S1E13: The Storyteller; S1E14: Progress; S1E15: If Wishes Were Horses
The Storyteller: Get in the minivan, Bashir! Horny teens should not be in charge of negotiations. O No My Bukkit. DS9 learned important lessons from TNG in terms of how to treat teenage characters--specifically, let them be cringe and celebrate it. Ferengi kinks.
S1E12: Vortex; S1E13: Battle Lines
Vortex: A... changeling? Odo--authoritarian, utilitarian, or just childfree? Good old ass-forehead trek aliens. Klingon shift! Jude trips over the plot from season 4-7.
Battle Lines: Kira's "secret" Cardassian file. Artificial purgatories are kinda shitty.
It was all for you.
Kieron Gillen first came to attention as a comic creator with his 2006’s Phonogram, with Jamie McKelvie. Jamie and he formed into a gestalt monster that rampaged against the next fifteen years of comics, culminating with critical and smash hit the Wicked + the Divine.
Issue 19: Boss Fight; Issue 20: Open Table
Boss Fight: The group opens up. Also the characters open up. The context of people's lived experiences informs the media they make. Justen and Ana force Jude onto a soapbox.
Open Table: Explain the fucking backstory. Chuck's heroic sacrifice is almost enough.
DS9 S1 E10: Move Along Home; DS9 S1 E11: The Nagus
Spoiler warning: Headphones moment from 46:10 to 47:53, and from 1:00:21 to 1:00:55
Move Along Home: Game time! Also, yes, Nog should probably not be teaching sex ed to a humon. What Trek character would be a good sex educator?
Issue 17: Total Party Kill; Issue 18: Lines and Veils
TPK: The funniest possible Lovecraft explanation--and the only master who appears to be aware of his outside self. Personal horror is to evoke interesting responses, not traumatize the audience. BabPod lore!
S1E08 Dax; S1E09 The Passenger
Jude would take a bad Trek theme over Picard's theme, but hates ENT. There's some time travel in this episode because we had to re-record it nearly a season later.
Dax: Dax and... Bashir? are in charge of Engineering?
Issue 15: PVP; Issue 16: THAC0
Justen tells a Games Workshop story.
PVP: Interesting choices. Silmarillion reference. No one noticed that Sol got bamboozled. Sol would have loved Nobilis. Vampire might have fixed a lot of this group's issues.
S01E05: Babel; S01E06: Captive Pursuit; S01E07: Q-Less
Babel: O'Brien Must Suffer level Orange. Ominous Blinking Device time! Jude had severe empathy-pain for O'Brien. Sisko knows that Kira will always blame Cardassians first. Quark arguing he's an essential service is so 2023.
Issue 13: Little Wars, Issue 14: Dual Wield
Little Wars: 20+20. Complicated verb tenses. The origins of the Fair. H.G. Wells is a Prick. The Masters of DIE. Dual Wield: If your kids grew up any time after the 1990s and get Jumanji'd, it's not your fault. According to tiktok dice are a little easier to make than this. If a Protagonist's mom is Bad News, what do you do?