Psychiatry has been a traditional way to suppress dissidence in nearly all countries, the US included.

Minor thing:  Worf misidentifies the ship in question.  It's not a Dominion "battleship" which we'll later see is like the Dominion's version of the death star.  It's a dominion battlecruiser or war cruiser.   Prior to "By Inferno's light"  the only Dominion ships we had seen were much smaller fighters (with some…

It's heavily implied later that the Vorta are "pre-uploaded" with the memories of their predecessors.

@Amalthea:            The closing shot and the music is probably the best "cliffhanger" shot in all of star trek.

SPOILERS

One other thing, I posted this super late on the last thread, but I thought I'd repost earlier here. I found a writer's guide made after the first season of TOS which people here might find interesting:  http://captainrobertapril.a…

I kind of feel like this stretch of episodes feels a little like "filler".  I like a few of them, but too many of them feel like the writers are killing time before the season finale.

On rewatching, I didn't like "Ties".  The problem is, the more interesting question, or what the episode should really be about, is sort of an out of character fake out that really muddles the episode.    As a counterpoint to "The darkness and the light"  the epsiode should have been about Kira forgiving Ghemor, and…

Which for me, is what kills the episode, because it seems out of character for Kira.

I can't imagine the Bajoran resistance had alot to work with.

Which actually has some ramifications.  When the Founders said they are the Dominion, they weren't kidding.  The Dominion is entirely their creation, made up of slave clone races designed to worship the founders.

I thought it was supposed to play broadly campy/comedic.

SPOILERS:  I think the couple of episodes you're referring to are actually during a temporary cease-fire after Starfleet retakes DS9.

That's what i think ultimately made Voyager so insufferable, it's horrible lead.

right

I think those failures were more just people trying to cash in on the next "Lost.'

I think Buffy was a good example of this balance.  Even though it was serialized, many episodes can stand on their own on rewatching, even though the drama of the serialization arcs isn't the same.

It occurs to me though (and this is a problem that will probably become a real issue in the future) is that drones and robots can be hacked.  So the war becomes not just who has better robots, but who can control those robots.

I don't know.  I think there are real limits to "reset" style shows, especially as far as drama goes.  Because how invested can you be in the drama of an episode when everything goes back to square one at the end?  And how interesting are characters that don't grow and evolve?

Right.  There's a big difference between drones with basic war programming and Data.