Star Trek DS9 - Season 2 - Episode 06
Originally Aired: 1993-10-31
Synopsis:
After falling in love with a woman whose species is unable to walk in "normal" gravity, Bashir develops a technology that could free her of her wheelchair forever. [DVD]
Filler Quotient:
3, bad filler, totally skippable.
- 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. And we never see Melora again.
Problems
- The gravity Melora is used to is extremely, extremely low. So low that there's barely any at all; she floats around like a feather. Why would her species evolve as bipedal life forms when they can just fly around most of the time?
Factoids
- Bashir's father was a Federation diplomat.
- Bashir is supposedly no good at Tennis.
Remarkable Scenes
- Fallit Kot just after walking into Quark's bar: "I've come to kill you, Quark."
- The Klingon restaurant scene. I love when the Klingon chef throws the plate behind him. Hilarious!
- Melora: "What kind of architect would design a raised limb at the entrance of every door?!" I wondered this myself in the pilot episode. :)
- Melora and Dax discussing alien relationships.
- Melora kicking some low gravity ass!
- The Klingon chef singing.
- Rules of Acquisition: 16. A deal is a deal.
- Morn Appearances; 1. Seen sitting behind Bashir and Dax in the opening scene while they're talking to O'Brien about the wheelchair. 2. In Quark's bar just before Quark attempts to be really really nice to Fallit Kot so he won't kill him.
My Review
This episode is an attempt to prove handicapped people can contribute to society, in a Federation enlightenment sort of way, but instead just comes off as a bit obnoxious. Geordi LaForge was a much better example of how handicapped people can contribute to society, but admittedly in some ways, Geordi is a poor example because they eliminated his problem with technology. Melora is a better example of how handicapped people can contribute to society because her problem is natural to her species. Unfortunately, Melora was the obnoxious thing about this episode. Her behavior was just annoying, whereas Geordi was a very likable guy. The idea of a medical cure for her situation is obnoxious too. The science behind it is a little fuzzy, but far less so than Melora's species' curious bipedal evolution in a low gravity environment. What I didn't like most about it was the episode should have been more about Melora living on the station with a handicap and less about curing it. And even that would have been a little lame. Fortunately, the ending redeems quite a bit of the episode's mistakes. Melora is not going to fix her handicap, as that would be insulting the rest of her species.
The following are comments submitted by my readers.
The gravity in the scene in Melora's quarters were inconsistent, too, switching between low gravity and no gravity at least once.
I have to disagree with your review, dear Kethinov. I loved this episode! It definitely had its flaws, which I'll go into later, but first I'll say why I liked it.
This was obviously an episode that wanted to deal with "disability" issues. Melora is predictably rough around the edges and fiercely independent, and very walled off. Bashir's ability to worm his way in through her defenses was beautifully written and acted, and we see behind Melora's rather off-putting exterior is a vulnerable person who's rather insecure about her qualifications. It's actually great character development for Bashir.
I also liked that they pulled off a low-gravity scene. It's the first I've really seen since Star Trek VI (I may be wrong), and you'd think you'd see more of them, seeing as how most of the gravity we see in Star Trek is artificial. Of course, this is a budget issue. If, every time an away team boarded some disabled ship or derelict, they had to be weightless, as would be most realistic, the budget would go through the roof. Oh well.
Anyway, it's nice to see Bashir turn his attention away from Dax for a little bit! It was also nice and realistic to see a hostile alien follow through on his threat to kill a hostage (even though she didn't die). I also liked how she saved the day, and how an analogy to an ancient earth story got her to reconsider undergoing those treatments.
Now to the faults: As Kethinov pointed out, Melora's appearance is rather unrealistic. A planet with such low gravity would have to be extremely small (smaller than our moon), and would probably hold next to no atmosphere, which would probably make any species living on such a planet A) very tall, and B) able to live on very little air. Melora would probably find the atmospheric pressure on DS9 unbearably high. Maybe her species migrated from some other planet and hadn't evolved past its original humanoid appearance; who knows.
They could have done it some other way; they could have made her born with some genetic muscular defect that required her to live and grow up in a low-gravity environment, but Star Trek, despite its many strengths, has always required a bit of suspension of disbelief. Some more than others.
The other flaw is one not intrinsic to the episode, but another unfortunate theme in Star Trek: we never hear from Melora again. The theme of exploring a romantic interest in an episode only to have it forgotten in the next isn't new (see TNG: Lessons, The Game, etc.), and it's rather irritating! Oh well. I still liked this episode a lot.
Solid episode. Great to see Bashir getting some nice character development, also great to see another strong female character in DS9. DS9 was particularly good at independent women but Melora is fantastically prickly, driven and stubborn. Quite similar to Ensign Ro in her first appearance actually, but I have to agree with djb that it is such a shame that we never see her again.
On the down side slightly obvious plot developments lets the rating of this episode slide. I'd give it a 5 or 6.
Again, suspension of disbelief is an absolute requirement when watching Star Trek. I always feel that, as long as they don't break too many of their own rules, then I'm happy with it. If you get too upset by the science of Star Trek then you'll have to switch off every time they use the transporter surely?
While I don't always agree with our host on episode ratings, I completely concur with the 2/10 rating on this one, as well as the reason for such a rating.
The character of Melora is quite irritating, and Bashir, with his constant professions of awe about her gets old pretty quick too.
The high point of the entire episode for me is the Klingon chef -- I wish they had featured him, if not prominently, then more regularly in the later seasons. As it is I don't think they even gave him a name.