Day 23: Invasive Procedures

Show: Star Trek; Deep Space Nine

Episode Particulars: S2EP4, “Invasive Procedures”

 Summary: During a storm that has left the station with a skeleton crew (aka the main characters), a ship enters the area, supposedly looking for assistance. It turns out that they’re there for more sinister purposes, and while Quark, predictably, is involved, even he had no idea what they were really after. What they were after is Dax, or rather, the symbiote inside Jadzia; Verad (John Glover) a Trill who was deemed unsuitable to be matched with a symbiote, has decided to take matters into his own hands and force the crew to let him take it. Everyone reluctantly complies, but they’re immediately looking for ways to stop him, especially since Jadzia won’t live for very long once the symbiote is removed. The best option, it seems, is to appeal to Verad’s girlfriend Mareel (Megan Gallagher), who’s from a different planet and doesn’t fully realize that once a Trill becomes a host, their personality changes. Given her loyalty to Verad, though, even that might not be enough.

Standalone Thoughts: Unsurprisingly, this episode isn’t quite as strong as the three episodes prior to it. But even factoring that in, this episode is mediocre. It’s a decent enough idea, but the execution is just…off. Glover does a good job of showing the difference in Verad’s personality before and after getting the symbiote, but everyone else is mostly going through the motions. Yes, Bashir shows he still has feelings for Dax and isn’t afraid to stand up in the face of danger in order to help his patients, and Quark uses his deviousness to both cause the problem and help with the solution, but for all that, most of the characters don’t seem very concerned about the situation. Or rather, the script says that they’re concerned, but the actors aren’t doing a good job of telegraphing that. I’d suggest that maybe they were just exhausted after the mini-arc and needed time to recover, but even the guest stars this episode seem to be set to “bland”. It makes it hard to get invested, and even harder to believe it when Mareel starts to doubt Verad. There’s no real moment where we can say “yes, she should be suspicious” when all the conversations have pretty much been spoken in the same indifferent register. It’s like everyone is reading from the script, but not interacting with it, if you get what I’m saying.

The other thing that I can’t help but notice is that once again, an episode that revolves around Dax doesn’t feature much involvement from Dax herself. She agrees to undergo the procedure, then spends most of the episode lying on a medical table, unconscious or semi-conscious. It’s not really a good sign for her character. The good news is, she is starting to come across as friendly and playful in other episodes, instead of just being the speaker of technobabble. It’s just sad that we can’t get more out of her character in episodes she’s supposedly important to.

How it Relates to the Whole: There’s not a lot here that’s going to relate to any of the major arcs we get later in the show, but it will be good to keep in mind when we get some Trill-related episodes later down the line. There are at least two episodes where what happens here should be referenced. I’ll be interested to see if they actually do.

Other: *While it’s a fairly subtle thing, I notice that this episode acknowledges the “weapons scanner” detail that was brought up in “Captive Pursuit”. It still doesn’t seem to come up as often as it should, but at least the writers remembered that piece of information.

*I can’t help but be amused by the fact that one of the Klingons is played by Tim Russ, who not only would go on to a regular role in Voyager, but previously played a bad guy holding hostages in an episode of TNG. I wonder if that’s what got him the job for this episode.

*Speaking of Russ’ character, T’Kar, he makes a little speech after taking O’Brien hostage where he says that most Klingons are weak, hence their friendship with Starfleet. He then proceeds to get punched so hard by Sisko that he falls to the ground, is knocked unconscious by a tag-team of Kira and Odo, and even Quark manages to get the drop on him at one point. I don’t think you’re much better than the other Klingons, T’Kar.

Best Line/Exchange: Most of the dialogue in this episode is about what you’d expect, but I noticed something interesting while Verad was justifying himself;

Verad: All they’ve done is condemn me to a life of…of…mediocrity. Well, I refuse to accept that. I-I’m not going to spend the rest of my life dreaming about what I could have been. What I should have been. I deserve more, and I’m going to get it.

The thing is, in another set of circumstances, this would have been an inspirational speech, as someone who no one expected to succeed fought to prove their detractors wrong. But the delivery (there are a lot of stutters and awkward pauses) and this particular set of circumstances paints Verad as a petulant villain instead. If you want an example of how context can change everything, this would be a pretty good thing to point to.

After the Fact Update: The DS9 Companion reveals that the writers were making up things about the Trill species as they went along. This may explain some of the issues they’re having with Dax’s character/episodes; no one’s really sure what they’re doing.