Shadows and Symbols

**** (4 stars out of 5)

An answer is given at last for why the Prophets arranged for Sisko's conception. Because who else would wander into a desert with his aged father, young son, and mentally unbalanced BFF? And why? Because Prophets don't have HANDS. There was a Prophet buried in a box, and it was needed to turn the tide against the Pah-Wraiths and re-open the wormhole.

You heard right. A Prophet can influence time and space and human minds, rewrite history, traverse a galactic quadrant in moments... but it was stymied by a set of hinged doors and a few feet of sand.

It wasn't an easy journey for the Emissary, either. The Pah-Wraiths re-activated the Benny Russell Visions and tried to convince Sisko that he was a madman scrawling the history of Deep Space Nine on the walls of an asylum. Or DID they?

Yes. They did.

Meanwhile, Ensign Ezri Dax, assistant ship's counsellor from the U.S.S. Destiny struggles to keep track of her eight previous identities... and keep her lunch down. Ezri had no host training, but was the closest Trill around when Dax was dying.  She's coping about as well as one might expect. Plus she's that chipmunk-cheeked lass from Deepwater Black, so she can't be ALL bad.

Also meanwhile, Kira and Odo and a fleet of those rusting venetian-blind Bajoran ships (plus a surplus Karemman canoe) are all that stand between a Romulan fleet and the weaponized hospital on the Bajoran's back doorstep.

Still elsewhere meanwhile, Worf and all the boys that loved Jadzia join Martok's Klingon fleet in a daring assault on the Monac shipyard, setting a giant fire with the local sun. Take that, every other funeral pyre ever!

"Shadows and Symbols" is great fun. This is one tremendous season. Watch it again, won't you?