The writers of DS9 so got the nature of the Star Trek phenomenon, and pop culture, and how their characters would define themselves in terms of 20th C ideas and so on. And then they had all these excellent actors to act their hearts out with those ideas.

Yes, and then came Voyager. shudder

Good lord, I'm away from the computer one day and I wander back and there's a new thread and 134 posts and people discussing all kinds of cool stuff.

Just seconding what was said a dozen or two messages back, the "Militant Separatists" part of MRKS was at least partly tongue in cheek (I speak here as someone hosted on mrks.org). And I see a new Era of Good Feeling in dS fandom going on, certainly amongst a lot of the RayK-oriented writers and fans; in fact, I find most of the fandom an exceptionally pleasant place to be nowadays. (Although I will say that I wandered briefly onto Two Axes, the old hard-core Vecchio/Fraser site, and found the Kowalski-hatred still burning hot in some breasts, alas. Reminded of why the "MS" was partly not tongue in cheek.)

Um--so, clearly, dS is my main squeeze these days, but Highlander is my old flame whom I'm still happy to get frisky with at times, and it's been a huge pleasure watching others discovering it and getting initiated into the Methos-love. Farscape I've never watched, though a lot of my friends keep telling me I'd love it, and I'll have to catch up with it someday.

Smallville ... well, I watched the whole first season, largely so that I could make sense of what my buddies were writing about, but I just couldn't stay the course. I'd actually be very happy to watch The Lex and Lionel Show, but there's all those damn teenagers who unfairly get most of the screen time.

And (topic swerve) having never watched DS9, Saddig was totally unknown to me, but I thought he was amazing on MI-5. Bucketfuls o' charisma.

Yes, and then came Voyager. shudder

Wrod, expect that (having seen Enterprise) I can see Voyager's one redeeming feature: characters with more than one brain cell. V isn't good, but it's not as bad as E.

Wrod, expect that (having seen Enterprise) I can see Voyager's one redeeming feature: characters with more than one brain cell. V isn't good, but it's not as bad as E.

Oh be fair - the beagle has more than one brain cell. Granted, probably the smartest character on the show, but...

Well I loved Due South and loved Farscape, Smallville's okay, so I think I'll feel at home here.

Dead Like Me might well be shouldering a few other shows out the way if it continues to be this good though.

Oh be fair - the beagle has more than one brain cell. Granted, probably the smartest character on the show, but...

Okay. The beagle is okay. The rest, though? Dead loss. Or, at the least, isn't-it-amazing-they're-still-alive loss.

(Suddenly realised that we're back at the game I used to play with my brother: rank your Trek series. My order's always going to be: DS9, TOS, Voy, TNG, Ent.)

What I loved about "Our Man Bashir" was that it built on characterization that had been developing for years. In the first seasons he was all into the idea of spies, and had a bit of a crush on Garak, the possible Cardassian spy. To add to the fix, over the years he'd begun to run James Bond style programs in the Holosuite and look for other spies on the station. And even during the ep, it was Bashir's knowledge of the stereoptypes that got him out, like knowing that he could just charm the key out of the woman scientist, but also realizing the downside that only the woman who ended up with him could survive till the end.

Sort of sad he can't use his own real name, though. Got to be irritating.

Um. why can't he? I always wondered why he changed it.

I read that he found his real name, Siddiq El Fadil, was too hard to pronounce. And his uncle is Malcolm McDowell.

Yeah, I suspect it was one of those things where he was just tired of people fumbling his name, and decided to make up a new one. Like Martin Estevez becoming Martin Sheen. I always wondered if stars who change their names sign their checks that way, or if they keep their legal names the same. (I suppose Sheen kept his legally the same, if most of his kids use it.) (I suppose if you didn't, family reunions would be tense and confusing.)

I remember back when he changed his name, I was rather surprised to see Alexander Siddig instead of Siddig El Fadil. I do remember that it was supposed to be hard to pronounce and hard for people to remember. I'm not sure about the hard to pronounce part because I never actually heard his name officially said out loud so I may have been butchering it myself.

Alexander wasn't totally pulled out of a hat, I can't remember where it came from (where are the hardcore Star Trek fans when you need them!) I want to say it was his dog's name but that just sounds to weird.

He was married to Nana Visitor but they're divorced now and they have a son, I don't remember their son's name but it's something unusual. I believe they named him for a musician they both liked.