Star Trek: Deep Space Nine — 2x17 — Playing God

Aired 1994-02-27

SpaceOpera.com rating:1

Average reader rating:4.82

Synopsis

While hosting her first Trill initiate, Dax discovers a tiny, developing universe, which threatens to destroy the station as it expands.

Filler rating: bad filler

There's no essential plot or exposition in this episode that renders it unskippable and while the story has a few charming moments, it's mostly terrible.

Remarkable scenes

Dax: "It always takes me longer to get ready as a female."
O'Brien and Kira chasing voles.
O'Brien's sonic weapon he developed for the voles causing Quark great pain.
The Klingon chef singing.
O'Brien's chat with the Cardiassian about the voles.
Jake accidentally spilling the beans about his Dabo girl girlfriend to Sisko.
Rules of Acquisition; 112. Never have sex with the boss' sister.
Morn appearances; 1. Behind Arjin during his conversation with Quark. 2. Behind Dax at Quark's when she talks to Arjin.

Review

This episode features some nice Trill trivia, but a bad sci fi plot. The idea that an entire universe could be trapped inside of a lab on DS9 is just ridiculous. Personally, I agree with Kira's solution. Step on the damn ants! The way they stopped this proto universe thing from expanding after they dropped it off back in the Gamma quadrant isn't really explained and the whole Trill plot seems to be wasted as a result. I've seen worse, but this was definitely bad.

4 reader comments

Yeah I still don't understand what they did with the universe. Did they beam it back into space in the gamma quadrant? If so, wouldn't it just destroy the area? And they tried so hard to make the episode really epic, with sisko's comments about the Borg "stepping on" other races.
Just a very crappy episode
by Pete Miller | 06/10/2006 at 1:50 am

According to Jadzia, Runabouts are 14 meters wide, not 17. The tight passage was 17 meters wide.
Arjin: I don't see it! I don't see it! Arjin: I see it! It's less than 17 meters across. Jadzia: This ship is only 14 meters wide. That gives you over 2 meters to work with.
by Remco | 10/06/2008 at 9:27 pm

Another problem. When flying into the wormhole towards the end, the shuttle accelerates to "50 kilometers per hour" and then we're told that it'll take 17 seconds to enter the wormhole. Is the station really just 236 meters from the wormhole?
The universe size "problem" isn't a problem. Read some Iain M. Banks for ways around it. Otherwise, this is a decent episode that adds a lot of back-story.
by Rob Herbert | 07/27/2010 at 9:51 pm

With this episode marks a big change for the series dynamic. The reason for that is the complete turn around in the writing of Jadzia Dax. Gone is the aloof, ageless, purely scientific young woman. In comes the raunchy, loud, aggressive Curzon… Sorry, I meant new Jadzia. This is the first big shift towards a more action orientated series (the later changes are the dominion, the defiant, bad-ass Sisko and finally the introduction of Worf).
I don't complain about the change in the Jadzia character, but you have to ask why not change the host? You have the only species in the Star Trek universe that allows you to completely change actors legitimately and instead they decide that Jadzia will be written completely differently to before.
This episode is okay but it does contain loads of interesting tidbits of Trill info that will be built upon later in episodes like 'Equilibrium' and 'Facets'.
I don't care about bad science in the slightest… when the story is good enough to make you suspend disbelief. Here it isn't, and I found myself scratching my head just as some of you have commented.
So, poor outing, but the first steps toward making DS9 into the best of the Star Trek series' have been taken.
by Bernard | 03/27/2011 at 8:52 am