Entertainment
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s Best Character Was Nearly Tortured By Khan’s Favorite Weapon
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Who do you think the most beloved character in Star Trek is? Some would go with famous figures like Kirk or Spock, while others might say Picard or Janeway. Younger fans might even go with Mariner, the firebrand lead character on Lower Decks. For many of us older fans, though, the most beloved character is Quark, the affable Ferengi bartender on Deep Space Nine.
Quark is an ultracapitalist surrounded by socialist Federation types, and his banter with characters completely different from himself is a big part of what makes DS9 so popular. This bartender rarely goes into battle, but he still finds himself in all kinds of painful trouble. Of course, things could always have been worse. One unfilmed scene from the episode “Melora” would have had Quark tortured by the same alien eels used to torture people by Khan Noonien Singh, the greatest villain in all of Star Trek!
All Quarked Up
How the heck did Quark nearly end up on the receiving end of an alien eel attack? It all goes back to “Melora,” a Season 2 DS9 episode involving Dr. Bashir falling in love with a woman who can’t easily navigate the Earth-like gravity of the station. Meanwhile, the episode’s B plot involves a menacing alien shaking Quark down over past debts.
The first draft of “Melora” was written by Evan Carlos Somers, a former intern who pitched the episode. Since Somers uses a wheelchair, he hoped to bring some authenticity to the titular Melora, someone who must navigate DS9 using a wheelchair. While the writer turned in a solid draft, the script ultimately needed retuning. Several writers (including then-showrunner Michael Piller) tweaked the script, resulting in the episode you see onscreen. Among other things, they removed a plot point from Somers where Quark’s nemesis (a man named Fallit Kot) would have tortured the Ferengi using eels from Ceti Alpha V.
Hear No Evil
According to The Official Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Magazine, Somers wanted to portray the villain “psychologically toying with Quark, terrifying him” and eventually killing Quark “by using the Ceti eels introduced in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, but this variety didn’t cause mental vulnerability for mind control.” After making all these elaborate plans for the Ferengi’s torture, he was disappointed that “Fallit Kot just strangles Quark” in the aired episode, a threat which was “not quite titanic enough.”
In retrospect, I’d have to agree. Certainly, an elaborate torture sequence is going to be more tense and exciting than a plain, old strangulation. If nothing else, this scene would have cemented what a creepy threat those Ceti Alpha V eels really were. Sadly, the last time they were mentioned in canon was in Star Trek: Discovery, where an Orion outpost was selling them as a tasty treat on the Klingon homeworld!
As a huge fan of Deep Space Nine, I would have loved to see a major homage to The Wrath of Khan so early in the show’s run. Instead, we’d have to wait several more years until “Doctor Bashir, I Presume” revealed that the titular physician had received Khan-like genetic augmentation. As for Quark, he completed the show’s run without getting threatened by any more creepy eels. That might be for the best, though. Knowing the opportunistic Ferengi, he’d probably just end up serving them to his customers with a healthy heaping of yamok sauce!
Entertainment
NYT Strands hints, answers for March 22, 2026
Today’s NYT Strands hints are easy if you’re simple.
Strands, the New York Times‘ elevated word-search game, requires the player to perform a twist on the classic word search. Words can be made from linked letters — up, down, left, right, or diagonal, but words can also change direction, resulting in quirky shapes and patterns. Every single letter in the grid will be part of an answer. There’s always a theme linking every solution, along with the “spangram,” a special, word or phrase that sums up that day’s theme, and spans the entire grid horizontally or vertically.
By providing an opaque hint and not providing the word list, Strands creates a brain-teasing game that takes a little longer to play than its other games, like Wordle and Connections.
If you’re feeling stuck or just don’t have 10 or more minutes to figure out today’s puzzle, we’ve got all the NYT Strands hints for today’s puzzle you need to progress at your preferred pace.
NYT Strands hint for today’s theme: Trademarked no more
The words are related to common items.
Mashable Top Stories
Today’s NYT Strands theme plainly explained
These words describe everyday objects.
NYT Strands spangram hint: Is it vertical or horizontal?
Today’s NYT Strands spangram is diagonal.
NYT Strands spangram answer today
Today’s spangram is Generic Term.
NYT Strands word list for March 22
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Zipper
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Escalator
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Thermos
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Generic Term
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Aspirin
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Dumpster
Looking for other daily online games? Mashable’s Games page has more hints, and if you’re looking for more puzzles, Mashable’s got games now!
Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.
Not the day you’re after? Here’s the solution to yesterday’s Strands.
Entertainment
Upcoming Firefly Reboot Will Feature Weird Animation And Activist Showrunners, Fans Divided
By Jennifer Asencio
| Published
The announcement of a new Firefly season at AwesomeCon on March 15, 2026, was eagerly anticipated by fans of the show. When Firefly was canceled in 2002, it was abrupt and even traumatic because we had all quickly grown attached to the quirky crew of the Serenity. The movie, named after the smuggling starship, delivered both excitement and heartbreak, giving fans what we all thought was one last look at Malcolm Reynolds and his associates. So when lead actor Nathan Fillion started teasing a cast reunion, Browncoats took notice.
On the surface, the cast announcement, made via Zoom, sounds awesome. There’s a new season in development and it’s going to be animated. It’s going to take place between the end of the single television season and the movie. This means Alan Tudyk’s wisecracking Wash is still alive, and also that Shepherd Book, previously played by deceased actor Ron Glass, can be taken “out to the black” and live on.
Same Cast, Different Style
Some fans are happy because the rest of the cast is reuniting for this project and finally answering their hopes. An animated version also avoids trying to explain why the characters look older than they did in the Serenity movie, while providing the fan service we’ve all been asking for.
The animation is being produced by award-winning studio ShadowMachine, which also inked BoJack Horseman, Guillermo del Toro’s Oscar-winning Pinocchio, the vanished Final Space, and a fair portion of Adult Swim’s content, including Robot Chicken. The animation style isn’t to everyone’s taste, though. Some people, beyond just those who only wanted something live action, aren’t warming up to the artistic concepts shared so far.
Still Looking For A Proper Platform
Another source of dissatisfaction is that the show doesn’t actually have a home. It has almost everything else it needs: a studio, a returning cast, and creator Joss Whedon’s blessing, but no streamer or network. The cast announcement struck some viewers as begging for help, and others as a false promise, since a show without a network is no good to fans.
The biggest red flags about the show for some fans have surrounded the show runners, both past and present. Whedon may have given his blessing, but he is not involved. Many believe that he is the heart of the show’s tone and humor, and that it wouldn’t be the same without his involvement.
Fans Approach With Guarded Enthusiasm
This has been amplified for a lot of viewers by the involvement of Marc Guggenheim and wife Tracy Butters, both alums of superhero shows but also outspoken activists. Guggenheim, responsible for the CW Arrowverse, has never shied away from using Arrow or Legends of Tomorrow to make political statements favoring specific talking points, and has already been noted for attacking Firefly fans who voted for President Trump. Such fans are concerned that yet another beloved property they enjoy will be used to attack and scold them with political messaging rather than good storytelling.
Every fandom has its slop eaters who will eat up a show, no matter how bad, just because it exists and bears the name of their favorite franchise. The Firefly fandom has hope that the combination of the cast reuniting and the show being animated compensates for its physical limitations. But a lot of fans, who have spent the past decade being burned by bad reboots, sequels, and spinoffs from their favorite franchise, are wary that Firefly is about to do it again.
Entertainment
One Of Star Trek's Best Episodes Was Created Out Of Spite
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Ever learn about someone for the first time and feel an immediate kinship with them? Recently, I learned about the late, great Evan Carlos Somers, someone who wrote for the best Transformers show ever made: Beast Wars. He also wrote the episode “Melora” for Deep Space Nine, which just happens to be the greatest Star Trek show ever made (I said what I said, haters!).
What intrigued me most about Somers is that he wrote “Melora” out of spite. Part of that spite was for the Paramount production offices and the DS9 set itself. As a man in a wheelchair, Somers discovered how tough it was to get around the studio, and he made sure the wheelchair-bound Melora faced the same difficulties navigating the most famous space station in the quadrant. On top of that, he wrote “Melora” largely to wave a middle finger at the writers of “Ethics.” That’s the TNG episode where a paralyzed Worf wants to (as the kids on Starfleet Academy might say) unalive himself with the help of Commander Riker.
The Best Parking Spot On The Station
This tale is gonna need a double dose of context, so buckle up. The most notable thing about the “Melora” is that even in the 24th century, the titular Starfleet officer must use a wheelchair to move around the station. This is because she comes from a low-gravity planet, and her fancy hoverchair is incompatible with the station’s Cardassian technology. The episode was pitched and originally written (it got later rewrites) by Evan Carlos Somers, who felt that his life as a handicapped person would help him more authentically write for a wheelchair-bound character.
The big emotional thrust of the episode comes when Dr. Bashir develops a “cure” for Melora that would allow her to easily walk in Earth normal gravity. However, it would keep her from returning to her homeworld. It would also fundamentally change who she is, and she eventually decides not to go through with it just to make Bashir happy. In this way, the handicapped Somers wrote a quintessential Star Trek episode in which a character refuses to be defined by her disability and, instead, fully embraces it.
Today Is A Good Day To Die
While he was motivated to write “Melora” largely out of his desire to honestly portray the lived experience of a handicapped person, Somers also wanted to write a response to the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, “Ethics.” This is the episode where Worf gets paralyzed by some falling barrels, and he considers committing ritual suicide because of Klingon cultural customs. They believe if you can’t walk, you can’t fight, and if you can’t fight, you might as well be dead. Worf is unable to convince Riker to help with his assisted suicide and is unwilling to ask his son, so he reluctantly agrees to an experimental medical procedure that allows him to walk again.
In an interview with The Official Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Magazine, Evan Carlos Somers revealed that “Ethics” was an episode that “had gotten a little under my skin.” While acknowledging that Klingons have their own cultural values, he still felt that “we’re making statements with Star Trek” and that “messages and values are being broadcast loud and clear.” In this case, he “reented the message in ‘Ethics’–that Worf is worthless now that he’s disabled and therefore must kill himself.” This motivated the writing of “Melora” because “I always thought it would be nice to create a disabled character who’s accepted for what she is and doesn’t have to change.”
In retrospect, “Melora” did have a nice message, but I find it personally hilarious that this progressive episode was written out of spite for the writers of an earlier TNG episode. Even funnier, “Ethics” was written by Ronald D. Moore, the Klingon expert who later went on to create the acclaimed Battlestar Galactica reboot.
He’s considered one of Star Trek’s best writers, but that didn’t keep a young intern-turned-writer from calling him out with one of DS9’s craziest episodes. Somers was powered by spite the same way the Enterprise is powered by the warp core, and like Scotty, he was giving it all he’s got with “Melora.” Real talk? As a cranky writer myself, that’s the kind of motivation I can get behind.
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NYT Strands hints, answers for March 22, 2026
