https://archive.org/details/CharacterInsightEp250
For no reason in particular, when I started this segment over five years ago, I decided to start with one of the commanding officers, and so Ben Sisko was originally covered in segment number 1. It's been a long road getting from there to here, but I'm happy to bring us back to Sisko and cover his best moments to finish up this series on DS9 main characters.
As with most commanding officers and leads, there are so many high points in the character development of Ben Sisko. One of the best episodes in Deep Space Nine is The Visitor, which focuses on the special bond Jake and Ben Sisko share as son and father. Ben is always providing life advice and guidance to Jake, who we see as an adult and a young man in this alternate timeline episode.
QUOTE (from The Visitor, S4):
Captain Sisko: I'm no writer; but if I were, it seems to me I'd wanna poke my head up every once in a while and take a look around, see what's going on. It's life, Jake. You can miss it if you don't open your eyes.
In the episode In The Pale Moonlight, Sisko hits a personal low point as he goes to any means necessary to bring the Romulans into the Dominion War to help the Federation. His personal logs recounting this turn of events is some of the darkest and most interesting moments we see from a captain or commanding officer in all of Star Trek.
QUOTE (from In The Pale Moonlight, S6):
Captain Sisko: So... I lied. I cheated. I bribed men to cover the crimes of other men. I am an accessory to murder. But the most damning thing of all... I think I can live with it. And if I had to do it all over again - I would. Garak was right about one thing: a guilty conscience is a small price to pay for the safety of the Alpha Quadrant. So I will learn to live with it... Because I can live with it...
In a unique episode called Far Beyond the Stars, Sisko deals with visions in which he is Benny Russell, an African-American science fiction writer in the 1950s dreaming up and writing the Deep Space Nine story as science fiction. The other main actors on the show also take roles in these visions as other human characters, which allowed for us to see more of their depth outside alien contexts. This take on metafiction allows for a commentary on the importance of science fiction in our current era.
QUOTE (from Far Beyond the Stars, S6):
Captain Sisko: I have begun to wonder. What if it wasn't a dream? What if this life we're leading - all of this, you and me, everything - what if all of this... is the illusion?
Joseph Sisko: That's a scary thought.
Captain Sisko: I know, I know... But maybe, just maybe, Benny isn't the dream. We are. Maybe we're nothing more than figments of his imagination. For all we know, at this very moment, somewhere, far beyond all those distant stars, Benny Russell... is dreaming of us.
Sisko broke the mold of what we previously knew as Starfleet commanders, and that was a great thing for the future of this franchise. He's certainly one of my favorites, so the Emissary of the Prophets is a fitting end to the Best Of series for DS9.
Ben Sisko is played by Avery Brooks, who has the most fantastic interview with Bill Shatner in the documentary The Captains. He has passion for music and theater, and he's been a professor in the theater department of Rutgers University for 40 years. He even taught courses while he played Sisko, sometimes sending lessons by video to his students with him still in his uniform from filming!
-----
Contact me with segment suggestions @BuckeyeFitzy on Twitter! Thanks!
No comments:
Post a Comment