That scene works on like 10 levels, and you really have to have seen the entire series to understand just what it means for Kira, Garak, and Damar to be in that place, saying what they're saying.

Probably a good time to lavish some praise on Ron Moore, as "Tacking" was his final DS9 solo script. (He wrote another one for some Trek show I can't remember, but let's not talk about that.)

Also known as my old VHS recordings of DS9, wherein I removed the opening, commercials, ending, and preview. Just 6-8 hours of unending DS9 goodness.

While not comparing the quality of the two (not fair to), "Tacking Into the Wind" is, in some ways, this show's "Ozymandias," an episode very near the end that is both a superb representation of everything that was great about the show as a whole, but also one that pays off years (and years and years in some cases) of…

Ezri: "To Chancellor Worf."
Worf: "My reign was… brief."

I love that there's a phaser in his hand in that moment. It tells you that if at any point Rusot had gotten the better of Kira in their confrontation, Garak was going to vaporize him.

There's a great one-word change from the script from "Tacking Into the Wind" that I love. In the script, Sisko tells Worf: "Gowron's risking the safety of the entire Alpha Quadrant and it has to stop." But in the episode, Sisko tells him "he" has to stop. That one change, along with the way Brooks delivers the…

As much as we all love Vir's wave to Mr. Morden, one thing has always annoyed me about it: that damn flashback right before it to their conversation in season 2.

"Aha! We'll get Winn and Dukat together, and that will be great!"

SPOILERS

I agree with a lot of that. For me, it's just that Ross shows up to tell Sisko to take the Defiant into battle, and (literally) 10 minutes of screen time later, it's been destroyed.

I think it's the last truly great DS9 episode. Only problem is the remaining arc can't quite live up to it, but it's wonderful that we got one of the show's best episodes so near the end.

Just give us Ron Moore and Bryan Fuller teaming up to run the miniseries. (Anyone ever read Fuller's pitch about a Trek series set 1,000 years after DS9 with no more Federation? It was all kinds of awesome.)

I stand corrected. (Just insert Netflix Instant in there, which is what I meant, and I'm pretty sure didn't exist then.)

I agree with some of Zack's criticisms, but it is really too bad he couldn't watch "When It Rains" and "Tacking Into the Wind" together, because a lot of the payoffs he's looking for are coming.

I don't think you're alone in that opinion. I certainly don't think it works as well as season six's opening arc, but I love its ambition. Whether they pulled it off or not is a worthy subject for debate.

It gave us "Tacking Into the Wind." That justifies its existence, even if there was nothing else to recommend it (and there's plenty, IMO).

I think because they did all of the editing on video, they have to go back to the original film for any HD cuts, so I assume all the extra footage is stored there.

Extended cuts of episodes with writer and actor commentaries when DS9 (maybe) comes to Blu-ray? I can dream…

I think the Damar thread is what really anchors the final arc. It's just so much fun, and yet has a lot of weight to it. And it's about to get… even more interesting.