Sisko has a vision where he’s a 1950s pulp SF writer.
I am really torn about this episode. On the one hand, it’s an interesting conceit, and is pretty well delivered (apart from the ‘breakdown’ scene at the end, which is a bit too scenery-chewing). It deals with real issues, without resorting to crude analogy. And it’s fun to see the alien cast without their makeup on.
But it doesn’t feel a lot like Deep Space 9. It’s a bit too ‘meta’, and the connection to Sisko’s ‘inner conflict’ is pretty sparse. And it sets things up for an ‘it was all a dream’ ending, which I hate. And while the racism issues of the 1950s are all very real, the inciting incident of ‘they won’t publish my story’ isn’t significant enough without a much better understanding of Sisko’s 1950s doppelganger.
507 down, 230 to go.