302. ProgressFORMULA: Preemptive Strike + The Ensigns of Command + Past Prologue
WHY WE LIKE IT: The Ja-Nog Consortium (stem bolts especially). A sympathetic Kira.
WHY WE DON'T: Bajoran environmental policy.
REVIEW: I will always question the decision to destroy an inhabitable moon for the sake of giving "thousands" of homes (not "millions" mind you) power over the winter. Not that similar disregard doesn't happen in the real world, but that the Federation characters in the story are turning a blind eye to it. This is an odd conceit, but one that gets Kira into a difficult situation. She's suddenly part of the establishment, and after being an underdog all her life, it's unpleasant. How do you make that transition when you've "won"?
Nana Visitor has a tendency to over-emote in sad scenes, but when restrained and empathetic, she's quite good. Shades of Ro, how she responds to a father figure is key here. Mulibok is a great logician manipulator, a gentle caustic who wins her admiration by being just as hard-headed as she used to be (well, still is). They've got some great scenes together, and her final solution not to choose between her heart and her duty, but in a sense, to choose both, is devastating. And as has become a Kira story tradition, it ends on a down note and avoids a pat epilogue.
Sisko also gets to shine here, as he aids and abets Kira by ordering Bashir to give a particular report. As in Captive Pursuit, Sisko gives the benefit of the doubt to his officers, and isn't a rulebook kind of guy. Still, he has a good talk to Kira that hits all the right notes about saving her career and what can actually be accomplished by her act of resistance. He leaves it up to her, and I do think this is where they bond. I'm loving his style.
The B-story is a personal favorite, cementing Jake and Nog's charm. In a sort of follow-up to the previous episode, Nog follows "opportunity" with the help of Jake's instincts, and pulls an amusing "red paperclip". The self-sealing stem bolts/O'Brien scene is the standout. The Kira story is a bit heavy, so this light-hearted stuff is definitely appreciated. I should also mention that Dax's (Curzon-propelled?) propensity to find any damn species attractive starts here with a comment about Morn. Kira's disgust also starts here.
LESSON: The people and the land are one. (Learned yesterday, but I guess it bears repeating, eh Kira?)
REWATCHABILITY - Medium-High: An episode that has real heart, important character moments, and even a sense of fun.
Comments
I'm pretty sure the writers wanted to do a story about "eminent domain" (as we call it in the USA), where the government has the right to buy your land for essential projects like highways. But they had trouble coming up with a scenario taht still worked in DS9 times, where there was no simple technological solution to any of the conflicts they contrived, and they had to end up putting Mellibok on his own freaking moon just to make the story work, sort of.
With that in mind, I feel the best way to watch the episode is to understand that the technological / environmental concerns are pretty much irrelevant to the plot. I treat the energy extraction plans as a MacGuffin and the episode works perfectly well for me. Brian Keith puts on a terrific performance, Nana Vistor and Avery Brooks are in top form, I have no complaints.