Taking Deep Space Nine and Voyager to the Next Level

In 2012, CBS released three episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation on blu-ray disc, with reach episode remastered in high definition. This was no mean feat, because the show was shot on film, but the episodes were edited on video, which effectively meant that any shots with special effects were, by their nature, restricted to standard definition. The producers of the blu-ray sets had to re-edit every episode from its original elements, an incredibly expensive and time-consuming process. 

To test the market, they released this disc, which included the remastered pilot, "Encounter at Farpoint," one of the series' most beloved episodes, "The Inner Light," and the Worf-centric "Sins of the Father." 

According to CBS, the blu-ray releases of seasons one through seven of TNG did not sell well enough to giving Star Trek: Deep Space Nine or Star Trek: Voyager the same treatment. Indeed, to this day, every Star Trek series except for those two has been released in high definition. 

But what if CBS had decided to forge ahead, once again releasing sampler discs before the season sets of DS9 and Voyager? What episodes might they have included? 

Doubtless they would once again include the pilots for the shows: "Emissary" for DS9 and "Caretaker" for Voyager. Both pilots are excellent, with plenty of outer space action to show off the remastered special effects. That leaves two more episodes for each series. 

Were I in charge, I'd choose "Duet" and "Far Beyond the Stars" for the DS9 sampler disc. While the episodes are light on special effects, they offer some of the very best dramatic storytelling the franchise has ever produced, and the great performances of the cast would look amazing in high definition. 

As for Voyager's sampler, I'd choose "Death Wish" and "Living Witness." "Death Wish" features an appearance by Q and Commander Riker while telling a compelling story about the consequences of immortality and the right to end one's own life. And "Living Witness" is simply one of Voyager's best episodes, giving us an alien perspective on the ship's adventures through the Delta quadrant. 

I want to believe that one day the business case will make sense and that someone will release DS9 and Voyager in high definition, maybe even sooner rather than later; physical media seems to be making a comeback. 






 

Series Assimilation Misstep

SPOILERS AHEAD for Star Trek: Starfleet Academy
Episode Five, "Series Acclimation Mil" 

I've had more than enough time to reflect on "Series Acclimation Mil," the first episode of Starfleet Academy focused on the school's sole holographic cadet, for whom this episode is named. (Everyone just calls her "Sam.") And while I wanted to love this episode, it demonstrates that good intentions alone cannot deliver a satisfying dramatic experience. 

In this episode, Sam hears the legend of Captain Benjamin Sisko. She decides that because Sisko was known as "the Emissary" by the Bajorans, and she, Sam, is an emissary of her people to humanity, she should investigate the final fate of Captain Sisko as a project for school. It's a pretty tenuous connection, and not a great beginning. Worse, the episode feels strangely bifurcated between Academy carousing shenanigans and Sam's research. There are also some bold directorial and editing choices that feel a bit too wacky for an episode with some pretty serious themes--loss, grief, and most importantly, perhaps, ambiguity. 

In the real world, Avery Brooks, who had played Captain Sisko in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, retired not long after the series concluded. At the end of that series, Sisko jumped into a pit of fire and "joined the prophets" in the Bajoran wormhole. But before leaving what the wormhole aliens call "linear time" forever, Sisko promised his wife and son that he would return--a line added at the actor's insistence, because he did not want to contribute to the racial stereotype of a black father abandoning his family. 

That left the character's fate in limbo; to this day, we haven't learned whether or not Sisko kept his promise. That was the actor's intent, but apparently the showrunners wanted a clearer ending, one indicating that Sisko had made the ultimate sacrifice for Bajor. 

So here we are, thirty years later in our time, almost a thousand years later along the fictional Star Trek timeline. If you're going to tackle a story point that has been festering for decades, you'd better know what you're doing and have some kind of satisfying catharsis, one way or another. 

Unfortunately, the episode plays it safe, leaves things ambiguous, and in doing so compounds the downsides of the original story choices. There are some nice moments in the episode to be sure, including Tawny Newsome in a guest starring role and the return of Cirroc Lofton as Jake Siskso. But the themes here were too large and too complex for these particular writers to handle. They did their best, but some stories are best left alone. 


 

Stable Trek: Deep Space Nine--Season One

To generate title-based images for the first season of DS9, I asked Gemini to incorporate the title into the scene and specifically told the engine these are all DS9 episodes to avoid generic titles triggering generic images. Here's "Emissary," the pilot.

"Past Prologue"

"A Man Alone." Generic, but...I guess this could be Bajor? 

"Babel." Captures the episode's problem! 

"Captive Pursuit." The alien doesn't look much like Tosk, nor do the hunters look much like the hunters, but O'Brien is captured pretty well, and he's the focus of this episode. 

"Q-Less." Well...not the episode we got, but I would have enjoyed this.

"Dax." Huh! They went with the symbiont pools. Interesting. 

"The Passenger." That is not Dr. Bashir. 

"Move Along Home." Probably better than the episode, the weakest of the first season.

"The Nagus." Good job, Gemini. 

"Vortex." Would be better with a Federation runabout being sucked into it. 

"Battle Lines." Not bad. Love the trench. 

"The Storyteller." Not bad! Almost like Gemini watched the episode.

"Progress." Not a bad concept, but would have been way cooler if they'd incorporated some Federation tech--a shuttle, for example. 

"If Wishes Were Horses." No relation to the episode here. 

"The Forsaken." 

"Dramatis Personae." Ha. 

"Duet." Not bad at all. Kira captures exactly how I felt at the end of this episode, one of the best of the series, if not THE best.

"In the Hands of the Prophets." It's not bang on, but not bad. 

Sisko's Pitch

Captain Challis' Choice

While watching the second season of Andor, a thought occurred to me: Colm Meany would be wonderful as Lynnic Challis, an Imperial officer with growing doubts about the Empire he serves. I can just see him starting out as a veteran officer of the Old Republic who gets taken in by the Emperor's propaganda, only to slowly realize his duties are becoming more and more onerous. You could do a whole season about one person's choice--to stay safe and support tyranny, or rebel and risk everything? 

I guess that's really just Andor all over again, but with a minor shift in point of view. 

Never mind. Just watch Andor. It's phenomenal. 

Vivisection 31

Star Trek: Section 31 (Olatunde Osunsanmi, 2025) is the first direct-to-streaming Star Trek feature film. It also has the distinction of being the worst Star Trek feature film of any kind. 

Based on Section 31, the shadowy spy organization first seen in season six of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, this new film pulls Section 31 from dark corners and into the spotlight, thereby subverting and missing the point of the original DS9 episodes featuring 31. Rather than asking questions with some nuance and ambiguity about moral actions in times of war, Section 31 (the film) tries to turn one of Star Trek’s most despicable villains into a hero while replacing spy intrigue with fight scenes and explosions. 

Mission Briefing

Control speaking. You are directed to watch a very special episode of Mission: Impossible reskinned in Star Trek: Discovery and Suicide Squad (the worse one) garb. Believe in the extremely plausible redemption arc of Emperor Philippa Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh), admitted genocidal cannibal and torturer from the Mirror Universe! Watch her team up with a ragtag assortment of unlikeable Section 31 agents to chase a McGuffin before it wrecks the galaxy! Revel where no Star Trek story has revelled before! Revel, I say! 

Well, in the words of another Control before me, “That’s why it’s called Mission: Impossible, not Mission: Difficult.” 

Dark Origins

Originally developed as a new Star Trek series, Section 31 was whittled down into a single film presumably because Michelle Yeoh became way too busy (and expensive) to commit to a series in the wake of her escalating popularity rising from Everything Everywhere All at Once. This turn of events is a blessing, leaving us with just a couple of hours of agony instead of several seasons’ worth of pain. 

13 Things Wrong with Section 31

• Cinematography. The camera can’t sit still, transitioning from snap-zoom to snap-pan to shaky-cam to torturously elaborate spins and swoops that distract from the story telling. 

• Editing. The hyperkinetic editing brings to mind the excesses of later Bourne movies; it’s distracting and fails to capture the stunt work of the fight scenes, rendering them impotent. 

• Plot. In a remote corner of the galaxy, outside Federation space, someone has a doomsday device and it’s up to our heroes to get it out of the hands of the bad guys. Absolutely by-the-numbers with not a single interesting take on a very old trope. 

• Dialogue. The dialogue is filled with painful catchphrases stolen from 21st century sitcoms and action movies, ruining our immersion in what’s supposed to be the far future while annoying us at the same time. None of the cheap laughs land at all.

• Characters. Aside from Emperor Georgiou, who benefits from the character development she enjoyed on Star Trek: Discovery, none of our protagonists exist as other than as science fiction tropes decades old. There’s a sexy vamp, a grizzled combat veteran (with a thrown-in backstory established strictly in dialogue to tie the story back to better movies and shows), the comic relief, a shapeshifter, the Starfleet officer pressed into Section 31 service because she somehow messed up (never explained), and a guy in a really janky-looking mech suit. 

• Cheap laughs and cultural insensitivity. Two of the characters have exaggerated Irish (?) accents because ha ha, accents are funny and just add to the quirkiness of this lovable bunch. You’d think we’d have outgrown this kind of humour by now, but no. 

• Direction. There’s no tension in any of this. There are foot, hovercar, and spaceship chases without any zing or real stakes. Also, the actors are either explicitly told to ham it up or the director just can’t control them. Half of these performances are so over the top you want to throw things at the main viewscreen. Er. The TV, I mean. The other performances are TOO understated. And finally, an unforgiveable sin outside of parody: the protagonists walk toward the camera in slow motion to show how badass they are. At least there wasn’t an explosion blooming behind them. 

• Twist. There’s a twist. This isn’t a spoiler, because you’ll see it coming from a mile away. Actually there are two twists. You’ll  see both of them coming from two miles away. Each twist is explained with exposition and flashbacks to be sure you understand each twist. 

• Music. The music, even though created by the talented Jeff Russo, is bland as bland can be, especially for an action film. 

• Phasing. Remember that episode of TNG where LaForge and Ro are out of phase with the rest of the people on the Enterprise, and yet they don’t fall through the floor? Section 31 makes the same mistake and compounds it by having a character get stuck while passing through a wall without the wall exploding or their foot being severed at the ankle. 

• Most embarrassing surprise cameo ever. Oh boy, I would have loved this for this person if it had been any other Star Trek project. Alas. 

• Extreme stakes. Far too often in modern Star Trek the heroes face galaxy- or even universe-threatening disasters, and Section 31 does the same. NOT EVERY STORE CAN HAVE STAKES THIS HIGH. The impact is utterly lost. 

• And most importantly and most damning of all: Why is this even a Section 31 story? The way this tale is structured, it could just as easily been the crew of the USS Cerritos taking on this mission. Or the folks from DS9. Or maybe a pack of Klingon warriors. Any of these would have worked just as well as Section 31, because there’s no spycraft in this story! There’s no skullduggery! No questions of morality or ethics are ever raised, aside from one character’s note that “I’m here to make sure no one gets murdered.” This film is about Section 31, but aside from the limited participation of Control—the mission commander—this story has none of the essential trappings of the organization it’s purportedly about, nor does it touch any of the original themes raised in DS9 in any meaningful way. It’s “rule of cool” taken to ridiculous extremes, except none of it is cool.  

Stories I Enjoyed More Than Section 31

Every other Star Trek film. Yes, including Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Star Trek: Nemesis, and Star Trek Into Darkness. 

“The Alternative Factor”

“And the Children Shall Lead”

“The Way to Eden”

“Turnabout Intruder”

“Shades of Gray”

“Endgame”

“These Are the Voyages”

Season two of Star Trek: Picard

At least these episodes and movies, as flawed as they are, were made with a level of professionalism and pride that eclipses the laziness and cynicism on display in Section 31. Every example named above tried to be about something--or at the very least was brought low by production difficulties. Section 31 has no such excuse. 

I would also rather rewatch

• Any Transformers film
• Artemis Fowl
• The Blind Side
• Attack of the Clones
• The Rise of Skywalker

Well…maybe not that last one. But boy is it close. 

Romulan Unmasked?

At first I thought this figure was a Cardassian, so I painted him in shades of brown. But now that I see it close up, I think this might be another Romulan. Either way, I think the brown suits him. 
 

Romulan Operative

Colours are all right except for the base, which I hate. Facial definition is okay. Disruptor is hard to see. The Tal Shiar would not be pleased. 
 

What They Sent Me

It was only a couple of years ago that I supported the crowdfunded Deep Space Nine documentary, What We Left Behind. Months and months ago they sent me these cool pins as thanks for my support. The movie turned out great, and my name is in the credits as a supporter. 

DS9 in 4K

Here is a truly stunning 4K fan-made trailer for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's fifth season. It's very unlikely CBS will ever fund an HD restoration of the show, but oh my, these fans really know how to show just how awesome such a remastering could be. 

Dick Miller Tribute

Dick Miller Monsterpalooza Highlight Reel from Elijah Drenner on Vimeo.
I've long had a special fondness for character actor Dick Miller. He had a career spanning decades, usually in small supporting parts. He also appeared in Star Trek: The Next Generation on the holodeck in "The Big Goodbye" and as a Sanctuary District guard in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's "Past Tense" two-parter. He died this year, age 90, but as you'll see in the tribute video, he has one last film coming out in 2020.

I've seen only 29 films with Miller, just a fraction of his output. I look forward to seeing many more. 

Quck Take: What We Left Behind

I can't say much thanks to a nondisclosure agreement, but I will say that What We Left Behind: Looking Back at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is a deeply moving, heartfelt, sincere, in depth, and fascinating examination of my favourite Star Trek show, Deep Space Nine. I watched it last night, and tears were shed. DS9 came along at a point in my life when I really needed it, and it was amazing to see the actors, writers, and other creators come together to share their memories of the show's production. Best of all was the reunion of the writer's room and the blocking out of an imaginary first episode of an equally imaginary (alas!) eighth season. And the newly remastered high definition footage is another highlight. If you're any kind of Star Trek fan and get a chance to screen this, don't miss it. The blu-ray is being released in a couple of months.

Special thrill: seeing my name in the list of credits on a Star Trek-related production. So totally worth the 50 bucks, above and beyond helping the film get made.

There you go, Ira, no spoilers. 

I’m a Hi-Def Hero!

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is my favourite, alongside the original series, of the various Star Trek television shows. So when showrunner Ira Steven Behr and several other members of the cast and crew organized the production of a brand-new documentary about the show, I contributed to their Indigogo campaign right from the beginning. Later, when an opportunity arose to remaster select scenes from the show into high definition for the documentary, I threw some more coin their way - and was rewarded with this nifty DS9 challenge coin and a letter from Behr! 

Two Enigmas

Some time ago, I wrote about the U.S.S. Enigma, a Constitution-class variant capable of cloaking, a tool of the nefarious Section 31. Originally, I had envisioned the black ship you see at right as the ship's standard look; when it cloaked, I was going to swap the black ship for a non-painted, translucent model. This was Steve's suggestion, and while I love it (and could in fact still do it), I really wanted a version of the ship that could masquerade as a legitimate Federation vessel. So here's the U.S.S. Enigma in standard Starfleet livery. I now imagine the black ship as the cloaked version, but since it's not truly invisible (as the translucent model would have implied), maybe this, in-universe, could represent a more or less powerful cloaking device than the standard Romulan model. 

More importantly, I'm getting better at applying these finicky little decals. 

Collision Course

Ventral Centaur

A Simple Tailor

Four Views of an Enigma

A few nights ago, I dreamed I'd painted one of my recently-ordered 3D-printed starships (meant for use with the miniatures game A Call to Arms: Starfleet) black with red highlights; in the dream, the ship was the NX-007, a black ops Section 31 starship. Today I painted it as shown in the dream.

As you can see, my technique has improved a bit since the last time I painted starships, but it still needs work.

I think it looks nice and ominous.

I like to imagine that the nefarious Section 31 will not include the requisite NX registry or ship name on the hull as they should, for plausible deniability. This also saves me trying to paint or draw tiny, tiny letters and numbers.

The ship didn't have a name in the dream, but I've considered Spectre, Bond, Mata Hari, LeCarre, and Fleming; Stephen suggested Nathan Hale, the famous American spy of the war of independence. However, I think I'll call it the Enigma, since all the other ships in my A Call to Arms: Starfleet fleet have names beginning with E.

A Tinful of Talismans

DS9 in HD (if only...)

Some talented and enterprising souls have, to date, produced four videos to show what Star Trek: Deep Space Nine could look like in high definition. Would that the TNG HD blu-rays had sold well enough to make it so...still, this is gorgeous work. CBS, I plead once again: reconstruct DS9 in HD, as you did with The Next Generation. You know I'll buy every season, dammit. Possibly twice.