The Search, Part II

DVD, DS9 S3 (The Search, Part II)

It looked like Odo might be leaving the series by the end of Part I, now that he'd found his people, but trust the 'DS9' writers to turn things on their head - to discover his life's goal and then learn that his people are the most feared race of the Gamma Quadrant and actually at the heart of the recent troubles, was a shock, but one that Odo takes in his stride. His anger over Starfleet's lack of faith in him is forgotten and he comes to see that it is his own 'Link' with the 'solids', as his people call them, that he will maintain, rather than joining his 'rightful position in the Great Link, because they share his belief in justice and rightness, while his people only care about order at any cost. Kira's a good friend to Odo in the midst of these shifting grounds, tenderly accepting whatever course of action he appears to be taking, such as the desire to be with his people at first, or to change shape, something that she can't understand, and ultimately his decision to leave the Founders to return with her and the others. Perhaps the seeds of future stories were being sown here.

As with the possibility of Odo leaving to join his people, the first intimations that Commander Sisko might become a Captain and take command of the Defiant come through. It may have worried viewers at first that if these events came to pass the series might become a standard Trek series with a Captain and a ship, going from planet to planet, but they should have had more faith in the writers - almost always when something new was added, it was to broaden, expand, improve the series, and make it more exciting, not to lose what had already been gained. While some things did fall by the wayside, such as Bajoran politics and religion, they were always there to be tapped into in future stories and things never changed beyond recognition that this was Deep Space Nine. The best, and most intelligent Star Trek series of them all.

Having Admiral Nechayev, the ice queen, back as the superior that Sisko butts heads with (and how I wish that literally to have been the case!), was a move that added plausibility to Sisko's ousting from the centre of events. His best scene is when the volcano erupts and he barges into the meeting making demands and throwing his considerable presence around. He doesn't do so well against the Jem'Hadar here as he did in Part I, falling to only two, when he seemed to take on about six before! Mind you, these were 'dream' soldiers. His interaction with Garak is something more usually reserved for Bashir, and it might have been better had their positions been reversed - Bashir talking over the Replimat tables, and Sisko assisting O'Brien in the bar after the engineer gets walloped by a Jem'Hadar.

Even when Garak's not really there, he's great fun. The power of the Founders is shown clearly in their well-researched and highly accurate forced memories of the station and its inhabitants. Even Quark is suitably grasping, although one thing doesn't ring true: the Jem'Hadar were later to prove they defiantly didn't have the gambling gene. But as I say, these were 'dream' soldiers. The notion of Bajor signing a pact with another power is first suggested here, and though this time it was a false reality, the Dominion proved consistent, for though Bajor never joined the Romulans, they were to sign a pact with the Dominion itself! The genesis of creating tensions between Alpha Quadrant powers, something that would give success to many Dominion plots, began in this episode, which shows the test was a success for them in some ways. Perhaps they couldn't deal with Starfleet, but their were other powers available. The Romulans were ironically to become a major threat to the Dominion, both in this season and later.

Garak's death scene is a little too brief for such a great character, and though they were under attack you'd expect more feeling in Sisko's urging of Bashir to leave Garak's body instead of a slight pull of the arm and a 'come on'. And O'Brien must have left his family behind on a station that was in the clutches of the Dominion, which I don't believe he would do, though they aren't mentioned so perhaps they were on Bajor or somewhere else. If one hadn't already worked out that this was all happening too fast to be credible as reality then such scenes might have given the game away. Of course having seen the episode so many times it's difficult to judge, but watching it with someone who hadn't seen it before, it was believeable enough to fool the unsuspecting.

Odo, Kira and the others who were unaccounted for (as Dax informed Sisko earlier) would have been stranded, never to return to the Alpha Quadrant, had Sisko really collapsed the Wormhole, which highlights how much he was sacrificing by taking that course - it really was more than careers at stake, as Garak noted. Equally Borath and his Jem'Hadar minions would have been trapped 70,000 lightyears from home. They could have made a spinoff called 'Borath's Voyager's' about his long journey back home to the Gamma Quadrant!

The question is, what happened to Dax and O'Brien? Were they immediately drugged at the relay station, or did they experience some of the events in reality: meeting a 'Founder' (Borath), who agreed to peace talks, who then rendered them unconscious and put them in the test? At least we know the Karemma weren't spies as Quark must have got back safely to DS9 since he's not among the captives on the planet. But did all the other crewmembers of the Defiant die, or were they held elsewhere? If they did all die it must be considered an absolute disaster for the history books - a maiden voyage in which most of the crew succumb to an attack and the rest forced to play out a very real unreality. Odo's status should now be much increased, since he is the inside track on the most dangerous enemy of the Federation. And Eddington. He really is portrayed badly here - he has no links to any of the crew and so has no compunction in following orders and locking up officers or allowing the Jem'Hadar to do as they please. Kind of unfair since this isn't the real man, and the only scene he's been in so far he owned up to wanting to make friends! Perhaps his future was already being mapped out?

Jonathan Frakes does a good job of directing in his 'DS9' debut, I particularly liked the scene between Borath and Sisko when they first meet, the Vorta sidling round the Commander, the camera following, then focusing on Sisko's expression, in and out in one smooth shot. Or when he and Jake are having dinner and his preoccupation is shown by the camera's close proximity to his face until he responds to Jake's query and the camera pulls back to expands its view of the table as he comes into awareness. The garden set was one of the only flaws and something the makers were unhappy with, and I can understand why. It's too dark, and far too cluttered, but it works in some ways because it mirrors the Founders, and their dark corners, and Odo's mental state of confusion and bewilderment in the array of new possibilities. Plus there's a link to the Season 2 episode 'The Alternate' in the similar pillar that is the focus of the garden, one might even call it a Great Link...

You could argue that the 'be the rock' sentiments the Female Changeling endorses are a bit New Age, but in this case it's true - Odo literally can be the rock, but he still doesn't quite get what it means, so he's a bit of a sceptic. We learn he and his brethren weren't expected back for 300 years, which makes you wonder how long Odo can live for. We also don't know how long he was floating in space before he was found so who knows how old he is already! The reason we don't tend to see any of the 100 infants is probably because Odo was unique in going through the Wormhole - we hear occasionally about legends of shapeshifters from visits to the Gamma Quadrant, but not so much in the Alpha, and it wouldn't be until Season 7 that the storyline would be followed up.

There is a potentially massive oversight/plot hole with the look of the changelings. We know Odo based his appearance on Dr. Mora, the Bajoran scientist that studied him, and we've seen this to be the case, so why do all the changelings we see look like Dr. Mora/Odo? The simple explanation would be that since Odo was the first of the infants to return they took his form and kept it up whenever they chose to appear as a solid, unless of course they were in disguise - if you look at most episodes, changelings tend to have dialogue with Odo, and in some cases where they don't they're appearing as a human or other race in order to spy. It's also true that we rarely see a changeling speak, other than the Female. This episode we get one, but it's only in a handful of cases we see this (and usually changelings that are in disguise).

Their threat doesn't diminish by the end of the episode, but you get the idea that there's a bit of breathing room before any further attempts at invasion will commence, though ominously the Female Changeling does express interest in 'bringing order to the Alpha Quadrant'. Indeed, so much is put into motion with this episode, and so much is learnt about Odo and his people, that in some ways it's more satisfying than the first part, although that tended to be more exciting and have a greater action quotient.

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