding the nature of the Admonition -- that it's a warning for synths and not against synths -- was a clever one. Of course, it all comes in service of one of a writer's favorite tropes: that a prophecy will always be fulfilled despite efforts to stop it. Still, I felt it all worked, in part because actress Ira Briones gave a starkly different performance as Sutra. (Indeed, if the gold skin was a gimmick to help us tell her apart from Soji, it hardly seemed necessary. Then again, perhaps it was a deliberate choice to take the "one pretends to be the other" story path off the table.)

And, as always, the production values throughout remain sky high. For example, it's a small detail, but I like how violent the passage through the transwarp conduit felt at the start of the episode. We've seen countless starships pass through countless such phenomena in Treks past, but the union of on-set shaking, visual effects, and sound design all served to make this space oddity feel more dangerous than we usually see. Other accents throughout the episode included an alien landscape with just enough subtle color tweaks to make it feel a bit alien, impressive visuals of crashed ships, the eerie translucence of a not-yet-developed android body, and more.

For the parts of the episode that weren't quite great to me (at least, not without part 2), I think I'll give "Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 1" a B. But if this is at or near as "bad" as the show has gotten all season, it is certainly a very high bar. I'm looking forward to the finale!

DS9 Flashback: Blaze of Glory

As season five of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine drew near a close, the writers had big plans for season six: the Dominion war. But they felt that this plus their many other ongoing story lines and characters were all a bit too much. Show runner Ira Steven Behr was determined to get closure somewhere. As he claims to have told his writing staff: "We are going to end something and then not hear about it again!" That something was the Maquis, and the episode was "Blaze of Glory."

Sisko receives intelligence that the Maquis are planning a deadly missile strike on Cardassia, an act that could ignite war between their new Dominion allies and the Federation. To avoid catastrophe, Sisko fetches Michael Eddington from prison for one last mission -- to stop the missiles before they reach their target. But Eddington secretly has his own objective. Meanwhile, Nog is feeling disrespected by the Klingons on Deep Space Nine, and searches for a way to be taken seriously.

I've said before of Maquis episodes that even though the entire concept was forced on Deep Space Nine by Star Trek: Voyager, DS9 wound up doing more with the idea. That was true even here at the end: Behr wanted to literally kill off every last Maquis in this episode, but was told not to do that by executive producer Rick Berman, "just in case" Voyager ever wanted to use them somehow. They never did, predictably, but DS9 still got its grand finale here by killing Eddington, pronouncing Sisko's old friend Cal Hudson dead (off-screen), and then never mentioning the Maquis ever again.

Just because this was the end, though, doesn't mean the writers weren't still building story. We get plenty more of the rivalry between Eddington and Sisko, digging into why each man is so offended by the other. Sisko says its disdain for any Starfleet officer who betrays their uniform; Eddington says Sisko can't get over the betrayal of himself, personally. Eddington still trumpets the nobility of his cause, defending people who were left by the Federation in impossible conditions to fend for themselves; Sisko says Eddington will put the blame anywhere but on himself, the troublemaker whose guerilla tactics only make the situation worse.

Sisko and Eddington play mind games with each other throughout this episode. Sisko risks both their lives to force Eddington to act. Eddington pledges to kill Sisko when he has the chance -- putting him in unnecessary danger once and delaying a rescue another time, if never actually making good on that threat. Eddington hides secrets from Sisko almost until the very end, and while Sisko always suspects he's being played somehow, he's never quite able to figure out how.

Eddington goes out at the end of the episode in the titular "Blaze of Glory," but not before we learn a few more things about him. He's Canadian, and used to carry with him a lucky loonie. (It's not at all ominous that he no longer has it.) And, just before his capture earlier in the season, he got married -- all the talk of missiles is just a coded message between Eddington and his wife.

Meanwhile, the episode has one of the show's signature B-plots meant to balance the drama with something light. Actually, according to Behr, this B plot, though about Nog, was really crafted to reassure the audience that Martok was still a presence on the station and the show after getting his own ship in "Soldiers of the Empire." The story is a parade of playful "whomp whomp" moments -- Jake is grossed out by Nog's food, Nog falls back in his bar chair while posturing to look tough, Klingons take over Jake and Nog's "spot" on the Promenade (as if they knew what that was) as the final insult. It just sort of coasts along until Nog learns the lesson your parents always told you about bullies: stand up to them, and they'll back down. Unhelpful and untrue in life, as I think anyone with experience will tell you. But it often works in fiction, and plays well enough here in a story line that's never meant to be serious.

Other observations:

• The establishing space shot of Eddington's prison facility is stolen from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan -- and no attempt is made to restore the footage or match the film grain. It looks quite out of place.

• Inside the prison, harsh lighting and subtle makeup are used to give Eddington some starkly sunken eyes.

• We hear that Morn, freaked out at the possibility of a Dominion attack, strips naked and barges into the Bajoran monastery. It's played for comedy, but it's an odd reaction to say the least, one you'd think might actually have long-term repercussions on Morn's freedom on the station.

• The visual effects of the Badlands keep improving every time we see them. Here, the swirling columns of flame look dangerous indeed. (Meanwhile, the Badlands now have an effect on a cloaking device, as justification for being out there in a runabout rather than the Defiant.)

I'm not so sure that another Maquis episode really felt necessary after the (in my mind) rather conclusive "For the Uniform." Still, this does all wrap things up in a tidy package. I give the episode a B.

Jam on It

"Word Game" is probably too broad a genre to declare a thing, but if it is one, it's a genre I've always been fond of. I've liked them since Scrabble and Taboo were among the only dozen-or-so games I really knew. From Codenames to Decrypto to Just One... I'm a fan. Most of these games tend to have fairly simple rules and strategies, though. And while simplicity can be great (and very hard to achieve in game design), I sometimes find myself wishing for something a little more sophisticated.

Taking aim at that target is Letter Jam, a new game from designer Ondra Skoupý. It's a cooperative game, in which every player is trying to figure out a five-letter word that's been prepared for them by another player. Each player's word is made up of five scrambled up, face-down cards with one letter each. Each round, players take one letter from their word and places it in a stand facing out so that everyone else can see the letter. Looking around the table, players suggest clue wordss that they could give using the letters visible at that particular moment -- including one wild card in the center of the table, if necessary.

"I can make a five letter word that uses three players' letters." "Well, I can make a six letter word that uses four players' letters and the wild." You can repeat a player's letter as often as needed. You can repeat the wild too, though you must use it for the same letter every time it appears in your word. Once players agree as a group on whose clue sounds best, that player gives it... but not by actually saying their word. They use a series of poker chips to mark letters and spell out their word.

For example, the word "settled." The player giving the clue grabs seven chips and puts the 1 in front of the first player's "S," the 2 in front of the second player's "E," the 3 and the 4 in front of the third player's "T," the 5 in front of the wild card he's secretly using as an "L," the 6 in front of the second player's "E" again (next to the 2), and finally a 7 in front of a fourth player's "D."

Each player then takes notes based on the information they've received. To player 2, based on the card she sees, that clue looks like "S-?-T-T-*-?-D." Hmm.... looks like I have a vowel. It's gotta be an "E," right? To player 4, the clue looks like "S-E-T-T-*-E-?" Hmm... do I have a D? An R? An S? I'm not sure yet. I'll need another clue.

Once a player thinks they have one letter, they move on to the next. Always forward, never back. You have only a little more than 10 rounds to clue everyone in. A mechanic encourages players to diversify their clues and give everyone a chance to give a clue at least once. At the end of the game, players must try to rearrange their five face down cards in a way that will spell out a five letter word when revealed. If everyone pulls that off, the group wins!

I love the idea of this game. I love playing it too. But I have to admit, there is an element of "be careful what you wish for" to this game. It is more sophisticated than most games, with a lot of strategy in how word clues can be given -- and that makes it a lot harder to explain and much more difficult to play than, say, Just One. To a casual observer, a game of Letter Jam can, at times, look like a bunch of people sitting in silence for a minute or more (as they stare around the circle trying to figure out how to give the best clue based on what they see).

Also, for being a more "gamer's game" kind of thing, its scoring system is pretty squishy. You can play it "pass/fail," with everyone either correctly guessing their word or not... or you can try to use this elaborate scoring mechanism the game suggests as an alternative: this many points for each correct letter, this many bonus points for each letter added on to a word (using another rules mechanism), this many points for shaving rounds off the game, etc. It certainly looks like a method to quantify your group's performance, but in practice it feels like more trouble than it's worth.

Among my group, after just a couple of plays, it's looking as though these shortcomings (particularly the "clue difficulty" issue) are turning most of the players off. I like the game a lot, but I'm already doubtful I'll get to play many (any?) more times. It's definitely for specific tastes. I would give Letter Jam a B+ (which is maybe an A- personally, demoted for its accessibility).

DS9 Flashback: Children of Time

Just when the writers of Deep Space Nine had seemingly closed the door on Kira and Odo as a couple, along came an episode to kick that door wide open -- presenting an interesting personal quandary for plenty of other characters in the process.

While investigating unusual readings at a planet in the Gamma Quadrant, the Defiant encounters a colony of thousands of their own descendants! It seems that their attempt to leave the planet in a few days' time is destined to fling them 200 years into the past, where they'll become trapped and begin a new life. But knowing about this accident gives them the means to avoid it -- and a tricky moral dilemma. Do they avoid their destiny and return to their own lives, consigning their own descendants to non-existence? Or do they abandon everyone and everything, and let an injured Kira die, so that the people of this colony may live?

At first, the episode feels a lot like an episode of The Next Generation: the ship is on its way somewhere else when it diverts to do some random science, winding up in a situation that technobabble might be able to solve. But it soon becomes a uniquely Deep Space Nine take on a Next Gen premise, more deeply rooted in the characters and their history, and with very personal stakes.

The story got there in a roundabout way. Outside writer Gary Holland had seen Rene Auberjonois interact with Kira in his previous second season episode and concluded Odo was secretly in love with her. So long before the staff was ready to play with that idea, Holland was trying to come up with a way Odo's secret might come out. His idea: some sort of time travel premise that would bring in an older, more mature Odo who was more open with his feelings.

By the time Holland pitched that idea, the staff felt that too many time travel ideas had been put in the mix -- they'd just done the "Past Tense" two-parter, and "The Visitor" was on the horizon. So the response was "good idea, but not right now." But in season five, when another outside writer (Ethan H. Calk) independently pitched almost exactly the same idea, the staff decided the time had come. They bought both pitches, had both writers submit an outline, and wound up taking the best parts of each to then craft the script.

Indeed, it is an interesting Odo story. The older version truly is different, with Rene Auberjonois giving a more relaxed performance, assisted by a lighter costume and a less severe makeup. It's also well contrasted with an especially awkward "regular Odo" at the beginning of the episode, as he reacts oddly to the (off-screen) breakup of Kira and Shakaar.

There's a great story arc in the episode for Kira too, as her religious faith comes into conflict with a Star Trek-brand technobabble cheat that would allow her to escape destiny. Her entire life has been devotion to causes greater than herself, and she stays consistent when it's literally her life weighed against literally thousands.

Both Auberjonois and Nana Visitor play the Odo/Kira scenes with the right emotions -- even though (for different reasons) they were reportedly not fans of this story. Visitor felt that the two characters should have stayed friends, that it would have been more interesting to maintain their "real deep friendship without it becoming physical." Auberjonois felt the final twist -- that the older Odo chooses Kira over all the lives in the colony -- was "tricky" for his character, sending a dubious message to the audience. The writers, for their part, loved taking the less obvious route. After early talk that Yedrin Dax would have the change of heart that Sisko and Jadzia assume, show runner Ira Steven Behr insisted on painting Odo in the shades of gray in which the series thrived.

The episode does a remarkable job of making us care about the fates of the people of the colony, through smart connections to most of the main characters. The character of Yedrin is arguably most effective here, in that it is Dax, several hosts later. Guest star Gary Frank seems to have been given some episodes to study for his performance here; he appropriates parts of how Terry Farrell speaks and stands, and it feels quite natural when Sisko starts calling him "old man" like Jadzia. (But his more sparse spots are a nice unspoken nod to the fact that Trill genes are thin in the colony pool.) Meanwhile, Jadzia herself is full of regret for having brought them all to this planet in the first place.

O'Brien is set up as the "last person to come around" -- after talking about his family back on the station and pointedly refusing to engage with the colonists, him changing his mind is a big moment. Worf gets the opportunity to lead a group of Klingons -- some by blood, some by choice -- in a lesson that some enemies are not defeated by armed combat: he directs them to help the colonists plant their fields. Bashir is almost eager to embrace his destiny, or at least interested in exploring it. Sisko is seen playing joyfully with a baby, as he has done in past episodes. Nearly all the main characters are in this episode, and all of them ultimately open their hearts to these descendants. No matter who your favorite character is on Deep Space Nine, you have an avenue into caring about this story.

Other observations:

• Shakaar has made his last appearance on the series, as Kira announces they've broken up at the start of this episode. The writers have said that by jumping him straight from Resistance hero to government leader, they left him no arc but to become an adversary of Sisko and our gang -- a role they preferred giving to Kai Winn. (Fair enough. You want to give good material to the Academy Award winning actress who wants to keep doing your show.)

• Matte paintings are often static in Star Trek up to this time, but in this episode we see moving wind turbines to help sell the environment. There's also poignant outdoor shooting at the site of Kira's grave. From how windy you can see it was on the day, you know they must have had to re-record every last line of dialogue. Still, the visuals are worth it.

• The "medical device" that Bashir stores "present day Odo" inside is a bread maker that was widely available at the time.

• It's important to this story that it takes place in the Gamma Quadrant -- stranding our heroes not just in the past but on the wrong side of the undiscovered Bajoran wormhole, should they go back in time. Interestingly (according to info I found online), this is the last episode to have any scenes set in the Gamma Quadrant until the series finale.

• The discussion of whether the crew will go back in time shows just what was lost in the previous edict that characters shouldn't have conflict with each other on Star Trek. O'Brien pointedly notes that for all he and Kira have been through together, he doesn't believe in her prophets. And when Worf suggests that O'Brien be willing to let his family go, the Chief notes that Worf hardly ever sees his own son. It's very meaningful texture that draws a bit of emotional blood without inflicting permanent damage.

While "Children of Time" is built on one of the more elaborate science fiction premises presented on Deep Space Nine, that emerged from the desire to tell a character-driven story. The results are effective and emotional. I give the episode an A-.

Roux the Day

It seems like ski season may have ended early. (Right now, Colorado resorts are only officially closed for one week, but... yeah, right.) Yet while winter was in force (and COVID-19 was not), I was fortunate to get in a lot of skiing. On one of the long drives into the mountains, my husband and I passed the time with an audiobook novella: Wally Roux, Quantum Mechanic.

This is a story released exclusively on Audible, written by Nick Carr. Protagonist Wally Roux has been uprooted from his home in Maine by his Mom, to now live Savannah, Georgia. But his struggles to fit in at a new school aren't the most pressing problems on his agenda. He keeps discovering strange anomalies in the fabric of space-time -- and as the only one qualified to even recognize the problems, he takes it upon himself to fix them.

Whether you'll be satisfied by this story depends a great deal on your expectations. That brain-tickling title would set many up to expect a tangled sci-fi extravaganza... which is decidedly not the focus of the story. Science fiction is merely the accent, the spice in the meal, to add flavor to what is very much a character study. Wally Roux, Quantum Mechanic is really an examination of adolescent awkwardness, particularly when dealing with issues of race and adoption. And even though the story clocks in at less than two hours, it takes its time unspooling this, weaving its themes throughout.

Nick Carr is good with a clever turn of phrase. This is an excellent exercise in fully developing the world view of a single character and writing exclusively from his point of view. Wally Roux has relatable problems (aside from the space-time anomalies), and the attitude he wears as an armor to face them is also relatable as a response. He's funny and witty... but also conflicted and troubled.

I think this is a good story to make available in the audiobook format, as much of the appeal comes from the performance of William Jackson Harper. Fans of The Good Place (and if you aren't one, you should be) will know him as Chidi, and there are many superficial connections between that character and Wally Roux that make him an ideal narrator for this story. Harper knows how to play a character cursed with too much awareness. But he gets a chance here to stretch in other ways; not only is Wally Roux also a sassier character than Chidi, Harper also effectively voices other characters and embues them with different personalities.

I'd have to say that the end of the story isn't as compelling as the journey itself; though it starts out quirky and clever, Nick Carr ultimately writes to an ending that feels more conventional than all that, pretty standard introspection about "the road not taken." But I also think it's likely that in this tight a package, no ending really could have done any better. Again: this isn't actually a science fiction story, it's a character study using science fiction as its medium.

Wally Roux, Quantum Mechanic is a solid B. If you're already on Audible and looking for something small and manageable as opposed to a 30+ hour epic, you might want to consider it.

Broken Pieces

Tilt your head one way, and not a lot actually happened in the latest episode of Star Trek: Picard. The characters generally ended the episode in the same place they began it, there was lots of sitting around and talking, and it was full of big chunks of exposition. But this is how I know I'm all in on this series at this point. My head was tilted a different way, and I was really here for it.

Aboard La Sirena, Rios retreats into isolation upon meeting Soji. When he's finally persuaded by Raffi to emerge, his information, combined with more from Dr. Jurati and unlocked memories inside Soji, reveals the full scope of what happened in the Mars attack years earlier, and why. Meanwhile, aboard the Borg cube, Seven of Nine comes to the rescue of Elnor. But what she must do next to rid the cube of Romulans is a step she's reluctant to take.

There hardly seems a way to talk about this episode without wading directly into the SPOILERS, so... you know the drill, people. That said, you may well have predicted the rough shape of what was revealed this episode, even if the particulars were unclear. That's because every part of this story is connected. The synth revolt on Mars was created by the Zhat Vash, precisely to cause the Federation response it caused. The semi-derelict Borg cube? That's connected too, as the assimilation of knowledge in Ramdha's mind is what ultimately caused the collective to sever its link.

And yet, as satisfying as all this revelation was (and it was), I thought there was still more compelling exposition delivered elsewhere in the episode: the story behind what drove Rios out of Starfleet. This episode was all about revealing his secret past... and who better to do that than Raffi? We learned what happened to a captain he admired, and how Starfleet's policies drove a man to kill himself. It certainly reinforces Picard's declaration in the very first episode, that Starfleet wasn't itself anymore.

This dramatic history was exposed with deftly handled humor, as Santiago Cabrera got to chew the scenery as five different holographic characters with five different personalities and accents. (Of course, the engineer was Scottish.) It was something of a microcosm of the series as a whole -- great fun on the way to something deeper. And it was a perfect marriage of performance and, during the big "group therapy" scene, seamless visual effects.

Still more exposition woven into the episode let us know why the Romulans are doing what they're doing -- an ancient civilization left behind a convincing warning. Given what we see in the opening scene, with a half-dozen Romulans committing grisly suicide when exposed to this knowledge, it's a testament to Dr. Jurati that she didn't fall apart more than she did. You could argue that perhaps Oh (revealed to be half-Vulcan, half-Romulan) filtered some of the worst from her mindmeld, but she doesn't come off as the type to be concerned with human frailties.

But if Oh is the leader, Rizzo is the true believer. We saw in flashback that she met all this information with steely resolve. This rounds out her character some, perhaps making her less of a mustache-twirling villain than we've seen so far... though perhaps it makes any restraint she's previously shown less understandable in retrospect? (But she's now totally on a course to be at odds with her softer brother Narek when he re-enters the story, right?)

Seven of Nine re-entered the story herself, in what to me was the weakest plot thread of the episode. I certainly felt for her reluctance to be personally responsible for the re-enslavement of countless former Borg. Yet the culmination of that story largely let her off the hook -- most were vented out into space by Rizzo, while the handful that may have remained seemingly released her with "more work to do." For what this show has given us so far, it felt like an uncharacteristically easy out. (Though, of course, I'm glad to still have Seven in the story.)

There were other treats at the margins, from a reference to Picard's former classmate (shown in "Tapestry") becoming a captain, to the return of the delightfully potty-mouthed Admiral Clancy. (I've seen complaints online from fans who say the language means they can't watch Star Trek: Picard with their kids now. I see few complaints about the more graphic violence of the series, though, so...)

I give "Broken Pieces" a B+. It may have been a little exposition-dense, but then, the way all the threads of the story came together felt quite satisfying to me. I'm looking forward to the next two weeks to see how it all wraps up.

DS9 Flashback: Soldiers of the Empire

The previous episode of Deep Space Nine was all about "how Quark got his groove back." Next up was an episode all about "how Martok got his groove back" -- aka "Soldiers of the Empire."

General Martok is being given command of his first ship since escaping the Dominion prison camp, and he wants Worf at his side as first officer. With Dax joining as science officer, the Rotarran sets out to rescue a missing cruiser. But the crew hasn't won a battle in far too long, and edges toward mutiny when Martok avoids combat in dogged pursuit of the mission. Worf and Martok may soon be at odds with one another.

The inspiration for this episode came when show runner Ira Steven Behr asked resident "Klingon expert" Ron Moore to write an episode as if for a TV series called Star Trek: Klingon. Thrilled to break format, Moore's story pitch involved a missing colony near a foggy lake, where a boatman appears to ferry Worf and Martok to Klingon "hell"... and encounters with Worf's father and a dead friend of Martok's. Between the budgetary demands and the rather heady philosophical content, this was judged to be too much of what Behr had asked for. The "hell" angle was removed (later to become the basis of a Star Trek: Voyager episode), leaving behind a simple adventure aboard a Klingon ship.

I wish we could have seen the original version, because what's left feels a bit "been there, done that" at times. We spent time on a Klingon ship on The Next Generation, when Riker served aboard one in "A Matter of Honor." This isn't exactly the same -- but the thread of mutiny runs through both, and both have the same climatic moment of a main character having to turn on a Klingon captain. But I'd say the Next Gen episode had more tension in it, with the mutiny being about whether to launch an attack on the Enterprise. This story features a more run-of-the-mill "Klingons gotta Klingon" kind of conflict.

On the other hand, the personalities of this story are more well-drawn. Leskit and Tornan and Tavana are all one-off characters, but with far more variety than Klingons usually get. Plus of course, we come into this with reason to care about the friendship between Martok and Worf, background on how they helped lift each other's spirits during their time in Dominion prison, and a sense of what they owe each other as a result. It's also almost a better Dax episode than a Worf episode, with Dax serving as the real pivot point between a demoralized crew and the superior officers who don't see the depth of the problem. (Worf's big moment comes at the end, when he throws his fight with Martok, and is then offered to join his Klingon house.)

If you are into Klingons (more than I am), this episode is steeped with plenty of fun flavor. We get Klingon takes on Starfleet customs, from assuming one's post to recording log entries. We get a Klingon "sea shanty" (which was originally written for a Star Trek video game made prior to this). Amid a fun dinner scene of insults and revelry, Dax and Tavana bond over the former's past host and latter's mother having lecherous good times together -- a conversation we'd never see on a Starfleet ship. There's personality to it all, just not much in the way of stakes.

Other observations:

• It's not just Worf and Martok who bonded during their time in prison. Bashir and Martok are shown to have a good rapport too, riffing over the difficulty of getting blood out of the Infirmary carpets.

• Nog gets some fun comedy as Worf and Martok tower over him during a conversation, and he'd rather be anywhere but stuck between them. 

• It seems like being taken prisoner must be quite a dishonor among Klingons. At least, that's the reason I can think of for why Martok, a high-ranking general who once served as Gowron's right hand, is given such a dump of an old ship crewed by demoralized misfits.

• "Kellicams" were a Klingon unit of distance invented for Star Trek III: The Search for Spock. They're referenced here in a quick but deep bit of continuity. (Also from the Star Trek movies, the old Klingon battle cruiser model makes an appearance.)

• It was apparently a hard and fast rule on Star Trek that sound from inside a ship was not to be heard while looking at the outside of the ship. Director LeVar Burton lobbied for an exception here, which plays wonderfully as the Klingons sing their way into battle.

• After all the talk about how these Klingons need to see battle, we don't get to see battle. The episode jump cuts past the ship combat. (Don't worry, though. We'll get our fill in later episodes, once the Dominion War heats up.)

I might be too much of a sourpuss when it comes to Klingon episodes, but in my book, "Soldiers of the Empire" is a B-. The characters are well-used throughout, but in a story line that also feels "well-used" to me.

The Map to Fun

I've written before about the trendy "roll and write" genre of board games. Like any other popular category of game, designers are always working to expand the field with clever twists and innovations. In some cases, it's to remove the "roll" part of "roll and write" (the dice) entirely. That's what designer Jordy Adan has done with Cartographers. (Or, including its quite misleading subtitle, Cartographers: A Roll Player Tale.)

Each player is given a sheet of paper with a large grid on which to map their fantasy countryside. In each round, two cards are flipped face up, presenting two different options everyone can add to their map. Each option shows one or two terrain types (from a handful of possibilities) and one or two terrain shapes (think Tetris piece). Everyone draws their choice, then play advances to a new pair of cards.

After a few rounds, the game pauses for scoring; this happens four times for the seasons of spring, summer, fall, and winter. In each season, points are awarded for two different game conditions that are randomly determined at the start of each game. Each condition counts in two different seasons, making you care about particular terrain types for a time before moving on to other considerations.

Periodically, a card flips up that requires each terrain a player draws be put in one a few specific locations on their grid. At other times, an "attack" requires you to pass your map to an adjacent player, who then draws bad terrain on your map in the most meddlesome way they can contrive. These two elements throw wrenches into your carefully laid plans and force you to adapt on the fly.

It's a fairly easy game to explain and understand, with the most complicated element really just being the particular scoring conditions in any given game. (Some of them are considerably more complicated than others, and don't necessarily sink in at first glance.) The rules simplicity, plus the fact that (like so many "roll and write" games) it can expand so easily to any number of players, makes Cartographers a great "large group" game. We've played with as many as seven before, and the only theoretical upper limit is the number of game sheets you have to pass around.

Although the gameplay was quite different, Cartographers nevertheless reminded me a fair bit of another game I've played, Welcome To.... Both are spatial-minded games where players act simultaneously. The particulars are quite different, though -- and I find myself preferring Cartographers. The scoring system makes a huge difference; where Welcome To... just sort of presents all scoring options at all times and leaves it to you to figure out where to go, Cartographers cleverly funnels you to different goals at different times. That may sound like it's less strategically engaging, but the helping hand is actually quite nice. And you still have plenty of agency -- you could, for instance, give up what scores well for spring in order to score extra big for what's coming in fall.

That said, there is one element shared between Welcome To... and Cartographers that I'm much more skeptical of: it's another game where every player is presented the exact same choices at every stage of play. What you choose doesn't affect any other player. That means that in the end, you can't help but compare yourself directly to the winning player. If only you'd made exactly the choices they made throughout the game, you would have shared the win too.

Cartographers has at least a little bit of mitigation in this that Welcome To... does not have. There's that attack mechanism, where you must pass your map to another player to sabotage -- you have no say in what happens to it then. Also, the map's large grid offers far more possibilities about where you draw your terrain than the streets of Welcome To.... The choice matrix is much larger, making it harder to believe you really could have done exactly as the leader did.

In a competition between the two games, Cartographers comes out ahead for me. Still, I remain a little leery of the somewhat "tandem solitaire" nature of the "roll and write" games I've seen so far. I give Cartographers a B.

DS9 Flashback: Ferengi Love Songs

Deep Space Nine tried its best to circulate around all its many cast members, giving each of them episodes throughout a season in which to shine. In an odd bit of timing, two different Quark episodes arrived in a three-episode span near the end of season five. But where "Business As Usual" had been a dark look at Quark's moral boundaries, "Ferengi Love Songs" was more traditional Ferengi comedy.

Quark has the blues -- and when his bar is closed for days on end for pest control, he has nothing to take his mind off it. He takes his brother's suggestion and visits home, where he learns that his mother has secretly become romantically involved with Grand Nagus Zek. Quark's rival Brunt then arrives with a proposition: break up the happy couple, and Quark's business license will be reinstated. But there's more to the relationship between Zek and "Moogie" than first meets the eye. Meanwhile, Rom and Leeta have decided to get married. But when Rom begins to fret about losing his Ferengi culture, he asks Leeta to sign a prenuptial agreement... and risks destroying the engagement.

This is an episode about two loving relationships that almost get sabotaged by outsiders. That they could be sabotaged so easily suggests maybe they're not quite solid relationships, but hey -- that's one hour television. Both story lines are comedic, but let's start with arguably the lighter of the two, the "B plot."

Though the story of Rom and Leeta's rocky engagement is played only for laughs, it actually speaks to some fairly serious issues with Rom, if you stop to think about it. For all the abuse Rom takes from his brother without apparently internalizing any of it, it takes just a couple of stray comments from O'Brien (that it's great Rom is changing for Leeta) and Dax (that Rom is the least Ferengi-like Ferengi she's ever known) to send him into a major shame spiral. Rom's ex-wife clearly left some emotional scars, and it seems he'd rather hurt himself than risk letting another woman hurt him again. This could be the stuff of serious drama.

But we're talking about Rom, of course -- in an episode that generally has the tone of a cartoon. (Directing yet again on a Ferengi episode, Rene Auberjonois literally used the word "cartoon" to describe this one.) So we get Rom wailing so loudly in public that he attracts notice from Sisko. We get him impulsively giving up his (meager) life savings as though that's somehow the answer to his troubles.

Leeta gets similarly broad treatment. Being asked to sign an offensive prenup could be the inciting incident of a dramatic story, but instead Leeta huffs around for a while, eventually unburdens herself to a smirking Kira, and finally makes up with Rom. I don't suppose I actually want the serious version of this story. And the actors are fun in this silly take. (Nana Visitor in particular seems to really enjoy having something light for a change.) But it is sort of odd for Deep Space Nine, the show with the reputation for being "dark and serious Star Trek," to deal with such potentially deep material in this way.

Things get broader still in the A plot. It's a door-slamming farce without the slamming, as characters actually hide inside Quark's closet. Here, people are trying to break up a happy relationship, Quark with modest goals, and Brunt with the hopes of becoming Grand Nagus. It's a plot that gives us plenty of sight gags, from towering Maihar'du bending almost in half at the waist to get through Ferengi doors, to Quark basically playing with Star Trek action figures.

The writers had apparently imagined putting Zek and Moogie together from her first appearance on the series. But when Andrea Martin refused to return to the role (and its extreme makeup demands), it took a while for them to decide it would be okay to recast. Cecily Adams does a credible enough impression of Martin that between it and the makeup, you might well never notice the difference.

As in the B plot, there is the potential in the A plot for a more dramatic angle that the show isn't interested in. But at least here, the themes are voiced, sort of slid in under the audience guard amid the zaniness. As always when dealing with Moogie and Ferengi society, there's commentary on sexism. Even her own son is blind to it, with Quark complaining at one point that she can't know what it's like for him not to be able to earn profit. The financial advice she gives to Zek initially has to be given anonymously, as if from a man.

Then there's the whole idea of a powerful leader in growing cognitive decline, propped up by people around him. Plus the politics not just of equality but of capitalism. The episode casually drops in the scathing idea that a leader's personal greed is okay, so long as it also reflects the public greed. But mostly, it's really just quite silly. You could argue that Star Trek -- even Deep Space Nine -- does get this silly on occasion. (Say, when tribbles are involved.) But I'd say this episode is trying to be funny more than it's actually being funny. Some of the jokes land; many don't.

Other observation (just the one this time):

• In the opening scene, it seems they're using phasers to go after the voles in Quark's bar. I mean, I guess those can be set for stun, but it still seems surprisingly inhumane for the enlightened future.

Among both lighter episodes and Ferengi episodes, "Ferengi Love Songs" is not my favorite. Still, it's fun enough in moments to deserve perhaps a B- overall.

Miscarriage of Justice

Every now and then, a friend posting about a movie will say something along the lines of: "I thought it was going to be really bad, but it turned out to be decent." Usually, that sort of review makes me think: "if you thought is was going to be so bad, why did you see it?" Well, I must now point the finger back at myself, as I have watched a movie that I not only thought would be bad, I'd been explicitly warned it was bad by just about everyone I know who saw it.

Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice is inevitably compared to films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and always comes out worse in the comparison. The DC creative forces were trying to force their own Avengers before putting in all the pre-Avengers legwork Marvel did to make that happen. I've heard it all. The characters felt off. The atmosphere was relentlessly grim and dark. So why see it? Well... Wonder Woman did turn out to be fairly good. And Aquaman looked like it might be entertaining. But maybe I should see Justice League first? And maybe that requires seeing Batman v. Superman first? See, it's this whole road to hell you walk one step at a time or something.

The movie marks the first appearance of both Batman and Wonder Woman in the incarnation of the DC Universe that began with Man of Steel. Horrified at the destruction in Metropolis at the climax of that film, Bruce Wayne is determined to find a strategic advantage over Superman and, if necessary, use it. Agitate with some manipulation by Lex Luthor, and the two heroes are soon at each other's throats.

It's an incredibly silly and internally inconsistent film. Though ostensibly a response to audience criticism over the wanton destruction of Man of Steel, the movie itself builds to a finale also marked by casual carnage and the annihilation of countless computer pixels. The characters are tissue thin, blowing in the breeze in whatever way the plot requires; Batman's attitude pivots in a literal instant at the crescendo of the movie (as has been widely and deservedly mocked).

The movie clocks in at two-and-a-half hours, and yet it somehow manages to feel strangely truncated. For one thing, we're denied a satisfying helping of the few parts of the movie that do work. Gal Gadot makes a striking entrance as Wonder Woman, though she appears in perhaps 15 minutes of film at best. She doesn't have any worthwhile scenes of her own, either; she just shows up randomly in advance of her far better solo movie. Scenes abound in the movie that feel oddly edited, as though lines were cut from the top or sliced from the end in an effort to get in, get out, get on to the next moment as soon as possible.

Worst of all is the portrayal of Lex Luthor by Jesse Eisenberg. Sure, many actors have played the role on film and television over the decades, so it's wise to try and chart a different path. But the script kneecaps his performance right out of the gate with an unrecognizable take on the character. The Lex Luthor of this film doesn't seem brilliant or tactical, he seems like a crazed force for entropy, as though a late find/replace command on the script substituted all previous references of the name "Joker."

What's good? Well, besides Gal Gadot's Wonder Woman, not much. Jeremy Irons is fun as an especially weary and put-upon Alfred. Amy Adams is a likeable Lois Lane (though very much underused in the story). The music by Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL is bold and clever, weaving together several disparate themes that don't necessarily seem like they would have worked together (and that don't copy Zimmer's previous Batman work for director Christopher Nolan). And... that's about all.

I'd say Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice rates about a D+. It's the brazen blockbuster that really is as bad as people say it is. And yet, it suckered me in too.

Nepenthe

The nostalgia factor of the latest Star Trek: Picard episode was sky high. It was almost inevitable that I, and many longtime Star Trek fans, were going to love it. So perhaps price that in when I say that "Nepenthe" was my favorite episode yet of this new series. (I should also note that SPOILERS abound through the rest of this post, so if you haven't watched, you can take that ringing endorsement and head on out of here.)

Picard hides out with Soji on the planet Nepenthe, where Will Riker and Deanna Troi have made a home with their teenage daughter Kestra. They're eager to help their former captain, and we learn why he was previously reluctant to ask them: their family has suffered a tragic loss. Yet Riker, Troi, Picard, and Kestra all do their best to help Soji reckon with the massive revelation of her true identity. Meanwhile, La Sirena is being tracked by Narek on its way to Nepenthe, and Rios begins to suspect one of his passengers may be the means. On the Borg cube, Elnor tries to protect Hugh and get to safety.

I think it's a testament to the quality of this episode that even its more cliche moments still really worked for me. I still don't exactly buy Elnor staying behind on the cube, and it led to a trope parade of tossing aside weapons in favor of cinematic fist fights, and holding a friend as he dies in your arms. But hearing composer Jeff Russo use the Picard theme for Elnor as he heeded his call to adventure was as potent to me as it was meant to be. Hugh thanking Elnor for taking up his "lost cause" was sweet. (Would I have rather seen Geordi reunite with Hugh at some point? Sure -- but Hugh really had been dealt an unrecoverable emotional blow in the deaths of so many "xBs" at the start of the episode.)

The drama aboard La Sirena was more potent still. It was great to see Raffi, so broken herself, try to tend to someone else clearly breaking. She never fully understood Jurati's torment, but inched ever closer to it throughout the episode, "medicating" with cake and chocolate rather than her own choices of alcohol and vaping. Meanwhile, Rios was also misdiagnosing the situation, getting far enough to realize his ship was being tracked, but incorrectly identifying the traitor in his midst. Did he suspect Raffi because she's more obviously troubled? Or did he not suspect Jurati because he slept with her? Either way, he's in for some regret.

But nothing compared to the regret Jurati feels over what she did to Maddox. Sure enough, we got the inevitable flashback to Commodore Oh and the rest of her memorable, sunglassed visit to the doctor earlier in the series. Jurati seems neither to have been coerced nor brainwashed. She was just powerfully convinced... but in a way that fades as she sinks deeper and deeper into an espionage she simply isn't built for. Was she trying to put herself in a coma, or was the medical hologram's intervention enough to overcome a sincere effort to kill herself? My take is the latter, and that Jurati will awaken at a future point with a great deal of guilt to somehow work through.

Speaking of that flashback, arguably the biggest revelation of it was that Oh is actually a Vulcan (capable of performing a mindmeld) and not a disguised Romulan. We learn how Jurati was so deeply convinced to turn on Maddox and spy on Picard. Yet to be determined is why Oh herself is so convinced of the threat of synths. Is she a manipulator, or manipulated? How much does she really know about Rizzo?

As interesting as all those other elements were, though, the real centerpiece of the episode was the time with Riker and Troi -- every last moment of which was perfection. The tragedy of their back story was effective, giving them a reason wholly different from Picard to have left Starfleet, yet one also ultimately rooted in the larger story of the series. It was heartwarming to see that the loss of a child caused no rift between the two, instead bonding them together more than ever.

Riker and Troi could easily have been brought into the show to wave to the fans and exit stage, but it felt essential that it was the two of them, and at this moment in the story. Troi got to do actual counseling, as she only too rarely did on The Next Generation. She really drove at how profound an emotional crisis Soji was facing, and zeroed in on Picard's emotional state as well. Riker got to act as Number One one more time, offering his dinner table as a conference table, giving his captain his thoughts when prompted, and steering Picard onto the right track. And yet even as these three fell into a pattern defined by their old jobs, we saw interactions between them all that felt distinctly more personal than all that. They were friends first, colleagues second. It was a time that rejuvenated Picard and made him truly, fully ready to be Picard again.

And while these three actors, so beloved by Star Trek fans, were commanding all the attention, it might have been easy to overlook what a performance Isa Briones was giving as Soji. This was an unimaginably big upset to Soji's entire existence, and the episode was asking a lot of Briones to portray it convincingly. She did, wonderfully, and with great help from child actor Lulu Wilson as Kestra. The relationship between Soji and Kestra felt like something Star Trek has tried for before and never effectively reached -- like, say, when Data and the guileless kid in Star Trek: Insurrection became friends. Here, the writing reached for and grasped this important dynamic.

Even the little accents were on point: from references to the "gormagander" of Star Trek: Discovery to reminding us of Picard's artificial heart, to the names of Riker and Troi's children honoring family we already new about ("Thaddeus" being an American Civil War ancestor of Riker's; "Kestra" being Troi's decesased older sister).

It feels like they kind of made an episode of Star Trek: Picard right at me. And I absolutely loved it. It was a grade A, and as I said, the best yet for the series.

DS9 Flashback: Ties of Blood and Water

Deep Space Nine is well known for becoming more serialized in its later seasons. Part of that was not just a willingness to tell a story across multiple, consecutive episodes -- it was a willingness to do follow-ups to earlier episodes that, on previous Star Trek series, would have been one-offs. Bringing back Kira's Cardassian "father" was one such follow-up, in the episode "Ties of Blood and Water."

Legate Tekeny Ghemor, the Cardassian who embraced Kira as a daughter when the two were used in an Obsidian Order scheme, is coming to Deep Space Nine. But it isn't a social call. He is dying, and wants to unburden his secrets to Kira before he passes. Kira is out of her depth in providing end-of-life care, and is haunted by her past and her final moments with her own father. Looming over all of this are galactic stakes: Gul Dukat wants Ghemor extradited to Cardassia, and is using his new Dominion allies to force the issue.

Star Trek, in all its incarnations, focuses a lot on "found families," with the crew of a ship (or station) bonding with each other far more deeply than with the occasional parent or sibling that swings in to guest star every now and then. But Kira goes one step farther in choosing the people who are family to her, and this episode thrusts her found family into the spotlight, giving her a chance to say goodbye to a father figure in a way she never did with her actual father.

While we haven't actually seen Kira's relationship with Ghemor develop over time, the episode does a credible job of making us believing in it. Kira expresses real childlike eagerness over Ghemor coming to the station as the episode begins. She's proud to introduce him to baby Kirayoshi O'Brien -- sharing a child that isn't truly hers with a father who also isn't truly hers. Yet for both Kira and Ghemor, the feeling of these connections is genuine.

At the same time, the episode doesn't paper over the significance that Kira has been able to forge this kind of connection with a Cardassian, of all people. Worf is shocked -- almost appalled -- to learn this. What's more, it turns out that Ghemor has done bad things, which Dukat is able to exploit to drive an almost permanent wedge between him and Kira.

The episode also tries to show truth in what it's like to care (medically and emotionally) for a fading loved one. The first of two powerful monologues by Nana Visitor is ostensibly about whether Kira can ask the right questions of Ghemor to maximize the intelligence win, but it's really a monologue about whether she's up to being with a loved one in their final moments -- as she was not for her real father. Sisko and Odo both prove to be good friends to Kira, gently pushing her into an uncomfortable situation that will ultimately bring her growth and closure.

That growth and closure comes in the second monologue by Visitor, near the end of the episode, in which Kira's numbness at Ghemor's death slowly gives way to acceptance of both his loss and that of her father years ago. I've said it before, but you can always count on Nana Visitor to deliver in scenes like these. (And when he's directing, as he did in this episode, Avery Brooks never fails to get the best out of a performer.)

But all that said, this episode doesn't pack as big an emotional punch as other Kira-centric episodes have. I think it's because in between those two big monologues, a lot of what we see is more fun than moving. A lot of the episode revolves around Dukat's machinations. It's a treat to watch Sisko trade barbs with him, or watch Kira throw something at him. It's cool to see Ghemor stand up to him, even when Dukat dangles the thing he wants more anything: information on the whereabouts of Ghemor's real daughter. But those sorts of thrills pull you away from really living in the end-of-life drama that's playing out.

That's not even mentioning the biggest thrill of all: the return of Jeffrey Combs in the role of Weyoun. The Vorta species had been a tough nut for the writers to crack, and when they finally found an actor who did it, his character had unfortunately died in the very same episode. So much did they like Combs and his performance that the entire idea of Vorta cloning was invented as a way of bringing him back. And while Weyoun's antics here do take the sting out of the drama in this episode, it's clear that bringing back Jeffrey Combs was the right thing to do for the series. It would be worth it alone for the scene in which Weyoun knowingly ingests poison!

Other observations:

• Speaking of returning characters, here we see Kira's resistance friend Furel in flashback. (And, at this point in time, while he still had two arms.)

• Thomas Kopache gives a solid performance as Kira's dying father. But Last Week Tonight With John Oliver has kind of "ruined" him for me -- I now just see him as the "Catheter Cowboy."

Leavened a bit too much with humor, I think, "Ties of Blood and Water" isn't as strong as it could be. But I still think it has enough great scenes to work out to a B+.