30th Anniversary DS9 Discussion Marathon

[Nate the Great]

The Fiver

Medical Log: I wonder if the fact that I get to make a log entry will impress today's blonde guest star....

This joke is half baked. You shouldn't confuse medical logs with station logs, and Melora knows how any official log works.

Jadzia: So you've gone from stalking me to the alien chick of the week?
Bashir: Not at all. I just understand that "alien chick from a low-grav environment" in any science fiction TV show inevitably equals "low-grav make-out scene."

Like that's something to be excited about. The extra stagehands and hardware would suck the romance out of the scene in seconds.

Melora: I absolutely refuse to be babysat. I'm going alone!
Bashir: And if you get eaten by a savage lifeform or fried by an exploding console?
Melora: Hello? Does this shirt look red to you or are you just color-blind?

This gag doesn't work outside of TOS.

Bashir: Ah, the joys of Klingon dining.
Melora: Eeeew, this isn't live worms...it's leola root soup. Fix it at once, p'taK!
Klingon Chef: Oh my God...leola root soup? I have dishonored my restaurant!

You sure did! Incidentally the Chef is never given a name in canon, but several books gave him the name Kaga, after one of the Iron Chefs. Legends of the Ferengi gives him the name Kalaw, but I'd put that on a lower tier of canon than the actual novels.

Melora: You and Julian aren't having some sort of fling, are you?
Jadzia: Me and Julian? Hahahaha...are you kidding? Not even if I was killed by Dukat while he was possessed by a pah-wraith, and then got a new, more naive host who wasn't able to control herself!
Melora: ...and we all know the odds of that happening are, like, nonexistent.

This doesn't work because Ezri said outright that if Worf had never come Jadzia would've been with Julian eventually.

Quark: Pleeeeease, Odo, have mercy on poor little me!
Odo: Ha. I laugh at you, miserable Ferengi scum. Hahaha. But I'll save your butt anyway.
Quark: Why? You hate me.
Odo: Yeah, but have you ever seen "Caretaker, Part Two"?

Well, that's an interesting coincidence.

Jadzia: You know, this reminds me of "The Little Mermaid." Of course, she ended up committing suicide at the end.

I wouldn't call it "suicide" exactly, but that's another screed.

Melora: Not so fast! Since I'm not dead, I'm going to disable the gravity and use Mad Matrix Skillz!

Ha ha. "Mad Matrix Skillz"... I don't think the budget would allow that on the shows airing NOW.

Memory Alpha

* Scriptwriter Evan Somers was wheelchairbound himself and wanted to do the episode not just because of the obvious reason but also because he wanted to do a better job talking about the issues than "Ethics" did. I would argue that it was two completely different scenarios, but that's another screed...
* They also wanted to write a recurring girlfriend for Bashir, but I think the idea to do it with Melora was ludicrous. The budget would simply not allow for wirework in more than one episode.
* The wheelchair from "Too Short a Season" was still in storage, but it was too big for the DS9 sets.

Nitpicker's Guide

* Phil rants for a bit about how Yridians are supposed to eat and drink with that extra flap.
* Wouldn't all Starfleet officers be trained to operate in zero gravity if they had to? So why is Bashir so clumsy?
* When Dax and Melora are in the Gamma Quadrant we never see the warp effect from the inside or outside. Are they piddling around the mouth of the wormhole at impulse?
* Bashir's solution to Melora's inability to operate in normal gravity is to strengthen the signals going from her brain to her limbs? Isn't the real problem her musculature that isn't strong enough to carry and move her body in standard gravity? This seems more like a problem that you'd need specialized nanites to solve, right?
* He brings up using a multilegged machine instead of a wheelchair, but admits that the TV budget wouldn't allow it. I'll say, can you imagine the stop motion costs! Plus you couldn't even have Melora near anyone else or talk because the special effects at the time wouldn't allow it.
* Phil thinks that the station will be upgraded for antigrav because in two episodes an antigrav stretcher will be used. I say that the Cardassians would've had their own antigrav stretchers that the DS9 people could obtain, plus Melora's antigravs require much more cross-system coordination than a stretcher.
* How does Kot have a phaser, I thought Odo had sensors to detect such things?
* What about the security force fields, where are they this week?
* The creators made no attempt to make the gagh look like anything other than gummy worms, plus gagh is supposed to be served alive.