Beware Strange Orbs

Jim’s Take on Episode 2.2: “The Circle” (Part 2)

You know that dream where you’re naked, but all your friends are there, and then the handsome religious leader of your people appears behind you, also naked, and starts putting the sexy-times moves on you? No? Only me and Major Kira? The point is, the Prophets of the Celestial Temple are pretty weird and it’s almost certainly advisable to stay as far away from their orbs as possible. Don’t mess with strange orbs, people!

Other than ill-advised orb tampering, “The Circle” is another excellent episode of DS9 that really highlights the strength of the characters and the writing as the second season progresses. There are so many great moments and great lines in this episode that I don’t even know where to start. It makes sense to just start at the beginning and work my way through, so here we go.

Sisko’s sparring with Minister Jaro is wonderful and really shows the alchemy that happens when you have two powerful actors together on screen. Watching Sisko clearly put Frank Langella’s creepy Minister Jaro in his place, in no uncertain terms, while never actually saying anything that could, on the surface, be construed as an insult that would put him in a diplomatically difficult position, is so much fun. I could just watch an episode where these two stayed in Sisko’s office and had a passive/aggressive face off for 45 minutes.

The next great scene is when almost the entire main cast comes to either wish the departing Kira well, or convince her to fight to stay on the station. It’s hilarious to watch Kira’s frustration build as people keep piling in to offer advice, support, or arguments, but it leads to some nice character moments. The tenderness beneath the surface that Odo and Kira feel for each other, the way Jadzia disses Julian’s “best” with, “That’s rather dull,” and the way the clearly overwhelmed Kira has to pause to admit to Vedek Bareil, and herself, that “these are my…these are my friends,” is very funny, but also very sweet. The closed off Kira we met at the beginning of the series could never have admitted such a thing.

Kira gets so many great scenes in this story! From her awkward attempts at meditating and being peaceful and relaxed, to her surreal orb experience, to her face-off with Minister Jaro, this is really her episode. When Jaro reveals that he IS the Circle and Kira shuts him down with, “If you want to change the government, Minister Jaro, you vote to change it. You don’t sneak up behind it with a dagger,” he is so left without an argument to stand on that he has to resort to some very Cardassian-style torture to get his way. He and Kira both learned a lot from the Cardassian occupation of Bajor, but it’s clear here that he learned all the wrong things!

Unfortunately, when political shenanigans are going down on Bajor, Vedek Winn can’t be far away. Her hateful, scheming, corrupt foulness makes my skin crawl the minute she appears on the screen. I literally cannot think of a villain in TV, film, or literature who I find more revolting and detestable than Winn. “Orthodox values”, throughout history,  always seem to equal repression and prejudice. The fact that her political goal is essentially “make Bajor great again” just makes me hate her that much more. Credit to Louise Fletcher, there has never been a villain in Star Trek that I would more like to see get a phaser to the face than Winn.

As this is an epic three-part tale, we’re left on quite a cliffhanger when the Bajorans demand the removal of all Federation personnel from the station and Sisko is ordered by Admiral Chakote to evacuate immediately. Prime Directive notwithstanding, Ben Sisko is not one to blindly follow any order, so he plans to stall just long enough for some of them to still be there when the Bajoran forces arrive.

Lots of great stuff happens and tension is building for part three. Despite all the insightful political messages and ideas expressed here, the real lesson for everyone is this: If you happen across any strangely glowing artifacts, unless you want to have some awkward conversations with your friends, relatives, or co-workers, maybe don’t stare into the orbs. Sound advice in any situation, really.

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