‘BLAZE OF GLORY’ (DS9)
Please feel free to comment on my review.
This episode features another return appearance of Kenneth Marshall as Michael Eddington. It’s also his final appearance in the ‘DS9’ series and this episode concludes the rivalry between him and Sisko.
In the episode, Sisko is informed by J. G. Hertzler as General Martok about an intercepted message being received. A few Maquis members have survived. Most have been wiped out by the Dominion.
These few Maquis survivors say in the message they’ve launched a massive retaliatory missile strike against Cardassia, which is now a member of the Dominion. The missiles could be cloaked on launch.
Unless the missiles are stopped, Sisko fears the Dominion will respond pretty violently, enveloping the entire quadrant in an all-out war. Sisko goes to Michael Eddington, who’s now locked in a prison.
Interestingly, the establishing shot of the starbase where Eddington is being kept prisoner is re-used stock footage of Regula I from ‘Star Trek II’. I thought I’d seen that space station somewhere before.
Sisko tries to get Eddington to tell him how to stop the missiles, but Eddington refuses. Soon, Sisko takes Eddington to the Badlands in order to compel him to help, especially in dangerous territory. 😐
This is where Sisko and Eddington’s bitterness towards each other comes to the fore. It had been done in ‘For the Uniform’, but it’s very interesting to see it continue and how raw their bitterness is.
Eddington continues to be uncooperative, even becoming a food critic when Sisko gives him a meal from the replicator. Gosh, I wish I could do more cooking. I might do that after writing this review. 😀
Sisko soon tricks Eddington into taking over the runabout’s controls in order to evade two pursuing Jem’Hadar warships in the Badlands. Don’t worry. A proper Jem’Hadar fight will come later on here.
Eddington finally agrees to help Sisko find the launch site and deactivate the missiles, but vows to kill him afterwards. It’s amazing how confident Sisko is once Eddington makes the idle threat to him.
Soon, Sisko and Eddington arrive on a tiny, fog-bound planet called Athos IV on the other side of the Badlands. This is where the launch site is hidden. Upon arrival, the place is crawling with Jem’Hadar.
I like how Sisko and Eddington get to fight it out with the Jem’Hadar soldiers already there. When ‘DS9’ does action-filled episodes with Jem’Hadar done right, it does it right and it’s really compelling.
Eddington is shocked and stunned about many of the Maquis dead, killed by Jem’Hadar. He hoped the Maquis were on the verge of declaring their colonies ‘independent’ from Starfleet and Cardassia.
Sisko gets Eddington to snap out of it, even though he does admit that Starfleet let the Maquis down. I wonder if things would’ve been different if Starfleet did assist the Maquis against Cardassia.
Very soon, Sisko and Eddington fight their way to the command centre against the Jem’Hadar soldiers where they find, to Sisko’s surprise…a dozen Maquis prisoners. There are no missiles either!
One of the prisoners is Gretchen German as Rebecca Sullivan, Eddington’s wife, who sent the message to him in the first place. Eddington reveals to Sisko that there were no missiles launched. 😮
Eddington needed Sisko’s help in order to evacuate the Maquis survivors from Athos IV. Sisko is furious about being lied to, but is thankful that an all-out war with the Dominion isn’t imminent here.
Sisko and Eddington fight off the Jem’Hadar whilst they direct the Maquis prisoners towards the runabout. Eddington ends up getting shot whilst Sisko and the others head back to DS9 without him.
Eddington stayed behind to fend off the Jem’Hadar soldiers, getting killed in the process. Sisko and Jadzia Dax lament on how Eddington ended up being a romantic hero in the end for this certain tale.
I liked the side plot where Aron Eisenberg as Nog tries to earn the respect of the Klingon soldiers on DS9, including Martok, by learning to stand up to them. He even has a nice scene with Major Kira. 😀
‘Blaze of Glory’ is a fitting conclusion to the story of Eddington’s character journey. I like how Eddington and Sisko sort-of resolved their differences and Eddington got to die fighting like a hero. 🙂
‘Blaze of Glory’ (DS9) rating – 8/10
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