Never Say Never Again

"Our Man Bashir" Plot Summary:

Bashir's secret agent holoprogram goes berserk when the transporter patters of the station's command crew are inadvertently trapped within it. Bashir must contend with an O'Brien who wants to kill him, a Sisko who wants to destroy the world, and a Dax and Kira who want his body, all to save his crewmates.

Analysis:

Ha, ha, ha. I know I was supposed to think that this episode was adorable. Gosh why isn't it working? Maybe because this episode is anti-Trek in every meaningful way, much more so than the crossover episodes which it resembled uncannily at times. Or maybe because I can't stomach seeing women degraded on holodecks - they've already done it to Kira and Dax once this season and Voyager does it to Janeway on a regular basis.

Maybe I didn't want to know that, deep down in his fantasies, Bashir is still the same self-indulgent, womanizing boy I despised the first season and thought had grown up a bit. And maybe I just don't like Goldeneye cross-marketing.

At any rate, my amusement wore thin very quickly. I have town good things to say about this episode. 1) Avery Brooks was born to play a Bond villain, his world conquest speech is the equal of any mad-dictator performance I've ever seen. 2) Garak was born to play a Bond sidekick; between his line about working for the wrong government and his line about not wanting to know this much about Julian's fantasy life, he earned every laugh I emitted.

As for the rest, well...if they hadn't done "Little Green Men" this season and "Though the Looking Glass," "Fascination," "Prophet Motive," and "Facets" last season, it might have been fun to see the cast out of character. The problem is that they do out-of-character so often that I'm starting to get the feeling the producers don't know who the characters are anymore. The women of DS9 fared... well, embarrassing doesn't even begin to cover it. Visitor was quite convincing as a Russion spy bimbo who did nothing of any use but wear the proper jewelry and demonstrate why Sisko-Noah would want to propagate with her. I just plain can't stomach watching women used like that - the real Bond movies were less demeaning to women that this episode, and at least the Russian spy types a la The Spy Who Loved Me had some initiative.

I hated what they did to Dax - the scientist who just wants to be loved - even more. The heroine of "Moonraker," also a scientist with an itch, was far more intelligent and self-possessed. OK, I admit that I like his episode better than Timothy Dalton bond movies, but that's not saying much. Siddig's fine in Trek action sequences, but Connery or Moore he ain't.

Maybe they'll learn something: when five command-level officers get on a ship together, sabotage is a high risk and a Very Bad Thing. It would have served them right if Sisko, Kiro, Dax, O'Brien, and Worf had all died, and Eddigton wound up the senior Starfleet officer on the station! He seems more intelligent than O'Brien or Worf anyway, and I couldn't help but notice that Quark figured out something technical which even Rom hadn't realized! Ah, the Ferengi has untold depths. What a relief, since deep down Bashir's values are obviously similar to Quark's.