Star Trek: Deep Space Nine/Headscratchers: Difference between revisions

*** It's hard to say how legal theory might work several centuries from now but the defense of simply following orders hasn't protected anyone from being arrested for simply being guards at Nazi concentration camps.

*** Nazi concentration camp guards weren't forced into those jobs against their will. They would've either volunteered or been specially chosen for their obscene loyalty to the Nazi party and/or hatred of Jews. And we're not talking about a guard at a Cardassian death camp here. We're talking about a household servant. He probably had ''no choice at all'' in where he worked or who he worked for.

 

== Medieval Bajoran Spacecraft ==

** Just had a thought. Perhaps the Bajorans did have access to electricity and motors and stuff but intentionally left it out of the design for some reason. For example, if the ship were to encounter an EMP wave that would cripple the ship. Maybe the Bajorans were expecting something like that to happen. They explicitly mention the Denorios Belt bring a major concern and that's a plasma field within the Bajor system. Surely that would have caused major problems for a ship that does have a power source, right?

*** If they were advanced enough to launch the ships then shouldn't they have been advanced enough to know the basics about protecting electronics? It would seem far more dangerous that without sensors and computers they would go ''far'' off course. Of course, unless the Cardassian home planet is in the same system as Bajor it makes even less sense that anyone would try it. Anything less than warp speeds couldn't make that long a trip safely (something an experienced officer like Sisko should know).

 

== But the Other Dax did it! ==

** Unilateral extradition isn't ''that'' odd by itself (at least, it's not an inherently ridiculous concept), but if the Federation is really based on the EU, they would never for a moment consider handing Dax to a government that used the death penalty, without the explicit assurance that the entire plot of the episode wouldn't happen.

*** The series itself never explains the full terms of the Treaty of Algeron, but presumably in return for not developing cloaking technology the Federation gained some concession from the Romulans.

 

== Cross-breedin' Cardies ==

*** Possibly symbionts originally lived out their entire lives in their first host, which they entered as eggs/larvae, and died when the host did. Surgery to transfer the symbionts was developed later, allowing symbionts' lifespans to exceed that of their hosts for the first time.

** Bajorans and Cardassians, despite appearances, are more closely-related than Klingons and Trill, I guess. They ''do'' live within, like, a parsec of each other, if I recall correctly.

 

== We're more justified than you! ==

*** In the ''[[Star Trek Terok Nor]]'' prequel novels, the reason for Bajor's "stagnation" is made clear: They have everything they need. Prior to the Cardassians' arrival, they had little interest in meeting with other races or even colonizing outside their star system, and those that did were considered fringe, at best.

*** A good comparison for this can be made with the Vulcans. They were way more advanced than humans, even leaving out ''Enterprise'' continuity. In the span of a few centuries Starfleet has outstripped them completely. The Bajorans just didn't have that drive.

 

== Who's responsible for the Maquis? ==

*** This is probably where it all went wrong. Picard managed a sensible compromise (or as sensible as was possible under the circumstances), keep your citizenship but leave, or stay but become Cardassian citizens. That is straight forward enough; clearly when it came to time for Federation Ambassadors to formalize that someone back-pedalled, took a clear-cut compromise and created a quagmire because it seemed "nicer".

* There is suspicion that Kasidy sold medical supplies to the Maquis. Odo wants an illegal search to gather evidence.

Odo: She ceased to be a Federation citizen when she helped the Maquis. }}

** Holy Patriot Act, Batman. Fed citizens have inalienable rights, but any policeman, even a foreign policeman can cancel your citizenship and rights on '''suspicion???'''

** Odo also has a bit of a history of Orwellian beliefs so i'm not surprised he acts that way.

 

== Will the real Darhe'el please stand up? ==

* This is not to knock "Duet", which is one of the best episodes of the series and in all of ''[[Star Trek]]'' in my opinion. But one wonders exactly how Marritza expected his plan to work. If Darhe'el ''had'' been alive, all the Cardassians would have to do to discredit Marritza is simply produce him. And if he were dead, just tell everyone that-- hell, half of Cardassia ''viewed his body!'' So whether Darhe'el were alive or dead, there was no way Marritza would be able to convince people that he was him. This was not a very well-thought-out plan on his part.

** He might not have expected the crew of DS9 (or wherever he ended up captured at) to actually contact the Cardassians and check. This would be a fair assumption assuming the station were run solely by Bajorans, perhaps he didn't know about the Federation involvement (which happened only a few months before he arrived.)

*** Or having checked, he might expect them to believe that the Cardassians had lied. After all, it's not like the Cardassians were above lying to save face on, well, ''just about anything''. If it hadn't been for them {{spoiler|finding the records which clearly showed that Gul Darheel had been on Cardassia when the accident happened, therefore couldn't have Kalinora syndrome, therefore the man in the cell couldn't be Darheel}} then they might well have assumed that the Cardassians were trying to create an alibi.

**** In fact, after receiving that information from Dukat, DS9's crew ''did'' assume that it was forged-- at least, ''Kira'' certainly did. It was the dermal regenerative Marritza was taking that tipped Bashir off.

 

== If you eat at my restaurant, you'll be making a mistake you'll regret for the rest of your lives! ==

* Is that really how restaurant owners talk? Throwing a big chunk of their own product under the bus?

*** Of course, since no one needs money in the Federation, what does he care?

*** It's not about money, but about professional pride.

** Shit, maybe he'd just realised he'd forgotten to get the ingredients for anything except a bread pudding souffle (and how does that work, by the way?) and was extemporising to cover his ass.

*** If [[Alternative Character Interpretation|that's the case]], then he certainly fooled Ben, who then says [[Informed Ability|"you should listen to him. The man knows his bread pudding."]]

 

== Wartime extradition ==

* Klingons try to extradite Worf for allegedly shooting a civilian ship.

Prosecution Attorney: There are no diplomatic relations. }}

** In that case there is no Extradition Treaty and the episode should end right there.

*** The difference is that up until the conflict began the Klingons and Federation were allies and the Federation very much wants friendly relations with the Klingons to resume again. They're playing nice in hopes that it will be a step to reconciliation between their two powers, plus the Federation was not happy with the situation and Worf was hella lucky it was a frame up. Heck, for all we know WORF is the one who accepted the charges set against him and agreed to the trial, murdering civilians would be something all sides could agree would warrant punishment.

**** In my opinion Worf was completely justified in taking the shot. Present day Navies "strongly encourage" everybody to keep well away in peace time. And he was at that time in combat. Anybody who approaches active combat puts themselves willingly at risk. Trying to sneak up on the combatants is suicidal.

 

== No law against Genocide ==

** "For the Uniform" has been a controversial episode since it aired, but I think people have a long history of misinterpreting the ending. Sisko did not commit genocide or attempt to -- he just ruined the Maquis's real estate. One might note, however, that he did commit a massive ecological crime, but it seems Starfleet is willing to turn a blind eye to that.

*** Generally if you launch weapons towards a space with the express purpose of making that place uninhabitable by the residents until a terrorist surrenders that's going to at least be ethnic cleansing.

* Speaking of Eddington, of all the ships in Starfleet they could have sent after him, why did they pick the one ship he had ''served aboard'' to catch him? While this was justified in "For The Uniform" by having the Maquis damage the only other ship in range, Sisko had apparently had the assignment for eight months before that. Did it really not occur to them that, in the months he was aboard, he might have sabotaged the Defiant like he did the station? And surprise surprise, it turns out he did!

** True, and why give Sisko the job of tracking him down at all? A: Sisko's plate is pretty full anyway, and B: Sisko harbours a personal grudge against him and that threatens his objectivity.

*** The ''Defiant'' was apparently one of the few major combat vessels the Federation had in the area (not that it makes any sense to have so few there). Of course why the head of the most important space station in the region is going terrorist-hunting instead of delegating to his officers is a good question.

 

== If You Prick a Changeling, Does He Not Bleed? ==

*** Come to think of it, it'd be pretty easy to get around that test if you knew ahead of time you'd be taking it. And by making it standard practice, you know when to expect it.

*** It would be a hell of a lot harder if the Feds did a DNA test on the resulting blood which probably takes less than a minute with their technology, that would at least limit the infiltrators to having to always impersonate the same person

 

== Good Luck With That Trapped on a Deathless War World Thing! ==

*** They left Opaka behind because they had no way to get her off-planet without killing her. And even if they had, she seemed to have decided that bringing peace to this world was her destiny. Kind of a noble sacrifice.

*** A good thing Kira was there, though. The Bajoran government would likely have been pretty pissed off and suspicious if an all-Starfleet crew came back and said "Yeah, she told us to tell you she's staying behind. You'll have to take our word for it." Bajor was still somewhat uncomfortable with the Federation at that point, and something like that would have been a major, major problem if the government's own chosen liaison officer couldn't verify Starfleet's story.

** The original poster seems to have neglected this conversation towards the end of the episode:

'''Kira:''' You really think the fear of death would stop the fighting? It never has in any ''other'' war. }}

'''Shel-la:''' On this world, your disabled microbes would be the ultimate weapon, Doctor-- one that we could use to truly destroy our enemies. }}

** So the point here is: They didn't disable the microbes because the Ennis and the Nol-Ennis would simply use it as an excuse to finally annihilate one another. They had no interest in making peace with one another, and that's why Kai Opaka willingly stayed-- to help them begin the healing process. (In the [[Expanded Universe]], the two tribes eventually {{spoiler|make peace, unify, and gain the ability to leave the moon.}})

*** That makes sense - when they had the benefit of immortality, if not for the war, they would have had plenty of time to develop scientific processes necessary to not only understand the microbes, but alter them. It is possible that it was, in part, a component of the plan of those who imprisoned them there to begin with - their fighting would continue until they had eventually learned the futility of it, and started to actually work together. Eventually, they would come to develop the technology necessary to end the cycle completely and escape the moon, but it could only happen if they first end their war with each other, and since both sides were made immortal, war could not be ended by the victory of one side over the other - only a diplomatic ending was possible.

 

== Good Luck With That Cardassian Prison Thing! ==

* ''Deep Space Nine'' episode '''The Homecoming''': Kira and O'Brien go to break Bajoran prisoners out of jail. Good so far. They can't use the transporter to beam them up because the runabout's transporter can only beam two people at a time and there's a dozen, so beaming two of them will make the guards fire on the rest. Makes sense so far. They land, make a daring escape with six of the prisoners, get to the runabout and fly off because the guards are firing with hand weapons. Then, even though no one is shooting at them with weapons rated for ship fire, '''they raise shields and fly off leaving 6 of the prisoners to die instead of beaming them onto the ship!''' What the hell?

** They have to leave in a hurry because there are two warships coming into range; they may just not have had the time.

 

== Changelings Fail Kidnapping Forever ==

** Quark is working under the authority of the Ferengi Commerce Authority. Regardless of ''where'' he works, he still has to operate under Ferengi law to keep their authority. Without their authority he cannot do business with other Ferengi. They have every right to revoke his license and take any other actions required under Ferengi law. It's like if you work for an American company in Russia. Your company can revoke your ability to do business with them there. (The Ferengi Government is more like a corporation than a government if you recall).

*** Plus, it's not a Federation outpost. It's a Bajoran outpost with a Federation administration.

** Because his financial holdings are only recognized by the Ferengi government. The Federation can't stop Brunt from selling off Quark's assets because those assets ''do not exist" as far as the Federation is concerned. It would be like the United States trying to stop Switzerland from seizing the assets of a Swiss tourist.

** At the end of the episode, he re-opens the bar and continues doing business after Sisko &co. donate furniture and resources (for the community's benefit). The FCA can stop him trading legally with other Ferengi, but have no power to stop him running a business in Bajoran territory, so they don't. ([[Hand Wave|Let's just assume]] that the Ferengi staff are now formally employed by Sisko or something.)

*** Actually, for the duration of the revocation of Quark's business license, no Ferengi are seen working in the bar. Presumably he hires extra dabo girls, who then pull double duty as waitresses.

* Doesn't its very existence go against the Ferengi principle of free enterprise anyway?

 

== Whacking the Dominion Hive ==

** The Federation is a great power in its own right, and even peaceful great powers don't like being bullied. Even weak governments don't like that. The Dominion's demands were a slap in the face of Federation sovereignty.

** Both the phrase "Whacking the Dominion Hive" and this complaint, by the way, come straight from Phil Farrand's ''The Nitpicker's Guide for Deep Space Nine Trekkers'', a book full of Headscratchers and other nitpicks. 'Tis a good read.

 

== Attack of the 50-Foot Odo ==

*** Laas can also turn into fire, so that may be how he keeps warm in his space-dwelling form. And maybe he just held his breath. If he can travel faster than light then anything is possible!

*** Um, "Treachery, Faith and the Great River" was eight episodes ''earlier'' than "Chimera."

 

== Why was Odo turned Human and not Bajoran? ==

** Could have been another layer of the punishment. By turning Odo human, he is further isolated from the culture that he grew up in and is thus made even more alone.

*** I'm not sure that really works as an explanation, because 1: Odo was only marginally connected with Bajoran society to begin with, and 2: he doesn't outwardly look like a Bajoran even during his exile. He just looks like Odo (and, as emphasized in "Apocalypse Rising," chooses to continue to look that way). The arrangement of his internal anatomy would seem to make little difference.

 

== A bit quick to profile there ==

** And the heck of it is, ''she was right.'' Of course, it wasn't just her coming to that conclusion; Joran helped quite a bit.

 

== New Bajoran Prisoners As the Plot Demands ==

** Original Poster: But that's exactly my point. Since the Cardassians have ''already'' promised that they released all their Bajoran prisoners, the Federation and Bajor should take a more hard-line stance when Cardassia attempts to negotiate with the release of (allegedly nonexistent) Bajoran prisoners. Their governments should say, ''"What'' Bajoran prisoners? Your government already agreed to release ''all'' of them, and we demand that you live up to that agreement."

*** I agree; this is a simple continuity problem.

** It could have been a one-time amnesty at the end of the occupation; the Bajorans captured later would be members of the Maquis or other terrorists that carried on the fight after the occupation was over. Though they may be criminals, Bajor would want their citizens back because their government knows full well how harshly Cardassians treat their prisoners.

** It could have been that the Cardassians were releasing all ''political'' prisoners in that agreement, and later prisoner releases were for crimes such as murder, theft, etc. that took place under the Occupation. Or prisoners taken since the end of the Occupation for things like border incursion, smuggling, or espionage.

== Duh, the Cardassians just want the station ==

 

 

== The General's Kia-of-Prey ==

*** If they had put a gun to his head and then revealed that it was fake I doubt he would have been so forgiving.

**** And? They didn't put a gun to his head. And try this on for size: the Wadi well and truly did not seem to understand that anyone ''wouldn't'' want to take part in their game. They misjudged their audience (as did the Iyaarans in ''Liaisons'') but when cultures are interacting for the first time, this is a known risk.

 

== State-sponsored murder has no consequences ==

** Probably not. Now that the Federation knows what they wanted to do, trying it ''again'' would give them worse things to worry about than a few biological weapons here or there. And Bashir and O'Brien are unlikely to return to T'Lani or Kellerun space of their own accord, or even talk to their representatives, so the knowledge won't be returned to the people who are interested in it.

*** The T'Lani and Kellerun were certainly willing to attempt murder when there was no reason to think that O'Brien and Bashir would return anyway. Really the only way they could be safe would be a very large warship reminding both species ''why'' the Federation is one of the dominant powers in the galaxy.

 

== Off-screen, never mentioned before war crimes? ==

**** That guaranteed execution might be part of why the Federation would have been reluctant to hand him over to the Bajorans...

** There's also a big difference between what we saw of Dukat, as viewers, and how much the Federation knows. We know that he was actually pretty restrained because we saw it happen, but the Federation would realistically need to carry out an investigation to sort things out, which is what they were doing now that they had him in custody. Plus, I'm sure "investigating" Dukat's role in the Dominion War is, in part, a way of trying to get him to cooperate and provide them with valuable intelligence.

 

== Cloning a man as evidence? ==

** I don't know about other Federation stations, but DS9 was somewhat of a special case. At the beginning of "Emissary", Starfleet wasn't completely taking over the station, but helping out Bajor after the occupation as a facilitator. The Starfleet crew early on was nearly a skeleton crew: you had your doctor, your chief engineer, your head science officer, and a few other crewmen scattered here and there to fill gaps, but the rest of the station personnel were mostly members of the Bajoran militia (such as Odo's entire staff). This wasn't exactly a plum assignment, or even much of an important one; Bajor wasn't strategically important, the station wasn't exactly a major hub for starships, or any traffic, for that matter (remember, it wasn't named ''Deep Space'' Nine because it was in a major traffic zone), and the station was still technically Bajoran with a token Federation presence. Perhaps Starfleet just didn't see it as important enough to send a captain in. It was only after the discovery of the wormhole that suddenly Bajor and the station became important to both the Federation and the Alpha Quadrant as a whole, but by then Sisko had already been placed in the position of Emissary by the Bajorans, and the Starfleet higher-ups probably thought it would weaken their relationship with Bajor to bring in somebody else above Sisko at that point.

** No doubt Sisko has special training and experience that makes him appropriate for such an administration job (and it's easy to forget that, at the beginning of the series, Sisko is a mid-level administrator). I think spending so much time aboard starships throughout most of [[Star Trek]] fosters a "captain or nothing!" mentality in most audiences, but realistically a commander is more than experienced enough for most command situations.

 

== Vital ability to see tiny indistinguishable specks? ==

== "Or should I say Bill?" ==

* Admiral Ross went without a first name for a while, until "Image in the Sand," when Odo says to Kira (sensitive about being called "Colonel"): "Well, has Admiral Ross, or should I say Bill, arrived yet?" Indeed, later episodes call him William or Bill Ross. The headscratcher is that the ''Deep Space Nine Companion'' notes that the writers weren't sure at first if that reference was to be taken literally (and early set decorations called him "Cliff Ross"), because it was in the context of Odo cracking a joke. It was indeed gentle dig at Kira's discomfort with her new title, but how could this joke work at all if Admiral Ross's given name was anything other than William?

 

== Hastily thought out mole hunt from shaky evidence? ==

** Sloan knew the entire time that Bashir wasn't a mole. He wanted to test him to see if he was worthy of joining Section 31. It's been a while since I've seen the episode, so I don't remember the particular reason it was so elaborate.

*** Slaon mentions that he had been proven wrong by the test, implying he had suspected that Bashir was a traitor before.

 

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[[Category:Live Action TV/Headscratchers]]

[[Category:Headscratchers]]

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