Probably my favourite Trek (or any other sci fi) battle seen with the Klingon fleet hammering full pelt in to the Dominion fleet, along with numerous other shots that rank with the best in Trek (imho) :)

My main gripe with this ep is the way in which the Dominion reinforcements were conveniently disappeared :rolleyes: Doesn't seem quite to bad on repeated viewings but I can remember being pretty p*ssed off when I first saw this as it felt like they'd run out of ideas and couldn't come up with a plausible way of dealing with the fleet, so they just disappeared it <_<

Other than this it's a fantastic ep ending with Dukat going ga ga and Ziyal dead, the latter being a shame as minor character though she was I quite liked Ziyal.

What would have helped the deus ex machina ending would have been the fact that Sisko had planned to get the Prophets to do something, rather that him just going in to try and take out as many ships as they could. (I wonder whether Defiant could have fired a few torpedoes into the wormhole and hope that the one got lucky, hit one ship and the resulting chain reaction took out a) the Dominion reserve ships, and b ) the wormhole itself, so preventing the Dominion from ever getting any reinforcements without waiting 90 years :)

Still, aside from that this is another great episode, and a fitting end to the occupation arc :) And personally I love the gibbering Dukat finally surrendering Sisko's baseball back to him - did he ever not carry it with him while he ran the station? :)

The battle scenes were pretty decent for a tv show, although I still find the ship designs less than inspiring, and the sight of the massive starships zipping around each other, and in such close proximity to each other, is slightly hilarious. They should be lumbering, as in TWoK. That's something that B5 and Star Wars got right. We didn't see enough of the fighters, imo.

The other slightly hilarious bit was Quark taking out the two Jem'Hadar. Yeah, right :lol:

Other than that I thought it was a great episode, even if it did all seem to come to a rather convenient end. I was quite impressed when Rom and Kira didn't deactivate the station's weaponry in time to stop Dukat destroying the minefield, because I fully expected them to do it just in the nick of time. So to have that surprise completely undermined by the interference of the prophets was slightly annoying.

I really liked Dukat's meltdown, though. When Ziyal confessed that she'd helped Kira and co I fully expected him to kill her himself, so for it to happen the way it did was quite a surprise and very well done, imo. Slightly confused as to how Damar's bruises had disappeared so quickly, though...

I'm sure there was more to say, might think of it later :ponder:

Couple of points on this one;

The battle fx are a good shout. I have to admit, I've never liked the way DS9, or any Trek really, did major battle fx once they moved away from the traditional models to pure FX. B5 pioneered the use of digital FX, and in truth we were probably spoiled by what they managed to do, but for me, I always found the way they did it on DS9 quite disappointing. One of only a few disappointing aspects to the series imo. That's not to say that all the FX work is poor though. When they take the time to do it right, more often than not on a much smaller scale, like the ship in Explorers, then they do it beautifully. When they have to have a million and one things flying around on screen though, they just can't keep up with B5. I'm particularly reminded of the scene from Shadow Dancing, where Sheridan's fleet intercepts the Shadows. There's one shot in particular that starts on the one side of the screen and then pans across for a couple of seconds, just taking in a completely panoramic view of the battle. I can't remember DS9 doing anything as well as that.

Second point, keep an eye on Damar from this point. He's about to undergo one of the best character progressions of anyone throughout the series. By the time his character's arc comes to an end he'd probably become one of my favourite peripheral characters.

Personally, I viewed this ep as a Dukat story. (Sorry, I just love to be awkward :lol: )

Dukat, arguably one of the most evil/enigmatic characters in Trek history(imo) who has been through hell (invaded by Klingons, ousted by terrorists/Federation forces) has his daughter killed, by his trusted lieutenant. :o

The character of Dukat has undergone so many twists and turns already, nobody would know from one week to the next, which way he would be jumping. This one act carried out by Damar, changes that forever, there is only one route for Dukat now. This ep crystalizes his character perfectly.

OH, the battles were pretty enough :lol:

I always thought that they chickened out of the Dukat story for the sake of a contrived plotline that his character was at times forced to carry.

If you look at it, it's fairly obvious that the storyline that Damar ends up with was ultimately intended for Dukat's fate.

OK, I concede to your last point.

But Dukat is still, by far, the second best "villain" in Trek history.

Who's the best you ask? Easy, its......


KAAAAAAHHHHHHNNNNNNNN


Nuff said.

Are we taliking about the 'rehabilitation bit' where they made him semi nice and get on with Kira :unsure:

Personally I always liked the ambiguity of the character - you want to hate him and then he goes and does something nice. Much more interesting than just having a scowling black caped individual strolling around eating babies :)

But he did that with such conviction and gusto as well :lol: