Star Trek 316: Second Sight

316. Second Sight

FORMULA: Half a Life + That Which Survives

WHY WE LIKE IT: Gideon Seyetik's exhuberance.

WHY WE DON'T: It's another damn ghost story, isn't it?

REVIEW: And things were going so well... This is the kind of silly SF story I thought we'd gone beyond by now. It starts off well enough, with the Siskos dealing with the anniversary of Jennifer's death. Her ghost still lingers, but Sisko's largely moved on with his life, if not his love life. Enter Fenna, a mysterious fantasy woman drawn in by his emotional sinkhole. Sisko is charmed, but we are not. It's unfortunately one of those sappy Trek romances where nothing much happens, and you can't really see what the big fuss is about. The actress is just... stiff in the role. That Fenna will then turn out to be a mental projection from an even duller woman, well, that's where the plot turns to sludge.

The bright spot in Second Sight is the madly egocentric terraformer Gideon Seyetik, full of energy and unashamedly self-congratulatory. Tony-award winner Richard Kiley (the original Man of La Mancha) gives a boisterous and fun performance, nonetheless laced with pathos as he sacrifices himself for his wife and gives new life to a star. Oddly, the ship he works off of, the USS Prometheus seems to be captained by a Lieutenant (j.g.). The conceit is that to put our characters in charge (Sisko and Dax), you must remove any higher ranks from the equation. But it is just absurd and extremely distracting.

A Sisko-heavy story (I'm not complaining, we've had far too few), the other characters don't get to do much, though there are some good bits. Sisko and Dax's awkward "man to man" talk is very amusing, and Bashir WOULD be a fan of Seyetik's, ego and all. Low point: Kira's strange reaction to Sisko's good mood. What was that all about?

LESSON: In the future, prejudice will be abolished to the point where you wouldn't think of mentioning double-tipped ears when describing someone.

REWATCHABILITY - Low: If only the whole of the episode could boast the same energy as the Seyetik subplot, we might have something here. It doesn't and we don't.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Non corporeal being impersonating others is one of the tropes of the ST-verse that should not have been.

Along with holodeck and transporter malfunction as being the main driving plot of the episode.

Oh, and bizarre - evolving and devolving of crew members due to "wacky-tech."
Siskoid said…
Anyting with DNA in flux, yeah. I hate that, because it makes no sense at all, especially the inevitable reset button.

Holodeck/transporter malfunction episodes have been entertaining from time to time, but by Voyager, it had gotten very dreary indeed.