Synopsis: Odo begins an investigation after a bomb destroys Garak’s tailor shop. The Cardassian-Romulan fleet enters the Gamma Quadrant; Sisko goes against Starfleet orders to rescue Odo.

Memory Alpha Summary: God from the Machine

Review: Any episode that features Garak or The Dominion is going to be entertaining, and here we get both. Though I have to say, I think perhaps here we get just a bit too much Garak. There’s just a lot of snark over two hours, the interrogations with Odo and the witty repartee with Tain coming off a bit thick.

Odo being tortured is nothing new, and while it’s a good scene, it pales in comparison to Picard’s torture just a couple years earlier. And while the Dominion wiping out the Obisidian Order and the Tal Shiar is chilling, reminiscent of Wolf 359, the ending to this two-parter was really close to deus ex machina. On the one hand, while we know as the audience that it’s always possible that a Founder can be impersonating someone, there were no clues throughout the episode that Lovok was indeed a Founder. It felt very much like the writers came up with an ending and worked backwards, but didn’t drop enough bread crumbs. 

I will say, though, that one can easily notice the increased budget. The space battles are pretty sweet and way more realistic looking than anything on TNG.