Ipad Broken So You Already Know I'm Drawing Garak Traditionally And Taking A Picture Of It In The Dark

(Edited to add headshots because tumblr hates detail) I've etched away at this is a lovely few weeks, so click for full res and all the little details, okay? It's my love letter to the journey I've found myself on

This is long-ish, so its under the cut (but worth reading...)

I had been thinking a lot recently about that double feature episode, you know the one? I half remembered it then, when they chased a bunch of alien spies so fast through the solar system they all got thrown back in time. Half the crew went on a little undercover adventure in Toronto in 2024. It was great because they got completely cut off from the Enterprise, so half of them, well mostly Uhura and Spock if I recall correctly, spent their time collecting as many radios as possible and worked on building their own communications. Uhura and Spock were basically taking turns constantly tweaking radios by the window with wires everywhere. Oh yeah, their base of operations was the whole top floor of a worn out old building looking over a big square. They ended up in the really arty/queer part of town full of art galleries and thrift stores.....??

Chapel and Chekov were sent out to those shops to find disguises for everyone. I loved the joke that Chekov was puzzled and slightly alarmed that Christine just knew everyone's clothes sizes and measurements with no explanation. Later on, they ended up getting separated from the rest of the group and getting held up by B story shenanigans, mostly getting lost and running into culture shocks. It was fun to see them having their own adventures and made for a pretty interesting combo. Spock and Uhura spent most of their time with the tech, accidentally listening to the times most popular music while changing frequencies. Jim and Sulu paired off to search for clues, and getting supplies and spent a lot of time talking to the locals setting up for a Pride parade. McCoy, feeling paranoid and irritable that he had practically no equipment, wandered around with Dr Alfred Nahdi, the Botanist, who kept picking random weeds and talking about how extraordinary the little dandelions were. Oh and together they stole a whole medical bag out of an ambulance?? It was pretty funny.  Anyway, the main issue was they couldn’t risk leaving the area because all these alien spies had assimilated into the population and they had to track them all down and bring them back with them so as not to disrupt the timeline or something. They had to track down the aliens while making sure the aliens didn't pick up on who they were or that they were also out of place. They ended up being there for around two whole ass months, I think. The spies were spread out all over and there were about 30 of them, but it ended up being the Botanist, Alfred (Alfie) Nahdi who found the enemy base of operations by complete accident. Alfred, who had spent most of the time studying all the common flowers and weeds that were so ordinary at that time but were extinct in their time, figured out where the aliens' base of operations was because the big plant shop at the end of the square had a few succulents that could not have existed in 2024. It was a big "woah" moment. And there was this whole thing where he had to act like he hadn’t just figured it out because the florist, who was almost certainly a spy, was watching him and McCoy. But soon after, it all went to hell anyway when a fight broke out and Sulu was straight up shot with the aliens' weapon that had bullets made from alien metal. So then Bones had to perform old school surgery on him in their HQ, with only 2024 equipment. Jim, Spock, and Uhura were out fighting and ran into Chapel and Chekov and were able to finish them off, but it got really crazy because there was a Pride parade in the square at the same time so they had to make sure no one noticed them. While Bones was pulling bullets out of Sulu, with the botanist assisting him until Chapel (who had been sent by Jim) appeared and took over. McCoy said something like, “Christine, I’ve never been so glad to see you in my life,” and they sewed him up all old school. And it worked out! But Bones was a mess because he had to do messy surgery with none of his kit, and so much pressure, and more blood than he was used to... Chapel stayed with Sulu, and Bones and Nahdi went to sit on the fire escape stairwell and had a sweet scene of Bones just full of adrenaline, his hands couldn't stop shaking. They sat hand in hand for a while listening to all the people on the streets below. Then Spock, Jim, Uhura, and Chekov appeared at the stairwell and they all had a happy, albeit exhausted reunion. After a day of everyone recovering from all the excitement, Uhura and Spock used some extra tech they got from the aliens and finally made contact with poor Scotty who was up on the Enterprise losing the will to live. Anyway, their outfits were iconic tbh.

I invented this whole thing to draw Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy in a sweater. I lost control of the situation. I spent a lovely two weeks etching away at this with the support of my lovely ST server, I love you guys. This ones for you.

jake sisko jumpsuit haters are weak and will not survive the winter. who else on the station is combining patterns and colors like that? who has the effortlessness, the ease? aura off the charts BECAUSE of the insane outfits, not in spite of them.

People are way too mean to Jake Sisko about his outfits :(( his fuckass outfits are one of the best parts of the whole show. Seeing non starfleet federation citizens. Seeing futuristic fashion. Having fun with colours and patterns. Seeing his fashion sense change from a child to an adult. He has more fashion sense than any of the muted militarised "something you could find in abercrombie and fitch" ass outfits of modern trek shows. Where is your zest for life, where is your idealism? Only Quark has more drip.

LMAOOOOO IM LISTING TO THE GARAK BOOK RIGHT NOW AND IT'S JUST HIM TRAMA DUMPING TO BASHIR FOR 20 HOURS STRAIGHT... I can't stop picturing Bashir listening to all of Garaks messages like:

fantastic.!

sorry but bashir was really excited by the prospect of fucking his great-grandmother and becoming his own ancestor. he was all fired up defending his theory

So did anyone on DS9 production give a reason for putting mirror!Garak on a leash when he was a prisoner or was mirror!Worf just a freak

this is so great to know and so funny because as I have been making my way through the treks, I pretty much always googled a ‘best/worst episodes of season x’ and skimmed them all just for titles. not so I could actually skip anything but so I had a heads up and neither accidentally used a real fuckin clunker as a nice relaxing break after a tough day nor like tried to do major crafting during one of the best episodes of tv of all time yanno. now I can just look at this one !!

Ok heart eyes emoji for new ds9 fans forever -- but now you're in the lurch and wanting more!! There were great comments about Stitch in Time and other post-canon works from cast members but I'd also highly recommend the post-canon DS9 novels in general beyond Stitch in Time. Memory Beta has very clear listings and some titles are available on Internet Archive.

For stuff beyond DS9, there's oodles of Star Treks (which I love) but if you want a space station I'd recommend trying Babylon 5 (you can skip to season 2). It's a different world -- more capitalistic, a lil more nasty -- and there was controversy over similarities between B5 and DS9, but the tones and settings feel radically different to me.

noted about the post-canon novels!! stitch in time was ABSOLUTELY already on my library holds waitlist, but that's great to know I can get some of them on internet archive...

and I've been eyeing babylon 5, I know Jessie Gender's been doing some watchthroughs of it. tbh tng was my home trek from years ago, and I think now that I've wrapped ds9 i wanna tackle voyager while I'm still in the groove so I can say I've done the tng/ds9/voy trilogy!!! plus I want to Lower Decks but I know since it's so predicated on references, there'll be even more to love if I do voy first!!

and hi ty for inbox sliding c:

Quodo 4 Lyfe

caveat: all trek is beautiful, this is in no way a better/worse thing

i joke that one of the biggest problems I have with tng characterization is the 'we need to give a character the Bad Opinion' phenomena.

an episode wants to explore a moral quandry through plot, but for that to work, they usually need to Give A Character The Bad Opinion– it's often Geordi, or Riker, or Worf who take a stance that's less generous, more defensive, or just plain wrong-through-misunderstanding. now this does give the episode narrative structure, where the character with the Better Opinion and the Bad Opinion can have interpersonal conflict, and then this can resolve in a nuanced understanding. I get it. it's basic plot construction. but this also gives these Bad Opinion prone characters some wildly uneven characterization over the show's run.

I've been rewatching some ds9 episodes (I only just finished my first watchthrough last month) and I've realized that ds9 avoids this issue by simply having so many more characters who are not good people.

It's weird when they write Geordi being unnecessarily stubborn and easily-annoyed towards Scotty, or Riker being a shouty hard-ass to Barkley– because both of these characters are fundamentally good people who we need to root for. It's weird to see them being complete dickbags above and beyond what seems congruous to their characterization, when the whole point of the show is that the crew of the Enterprise is flawed but fundamentally equipped to carry out their mission.

By contrast, it makes perfect sense that Garak would be the one to try and exterminate the Founders instead of finding an ethical peace. It makes perfect sense for Quark to position himself on the side of whatever benefits his business most, even if it's horrific. None of this feels incongruous with who they are throughout the rest of the show– because their function as characters simply doesn't depend on you rooting for them the way you want to root for tng characters.

just thinking a lot of thoughts about this horrible satellite zoo of freaks and bad people who still deserve community. thinking a lot about how you don't have to be good to have a home.

on my (scarse) free time I’ve been watching a lot of DS9 and of course he is my favorite