SDS9 – S4E14: "Return to Grace" (Patreon)

This episode was recorded on June 13, 2024.

Sam and Scott discuss "Return to Grace," where Kira helps Dukat return to grace.

SDS9 seasons 1, 2, and 3 can be found wherever you stream Southpaw. Season 4 is only available to paid subscribers.

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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. Today, we are discussing Return to Grace. Scott, can you recap this episode?

Return to grace.

Dr. Bashir is in the infirmary with Major Kira. He's giving her some vaccinations, inoculations, because she is heading to a conference on a Cardassian outpost. Korma. She's been convinced by Shakar, who we know from last episode that they're sort of dating, that they should share Bajoran and intel about the Klingons. And because of

The Cardassian health system has totally been messed up by the Klingon invasion. It's important for her to get shots and vaccinations. And side panel, vaccines are awesome. Feeling nauseous and sick... Kira's doing her best to be part of everything. She listens.

Worf is like, look, this is all the stuff that the Federation wants to not tell the Cardassians. Just don't tell any of the secrets. And he's very serious about it. And she runs out of the bathroom. Runs out to find a bathroom. As she packs, Dukat is here. And he's like, I'm the captain of the Grumal.

And I'm going to take you to the conference. Isn't this so awesome that we're going to be friends? And she's like, Elimeo will never be friends. And Dukat's like, since I last saw you and you convinced me to not murder my half Bajoran, half Cardassian daughter, Torzael, my house has been destroyed. My wife has left me.

I've been ostracized. And now I've been demoted. It's all good. Or is it? Wink, wink. And he's like, thank you for stopping me from murdering my daughter. But he's like, all good. I'm going to be great one day. Let me take your bags. Let's be friends. And she's like, no.

And in Grimauld, Kira is looking at the notes, trying to do her homework. And Tora arrives. They're so happy to see each other. Tori explains that her experience has been really rough. Being half Cardassian, half Bajoran has made her deal with considerable Cardassian bigotry. And she loves her dad so much.

So she's just happy to be with her dad here and away from being judged. And then a siren goes off. There's a battle drill. And Kira's like, why are freighters doing battle drills, heads of the bridge, basically Dukat? is just always ready for everything.

And he's like, y'all are taking too long, and we need to destroy this asteroid, and blah, blah, blah. And Kira's like, well, we can speed up the phasers. And Dukat's like, nah, I'm an angry guy. And then apologizes and invites her to dinner. Because it is tradition to invite your guests for dinner. But

Kira's going to say no, but she sees Ziles just looking at her with doe eyes. He's like, fine. At the dinner, Dukat tries to get her to open up. He opens up a fancy bottle of wine and is like, I heard that you're dating this dude that, let me tell you, he's dated a lot of people.

just i'm not trying to be passive aggressive but just want you to know he's kind of a luthario and she's like i didn't mean that for for that to run and she just she's dismissive and and he just like keeps on talking about your car's active romantic

past and then another siren goes off and she was like why are you doing a drill son he's like nope And they rush to the bridge to find that the Korma outpost and Bajoran and Cardassian delegations have been destroyed. And you see a Klingon bird of prey decloaking. The Klingons scan the Grumal, see no threat,

and leave at a leisurely pace and sort of mock them as they do it. Dukat is angry. He's like, I'm going to attack them. And Kira's like, chill out. If you're going to do it, target the Klingon's weakest spot, but the Grimmauld's weapons can't even breach the Klingon's hull, and so the Klingon's just dissed them by, like,

we don't even consider you worthy of death. which is a huge Klingon diss. So Kira is trying to figure out where the nearest Cardassian warship is. It's a few days away and urges Dukat to pursue the Klingons, but to be better prepared. And here it's like, you should use the outpost-disabled disruptors, convert the Grumal into a Q-ship,

and, you know, science, science, science. And Dukat is skeptical of skeptical. But Kira insists, look, we will improvise, we'll jettison some cargo, we'll do this, we'll do that, we'll do this, and we're going to be unstoppable. Which finally impresses Dukat because Dukat's a weird dude. And he's like, we'll work together. Let's be awesome.

And she's like, we're never going to be awesome. Fetch is not going to be a thing. Dukat and Kira test the new disruptors. which causes the recoil, causes a little bit of damage. But again, Dukat is super excited. But Kirza, you just want status.

I just am here to revenge the death of Bajorans, but you're in it for something else. And Dukat again tries to provoke her with Shakar, but Kira's like, let's just get to the work. Let's just do this. And then Kira hangs out with Zayal and trains her with the Cardassian Federation phaser rifles.

And it's like, look, if the Klingon's bored, you need to know what to do. There's just a really beautiful connection between these two people. And Zayal tries to get... kira to understand how great her father is she loves her father so much and that's

sort of her zero that's her baseline that's her connection and but she also clearly really loves kira and she's just like try to understand him try to see something she's like i just see a murderer this dude murdered my people he is a bad dude and um Like, Dukat clearly wants forgiveness, and it's never going to happen.

But her and Zayal can be friends. um, Dukat and Kira on the bridge are predicting the next move of the Klingons. Um, they believe that it's going to be, uh, planet Laval with, with some weapons and they're going to lure the Klingons. They're going to use the diluthium signature.

Dukat again, tries to play with Kira and does not go well. And he orders the ship to Laval. Now Laval, uh, They're setting up this decoy and they wait. And Dukat just daydreams about regaining his status and his rank and punishing all of his rivals. And I think someone's trying to game up his wife.

And they're interrupted by the Klingons' arrival. The Klingons take the bait. They lock the disruptors on the Grimauld. They demand surrender. And as they engage with tractor beams, Dukat orders Kira to fire. This new weapon that they created. It preaches the Bird of Prey's hull, disabling its engines. But the Klingons return. Boop, boop, boop.

And they get the Grumal real bad. With basically one hit left, Dukat's like, we need a plan, Kira. So Kira and Dukat, they just beam into the Klingon ship. They defeat some officers. They use the Klingon transporters to swap the Grimmel's crew with the Klingon crew, doing a little switcheroo.

And Kira is surprised that Dukat just destroys the Grimmel, killing his new crew. He's like, ah, boom. If you ever need to think, is Dukat a good dude? He is not. They secure the Klingon ship. Kira finds a list of Klingon targets in Cardassian space. Dukat contacts the government, hoping that he's going to be reinstated.

And he is disappointed to find out that despite all this intelligence, the new Cardassian government, which is the Datapa Council, they want diplomatic solution with the Klingons and recalls him to be a military advisor. He's frustrated. Dukat is. Dukat is frustrated. He's like, I'm going to fight the Klingons alone if I have to.

We are too paralyzed to resist this. And Kira's honestly shocked by Dukat's plan. And it's like, you're going to die by yourself. And Dukat's like, join me. If Cardassia falls to the Klingons, Bajor will fall to the Klingons, and everyone will fall to the Klingons. And the great rapper MF Doom was the Klingon with the ring on.

And he insists that she was meant to be a resistance fighter. And this is in her blood to do. And Kira is dubious. Later, Zial tries to show Kira a knife trick. With this knife that she has, Kira easily deflects it. And she's like, you should avoid knife fights. In fact, you should avoid fights.

And Zial says that she needs help to fight the Klingons. And it sort of creates a light bulb in Kira's head. She realizes something. On the bridge, Kira... declines the offer of Dukat to kill people at the cost of their death, but proposes something else.

The life that Dukat has chosen to live is really painful and stressful for Zayal and isn't fair to her. She deserves more and has earned more and Kira thinks that she should be on Deep Space Nine, and that's a great place for her. When Dukat incredulously asks Kira why, she's like, she reminds her of me.

And Kira just doesn't want Zayal to endure the hardships that she did, which is a reminder that Just because we went through pain doesn't mean the people ahead of us need to feel pain too. In fact, we can keep them from feeling pain. A novel concept indeed. Dukat is pleased. He's like, we're going to be best friends.

And she's like, stop with this and allows it. On Deep Space Nine, Kira introduces Zayal to Odo. He's like, I'll tell you about all of this later.

I like how DS9 explores relationships between different characters. In the last episode, Crossfire, we saw the growth of Odo and Quark's frenemy relationship. And in this episode, we see something similar between Kira and Dukat. Dukat and Kira's relationship is complicated. So many shades and angles, and this episode really explored a lot of them.

Feels like the strained relationship of divorced parents where they have a kid together. And in this case, that's ZL. Also, there's this flirting from Ducat that's been interesting to see bloom. Kind of Sam and Diane cheers vibes. Their back and forths are what, Scott, you call delicious writing.

Yes.

At least it was for me. The writing in this episode is delicious. Like, Kira is supposed to hate Dukat, and maybe that's in the writing, but in the acting, we can see more and more that's not so easy for her. This is more believable because we only know on paper what their previous relationship was like.

This show takes place after the occupation. We didn't get to see that show. We didn't have a previous series on that. So knowing the facts of something and knowing something viscerally are not the same. Since we, the audience, never lived through that with Kira and only know in our emotions what we've seen in this DS9 series,

this relationship isn't far-fetched. It's far-fetched maybe logically or historically, but not emotionally. This is the good and bad of media and how it can manufacture all kinds of truth and beliefs because it can hit us at different levels of our consciousness.

It could hit us in an emotional level, a logical level, or a narrative level, or a mixture of those. Then on top of that, the father-mother relationship to Xiao only further complicates their feelings for each other. We don't know what Dukat is really thinking, but what we've learned in the past episode, Crossfire,

is that Bajorans have a hard time hiding their feelings. Yeah. And we see Kira is much more conflicted. Both Kira and Dukat also have to include Xiao in their relationships. Like divorced parents, it's complicated. Sharing custody of a daughter with your enemy. Who would have thunk it? And in this episode, the stakes get even higher.

Not only is there the Dominion to contend with, but Klingons are murdering Bajorans and Cardassians, becoming a common threat. DS9, the station, is more and more in danger, and so are the crew members, personally. Dukas says he's inspired by the Bajoran resistance in this episode. How true is that? We don't know.

But that was the parallel drawn in this entire episode, that Cardassia is now in the position Bajor was, which further complicates matters. Should we believe Dukat? We don't know. And that's what makes this episode so delicious. When Dukat tells Kira, you don't have to like me or be my friend. Just fight on my side.

And somewhere inside, there's a yes. God damn. Yeah. That's not only good writing, but some great delivery. I'm conflicted now as a first time watcher of this episode. If you've already watched the whole series, you know how to think about this. But I only know what's happened this far, right?

So I only know the past and up to this far, and it's a growth. I haven't had the betrayal yet. So this is conflicting for me because I'm taking the historical facts, but then I'm taking the emotional truths this DS9 series has given me. And it's a lot, a lot going on here.

Then at the end, Kira gives Ducat her own proposal. leaves Zia Wakira. If we are to believe Dukat loves his daughter, what a choice to make. Yep. You have to leave your daughter behind with your enemy. Mm-hmm. And someone you know that doesn't like you. Then he does the right thing, or so we think.

This episode builds on past episodes where little by little, and sometimes by big leaps, we see Dukat's humanity. He's three-dimensional. Even little things he's done for Sisko, little banters he's had with Sisko, you kind of feel like there's some kind of hesitant friendship forming with Dukat and some of the crew members. And according to Ziyal,

This friendly human side of Dukat, that's all he's been showing her. So if that's an act, he's on 24-7. Unless Yao can't be trusted either. And I don't know. Right. That's the thing. We first-time viewers don't know how this episode will age as we work through the series. Because you know Dukat is a baddie.

So is this all some trick or what? Or is this just more of the grayness? Is Ziyal as wholesome as she seems, or is she also gray and three-dimensional? I don't know what to think other than great long-term storytelling, but that's my opinion.

I specifically asked Scott not to tell me what he thought about this episode, so now I'm dying to know. Scott, I really need to know what you thought, how you rated it, and does this episode matter?

Sam, this episode matters. So let me ask you a question. Do you think Dukat is important to this show?

Yes.

He is. So let me tell you, I don't think that you'd be able to guess where it's going if you could, which is good. But I will tell you that Dukat is an important character. And Zayal is an important character. I was about to use an adjective to describe her, but I chose not to.

To revealing?

Yep. So I'm not going to. But we're getting to a point where I have to be careful to not give too much away.

Oh, we're getting to long-term important stuff.

I'm going to say that this episode, in retrospect, is very important.

Ah. So when you first watched it, you couldn't place its importance. No. It's only in hindsight that you could do that.

Correct. When I first saw this episode, I was like, oh, Dukat sucks, and it's really unfair what his daughter's going through. But having watched the show several times... and also watching the show this time under a particularly leftist, Marxist, Leninist, Trotskyist lens, I see things totally differently.

And also, I'm very thoughtfully taking in this media, so there's something for that as well. You're taking notes now. I'm taking notes. So I'm watching now and I'm like, oh, even in my most recent watches of the show, I didn't consider the importance of this episode. But watching it now, I'm like, oh,

this is quite important to understand the why of at least three characters. Which is why I was so careful in my script of retelling to talk about how badly Dukat wants a relationship with Kira. And how Kira's completely disinterested because she's like, you're gross and a war criminal. And he's like, no, I'm not. I'm just chill.

I'm charming. And the biggest victim here is Zayal. And the importance and interest of that character, I didn't really consider until probably my second to last watching of this show. But now I'm like, oh, okay. But it's hard because I'm not trying to just throw out 4.5s willy-nilly. You know what I'm saying?

Yes.

And I'm pretty sure I gave a 4.5 recently. But I think I have to give this a 4.5. Wow. Because the acting is delicious. The writing is delicious. The plot points is delicious. Its use of the five-act structure is smart.

Can we also mention how the actor who plays Dukat was able to be both disgusting and charming at the same time? Like, how do you do that?

You have to be Dukat. That actor is... is you will understand throughout the show, is the reason why Dukat's character is able to exist. If done by a less mighty actor, it would be hard to believe him. But the acting by him is so well thought out, so precise,

that you're able to believe that he is as terrible a person as he is. Because Dukat is terrible. But with good storytelling, good acting, you're able to feel feelings for him. But yeah, the acting in this episode, it's just a great episode. It's a solid episode.

I think I'm going to be moving on a little more careful about 4.5, but I can't give episodes before this a 4.5 and not give this a 4.5. And also I'm a human, so I'm allowed to make mistakes and I'm also allowed to change my mind.

Maybe you could also like start using like 4.7, 4.4, you know, to give a little more nuance as like a lot of episodes get really good.

All right. So this is a 4.6.

Wow. It's on the upper end. It's on the other side. Absolutely.

it's very possible that you discovered this podcast because you wanted a leftist understanding of Star Trek from an episode-by-episode perspective. But it's also possible you found this channel, which is a channel that looks at MMA and martial arts from a leftist perspective. And a very long time ago,

when Dustin Poirier was asked about the behaviors of one Conor McGregor, he said, look, man, karma is a prism. And that line has stuck with me quite a bit. Now, your thoughts on him might be complicated. MMA is intrinsically a little right-leaning, unfortunately. It's also a very gray world, right?

It is a very gray world, but karma is a prism. And the idea of looking at things from a prism lens really helped me with my language.

Yeah.

Because language is a living being. And in our previous episode, I'm talking about the power of pronunciation and language. So it's all connected, baby. Scott, you somehow did it.

You threaded the needle. You brought it all together. That's what I try to do. All right. Scott, can you tell us about the next episode?

We're going to have a fun little wharf episode.

Until then...