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Benjamin Sisko

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Starfleet Captain Benjamin Lafayette Sisko is a 24th century Human man, most famous as commanding officer of Deep Space 9 and as the Bajoran Emissary of the Prophets . He left DS9 at the end of the Dominion War to join the Bajoran Prophets , but eventually returned.

• 1.1 Early life
• 1.2 Starfleet Academy
• 1.3 Early Starfleet career
• 1.4 The Saratoga
• 1.5 Deep Space 9
• 1.6 The Emissary of the Prophets
• 1.7 The Maquis
• 1.8 The Dominion War
• 1.9 Return from the Celestial Temple
• 2 Alternate timelines
• 3.1 Commendation
• 4.1 Connections
• 4.2 Background information
• 4.3.1 Appearances
• 4.3.2 References
• 4.4 External links

Biography [ ]

Early life [ ].

Benjamin Sisko was born in the year 2332 in the city of New Orleans on planet Earth . ( DS9 novel : Avatar, Book One )

When Ben was a newborn, his proud father, Joseph Sisko , the owner of the renowned restaurant Sisko's Creole Kitchen , would show off his infant son to diners with one arm, and serve tables with the other, not always successfully. A Sisko's patron named Andreas Nikolas once commented about Ben's crying, "...what I really remember is Sisko's boy - must have been just a few months old when I was there, and already the kid had a pair of lungs on him. I swear he drowned out the horn music from next door." ( STA novel : Maker )

Ben had two younger brothers, Samuel and Aaron, and a younger sister, Judith . ( DS9 episodes : " Homefront ", " Paradise ")

Starfleet Academy [ ]

Sisko entered Starfleet Academy in the year 2350 . ( DS9 episode : " The Ascent ")

Sisko once told Odo that he was nicknamed "Dead-Eye" at Starfleet Academy since he was the best shot there, able to bounce a phaser beam off a mirror and still hit the target. He later admitted however, that this was somewhat of an exaggeration. ( DS9 novel : The Siege )

While at the Academy, Ben met and befriended fellow Cadet Cal Hudson . ( DS9 episodes : " The Maquis, Part I ", " Apocalypse Rising ")

In the year 2353 , Ben had not yet graduated from the Academy yet when he was assigned to Pelios Station as an Ensign . It was there that young Sisko first came under the tutelage of Ambassador Curzon Dax , a joined Trill . Sisko would later consider the "Old Man" Curzon to be both a mentor and a second father figure. ( DS9 short story : " The Music Between the Notes "; DS9 episode : " Invasive Procedures ")

In 2354 Ben was captain of Starfleet Academy Wrestling Team . ( DS9 episode : " Apocalypse Rising ")

Early Starfleet career [ ]

Shortly after graduation and awaiting his first assignment, Sisko met and quickly married his first wife, Jennifer . ( DS9 episode : " Emissary ")

As a junior officer, Sisko was assigned to the Federation embassy on Romulus . ( ST - Typhon Pact novel : Rough Beasts of Empire )

In 2355 , while Ben was on paternity leave from his first posting on the USS Livingston , Jennifer gave birth to the couple's only child, Jacob Isaac Sisko , at the Starfleet Potrero Hill Medical Center in San Francisco . ( TLE novel : Deny Thy Father )

Around 2355, Sisko joined Zach Warner and a Starfleet team in a mission to Theta IV-Z . An incident happened that caused the mission to be botched and Sisko placed the blame on Warner. Sisko did not reveal his knowledge about that at the time. ( DS9 novelization : Call to Arms... )

In 2360 , Sisko was serving as a Lieutenant in the Engineering section of the USS Okinawa under captain James Leyton when, at Curzon's urging, Sisko accepted a temporary assignment for Starfleet Intelligence under Admiral Nyota Uhura .

The assignment saw Sisko in command of an undercover team deep within the space of the Romulan Star Empire . It was after this assignment that Sisko switched from Engineering to Command . Sisko soon found himself as first officer of the Okinawa . ( TLE novel : Catalyst of Sorrows )

The Saratoga [ ]

During his time on the Saratoga , Sisko and the crew encountered a hostile Breen ship at Guldammur IV . In a plan devised by Sisko and Hranok , a narrow-gauge phaser spread was fired from the weapons of the Saratoga , making several small gaps in the Breen's shields. This allowed the Saratoga crew to beam unwanted items into the Breen's weapon banks, clogging them and leaving them unable to fire. ( DS9 novel : Saratoga )

On Mariphasa IV , Sisko, Hranok, Aidan Thorn and Miriam Laffer were captured by the Cardassians and were about to be tortured to reveal their mission there. They were saved by Doctor Laffer's arguments with the Cardassian in charge, which bought time for Thorn to disarm one of the Cardassians and make their escape. ( DS9 novel : Saratoga )

On a mission to Thetalian Prime , Sisko, Hranok, Graal and Laffer were affected by alien organisms until Dr. Laffer was able to find a cure. Some of the organisms, which produced corlandium , remained in their systems. ( DS9 novel : Saratoga )

Benjamin Sisko, first officer of the USS Saratoga

By 2367, Sisko was a Lieutenant Commander and the ships first officer of the USS Saratoga , when that ship was lost fighting the Borg at the Battle of Wolf 359 . Jennifer Sisko was killed in that battle. ( DS9 episode : " Emissary ", TNG - DS9 comic : " Prophets and Losses "; DS9 comic : " Program 359 ")

Deep Space 9 [ ]

Sisko spent the next three years assigned to the Utopia Planitia Fleet Yards on Mars . During this time, Curzon Dax had died, and the Dax symbiont , with all of Curzon's memories, was transferred to a young female Starfleet lieutenant, Jadzia Idaris .

In the year 2369 , Sisko, now a full Commander , received new orders from Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the USS Enterprise , placing him in command of Starbase Deep Space 9 , a Cardassian -designed space station formerly known as Terok Nor , in orbit of the recently liberated planet Bajor . ( DS9 novelization : Emissary )

The Emissary of the Prophets [ ]

Prophecy and Change

Shortly after arriving in Bajoran Space, Sisko met with Bajoran Kai Opaka Sulan , who told him the he was the Emissary of the Prophets , foretold in Bajoran scripture, destined to find the Celestial Temple of the Prophets , home of the Bajoran gods.

Sisko was skeptical, but soon after an encounter with the Orb of Prophecy and Change , he and Lieutenant Jadzia Dax discovered the Bajoran wormhole , an artificially created passageway to the distant Gamma Quadrant created by the beings that the Bajorans consider to be gods.

Sisko requested a Bajoran national for the position of first officer, and the post was given to former Bajoran freedom fighter Kira Nerys , who was staunchly against the Federation's presence on Bajor , believing the Federation to be little different from her former Cardassian oppressors.

It wasn't until Kira discovered that Sisko was supposedly the Emissary of the Prophets , that she gave the Federation a chance. ( DS9 novelization : Emissary ; DS9 short story : " Ha'mara ")

The Orb of Time -or in this case a similar one-transported Benjamin Sisko in 2369 back to his own past in 2366 . In order to defeat a Bajoran / Cardassian insurgency in the present, he had to re-visit the USS Saratoga (NCC-31911) . Obtaining vital engineering materials from his doomed, former starship was the key to repairing sabotage throughout Deep Space 9. ( DS9 video game : Crossroads of Time )

In late 2370 , Sisko discovered the existence of the Dominion , a dictatorial power based in the Gamma Quadrant. Sisko led a mission into the Gamma Quadrant commanding the USS Defiant in search of the Dominions leaders, the Founders . The Founders turned out to be of the same race as DS9's shape-shifting Chief of security , Odo . His first contact with their Vorta facilitators left him with the notion he has no idea of what's begun. ( DS9 novelization : The Search )

In 2371 , the mirror universe counterpart of Miles O'Brien kidnapped Sisko to his own universe. There, Sisko posed as his own mirror counterpart , in an attempt to convince the mirror version of his wife, Jennifer Sisko , to join the Terran Rebellion . Sisko's experience from the regular universe proved invaluable in this mission, and Jennifer joined the Rebellion. Although Sisko and O'Brien were careful not to disclose Sisko's true identity, the truth later became common knowledge to the members of the Rebellion. ( DS9 episode : " Through the Looking Glass "; VOY novel : The Mirror-Scaled Serpent )

The Maquis [ ]

Having just been promoted to Captain , Ben Sisko endured battles with his loyalties on all fronts for the next two years . He risked his personal and professional health to investigate both Starfleet and private, Federation citizens, as well as Bajorans and an underground host of other races seeking to weaken the Cardassian Union . These trials upon his conscience prepared him for even more difficult choices, as Sisko was pushed to the brink of his own morals, questioning his own integrity under fire. ( DS9 episodes : " The Circle "; " The Siege "; " For the Cause "; " For the Uniform "; " The Adversary ")

The Dominion War [ ]

In late 2373 , when war broke out with the Dominion (and their new Cardassian allies), Sisko and Starfleet were forced to temporarily abandon the Bajoran sector. Shortly after receiving word of the near destruction of the Seventh Fleet, Sisko begins to hatch a long-term plan with General Martok that would eventually lead to the operation that retook DS9 .

Sisko led the combined fleet that retook DS9 and the Bajoran sector, but it was only the intervention of the Prophets, acting at the behest of their Emissary , that truly defeated the Dominion. He was then given the Pike Medal of Valor for his actions.( DS9 novelizations : Call to Arms... , ...Sacrifice of Angels ; DS9 short story : " Three Sides to Every Story ", DS9 episode : " Tears of the Prophets ")

In 2374 , Sisko was responsible for bringing the forces of the Romulan Empire into the war against the Dominion. Although Sisko violated several Starfleet regulations in this endeavor, the Admiralty was reluctant to punish Sisko, fearing reprisals from the Romulans. ( DS9 novel : Hollow Men )

When the Dominion War ended in late 2375 , Sisko led the charge into Cardassian space for the final battle . Shortly thereafter, the peace treaty was signed on DS9. Sisko averted an assassination attempt on the Female Changeling , who commanded the Dominion war effort in the Alpha Quadrant .

Shortly thereafter, Sisko ascended to the non-linear realm of the Prophet after defeating Dukat and the Pah-wraiths. He promised his pregnant second wife, Kasidy Yates , that he would return. ( DS9 novelization : What You Leave Behind ; DS9 short story : " Requital ")

Return from the Celestial Temple [ ]

Sisko remained with the Prophets for three years, but had to be returned to deal with a threat that the Prophets couldn't deal with from out of time. ( Part 1 - Godshock comic :)

Alternate timelines [ ]

In an alternate timeline created in 2371 by a time -shifting Karg temporal disruptor , Sisko had resigned from Starfleet in 2367 , after the Battle of Wolf 359 , in order to become a university professor on Earth . By 2371 in that timeline, Jake berated Sisko for leaving behind the potential of his former life in Starfleet service.

As the temporal distortions became more severe, Sisko found himself on Earth on October 27 , 1995 , listening to a televised announcement from victorious dictator Khan Noonien Singh regarding his plans for the future of the Human race 's DNA . ( DS9 comic : " No Time Like the Present ")

During an orb experience in 2377 , Sisko encountered seven alternate versions of himself, all of whom had become Emissary in their respective realities:

• Ambassador Sisko of the Federation Diplomatic Corps , who lost his wife Jennifer on during a Kohn-Ma attack on Cardassia Prime while negotiating the Cardassian withdrawal from Bajor.
• Fleet Captain Sisko of a Terran Empire which never fell, who served as military governor of Bajor.
• Dr. Sisko of the Daystrom Institute , who discovered the wormhole following the death of his sister.
• Colonel Sisko of the Celestial Union , who discovered the wormhole during a war with the Tholians .
• Admiral Sisko, the hero of the Battle of Wolf 359 .
• Sisko of the Borg , who became Emissary after the assimilation of Earth.
• Benjamin Sisko, whose son died aboard the Saratoga rather than his wife.

In this vision, it was explained to Sisko that his mirror universe alternate was also destined to become Emissary, and that he needed to help make that reality. ( DS9 novel : Fearful Symmetry )

• Lord-Commander Sisko of the Earthfleet station D9. In this reality, Khan Noonien Singh won the Eugenics Wars and, as a result, Sisko was an Augment . ( DS9 - Myriad Universes novel : Seeds of Dissent )

Starfleet service record [ ]

Commendation [ ].

Christopher Pike Medal of Valor - in recognition of his remarkable leadership and meritorious conduct against the enemy, and in particular for acts of personal bravery displayed during the battle to retake Deep Space 9. ( DS9 episode : " Tears of the Prophets ")

Appendices [ ]

Connections [ ], background information [ ].

• Sisko was played by Avery Brooks . Kevin Michael Richardson voiced the character in The Fallen .

Appearances and references [ ]

Appearances [ ], references [ ].

• ST reference : Star Trek Chronology , 1996 edition, page 222
• TNG novel : Planet X

External links [ ]

• Benjamin Sisko article at Memory Alpha , the wiki for canon Star Trek .
• Benjamin Sisko article at Wikipedia , the free encyclopedia.
• 1 Ferengi Rules of Acquisition
• 2 Odyssey class
• 3 Akira class

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How old is captain sisko in star trek: ds9.

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How To Watch All Star Trek TV Shows In Timeline Order

Star trek: ds9 blew up an enterprise starship to make a point, sisko & quark's ds9 fight was a major star trek turning point.

• Captain Sisko was 37 years old at the start of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine in 2369.
• By the end of DS9 in 2375, Sisko was 43 years old.
• Post-DS9, Sisko's age became hard to determine due to his non-linear status as one of the Bajoran Prophets.

How old was Captain Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks) before, during, and after Star Trek: Deep Space Nine ? Sisko was the lead in DS9 's main cast of characters and is widely regarded as one of the most influential characters in the franchise. Born in 2332, Sisko became Star Trek 's first Black male lead when he took command of the Deep Space 9 space station in DS9 's pilot episode, "Emissary." During his time in command of the station, Sisko also acted as the Emissary to the Bajoran Prophets and was instrumental in the conflict that eventually became the Dominion War.

Although it wasn't revealed until "Emissary," Sisko's involvement in important Star Trek timeline events started before his tenure on DS9 . In 2366, Sisko was present at the Battle of Wolf 359, the first major encounter between the Borg and the Federation. Sisko was 34 at the time of the Battle and lost his wife Jennifer Sisko (Felecia M. Bell) in the conflict. The trauma and grief of Wolf 359 influenced a good deal of Sisko's character in "Emissary" and throughout the rest of the series.

The Star Trek TV franchise has existed for 57 years and consists of 12 shows (and counting). Here's how to watch them all in timeline order.

How Old Captain Sisko Is In Star Trek: DS9

Ds9 covered six years of sisko's life.

Because Sisko's birth year is well documented, it's easy to determine his age during DS9 's run. At the start of the series, in 2369, Sisko was 37 years old . DS9 began three years after the Battle of Wolf 359 , and concluded in 2375, approximately six years later. In the series finale, "What You Leave Behind," Sisko sacrificed himself to stop Gul Dukat (Mark Alaimo) from unleashing the Pah-Wraiths and ascended to the Celestial Temple to live with the Prophets. By DS9 's finale, Sisko was 43 years old, an age he may have remained indefinitely given how his story ended.

Captain Sisko’s Age After DS9 Is Tricky

Sisko's ds9 ending makes his post-series age complicated.

Because of his status at the end of DS9 , Sisko's age post-series is tricky to determine. As a non-corporeal, non-linear being, Sisko likely stopped aging when his corporeal body presumably died on Bajor in the Fire Caves. Therefore, although he was 43 at the time of his "death," Sisko is now ageless given that the Prophets experience time differently than humans and the rest of the galaxy. Normal, linear aging would likely mean nothing to Sisko upon his ascension to the Celestial Temple.

However, given that the franchise continued after Star Trek: Deep Space Nine ended, it is still possible to determine how old Sisko would be at the time of new Star Trek shows . Star Trek: Picard brought the franchise into the 25th century, with season 3 being set in 2401 and 2402. By 2402, Sisko would have been 75 years old . Sisko's age corresponds with Avery Brooks' age, with Brooks also being 75 as of 2023. Matching the actors' and characters' ages so exactly made for a more realistic performance from Brooks as Captain Sisko.

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, also known as DS9, is the fourth series in the long-running Sci-Fi franchise, Star Trek. DS9 was created by Rick Berman and Michael Piller, and stars Avery Brooks, René Auberjonois, Terry Farrell, and Cirroc Lofton. This particular series follows a group of individuals in a space station near a planet called Bajor.

Star Trek: Picard

After starring in Star Trek: The Next Generation for seven seasons and various other Star Trek projects, Patrick Stewart is back as Jean-Luc Picard. Star Trek: Picard focuses on a retired Picard who is living on his family vineyard as he struggles to cope with the death of Data and the destruction of Romulus. But before too long, Picard is pulled back into the action. The series also brings back fan-favorite characters from the Star Trek franchise, such as Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan), Geordi La Forge (LeVar Burton), Worf (Michael Dorn), and William Riker (Jonathan Frakes).

• Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993)

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Product Key Features

• Convention/Event San Diego Comic Con
• Year Manufactured 1997
• Sport Boxing
• Animation Studio Paramount Animation
• Character Captain Action, Diego, Captain Benjamin Sisko
• Color Multicolor
• TV Show Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
• Vintage Yes
• Original/Licensed Reproduction Original
• Features Boxed, With Clothes, Limited Edition, Collector's Edition
• Featured Person/Artist Avery Brooks, Seal, Yes
• Movie Star Trek
• Material Plastic
• Franchise Star Trek
• Series Deep Space Nine
• Type Action Figure
• Model Animator Doll
• Theme TV, Movie & Video Games
• Item Height 9 in
• Weight 0.7 pounds

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Revisiting Star Trek ’s Most Political Episode

In 1995, the Deep Space Nine installment “Past Tense” stood out for its realistic, near-future vision of racism and economic injustice.

“It’s not that they don’t care. It’s that they’ve given up.” This was how Commanding Officer Benjamin Sisko, played by Avery Brooks, described early 21st-century Americans in an episode from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. When it aired in 1995, “Past Tense” spoke to contemporary concerns about homelessness by telling a story set in 2024—the near future for viewers, but the distant past for characters. In the two-part episode, Sisko and two of his companions from the U.S.S. Defiant find themselves stranded in San Francisco, where they’re reminded that the federal government had once set up a series of so-called “Sanctuary Districts” in a nationwide effort to seal off homeless Americans from the general population. Stuck in 2024, Sisko, who is black—along with his North African crewmate Dr. Julian Bashir and the fair-skinned operations officer Jadzia Dax—must contend with unfamiliar racism, classism, violence, and Americans’ apparent apathy toward human suffering.

The Star Trek franchise has, for 51 years, told plenty of stories about the political and social ills of American society. Deep Space Nine , which ran from 1993 to 1999, was no different. Set on an outpost for the peaceful United Federation of Planets’s defense and exploratory service known as Starfleet, Deep Space Nine tackled subjects such as terrorism, imperialism, and the limits of democracy during crisis. It was also the first Trek series to feature an African American commanding officer—a legacy that has been continued in CBS’s recently debuted reboot Star Trek: Discovery , which stars Sonequa Martin-Green as the show’s first black female lead.

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The kind of storytelling Discovery is hanging its hat on, with flawed characters, multi-episode story-arcs, and a grittier outlook, was pioneered (for Star Trek at least) with Deep Space Nine. With Sisko at the helm, the series also introduced new concerns about race, family (Sisko was a widower and a loving father to his son, Jake), and what it means to be the representative of a far-away government on the (final) frontier. Looking back today, “Past Tense” still stands out for its surprisingly realistic, near-future vision of racism and economic injustice. And unlike the typically optimistic characters that occupy most of Star Trek , in “Past Tense” the people of 2024 are beaten down, exhausted, and weary of their world.

In science fiction, it’s common for the problems of the human condition to be addressed through allegory. Star Trek did this regularly. Throughout the series, aliens would stand in for different elements of an all-too-familiar debate about race, class, or gender. For example, the 1969 Trek episode “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield” tries to make a point about the absurdity of racism—via a ham-fisted story about an alien population that’s divided between individuals whose faces are half-white and half-black, and those who have the color scheme reversed. The allegory was obvious, but it elided the complexity of how racist societies operate.

“Past Tense” aired 26 years later, in the third season of Deep Space Nine . Combining a searing look at homelessness with an indictment of America’s refusal to tackle the crisis head-on, it was arguably the most straightforwardly political story Star Trek ever told. It dispensed with clumsy metaphors to examine public health and mental illness; it also confronted the effects of the country’s waning optimism following Lyndon B. Johnson’s “Great Society,” a series of domestic programs meant to end poverty and inequality in the ’60s. The script was also written and produced only two years after the Los Angeles Riots, which clearly influenced the story. The episode could perhaps have dug even deeper into its critique of bigotry. Still, “Past Tense” was notable for depicting racism not from the perspective of a well-meaning white liberal, as seen in previous iterations of Star Trek , but through the eyes of people of color directly threatened by violence and indifference.

Seeing the main characters thrust from the relative comforts of the 24th century into the despair of the 21st is jarring. Sisko and Bashir end up in a Sanctuary District, lacking the necessary identification cards to keep them from being rounded up by the local authorities. Dax, a member of the alien Trill species who looks like a young white woman, is lucky enough to be found by a wealthy member of the media who gives her new clothes and food, and makes her part of upper-crust San Francisco society. Bashir’s incredulousness at the plight of people in the Sanctuary Districts is meant to reflect the viewer’s outrage. “Why are these people in here? Are they criminals?” he asks Commander Sisko, who replies, “They’re just people without jobs or places to live.” The district’s inhabitants come from a variety of backgrounds, a reminder of how poverty cuts across race, gender, and age. What everyone there has in common—whether they are homeless, law enforcement, or an administrator—is anger at how the U.S. government has left them behind.

Where Bashir condemns American society, Sisko tells the doctor that, as Starfleet officers, they should have a longer view of history. According to Sisko—an expert on the 21st century—the social upheaval in San Francisco’s Sanctuary District plays a major role in triggering an event that will prove transformative for the country. The homelessness crisis leads to what will be known as “the Bell Riots,” named after its primary historical protagonist, Gabriel Bell, an African American man who dies in the clashes and becomes a national hero. The riots and their aftermath spur humans to become the kind of species that will, by 2161, form the enlightened United Federation of Planets.

Bell’s race gives the two-parter an eerie realism. His almost sacrificial death recalls pivotal moments in U.S. history when black Americans died violently and spurred others to ensure the nation lived up to its lofty ideals. The modern Black Lives Matter movement emerged following the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the fatal 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin and gained wider prominence after the police killings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner in 2014. The assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. sparked the passage of the Fair Housing Act of 1968. A bombing that killed four little African American girls in Birmingham, Alabama, at the height of the civil rights movement galvanized public opinion against Southern segregation.

In “Past Tense,” things are complicated when Bell dies, ironically, trying to save Sisko and Bashir from a group of muggers within the Sanctuary District. Sisko takes on Bell’s name, knowing that his comrades’ unplanned presence in 2024 San Francisco risks damaging the larger timeline unless they can recreate the events of the riot. Because official records show that Bell died in the chaos, Sisko grimly concludes that he must take on that same task—for the sake of humanity and the Federation.

The episode’s emphasis on history is crucial. In every iteration of Trek, the captain has a special appreciation for the past. Captain James T. Kirk adored Abraham Lincoln. Jean-Luc Picard ( The Next Generation ) spoke fondly of the greatness of both France and his own family. Kathryn Janeway ( Voyager ) would, at times, reflect movingly on the progress women made on Earth. Captain Jonathan Archer’s own father ( Enterprise ) was a critical part of Earth’s early attempts in the 22nd century to advance warp travel. But for Sisko, a native of New Orleans, history spoke with a powerful, notably African American voice. Unlike the uplifting accounts other captains pointed to, Sisko indicated that he remembered humanity’s more vicious moments, too.

Sisko’s recollections of his family often included meditations on discrimination. In Season 7’s “Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang,” Sisko would refuse to participate in a holographic program set in 1962 Las Vegas due to its fanciful obliviousness of racial issues in that period. (“We cannot ignore the truth about the past,” Sisko insists.) In “Past Tense,” he immediately understands the significance of the Bell Riots, and is even willing to give his life to make sure history continues as it should. Because Sisko takes charge in the crisis, the previously belligerent security guards are willing to let him escape and to tell the world that “Gabriel Bell” died in the uprising. The Federation is saved, and the 21st and 24th centuries are saved. Nonetheless, Sisko, Bashir, and Dax are all profoundly shaken by the world that they’ve lived in for only a few days.

The creators of “Past Tense” confronted the story’s real-world analogues as they filmed it. Ira Steven Behr, one of the episode’s writers, recalled reading a Los Angeles Times report on then-Mayor Richard Riordan’s push to have the city’s homeless moved to enclosed spaces, both for their sake and for the benefit of local businesses. Behr also acknowledged the episode’s implicit racial commentary, noting for the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion book that Sisko and Bashir—being people of color—were treated more harshly than Dax. He also recoiled from criticism that the two-parter was too one-sided in its portrayal of a country dealing with homelessness, telling Star Trek Monthly magazine in 1996 that, “People are still even writing that we only presented ‘one side’ in ‘Past Tense’ and that we should have presented ‘both sides’ and not just the ‘liberal’ point of view—and I’m still trying to think what that means.”

Watching from 2017, it would be easy and somewhat trite to say that the Trek writers “predicted” a divided America that seems to have forgotten its history— of slavery , of segregation , and of the hard work done to ease inequality in its many forms. But the final lines of “Past Tense” should serve as both a testament to the power of science fiction, and to how even the usually optimistic Star Trek was unsure of the near future. Bashir asks Sisko, “How could they have let things get so bad?” Sisko responds, “That’s a good question. I wish I had an answer.”

As Sisko returns in IDW's new flagship 'Star Trek' series, writers Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly weigh in (exclusive)

Benjamin Sisko is back from the Bajoran wormhole to save the galaxy from deadly god killers in IDW's Trektastic new series.

Accomplished comic book writers Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly ("Star Trek: Year Five," "Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty") are relishing their dream job of crafting compelling stories within the legendary sci-fi franchise for IDW Publishing's new "Star Trek" series starring "Deep Space Nine's" Commander Benjamin Lafayette Sisko.

Joining the veteran pair on this creative " Star Trek " odyssey is artist Ramon Rosanas (Marvel's "Star Wars,") and colorist Lee Loughridge ("The Batman Chronicles," "Deadly Class") in a planet-hopping mystery to discover why the cosmic gods are being murdered. 

Star Trek (2022-) #1 ebook: $1.99 at Amazon

You can get issue 1 of the relaunched "Star Trek" from IDW for just $1.99 at Amazon for Kindle. 

Here’s the official synopsis:

"It's Stardate 2378, and Benjamin Sisko has finally returned from the Bajoran Wormhole omnipotent. But his godhood is failing with every minute. Sent by the Prophets on a mission to the deepest parts of space aboard the U.S.S. Theseus, he witnesses the unthinkable: Someone is killing the gods. And only Sisko and his motley crew of Starfleet members from every era of 'Trek' can stop them."

"Star Trek #1" landed on Oct. 26 and the second issue of this remastered "Star Trek" project featuring familiar characters pulled from all corners of the canon arrived today, Nov. 30, as "Star Trek: #2." Space.com chatted at length with its eager architects, Lanzing and Kelly, about their bold plans moving forward at warp speed and what inspired them to tackle this Sisko-centric series from IDW.

"We are the nerds who were playing Star Trek role playing games in our living rooms ten years ago and the kids who grew up and used it to bond with our parents," Lanzing tells Space.com. "'Star Trek' is a continuous element in both of our lives. It helped form our friendship. It's helped connect to our friends and family. A lot of people responded well to " Star Trek: Year Five ," and now seeing the response to the new launch, we’re extremely lucky to be here. Not a lot of people get to touch this IP, especially not in comics. It’s a very small group, so getting the chance to come in on it is a real privilege. We just need to do right by "Star Trek" and do the work that we as fans would want to see. Otherwise we’d bury ourselves under pressure."

"Deep Space Nine" holds a special place in both of the writers' hearts and they share a deep affinity for the Benjamin Sisko character. This was the only open story territory that gave them enough runway to do something with and was exactly what they hoped to do for nostalgia's sake, which was to bring Sisko back out of the wormhole and throw him into his next big adventure. If you're as intrigued by the series as we are, check out our guide to the best Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episodes of all time.

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Star Trek (2022-) #2 ebook: $4.99 at Amazon

Issue 2 of "Star Trek" from IDW is available at its full ebook price for Kindle as of its Nov. 30 release.

"Sisko is the captain who doesn’t have his own show or his own feature film," Lanzing explained. "Avery Brooks seems like he has no intention of ever returning to the character. But his character specifically says he will return, in part because Avery Brooks himself was unhappy with the idea that the first Black captain was going to leave his son and disappear into the wormhole and become an absentee father. So he made them add a line that he was coming back. Then he never came back and so there's this giant question mark of what’s up with Sisko."

Lanzing and Kelly are approaching this project with a fan-first attitude, and their unbridled enthusiasm for the material is what people are most excited about.  

"We just have to keep telling stories that continue to bring us passion," Kelly said. "'Star Trek' is this universal language we can all love and adore and take something out of. But if we start thinking of ourselves as bigger than that I think we'd collapse under the responsibility and legacy we’re now so privileged to be playing a part in."

Relating to this rebooted flagship series that finds Sisko returning as a god and gathering a legacy crew borrowed from the "Star Trek" universe, the writing duo has put a fresh wrapping on a popular fan-favorite character. Lanzing explains the idea:

"We turned in a three-page document for 'Star Trek' and we came in with a very simple phrase, of 'Someone is killing the gods.' Within 'Star Trek' that might feel like an odd way to pivot in. In talking about 'Star Trek' and what made it specifically not 'Star Wars' or 'Battlestar Galactica' is that it plays with species that exist far beyond our technological level. Species that don’t operate the way that we do, that have the technological equivalent of magic. Those things are never threatened in 'Star Trek.' They're always at the top of the food chain and if those start getting taken out, that means you can put in our favorite captain, a character we knew we wanted to center this book around … Benjamin Sisko, the Emissary of the Prophets."

Their elevator pitch was, "Let’s do an 'Avengers' with 'Star Trek,'" and pull characters from different eras by setting it in a time where most of these characters were alive. It's a notion that alludes back to Marvel's "Original Sin" and "Thor: The God Butcher."

"I wouldn’t say we were necessarily riffing off any of those iconic series, however, we are fans of comics first and foremost and we love the power of the crossover," Kelly added. "And "Star Trek" is really the first shared universe in modern big-budget storytelling. With our sister book, ' Star Trek: Defiant ,' which launches next year, there’s nothing more exciting than having them slam into each other."

Ramon Rosanas' illuminating, retro-cool artwork truly captures the authentic "Star Trek" tone and greatly enhances Lanzing and Kelly's carefully composed storyline.

" Art in 'Star Trek' comics has had a certain look for a very long time and there’s only a few artists who’ve done it and done it successfully," Lanzing notes. "When editor Heather Antos came in, her immediate goal was to try to take the "Star Trek" art style and push it well beyond what people were used to, and to open up a space for different kinds of comics artists to come in and play.

"Up until now, there’s been a push to make the art feel like the actors, the likenesses. But at any given time we should see Benjamin Sisko, not just Avery Brooks. Ramon is great at both. He really is a remarkable artist and he’s a lot more understated than people would think. Then Lee Loughridge is a colorist we’ve wanted to work with for ages. He’s got a great eye for it and pushes stuff forward."

Kelly feels that Loughridge's veteran contributions are essential for the book’s ultimate success.

"Lee fills in and creates a lot of texture and depth to Ramon’s pencils," he noted. "Ramon is not hyper-focused on detail in terms of likenesses, which lets Lee play, which is incredibly important to trust your artist. Especially when you think of ' The Original Series ,' which was a very colorful show. They were constantly slamming things with purple lights and hot green."

Moving forward into the second issue and beyond, two temporary artists take over for series illustrator Rosanas, each one with a slightly different take on the style.

"Ramon is taking issues #2 and #3 off as he's doing a big crossover for #4, #5, and #6 later in the run," said Lanzing. "We have two one-off issues, #2 which takes readers deep into Klingon territory, and #3 is our Q issue. Knowing those were going to be two different tones, we brought in other artists to try some different stuff. Oleg Chudakov is going to be doing #2. He's a new Russian artist and much more expressive so you'll see that idea of pushing likeness before we lose the thread. Then we’ve got Joe Eisma, who did 'Morning Glories,' who’s an amazing artist and great at acting coming in to do Q before we bring back Ramon and settle into that tone."

Lanzing and Kelly are having a blast on this "Star Trek" title and the thrill is evident.

"We've been playing 'Star Trek' as a role-playing game for years so really one of the first jobs you have when thinking about 'Star Trek' is what pieces are on the table," Kelly adds. "Sometimes it's important to come in and build new things, but the danger can be getting so into the weeds that it can start to edge into fan fiction. We need to make sure our characters are earning it and everything is diegetic to the universe and the reality of 'Star Trek.'"

IDW Publishing's "Star Trek #2" lands on Earth on Nov. 30, 2022.

Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom or on Facebook .  

Join our Space Forums to keep talking space on the latest missions, night sky and more! And if you have a news tip, correction or comment, let us know at: [email protected].

Jeff Spry is an award-winning screenwriter and veteran freelance journalist covering TV, movies, video games, books, and comics. His work has appeared at SYFY Wire, Inverse, Collider, Bleeding Cool and elsewhere. Jeff lives in beautiful Bend, Oregon amid the ponderosa pines, classic muscle cars, a crypt of collector horror comics, and two loyal English Setters.

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See Captain Sisko Meet A Familiar Face From ‘Picard’ In Preview Of ‘Star Trek’ #20

| May 14, 2024 | By: TrekMovie.com Staff 10 comments so far

This week IDW’s ongoing Star Trek series continues the 6-issue “Pleroma” storyline with part 2 of the new arc that delves into the issues of divinity that have arisen since Sisko’s return from the celestial temple. Collin Kelly and Jackson Lanzing co-write the series with art by Megan Levens ( Buffy the Vampire Slayer , Starsigns ). We have covers and a preview of issue 20.

Star Trek #20

Having revealed their true godlike identity, T’Lir is relying on Captain Sisko to help repair Kahless’ damage to space-time and save their species from extinction. Despite the Prophets’ eerie warning that Sisko is forbidden at the Pleroma-a meeting place for god-level species at intersecting space-time coordinates-he and his crew head to the Utopia Planitia Federation Shipyards for a retrofit to the  Theseus  in preparation to boldly take on the unknown. Meanwhile, a mysterious figure from Section 31 approaches Lily with a mission, claiming the Federation’s future is in her hands..

Cover A by Megan Levens

Cover B by Taurin Clarke

RI cover by J.J. Lendl

Setup/credits:

Five-page preview:

Star Trek #20 available Wednesday

Star Trek #20 arrives on May 15. You can order issue 20 or upcoming issues at TFAW . Or pick up individual digital editions at Amazon/comiXology .

The new “Pleroma” arc continues through the summer. You can see covers for the next two issues arriving in June and July below…

The J.J. Lendl retailer incentive covers for “Pleroma” fit together to make a stained glass-style piece of art. Each cover features different “gods” from Star Trek history. You can see how all six Lendl covers fit together below…

Six covers by J.J. Lendl for “Pleroma”

Star Trek annual coming in July

The 2024 annual issue of the Star Trek series arrives on July 3. You can pre-order the digital edition at Amazon/comiXology . Here is the synopsis and cover:

With no one but himself to blame for his brother’s sudden escape during the Klingon Day of Blood, Lieutenant Commander Data sheds his Starfleet uniform for an ensemble inspired by none other than Sherlock Holmes to track down Lore’s whereabouts… and figure out what sinister plans he’s been scheming. With the one and only Miles O’Brien as his Watson at his side, there is no mystery that Detective Data can’t solve!

Cover A by Rachael Stott

Star Trek collection

Last month IDW released a hardcover collection of last year’s “Day of Blood” crossover of their ongoing Star Trek and Defiant series. The release collects Star Trek: Day of Blood , Star Trek: Day of Blood–Shaxs’ Best Day , Star Trek 2023 Free Comic Book Day issue, Star Trek issues #11–12, and Star Trek: Defiant issues #6–7. You can order now at Amazon for $27.99 or get the Kindle eBook version for $9.45 .

Keep up with all the Star Trek comics news, previews and reviews in  TrekMovie’s comics category .

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Wait, Shaw doesn’t geek out on meeting Scotty?

Honestly I don’t think Shaw would be a fan of Scotty’s admitted penchant for inflating repair times as he mentioned in Relics and in the movies.

Shaw described his career as pretty boring before the events of Picard Season 3. If they give him too much action in this comic, could undermine that.

We need a Shaw / Titan-A show/cartoon/comic/podcast whatever

All the Shaw. 24/7. Please. What an enormous mistake knocking him off at the end of the season. He could have easily carried a very successful Titan series. Just a big waste of a terrific character and actor playing him, thrown away in favor of an ephemeral nostalgia squirt in service of an outgoing cast. Bah.

Why not a TV show? I want the Captain Shaw Chronicles. Start from his time at battle of Wolf 359 and go all the way to his days on the Titan. We know how the character ends, but we can still see how his journey was until he reached that end point.

Great to see the classic Connie.

Yes indeed! I’m sure Utopia Planetia had one there as a momento of their distinguished past glories. Arguably the most famous line of ships in Starfleet history.

Shaw should be court-martialed for that line about ignoring orders from Starfleet Command. And “we don’t have time to help a god. Oh nevermind, I wasn’t actually saying you were a god or that I cared”

What terrible writing

Also, “spent most of time, poking holes” – just like in PIC S3 !! Engineer my skidplate, guess he can only be useful when there’s an emergency that requires HIS specific skills, and no one else. Otherwise, he pawns it off to that vulcan assistant of his.

It had me at the “2001” reference.

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Published Dec 30, 2021

The Promise of Sisko's New Orleans

DS9 shows us that New Orleans will thrive at 600 years old, but we have work to do in the present to get it there.

StarTrek.com

Star Trek has offered many exciting visions of the future over the last 53 years. The most apparent ones are technological: faster-than-light travel, teleportation, and handheld long-distance communicators. These have an obvious appeal and have inspired real-world scientists. Perhaps even more attractive to many viewers, though, are the social innovations: the elimination of poverty and old prejudices, and a driving commitment to a grand shared future.Some of the ways this has played out in the different Star Trek media have been fairly subtle. For instance, Deep Space Nine revealed that its central character, Benjamin Sisko, was from New Orleans, Louisiana, where his father Joseph ran a Creole restaurant. This was only an offhand mention early on, but it gained greater significance once the plot actually took viewers to Earth and gave us a few brief views of the Big Easy in the 24th Century. Even then, the city was mainly just a backdrop for the interstellar action and personal drama that were the main focus of the stories. However, real-world developments since those episodes aired give New Orleans’ appearance in Deep Space Nine a haunting resonance that is no less optimistic than the other appealing developments of the Star Trek future. Realizing just why, though, requires us to take a hard look at the tensions between futurist fiction and modern reality.

Robert Lloyd

In 2018, New Orleans celebrated its 300th anniversary. In the eyes of many, especially as the city experiences a new round of devastating flooding, there is a good chance it will not survive to see 400.

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast, and the resulting failure of levees and floodwalls around New Orleans caused 80% of the city to be flooded. The apocalyptic images of the disaster made international news, as did subsequent investigations into the cause: in short, the city’s levees and floodwalls were not up to the task of effectively protecting it from even a medium-strength hurricane and the resulting storm surge. Several lessons were learned, and costly improvements to New Orleans’ flood protection systems made. Nevertheless, the recovery, in many ways, is still ongoing. Statements made in 2019 by the US Army Corps of Engineers (which has authority over many waterways and water control structures in the country) indicate that even the recent, highly expensive new installations will not be able to keep up with rising sea levels and growing storm intensity – both the effects of global, human-caused climate change.

New Orleans worked its way into this situation gradually over its centuries of existence. The city was founded in 1718 by French colonizers on land already long occupied and used by Indigenous people like the Chitimacha, Natchez, and Houma. The raised strip of land alongside the Mississippi River was seized by the French, who found it ideal for establishing control over access to the river and the shipping opportunities it promised. Other nearby land had proven too low and swampy for the purpose.

As the settlement grew into a port town, it attracted people from other areas, drawn by the promise of work and trade. Living space had to expand to accommodate these new arrivals. Surrounding wetlands were drained, and water walled off with levees. This process continued over the decades as New Orleans grew. Pumps were installed to quicken the drainage process. By the end of the 20th Century, the original settlement – now known as the French Quarter – was only a tiny fraction of the size of the total inhabited area of New Orleans and its suburbs. Today, the metropolitan area is surrounded by water – the Mississippi, Lake Pontchartrain, and adjacent wetlands – and roughly 50 percent of its area is below sea level. Large portions of the city are sinking still further in elevation as the installed pumps pull groundwater out of the soil. What’s more, the southern coast of Louisiana is gradually eroding away , thanks to rising sea levels, the canals cut through the coastal wetlands by oil and gas companies, and human alteration of the Mississippi’s natural systems of seasonal rises and sediment deposition. This means that less and less land and vegetation remain to protect New Orleans — as well as its surrounding smaller communities — from the threat of storm-related flooding.

But it doesn’t take a hurricane to soak New Orleans. The city often experiences localized flooding just from a heavy rainstorm, thanks to its low elevation and ever-present humidity. The problem is worsened by the fact that the pumps relied upon to move water from the city fail frequently .

In addition to the problems exacerbated by Climate change, poverty and crime have come to be endemic to the city. Although it remains a popular tourist destination, its national reputation has also suffered from the intractable nature of those issues, as well as the fact that parts of the metropolitan area (including those most damaged by Katrina) remain in relatively poor repair, or simply run down. However, this has not stopped moneyed newcomers from moving into the city, drawn by the relatively low cost of living and the easygoing lifestyle. No matter how well-intentioned these arrivals may be (or how badly the city needs to rebuild its population and tax base), many longtime residents are being priced out of the city. The rise of short-term rental properties (largely serving the tourist trade) is accelerating that process. Personal ties and local cultural traditions are eroding as more and more people are forced to move to the suburbs or even other cities.

How could any of this have been on the minds of the Deep Space Nine production team when they took us the Big Easy of the 24th Century,? It would have required a supernatural amount of foresight. Still, for those of us who appreciate Star Trek ’s optimistic vision of the future, we can take heart from the idea that New Orleans has the chance to overcome not only current challenges, but to thrive even 300 years from now. Yet how might this happen? How can we change the current state of things in any meaningful way to ensure New Orleans’ survival?

First of all, there’s nothing to suggest that the Siskos’ home is not the city which currently exists – we have no reason to assume this is a “New New Orleans” established in, possibly, a safer location. That being the case, New Orleans appears to be one of the rare major cities to have survived World War III, as referenced in Star Trek: First Contact and a number of TV episodes. It’s a safe bet to assume that the city also successfully weathered any number of hurricanes over that period! But like many cities that experience war or disaster, it could have suffered significant devastation, followed by rebuilding. What might be the state of New Orleans in the 24th Century, compared to the 21st?

It’s tough to tell from the TV series alone – we are shown only tiny portions of the city onscreen, and glean a few other details from dialogue. We know that Sisko’s Creole Kitchen is somewhere in the French Quarter, which is located on the high ground near the river and is one of the parts of the city most likely to escape severe flooding. The episodes “Homefront”, “Paradise Lost,” and “Image in the Sand” show us some glimpses of the street and other buildings outside the restaurant – the Old World architecture and greenery-draped balconies familiar to residents and tourists seem to still be present in the future (unless they are recreations, which is always a possibility).

A couple of New Orleans landmarks are also mentioned in Deep Space Nine . In “Image in the Sand,” Joseph mentions meeting Ben’s mother in Jackson Square, a park also in the French Quarter. In the same episode, Jake mentions himself and Joseph planning to go to Armstrong Park, not too far from the Quarter, to listen to music. Both these excursions seem more reasonable than Joseph’s suggestion to his son in “Homefront” that they take a “stroll” to Audubon Park in the hour Ben has free before returning to Starfleet Headquarters – located on higher ground, Audubon Park is some six miles from the French Quarter! However, the mention does help us pin another aspect of present-day New Orleans to its future version. Beyond that, we can speculate that Joseph and Benjamin might be able to catch some unmentioned future form of high-speed urban transport to the park itself, where they would then take their “stroll”.

We can get a little more information from non-TV media. The book Typhon Pact: Rough Beasts of Empire includes the death of Joseph Sisko, and describes the route of his jazz funeral , a beloved New Orleans tradition familiar even to people who have never been to the city. The procession travels down St. Charles and Nashville Avenues and up Soniat Street, moving through parts of the Uptown and Freret neighborhoods on its way to the Katrina Memorial – areas that were flooded after that hurricane and could be again, temporarily or permanently, in the event of another widespread failure of the city’s water management infrastructure. Although this leaves huge areas of New Orleans unaccounted for, most of them currently packed with densely gridded streets lined with shotgun houses, the fact that these places still exist and can be traversed on foot in the time of Deep Space Nine does suggest the ongoing maintenance of the city and the systems that protect and support it. (The book also mentions New Orleans hosting a maglev train, indicating improvements in local transportation too – maybe that’s how the Siskos got to Audubon Park?)

Back on TV, the episode “The Visitor” shows us a possible future in which Jake is living in “the bayou.” His exact location in Louisiana is unspecified, but it’s likely near New Orleans, since he moved there as an adult to be closer to his grandfather. So, besides the defenses for the city itself, surrounding areas are still habitable despite the coastal erosion. We know that the 24th Century offers powerful geoengineering techniques (the Next Generation episode “Family” tells us there is even a project in the works to lift a new continent from the sea), and it’s worth considering whether future science, possibly technologies yet to be invented, are needed to save our own New Orleans.There are plans in motion already. Regular diversions of sediment-laden water from the Mississippi to coastal wetlands , strategic vegetation plantings to catch and anchor soil , and other techniques are being employed to try to rebuild the coast, or at least slow its disappearance.  Following Katrina, a team of architects, engineers, and urban planners worked together to generate the Urban Water Plan – a sweeping, holistic redesign of the city’s water management systems, intended to “let the water in” via extended canal systems, urban wetlands, and other features, rather than relying so completely on unsustainable levees and floodwalls to hold it out. Seeking to enable engagement with the area’s watery nature, rather than denial of it, the Urban Water Plan is ambitious and innovative, but would also be expensive. Although it was introduced in 2013, to date only fairly small, piecemeal drainage improvements have begun to be implemented.

As important as the structure of New Orleans to its future, though, are less tangible factors. Even if Star Trek doesn’t tell us much about the physical nature of its future New Orleans, it does have some things to say about the social aspects of the city and the world it exists in. Joseph Sisko being specifically a Creole chef, anchors the Siskos with detail grounded in the real world. Dishes like gumbo (referenced in “Homefront”) and etouffee (“Image in the Sand”) appear to still be staples of New Orleans eating. Joseph’s complaint in “Homefront” that his doctor “ can’t tell the difference between Creole food and Cajun food ” suggests a commitment to preserving the standards of such traditions and the distinctions between them, but he’s also not opposed to attempting a Creole/Ferengi fusion dish, suggesting in the same story he might try cooking tube grubs with a remoulade !

That blend of the traditional with a willingness to experiment is also at the heart of jazz music, which has its origins in New Orleans and is also seen to still be treasured in the 24th Century – aside from the Siskos, we even see Riker playing it on the trombone in the Next Generation story “11001001” (in a holodeck recreation of a Bourbon Street bar, no less!). Other clues, like the local architecture, and the indications in “Paradise Lost” that the Sisko restaurant doesn’t use replicators, lend further credence to the preservation of tradition even in a world of technological wonders and the influence of cultures from light-years away. This suggests that the social structure of Earth in the future of Star Trek allows people the consideration, and even the support, to go on doing valued work in their own way, even when that work and the methods of doing it might seem at first look to be inefficient. Sisko’s Creole Kitchen is clearly valued by its community, judging from the number of customers we see.

It also must not be overlooked that many of the celebrated New Orleans customs mentioned here – Creole cuisine, jazz music and funeral processions – are the products first and foremost of the city’s Black residents, with strong links to African traditions. African-Americans in fact represent a majority of the New Orleans population, and have for decades. These truths are often glossed over or omitted entirely by businesses, tourism agencies, and other entities trading on New Orleans history and culture.

Although Star Trek presents racism among humans as a thing of the past, that does not mean the history of racism and the unequal power relationships it represents will be unremembered in the 24th Century. In fact, race is very much on Ben Sisko’s mind when he voices his discomfort with Vic’s, the mid-20th Century Las Vegas holodeck program, in “Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang”. Based on his speech in that episode, the Siskos’ identity as Black men is still very real in the 24th Century, even if it does not compromise their equal status in Earth society. The presentations of Joseph Sisko operating a Creole restaurant, and his life celebrated with a jazz funeral, indicate that not only are iconic local traditions still alive in the New Orleans of Deep Space Nine , but the city’s Black residents maintain some ownership of them, and are honored for that fact – one more piece of the picture of a more equal and just society that Star Trek sets out to portray throughout its various incarnations.

Ultimately, just as Star Trek doesn’t have much to say about how to really build a warp drive, it can’t tell us just how, 300 years from now, New Orleans might have overcome its infrastructural and social challenges. What it can do very well, though, is what Trek has always done: inspire.

Through its appearance in Deep Space Nine , we can take a good, hard look at New Orleans as it is, and think about what will be required not only to preserve its best aspects – its beauty, its hospitality, its rich blend of traditions from around the world - for people in the future to enjoy, but to give it and its residents the support and the drive to realize still further greatness. Doing so will require a collective will to execute massive and transformative projects such as the restoration of the Louisiana Coast and the re-engineering of the water infrastructure – and to do so without concern about monetary cost. It will take a willingness to let people live their lives and chart their destinies in an atmosphere of true equality and respect. If New Orleans can overcome physical rigors, and navigate social difficulties to allow people to live in harmony and shared prosperity, it will live on to stand as a beautiful exemplar for what Star Trek is all about.

Robert L. Lloyd is a PhD student at Georgia State University’s Urban Studies Institute, in Atlanta. He loves both Star Trek and New Orleans deeply and unconditionally.

Early life [ ]

Jake Sisko is born

Jake was born in 2355 , one year after his parents met. ( DS9 : " Move Along Home ", " Emissary ", " The Abandoned ", " The Visitor ") His birth was planned: his parents decided to have a child, and his father excitedly created a nursery , including a starscape on the ceiling which the future Jake came to love. When they moved out of their house, young Jake couldn't understand why they couldn't just take the starscape with them. ( DS9 : " Explorers ")

Jake aboard the Saratoga in 2366

In 2366 , Jake was living with his parents on the USS Saratoga , where his father was first officer . Late that year, eleven-year-old Jake lost his mother at the Battle of Wolf 359 , during which the Saratoga was destroyed by a Borg cube shortly after he and his father escaped the ship. Jake subsequently moved to the Utopia Planitia Fleet Yards on Mars , where his father moved into a new posting. Together, they frequently played baseball on the holodeck there and often went fishing at a lake on Earth . ( DS9 : " Emissary ")

Prior to 2367 , the Sisko family made a camping trip to Itamish III , where Jake learned water skiing . While on a camping trip on a planet in the Gamma Quadrant in 2370 , Jake would recall this vacation as the happiest time he and his parents had had together. ( DS9 : " The Jem'Hadar ")

Deep Space 9 [ ]

In 2369 , Jake accompanied his father to his new posting, Deep Space 9 in orbit of Bajor . He was not enthusiastic about living on the space station and would initially have preferred living on Bajor. However, he gradually came to accept it after meeting Nog, who became his best friend. Jake was a good influence on Nog, who enrolled in a school run by Keiko O'Brien . There, Nog learned to read and write, and Jake expanded his studies. ( DS9 : " A Man Alone ") Jake's father became concerned with his friendship with Nog, worried that Nog would be a bad influence on Jake. When Nog was forbidden to attend school, Commander Sisko was relieved and hoped the relationship would end. But the two still spent time together and it was discovered that Jake was tutoring Nog. Seeing that the friendship, rather than being a bad influence, was beneficial to Jake, Commander Sisko allowed the two to continue spending time together. ( DS9 : " The Nagus ")

Jake asking Odo to arrest him

Jake had many adventures on the space station. He was one of the first infected by a virus left by the resistance on the space station that caused aphasia . ( DS9 : " Babel ") During a camping trip in the Gamma Quadrant , Jake and his father ran into the Jem'Hadar . When his father was captured, Jake, along with Nog, used the runabout Rio Grande to alert a search party looking for them. ( DS9 : " The Jem'Hadar ") In 2371 , Jake, his father , and Miles O'Brien became trapped in an former ore -processing unit when an old Cardassian security system was activated and the station was threatened with destruction. They were saved when they were able to reach the main control junction and shut down the program. ( DS9 : " Civil Defense ")

During the Bajoran Gratitude Festival , Jake became enamored with Major Kira , who was in love with Vedek Bareil at the time. However, this later turned out to be a side effect of Lwaxana Troi 's Zanthi fever , which projected amorous feelings for the person who was closest to her at the time – and that was Kira. ( DS9 : " Fascination ") He also helped his father pilot a replica of an ancient Bajoran space vessel , which Sisko built, on a journey to Cardassia to prove that the Bajorans reached Cardassia without the aid of warp technology. ( DS9 : " Explorers ") When Sisko was later promoted to Captain that year, Jake had the honor of placing the fourth pip on his father's dress uniform . ( DS9 : " The Adversary ")

Jake watches his father hugging his grandfather goodbye in 2372

In 2372 , he accompanied his father to Earth during the Changeling scare. There, he experienced a taste of martial law , with troops in the streets and everyone subject to blood screenings , which was a way of verifying if one was Human or a Changeling. ( DS9 : " Homefront ") While on Earth, he was able to spend time with his grandfather, Joseph Sisko . He also witnessed the attempt by some Starfleet members to attempt an overthrow of the civilian government. They believed that a military-run government could best meet the threat of the Dominion . ( DS9 : " Paradise Lost ")

Professor Jennifer Sisko of the mirror universe kidnapped Jake in order to lure Captain Sisko back to her universe to help the rebellion build a copy of the USS Defiant for the rebels. She and Jake became very close, only to have Jake experience another loss when Jennifer was killed by the mirror Kira . ( DS9 : " Shattered Mirror ")

Jake possessed by a Pah-wraith

Over time, Jake became involved in Bajoran spiritual activities. When his father began having visions of the future of Bajor and Jake learned that the visions were harmful and could kill him, he ordered Dr. Bashir to operate and repair his father's synaptic nerves. He was taken over by a Pah-wraith , an evil prophet, who wished to destroy the wormhole. He was stopped by a Prophet who had taken over Kira. ( DS9 : " Rapture ", " The Reckoning ")

Jake together with a wounded Starfleet soldier on Ajilon Prime in 2373

Jake got a first-hand look at war when a Federation colony was attacked by Klingons . Amid the fighting and killing on Ajilon Prime , Jake helped out in the infirmary and was horrified to realize that war is not a romantic adventure. When trying to retrieve a generator for the infirmary, he became frightened by shelling and ran away terrified. After wandering across a wounded soldier he was unable to save or help, he returned to the infirmary and hid during another Klingon attack as the hospital was evacuated. As the Klingons entered the facility to give chase to those trying to escape underground, he grabbed a phaser rifle and fired in panic, causing the ceiling to crash in on the Klingons, stopping their advance. He was hailed as a hero for having delayed the enemy and bought everyone else time to escape, despite having courageously revealed the truth and writing an article about the fine line between courage and cowardice, which only served to further impress his father, who told Jake he was proud of him. ( DS9 : " Nor the Battle to the Strong ")

The Dominion War [ ]

Jake played a prominent role in the war against the Dominion. After the Second Battle of Deep Space 9 , Jake elected to stay behind as a front-line reporter on the war, reasoning that his status as the son of the Emissary would prevent the Dominion forces from harming him for fear of angering the Bajorans. ( DS9 : " Call to Arms ") Jake clashed somewhat with Weyoun 5 , the Vorta leader of the Dominion forces aboard the station. Weyoun was disturbed by Jake's use of the word "occupation" in his reports for the Federation News Service to describe the nonaggression pact between the Dominion and Bajor and concluded that Jake was biased against the Dominion and refused to transmit his stories to the outside world for publication. When Jake insisted on freedom of the press , Weyoun smiled and replied, " Please, tell me you're not that naïve. " ( DS9 : " A Time to Stand ")

Jake joined Major Kira and Rom in forming a resistance cell on Deep Space 9. They attempted to sabotage the station. ( DS9 : " Behind the Lines ") Later, they were arrested, with Rom sentenced to death. Tora Ziyal and Quark rescued them and together they took the weapons off-line, with the help of Odo , which helped lead to the retaking of Deep Space 9. ( DS9 : " Sacrifice of Angels ") Later, after the station had been retaken by the Federation, Jake successfully published a collection of his stories about living on the station under Dominion rule. ( DS9 : " You Are Cordially Invited ")

Jake and Nog fight the Jem'Hadar aboard the runabout Shenandoah in 2374

In 2374 , Jake and Nog were traveling to Ferenginar when their runabout was attacked by a Jem'Hadar ship and they were rescued by the USS Valiant , manned and captained by an elite group of Starfleet Academy cadets called Red Squad . The ship was originally on a training mission but became trapped in Dominion space at the outbreak of the war and all the officers were killed, leaving the cadets to run the ship. Although Nog immediately hit it off with the crew, Jake had reservations. The captain of the ship decided to carry out the original mission and obtained information on a new Jem'Hadar battleship. They were able to complete their mission, but then the crew decided to attack the ship. Jake believed that this was a suicide mission . Captain Watters had Jake arrested and put in the brig . The Valiant was destroyed in the attack, with all hands killed except for Jake, Nog, and one crewman , all of whom escaped and were rescued by the USS Defiant . ( DS9 : " Valiant ")

Jake, looking out at the Bajoran wormhole with Colonel Kira

When Captain Sisko took an indefinite leave of absence and left Deep Space 9 after the death of Jadzia Dax and the closing of the wormhole by a Pah-wraith who entered into the body of Gul Dukat , Jake returned to Earth with his father to stay with his grandfather, Joseph Sisko. ( DS9 : " Tears of the Prophets ") After an assassination attempt on his father by a Pah-wraith cultist and a reunion with Ezri Dax , he helped his father find the Orb of the Emissary on the planet Tyree , which reopened the wormhole, freeing the Prophets. Jake then returned with his father to Deep Space 9, where he remained until the conclusion of the war. ( DS9 : " Shadows and Symbols ", " What You Leave Behind ")

Hobbies [ ]

Writing [ ].

Jake Sisko signing the title page of his novel Anslem

Jake did not follow in his father's footsteps to enter Starfleet , contrary to his father's initial expectations. ( DS9 : " Shadowplay ") However, he did inherit his father's love for art, surprising his father with the fact that he wrote poetry. ( DS9 : " The Abandoned ") Eventually developing a fondness and talent for writing, he considered enrolling at the Pennington School in New Zealand on a writing fellowship . He started at least two works: Anslem , a novel, and the short story " Past Prologue ". Later, Jake joined the Federation News Service as a war correspondent, remaining on Deep Space 9 while it was under Dominion control and placing himself in considerable danger. He was present on the USS Defiant during the invasion of the Chin'toka system . Jake was a gifted writer but a horrible speller. ( DS9 : " The Muse ", " The Ascent ", " Call to Arms ", " Tears of the Prophets ")

Cooking [ ]

Like his father, Jake had been taught cooking from an early age by his grandfather and regularly enjoyed cooking, his skills gaining the surprised admiration of his mirror mother , calling his family's expert cooking skills the "cooking gene" which supposedly all Siskos shared. ( DS9 : " Shattered Mirror ") Jake frequently impressed residents of Deep Space 9, including his father, with his abilities in the kitchen. ( DS9 : " Rapture ")

Sports and games [ ]

Jake and his father shared a fondness for baseball, a fondness shared by Kasidy Yates; the pair or trio often visited the holosuites on Deep Space 9 and re-enact famous historical matches. Jake considered London Kings player Buck Bokai to be " the greatest hitter of all time ". Jake also enjoyed playing dom-jot with Nog . ( DS9 : " The Abandoned ", " The Storyteller ", " Life Support ", " Little Green Men ", " Shattered Mirror ")

Personal relationships [ ]

Jake Sisko's family came from New Orleans , Louisiana , with ancestry from Africa . His father kept several African masks on the wall in his quarters, after retrieving them from storage on Earth. ( DS9 : " The Search, Part I ") His aunt, Judith , lived in Portland . ( DS9 : " Past Tense, Part I ")

Jake (right) with his father in 2375

Jake and his father enjoyed a strong relationship; the two especially shared a love of baseball, and regularly played the game together in Quark's holosuites. ( DS9 : " Emissary ", " If Wishes Were Horses ", etc.) Jake and Nog even went to great lengths to acquire an original Willie Mays baseball card for his father as a "cheering up" present. ( DS9 : " In the Cards ")

Jake introduced his father to his second wife, Kasidy Yates, despite some initial reluctance due to her occupation as a " freighter captain " and served as best man at their wedding. ( DS9 : " Explorers ", " Family Business ", " 'Til Death Do Us Part ")

Jake's paternal grandfather was Joseph Sisko. Whenever Jake visited his grandfather's restaurant, Sisko's Creole Kitchen , the latter made him scrub oysters or peel potatoes . When Jake was young, Joseph would tell him that the alligator that hung off of his restaurant's ceiling came down at night and guarded the restaurant, and that during the day it was in stasis . ( DS9 : " Homefront ")

Both his father and grandfather would call Jake by his nickname, " Jake-o ", from time to time. ( DS9 : " Paradise ", " The Maquis, Part I ", " The Jem'Hadar ", " Civil Defense ", " Explorers ", " Family Business ", " The Visitor ", " Indiscretion ", " Homefront ", " Shattered Mirror ", " Sacrifice of Angels ", " The Reckoning ")

Friends [ ]

" Noh-Jay Consortium " negotiating

Upon arrival at Deep Space 9, Jake quickly became friends with Nog despite the differences between their cultures, even teaching the young Ferengi how to read and encouraging him to attend Keiko O'Brien's school. This friendship endured, and Jake and Nog eventually moved in together when Nog returned from Starfleet Academy on Earth. He encouraged Nog to apply to Starfleet. ( DS9 : " Heart of Stone ")

Jake and Nog occasionally sat on the Promenade and watched "the women" arriving on the station. ( DS9 : " Move Along Home ", " The Storyteller ", " The Maquis, Part I ")

In 2373 - 2374 , Jake and Nog shared quarters together. They were located in Section M of the habitat ring . Prior to this he lived in his father's quarters. ( DS9 : " The Ascent ")

When Nog was wounded during the Siege of AR-558 and lost a leg, Jake tried to help him adjust. Nog was spending a lot of time in the Vic Fontaine holoprogram . When Jake came into the holosuite , Nog became enraged and punched Jake, but Jake continued to try to help his friend. ( DS9 : " It's Only a Paper Moon ")

For a short time while Nog was on a mission with the Defiant , Jake hung out with Quark and observed him as he was conducting a "nefarious deal." ( DS9 : " The Sound of Her Voice ")

Romances [ ]

Jake went on his first date in 2370 , with a young Bajoran woman named Laira . ( DS9 : " The Homecoming ") Following the end of that relationship, Jake started going out with another Bajoran, this time a dabo girl named Mardah , until 2371 , believing he was in love. ( DS9 : " Sanctuary ", " Playing God ", " The Abandoned ", " Fascination ") Following their break-up, Jake began dating a Human woman named Leanne . ( DS9 : " Life Support ", " Explorers ") By 2375 , Jake was dating a Bajoran woman named Kesha . ( DS9 : " It's Only a Paper Moon ")

Alternate future [ ]

Jake Sisko in his thirties

Jake Sisko in the mid- 25th century

In an alternate timeline , Jake was a great writer who retired at the age of forty. He revealed to a young admirer who visited him in his New Orleans home that he retired because of the death of his father, when Jake was eighteen years old. Captain Sisko was "killed" when he and Jake were on the Defiant to view the inversion of the wormhole. Sisko was killed when a bolt of energy from the warp core hit him as he pushed Jake out of its way.

After his father's death, Jake was visited several times by his father who, it turned out, was not actually dead. His father's temporal signature had been altered and he was appearing and disappearing due to the fluctuations of the signature. Attempts by the crew to save him failed and he dematerialized.

During this timeline, the station was turned over to the Klingon Empire , and Jake returned home, where he married a Bajoran woman named Korena and began writing.

In his thirties, however, his father appeared to him again, and, obsessed with trying to find a way to save him, Jake abandoned his writing and devoted his life to trying to free his father from the subspace field in which he was trapped. All attempts to free his father failed; it was only near the end of his life that Jake realized that the only way to save his father was for Jake to die, at the moment when his father returned and was with him in normal space, so the bond between the two would sever and the elder Sisko would be returned to the time of the accident. He poisoned himself to ensure that he would die when his father was with him; as he died, his father was returned to the Defiant , and dodged the energy burst, thereby avoiding the accident and giving Jake a second chance at life with his father. ( DS9 : " The Visitor ")

Appendices [ ]

Appearances [ ].

• " Emissary "
• " A Man Alone "
• " Move Along Home "
• " The Nagus "
• " The Storyteller "
• " Progress "
• " If Wishes Were Horses "
• " In the Hands of the Prophets "
• " The Homecoming "
• " The Circle "
• " The Siege "
• " Second Sight "
• " Sanctuary "
• " The Alternate "
• " Whispers "
• " Shadowplay "
• " Playing God "
• " The Jem'Hadar "
• " The Search, Part I "
• " The Search, Part II " (simulation)
• " Equilibrium "
• " The Abandoned "
• " Civil Defense "
• " Fascination "
• " Life Support "
• " Heart of Stone "
• " Explorers "
• " Family Business "
• " The Adversary "
• " The Visitor "
• " Indiscretion "
• " Little Green Men "
• " Homefront "
• " Paradise Lost "
• " Hard Time "
• " Shattered Mirror "
• " The Muse "
• " For the Cause "
• " Apocalypse Rising "
• " Nor the Battle to the Strong "
• " The Assignment "
• " The Ascent "
• " Rapture "
• " Doctor Bashir, I Presume "
• " Business as Usual "
• " Blaze of Glory "
• " In the Cards "
• " Call to Arms "
• " A Time to Stand "
• " Rocks and Shoals "
• " Sons and Daughters "
• " Behind the Lines "
• " Favor the Bold "
• " Sacrifice of Angels "
• " You Are Cordially Invited "
• " Far Beyond the Stars "
• " The Reckoning "
• " Valiant "
• " The Sound of Her Voice "
• " Tears of the Prophets "
• " Image in the Sand "
• " Shadows and Symbols "
• " Afterimage "
• " Take Me Out to the Holosuite "
• " Once More Unto the Breach "
• " It's Only a Paper Moon "
• " Penumbra "
• " 'Til Death Do Us Part "
• " What You Leave Behind "

Background information [ ]

Jake was played by Cirroc Lofton . The young Jake seen in " Emissary " was played by Thomas Hobson . The middle-aged and the elderly Jake in " The Visitor " was played by Tony Todd .

The original 1992 Writer's Bible for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine [2] gave this biography for the character:

Jake Sisko, the commander's son. An Army brat who doesn't remember life on Earth, has been aboard four different starships, and stationed on two planets. This transient life style has taught him how to scope out a new terrain and assimilate quickly. At the same time he has an inner fear of forming new friendships because he loses them so easily. He dreams of going to live on Earth. He collects holodeck programs of various places on Earth that he uses to try to fulfill his fantasy. Deep inside he knows that his mom would still be alive if they did not live in space, and he has a suppressed bitterness about it. His father promised there would be other kids on the station; as it turns out there are only a handful of various alien species. Only one is his age, Nog, a Ferengi teenage boy who is a bad influence. Jake is close with his dad; they are buddies. The boy has no technical expertise at all. He struggles with his homework but is dedicated to doing his best.

On creating the dynamic of Jake and Ben, Michael Piller explained, " We felt that a father and son relationship would be a different relationship than any other Star Trek kind of hero that we've seen before. " ( Trek: Deep Space Nine: The Unauthorized Story , p. 9)

Ronald D. Moore has commented, " Until we hit on Jake as a writer (in " The Abandoned " as I recall) we didn't really have a role for him within the context of the show. No one wanted to go down the Wesley Crusher super-genius road again, and it just took a while to find Jake's niche on the station. " ( AOL chat , 1997 )

Speaking in 1999 , shortly before filming finished on " What You Leave Behind ", Cirroc Lofton said, " Jake, like most children, was finding himself, and trying to see where he was going to be in the whole overall scheme of things, and I believe that he just really grew up on the show, he went from adolescence to manhood, where he's now discovering himself, on his own, and coming into his own self, so he knows what he wants to do, he's found things that he's interested in, and he went from being a kid to being this young man ready to face the world, and ready to take on new challenges. I think that's really the evolution of this character, he was just there to show you there are children, and there are ways to cope with this lifestyle in space, and you can mature, and you don't have to be a Starfleet officer necessarily. " ("Crew Dossier: Jake Sisko", DS9 Season 7 DVD , Special Features)

Despite being a regular cast member throughout all seven seasons of the show, Jake Sisko appeared in only seventy-one of the show's 173 episodes. In season 7, again despite his status as a regular for the whole season, he was in only nine of twenty-six episodes – and less than that of two recurring characters, Nog and Damar (eleven each). Another recurring yet nonspeaking character, Morn , appeared in ninety-two episodes across the series.

Jake is the only member of the main DS9 cast to not have a mirror universe counterpart as the mirror counterparts of his parents, Benjamin Sisko and Jennifer Sisko , separated before his counterpart could be born. He is the also the only character in the Star Trek universe known not to have a mirror counterpart.

Although the Dominion creates a hallucination including him, Jake is one of only two main characters in the spin-offs of Star Trek made from 1987 to 2005 ( TNG - ENT ) to not have appeared as a holographic duplicate . The other is Ezri Dax .

Jake is the only Human regular character on any Star Trek series who was not in Starfleet and never wore a Starfleet uniform .

Apocrypha [ ]

In the Pocket DS9 series of novels , Jake's full name is given. His full first name, "Jacob", is mentioned in the novelization of Emissary , and his middle name, "Isaac", in Avatar, Book One .

According to the Star Trek: The Lost Era novel Deny Thy Father , Jake was born in San Francisco on Father's Day, June 12th, 2355. His father was on paternity leave from the USS Livingston at the time and was able to attend the delivery.

In Rising Son , he travels into the wormhole looking for his father and becomes lost in the Gamma Quadrant . He joins a ship of treasure hunters and eventually discovers Kai Opaka . He helps bring her home and unwittingly participates in finding a lost civilization in the Idran system .

In Worlds of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine novella Fragments and Omens , Jake meets and marries a Bajoran woman named Azeni Korena (Rena for short), whom Benjamin Sisko met in the alternate timeline of the " The Visitor ".

In the Star Trek: Enterprise novel The Good That Men Do , Jake is approached by Nog with recently declassified files from the early days of the Federation, and the two investigate the "death" of Charles Tucker III and the actual founding of the Federation. It also mentions that Jake and Korena had a daughter named Jennifer after Jake's mother.

In the 1990s, several Star Trek: Deep Space Nine young adult novels featured several adventures of Jake and Nog.

In the short story "Ha'mara" from the anthology book Prophecy and Change , Jake accompanied his father, Major Kira, and Dr. Bashir on a trip to Bajor shortly after their arrival to Deep Space 9 and Sisko and Kira get trapped in an underground cave-in and are believed dead. During the rescue operation, Bashir gives Jake a PADD on which to write his thoughts. This would prove to be the beginning of his love of writing.

In Star Trek Online 's background material, including the novel The Needs of the Many , Jake is working as a journalist , and conducts interviews with a number of characters on current events in the chronology. Among other things, he sneaks into First City on Qo'noS in 2388 to interview Worf as the latter is recuperating from injuries sustained by Nero in Star Trek: Countdown , and is warned not to return to Klingon space for his own safety due to the Federation's current unpopularity in the Klingon Empire . The Needs of the Many also states that his novel Anslem is considered one of the great works of contemporary literature in the 25th century .

Jake Sisko of the alternate reality

The alternate reality version of Jake Sisko appears in the fifth issue of the Star Trek: Ongoing story arc The Q Gambit where he is a member of the Free Federation Resistance stationed on the Resistance outpost planet Paradise alongside Jadzia Dax until it was bombed by the Dominion. They manage to gather survivors and take cover among the trees and dodged ground forces until they left. When the Defiant arrives the next day, Jake and Dax are reunited with Benjamin Sisko and Odo and Jake is surprised to see James T. Kirk with them as Jake explains that he grew up reading about Kirk from Starfleet histories his dad would sneak past the Klingon quarantine on Earth. He then asks Kirk how he got here, to which Kirk explains that he and his crew were brought over a hundred years into the future by Q to face a no-win scenario . When Sisko later becomes a host to the last Prophet, Jake believes it was killing him, but Sisko assures his son that he was okay and has never felt more alive.

External links [ ]

• Jake Sisko at StarTrek.com
• Jake Sisko at Wikipedia
• Jake Sisko at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• Jake Sisko at the Star Trek Online Wiki