Past Tense, pt I & II

episode 56 production #457 teleplay - Robert Hewitt Wolfe story - Ira Steven Behr & Robert Hewitt Wolfe directed by Reza Badiyi original air date: 1995.01.02

episode 57 production #458 teleplay - Ira Steven Behr & Rene Echevarria story - Ira Steven Behr & Robert Hewitt Wolfe directed by Jonathan Frakes original air date: 1995.01.09

Every Star Trek series has one. An episode where our heroes are trapped in the past, trying to correct some accident that has changed the future (TOS's City on the Edge of Forever; TNG's Time's Arrow; VOY's Future's End). And the two-part Past Tense story is DS9's contribution to that legacy.

Without a doubt the season's finest effort, and one of the best DS9 stories of the entire seven year run, Past Tense does what Star Trek does best: social commentary. Here, the treatment of second class citizens and the escalating plight of the middle class take center stage. And the story contributes another piece of the Roddenberry Future puzzle, how our earth became the utopia of the 23rd and 24th centuries.


Points of Interest:

Sisko mentions that his sister lives in Portland.

This episode features the first mention of Starfleet's Temporal Displacement, which would later provide the basis for fourth season's Trials and Tribble-ations.

We learn another tidbit about legendary baseball star Buck Bokai (If Wishes Were Horses), that his rookie year with the London Kings was in 2015.

Clint Howard makes his second Star Trek appearance in this episode. The first was as Balok in TOS's The Corbomite Maneuver.


The One Hundred Eleventh Rule of Acquisition: Treat people in your debt like family - exploit them.
The Two Hundred Seventeenth Rule of Acquisition: You can't free a fish from water.

Quote of the episode: "Are humans really any different than Cardassians or Romulans? If push comes to shove, if something disastrous happens to the Federation, if we are frightened enough or desperate enough how would we react? Would we stay true to our ideals or would we just stay here right back where we started?" - Bashir