SDS9 – S4E7: "Starship Down" (Audio + Transcript) (Patreon)

This episode was recorded on May 5, 2024.

Sam and Scott discuss "Starship Down," where the DS9 crew hosts secret trade negotiations with a Dominion subject aboard the starship Defiant, but the ship is heavily damaged in an attack by the Dominion's Jem'Hadar.

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Transcript

[Note: Transcripts are autogenerated and may contain errors.]

We are back with Southpaw Deep Space Nine Season 4. If you don't know what SDS9 is, it's Southpaw's completest DS9 watch-along show where we watch every episode, recap it, and analyze it. We are your hosts, Scott and Sam. Scott is someone who's watched DS9 more than once,

whereas I'm someone who's casually watched some episodes when it first aired. But this is my first time watching each episode in earnest. One of the cool things about this is that it also gives us different perspectives. After we watch each episode, we come together and talk about it.

Scott gives us the play-by-play along with his insights while I analyze scenes that stuck out for me from a political, philosophical, or media studies perspective. In this episode, we are discussing Starship Down, which the title makes it seem a lot more interesting than I guess we'll find out. Scott, can you tell us about this episode?

If you insist. Ben has brought the Defiant to the Gamma Quadrant to talk about trade agreements with the Karema Commerce Ministry, Hanak. Hanak, the Ferengi are mediating a way for goods to get through, and it turns out that Quark is doing quite a bit of taxing and tariffing and... dishonest money stuff that Quark is doing.

But as you've seen in earlier episodes, the Ferengi are sort of a way in to connect to other people in the Gamma Quadrant and sort of forego or not deal with the Dominion, which have a grasp on basically have a clutch on the Gamma Quadrant and are sort of the looming threat

right now in this part of Deep Space Nine lore that we're dealing with. Ben is frustrated about everything. Worf is running defense drills and is unhappy with the defense, and he's frowning a lot in this episode. You know, resting Worf faces is really a thing, just like how uncomfortable Worf looks. Kira and Jadzia are talking.

It turns out that Kira is fasting for Hamara, which is the anniversary of for when Ben or the emissary appear. Benjamin is the supposed chosen one of the Bajorans, the prophets, the faith, the faith of the Bajorans. Just, you know, if you've watched the show or listened to this show,

basically in the wormhole are these celestial beings unbound by time, also known as the prophets of, for whom the Bajoran faith is based. And there's always talk of an emissary that would come and bring knowledge to all. And it's been. So it's pretty cool. And Benjamin is conspicuously missing from all of this celebration. He's

As we know, as of right now, he's pretty uncomfortable with the whole idea. And he's just like, I'm a regular dude that likes my son and baseball and space. The final frontier. And then Jem'Hadar ships show up with torpedoes. The Karema think that it's because of them. They're like, oh man, we shouldn't have done all this.

The Defiant follows the Karema ship into the atmosphere of a planet, and there is lots of 90s CGI. The interference in this area limits the sensors by a lot, and they're unable to cloak. The weapon systems have to be done manually, and Kira and Jadzia propose, they're like, we should modulate, like, Tetreon pulses and...

which create active scanning, which met, which is a method that Kira reveals that she used during the occupation to avoid Cardassian ships. Cause you remember Kira was basically a freedom fighter and all the, any pulse that is sent or any, drone or whatever will reveal the defiance location.

So they need to be fast and they need to be careful with changing courses and that each scan can equal... Quark is, you know, talking to Hanak and he's like throwing his brother under the bus. He's like, ah, it's my brother who did all the bad stuff. And, you know, greed is good. Let's work together, buddy.

It's weird. On the bridge, the echo location pulses are picking up. The Defiant sends other pulses to stay on course. And then out of nowhere, Bam! The Jem'Hadar show up and start blasting. The Defiant gets blasted around by phasers and stuff. Shields are taking a beating down to a low percent. Emergency lights flashing.

The ship is cruising towards bad times with all the thingies fried. Jadzia hauls to manually deal with the engines. The ship is creaking with damage. The fire is intense. Jadzia needs to get... Well, doesn't need to, but is saved by Julian. He's hurt. They're in an area together, and they look for the Karema ship.

Quark is impressed with the Karema minister and reveals how he plays games to get money and that the misnomer... that this guy has the lobes, which is a Ferengi compliment, but the minister is nonplussed, and you still won't work with him. And what is going on? The Defiant sends probes to find the Jem'Hadar ship.

This teases the Jem'Hadar to attack. The bridge is screwed, and basically a torpedo lodges into the ship, and Miles says, everyone's dead. Spoiler alert, not everyone. On the ship, the bridge, and engine, they can't talk to each other, and there are casualties. Red shirts, which don't happen a lot on Deep Space Nine,

is basically this trope where often characters on Star Trek that wear red shirts die on episodes. And we get some red shirts on this episode. It's sad. I guess we don't really know them on the ship. There's so, and then, you know, there's this torpedo. There's just there that could blow up at any moment.

And Ben is concussed. And, and as we know, when you have a concussion, you really need to have it taken care of. It's very unsafe to go to sleep with a concussion and, If you're into fighting, you probably know the other shows on the Southpaw channel.

And if you know anything about fighting, if you are concussed, see a doctor. Everything is bleak. The ship is messed up. And Kira knows that she needs to keep Ben awake so he doesn't go into a coma or something worse. So she starts telling him Bajoran folktales. Jadzia and Bashir are low on oxygen.

Jadzia notes Bashir might be a better person than she thought. She's surprised by this act. And the minister and court are talking again about different types of capitalism and which capitalism is better because the Karema believe in a logical set way of commerce and doesn't believe in cheating but still believes in profit.

On the bridge, Worf, Miles, and the team are getting to work. Kira's having trouble talking to Ben. They realize that they usually talk about work when they're together. And Kira and Ben sort of realize they have a transactional relationship. And Kira thinks that this might be because he's the emissary and that she might be weird around him.

And he says, finish the story you were telling me. So Kira tells the story about farmers. The Defiant is shot at. They evade. Worf is doing the best at this. Though again, he's kind of being rude to everybody and everything. Again, his face.

Quark and the minister decide to save the day and deal with the torpedo that's just lodged in the ship in the room that they're in. Because plot. And again, Worf is just being so hard on everyone. And most of the people on the ship are not prepared for these sort of tactics. They're all like engineers and stuff.

And Miles is like, you need to be kinder. A lot of these people are out of their depth. And, you know, it kind of reminds me of the original series when Bones would be like, I'm a doctor, not a blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever.

So, you know, Jadzia and Bashir are getting cold and scared and they hold each other. And Jadzia reveals that, you know, when they first met, he came on really strong. You remember, if you've listened to this show, a previous host used to call him Dr.

Horny because he was kind of a bit of a cad and always trying to impress women. And He makes you think that he's a Lothario, but you don't really see it that much so far. And she believes that him doing this kept them from getting really close, that they also have a not very close relationship,

even though they are friends. And Bashir talks about a fantasy he had so he could spend time with her. It's weird. Worf has an idea and convinces the engineers to do their thing, that they need to science a new weapon. They have these probes, and they realize that they move together, so the phasers are messed up,

but the generator for the phaser is fine. So they use a deflector Ray as a one-time phaser shooter. Worf is open that he's told, look, We're only going to get one shot at this. And he's like, we only need to do it once. Or whatever. I don't know if I'm allowed to do a Worf impression.

And that wasn't a very good Worf impression. But, you know, they set it up. Ben is getting worse by the moment. So Kira gives him a stimulant to keep him up. And realizes that she has kept her arms length because of her faith. But Kira doesn't care anymore about...

it being weird about the faith and she's praying she's like you know what whatever dude you're you are the emissary i'm a religious person i'm going to pray On the bay where the weapons are, the one-shot blast is ready. Quark and Hanak try to dismantle the torpedo. Hanak sort of knows about the weapon.

So it turns out that the Karama are basically weapons merchants. Amongst the things they sell, they are selling weapons. They are war profiteers. And they talk about gambling and Davo and Quark disables the torpedo. There's a 50% chance, but it's, you know, not everyone. Really, it's a 0% chance you're going to kill all the characters.

Plot armor, baby. Bigger the risk, bigger the win. Quark continues to use this idea to make a deal with Hanukkah. Then they maybe will work together in the future. And Ben asks Kira to finish the story and asks for another. And Kira's just telling Ben Bajoran tales as he's slowly trying to stay awake so he doesn't die.

The Jem'Hadar show up. And guess what about that one shot? It works. Everyone is saved. At Quark's, Hanek is playing Davo, and he says just because someone loses a bet doesn't mean someone loses a game. And he makes a wild bet that Quark suggests he doesn't, and he wins. A friendship may start.

Jadzia saves Bashir from talking with Morn. Miles and Worf drink, and Worf commends the team and tells them to use their discretion and expertise while fixing the Defiant, because the Defiant was messed up really bad. Worf says they need to be done in a certain amount of time, and Miles cuts him off and says, no,

it needs to be done sooner. And the supposedly pro-union and pro-worker Miles is telling Worf that you give a little slack, but you still have to remain tight on other people. Miles, I don't like the way you're written this season. Kira talks to Ben about work stuff,

and Ben invites Kira to watch a hollow sweet baseball game to become better friends, which she agrees to, and then he gives her a hat to wear, and it makes you smile.

Baseball. So to expand on something you talked about, this episode illustrates how capitalism is not any one thing. There are actually different schools of capitalism and different expressions of capitalism and different individual expressions of capitalism, which is why they pretend it's democratic. But to the people it oppresses, it all feels the same. The goals aren't different.

It all wants to maximize self-interest and profit. It's just differences in the best methods to get there.

Exactly. They're just like, which capitalism is better? We do kind capitalism. There are people that try to talk about this sort of kind capitalism. It doesn't exist. I read this pretty good book put out by Jacobin a few years ago about Oprah Winfrey

and a bunch of other people that try to be like the owner of Whole Foods. Effective altruism. Effective altruism. Yeah. The Gates Foundation, like these kind of characters that think that they can do compassionate capitalism that, oh, like the Gates family, they're like, oh, we're giving away all of our billions by creating charter schools and then the

charter schools. So then they're actually sort of controlling the school systems and charter schools are incredibly problematic. Yeah. Not every single charter school, obviously, but a lot of them are problematic and get in the way of public education and affect people. So the idea of compassionate capitalism is something that people love talking about,

but I don't believe in it. And if someone tells you that they're an anarcho-capitalist, run. Run. Don't walk. It often connects to a not very nice person. The actor from Firefly who basically started Gamergate is an anarcho-capitalist.

I didn't know he had actually taken identity.

Yeah, he's like, I believe in a totally free market. Then this market isn't free. And it's just like everything about that guy is not great. But whatever. Famous people are like regular people. A lot of them aren't very cool.

So just like you mentioned, there's different types of capitalists. You have conservative capitalists who think the best way to make money is to go with sure things while reducing losses. And then there are people who want to take big risks with the risk of heavy losses for big payoffs.

The wealthiest of wealthy are more about keeping what they got, which includes not paying taxes and maintaining institutional power. but also keeping their colonial and imperial power in other countries, which is why they always need to overthrow anyone remotely, even social Democrat. And this could even connect back to that effective altruism, compassionate,

kind capitalism that you were talking about. It's often people who are now at a point where they're so rich, they just want to keep what they got. But then they pretend they're going to use it to help the world. But really what they're doing is creating a government within a government.

They're creating these shadow governments within the U.S., like you mentioned, or in other countries so they could control regulations, control policies, ultimately for themselves and to create the world that they want.

Yeah, the book I was talking about is The New Profits of Capital. It's really good. It's by Jacobin, and it's about Sheryl Sandberg, John Mackey, Oprah Winfrey, and Bill and Melinda Gates. And it's about how capitalist altruism isn't real. I just want to drive that down.

Because Sheryl Sandberg thinks that capitalist work ethic is the antidote to gender inequality. You just got to lean in. Just got to lean in. Just got to work harder. I know you do a lot of the political talking on this show, and we love that about you, Sam. But I have thoughts about this.

And one thing that is very powerful in this episode and in the show is spirituality and particularly in this episode, the Bajoran spirituality. Because in the episode, the next episode that we will discuss, we learn a little bit about Ferengi spirituality. So we learn a lot about spirituality. And spirituality capitalism is a big thing.

The whole idea of just manifesting through good vibes. I mean, that's how Oprah Winfrey became a billionaire. So like, oh, she's manifest the vibes. That's not how you make a billion dollars. No one you know is going to make a billion dollars. And no one should have a billion dollars.

I believe that there should not be billionaires, just in case that's not clear. And I think most people in the Star Trek universe would also agree.

Back to the point about different types of billionaires and maybe even people richer than billionaires. Some of the richest, richest people, this is where we're talking about legacy money. These folks like to stay discreet. Even when we think about the Gates Foundation and things like that, they do a lot of public-facing stuff, but-

You think about them compared to like Elon Musk or more of the risk taker gambler type capitalists, and they still like to keep a low profile compared to them. So they do things more behind the scenes, more policy, more government, more of the, what did you call it in the past? Procedural fascism.

Yeah. Procedural fascism. And something to bring into context, because we're contextualizing and discussing and putting our lens on this show in 2024, but the show is from the mid-90s. In the mid-90s, something to think about is that the richest people in the world, which was often Bill Gates, they had like $5 or $6 billion.

Now, if you have $5 or $6 billion, you aren't even in the top 10. And the amount of billions that people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos made during the pandemic is insane. So it is something to think about because we're thinking about profit in the early

90s when you probably couldn't conceive of how rich people are now and to even conceive, will there ever be a trillionaire?

So those who aren't quite there to that highest level They need to take risks. Those type of capitals need to take risks to get there. And so in taking their risks, they're often more well-known. But once they get there, they'll also be more about keeping what they got. And their descendants will keep a low profile.

You talk about trillionaires. I don't know if there's an individual who's a trillionaire, but there's definitely trillionaire families. There's families who are so rich, they don't even know what their net worth is. And there's no way to even try to figure it out. So capitalism and colonialism and imperialism all overlap. If you understand,

it's not just about exploiting and looting, but also about the looters keeping and maintaining what they got, not just getting more of it. Looters have stuff around the world. So to keep what they got means controlling laws and international world order. The supreme authority of the world is the U.S.

So being rich either means you're an American or you become an American. or you're in bed with America and America is in bed with you. The Federation could also be an allegory for the U.S. when it comes to DS9. The U.S., like the Federation, claims it doesn't meddle with other governments, but obviously it does.

And that's what this episode is about. They're doing trade deals within Dominion territory with Dominion subjects. And how this episode tells it and its perspective can also be an allegory for how the U.S. portrays its interference and meddling with other countries when it does come out.

The rebel underdogs against the empire, liberating business people, gamblers, and arms dealers. Because we find out these people are arms dealers. So Scott, what did you think about this episode? And were there any scenes that stuck out for you? So I'm going to give this episode a 2.5.

This is the worst episode of the season thus far. Now, as we know, each rating is based on a season. So this is still better than many of the Season 1 episodes, but... Because there are some real slogs and not so great episodes in season one. There are some decent... You know, it gets better.

This season hit the ground running and had some bangers. To me, this episode is not even close to a banger. Nothing really happens. Miles is being really whack. I don't understand the... inspiration and idea for this episode. So for that, I'm giving it a low rating. My favorite scenes were the scenes with Ben and Kira.

The relationship that Ben and Kira have has been really interesting and has been very transactional. What do you do when you're You're a commander now, I believe now a captain of a ship that at one point was the ship that was based Tarak Nor during the Cardassian occupation that was oppressing her people. She is now

working with not only someone who's part of Starfleet, but also somebody who is supposedly a great bringer of her faith. And their relationship has been complicated and very work-focused up until now. So seeing them connect was a real highlight. And the last scene of the Davo, the gambling was humorous.

You know, when I heard your recap, I forgot those scenes between Kira and Cisco were in this episode. And I was like, oh, crap. Did I watch the wrong episode? Was that in this one? And then I realized. Yeah, it was in this episode. And I did like those scenes.

It was just that it felt so disjointed from the rest of the episode that I assume I remember those scenes, but I thought it was a different episode. I thought it was like an episode from the past that we had already talked about because it surely couldn't have been this one. Right. Because this episode sucked, man.

It really just really wasn't great. But it was a lot better than a lot of the early seasons. I'll say this. The early seasons were so bad, it chased away Angel. That's how hard it was.

Yes, that's canon.

Scott, can you tell us about the next episode?

Next episode, Little Green Men. The Ferengi do a time travel.

Until then...