[9.2/10] “Empok Nor” is a better slasher flick than 90% of what gets released in cinemas. Star Trek has a scant, but long history with horror, and this is at the top of the charts. Turning a franchise and a show that are normally so measured, so clean, even in more intense episodes, into something this suspenseful, this unnerving, this downright scary, is incredible.
Normally, I focus on the writing, and there’s plenty to say about the themes and character dynamics and great nuts and bolts plotting that buttress this episode. But an ocean of credit is owed to director Michael Vejar and the production team for not only making the Deep Space 9 set look like a haunted house, but also shooting it like a horror movie so successfully.
These are obviously the same sets we’ve seen for five seasons, but simple changes in lighting, set dressing, and composition, make Empok Nor feel like the most foreboding place in the galaxy. If anything, our familiarity with the layout of a Cardassian refining station makes this place feel that much eerier. Taking something known, and twisting it just enough to where it feels uncomfortably off is a trademark of unnerving folks. Hell, it’s the core of the uncanny valley.
Here, the production and direction uses that to perfection. They shoot the exterior of the station from odd angles, creating the subconscious sense that something is wrong and derelict here. Bathing the place in darkness, even more than in the Terok Nor flashbacks in prior episodes, gives the sense that this locale has been abandoned entirely, and our heroes are coving through the scraps, unaware of what they might find inside. Bathing everyone in shadow adds an air of mystery to the piece. In a paranoid story, it adds to the sense that you never know what might leap out of the dark.
Vejar and company’s direction adds to this sense of foreboding. While there are some of the usual Trek-y speeches, this is a quieter episode, one that lets the anticipation hang in the air before terror strikes or release comes. Much of that is on the editing team, but there’s long shots and extended sequences here that draw that out. The scene construction here is brilliant, with enough time and blocking given to really heighten the suspense and sense of unease at even being on Empok Nor, even before the slashers start coming out of the woodwork.
And while the score does feel a touch obtrusive sometimes, those longer dialogue free stretches are heightened by the music team accentuating the chill factor by playing to the anxious emotions of a given moment.
In short, so much of good horror is about the vibes. Psychology is important, but truly chilling someone often comes down to the visceral. That requires a show’s craft to truly shine. Vejar and company construct this one like a movie, with more adventurous framings, unusual lighting, and different pacing than we’re used to seeing on Deep Space Nine. The results are some brilliant scares, which punctuate some truly gripping suspense, and result in one of Star Trek’s most frightening and cinematic installments ever.
Don’t let my love of the production work here detract from the fact that the writing here is very good! It’s not shocking to see that this great horror story was dreamed up by future Hannibal showrunner Bryan Fuller, and penned by Next Generation vet Hans Bemler. The basic idea -- of the DS9 faithful needing to explore an abandoned and booby-trapped old station to scavenge for needed parts -- would be a strong premise on its own even before you get into the broader themes and horror elements.
It gives our heroes a purpose -- to find necessary items to repair DS9. It creates an immediate danger -- the place is riddled with traps that could kill them at any minute. And then “Empok Nor” ups the ante, with a pair of awoken Cardassian super soldiers skulking through the hallways, stealthily eliminating the good guys one-by-one.
It sets up the anxiety-ridden atmosphere perfectly. The script gives the redshirts just enough personality -- the nervous Bolian, the collector of Cardassian artifacts, the joshing friend -- to make us care when they’re afraid and wince when they die, even if they’re obvious cannon fodder.
Along the way, Bemler’s script sets up the character dynamics between the three main players nicely. Gartak is in rare form, promoting Cardassian decisiveness while chiding Nog for his conservative approach and goading O’Brien to act more aggressively himself. Nog strives to be the consummate officer-in-training, while clearly being terrified by what’s happening. And O’Brien endeavors to keep an even keel, despite the horrors that are happening to his away team, and the deliberate barbs meant to draw blood that come from the plain simple tailor.
That’s the most interesting part of the character work here. Exiled or not, Garak has still shown himself to be a proud Cardassian. He clearly has a desire to settle the score with the “Hero of Setlik III”. For O’Brien’s part, he doesn’t seem proud of his war record. After his reflections in TNG’s “The Wounded” and his experiences aboard the station, he has a more sanguine view of his time at war, and isn’t as interested in reliving as Garak seems to want him to be, adding a personal angle to all the slasher flickery.
It’s one of my favorite things about this episode. For one thing, it plays on the characters’ known histories, from Garak’s pride and urge to defend and avenge his people, to O’Brien’s mixed past as a soldier-turned-engineer. For another, it adds vivid themes of prejudice and a desire for fruitless revenge that have been with the franchise since The Original Series, There is something potent at play here, both personally and politically, which elevates an episode that could have gotten by on being an exquisitely-crafted horrorshow alone.
That is the bigger idea at play here -- that the real horror is bigotry -- not to put too fine a point on it. Empok Nor isn’t just booby-trapped; it’s specifically designed to kill non-Cardassians. The awoken soldiers have been revved up on a drug that accentuates their Xenophobia. Garak scolds Nog for his “Ferengi ways” and tries to renew a cultural conflict with O’Brien by invoking the equivalent of racial slurs humans use for Cardassians. This isn’t a simple tale of evil monster attacks or a personal dispute; it’s relitigating the animus between humanity and the Cardassians in a dark-tinged morality play.
That adds stakes when Garak himself is turned by the same compound that hyped up the sleeping Cardassian soldiers. That’s the script’s most brilliant turn. Sure, mindless indiscriminate killers are frightening. But you know what’s even more terrifying? Garak unleashed. The dialogue jokes that too many people trust Garak now. He’s become a little warm and cuddly. So reminding us that he can be frighteningly cunning, villainous, and deadly under the right circumstances boosts his cred again and makes him the perfect horror antagonist here.
His deepest desire is to turn O’Brien, to revert him into a soldier and a killer. He wants to draw out the same prejudiced instincts, the same desire for vengeance, that is suddenly coursing through his veins. I love that Miles manages to hang onto his soul despite that. And the fact that he defeats Garak and his hostage scheme not through brute force or murderous rage, but cleverly “as an engineer,” is some stellar writing for him. The Chief is good in a crisis and knows how to handle himself, but he’s not the gleeful killer Fa deranged Garak wants him to be, and never wants to be again.
What puts “Empok Nor” over the top is its denouement. For all that Miles is a bastion of integrity, he admits to Garak that he was trying to kill him. The necessity of the moment overcomes even the empathetic instincts of a trained Starfleet officer. And Garak is rehabilitated, by not asking for O’Brien’s help with the inquest, but for asking him to pass on Garak’s regrets to the family of the officer he killed. There is still a killer instinct in the noble Starfleet chief, and there is still empathy in the deadly Cardassian operative.
That is in keeping with Deep Space Nine’s complex approach to all its characters, and in keeping with how great horror can use its chills and thrills to get at something deeper about human nature and how we connect with one another, or fail to. “Empok NOr” is not just great horror, with its wonderfully-constructed scares and chilling design and direction. It’s not just a great Star Trek episode focused on the clash of cultures and what lies in the heart of men. It is an extraordinary hour of television, suffused in terror, made palpable in its chills, but made affecting by the souls at the center of it.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2023-10-05T13:45:48Z
[9.2/10] “Empok Nor” is a better slasher flick than 90% of what gets released in cinemas. Star Trek has a scant, but long history with horror, and this is at the top of the charts. Turning a franchise and a show that are normally so measured, so clean, even in more intense episodes, into something this suspenseful, this unnerving, this downright scary, is incredible.
Normally, I focus on the writing, and there’s plenty to say about the themes and character dynamics and great nuts and bolts plotting that buttress this episode. But an ocean of credit is owed to director Michael Vejar and the production team for not only making the Deep Space 9 set look like a haunted house, but also shooting it like a horror movie so successfully.
These are obviously the same sets we’ve seen for five seasons, but simple changes in lighting, set dressing, and composition, make Empok Nor feel like the most foreboding place in the galaxy. If anything, our familiarity with the layout of a Cardassian refining station makes this place feel that much eerier. Taking something known, and twisting it just enough to where it feels uncomfortably off is a trademark of unnerving folks. Hell, it’s the core of the uncanny valley.
Here, the production and direction uses that to perfection. They shoot the exterior of the station from odd angles, creating the subconscious sense that something is wrong and derelict here. Bathing the place in darkness, even more than in the Terok Nor flashbacks in prior episodes, gives the sense that this locale has been abandoned entirely, and our heroes are coving through the scraps, unaware of what they might find inside. Bathing everyone in shadow adds an air of mystery to the piece. In a paranoid story, it adds to the sense that you never know what might leap out of the dark.
Vejar and company’s direction adds to this sense of foreboding. While there are some of the usual Trek-y speeches, this is a quieter episode, one that lets the anticipation hang in the air before terror strikes or release comes. Much of that is on the editing team, but there’s long shots and extended sequences here that draw that out. The scene construction here is brilliant, with enough time and blocking given to really heighten the suspense and sense of unease at even being on Empok Nor, even before the slashers start coming out of the woodwork.
And while the score does feel a touch obtrusive sometimes, those longer dialogue free stretches are heightened by the music team accentuating the chill factor by playing to the anxious emotions of a given moment.
In short, so much of good horror is about the vibes. Psychology is important, but truly chilling someone often comes down to the visceral. That requires a show’s craft to truly shine. Vejar and company construct this one like a movie, with more adventurous framings, unusual lighting, and different pacing than we’re used to seeing on Deep Space Nine. The results are some brilliant scares, which punctuate some truly gripping suspense, and result in one of Star Trek’s most frightening and cinematic installments ever.
Don’t let my love of the production work here detract from the fact that the writing here is very good! It’s not shocking to see that this great horror story was dreamed up by future Hannibal showrunner Bryan Fuller, and penned by Next Generation vet Hans Bemler. The basic idea -- of the DS9 faithful needing to explore an abandoned and booby-trapped old station to scavenge for needed parts -- would be a strong premise on its own even before you get into the broader themes and horror elements.
It gives our heroes a purpose -- to find necessary items to repair DS9. It creates an immediate danger -- the place is riddled with traps that could kill them at any minute. And then “Empok Nor” ups the ante, with a pair of awoken Cardassian super soldiers skulking through the hallways, stealthily eliminating the good guys one-by-one.
It sets up the anxiety-ridden atmosphere perfectly. The script gives the redshirts just enough personality -- the nervous Bolian, the collector of Cardassian artifacts, the joshing friend -- to make us care when they’re afraid and wince when they die, even if they’re obvious cannon fodder.
Along the way, Bemler’s script sets up the character dynamics between the three main players nicely. Gartak is in rare form, promoting Cardassian decisiveness while chiding Nog for his conservative approach and goading O’Brien to act more aggressively himself. Nog strives to be the consummate officer-in-training, while clearly being terrified by what’s happening. And O’Brien endeavors to keep an even keel, despite the horrors that are happening to his away team, and the deliberate barbs meant to draw blood that come from the plain simple tailor.
That’s the most interesting part of the character work here. Exiled or not, Garak has still shown himself to be a proud Cardassian. He clearly has a desire to settle the score with the “Hero of Setlik III”. For O’Brien’s part, he doesn’t seem proud of his war record. After his reflections in TNG’s “The Wounded” and his experiences aboard the station, he has a more sanguine view of his time at war, and isn’t as interested in reliving as Garak seems to want him to be, adding a personal angle to all the slasher flickery.
It’s one of my favorite things about this episode. For one thing, it plays on the characters’ known histories, from Garak’s pride and urge to defend and avenge his people, to O’Brien’s mixed past as a soldier-turned-engineer. For another, it adds vivid themes of prejudice and a desire for fruitless revenge that have been with the franchise since The Original Series, There is something potent at play here, both personally and politically, which elevates an episode that could have gotten by on being an exquisitely-crafted horrorshow alone.
That is the bigger idea at play here -- that the real horror is bigotry -- not to put too fine a point on it. Empok Nor isn’t just booby-trapped; it’s specifically designed to kill non-Cardassians. The awoken soldiers have been revved up on a drug that accentuates their Xenophobia. Garak scolds Nog for his “Ferengi ways” and tries to renew a cultural conflict with O’Brien by invoking the equivalent of racial slurs humans use for Cardassians. This isn’t a simple tale of evil monster attacks or a personal dispute; it’s relitigating the animus between humanity and the Cardassians in a dark-tinged morality play.
That adds stakes when Garak himself is turned by the same compound that hyped up the sleeping Cardassian soldiers. That’s the script’s most brilliant turn. Sure, mindless indiscriminate killers are frightening. But you know what’s even more terrifying? Garak unleashed. The dialogue jokes that too many people trust Garak now. He’s become a little warm and cuddly. So reminding us that he can be frighteningly cunning, villainous, and deadly under the right circumstances boosts his cred again and makes him the perfect horror antagonist here.
His deepest desire is to turn O’Brien, to revert him into a soldier and a killer. He wants to draw out the same prejudiced instincts, the same desire for vengeance, that is suddenly coursing through his veins. I love that Miles manages to hang onto his soul despite that. And the fact that he defeats Garak and his hostage scheme not through brute force or murderous rage, but cleverly “as an engineer,” is some stellar writing for him. The Chief is good in a crisis and knows how to handle himself, but he’s not the gleeful killer Fa deranged Garak wants him to be, and never wants to be again.
What puts “Empok Nor” over the top is its denouement. For all that Miles is a bastion of integrity, he admits to Garak that he was trying to kill him. The necessity of the moment overcomes even the empathetic instincts of a trained Starfleet officer. And Garak is rehabilitated, by not asking for O’Brien’s help with the inquest, but for asking him to pass on Garak’s regrets to the family of the officer he killed. There is still a killer instinct in the noble Starfleet chief, and there is still empathy in the deadly Cardassian operative.
That is in keeping with Deep Space Nine’s complex approach to all its characters, and in keeping with how great horror can use its chills and thrills to get at something deeper about human nature and how we connect with one another, or fail to. “Empok NOr” is not just great horror, with its wonderfully-constructed scares and chilling design and direction. It’s not just a great Star Trek episode focused on the clash of cultures and what lies in the heart of men. It is an extraordinary hour of television, suffused in terror, made palpable in its chills, but made affecting by the souls at the center of it.