Speaking as a Niner, the thing which frustrates me about Voyager is that what i like about DS9 – the character-based storytelling – always threatens to break out in the show… then the writers hit the reset button; & everything of consequence literally disappears. It isn’t that its a bad show, its just smegging frustrating. Something like this effects Niners when they try & review early DS9 shows – you know what the show became; & watching what it was can be odd

Personally, i think Whispers is a rare example of a really good DS9 episode which could have been (with different characters), a really good episode in any of the other shows. It doesn’t have the distinctive storytelling approaches of classic DS9 but doesn’t feel like a strange chimera, either

Odo was gruff, too, from beginning to end, but he went from a pure loner to someone who put so much importance on friendship and family that he turned back and rejoined his people at the end of the series. Kira went from someone who was angry and resentful to become a softer, more controlled person by the end. You couldn’t imagine the Kira from Season One running the station, and yet there she was at the end of the series. It’s that type of development that I appreciated about DS9. I’m not saying the other series were underwritten, but rather that the “vision” they had for DS9 had a significant influence on how much the characters were perceived to have developed.

And you know what? I agree with many of your points. I agree that TOS was often a victim of its time, though the characters DID change, somewhat, especially in the movies. (That Picard could evince an Ahab complex gave us unexpected insight into the emotional depths of the character.) I agree with how you felt about Quark, Jadzia, O’Brien, and the unmentioned
Ezri. Some characters never grew on me, either. Sadly, in any series,
there just isn’t enough time. After all, imagine how many billions of
lifelong stories exist out there on our planet, and what a miniscule
glimpse we get into any of them.

Also, if you’re going to ramble this seems like as good a place as any to
do it. I like Trek Today, but sometimes it feels a little like a ghost
town in the comments section.

BTW, you mentioned Torres as being an underdeveloped character in your first post, and then as a developed character in your last one.

In regards to developing characters, I think we can excuse TOS…they just really didn’t develop characters very much back in the day…you pretty know what the character is like in the first episode, and mostly they stayed the same.

TNG I will also excuse to a degree…most shows on in that day were still episodic. I do think Picard, Data, Riker, Troi, and Worf were the most developed of the show. Geordi was somewhat developed, and Dr. Crusher just didn’t much airtime.

Voyager was very good, IMO, at developing MOST of its characters. The only character that I think didn’t get much attention was Kim, as you mentioned. I thought they did a good job with everyone else, even Kes, even though I think they couldn’t really develop her anymore…part of the reason she was written out.

DS9 certainly developed the majority of their characters, except Quark and O’Brien. Quark is pretty much exactly the same at the beginning as he is in the end…but I think that’s actually a good thing, because it fits. His relationship with Odo changed, but that’s about it. O’Brien was developed some, but they could have done more.

And that brings me to part of my beef with the show in general. I think it’s amazing that they were able to develop so many minor characters…I mean, it really is amazing. However, I think they did so at the expense of the some of the other characters, like Quark and O’Brien, or even Jake. I think that adding an iconic character like Worf hindered that to an extent (granted, I generally liked what they did with Worf)

I guess it doesn’t help that I’m not overly fond of Jadzia. She’s probably my least favorite character of the show. I liked her, just didn’t love her. I always felt like the writers weren’t always sure what to do with her. I really think they didn’t get her right until they put her with Worf. They fit so well together, and I feel like before they got together, I was never sure who she was (as she didn’t really know either). But when she got together with Worf, I felt like I knew exactly who she was.

Some might say that was on purpose, but I would disagree. i’d say it’s coincidence.

Anyway, i’ve rambled too much.

I think it’s BECAUSE DS9 embraced the multi-episode arcs that they were able to credibly change the characters. There is a need for consistency in the serialized approach followed by TOS and TNG especially that means that the writers simply can’t rely upon viewers to have seen prior events to understand why Character X in one episode is so different from the same character in a later episode. You might prefer it, but I find it limiting.
I look at other series I like just as much as DS9, including Bab5 and BSG (well, until the final episode), and you appreciate the characters much more at the end because you’ve seen them change, substantially, as characters. Could Adama, Sheridan, Rosyln, or any of the others have been as complex had each episode been treated as a separate story? In my
opinion, the answer is a definite ‘no’.

I think episodic television remains THE predominant story format simply
because of syndication. But it makes folks like me more appreciative of
the series that reward an audience for following a story from episode one
until the final one. In this day and age of on-demand, it seems to me that
episodic television is a dinosaur.

As far as this episode, I remember being fooled nearly til the end. It’s just downright creepy the way the crewmembers were acting! I think it’s one of the better earlier season eps.

As far as being right after Armageddon Game (as the reviewer pointed out), I think that’s totally irrelevant. Remember, DS9 hadn’t really gone full-force one-story-arc-all-the-time yet, so it’s fine with me. Even when they did that later on, some of the best episodes were the ones that were NOT part of the main story arc (who mourns for morn, it’s only a paper moon, take me out to the holosuite, etc.)

While I liked the story arc thing (which has kind of taken over most shows today), I do miss the days when one could miss an episode, catch the next one, and not miss a beat.

In my defense, my long trail of credit card receipts for every Trek VHS, DVD, and Blu-ray tells the sad tale of my Trek obsession.