Deep Space Nine Almost Had A Much Darker Ending – Beragampengetahuan

“Deep Space Nine” is a massively complicated show, so I shall try to sum up some of its more sweeping political details. In brief, at the beginning of the show’s fourth season, Gowron — wanting to assert Klingon dominance in the galaxy by invading Cardassian space — spitefully rescinded the Khitomer Accords, putting the Federation and the Klingons back in an antagonistic position.

The Cardassians, being the Nazis of the “Star Trek” universe, ran to the Dominion for aid in response to the Klingon attacks, and the two empires teamed up to take over the Alpha Quadrant. War was brewing. At the beginning of the show’s fifth season, Changeling spies were afoot. A visiting warrior named Martok (J.G. Hertzler) was sent to Deep Space Nine as a trusted associate of Gowron but, through a series of investigations, was revealed to be a secret agent for the Dominion, arranging pawns to set up a Dominion attack. Odo (Rene Auberjonois) initially thought that Gowron himself had been replaced by a Changeling. There are more details, of course, but too many to get into here.

Showrunner Ira Steven Behr revealed that his initial plan for the series was to have Gowron actually be a Changeling, with the real Gowron having been replaced in secret some time in the previous season. Ultimately, Behr shifted that role to Martok. He explained:

“When we launched season five, we brought back J.G. Hertzler as the Klingon, Martok. He was fine in ‘Way of the Warrior,’ and at the end of the fourth season we said we were going to make Gowron a shape-shifter. Then we started to think, ‘Maybe Gowron being the shape-shifter is too on the nose,’ so we made Martok the shape-shifter, and then you get rid of him.”