Day 139: DS9, Wrongs Darker than Death or Night

Show: Star Trek; Deep Space Nine

Episode Particulars: S6EP17, “Wrongs Darker than Death or Night”

 Summary: On her mother’s birthday, Kira receives a message from Gul Dukat, in which he intimates that he and her mother were lovers. Shaken by the thought, Kira manages to convince Sisko to let her travel to Bajor and use the Orb of Time (last seen in “Trials and Tribble-ations”) to go back and see if Dukat was just trying to get into her head. When she arrives in the past, she strikes up a friendship with her mother, Maru (Leslie Hope), just in time for the two of them to be chosen to be “comfort women” on Terok Nor. And sure enough, Dukat singles out Maru and takes her away to his quarters. Kira isn’t sure how to process this information…or if she should do something about it.

Standalone Thoughts: While the episode is watchable, I mostly find it bland. Unlike the previous three episodes, this one doesn’t even try to connect up to the Dominion plotline, other than reminding us that Dukat is still out there. This one really could be inserted into any previous season, and it would make no difference. And while the episode manages to avoid feeling pointless, the truth is it actually is kind of pointless once you think about it. Not that that makes it a bad episode, but that may color your opinion of it somewhat.

Just looking at the episode on its own, it’s about what you’d expect. Shades of grey, unexpected revelations about the past, Kira having her perceptions challenged and struggling with that, Dukat being unlikeable but complicated…it’s nothing we haven’t seen before, only now we’re throwing in some time travel. I realize I’m probably making the episode sound worse than it is, but there’s just not that much to say that’s either positive or negative. For what it’s worth, it handles the tropes well, and of course Visitor does a fine job, but there’s nothing overly special or significant about any of it. Fortunately, I know for a fact that that won’t be the case with the upcoming episodes…

How it Relates to the Whole: For the most part, this episode doesn’t connect to the rest of the material, except perhaps to make Kira’s relationship with Dukat (and Dukat’s character on the whole) even more complicated. However, there’s a brief conversation between Bashir and O’Brien about an Alamo holosuite program that may seem like a throwaway discussion mostly used to give Siddig and Meaney a paycheck that week, but will turn out to be a major running gag. Not that that makes it essential to the whole either, but at least this means the episode did contribute something to Deep Space Nine lore.

Other: *When Dax asks why Kira has bought flowers despite not liking them, and Kira mentions privacy, Dax responds with “Not between friends,” Actually, Dax, I believe the privacy chain tends to go strangers/acquaintances/friends/close friends/family members, and even then, there are things you’ll want to keep to yourself. There are better ways of politely asking what’s going on, ways that don’t make you look bad besides. Though this might explain a few things about you…

*When Kira gets the call from Dukat, he tells her not to bother tracing it because “I guarantee you won’t be able to trace this transmission”, and Kira lowers her hand from the console. I know that’s just the whole movie trope about call tracing coming into play, but shouldn’t she at least try? Are you just going to take his word you can’t trace it? And even if you can’t identify his exact location, you may be able to get information out of the trace anyway; if nothing else, you can identify the method he used, which might tell you something useful. Although I feel like my having this train of thought says more about me than about the show…

*I’m not entirely clear why Kira changes clothes when she goes into the past. She’s wearing her original set of clothes when she returns to our time, so I’m just left wondering if this was some sort of astral projection. Which wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility for the Prophets, but would also seem to clash with what happened in “Trials and Tribble-ations”. Since it’s not the focus of the episode (although it does start raising a lot of questions the more you think about it), all I can do is throw up my hands and just declare “Science fiction!”

*We see that Kira has two brothers in the flashback, which came as a surprise to me (though Memory Alpha says they were mentioned in “Shadowplay”). Also according to Memory Alpha, this aspect of her past never comes up again, which makes sense on the one hand (the implications are a bit dark, since they’re very young children in the flashback), but feels like a bit of a missed opportunity on the other.

Best Line/Exchange: I didn’t have much to go on today, so I went with the most striking bit;

(Kira and a member of the Resistance, Halb [Tim deZarn] are discussing planting a bomb in Dukat’s quarters)

Halb: What about that Bajoran mistress of his?

Kira: What about her?

Halb: You cannot risk telling her what you’re doing. Not even to save her life.

Kira: Why would I do that? Like you said, she’s a collaborator. (She takes the bomb, which is disguised as a Bajoran earring) She deserves whatever she gets.

Sure, the line is deliberately chilling, but that doesn’t stop it from being effective. I think we’re all hardwired at some level to be shocked when a character wishes harm upon their parents, even if said parents do deserve it on some level (not that I think Maru deserves it in this case). Furthermore, even though this is in character for Kira, it still hurts to hear her say it because we’ve (hopefully) grown to like her over the course of the show. It’s not my best pick, but at least it serves its purpose, in more ways than one.