


Season 5
Season 5 of Deep Space Nine begins the Dominion War arc that will dominate the rest of the show. The Federation and its allies face a new enemy in the form of the Cardassian-Dominion alliance, which threatens to conquer the Alpha Quadrant.

Apocalypse Rising
Stardate: Unknown. With the war between Klingons and Federation intensifying, Sisko must make a plan to expose Gowron as a changeling. Odo is still having trouble with becoming a solid.

The Ship
Stardate: 50049.3. The crew find a crashed Jem’Hadar ship and work to repair it and capture it for the Federation, but are confronted by a Dominion force determined to recover the ship’s cargo.

Looking for par'Mach in All the Wrong Places
Stardate: Unknown. While Worf helps Quark to pursue his former wife Grilka, O'Brien and Kira grow uncomfortably close to each other.

Nor the Battle to the Strong
Stardate: Unknown. Jake, reporting from the front lines, sees what war truly is.

The Assignment
Stardate: Unknown. An alien entity has possessed Keiko's body and is holding it hostage until O'Brien completes an assignment for it.

Trials and Tribble-ations
Stardate: 4523.7. In this celebration of the 30th anniversary of The Original Series, the disgraced Klingon spy Darvin travels back in time to undo his century-old defeat by James Kirk. The DS9 crew must track him down and stop him, while blending in with the crew of the original Enterprise NCC-1701.

Let He Who Is Without Sin...
Stardate: Unknown. While vacationing on Risa, Worf and Dax meet a group of fundamentalist protesters who claim that the Federation has gone soft.

Things Past
Stardate: Unknown. Sisko, Dax, Odo and Garak find themselves in the past when the Cardassians controlled the station, and a crime that Odo investigated may be the key.

The Ascent
Stardate: Unknown. When Odo and Quark crash land, they must put aside their differences to climb a mountain to signal for help. Jake and Nog try to be roommates, but their different styles clash.

Rapture
Stardate: Unknown. After a brain injury, Sisko begins experiencing powerful visions through time. He dives fully into the role of the Emissary, while becoming obsessed with finding a legendary Bajoran ruin.

The Darkness and the Light
Stardate: 50416.2. A mysterious assassin begins wiping out all the members of Kira's old resistance cell.

The Begotten
Stardate: Unknown. The discovery of an infant Changeling gives Odo a chance to put right the trauma of his own upbringing, while his “father” Dr. Mora insists on a more clinical approach.

For the Uniform
Stardate: 50485.2. When the traitorous Eddington returns, Sisko will go to any lengths to capture him.

In Purgatory's Shadow (1)
Stardate: Unknown. A coded message from the Gamma Quadrant leads Garak to believe his mentor, Enabran Tain, is still alive. He and Worf seek him out, only to discover something much worse: a Dominion invasion fleet poised to attack the Alpha Quadrant.

By Inferno's Light (2)
Stardate: 50564.2. The station readies for a Dominion attack. Worf and Garak meet some unexpected friends in a Dominion Prison camp.

Doctor Bashir, I Presume?
Stardate: Unknown. Dr. Bashir is selected to be the model for the next-generation of Emergency Medical Hologram (EMH). But he balks when his parents are invited to the station to be interviewed by the EMH programmer, Dr. Zimmerman. There is a dark secret in his family that he's afraid that his parents will reveal.

A Simple Investigation
Odo helps a woman hiding on the station from organized criminals, but quickly develops a personal interest in the case.

Business As Usual
Stardate: Unknown. Quark must wrestle with his conscience when he becomes involved with arms merchants.

Ties of Blood and Water
Stardate: 50712.2. When a Cardassian official that thinks of Kira as his daughter is dying, he agrees to reveal all he knows to her. But the experience dredges up Kira's memories of her own father's death.

Ferengi Love Songs
Stardate: Unknown. Quark doesn't know whether to be panicked or overjoyed when he learns that his mother is the new lover of the Grand Nagus.

Soldiers of the Empire
Stardate: Unknown. Dax and Worf accompany Martok on his first command since being held by the Dominion. But the ship they are given hasn't seen victory in months and the crew is near mutinous.

Children of Time
Stardate: 50814.2. The DS9 crew discovers a colony that, due to a time travel accident, turns out to be inhabited by the crew's own descendants.

Blaze of Glory
Stardate: Unknown. Sisko learns that the Maquis are planning a devastating attack on Cardassia, and must rely on the traitor Eddington to help him prevent it.

Empok Nor
Stardate: Unknown. While salvaging components from DS9's sister station, the crew run afoul of a "surprise" left behind by the Cardassians.

In the Cards
Stardate: 50929.4. Jake has his heart set on a vintage Willie Mays baseball card as a present to cheer up his father, whose spirits are flagging from the ongoing conflict.

Call to Arms
Stardate: 50975.2. Sisko decides to mine the wormhole to prevent further Dominion ships crossing into the Alpha Quadrant. This provokes an attack by the Dominion and the Cardassians, and a desperate last stand on Deep Space Nine.
Avis de la communauté (2)
It's slightly worse than previous season. Overall, it's another strong season of DS9 as the exciting overarching story progresses. Things become more tense in the sector and some thrilling action episodes underline this fact. This season's *Trials and Tribble-ations* is one of the greatest, funniest, most entertaining episodes of the franchise and certainly a paradigm of how fan service is supposed to be. This season ends with one of the most exciting cliffhangers of the franchise. Not every episode is great though. The number of mediocre episodes is larger than in the previous season. *Let he who is without Sin* is shockingly bad. But that's not the only episode I'd call worse than "mediocre". Thus, quality is inconsistent. Often a mediocre episode follows a great episode. This season also lacks an intellectual showcase episode with a serious philosophical question, ethical dilemma, political message, a mind-blowing physics concept or very dark undertones. The premise of *Children of Time* was promising but ultimately fell flat. Even the overall mediocre episode *For the Uniform* showcased ethics that I'm very uneasy with but which the show never dared to discuss. In this case, the show's usual "action have consequences" rule was blatantly ignored. And both stories that showed the grim realities of battle (*The Ship* and especially *Nor the Battle to the Strong*) ultimately failed (for different reasons) to be anything more than solid episodes. This season also features the end of two mini overarching storylines: the Marquis story and the "Odo, the Solid", story. Both plot lines aren't really good. Too early, even before Odo experienced the pleasure of a solid state existence (what a joy would that have been to watch), Odo returned to his gelatinous state. The Marquis storyline had a lot of potential but was never a favorite of mine. Ultimately, it was ill prepared and executed on a tight budget. We hardly knew Eddington. We never saw the colonies. We never saw their bloody fight. How are we supposed to bond with them and be emotionally invested (negatively or positively) in those rebels / freedom fighters as much as Sisko (inexplicably) seems to be? Ultimately they are a nuisance. Their actions never had wider geopolitical implications for the conflict between the superpowers in the sectors that eventually escalates to open warfare in the season's finale. * :clown:My guilty pleasures: *Looking for par'Mach in All the Wrong Places* * 👍Best episode: *Trials and Tribble-ations* * 👎 Worst episode: *Let he who is without Sin ...* * ⏩ Guide on how to speed watch the main story: *Apocalypse rising* → *The Begotten* → *For the Uniform* → *Purgatory's Shadow* → *By Inferno's Light* → *Children of time* → [*In the Cards*] → *Call to Arms* * :black_heart: Benjamin, the Civil Rights leader watchlist: (Sadly there's no such episode.)
In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s fifth season the long awaited war with the Dominion begins. After Sisko and his crew expose a plot against the Klingon Empire peace talks begin, but the Dominion uses the opportunity to insert themselves into the conflict between the Klingon’s, Cardassians, and Federation. Additionally, Odo adjusts to living as a solid, Quark finds a way to get his Ferengi commerce license back, Kiera has the O’Bien's baby, and Worf and Dax start dating. And, as part of the Star Trek 30th Anniversary celebration, the show does a terrific homage to the original series with the time-travel episode “Trials and Tribble-ations.” Jeffery Combs becomes a recurring guest star as the fan favorite character Weyoun, and Aron Eisenberg is back as Cadet Nog doing his field training. The writers do a good job at balancing the ongoing story arcs with standalone episodes, and at giving each of the main cast subplots and character development. Also, the space battles are surprising good (for a television budget) and exciting. The most ambitious season of the series so far, Season 5 of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is full of thrills.