I think he did, if you consider his devoted fanbase. Anyone can get an emmy in the heat of the moment. Few have beloved characters that stand the test of time.
@@PhazonOmega true! I met and spoke with Andy Robinson at a recent Comicon, and I told him the same thing! He was flattered, and agreed how deep Garak’s character was written throughout the show. Oh, and Andy Robinson’s also super sweet and easy to talk to (you may’ve met him yourself).
Garak understands "why" and "how" people manipulate others, it's when he points those sometimes petty process out to people and it makes them look themselves in the mirror that people don't like being around him
When Garak was having his claustrophobia attacks, he helped Ezri more than Ezri helped him. By telling her the hard cold truth with no softeners. In his way, Garak was just as honorable a man as Worf was.
Damar had one of the greatest character arch’s in tv history. He went from a background nobody to a bitter , self loathing drunk to a galactic rebel leader to finally, a martyr.
DS9 had at least 2 characters that fit this Damar and Nog. Illiterate, juvenile delinquent to decorated war hero and Star Fleet officer. Not bad for characters not even in the main cast.
@@Turtle1631991 same. Think Kira should have jumped in front of that phaser so he could live to usher in a new Cardassia. Would have been the perfect end to both their arcs
@@Turtle1631991 They had to kill him off just before they finally entered the chamber where the female shapeshifter was hiding so that it was the main cast members who would finally end the war. If Damar had entered the chamber he probably would have shot her.
I also like the fact that Kira even felt any kind of regret after what she said despite the fact she was 100% right. A lot of Bajorans wouldn't and certainly not the most fanatical ones, they would say his wife and child deserved to be killed as retribution. But she didn't paint every Cardassian with the same brush the way they did.
He wasn't even a badguy, he was just Gul Dukat's flunky, who had his name said outloud once in the episode he was introduced in. I sometime wonder, if Damar had lived through the final assault on the command center, what would Cardassia have become under his leadership.
Damar is in personal agony and gets angry at Kira for using this moment to score points, Kira instantly regrets going there and realises that she really should've bit her tongue, Damar accepts her tacit apology but also takes it to heart and accepts that she was right... all without a single word of dialogue: Show, don't tell. A fantastic moment.
This scene is so deep and well done both by actors and writers. Absolutely one of my most favorite Star Trek scenes ever. And it takes so much of the canon history to build up the emotional weight for this scene to be successful. The camera watching Kira's face as Damar pulls the words right out of her mind...
I would love to be able to watch this show again for the first time. It's such a shame that they don't seem to be able to do anything close to this in the sci-fi series' of today (Trek or otherwise)
I am so confused by this post and the likes it has generated. There was literally no point in this 1:34 clip that didn't have dialogue, and every single thing you outlined (including the apology later in the episode) is communicated via the characters speaking to each other... also known as dialogue. Next time you could just say, "I like this scene" instead of handing out bullshit awards that aren't even applicable.
@@jackstack2136 Confusion is just a sign that you don't know as much as you think you do. That could easily explain why you didn't get the significance of that body language. This is also what happens when youth pay more attention to their cell phones than to other people.
It wasn't just that. He realized that she's right and that he's a hypocrite, which made him realize that Cardassia needs to change and become better than that.
you can even see him nod after her eyes drop. he was enraged at first, that she would use his family’s death as an opportunity to throw stones. but you absolutely caught it. the very moment her eyes drop is the moment the message sinks in for him.
@@Soulsphere001 yeah.. from the first time we see him, he was giving orders like that, and supporting officers who made a career out of orders like that. (Dukat for example.) and Damar himself carried out a killing of the sort with Ziyal. so yeah, once he got past his initial anger at kira's words, he came to a realization and became angry at himself.
@@tonoornottonoIt’s brilliantly acted. He is still clearly angry, but also realizes she is right, and apologetic so removes himself from the situation. Both actors brilliantly portray so many conflicting emotions.
I love the fact that Garak, during his exile, has come to have a better understanding of both his beloved Cardassia as well as those they conquered. He has realized that there is no romanticism about what happened and that in order for his world to survive, they’ll have to change.
I believe he always knew, but played the good Cardassian let himself model after his father to please him. He even said the latter when they were in the Dominion proson camp just before Enabran Tain died.
Garak , from the moment of his exile became his own man independent of Cardassian norms or anyone else's. He says he is very Cardassian but to be honest there are no Cardassians like him. Indeed, he was putting up a front because he really has no idea what he is supposed to act like naturally. The blank stare he gives Bashir in his last monologue is telling; Garak survives Cardassia's ruin but he ultimately feels both sad and dispassionate about it.
@@youtubestayatyourrootsforfsake I think to some degree Garak was pulling a Curb your Enthusiasm Larry David act to deliberately offend people. To what degree no one can know but I think he's certainly aware of the effect his comments would have.
Garak is by far the best character on this show... don’t get me wrong, I love Nog and Bashir and Worf especially, but Garak... he owns the scene every time he’s a part. One of his lines while they are captured and taken to the Dominion internment camp... “Oh thank goodness you’re here! Can you point us in the direction of the wormhole?” He just says it so passively and nonchalantly that you almost believe him... *almost* being the operative word.
When I was a kid, the 'theater' quality of Star Trek in general kind of annoyed me (I grew up when these were still coming out) - Now though, seeing them as an adult... there's a certain poignant honesty about it all, the acting is amazing more often then not, and the delivery of the message is hard hitting. This one in particular got to me, along with the Gul Darhe'el scene. Perfect delivery, superb acting in general.
Damar would not have been allowed to survive the series, given the blood on his hands. So he died a glorious, enlightened martyr. Garak, on the other hand, had to pick up the pieces of the aftermath. Redeemed he was, but subject to constant labour for the rest of his life.
Damar was never trully "evil" as megalomaniac Dukat or deceitful/manipulative Garak. He was an honest man trying to create/maintain order as he was taught to do by his people not knowing any better. When the price became too high on his conscience that he had to drown said conscience in kanar he formed the resistance and it was not to redeem himself in the eyes of the federation or the bajorans cuz until then he was just a good cardassian soldier doing his job....he had to redeem himself in his own eyes...maybe those of his family but then they got killed so for them it became to honor their memories and to only his eyes he needed too redeem himself.
@@edwinpoon Considering Garak's romantic patriotism, that's likely the best end he could have gotten. Working to build a new, better Cardassia. Fitting too, as his favorite tale was 'The Neverending Sacrifice' about duty to the state.
I honestly mourned for him, when he died Too bad we didn't see more of the redeemed Damar. I believe the new Damar would have been a great ruler, molded through blood and tears
You can see the moment that Damar realizes, the Cardassians had become to the Dominion what the Bajorans had been to the Cardassians. It was also the moment that I think he began wanting Cardassia to become something better.
The point is that during the occupation, the Cardassians didn't see their actions as "casual brutality," but as a justified way to keep people in line. Now that the shoe is on the other foot and HIS people are the ones being "kept in line," he's suddenly realized that it wasn't as justified as he'd built it to be in his nostalgic view of the Cardassian culture.
I love how the actors just basically conveyed a dialogue with their expressions alone! Kira: (closing her eyes) "Ah, goddammit. I'm sorry... That was uncalled for..." Damar: (slightly opens mouth and nods) "...N-no, I... I understand." Garak: (eyes eide open) "HOLY SHIT, that was a close one!"
And before that, when Damar is speaking, the look that Garak gives Kira at 0:26 ...Garak knows *exactly* what Kira is thinking, he's just not sure if she's going to say it out loud.
DS9 was masterful on all levels of acting. Garak,Damar,Dukat,Weyong,Female Changling,Odo,Sisko,Worf,Quark I can go on and on each played their roles expertly. There was alot of shakespearean influences in some of the roles and it fit the tone the darker tone of the show perfectly. Then you have the light hearted stuff with quark who could still bring out a very dramatic and meaningful scene at the snap of a finger.
She always had that flair, and she grew tremendously ever since Kai Opaca said, "This isn't your war." Kira slowly turned herself around and started seeing the universe as not black and white, but as many different colors as there are entities that she meets.
Start with a secondary character. Someone deep in the background. Someone with one, maybe two lines of dialog. Give that character a major story arc. Have the character undergo profound changes. Elevate the character to a central pillar of the storyline. And you've got Damar. DS9 deserves a lot of respect.
It really was something to watch how they built his character up from nothing to the leader of the rebellion. A better character and actor than gul Ducat ducat always annoyed me he talked way too much.
This was Garak, too. He wasn't originally supposed to be a major cast member but they loved his character and the acting in his first appearance, so they just kept bringing him back.
You guys are all right. Funny how a show that at the time was regarded as being to soap opera like is now being recognized for its truly amazing character development! Almost all of my favorite characters in star trek come from this series!
Garak was extremely intelligent, he knew what Kira was capable of. She was part of the Shakaar resistance cell which even Dukat admitted the Cardassians couldn't find a way to defeat them because of their expert guerilla tactics fighting in the mountains; knowing their own terrain much more than the Cardassians.
I see it as the reason why he wasnt more pissed against damar having killed the woman he loved. He's a highly trained spy and he has good control over himself. He knows what is necessary for cardasia. Theres also the fact Damar is doing exactly what she did.
@Sean D.G That was EXACTLY the time, Damars helped destroy hundreds of families and protected and venerated the men whom have done worse. Damar had no right to pretend that his family should somehow be immune to the pain he's helped inflict
@Sean I'm not sure I understand your point... Are you saying that Kira's family died along time ago and they were allies now and so she should have kept her mouth shut?
RogueDragon05 A) I am assuming that she was there, whereas Damar is only just hearing about it, B) I'm not downplaying either side, C) I'm just saying that they're just as dead later on, regardless if or when she turned them into another soapbox tit-for-tat, so I gotta ask... D) is there any fragment of the concept of "too soon", or is its application even in question now that they supposedly share the loss of family as collateral damage to a resistance movement specifically within Cardassian space, and conveniently outside of the spitshine and chrome that can only ever be the side of "humanity"?
Oh my god, Kira... The way she automatically responded, the way she immediately felt bad after saying it. She felt guilty at the same time that Damar felt angry and was about to yell at her about it. GOD this show is amazing
Andrew Robinson steals every scene he's in! Producers must pay attention that he and Jeffrey Combs aren't in a scene together for too long or a gravitas well may form.
Man, you could see Kira trying, /really trying/ to keep her mouth shut when Damar started talking, but he just went that extra step too far and she couldn't help herself.
And that's why Damar backed off. He realized she wasn't speaking out of a "gotcha" moment, but that it came from her own experiences. Once he saw her regret saying it at that time, he fully understood how true it was.
She did feel sympathy initially. But then he had to start talking about his beloved state, and the atrocities committed by those in power... Perfect reaction from 7 years of this character and this history.
You can tell how Kira first feels the pain of Damar but as he starts to rant about the Dominion she despises his blindnesss and wants to hurt him yet as he turns to her, she sees the individual (again) with his own dreams, love and losses and realizes she was out of line. Then again as Garak pointed out, Damar needed this last step to really become the man able to lead Cardassia into a brighter future, a man who could understand someone else's pain.
Thing is though that Kira wasn't out of line, was it a cruel thing to say at that moment yes for sure, but Damar has undoubtedly participated in similar atrocities over his career and even if he hadn't he's protected the men who did. He has no right to pretend that his family should be immune to the pain and terror that he's help inflict upon others.
He just didn't /realize/ it until she cut him to the bone with that comment. That, is one thing I liked about DS9, it showed real character growth, not like some of the other series.
@John Walker II It's alil bit like feeling sorry for a Nazi coming home to find his house bombed away and his wife and children starved to death, did they deserve it... no, but did "HE" deserve it? Yes. And I agree about the character development, Just look at Nog or Rom whom are unrecognizable by the end and compare then to say Nelix or Guinan, neither of whom change at all practically throughout there run.
@the Lost Q For one thing Kira was defending her home from an invading army, Kira did not have the option to wage a campaign against military targets either she had to strike where she could, the Cardassians and Damar and Dukat on the other hand were part of a massive army they didn't HAVE to target civilians they did it to terrorize the Bojarians into submission and because they enjoyed it. Another thing is that Star Trek labels the Bajoran freedom fighters as terrorists often times and to be honest the term doesn't really apply, Final Fantasy 7 does the same thing with it's main characters and again the term is misused... Terrorism is attacking a non strategic target for the primary sake of inflicting terror on the enemy, For example when the Germans bombed London or when the American's firebombed Japan, those could be argued to be at least partially terrorist attacks since they had no real strategic value, they were suppose to inspire dread and fear in the population. 9/11 or any of the bombings or mass shootings in America and the rest of the world are DEFINITELY terrorism. It's true that Kira did assassinate people and either didn't take precautions to protect Cardassian civilians or even intentionally targeted them. But these attacks had a military purpose to repel and to loosen the control of the Cardassians and to create political unrest on Bajor and Cardassia and while the Cardassians themselves may or may not have been innocent they were still part of an invasion force. To answer your question Kira was fighting to protect her home, thats the right of any living being, she dosent deserve any punishment.
@the Lost Q You can argue that breaking the enemy's morale is a tactical decision however I suspect we both understand that there is a difference between attacking an enemy army supply convoys and taking a plane full of innocent civilians and smashing into buildings or walking into a nightclub and opening fire on non combatants. You said that Kira convinced herself that she had no other options, what exactly might those options have been? The only one I could see is surrender and submit, and regardless of how ugly it gets if a population dosent fight against an occupying force that force never leaves. So I ask you what else was she supposed to do? You said the Kira's actions did'nt make much of a difference, No one person's actions ultimately make much of a difference in a war, that's why there's no such thing as a one man army, even the greatest generals plans are pointless without his soldiers to execute them even the most badass commando is impotent without some clerk making sure his equipment gets to him and some transport pilot to fly him to the battle. The Cardassians ended up leaving for a variety of reasons, like any sort of victory there is no one cause that won the day. "I think the bitter irony of the station is, in order to fight for her home, she had to become as ruthless and cruel, apathetic and blindly ideological as the people she fought. It's especially the blind ideology I take issue with." There are several episodes that deal with Kira's guilt and remorse about her actions in the war, believing in an actions necessity both in the moment and looking back on it, isn't the same thing as not feeling bad about something. You can't turn into an emotional wreck every time you have to do something you don't like in a war. You say that Kira is blindly ideological, I don't really understand where your coming from, I suppose you could say that she will pay any price to ensure Bajors freedom, but are you suggesting that that's bad? Are you suggesting that the Bajorans should have just accepted the murder and rape and subversion of their culture and homeland? Kira never forced anyone into working slave labor, Kira never found a group of abandoned Cardassian orphans and ordered them to be murdered for no other sake then doing so, Kira never sterilized a planet to make life miserable for the people that lived on it... I could go on. Your trying to put Kira and the Cardassians on the same morality level and it's not working. As for blaming her mother for being a comfort women and accepting such a life... what was Kira suppose to do, be proud of her mother for giving aid and comfort to the enemy and enjoying it? I admit don't recall the episode too clearly to be honest, but from what I remember her mother kinda ended up not minding it too much. There are situations where comfort women are rape victims plain and simple, however that's not always the case, if you give aid and comfort to the enemy that is murdering and raping your people because it's more comfortable and pleasant then fighting back then your a peice of shit traitor and deserve to die or at the very least to be exiled. A Gul is still a legitimate target replaceable or not, a soldier is easily replaceable, by your logic no soldier should be targeted because they can be replaced. As for blame falling on innocents... It wasn't Kira's decision to blame innocent people. If you allow the enemy to use innocent people as hostage, you've already lost. Imagine if Hitler said I'll bomb New York City unless you surrender and America actually did so, or imagine if Japan had said you will abandon Hawaii and the entire Pacific or we will attack Pearl Harbor and America did so? It's not Kira's fault that the Cardassians chose to murder or harm innocent people. Well I obviously completely disagree with your interpretations, I'm very aware that American pilots and leaders were not punished for bombing Japan, I'm not arguing about the morality of fire bombing Japan merely stating that on some level it WAS a terror tactic, while the target of the nuclear attacks were not military the end goal of the attacks WAS military, Truman knew it wasn't the people's choice to stop fighting, he demanded that of the Imperial government, and a sad reality is that in all likelihood less civilians died in the explosions then probably would have in a land invasion of Japan. (Thats my feelings on the matter, it's fine if you don't agree) Germany bombed London in both world wars, so it wasent just the Nazi's and again wether or not they were punished was not the point I was trying to make rather simply that both the germans and firebombs were examples of terrorism. I'm curious, what punishment do you think Kira deserved?
The level of acting in this scene is absolutely first-rate. There was a subtle exchange of glances between Casey Biggs and Nana Visitor that really showed how good both of them are.
As much as I love TNG, it's because is really amazing character moments like this that make DS9 the best Star Trek series. Not just the writing and the acting, but the composition of this scene - the very carefully chosen close-ups, the silent glance from Garrack to Kira that make it clear he knows EXACTLY what she's thinking before she says it - everything about this is just a masterpiece of story telling.
It's observations and comments like yours and so many others that make want to own DS9 the whole series. But I wished the creators had not killed off so many key characters.
@Nebel Werfer in this case she would probably of put up little resistance just due to her feeling that she could of choosen a more diplomatic tone. However there wasn't a better time to say it than that. It would of been purely emotional at any other point and it would of been wasted.
You can see she puts a lot of effort to control herself here. Had she punched him she would have been as condescendent and coxardly as the Cardassians were backthen. She also doesn't want to throw the Truth into Damar's face because she needs him as an ally and she also is kinda sympathetic towards the situation. The conflict on her face is still profound. Then Garal finds the right words to comfort her.
The unspoken dialogue between them is some of the best acting in the series. Damar is angry at what she says, she closes her eyes in regret for speaking so bluntly, and he immediately sees the reason she said it and walks off. Those three seconds are the whole interaction summed up without words or exposition. Just brilliant acting.
Stalin ... "If only one man dies of hunger, that's a tragedy. If millions die, that's only statistics." Machiavelli ... "Never wound a man by killing all he loves, never destroy all that brings him peace or gives him hope. Such a man is without vulnerability, without any hope for peace, his compass is guided by hateful fury and vengeance, and he becomes your greatest adversary because he has nothing left to lose."
@@RogueDragon05 To be fair Rogue, the Federation fought like idiots in the Dominion War. The Dominion uses anti-infantry mines and energy based artillery which decimated Federation troops and used A.I. controlled weapons platforms to decimate Federation starships. The Founder was smart enough to make an alliance with the Breen which nearly turned the tide of the war in the favor of the Dominion. From an outside observer's standpoint, it seemed that Sisko was the only competent military commander in Starfleet. Sisko got the Klingons to re-agree to the Kitomer accords. Sisko got the Romulans into the war on the Federation's side. Sisko armored his ship with Ablative armor to make it more combat effective. Sisko was the only one thinking with a military mind.
This scene relies on 7 years of character development + decades more backstory to really appreciate it of course. I wouldn't show it to a first timer, but it's absolutely a top scene to illustrate how ds9 really hits you.
Batman Laughed Honestly I think this episode pairs brilliantly with Duet. In that episode Maritza foretells how Cardassia will only survive if it stands before bajor and admits it's guilt. This episode shows how far they have come as a people, to see them humbled but grow from it.
what a great scene! Damar having a sudden and deep epiphany regarding his own actions. And then the underappreciated musical score of DS9 to underline the severity of this scene to the characters. These were the moments that made DS9 such an outstanding series.
Garak was right. There may have been a more diplomatic time to point out the similarity between the Dominion and occupying Cardasia, but not a more impactful one.
Scifi lingo only becomes technobabble when it starts distracting from the story, serves as filler or makes no sense. Most of the lingo in TNG was no technobabble. Sadly I can't say the same about Voyager.
@@Kaefer1973 Exactly. Technobabble is underrated. You want a sci-fi show to feel dated in a couple decades, put in "realistic" dialogue about how your 300-years-in-future space technology idea works. You want your characters to seem like clueless tourists just along for the ride, take OUT all the dialogue about the space technology. Technobabble justifies the eternal sci-fi story, "we don't know how this would work yet, but what if..." It's only bad when used badly.
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The Berman era. We shall not soon see its like again
One doesn't begin to understand the pain draconian methods of rule over others until gets a first hand experience... and Damar got to experience it all and become the man Cardassia needed. A shame he didn't live to pass on the lessons he learned.
His heroic martyrdom likely served as a grand example. Garak, Kira and those who followed him probably would have made sure the people knew everything. A new Cardassia rose from the ashes that day. I like to think it was a good one.
True, because Damar most certainly had the same twisted view of Dukat--that any violence against the Bajorans was their own fault for not accepting the Cardassians as the far superior race/species, and that the occupation made the Bajorans better. However they did abandon their old caste system so that was at least one positive outcome of the occupation.
I still like Discovery, but it´s a far cry from DS9. Then again I think all of the other Star Trek series are a far cry from DS9. It's just so much better.
Shatner, Stewart, Mulgrew, and Bacula could each act the house down, but overall they didn't have a strong supporting cast. What they had instead were really strongly written characters, so strong that we the audience barely noticed when the acting wasn't great. DS9 had not only strongly written characters but absolutely superb actors to play the roles -- all the roles, even the recurring ones like Garak and Damar. Nana Visitor was phenomenal in the role and brought life to it beyond what the writers had intended. Even in the bad parts of TNG, bad plots were saved by great characters. In DS9, great acting put it over the top. But I'm sorry John, DSC has neither good plots nor great characters. Great acting can't save it when the characters they perform in are all miserable, unlikeable asshats. No disrespect intended to the actors, but nothing is going to save that thing.
wolbaman - No they couldn't. You assume that the "writers" of Discovery are receptive, in any way save outrage, toward criticism or comparison. They'll just keep doubling down until they bust, as is the trend these days.
Beautifully acted. The shame on both of their faces. Hers for knowing she struck at him in a moment of weakness and that was cruel. His for knowing what she said was right. God I miss Star Trek.
When this episode first aired, I was surprised by the way Garak spoke about Damar. After all, it seemed he should have a good reason to despise Damar for killing Ziyal. That Garak was able to put aside his feelings in favor of the man he believed Cardassia needed struck me as a powerful moment.
It's sad but I think Ziyal loved Garak more than he loved her. He was very fond of her, may have been happy to have a romance (although not really clear if they actually did as opposed to being very close friends with romantic tension), but he always put himself at a distance, from EVERYONE. "She loved you." "I could never figure out why." Garak often sees himself as an outsider, looking in on and manipulating the galaxy but rarely a part of it.
Garak was excellent at seeing things before they happen and reading people, why he was a great assassin/intelligence agent. He understood Damar killed Ziyal because he saw her as a traitor and a threat to other Cardassians. He knows he genuinely cared about his fellow citizens unlike Dukat who was a selfish/egotistical megalomaniac who sold his people to the Dominion for power. It doesn't in anyway lessen what Damar did in killing an innocent girl or everything he did against the Bajorans as a soldier, but it showed he had an ability for redemption where Dukat never did. He did openly despise Dukat because of what he was and he of course regretted not killing him when he had the chance because he needed his help to fight the Klingons.
Hands down my favorite scene of the entire show. There may be more excellent episodes, but this scene is just so powerful, and is a succinct microcosm of the arc of the entire series.
It was. I finished it a few months ago. And in the last season, Damar became my favorite character! As mentioned above, the series starts slow and during the first two seasons I wondered if I was wasting my time (especially in the rough and very uneven first season) but the quality became consistently good by the third season and I really enjoyed it overall. I haven't watched TOS and TNG, which kept me from going ahead and watching DS9, but I'm glad I did. I missed a couple of references, sure, but DS9 is mostly it's own stories. And it's probably the strongest series, because the sustained plotlines and character development were great and something Star Trek hadn't done as well before. I also really enjoyed the divergence from Gene Roddenberry's progressive utopian vision that never appealed to me. Humans in Star Trek are still unrecognizable weirdos, at least in Starfleet, but the Bajorans, Ferengi, and even Cardassians give the audience something more like the humanity they know to relate to. Conflict, emotion, identity, nationalism, exploitation, etc. A lot of the aliens are more human than the humans. Excellent show. I really found the moral complexity compelling, something not seen in other Star Trek shows, so DS9 was my first Star Trek series. Unfortunately, there's no more to it. But the documentary _What We Left Behind_ is a must-see after watching the series, and most of the cast is still making appearances and involved with the show. Andrew Robinson just recorded an audiobook of his Garak novel _A Stich in Time,_ and even performed a scene from it with Alexander Siddig as Dr. Bashir. There's a lot of interviews and fan service stuff for fans to see on TH-cam and elsewhere on the internet if they're interested, which is nice. There remains a loyal fan following, even though they haven't filmed anything DS9 since the 1990s. The quality on Paramount streaming is pretty bad. It varies from almost-DVD quality to near-VHS. I hear the DVDs are significantly better, and I believe it. There's some fan AI upscaling online ("Project Defiant"), but current upscaling technology is so inconsistent: it either looks good or distractingly bad, and varies from shot to shot. At least the official releases are consistent. You can see a reel of remastered shots of the show produced for the documentary on TH-cam. In them, the show doesn't look dated but modern, better than Enterprise, perhaps better than TOS or TNG in HD. It's not just the resolution but the color that gets a big upgrade. Unfortunately, they only did about five minutes, not even one episode. It doesn't seem like there will ever be the money or the interest to remaster the series from the original 35mm film. So there's no point in waiting for that. Anyway, it's a great show that holds up. It might even play better today than it did when it came out. A few things are dated, but some things are refreshingly show. The depiction of Kira Nerys as an unrepentant former terrorist would have been unthinkable on TV just a few years later. I don't think the show really reckoned with it as much as it should have, but there was an episode that confronted it and made me like the show more for bravely putting some real dirt on one of it's heroes and making me like her less. The two standout episodes that I'd generally recommend are _The Visitor_ and _In The Pale Moonlight._ Those have self-contained stories and are accessible if you haven't watched the show. The other highlights of DS9 come out of episodes that build on plot and character development over episodes and seasons. Multi-part episodes, episodes that extend a character arc, etc. These are pleasures you must watch the whole show to enjoy.
No, if she said his wife and child deserved to be killed as retribution that would be savage. That is something a fanatical Bajoran would say. Murder is just as awful no matter who it's done to.
Incredible scene. Simple yet so effective. The acting is top level stuff from all 3 of them. Andrew Robinson only needs to use his eyes to express feeling and it's so effective. Probably my favourite DS9 characters all in one room.
Roddenberry was at times a hindrance to the series he founded, and Deep Space Nine was right to get away from his vision. The Dominion War was a curve ball, and led to the series losing its innocence and cutting out a lot of the preachy bullshit that infected Star Trek. Remember, it was Roddenberry and his micromanaging that created things like the first season of TNG, or people like Maurice Hurley, who ran rampant and nearly destroyed the series.
At it's best, it was among the best of Star Trek. Babylon 5 was right there with it though. B5's special effects didn't hold up as well, but the story and acting are every bit as good as DS9.
@BartJ583 I think a large War arc as subversion to what Roddenberry envisioned can be done, and wasn't done terribly in DS9, that being said for all I care there never needs to be a War or "Dark side of the Federation" arc in any Star Trek media ever again, by this point it's just a lame distraction.
At 1:00, you can see Damar give her a very slight nod. About like he's say 'I understand you' or 'You are right'. It's very subtle and not sure if it's supposed to be there or not. But I think it speaks volumes.
All of you here are acting like he gave some manner of tiny acknowledgment of the facts, whereas to me it looked for all the world like a tiny motion to prepare to turn and walk away.
My god, this show is a rare gem. The likes of which probably only occur once every century or so. Certainly entire lightyears ahead of the modern Trek reboots.
I have always thought DS9 was the best of Trek, maybe even eclipsing TOS. The characters were so compelling and the dramas and conflicts and interactions, great, and small, were the stuff of legends.
You're right, and what a lot of people can't comprehend is that it was done without CGI. Not that I'm against CGI, but great modern storytelling needs more than just special effects.
@@Skylinesandsunsets In fact, special effects far too often detract and remove focus on the storytelling. CGI is great, but only when it's used properly. Nowadays, graphics make up for the lack of a coherent story, acting, or anything else. Just "here's flashy lights kids! don't pay attention to anything else!"
@@Skylinesandsunsets TNG and DS9 i thought always used CGI as an aid, instead of a crutch. Much of both shows hinged on the actors themselves. Most of them were stage trained actors if i recall. The JJ movies and even Picard, felt like CGI was more of a crutch than an Aid (especially in JJ's movies).
This one scene to me is Nana Visitor's "GIVE HER SEVEN EMMYS" highlight reel to me haha. Watch her face go from sad to disbelief to quiet outrage to shame. Gets me EVERY time.
One thing I really like about this scene- Garak isn't just talking about Damar, he's talking about himself. He was blindly, desperately loyal to fascist-era Cardassia and Tain just as Damar was loyal to Dukat. But Dukat and Tain never deserved that loyalty, and Cardassia sowed the seeds of its own destruction.
Way back in season 2, Garak interestingly seemed rather conflicted about killing Quark's dissident friends, and cryptically said he let them go because he "loved Cardassia". It seemed to me that deep down, he knew the rotten core of the Cardassia he knew was going to collapse, and that major societal change was the only way to save his homeland.
@@ffnbbq If anything. The fact Garak was so well informed made him reinforce his delusion about the past even more. He knew what needed to be done but it wasn't till much later that he could emotionally accept it. I don't think he really accepted it even all the way up to when Tain passes. Feels like that's when the shoe finally dropped for him. That episode was kind of the turning point for a lot of Cardassian characters who were holding desperately onto the past.
The facial expressions of Damar when he first goes to confront Kira and then sees her expression and finally realizes the truth of it all. Absolutely great acting.
I comes full circle from what the cardassian in the episode "Duet" tried to do, Cardassian's needed to see and admit their guilt...it just took the occupation, oppression, and savaging of their people for them to start to see, Garak is a brilliant liar...cause he knows when the truth needs to be said, and reality confronted.
This scene was soooo good. The burn, the intent, the realization..everything. Great wrting, even better acting. For me the best part was Kira: in one small moment being triumpent and then realizing, for only a small fraction of a second, that she was maybe no better i that minute. A true Katharsis for both Damar and Kira.
The story was excellent, far better than the first seasons of any start trek show. The first season of all previous star treks have been wooden as hell. Discovery managed to launch in from the get go.
Tommy Gunns. Each episode actually adds to the longer story. Each main character develops in each episodes, no weird standalone episodes to force character development. The easter eggs that link it to other series. The overall story is excellent. Twists, double crosses. Love and friendships that other series have took seasons to develop. This is only seaons one. The scene above is good but it has seasons behind it. Discovery is the stargate universe of star trek.
Tommy Gunns stargate universe is not stargate sg1. DS9 is the star trek equivalent of SG1. Easily forgettable with the odd well-written episode, long season story archs that are developed at the start and end of each season and about 10-15 filler episodes to get the 24 count. Shoe-horned story development. Fairly wooden characters. Dax for one. Didnt change or evolve throughout. The new dax was a breath of fresh air. Kira was the only character that really grew in DS9....and Jake but that was more height. Voyage is Atlantis.
The acting here was spot on, the way Kira wants to point out how what is happening to the Cardassians is just like what they did to the Bajorans and Damar's words make her say something.....and then Damar goes towards her with Anger but suddenly he realises that she is completely right and the Cardassians are now under the Dominion's boot just like how the Bajorans were under the Cardassians..... but he also sees that she regrets saying it in that moment showing how her people have the compassion that everyone thinks that Cardassians don't.....and he walks away.
Didn't just walk away, gave a short nod of understanding before probably finding a bulkhead to punch because she didn't deserve to be his target. She's hurting for them and the PTSD, he's hurting, fighting each other won't fix anything
To me this whole scene is incredibly bitter to watch. I keep thinking there was another way Kira could have brought up the brutality of the occupation but in reality her feelings were warranted and so was what she said plus she had every right to say it at this moment. A hard but wonderful scene
There are ample ways she could have done it. Doing it when she did, being who she is, and being what she is. There was no time as perfect as that moment as Garak explains.
Kind of a shame Demar died, it would have been interesting to see how he would’ve led a new Cardassia. He’s character really seemed to change rather profoundly towards the end. Guess losing your family and your home can do that to a guy.
I don’t think he would be able to, not in the long run. He was a good rebel leader but he’s not a leader for the long haul. His past would catch up with him at some point. If he lived someone might even assassinate him.
It would have been interesting to have had a post-war miniseries for DS9. Damar having to mourn his family's death and still be a leader in the postwar Cardassian government. That was the charm of DS9. It was the only Trek series that seeing the consequences of decisions years later was a possibility. Damar, getting verbally slapped in the face here... probably realizes she still blames him for Ziyal's death. Or the family & friends lost in the Occupation. It's why Damar realized that a military dictatorship that practices "death to its enemies" isn't enjoyable if you are one of It's enemies.
At the same time however Kira realized she'd gone too far, and expressed genuine fear of Damar for the first and only time. Kira knows as well as anybody after all, how personal loss can fuel one's anger. That; and she's come to learn over the series that Cardassians aren't inherent monsters, thanks to Gemor and others. Both characters grow as a result of the scene.
@@jimtaylor294 I don't think she was afraid of Damar - she had already kicked his ass in the past, when he'd tried attacking her. But she saw the pain and fury in his eyes and recognizes it as something she'd seen before - in the eyes of Bajorans during the Occupation. Which made her regret rubbing salt in the wound. ...And meanwhile, Damar glared at this, this... Bajoran... and saw himself in her. He probably started thinking what Garak bitterly stated at the end: that many would call it karmic justice.
As Greg Kihn sang so long ago, "They don't write 'em like that anymore." This scene is a prime example on every level of what made DS9 such a great series.
And did better due to it. Sadly he died a martyr instead of being the leader that could have rebuilt a strong, just, and more open Cardassia. Yes some would argue a strong nation that was formerly an enemy I'd a bad thing but weakness breeds fear. Instead of tearing it down, rebuilding it stronger but more open to ideals that are closer to the Federation
I like how Kira’s hatred of Cardassians stayed true for all the seasons Yeah she eased up a bit but she never got buddy buddy with them Not very “Star Treky” that fantastical Utopia life, but very real & relatable
I actually think Kira, while holding to some justified resentment concerning the past, evolved a quite a ways in how she thought of and treated Cardassians. I think she stopped truly hating early on, actually, with her admitting that Maritza being a Cardassian wasn't enough to justify his murder in "Duet".
Bajor was not a Federation world to start with; plus Bashir and O'Brien noted that from someone who would bite a Cardassian in S1 she was greeting the old Cardassian father figure and being friendly of sorts towards Garak. and remember, for Cardassians showing contempt and arguing is a form of affection.
The way I see it, Deep Space Nine takes place in a frontier region of the Star Trek universe. Thus, the norms and morals that would be applicable elsewhere have to be twisted and even ignored to survive.
Fantastic scene and the acting is top tier. The emotions all right there on top. Great work for all. Casey Biggs really came into his own with the character!
The bad movies and failure of Enterprise put the TNG Trek era in its grave. The lesson learned unfortunately is 1 hour morality plays don't make money. Things need to be special effect fests, edgy and violent.
@@otomicans6580 one of the biggest reasons why Enterprise was not as successful as the others was because far too many fans did not give it a fair chance, it was not what Star Trek was supposed to be in their opinion, while taken on its own merits it was fantastic. And personally I don't see why Nemesis was received poorly, I thought it was absolutely amazing.
@@williammerkel1410 I personally wanted to see what happened in the alpha quadrant after TNG/DS9 and they didn't care to address it. Not sure how anyone could like Nemesis' plot of yet another Data clone and an evil Picard clone but hey, to each their own.
It's episodes like this that truly showcase how amazing Star Trek used to be. Kira, a Bajoran, who lived under the brutal occupation of the Cardassians provides a quip at Damar that makes him finally realize her point of view. But what is interesting is in later episodes, these same two people who despised each other for decades form an unusual bond of mutual respect. Damar realizes that the Cardassians were in the wrong with how they oppressed the Bajorans. But Kira also realizes that Damar is at heart, a patriot and he honestly thought what he was doing we for the betterment of his people and his culture. It's those subtle nuances that made Star Trek such an amazing show.
The amazing quality and power of this scene can be attributed to the fantastic acting, writing, and depth. By depth I mean that most watching this episode have known the Bajoran/Cardassian history since it's first mention in TNG. All the history and events since then led up to really understanding everything happening in this short yet powerful scene. Kira, Damar, and Garak nailed this scene. One of my favorite Star Trek moments of all time.
Someone once said in complimenting this scene that it should be shown as an example to new viewers of why they should watch DS9. Which is insanity to me - it is FAR too deep as you say. It would make no sense or at least be horrifically underappreciated by a newbie. Years of backstory of Trek races, DS9 seasons, and characters all come together for this moment. It's the *reward* for dedicatation to the show, not a teaser.
This moment, and the moment when Ezri gives Worf a reality check on Klingon "honor", are two of the finest moments of writing in any TV series, let alone Star Trek, and they both happened *in the same episode*.
The acting was superb. All the little micromovements are perfect and believable and an entire unspoken conversation took place that would have taken 5 minutes to verbalize. Damar is at first shocked, then takes a step forward in anger, but Kira deflects by looking down and away, removing the target of Damar's anger and forcing his thoughts inward again. Damar then realizes that Kira is absolutely right, and while he can't bring himself to say it, not right then, he gives a very slight nod before he turns away to process his pain and absorb this new idea into his thought process.
I think it's more he could see she regretted saying it yet even as she regretted it he could also see it needed to be said. Cardassia wasn't some blameless innocent in war and occupation. It had given its fair share of such orders.
enterprise was great in my opinion. they had some hiccups here and there, but not worse than some TNG episodes from the beginning(looking at the Doctor and Ghost episode etc.) why it gets all that hate baffles me...
@@floppydisksareop The garbage opening theme was the worst thing in Enterprise. The first few tunes were enough to completely obliterate all "Trek" feeling the intro might have created.
@@WilfredIvanhoe i actually liked the opening, it was fitting. Just because it is not symphonic doesn't mean it is bad... I detest the TOS Woooohoooo opening much more for example
Even as a fan of the happy and optimistic families-about-the-Enterprise TNG, there is absolutely no denying that this is one of the most beautiful moments of Star Trek. The exchange is one thing, then regret on Kira's part, and going even further with the guiding wisdom of Garak. I get chills.
Sisko poisoning the planet or the conclusion of Pale Moonlight or Quark's famous speech about the Federation are some of the most mentioned pivotal moments in the series, but I think this one was always the most powerful for me. It's not only really understated, but it's the biggest underlining moment in both Kira's entire character arc through the series, as well as the story of Bajor and Cardassia that served as the backdrop of most of the series. The karma of how the Bajorans were treated by the Cardassians had finally come fully around back to them, a moment Kira herself had been waiting for, but when the time finally came it was a conflicted, bittersweet one. She can't help but say it, because the Cardassian empire had it coming and the past happened no matter what, but knowing the pain and death that Cardassian civillians were now experiencing leaves it a necessary but empty thing to say. It's definitely Kira's most pivotal, arc defining moment. She finally got the revenge she's so craved (and honestly deserved) most of her life, but its now hollow.
I believe you'll enjoy another clip I uploaded 😉
th-cam.com/video/e8xLIs_9hp0/w-d-xo.html
Fuck off.
@@Avelanche no u
Kira & Damar when the family fell.
yep she killed it and he knew it and it made him more motivated as a man with nothing to lose.
Andrew Robinson should have won a ton of acting awards for his work as Garak.
If it was anything but sci fi, he'd have gotten at least two emmys.
Garak never misses a thing, and has huge deep wells of insight into everyone around him as a result. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy indeed. :D
I think he did, if you consider his devoted fanbase.
Anyone can get an emmy in the heat of the moment. Few have beloved characters that stand the test of time.
@@PhazonOmega true! I met and spoke with Andy Robinson at a recent Comicon, and I told him the same thing! He was flattered, and agreed how deep Garak’s character was written throughout the show. Oh, and Andy Robinson’s also super sweet and easy to talk to (you may’ve met him yourself).
I always thought he should have shot Dirty Harry, since Smith & Wessons only hold five rounds.
Garak has a certain way of not just telling you the truth.. but making sure you choke on it in the process if you didn't like the taste.
Garak understands "why" and "how" people manipulate others, it's when he points those sometimes petty process out to people and it makes them look themselves in the mirror that people don't like being around him
Kind of ironic for a man who's favorite activity is lying.
Garek so rarely tells the truth because he realizes how powerful of a weapon it can be when deployed at the right time and place
When Garak was having his claustrophobia attacks, he helped Ezri more than Ezri helped him. By telling her the hard cold truth with no softeners. In his way, Garak was just as honorable a man as Worf was.
Geo I think it’s why he lies, it’s kind of like a coping mechanism.
Damar had one of the greatest character arch’s in tv history. He went from a background nobody to a bitter , self loathing drunk to a galactic rebel leader to finally, a martyr.
Some similarities to the character of Neroon, in Babylon 5. Another great character.
I always thought that killing him off at the end was one of the few really big mistakes that they did in final DS9 seasons.
DS9 had at least 2 characters that fit this Damar and Nog. Illiterate, juvenile delinquent to decorated war hero and Star Fleet officer. Not bad for characters not even in the main cast.
@@Turtle1631991 same. Think Kira should have jumped in front of that phaser so he could live to usher in a new Cardassia. Would have been the perfect end to both their arcs
@@Turtle1631991 They had to kill him off just before they finally entered the chamber where the female shapeshifter was hiding so that it was the main cast members who would finally end the war. If Damar had entered the chamber he probably would have shot her.
I love that Damar is furious at first, but realises she was right.
That was the moment Damar stopped being a patriot fighting for the old Cardassia, and started being a revolutionary fighting for something better.
I also like the fact that Kira even felt any kind of regret after what she said despite the fact she was 100% right. A lot of Bajorans wouldn't and certainly not the most fanatical ones, they would say his wife and child deserved to be killed as retribution. But she didn't paint every Cardassian with the same brush the way they did.
She had to learn that lesson, but she learned it well.
I love that Damar started as a "throw-away" bad guy character, and ended up being one of the heros of the series. A truly amazing and underrated show!
He wasn't even a badguy, he was just Gul Dukat's flunky, who had his name said outloud once in the episode he was introduced in. I sometime wonder, if Damar had lived through the final assault on the command center, what would Cardassia have become under his leadership.
Damar is in personal agony and gets angry at Kira for using this moment to score points, Kira instantly regrets going there and realises that she really should've bit her tongue, Damar accepts her tacit apology but also takes it to heart and accepts that she was right... all without a single word of dialogue: Show, don't tell. A fantastic moment.
This scene is so deep and well done both by actors and writers. Absolutely one of my most favorite Star Trek scenes ever. And it takes so much of the canon history to build up the emotional weight for this scene to be successful. The camera watching Kira's face as Damar pulls the words right out of her mind...
Thanks for the breakdown. I didn't catch that.
I would love to be able to watch this show again for the first time. It's such a shame that they don't seem to be able to do anything close to this in the sci-fi series' of today (Trek or otherwise)
I am so confused by this post and the likes it has generated. There was literally no point in this 1:34 clip that didn't have dialogue, and every single thing you outlined (including the apology later in the episode) is communicated via the characters speaking to each other... also known as dialogue. Next time you could just say, "I like this scene" instead of handing out bullshit awards that aren't even applicable.
@@jackstack2136 Confusion is just a sign that you don't know as much as you think you do. That could easily explain why you didn't get the significance of that body language. This is also what happens when youth pay more attention to their cell phones than to other people.
The fact when Kira's eyelids closed in regret for her statement, Damar understood it was a pain he now could feel, and did not need a confrontation.
It wasn't just that. He realized that she's right and that he's a hypocrite, which made him realize that Cardassia needs to change and become better than that.
you can even see him nod after her eyes drop. he was enraged at first, that she would use his family’s death as an opportunity to throw stones. but you absolutely caught it. the very moment her eyes drop is the moment the message sinks in for him.
It's the little nod Damar gives after he pauses that ties this whole scene together for me
@@Soulsphere001 yeah.. from the first time we see him, he was giving orders like that, and supporting officers who made a career out of orders like that. (Dukat for example.) and Damar himself carried out a killing of the sort with Ziyal. so yeah, once he got past his initial anger at kira's words, he came to a realization and became angry at himself.
@@tonoornottonoIt’s brilliantly acted. He is still clearly angry, but also realizes she is right, and apologetic so removes himself from the situation. Both actors brilliantly portray so many conflicting emotions.
I love the fact that Garak, during his exile, has come to have a better understanding of both his beloved Cardassia as well as those they conquered. He has realized that there is no romanticism about what happened and that in order for his world to survive, they’ll have to change.
I believe he always knew, but played the good Cardassian let himself model after his father to please him. He even said the latter when they were in the Dominion proson camp just before Enabran Tain died.
Garak , from the moment of his exile became his own man independent of Cardassian norms or anyone else's. He says he is very Cardassian but to be honest there are no Cardassians like him. Indeed, he was putting up a front because he really has no idea what he is supposed to act like naturally. The blank stare he gives Bashir in his last monologue is telling; Garak survives Cardassia's ruin but he ultimately feels both sad and dispassionate about it.
It's just a shame that Cardassia had to learn their lessons the hard way. As Garak said 'We deserved it.'
@@youtubestayatyourrootsforfsake I think to some degree Garak was pulling a Curb your Enthusiasm Larry David act to deliberately offend people. To what degree no one can know but I think he's certainly aware of the effect his comments would have.
Garak is by far the best character on this show... don’t get me wrong, I love Nog and Bashir and Worf especially, but Garak... he owns the scene every time he’s a part. One of his lines while they are captured and taken to the Dominion internment camp... “Oh thank goodness you’re here! Can you point us in the direction of the wormhole?” He just says it so passively and nonchalantly that you almost believe him... *almost* being the operative word.
The level of acting on this show, despite the prosthetics is amazing
RecklessFables, The prosthetics are pretty good they hold up well in a lot of scenes.
It helps that they're damn good prosthetics too. High quality, artistic, realistic, and most importantly, flexible.
potaterjim, And they can handle all the running around and fight scenes.
Pretty sure it's meant that it's amazing how people are able to convey that amount of emotion even though prosthetics are obscuring much of the face
When I was a kid, the 'theater' quality of Star Trek in general kind of annoyed me (I grew up when these were still coming out) - Now though, seeing them as an adult... there's a certain poignant honesty about it all, the acting is amazing more often then not, and the delivery of the message is hard hitting. This one in particular got to me, along with the Gul Darhe'el scene. Perfect delivery, superb acting in general.
If there's any character who redeemed himself in everyone's eyes it was Damar.
Damar would not have been allowed to survive the series, given the blood on his hands. So he died a glorious, enlightened martyr.
Garak, on the other hand, had to pick up the pieces of the aftermath. Redeemed he was, but subject to constant labour for the rest of his life.
Damar was never trully "evil" as megalomaniac Dukat or deceitful/manipulative Garak. He was an honest man trying to create/maintain order as he was taught to do by his people not knowing any better. When the price became too high on his conscience that he had to drown said conscience in kanar he formed the resistance and it was not to redeem himself in the eyes of the federation or the bajorans cuz until then he was just a good cardassian soldier doing his job....he had to redeem himself in his own eyes...maybe those of his family but then they got killed so for them it became to honor their memories and to only his eyes he needed too redeem himself.
@@edwinpoon Considering Garak's romantic patriotism, that's likely the best end he could have gotten. Working to build a new, better Cardassia. Fitting too, as his favorite tale was 'The Neverending Sacrifice' about duty to the state.
I honestly mourned for him, when he died
Too bad we didn't see more of the redeemed Damar. I believe the new Damar would have been a great ruler, molded through blood and tears
I'll never forgive him for killing Ziyal!
You can see the moment that Damar realizes, the Cardassians had become to the Dominion what the Bajorans had been to the Cardassians.
It was also the moment that I think he began wanting Cardassia to become something better.
I really loved Damar by the end, I wish he had lived because I think he could have been one of Cardassia’s more benevolent leaders.
The Cardassians thought that they were helping the Bajorans though so Damar wouldn't see it as exactly the same
@@sgreen4865 dukat brought in the dominion to help cardassia. so the dominion are helping in the same way
The point is that during the occupation, the Cardassians didn't see their actions as "casual brutality," but as a justified way to keep people in line. Now that the shoe is on the other foot and HIS people are the ones being "kept in line," he's suddenly realized that it wasn't as justified as he'd built it to be in his nostalgic view of the Cardassian culture.
Funny how that happens. Turn about is fair play, and it often smacks karma in your face.
I love how the actors just basically conveyed a dialogue with their expressions alone!
Kira: (closing her eyes) "Ah, goddammit. I'm sorry... That was uncalled for..."
Damar: (slightly opens mouth and nods) "...N-no, I... I understand."
Garak: (eyes eide open) "HOLY SHIT, that was a close one!"
And before that, when Damar is speaking, the look that Garak gives Kira at 0:26 ...Garak knows *exactly* what Kira is thinking, he's just not sure if she's going to say it out loud.
Garak, his eyes wide open. Shaka when the walls fell.
😂
DS9 was masterful on all levels of acting. Garak,Damar,Dukat,Weyong,Female Changling,Odo,Sisko,Worf,Quark I can go on and on each played their roles expertly. There was alot of shakespearean influences in some of the roles and it fit the tone the darker tone of the show perfectly. Then you have the light hearted stuff with quark who could still bring out a very dramatic and meaningful scene at the snap of a finger.
@MrDibara... 100 percent true lmaooo
The Starfleet uniform looks natural on Kira.
No doubt! I'm also a fan of how Starfleet's uniform evolved through DS9 in general.
Jeffrey Chatman I dig it she can rock the heck out of a Starfleet uniform.
I dunno, I liked her in the alternate universe outfit :D
The casual stylishness of it. What kind of people don't wear those uniforms?
I thought she was a hot when watching this as a teen lol
Anyone else thinks kira looks sharp in a starfleet uniform?
Kira always had an underrated hotness to her. Especially in the early season.
Kira looks sharp, period.
/would do. /no incel
She always had that flair, and she grew tremendously ever since Kai Opaca said, "This isn't your war." Kira slowly turned herself around and started seeing the universe as not black and white, but as many different colors as there are entities that she meets.
B*tch looks fine in everything. Even that time in cardassian prosthetics!
*Kira:* "That was a mistake..."
*Garak:* "That, major, was a work of art..."
Start with a secondary character.
Someone deep in the background.
Someone with one, maybe two lines of dialog.
Give that character a major story arc.
Have the character undergo profound changes.
Elevate the character to a central pillar of the storyline.
And you've got Damar.
DS9 deserves a lot of respect.
It really was something to watch how they built his character up from nothing to the leader of the rebellion. A better character and actor than gul Ducat ducat always annoyed me he talked way too much.
This was Garak, too. He wasn't originally supposed to be a major cast member but they loved his character and the acting in his first appearance, so they just kept bringing him back.
This also very much covers Rom.
They did that with O'Brian as well. This show is just that damn good.
You guys are all right. Funny how a show that at the time was regarded as being to soap opera like is now being recognized for its truly amazing character development! Almost all of my favorite characters in star trek come from this series!
0:26 That look on Garak's face when he glances at Kira. He already knows whats coming.
1 minute 34 seconds of DS9, and it has more character and acting than most movies. DS9 = Best Star Trek! :D
Garak always seemed quietly, probably sensibly terrified of Kira.
Garak was extremely intelligent, he knew what Kira was capable of. She was part of the Shakaar resistance cell which even Dukat admitted the Cardassians couldn't find a way to defeat them because of their expert guerilla tactics fighting in the mountains; knowing their own terrain much more than the Cardassians.
I see it as the reason why he wasnt more pissed against damar having killed the woman he loved. He's a highly trained spy and he has good control over himself. He knows what is necessary for cardasia.
Theres also the fact Damar is doing exactly what she did.
So right. So right.
Garak: "I think he could use some cold water."
Me: "Yes, after that burn anyone would need cold water."
builder396 still doesn't make that the time.
@Sean D.G
That was EXACTLY the time, Damars helped destroy hundreds of families and protected and venerated the men whom have done worse. Damar had no right to pretend that his family should somehow be immune to the pain he's helped inflict
RogueDragon05 and remind me, exactly how many light-years behind _her_ back was _her_ family killed? Yet there they both stand.
@Sean
I'm not sure I understand your point... Are you saying that Kira's family died along time ago and they were allies now and so she should have kept her mouth shut?
RogueDragon05 A) I am assuming that she was there, whereas Damar is only just hearing about it,
B) I'm not downplaying either side,
C) I'm just saying that they're just as dead later on, regardless if or when she turned them into another soapbox tit-for-tat, so I gotta ask...
D) is there any fragment of the concept of "too soon", or is its application even in question now that they supposedly share the loss of family as collateral damage to a resistance movement specifically within Cardassian space, and conveniently outside of the spitshine and chrome that can only ever be the side of "humanity"?
Now this was Star Trek!
Alex Kurtsman:"But where were the explosions?"
@@gaydonaldtrump Yum yum.
@Jero Briggs True!!
Space Sonar....
I miss Actual Star Trek. [Sighs]
Oh my god, Kira... The way she automatically responded, the way she immediately felt bad after saying it. She felt guilty at the same time that Damar felt angry and was about to yell at her about it. GOD this show is amazing
He was about to do more than yell, lol.
She was right, and she knew it.
She was also cruel. And she knew that too.
Andrew Robinson steals every scene he's in! Producers must pay attention that he and Jeffrey Combs aren't in a scene together for too long or a gravitas well may form.
I think Weyoun would die, if they play a scene together.
Lambent Kith Gravitas well! Hahaha! Nicely done! 🖖😂
@@onkelebert787 Uh they did, and he did
I want to see Andrew Robinson revive his role in the new Star Trek Picard series even if just a cameo...
Yeah he is a great actor. I don't think he stole this scene in any way though. Damar was great here and so was Kira
Man, you could see Kira trying, /really trying/ to keep her mouth shut when Damar started talking, but he just went that extra step too far and she couldn't help herself.
And that's why Damar backed off. He realized she wasn't speaking out of a "gotcha" moment, but that it came from her own experiences. Once he saw her regret saying it at that time, he fully understood how true it was.
She did feel sympathy initially. But then he had to start talking about his beloved state, and the atrocities committed by those in power... Perfect reaction from 7 years of this character and this history.
You can tell how Kira first feels the pain of Damar but as he starts to rant about the Dominion she despises his blindnesss and wants to hurt him yet as he turns to her, she sees the individual (again) with his own dreams, love and losses and realizes she was out of line. Then again as Garak pointed out, Damar needed this last step to really become the man able to lead Cardassia into a brighter future, a man who could understand someone else's pain.
Thing is though that Kira wasn't out of line, was it a cruel thing to say at that moment yes for sure, but Damar has undoubtedly participated in similar atrocities over his career and even if he hadn't he's protected the men who did. He has no right to pretend that his family should be immune to the pain and terror that he's help inflict upon others.
He just didn't /realize/ it until she cut him to the bone with that comment. That, is one thing I liked about DS9, it showed real character growth, not like some of the other series.
@John Walker II
It's alil bit like feeling sorry for a Nazi coming home to find his house bombed away and his wife and children starved to death, did they deserve it... no, but did "HE" deserve it? Yes.
And I agree about the character development, Just look at Nog or Rom whom are unrecognizable by the end and compare then to say Nelix or Guinan, neither of whom change at all practically throughout there run.
@the Lost Q
For one thing Kira was defending her home from an invading army, Kira did not have the option to wage a campaign against military targets either she had to strike where she could, the Cardassians and Damar and Dukat on the other hand were part of a massive army they didn't HAVE to target civilians they did it to terrorize the Bojarians into submission and because they enjoyed it.
Another thing is that Star Trek labels the Bajoran freedom fighters as terrorists often times and to be honest the term doesn't really apply, Final Fantasy 7 does the same thing with it's main characters and again the term is misused... Terrorism is attacking a non strategic target for the primary sake of inflicting terror on the enemy, For example when the Germans bombed London or when the American's firebombed Japan, those could be argued to be at least partially terrorist attacks since they had no real strategic value, they were suppose to inspire dread and fear in the population. 9/11 or any of the bombings or mass shootings in America and the rest of the world are DEFINITELY terrorism. It's true that Kira did assassinate people and either didn't take precautions to protect Cardassian civilians or even intentionally targeted them. But these attacks had a military purpose to repel and to loosen the control of the Cardassians and to create political unrest on Bajor and Cardassia and while the Cardassians themselves may or may not have been innocent they were still part of an invasion force.
To answer your question Kira was fighting to protect her home, thats the right of any living being, she dosent deserve any punishment.
@the Lost Q
You can argue that breaking the enemy's morale is a tactical decision however I suspect we both understand that there is a difference between attacking an enemy army supply convoys and taking a plane full of innocent civilians and smashing into buildings or walking into a nightclub and opening fire on non combatants.
You said that Kira convinced herself that she had no other options, what exactly might those options have been? The only one I could see is surrender and submit, and regardless of how ugly it gets if a population dosent fight against an occupying force that force never leaves. So I ask you what else was she supposed to do?
You said the Kira's actions did'nt make much of a difference, No one person's actions ultimately make much of a difference in a war, that's why there's no such thing as a one man army, even the greatest generals plans are pointless without his soldiers to execute them even the most badass commando is impotent without some clerk making sure his equipment gets to him and some transport pilot to fly him to the battle. The Cardassians ended up leaving for a variety of reasons, like any sort of victory there is no one cause that won the day.
"I think the bitter irony of the station is, in order to fight for her home, she had to become as ruthless and cruel, apathetic and blindly ideological as the people she fought. It's especially the blind ideology I take issue with."
There are several episodes that deal with Kira's guilt and remorse about her actions in the war, believing in an actions necessity both in the moment and looking back on it, isn't the same thing as not feeling bad about something. You can't turn into an emotional wreck every time you have to do something you don't like in a war. You say that Kira is blindly ideological, I don't really understand where your coming from, I suppose you could say that she will pay any price to ensure Bajors freedom, but are you suggesting that that's bad? Are you suggesting that the Bajorans should have just accepted the murder and rape and subversion of their culture and homeland? Kira never forced anyone into working slave labor, Kira never found a group of abandoned Cardassian orphans and ordered them to be murdered for no other sake then doing so, Kira never sterilized a planet to make life miserable for the people that lived on it... I could go on. Your trying to put Kira and the Cardassians on the same morality level and it's not working.
As for blaming her mother for being a comfort women and accepting such a life... what was Kira suppose to do, be proud of her mother for giving aid and comfort to the enemy and enjoying it? I admit don't recall the episode too clearly to be honest, but from what I remember her mother kinda ended up not minding it too much. There are situations where comfort women are rape victims plain and simple, however that's not always the case, if you give aid and comfort to the enemy that is murdering and raping your people because it's more comfortable and pleasant then fighting back then your a peice of shit traitor and deserve to die or at the very least to be exiled.
A Gul is still a legitimate target replaceable or not, a soldier is easily replaceable, by your logic no soldier should be targeted because they can be replaced. As for blame falling on innocents... It wasn't Kira's decision to blame innocent people. If you allow the enemy to use innocent people as hostage, you've already lost. Imagine if Hitler said I'll bomb New York City unless you surrender and America actually did so, or imagine if Japan had said you will abandon Hawaii and the entire Pacific or we will attack Pearl Harbor and America did so? It's not Kira's fault that the Cardassians chose to murder or harm innocent people.
Well I obviously completely disagree with your interpretations, I'm very aware that American pilots and leaders were not punished for bombing Japan, I'm not arguing about the morality of fire bombing Japan merely stating that on some level it WAS a terror tactic, while the target of the nuclear attacks were not military the end goal of the attacks WAS military, Truman knew it wasn't the people's choice to stop fighting, he demanded that of the Imperial government, and a sad reality is that in all likelihood less civilians died in the explosions then probably would have in a land invasion of Japan. (Thats my feelings on the matter, it's fine if you don't agree) Germany bombed London in both world wars, so it wasent just the Nazi's and again wether or not they were punished was not the point I was trying to make rather simply that both the germans and firebombs were examples of terrorism.
I'm curious, what punishment do you think Kira deserved?
The level of acting in this scene is absolutely first-rate. There was a subtle exchange of glances between Casey Biggs and Nana Visitor that really showed how good both of them are.
Garak, his eyes wide open. Damar, when his jaw dropped.
Kira, with fire from her lips
Kira, when the truth was spoken.
Damar and Kira at Cardassia Prime.
Damar, his eyes open!
Kira her eyes lowered.
Damar, his face black his eyes red.
As much as I love TNG, it's because is really amazing character moments like this that make DS9 the best Star Trek series. Not just the writing and the acting, but the composition of this scene - the very carefully chosen close-ups, the silent glance from Garrack to Kira that make it clear he knows EXACTLY what she's thinking before she says it - everything about this is just a masterpiece of story telling.
It's observations and comments like yours and so many others that make want to own DS9 the whole series. But I wished the creators had not killed off so many key characters.
0:57 Kira's expression told a story, it was like she was waiting for that punch to come
@Nebel Werfer in this case she would probably of put up little resistance just due to her feeling that she could of choosen a more diplomatic tone. However there wasn't a better time to say it than that. It would of been purely emotional at any other point and it would of been wasted.
You can see she puts a lot of effort to control herself here. Had she punched him she would have been as condescendent and coxardly as the Cardassians were backthen. She also doesn't want to throw the Truth into Damar's face because she needs him as an ally and she also is kinda sympathetic towards the situation.
The conflict on her face is still profound. Then Garal finds the right words to comfort her.
The unspoken dialogue between them is some of the best acting in the series. Damar is angry at what she says, she closes her eyes in regret for speaking so bluntly, and he immediately sees the reason she said it and walks off. Those three seconds are the whole interaction summed up without words or exposition. Just brilliant acting.
@@TakaComics Don't forget the world's tiniest nod.
So much said in 3 seconds of silence.
@@hagamapama She's right, he KNOWS she's right, and that's what makes it so much more painful. DS9 was so good.
Stalin ... "If only one man dies of hunger, that's a tragedy. If millions die, that's only statistics."
Machiavelli ... "Never wound a man by killing all he loves, never destroy all that brings him peace or gives him hope. Such a man is without vulnerability, without any hope for peace, his compass is guided by hateful fury and vengeance, and he becomes your greatest adversary because he has nothing left to lose."
The Dominion should have learnt from human history.
The Founders are like children, and are the pettiest entities in Star Trek.
Stalin didn't actually say that, it's a mistaken attribution
@@comradesteve1990 You're right. Stalin never said that, not quite ... but (almost) everybody says that Stalin did, lol.
@@RogueDragon05 To be fair Rogue, the Federation fought like idiots in the Dominion War. The Dominion uses anti-infantry mines and energy based artillery which decimated Federation troops and used A.I. controlled weapons platforms to decimate Federation starships. The Founder was smart enough to make an alliance with the Breen which nearly turned the tide of the war in the favor of the Dominion. From an outside observer's standpoint, it seemed that Sisko was the only competent military commander in Starfleet. Sisko got the Klingons to re-agree to the Kitomer accords. Sisko got the Romulans into the war on the Federation's side. Sisko armored his ship with Ablative armor to make it more combat effective. Sisko was the only one thinking with a military mind.
I need to replicate a dermal regenerator for that third degree burn I just got.
Brilliant!
If someone asks what DS9 is about, this sums it up pretty well.
Actually you want to show DS9 at the height of it's powers, show someone Duet.
+Batman Laughed Man, they were just winding up with that episode.
Awesome username, by the way.
Batman Laughed I meet your "Duet" and raise you "In the Pale Moonlight"
This scene relies on 7 years of character development + decades more backstory to really appreciate it of course. I wouldn't show it to a first timer, but it's absolutely a top scene to illustrate how ds9 really hits you.
Batman Laughed Honestly I think this episode pairs brilliantly with Duet.
In that episode Maritza foretells how Cardassia will only survive if it stands before bajor and admits it's guilt.
This episode shows how far they have come as a people, to see them humbled but grow from it.
what a great scene! Damar having a sudden and deep epiphany regarding his own actions. And then the underappreciated musical score of DS9 to underline the severity of this scene to the characters. These were the moments that made DS9 such an outstanding series.
Garak was right. There may have been a more diplomatic time to point out the similarity between the Dominion and occupying Cardasia, but not a more impactful one.
DS9 was sooooo good. And it holds up SO well these days. It's not all blah blah technobabble. It's compelling people growing in fascinating ways!
Scifi lingo only becomes technobabble when it starts distracting from the story, serves as filler or makes no sense. Most of the lingo in TNG was no technobabble.
Sadly I can't say the same about Voyager.
@@Kaefer1973 Exactly. Technobabble is underrated. You want a sci-fi show to feel dated in a couple decades, put in "realistic" dialogue about how your 300-years-in-future space technology idea works. You want your characters to seem like clueless tourists just along for the ride, take OUT all the dialogue about the space technology. Technobabble justifies the eternal sci-fi story, "we don't know how this would work yet, but what if..." It's only bad when used badly.
The Berman era. We shall not soon see its like again
One doesn't begin to understand the pain draconian methods of rule over others until gets a first hand experience... and Damar got to experience it all and become the man Cardassia needed. A shame he didn't live to pass on the lessons he learned.
I think after what happened in the finale a lot of Cardassians will begin to understand.
Girintina Genocide is a harsh lesson.
Garak learned something there too... he learned it before though when Zial died.
His heroic martyrdom likely served as a grand example. Garak, Kira and those who followed him probably would have made sure the people knew everything. A new Cardassia rose from the ashes that day. I like to think it was a good one.
I thought it was a real mistake killing him off in the finale honestly.
As tragic as this situation is, Damar needed to know what it was like to be on the other end of a repressive dictatorship.
True, because Damar most certainly had the same twisted view of Dukat--that any violence against the Bajorans was their own fault for not accepting the Cardassians as the far superior race/species, and that the occupation made the Bajorans better. However they did abandon their old caste system so that was at least one positive outcome of the occupation.
@@ramibaghdadi1255 great men a forged by fire, it is the privaledge of lesser men to light the flame
Koo kinda like living in a town full of democrats.
@@notused2118 *Rolls eyes*
@@joaolucasfraga9147 you can't see parallels???
I wish they hadn’t killed off Damar, I understand why, but I still wish he could’ve seen a free Cardassia
In a way that is his punishment, he cannot live to see and build a free Cardassia because he had been for so long a loyal servant of the old one.
"Die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villan"
@@ChairmanMo More theatrical, lasting effect!
Sisko and Damar were the Moses characters of the series, leading two peoples to prosperity, but not living to see the fruits of their labor.
@@svenzo1199 except sisko comes back
So hard hitting in October 2023.
The timing, the expressions, the delivery ... top acting talent on this show. I miss it.
To this day this is still one of my favourite scenes in Star Trek, without question.
The miniscule nod from Damar.
Almost nobody would notice it. But he understood in exactly that moment.
The subtlety of this scene is great; they all convey so much with just their faces... the Discovery writers could learn a thing or two from DS9.
You mean to say that Discovery has writers? I thought they just had the actors make up something as they went along.
I still like Discovery, but it´s a far cry from DS9. Then again I think all of the other Star Trek series are a far cry from DS9. It's just so much better.
I still think discovery had the best first season out of any Star Trek show, TNG was utterly despised at first
Shatner, Stewart, Mulgrew, and Bacula could each act the house down, but overall they didn't have a strong supporting cast. What they had instead were really strongly written characters, so strong that we the audience barely noticed when the acting wasn't great.
DS9 had not only strongly written characters but absolutely superb actors to play the roles -- all the roles, even the recurring ones like Garak and Damar. Nana Visitor was phenomenal in the role and brought life to it beyond what the writers had intended.
Even in the bad parts of TNG, bad plots were saved by great characters. In DS9, great acting put it over the top. But I'm sorry John, DSC has neither good plots nor great characters. Great acting can't save it when the characters they perform in are all miserable, unlikeable asshats. No disrespect intended to the actors, but nothing is going to save that thing.
wolbaman - No they couldn't. You assume that the "writers" of Discovery are receptive, in any way save outrage, toward criticism or comparison. They'll just keep doubling down until they bust, as is the trend these days.
Beautifully acted. The shame on both of their faces. Hers for knowing she struck at him in a moment of weakness and that was cruel. His for knowing what she said was right.
God I miss Star Trek.
15 million Bajorans killed in the occupation.
1:09 Kira didn't realize it, but that one comment set Cardassia on a path to join the Federation
When this episode first aired, I was surprised by the way Garak spoke about Damar. After all, it seemed he should have a good reason to despise Damar for killing Ziyal. That Garak was able to put aside his feelings in favor of the man he believed Cardassia needed struck me as a powerful moment.
It's sad but I think Ziyal loved Garak more than he loved her. He was very fond of her, may have been happy to have a romance (although not really clear if they actually did as opposed to being very close friends with romantic tension), but he always put himself at a distance, from EVERYONE. "She loved you." "I could never figure out why." Garak often sees himself as an outsider, looking in on and manipulating the galaxy but rarely a part of it.
Garak was excellent at seeing things before they happen and reading people, why he was a great assassin/intelligence agent. He understood Damar killed Ziyal because he saw her as a traitor and a threat to other Cardassians. He knows he genuinely cared about his fellow citizens unlike Dukat who was a selfish/egotistical megalomaniac who sold his people to the Dominion for power. It doesn't in anyway lessen what Damar did in killing an innocent girl or everything he did against the Bajorans as a soldier, but it showed he had an ability for redemption where Dukat never did. He did openly despise Dukat because of what he was and he of course regretted not killing him when he had the chance because he needed his help to fight the Klingons.
@@ramibaghdadi1255 I love Odo's reaction to that revelation.
@@TheWPhilosopher Well, it's the safest way...
Hands down my favorite scene of the entire show. There may be more excellent episodes, but this scene is just so powerful, and is a succinct microcosm of the arc of the entire series.
For me, that's the final speech from the episode "In the Pale Moonlight".
Alright, this clip just convinced me that the show is worth watching. With characters like these, and Quark, it's definitely got a lot of good in it.
Watch DS9, it's great. More: th-cam.com/video/6VhSm6G7cVk/w-d-xo.html
It's a must watch. Slow start, but give it time it wil be worth your time. There are plenty more of those things to be seen, also about friendship.
I envy you, the awesome journey. Seasons one and two are a tad slow. Three picks up alot. By Season four..., hang on and enjoy the ride.
And, was it?
It was. I finished it a few months ago. And in the last season, Damar became my favorite character! As mentioned above, the series starts slow and during the first two seasons I wondered if I was wasting my time (especially in the rough and very uneven first season) but the quality became consistently good by the third season and I really enjoyed it overall. I haven't watched TOS and TNG, which kept me from going ahead and watching DS9, but I'm glad I did. I missed a couple of references, sure, but DS9 is mostly it's own stories. And it's probably the strongest series, because the sustained plotlines and character development were great and something Star Trek hadn't done as well before. I also really enjoyed the divergence from Gene Roddenberry's progressive utopian vision that never appealed to me. Humans in Star Trek are still unrecognizable weirdos, at least in Starfleet, but the Bajorans, Ferengi, and even Cardassians give the audience something more like the humanity they know to relate to. Conflict, emotion, identity, nationalism, exploitation, etc. A lot of the aliens are more human than the humans.
Excellent show. I really found the moral complexity compelling, something not seen in other Star Trek shows, so DS9 was my first Star Trek series. Unfortunately, there's no more to it. But the documentary _What We Left Behind_ is a must-see after watching the series, and most of the cast is still making appearances and involved with the show. Andrew Robinson just recorded an audiobook of his Garak novel _A Stich in Time,_ and even performed a scene from it with Alexander Siddig as Dr. Bashir. There's a lot of interviews and fan service stuff for fans to see on TH-cam and elsewhere on the internet if they're interested, which is nice. There remains a loyal fan following, even though they haven't filmed anything DS9 since the 1990s.
The quality on Paramount streaming is pretty bad. It varies from almost-DVD quality to near-VHS. I hear the DVDs are significantly better, and I believe it. There's some fan AI upscaling online ("Project Defiant"), but current upscaling technology is so inconsistent: it either looks good or distractingly bad, and varies from shot to shot. At least the official releases are consistent. You can see a reel of remastered shots of the show produced for the documentary on TH-cam. In them, the show doesn't look dated but modern, better than Enterprise, perhaps better than TOS or TNG in HD. It's not just the resolution but the color that gets a big upgrade. Unfortunately, they only did about five minutes, not even one episode. It doesn't seem like there will ever be the money or the interest to remaster the series from the original 35mm film. So there's no point in waiting for that. Anyway, it's a great show that holds up. It might even play better today than it did when it came out. A few things are dated, but some things are refreshingly show. The depiction of Kira Nerys as an unrepentant former terrorist would have been unthinkable on TV just a few years later. I don't think the show really reckoned with it as much as it should have, but there was an episode that confronted it and made me like the show more for bravely putting some real dirt on one of it's heroes and making me like her less.
The two standout episodes that I'd generally recommend are _The Visitor_ and _In The Pale Moonlight._ Those have self-contained stories and are accessible if you haven't watched the show. The other highlights of DS9 come out of episodes that build on plot and character development over episodes and seasons. Multi-part episodes, episodes that extend a character arc, etc. These are pleasures you must watch the whole show to enjoy.
there is no shortage of irony in the fact that Garak ends up leading the NEW Cardassia.
Very powerful scene
Savage Kira....savage.
Sometimes, the truth can BE savage.
No, if she said his wife and child deserved to be killed as retribution that would be savage. That is something a fanatical Bajoran would say. Murder is just as awful no matter who it's done to.
billnye69 I totally understand where Kira is coming from.
K O !!!
I am sure Kira knows exactly what kind of people. In her war of rebellion am sure she set bombs that killed many Cardassian women and children.
1:04
The precise moment Garak meets his superior in the art of torture.
Garak was probably thinking "Ouch, and I thought I was harsh during interrogations"
At one minute, that was one of the best moments in Star Trek. So very reconciling. 😢❤🖖
Her delivery of that line was perfect. The reflection of pain for the loss of his children with the bitterness that he has done the same.
Incredible scene. Simple yet so effective. The acting is top level stuff from all 3 of them. Andrew Robinson only needs to use his eyes to express feeling and it's so effective. Probably my favourite DS9 characters all in one room.
Powerful show. DS9 was the best.
Far better than that Discovery crap that's out today.
Roddenberry was at times a hindrance to the series he founded, and Deep Space Nine was right to get away from his vision. The Dominion War was a curve ball, and led to the series losing its innocence and cutting out a lot of the preachy bullshit that infected Star Trek. Remember, it was Roddenberry and his micromanaging that created things like the first season of TNG, or people like Maurice Hurley, who ran rampant and nearly destroyed the series.
I dunno. The Dominion while not being true to the core of Roddenberry's Star Trek still had a lot of really good episodes.
At it's best, it was among the best of Star Trek. Babylon 5 was right there with it though. B5's special effects didn't hold up as well, but the story and acting are every bit as good as DS9.
@BartJ583
I think a large War arc as subversion to what Roddenberry envisioned can be done, and wasn't done terribly in DS9, that being said for all I care there never needs to be a War or "Dark side of the Federation" arc in any Star Trek media ever again, by this point it's just a lame distraction.
At 1:00, you can see Damar give her a very slight nod. About like he's say 'I understand you' or 'You are right'. It's very subtle and not sure if it's supposed to be there or not. But I think it speaks volumes.
"Point taken, but stop talking."
Amazing catch of body language!
I noticed that and i couldnt put it any better.
That tiny micro-expression conveyed "OUR kind of people gave those orders... But no longer. I will ensure it."
All of you here are acting like he gave some manner of tiny acknowledgment of the facts, whereas to me it looked for all the world like a tiny motion to prepare to turn and walk away.
The writing is so strong in this scene. So is the acting. DS9 was the best Star Trek, and scenes like this made it.
One of my favorite scenes of any episodes
My god, this show is a rare gem. The likes of which probably only occur once every century or so. Certainly entire lightyears ahead of the modern Trek reboots.
I have always thought DS9 was the best of Trek, maybe even eclipsing TOS. The characters were so compelling and the dramas and conflicts and interactions, great, and small, were the stuff of legends.
This is arguably the strongest scene in the whole of DS9.
You're right, and what a lot of people can't comprehend is that it was done without CGI. Not that I'm against CGI, but great modern storytelling needs more than just special effects.
@@Skylinesandsunsets In fact, special effects far too often detract and remove focus on the storytelling. CGI is great, but only when it's used properly. Nowadays, graphics make up for the lack of a coherent story, acting, or anything else. Just "here's flashy lights kids! don't pay attention to anything else!"
@@Skylinesandsunsets TNG and DS9 i thought always used CGI as an aid, instead of a crutch. Much of both shows hinged on the actors themselves. Most of them were stage trained actors if i recall. The JJ movies and even Picard, felt like CGI was more of a crutch than an Aid (especially in JJ's movies).
Yes, and there a lot of even better one.
Aha, but what about 'Duet'!
This series is just so well acted
This one scene to me is Nana Visitor's "GIVE HER SEVEN EMMYS" highlight reel to me haha. Watch her face go from sad to disbelief to quiet outrage to shame. Gets me EVERY time.
One thing I really like about this scene- Garak isn't just talking about Damar, he's talking about himself. He was blindly, desperately loyal to fascist-era Cardassia and Tain just as Damar was loyal to Dukat. But Dukat and Tain never deserved that loyalty, and Cardassia sowed the seeds of its own destruction.
Way back in season 2, Garak interestingly seemed rather conflicted about killing Quark's dissident friends, and cryptically said he let them go because he "loved Cardassia". It seemed to me that deep down, he knew the rotten core of the Cardassia he knew was going to collapse, and that major societal change was the only way to save his homeland.
@@ffnbbq If anything. The fact Garak was so well informed made him reinforce his delusion about the past even more. He knew what needed to be done but it wasn't till much later that he could emotionally accept it. I don't think he really accepted it even all the way up to when Tain passes. Feels like that's when the shoe finally dropped for him. That episode was kind of the turning point for a lot of Cardassian characters who were holding desperately onto the past.
The facial expressions of Damar when he first goes to confront Kira and then sees her expression and finally realizes the truth of it all. Absolutely great acting.
I comes full circle from what the cardassian in the episode "Duet" tried to do, Cardassian's needed to see and admit their guilt...it just took the occupation, oppression, and savaging of their people for them to start to see, Garak is a brilliant liar...cause he knows when the truth needs to be said, and reality confronted.
This scene was soooo good. The burn, the intent, the realization..everything. Great wrting, even better acting. For me the best part was Kira: in one small moment being triumpent and then realizing, for only a small fraction of a second, that she was maybe no better i that minute. A true Katharsis for both Damar and Kira.
Garak was there to reaffirm Kira that she was right.
There was more tension and emotion in this scene about the horrors of war than there was in the whole first season of Discovery!
The story was excellent, far better than the first seasons of any start trek show. The first season of all previous star treks have been wooden as hell. Discovery managed to launch in from the get go.
Tommy Gunns. Each episode actually adds to the longer story. Each main character develops in each episodes, no weird standalone episodes to force character development. The easter eggs that link it to other series. The overall story is excellent. Twists, double crosses. Love and friendships that other series have took seasons to develop. This is only seaons one. The scene above is good but it has seasons behind it. Discovery is the stargate universe of star trek.
Tommy Gunns stargate universe is not stargate sg1.
DS9 is the star trek equivalent of SG1. Easily forgettable with the odd well-written episode, long season story archs that are developed at the start and end of each season and about 10-15 filler episodes to get the 24 count. Shoe-horned story development. Fairly wooden characters. Dax for one. Didnt change or evolve throughout. The new dax was a breath of fresh air. Kira was the only character that really grew in DS9....and Jake but that was more height.
Voyage is Atlantis.
Reminds me of some of those scenes in Inglorious Basterds.
Huge tension with people sitting down and talking.
Tommy Gunns nice to see you have no real arguements.
The acting here was spot on, the way Kira wants to point out how what is happening to the Cardassians is just like what they did to the Bajorans and Damar's words make her say something.....and then Damar goes towards her with Anger but suddenly he realises that she is completely right and the Cardassians are now under the Dominion's boot just like how the Bajorans were under the Cardassians..... but he also sees that she regrets saying it in that moment showing how her people have the compassion that everyone thinks that Cardassians don't.....and he walks away.
Didn't just walk away, gave a short nod of understanding before probably finding a bulkhead to punch because she didn't deserve to be his target. She's hurting for them and the PTSD, he's hurting, fighting each other won't fix anything
To me this whole scene is incredibly bitter to watch. I keep thinking there was another way Kira could have brought up the brutality of the occupation but in reality her feelings were warranted and so was what she said plus she had every right to say it at this moment. A hard but wonderful scene
Truth isn't always cute. It might set you free but free has a price.
This scene was beautiful because it was bitter. It was a hard hitting, pithy scene carried by pathos and good situational acting.
There are ample ways she could have done it. Doing it when she did, being who she is, and being what she is. There was no time as perfect as that moment as Garak explains.
Kind of a shame Demar died, it would have been interesting to see how he would’ve led a new Cardassia. He’s character really seemed to change rather profoundly towards the end. Guess losing your family and your home can do that to a guy.
I don’t think he would be able to, not in the long run. He was a good rebel leader but he’s not a leader for the long haul. His past would catch up with him at some point. If he lived someone might even assassinate him.
It would have been interesting to have had a post-war miniseries for DS9.
Damar having to mourn his family's death and still be a leader in the postwar Cardassian government.
That was the charm of DS9.
It was the only Trek series that seeing the consequences of decisions years later was a possibility.
Damar, getting verbally slapped in the face here... probably realizes she still blames him for Ziyal's death.
Or the family & friends lost in the Occupation.
It's why Damar realized that a military dictatorship that practices "death to its enemies" isn't enjoyable if you are one of It's enemies.
Very few revolutionaries live to see the results of their revolution.
Kira: Yeah, Damar, what kind of people give those orders?
Right then and there, Damar realized the irony in his question.
At the same time however Kira realized she'd gone too far, and expressed genuine fear of Damar for the first and only time.
Kira knows as well as anybody after all, how personal loss can fuel one's anger.
That; and she's come to learn over the series that Cardassians aren't inherent monsters, thanks to Gemor and others.
Both characters grow as a result of the scene.
@@jimtaylor294 I don't think she was afraid of Damar - she had already kicked his ass in the past, when he'd tried attacking her. But she saw the pain and fury in his eyes and recognizes it as something she'd seen before - in the eyes of Bajorans during the Occupation. Which made her regret rubbing salt in the wound.
...And meanwhile, Damar glared at this, this... Bajoran... and saw himself in her. He probably started thinking what Garak bitterly stated at the end: that many would call it karmic justice.
@@Archone666 That's one way of looking at it, though I prefer my interpretation.
@@Archone666 That tiny nod, that micro-expression conveyed "OUR kind of people gave those orders... But no longer. I will ensure it."
As Greg Kihn sang so long ago, "They don't write 'em like that anymore." This scene is a prime example on every level of what made DS9 such a great series.
This Scene slaps so hard I blacked out. She's worried it was too much, He wants to be furious but knows he can't...
Expertly done!
One of the many small reasons this show was the top Trek. These little emotional moments all stack up at the end.
I love this scene so much. There's so much said without a single word being spoken.
The acting in this scene was superb. That anguished nod from Damar before he walked off showed he got her point as a result of his own loss.
And did better due to it. Sadly he died a martyr instead of being the leader that could have rebuilt a strong, just, and more open Cardassia.
Yes some would argue a strong nation that was formerly an enemy I'd a bad thing but weakness breeds fear. Instead of tearing it down, rebuilding it stronger but more open to ideals that are closer to the Federation
Nana Visitor’s performance is stellar in this scene.
This scene almost perfectly sums up what makes DS9 so great.
Wow, the layers in this scene! Wonderful!
I like how Kira’s hatred of Cardassians stayed true for all the seasons
Yeah she eased up a bit but she never got buddy buddy with them
Not very “Star Treky” that fantastical Utopia life, but very real & relatable
I actually think Kira, while holding to some justified resentment concerning the past, evolved a quite a ways in how she thought of and treated Cardassians. I think she stopped truly hating early on, actually, with her admitting that Maritza being a Cardassian wasn't enough to justify his murder in "Duet".
She was the voluntarily adopted daughter of one Cardassian and ends up friends with Garak and Damar. But, she never forgot what they'd done.
Bajor was not a Federation world to start with; plus Bashir and O'Brien noted that from someone who would bite a Cardassian in S1 she was greeting the old Cardassian father figure and being friendly of sorts towards Garak.
and remember, for Cardassians showing contempt and arguing is a form of affection.
The way I see it, Deep Space Nine takes place in a frontier region of the Star Trek universe. Thus, the norms and morals that would be applicable elsewhere have to be twisted and even ignored to survive.
@@WorldWar2freak94 Horrible.
I weep for the end of this kind of writing.
Fantastic scene and the acting is top tier. The emotions all right there on top. Great work for all. Casey Biggs really came into his own with the character!
The last chapters of Star Trek's golden age.
C. Baer Before JarJar Abrams came along. He'd probably remake this and recast Kira, Damar etc so they're totally unconvincing!
The bad movies and failure of Enterprise put the TNG Trek era in its grave. The lesson learned unfortunately is 1 hour morality plays don't make money. Things need to be special effect fests, edgy and violent.
I liked enterprise, sure it’s not the best, but it was still pretty good
@@otomicans6580 one of the biggest reasons why Enterprise was not as successful as the others was because far too many fans did not give it a fair chance, it was not what Star Trek was supposed to be in their opinion, while taken on its own merits it was fantastic. And personally I don't see why Nemesis was received poorly, I thought it was absolutely amazing.
@@williammerkel1410 I personally wanted to see what happened in the alpha quadrant after TNG/DS9 and they didn't care to address it. Not sure how anyone could like Nemesis' plot of yet another Data clone and an evil Picard clone but hey, to each their own.
It's episodes like this that truly showcase how amazing Star Trek used to be. Kira, a Bajoran, who lived under the brutal occupation of the Cardassians provides a quip at Damar that makes him finally realize her point of view. But what is interesting is in later episodes, these same two people who despised each other for decades form an unusual bond of mutual respect. Damar realizes that the Cardassians were in the wrong with how they oppressed the Bajorans. But Kira also realizes that Damar is at heart, a patriot and he honestly thought what he was doing we for the betterment of his people and his culture. It's those subtle nuances that made Star Trek such an amazing show.
Possibly one of the finest moments in all of Trek. The acting is SO. GOOD.
Damn I LOVE DS9's later episodes... So much tension, struggle AND character development!! 👍
Easily one of my top five favorite scenes in the entire franchise.
Damar's character arc might be my favourite one in all of Star Trek.
The amazing quality and power of this scene can be attributed to the fantastic acting, writing, and depth. By depth I mean that most watching this episode have known the Bajoran/Cardassian history since it's first mention in TNG. All the history and events since then led up to really understanding everything happening in this short yet powerful scene. Kira, Damar, and Garak nailed this scene. One of my favorite Star Trek moments of all time.
Someone once said in complimenting this scene that it should be shown as an example to new viewers of why they should watch DS9. Which is insanity to me - it is FAR too deep as you say. It would make no sense or at least be horrifically underappreciated by a newbie. Years of backstory of Trek races, DS9 seasons, and characters all come together for this moment. It's the *reward* for dedicatation to the show, not a teaser.
One of the few times you see Garak genuinely surprised
This video shows up in my recommendations frequently and I watch it every time
great moments in Trek history , Star Trek unlike lots of other shows on TV Star Trek will now shy away from issues like this
This moment, and the moment when Ezri gives Worf a reality check on Klingon "honor", are two of the finest moments of writing in any TV series, let alone Star Trek, and they both happened *in the same episode*.
"Damar has a certain 'romanticism' about the past." Yeah, he's not the only one.
The acting was superb. All the little micromovements are perfect and believable and an entire unspoken conversation took place that would have taken 5 minutes to verbalize. Damar is at first shocked, then takes a step forward in anger, but Kira deflects by looking down and away, removing the target of Damar's anger and forcing his thoughts inward again. Damar then realizes that Kira is absolutely right, and while he can't bring himself to say it, not right then, he gives a very slight nod before he turns away to process his pain and absorb this new idea into his thought process.
I think it's more he could see she regretted saying it yet even as she regretted it he could also see it needed to be said. Cardassia wasn't some blameless innocent in war and occupation. It had given its fair share of such orders.
Honestly Deep Space Nine had some of the psychologically and emotionally deepest stories and moments
couldn't do anything like this in any other series.
(except enterprise, surpriusingly)
enterprise was great in my opinion. they had some hiccups here and there, but not worse than some TNG episodes from the beginning(looking at the Doctor and Ghost episode etc.) why it gets all that hate baffles me...
@@floppydisksareop The garbage opening theme was the worst thing in Enterprise. The first few tunes were enough to completely obliterate all "Trek" feeling the intro might have created.
@@WilfredIvanhoe i actually liked the opening, it was fitting. Just because it is not symphonic doesn't mean it is bad... I detest the TOS Woooohoooo opening much more for example
so much is said in this one scene and yet it is so little. the heaviness the icy cold tones. GOD you cannot write like this anymore.
Fantastic acting all around but props to the actors playing Kira and Damar.
So much conveyed in just a few seconds of facial expressions.
Casey Biggs and Nana Visitor.
All the things in this scene that are said without words.
Top 5 scene in any Star Trek show or feature film no question.
My two favorite Trek scenes ever are this one and Picard and Q in the afterlife after Jean-Luc gets a glimpse of his alternative, safe life.
I prefer the blooper clip where Q asks if Sisko will ravish him and Sisko replies that he might.
This is why DS9 is the best trek series IMO. You would never hear a line like this in any of the other series.
Even as a fan of the happy and optimistic families-about-the-Enterprise TNG, there is absolutely no denying that this is one of the most beautiful moments of Star Trek. The exchange is one thing, then regret on Kira's part, and going even further with the guiding wisdom of Garak. I get chills.
Sisko poisoning the planet or the conclusion of Pale Moonlight or Quark's famous speech about the Federation are some of the most mentioned pivotal moments in the series, but I think this one was always the most powerful for me. It's not only really understated, but it's the biggest underlining moment in both Kira's entire character arc through the series, as well as the story of Bajor and Cardassia that served as the backdrop of most of the series. The karma of how the Bajorans were treated by the Cardassians had finally come fully around back to them, a moment Kira herself had been waiting for, but when the time finally came it was a conflicted, bittersweet one.
She can't help but say it, because the Cardassian empire had it coming and the past happened no matter what, but knowing the pain and death that Cardassian civillians were now experiencing leaves it a necessary but empty thing to say. It's definitely Kira's most pivotal, arc defining moment. She finally got the revenge she's so craved (and honestly deserved) most of her life, but its now hollow.