“Facets” is an uneven episode. Even though its final paces are compelling and intriguing, the path is filled with far too many bumps and pitfalls to make the whole journey truly remarkable. Instead, we’re left with long stretches of pedestrian scenes, just to get to the real heart of the matter. As a result, there’s enough here for fans of DS9 to enjoy, but not enough to make this a truly classic installment.

The basic premise of the episode is a Trill ceremony which will allow Jadzia to “meet” the personalities of all the former hosts of the Trill, Dax, by using DS9 crew members as host bodies for the memories. Of course, the need for such a ceremony seems a bit superfluous, considering the fact that Jadzia is already supposed to have all of the memories of the previous hosts. One could argue that personality is different from memory. But at one point in the episode, one of the previous personalities explicitly states, “What is a person, but a collection of their memories?” As a result, the premise, which is an interesting idea as far as it goes, ends up becoming a distinct liability.

Worse yet, the parade of characters is redundant and, simply, boring. I’m sure for Jadzia it’s a neat thing to learn about why she holds her hands behind her back, but for the audience … really … who cares?

Even more problematic is how the episode handles the personality of Joran – the brilliant-yet-murderous former host revealed in “Equilibrium.” Instead of allowing him to have a complex personality, befitting someone whose creativity comes at the cost of his sanity, the episode portrays Joran as simply a “really bad dude” who, for some reason, just wants to kill Jadzia (Why? What on Bajor would that accomplish?). I’ll give the episode some credit for using the music to set the mood in those sequences, but beyond that, the only thing they manage to accomplish is to plant a seed of doubt in Jadzia’s mind – though, why Jadzia would take Joran’s statements at face value is another issue with the episode.

All of this seems to be little more than setup for Jadzia’s confrontation with Curzon – Sisko’s former best friend, and the man who originally denied Jadzia’s application to become a host. The fact that Jadzia needs some kind of reconciliation with Curzon for originally doubting her seems plausible enough. But the episode takes such a twisted, unsteady path toward it, that it almost ends up being utterly useless. Fortunately, the episode is saved by its one truly inspired notion: To have Curzon’s memories merge with Odo, to create a unique personality hybrid.

The Odo/Curzon union makes for some wonderfully entertaining moments – such as Odo/Curzon confusing the hell out of Quark. More importantly, it’ll not only allow Jadzia to later learn about Odo’s joy at being a shapeshifter but, more importantly, Odo will learn just how much humanoids enjoy “simple” pleasures such as eating, drinking and playing games of chance. It’s this exchange of “information” that really sells the episode. Beyond that, the revelation that Curzon fell in love with Jadzia – and that Jadzia never learned of those memories – seems almost too trite to justify all that setup work.

The episode’s subplot is about Nog’s attempts to gain entrance into Starfleet Academy by undergoing a series of pre-tests. It’s rather standard fare until Rom realizes that Quark sabotaged Nog’s test, to keep Nog from being successful. This leads to one of the episode’s best scenes when Rom forcefully stands up to his brother, saying, “My son’s happiness is more important to me than anything, even latinum!”

Good for Rom.

“Facets” has some interesting moments … and even some lasting revelations. But mostly, it’s a misguided, drawn out affair that isn’t entirely worth the price of admission.

Filed under: Deep Space Nine