In a meeting between the two, Sisko speaks to the TNG captain in a tone he’s likely never heard from a non-superior officer before, and Sisko’s dislike of the man ?- ?and the Deep Space 9 station itself? -? is made apparent. In the premiere, we learn Picard (while under control of the alien species The Borg) has killed Sisko’s wife. While I suspect the show's direct tone is one of the reasons DS9 isn’t as popular as its predecessors? -? along with the heavy emphasis on backroom politics instead of “seeking out bold new worlds”? -? if you didn’t like TNG chances are you’re going to love a show that goes out of its way in the pilot to distinguish Sisko from Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Even nearly 300 years in the future, whether Star Trek fans were ready for it or not, DS9 brought the topic of race closer to home. However, Brooks -? a Shakespearean-trained actor, graduate of Oberlin College, and the first Black student to earn an MFA in acting and directing from Rutgers University, where he was also a professor ?-? brought much of himself to the role, and that included an emphasis in the importance of the African-American and Black American experiences. This model may have continued through DS9 had they hired any other actor to portray Captain Sisko. The Star Trek franchise has always featured Black actors and actresses, well-developed Black characters, and even featured the first televised interracial kiss in the TOS episode "Plato’s Stepchildren." On Trek, racism is often dismissed on Earth as being as outdated as using money. Instead, racial politics between alien species are highlighted, rather than humans. Meanwhile, I can’t wait to show it to my kids.ĭS9 has your aliens and spaceships, and characters do occasionally say things like “set phasers to stun.” But all of that is more often than not outweighed through the gravitas brought to the show by the intricately laid political, wartime thriller plot, its critisisms of 20th century history and race relations in America, and its lead actor, Avery Brooks, who stars as Captain Benjamin Lafayette Sisko ?-? the first and only African-American captain to lead a televised Star Trek franchise. I’ve always found (non-scientifically?-?I just spend a lot of time at cons) that people either love it or loathe it. Deep Space Nine causes a strange division in the world of Trekkies. ![]() ![]() ![]() That’s normally how I find myself trying to describe the show to the uninitiated, as I firmly believe that it’s the Trek series you have to use when trying to get people into Trek canon - especially Black nerds, before Discovery's rise.
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