I actually really, really hate the idea that Odo's preference for "order" basically comes from, essentially, fascism passed down from the Founders through his DNA. It's the very worst kind of reductionist essentialism in Trek - even worse than "Ferengi are greedy because they're Ferengi" and "Klingons are violent…

Bonus points for the Narodnik reference!

I really like that mini-speech, in part because it's a good character moment, and in part because, holy fuck, it really IS hard to grow tomatoes.

Didn't Voyager do something like that too? Hell, I think they might have done a couple episodes like that.

@avclub-00b5f80238003a864880fe7d05293d64:disqus  "the Dems have been bailing on the middle class and the working poor for
decades, but our only other option is to vote for people I'm 100% sure
are fucking retarded." Well, that's not our only other option. The real option is neither Dems nor Republicans, but to build…

"By the nature of this sort of drama, people the viewer has met are a lot more important than the faceless trillions."

How does it make sense for Sisko to stay behind, though? I could see the Sisko of Season 2, maybe - but Sisko now, who has mostly accepted his role as emissary of the Bajoran prophets? Who sees himself as protector of Bajor and as standing in the way of Cardassian and Dominion threats? He takes one look at a baby and…

The problem is, it's a sci-fi show, and this specific episode is built around a moral dilemma - and that moral dilemma has to actual hold up to scrutiny in order to work as drama. And it just doesn't! What the show is holding up as the murder of 8000 people is actually the choice between two timelines - in one of…

Like I said elsewhere, I think "Children of Time" gets this wrong, by narrowing the focus to the point where it's all about this one farming community on this one planet and the people we've met from it, and thus choosing any other timeline than theirs is somehow "murdering" them. I'm sure there were plenty of…

I don't get that turtle thing. There's no way I WOULD do that to a turtle! That doesn't make me a replicant! LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT MY MOTHER!

Another reason why this episode is kind of awful: apparently the origin of the episode started with having Odo confess his feelings for Kira, and then it was decided that the only way this could happen was that if a future version of Odo did this instead. I think this is kind of horrible, and feels horrible and…

Completely agreed. Not only that, the dilemma is not the choice between the 48 lives on the Defiant and the 8000 (hypothetical) lives on the planet - it's the 48 lives on the Defiant and every other life that will be affected by their absence. In the case of Sisko and company, that means millions, maybe billions of…

Also - why does NCIS do that irritating "here's a cut to black and white, from the future! - it's a spoiler!" thing at every ad break, when every shot is of Mark Harmon looking vaguely constipated?

Well, they gave the dude the Nobel Peace Prize right after he announced an escalation of the war in Afghanistan.

The drug sequences on Mad Men mostly seem like scenes written by people who've never been on drugs ("what can we do that's visual and gets into the head of the character?" "Ehhhh, have him hallucinate his wife, or something, drugs do that, right?"). I try not to let it bug me too much. For the most part, the drug…

I could watch an entire hour of Stan leaving uncomfortable rooms.

Not by the standards set by the original series. William Hartnell was mostly known for playing tough-guy roles in war films and crime dramas before he became the Doctor. Patrick Troughton had a wide-ranging and eclectic career before taking over the role, ranging from stage plays to spy dramas. Jon Pertwee had mostly…

True, and all the more depressing for it.

@avclub-022199896b1f52952c180b60caa681bd:disqus  - Nah. The Thin White Duke would've been a great version of the Master, though.

How depressing is it that three out of four of those choices are baffling only because they're old - on a show that started out starring an elderly grandfather? I want an old Doctor again, god dammit.