#back to the maquis!

[walkingstackofbooks]

TNG 6x20 The Chase and 7x15 Lower Decks thoughts (rewatching, so possible future spoilers for DS9 too)

I’ve temporarily paused my DS9 re-watch after 2x20 Maquis Part 1 to go through all the Cardassian episodes in TNG to get a better picture of the build up: 4x12, 5x03, 6x10, 6x11, 6x20 and 7x15.

6x20 The Chase

Admittedly, I skipped the first half of this because as I skimmed through the plot on Memory Alpha, there was no mention of Cardassians until later on XD

Lady Captain Cardassian! I feel like they're pretty rare, it's sas I'm so excited by this

Tfw there's a looong pause... and you're watching it on 1.5x speed. Just how long was that pause in normal time?!

Living for the Klingon-Cardassian banter

Data just THRASHING that Klingon. I love him so much

The Klingon is so INTO Data - this is flirting, right?

"You are attempting to bribe me." "Not at all." "You suggested a plan that would work to your advantage, one that I would be capable of executing. You then implied a reward. Clearly you were."

I think Nu'Daq might be my new favourite one-off character

Cardassian treachery! Gotta love it

Federation smarts! Gotta love it XD

"I will go with you" but imma be salty about it

Just wondering why I hadn't seen Miles about since season 4, then realised that, of course, he's on DS9 XD Doh!

Romulans from nowhere :o

I do like the plan to answer the long-standing why-is-everyone-humanoid question

>> Thinking about the word humanoid the other day, do you think the other species hear their own word through the UT? Kingonoid and Romuloid or so forth.

Haha they disagree, so much for coming together in fellowship and companionship

Romulan ending <3 "Perhaps, one day." "One day."

7x15 Lower Decks

Deanna and Riker are just nice

Love the Vulcan

Bajor mention!

Very professional, waiter, to spill the beans lilke that!

I do love this episode, and seeing the command from the outside

I hope their friendship isn't ruined by promotion. They seem very sweet

Having said that, I suddenly have a horrible feeling Sita dies in this episode

Beverly is so lovely

Lost. Puppy. What?

Awwwwwkward. "They both get a lot of snow." Love how Riker just seems amused.

Yeah, this episode is great, only getting to see what one of the lower decks see

Did he also think Wesley should have been expelled?

I love this Vulcan. And I love Geordie, but his frustration with Taurik is pretty amusing

I'm a fan of this poker juxtaposition scene - interesting that they've broken away from just the lower decks characters.

Hah, okay, Lavelle does annoy Riker

Lol "You and Lavelle are a lot alike." "What? We're not at all alike." "You're bluffing."

I really love this Ben guy. Inclusion of a civilian just being friends with whoever is super cute

Okay, Worf is actually being pretty good here? I find myself liking him in this episode.

Ohhhh "I wanted to make sure that you got a fair chance to redeem yourself", that makes far more sense - no wonder I felt he was a little out of character in the first scene with her, he was acting.

"I didn't realise she would be so young."

The feels. She's so excited and proud and knowing what happens... it hurts.

Oh, the promotion. I'm tearing up. This episode is making me FEEL

Ben, you are great. Nice job moving Worf.

Amazing how this episode is so moving when you barely know the characters. I loved the premise, and I love the execution of it. (Though damn you for killing off Sito.)

Again, we see a helpful Cardassian, but get the overall impression Cardassia is still a threat.

[bumblingbabooshka]

Something about this interaction between Harry & Janeway - specifically Janeway but it's notable that Harry's the one listening because I think, say, Chakotay or B'Elanna might push back against the idolization of this 'it was different back in those days' way of thinking.

[lonely-night]

oh this ep slaps so hard with this monologue:

"Open your eyes, Captain. Why is the Federation so obsessed about the Maquis? We've never harmed you, and yet we're constantly arrested and charged with terrorism. Starships chase us through the Badlands and our supporters are harassed and ridiculed. Why? Because we've left the Federation, and that's the one thing you can't accept. Nobody leaves paradise. Everyone should want to be in the Federation. Hell, you even want the Cardassians to join. You're only sending them replicators because one day they can take their rightful place on the Federation Council. You know, in some ways you're worse than the Borg. At least they tell you about their plans for assimilation. You're more insidious. You assimilate people and they don't even know it."

it's just so good?????? oh my god????

[tea-earl-grey]

I very much love prodigy, it's objectively the best of kurtzman era trek HOWEVER the one bit of beef I have is that Chakotay simply wouldn't rejoin Starfleet after Voyager gets back. like. i very much get it. promoting a character in the organization the franchise is set in *is* an easy way to develop a character in a time skip (frankly i would have more questions if he was in Starfleet and still a commander) and given Prodigy's storyline, Chakotay is the only character who would make sense as Captain of the Protostar and as an impetus for Janeway being very personally involved in the search (Tuvok simply Would Not go back to the Delta Quadrant on a dangerous mission, Harry would be too young based on the timeline, and Tom & B'Elanna would *never* be Captains).

maybe my vibe sense was off about Chakotay but though he's fine with Starfleet rules for the most part, he and the rest of the Maquis crew never resolve their issues with the Federation and frankly shouldn't. the Maquis fight is over by the time they get back to Earth but all of them still have ideological qualms with the Federation and Chakotay left Starfleet for a reason! there might very well be some backstory for why he rejoined post-Voyager in s2 and I hope we get to see it because right now? eh I'm a little miffed.

[firstroseofspring]

i didn't want to leave a wall of text on that muse post by @marxistgnome but i love it so much and this is going to be so rushed but i could go on and on and on about b'elanna and storytelling and narratives. this got really long and so under the cut it goes

it all really ties into that post i once saw about this consistency with b'elanna episodes where they reveal more about her as a person through her interior life- her thoughts and dreams and visions... what she does when she's alone. and muse really gives us this close up look at the way she sees things and what she cares about through kelis - the stories she tells him and the way she interacts with him- because he gives this good intimate portait of the world as b'elanna sees it- as she's described it to him (almost makes you wonder what she was considering there- whether she thought she should tell someone their stories because they're stuck in another quadrant and might not make it home, or if she thought she wasn't going to get off that planet and might not make it back to voyager)

and of course he's crafting a play so there's room for his own creativity but b'elanna tells him their story really well and she cares about it and you can tell. she cares a lot.

we get another really good look at this in barge of the dead like famously- and it's so consistent in that episode too because she's on the barge and she recognizes kortar from the stories her mom told her as a child and he directly acknowledges that. he says she believes in grethor and in him and she believes because her mother told her the story after she nearly drowned in the sea of gatan. remember prophecy? she's recounting the whole heroic battle with the borg to the klingon generation ship that think baby miral is their savior and the whole scene is framed like (at least it felt this way to me) that for all she says about not being familiar with klingon culture in any respect, the way she interacts with storytelling especially reveals the depth of her understanding of it- shes telling the story and she's telling it really well according to klingon custom and the first thing the visiting klingons do after she tells it is compliment that ability. and its sooo much.

when her and harry are going back and forth at the end of muse and she just goes harry have you ever inspired somebody? when he asks why she even cares so much about the ending of kelis' play. there's just like this klingon belief about living a life that's worthy of being shared with others- like when in day of honor the hologram is evaluating whether she's spent her year honorably and asks her what she's done with her life that's worth celebrating and she can't answer and he tells her that she's giving him excuses. and the direct parallel that could be drawn about how she feels about that with the janeway vision in barge of the dead where she's being condemned and the whole reason is that she's done nothing worthy of glory- 'nothing worthy of song and story.' my goodness

even when she convinces janeway to let her go back to the barge- janeway says it's not real, that she won't let her risk her life for something that she only thinks she experienced- but b'elanna tells her it doesn't even matter if she thinks it was real- that it was real to her and she cares about what her mother thinks of her and she doesn't want her to die thinking badly of her.

we see this with worf, of course the angle we're given is honor and truth and duty- but how you're remembered and talked about is important, even from generation to generation- disgrace in his family is disgrace for him. when they accuse his father of being a traitor at khitomer, it's important to him that his father be remembered as he was - truthfully, honorably, as someone to remember well (even the titles and names they give themselves being little retellings of their lives and the members of their family- on memory alpha worf isn't just worf, he's worf, son of mogh, of the human family rozhenko, mate to k'ehleyr, father to alexander, husband of jadzia, bane of the house of duras, slayer of gowron etc etc.)

((sidenote but b'elanna never in her life introduces herself as b'elanna daughter of miral always as b'elanna torres but on the barge of the dead kortar calls her miral's daughter immediately. and if she's partially from this culture where naming and titles are so important in that respect and b'elanna thinks her mother is. not what she wants to be known by not what she wants to be identified as it's soo relevant to what she calls herself. roxann dawson said that b'elanna wanted to be 'human and perfect' like her father and so she's not ' b'elanna daughter of miral' anymore because she doesn't want miral to be a part of her story, how she's remembered. so it's belanna torres.))

anyway this same- dedication to truth we get from worf and his father's memory we see even with b'elanna in 'remember' where she gets those telepathic dreams/visions from the alien woman about what really happened with that group of people they oppressed. the crew discover that the dreams are starting to affect her health- and so they offer to suppress them, take them away and b'elanna just refuses. because how else will she know what happens to them? who's going to tell their story? and she shares that story once she has it with anybody who will listen because its worth telling.

i'm going a little crazy but klingons and writing and literature and song and stories and living memory its all so. it's ridiculously important culturally. and how that translates back to b'elanna is so fascinating

[joshuaalbert]

another thing I do wish had at least come up in ds9 while talking about the bajoran faith is the idea of just like. secular bajorans. I think the way they’re written that’s kind of ‘everyone just believes in the religion and that’s it’ is honestly a little flat? but I think there would be people who have a very complicated relationship with the prophets, who maybe didn’t believe in them before the events of the show and now maybe they have to but they think of them more as the wormhole aliens rather than gods, or just don’t believe (anymore, if they once did) that they should be worshipped because they allowed the events of the occupation to happen. but that wouldn’t mean entirely disengaging from the practices of religion as a community thing, or as comfort in times of need bc sometimes that sense of ritual can be a good one, who still wear the earring not so much as a sign of faith but just as a sign of being bajoran and being connected to their people.

idk not to sound like I’m overexplaining secular approaches to an ethnoreligion when that’s a lot of people’s lived experience but I’m just kind of thinking about what it would look like in this context, and I don’t know that it ever would have been a whole plotline but I think a mention could have been interesting. maybe something as small as rearranging duty schedules and it’s something that would interfere with religious services, but a couple specific bajorans are willing to take that because they’re not religious, and it’s a one line mention (which is the kind of thing ds9 often did well so it would feel natural), but it makes them a little less homogenous as a species.

[theotherrichardpapen]

Reading List 2023-2024 📚

The Secret History - Donna Tartt

The Song or Achilles - Madeline Miller

The Myth of the Wrong Body - Miquel Missé

The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald

Remainder - Tom McCarthy

If We Were Villains - M. L. Rio

Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov

Bones and All - Camille DeAngelis

The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt

The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde

Beyond Good and Evil - Friedrich Nietzsche

Diaries - Franz Kafka

Frankenstein - Mary Shelly

Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky

The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Tales - H. P. Lovecraft

The Divine Comedy - Dante Alighieri

1984 - George Orwell

The Iliad and The Odyssey - Homer

Unnatural Causes - Dr Richard Shepherd

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke and Other Misfortunes - Eric LaRocca

Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - Robert Louis Stevenson

The Trial of the Templars - Malcolm Barber

Foucault's Pendulum - Umberto Eco

Demian - Hermann Hesse

Pride & Prejudice - Jane Austen

Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte

The Atlas Six - Olivie Blake

Giovanni's Room - James Baldwin

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo - Taylor Jenkins Reids

Ninth House - Leigh Bardugo

Vita Nostra - Maryna & Serhiy Dyachenko

Pageboy: A Memoir - Elliot Page

Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut

The Brothers Karamazov - Fyodr Dostoevsky

(updated: 03/01/24)

[meggettes]

ok voyager rewatch continued etc etc

s2e14 and they are FINALLY discussing that Starfleet protocols may not be serving them well in the Delta quadrant.

Like, fucking finally! The previous episode was the first time, probably this whole season, that they mentioned the prime directive, and that even came as a surprise because of how Janeway has been going about this journey home.

And like, yeah, the Kazon have been troublesome, but they certainly should’ve been really reevaluating strict adherence to Starfleet protocol when they are in the Wild West/opposite side of the known world/completely abandoned to desperately fight for survival. Starfleet protocol is strict! Starfleet protocol is precise! Starfleet protocol is flexible, but it is vigorously adhered to.

So, it feels like it’s taken forever for them to finally arrive at this philosophical/tactical point. 

OK, I’ll keep watching the episode… 

[charlesemersonwinchesteriii]

WHAT’S UP WELCOME TO WIRE WEEKEND!!!! (← Friday night at 3 in the morning when I finally watch Star Trek: Deep Space 9 Season 2 Episode 22 “The Wire” for the first time)

[scvlly]

woke up normal and then remembered ro larens inevitable death and the changelilng infiltration of the federation and the possible resurgence of the dominion war and “she calls me Commander Seven out of respect,” fucking hell 

[starplusfourletters]

The news from the Alpha Quadrant turns both Janeway’s and Chakotay’s lives a little sideways. Janeway wants to talk about it. Chakotay doesn’t. Guess who wins.

[Me: No one ships J/C harder than me Also me: Anyway here’s wonderwall another gen J&C fic]

[bumblingbabooshka]

Tuvok just has a sort of ‘mutiny against me’ vibe to his leadership style that the ensigns in his care don’t appreciate

[trillscienceofficer]

Star Trek: Voyager Repression

Maybe it's a conspiracy. Since Voyager began sending datastreams back home, Starfleet has known that almost a quarter of the crew is Maquis.

[lady-sci-fi]

There are some ridiculous Garashir things that happen in the Deep Space Nine books.

Here's links to all my posts with screenshots of the book parts for ones I've found.

Proud Helios- Several pages straight of Julian getting flustered at Garak clearly admiring him, and Julian admires back and thinks about Garak's "beautiful hands" and they're touching and more... Then Julian has to go talk to Sisko and is absolutely not hiding his desire for Garak.

The Maquis Soldier of Peace comic- The plot is Dukat kidnapping Julian to get revenge on Garak, a shameless use of the "kidnap the target's love interest to get to them" trope.

Heart of the Warrior- Garak wanting Julian to wear an extremely revealing outfit, and Julian seems to do so after Garak helps them with the mission.

Fool's Gold comic- Garak no-showing a lunch date to go get some gemstones, complete with soft pink romantic lighting and lens flare. Also, he only gets involved with the plot because the shenanigans are ruining their lunch dates.

Vengeance- SO MUCH DAMN FLIRTING! Secret messges via Human/Cardassian sex chemicals?! Stuck in a small locker together and Garak whisper-flirting in Julian's ear. Julian swooning at Garak easily picking up Miles. Sisko hoping Julian and Garak are having a nice time together while he's out on a mission...

Dominion War Book Two- extended "A Time to Stand" Infirmary scene, with Garak offering to be Julian's nurse. Also Julian being paranoid about a Cardassian hitman coming after Garak while they're on the Defiant.

[clementine-kesh]

voyager is so good at inadvertently making almost every one of its characters gay. nutrek had the right idea leaning into it with seven but i think they can go further, they should keep bringing back voyager characters and making them gay until chakotay and janeway are officially the token straights. and even then hint heavily that chakotay had a brief dalliance with one of his male comrades in the maquis

[straightbaittournament]

may the best bait win! propaganda under the cut

brienne and jaime:

[major spoilers for the show] homoerotic as hell. for some reason. from what i've heard this seems like a rare case of buried straights. jaime i believe dies right after they get together. the first time they have sex jaime says he's never done it "with a knight" before. literally most of my knowledge about this ship comes from bait: a queerbaiting podcast (one of their "straightbait specials"), which i'm officially suggesting as propaganda i'm only up to s4 but i feel like they should be hereThey def have already been submitted but I'm getting in early on the #BraimeSweep They're soulmates 4real :( <33 "Brienne caught him before he could fall. Her arm was all gooseflesh, clammy and chilled, but she was strong, and gentler than he would have thought. Gentler than Cersei." "The swords kissed and sprang apart and kissed again. Jaime's blood was singing" "Jaime's golden hand cracked him across the mouth so hard the other knight went stumbling down the steps. His lantern fell and smashed, and the oil spread out, burning." "You are speaking of a highborn lady, ser. Call her by her name. Call her Brienne." "In this light she could almost be a beauty, he thought. In this light she could almost be a knight." Come on. This het couple has no right to drive me (a lesbian) crazy. If they don't get together I'll explode.

kathryn and chakotay:

Janeway is the Captain of a Starfleet ship lost so far from home it will take decades to reach. Chakotay is the Captain of a Maquis (rebel) ship also lost there. They decide to work together to get home and combine their crews when the Maquis ship is destroyed, and Chakotay becomes her second-in-command. Because of the seriousness of the situation, Janeway feels that she cannot afford the distraction of a romance and so they never get together. They have NO personal space and look longingly at each other quite often and one episode has them forced to abandon ship potentially forever and they live together in a little house and he builds her a bathtub because she complains about not having one and they share a romantically charged massage where he tells her a made up story about a warrior and the woman who inspired him which he openly admits is made up and actually about them. Also he holds her while she cries about their chance of going back to the ship being destroyed. In a different episode she “dies” and he cradled her body while weeping about it. They also have candlelit dinners regularly and she lent him a copy of the book her ex-fiancé gave her, and every time the show conspires to make one temporarily unaware of the other, they flirt hardcore. An episode designed to show how they wouldn’t work as a couple only makes more people ship them. Also a young version of Janeway meets older Chakotay via time travel and asks him if they’re together in the future despite her being engaged at that point. He declined to answer directly.they have a lot of Tension thruout the series & a very deep relationship, but Janeway has someone waiting for her back home & Chakotay ends up in a romance plot with another person in the last season (that I personally felt came from out of nowhere but whatever) I rooted for them! I rooted for a str8 couple! I did not care that Janeway had someone waiting for her back home even tho I usually do! but I did not care! they deserved to fuck!