The coup is underway on Bajor, and **Minister Jaro’s** face is finally on it. Dom Bettinelli, Jimmy Akin, and Fr. Jason Tyler break down Part 2 of Deep Space Nine’s season-opening trilogy — the episode that turns the political intrigue of “The Homecoming” into something darker.
The panel opens with what might be the episode’s best scene: the crew’s chaotic goodbye to **Major Kira** in her quarters, shot in one continuous take modeled on the Marx Brothers. It’s loose, comedic, overlapping — and it quietly reveals how much **Odo** and Kira mean to each other, even if neither will say it.
At **Vedek Bareil’s** monastery, Kira gets the orb experience she’s dreamed of all her life. The vision is strange — ministers, a naked encounter with Bareil, a Kai’s robe on Dax that becomes **Vedek Winn’s** face. The panel works through what it might mean, landing on a possible symbolic reading: Bareil as a stand-in for Jaro, Kira for Winn — both pairs a political-religious alliance reaching for power.
**Louise Fletcher’s** Vedek Winn gets her showcase scene here, ambushing Kira and Bareil on a monastery bridge with suffocating passive-aggression. “Feel free to stay as many days as you like. A week, if necessary.” The panel agrees: almost no actor could play that role this well.
Meanwhile, Odo recruits Quark — by force. “You’re either my deputy or my prisoner.” Quark, as always, chooses survival. He tracks the Circle’s weapons supply to the **Kressari**, who turn out to be Cardassian middlemen. The Circle thinks it’s fighting for Bajoran independence; it’s being manipulated into handing the planet back to the people who enslaved it.
The panel also flags structural problems: **Li Nalas** as Kira’s replacement is undercut the moment Sisko promises her he’s getting her back. The show signals the outcome too early, and Li Nalas never gets room to establish himself as a viable alternative. Jimmy corrects a detail from last week — **Richard Beymer**, who plays Li Nalas, is Benjamin Horne in *Twin Peaks*, not Sheriff Harry S. Truman.
The episode closes on a coup underway, all channels to Bajor blocked, and Sisko deliberately slow-walking an evacuation order he can’t refuse. Two armed ships are on their way to DS9. Part 3 is “The Siege.”
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