Series: Star Trek: DS9
Episode: 1.17 Forsaken (May 24, 1993)
Rating:4/5
Red Shirt Status: 0/2
Notable Guests:
Jack Shearer (Vadosia)- This is Shearer’s first appearance in Trek, but he would appear in several more episodes and a film. His most notable character being Admiral Hayes as seen in Voyager and First Contact.
Constance Towers (Taxco)- Towers is a Julliard Graduate, as well as the Academy of Dramatic Arts. She appeared in several of John Ford & John Wayne’s westerns in the late 1950s. She appeared on various television shows, including Soap Operas and of course Star Trek. She continues to be active with a recent role on 911: Lone Star.
Michael Ensign (Lojal) – Ensign is a character actor who has appeared in many many things, including Titanic.
Benita Andre (Anara) – Like Ensign, she is a character actor who has appeared in several well known television shows. This was her only appearance on Star Trek.
Review:
This is a great episode. It has a simple plot – a electronic life form takes over the computer systems – but more importantly it has quite a few character moments to develop it. In particular, this episode explores Odo’s past and it does it in an interesting way. The main plot has nothing to do with it. In fact, Odo spends most of his screen-time locked in a turbolift with Lwaxana Troi, one of my favorite reoccurring characters.
Its nice to see Lwaxana on her own, as just the Ambassador and not “Deanna’s Mom”. As such she is not entirely comic relief in this episode. She serves as Odo’s confessor – receiving information he would not normally tell anyone. Lwaxana has a crush on Odo, which is what brings her to be in the Turbolift with him. She’s good at getting people to talk, and talk Odo finally does. He tells us about his past, and we learn more about his regeneration process. It seems like such a natural scene, that even though its pointedly giving us information it doesn’t feel like such. And although I don’t think a wig would be a good container for a liquid, it seems to work well enough for Odo and its a sweet gesture from Lwaxana who admits she likes to be different.
The comic relief in this episode, like it often is in season 1, is given to Julian. Julian is given the task of showing some ambassadors around the station, show them the sights and in general take care of their needs till a showing of the wormhole opening happens. Julian hates this job. So did Sisko when he had to do it, but he makes Julian keep at it still. In the end it serves Julian well because the ambassadors,once unimpressed of the station, are impressed by Julian’s clear thinking in a crisis.
Interesting Notes:
- Written by Jim Trombetta (story), Don Carlos Dunaway, and Michael Piller (both teleplay)
- Directed by Les Landau
- The working title was ” Only the Lonely” based on the Roy Orbison song and frankly I think that would have been a lovely title. I think it would have been more fitting then the one they went with since the themes were the loneliness of the computer pup and Odo’s past. And also Lwaxana to a point.
- This was written to be a bottle show to save money. Its one of the more effective ones.
Pros:
- This is an excellent character episode with a good plot to carry those moments through. We learn alot about Odo, O’Brian and Julian. Mostly Odo.
- Interesting use of sets and effects to make this episode interesting.
Cons:
- Actually nothing to note right now. Good job, DS9.
Sokorra Lewis 