Exactly.  It shows that the Dominion is fully capable of fucking the Federation without even needing to launch an invasion.

Considering how few of the cast of B5 are still alive, I'd say they had some rather severe forms of punishment indeed.

"goo guy"…was that intentional?  If so, well played.

I'm pretty sure they hung a lampshade on that one.  Didn't someone on the Defiant actually come out and say something along the lines of "That's an Excelsior class ship, it shouldn't be a match for us", followed by some technobabble about unspecified "upgrades"

Absolute best part is the final monologue at the end, where Sisko admits to himself that he thinks he can live with what he's done.

I don't see any reason why he couldn't simply have told them the truth, that he was planning to bring the Federation under the control of Starfleet.  Given that these were Red Squad cadets we are talking about, it's entirely possible that they just agreed with Leyton's ideals and carried out his assignment without…

I dunno, I think "Paradise Lost" did exactly what it needed to do to wrap up the first episode.  It showed just how completely out of their depth the Federation was when it came to dealing with the Founders, and it hammered home the point that Starfleet is deeply conflicted on how to deal with the threat even at the…

Oh!  I almost forgot one of the most critical reveals in this two parter.  The reveal that blood tests don't and never did work as a reliable method of seeing if someone is a changeling.  Sisko's father's explanation of how a changeling would fool one comes in the middle of a heated argument with Sisko, but you should…

What I liked about it is that generally at the end of a two parter the status quo is restored, despite everyone being shaken.  Here, the status quo is mostly restored, except for the fact that there are still an unknown number of changelings on Earth and god only knows where else, and if it's one thing this two parter…

At least Shakaar only shows up on camera something like two more times in the entire run of DS9

"In the Pale Moonlight" isn't just the darkest Star Trek gets, it's one of the darkest hours of TV I've ever seen in general.  Also one of the best, in my opinion.  Avery Brooks's narration totally kills it.

Keep in mind Sisko mentions that nothing like that even existed when he was at the Academy, meaning that Red Squad was a fairly recent invention as far as Academy curriculum goes.  Given how the cadets behaved in this episode and then later in the events of "Valiant", my guess is that the experiment was deemed a…

Gestapo and Ru'afo?  My hat is off to you, sir.

The Originals got her, yes.  Not in the way you were referring to, though.

We don't actually know that Bonnie is all he has at this point.  He had Connor too, and to the best of my knowledge the extent of that relationship hasn't been discovered by any of the main group yet.  He's been all over the world and clearly been working on this plan for a long time, who knows what or who else he…

Yeah, he genuinely cared about Alaric…but he killed him once too.

It's worth mentioning that Damon didn't "try" to kill Jeremy, he DID kill Jeremy.  The only reason it didn't take was he was wearing the ring, which Damon later admitted he did not even notice was on Jeremy's finger before snapping his neck.

Caroline's father was gay.  He's dead now though, and didn't have all that much screen time.