Star Trek: Our Man Bashir

Episode: "Our Man Bashir"

Series: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

Season 4, Episode 10

Original Air Date: November 27, 1995

via Memory Alpha

Garak episode!

Julian is indulging in a James Bond-inspired holosuite program with himself as the "master spy."  First, Garak shows up uninvited, though as himself.  Next, the doctor's other station colleagues appear as characters within the story.  Kira is the Russian counterpart love interest.  Miles is the goon.  Benjamin is the arch-villain with Worf as his henchman.  Dax is the beautiful scientist caught in the middle.

The explanation for all this is unusually contrived.  The five crew members were lost in a transporter malfunction but miraculously, the computer was able to save their data in the holosuite program.  Bashir must keep the program going until a more permanent solution can be found.  The safety settings are off, too, so he also has to keep everyone, including himself, alive.

Contrived though it is, the story's a lot of fun.  Some call it one of the best.  I'm not ready to put it in my top ten but only because I need to leave room for others I prefer.  I will concede that as alternate reality tales go, I usually prefer DS9's holosuite adventures to its Mirror Universe escapades.  

The episode is a particularly important one for Bashir.  For the most part, the series was humming along beautifully by the middle of Season 4 but the writers were still sorting out the best approach with Julian.  The playboy/cad character didn't workout.  He came off as an annoying jerk.  They needed a new avenue and "Our Man Bashir" was just what the doctor ordered (pun fully intended).  

There's plenty of good material to go around.  Garak is wonderful with his running critique of Bashir's overly glamorous spy fantasy.  Rom gets to show off his inventive mechanical approach.  Sisko is a stellar Bond villain.  Some critics feel the female characters were a step backwards for Star Trek which is fair.  Nana Visitor had a lot of fun in her role, though.  Her off-screen romance with Alexander Siddig was already full-on at this point so their on-screen intimacy was all the more believable.

The allusions to Bond films and books are numerous, in fact too close for comfort for MGM.  The Trek producers got a cease and desist letter from the owners of the Bond franchise and the next appearance of Julian Bashir, International Spy, was more subtle with its references.

80th Episode

80 episodes is a significant benchmark for a Star Trek series.  The original series only had 79 in its initial run.  When NextGen hit 80, cast and crew threw a party.  I don't know if it was such a big deal for later series but I still see it as a good point to take stock.  And it's definitely a meaningful standard.  Of the 11 Star Trek television series to have aired so far, only 4 of them have 80 or more: TNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise.  There are far fewer episodes per season in the streaming era.  Discovery has the most among recent series with 65 episodes.

What's new?

The basic concept of Deep Space Nine represents a significant departure from the well-established Star Trek model.  The old way: the Enterprise visits a new world, makes everything right - Prime Directive be damned - and moves on to next week's adventure.  Others can deal with the messy aftermath.

In DS9, our heroes are stuck in the soup with the newly liberated Bajorans.  The story allows for a more intimate glimpse of one civilization and that of their recent oppressors, the Cardassians.  Exploration hasn't completely been thrown out.  The wormhole to the Gamma Quadrant brings many possibilities as does the introduction of the Defiant, a ship worthy of long-distance travel.  Still, the basic idea of "Star Trek stuck in one place" is new.  And it's wonderful.

Is this still Star Trek?

The real world of the 1990s was full of parallels for Deep Space Nine to draw from.  Is Bajor Israel?  Palestine?  Bosnia?  Are Cardassians Nazis?  British imperialists?  The wormhole is definitely a stand-in for the Suez Canal.  The rest is fuzzy.  Just like the real world.

Tolerance is still the basic dogma so in that, DS9 is pure Trek.  However, that tolerance is harder work for the principals.  Kira and Miles are both openly hostile to the Cardassians.  But they are challenged in their thinking and that's solid - even improved - Trek.

The one major element which feels un-Trek is Sisko's role as Emissary for the Bajorans.  I'm not a fan of chosen one narratives in Star Trek.  Unfortunately, they seem to be creeping into the franchise all the time now.  To me, that's Star Wars, Marvel or Doctor Who stuff, not Trek.  I don't mind the exploration of religion in general - fair game as far as I'm concerned.  I just don't like the protagonist being cast in the role of Messiah.  Sisko is a strong, rich, nuanced character even without it.

80 episodes in, Deep Space Nine is already the best series so far and with many of the most important story lines, it still feels like we're just getting started.