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Star Trek: What Happened To Captain Sisko After Deep Space Nine?

In the annals of "Star Trek" history, Benjamin Sisko is among the most notable captains the Federation has ever seen. Played by Avery Brooks, Sisko commanded the Deep Space Nine outpost, the setting of the 1992-1999 series "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine." But until last year, it was unclear what happened to Sisko after that series ended. Now, thanks to a new comic book series, his story continues.

As "Deep Space Nine" wore on, it became more serialized, focusing on the events of the Dominion War fought against the changelings of the Dominion who were bent on conquering the galaxy. The series concluded with the episode "What You Leave Behind," chronicling the final stand against the Dominion by Sisko and his crew. But in the final moments of the battle, in the Fire Caves of Bajor, Captain Sisko is transported to the Celestial Temple, a wormhole home to beings called Prophets whom the Bajorans worship as deities. One of the Prophets, taking the form of Sisko's mother (Deborah Lacey), tells him he must remain in the Temple as their emissary. He obliges, remaining in that dimension to learn their secrets.

What happened to Sisko after the "Deep Space Nine" finale has long remained a subject of much speculation. In the finale, Sisko tells his wife, Kasidy (Penny Johnson) that time in the Celestial Temple is nonlinear and that he could return to her at any point in time, including her own past. Recently, however, a "Star Trek" comic book series shed some light on the next steps in Sisko's journey.

Benjamin Sisko's post-war exploits continue in a new comic series

While Avery's Benjamin Sisko has not appeared on-screen in any "Star Trek" movies or TV shows since the "Deep Space Nine" finale, a recent comic book series reveals what happened following those events. The comic is "Star Trek," the first issue of which was published in October 2022 by IDW, and it picks up where "Deep Space Nine" left off.

The comic begins with a prescript narrated by Benjamin's son, Jake, who was played by Cirroc Lofton on "Deep Space Nine." Three years after Benjamin went to the Celestial Temple, in 2378, it confirms that Jake has neither seen nor heard from his father since. As the story begins, Benjamin emerges on the Deep Space Nine outpost, noting that he has spent an "eternity" in the Celestial Realm. Though he considers his return an "exile from paradise," he has been sent back to warn of an encroaching apocalypse. He maintains his extradimensional connection to the Celestial Temple and the godlike powers that come with it.

Sisko enlists the help of Captain Jean-Luc Picard , noting that Picard's brief assimilation by the Borg should make him sympathetic. Picard assigns Data to be Sisko's first officer, and they take the USS Theseus to the Hephaestus nebula. There, an unseen ship kills an entire race of planet-consuming crystalline entities, an act Data refers to as genocide. As Sisko and his crew continue to explore in subsequent issues, they discover a grand conspiracy. As of this writing, nine issues of "Star Trek" have been published, with more on the way to tell the continued story of Benjamin Sisko.

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Benjamin Sisko

• View history

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 ISS Enterprise (NCC-1701)
• 3 Odyssey class

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.

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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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Benjamin Sisko Deserves Real Recognition in Star Trek: Picard

With the show far from over, I hope the creators mend an epically broken fence.

• Author of Taking your Android Tablets to the Max

With season 2 of Star Trek: Picard now airing and production on the final season wrapping up, the final days of the most beloved Starfleet Captain will soon be upon us. So far we've seen a fantastic combination of trips down memory lane with Riker or Seven, and glimpses at what Earth and beyond look like in the aftermath of stories we've consumed over the last 35 years, but what comes next? 

Adm. Jean-Luc Picard has touched a great deal of Starfleet history, and many of those actors are still around to help tell those stories, but there's one particular point in the timeline I want him to pay respect to more than anything else. Picard needs to pay his respects to Ben Sisko in a much better way than we saw in this week's episode. 

When Cmdr. Benjamin Sisko was introduced to the world as the main character for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, several seemingly massive (at the time) risks were taken. Sisko was being played by the inimitable Avery Brooks, making him the first Black lead in a Star Trek series at a time where Black leads happened infrequently, especially in science fiction. 

But more than this, Ben Sisko hated Jean-Luc Picard. Viewers are treated to an angry conversation between these two incredible characters in the very first episode, followed a few episodes later with a rebuke of the way Jean-Luc conducts himself as Ben Sisko punches the godlike alien Q right in his face. Q's reaction of "You hit me! Picard never hit me," followed by Sisko's half-angry, half-excited "I'm not Picard!" has stuck with me ever since. It couldn't have been more clear that this new show was not like the other Star Trek shows you'd seen before, and that split audiences in a fairly significant way at the time. 

It's understandable Picard's first season would focus on two of the most significant ongoing stories in Jean-Luc's life and career, the persistent fight to have his best friend and all other synthetic life respected as sentient lives the same as ours and the endless struggle with the Borg's desire to have all life exist as a single forced consciousness. Episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation where Data's personhood was called into question are some of the most profound in the series, a notion Star Trek: Voyager continued beautifully with Seven of Nine. 

Jean-Luc's legacy is defined by recognition of the individual, regardless of race or origin, and what we've seen in Picard so far pays great respect to that legacy while enjoyably furthering it. But before this story is over, I really hope the struggles of Deep Space Nine and its long departed captain are recognized with greater respect than this most recent episode.

Spoiler ahead, obviously.  

Season 2, episode 2 of Picard gets dark fast as Q takes our main characters and moves them to a timeline where Earth was not part of a huge Federation of planets -- where instead, humanity had taken over the galaxy in the most brutal ways possible. A stroll through this dark Picard's trophy room revealed the skulls of Gul Dukat and General Martok, both made infamous in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Later in the episode, Confederation President Annika is asked if she wants to consult with General Sisko. It's assumed in this one, like that in this alternate timeline, Ben Sisko is both alive and attacking Vulcans. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine did have Mirror Universe episodes in which Sisko was an evil overlord of sorts, but that world and this are unrelated.) Either way, Ben Sisko and the characters of Deep Space Nine deserve so much more than this casual reference in a broken timeline.

As intense as Borg conflicts can be at times, the Dominion War told throughout Deep Space Nine had to have lasting effects on the Alpha Quadrant and Starfleet. In many ways the Dominion was held up as a dark reflection of the Federation: a collection of races aiming toward a common survival goal. Where the Federation demanded all planets and cultures had a say in how the whole would conduct itself, the Dominion led by fear and power and only existed for conquest. Its very existence would have challenged the way the Federation acted, especially after the Dominion successfully infiltrated Starfleet Headquarters. That conflict should have permanently changed the Federation and Starfleet in a way that would be obvious in this future world we see in Picard, and not in the bizarrely xenophobic way outlined early in the first season of this new series. 

But more than some reference to the Dominion War, I think some kind of resolution between Picard and Sisko is in order. I don't mean that I want to see Avery Brooks walk up to Sir Patrick Stewart and have a conversation. Sisko is gone -- and more than that, Avery Brooks appears to be happily retired. Instead, I would love to see some monologue where Picard reckons with that chapter of his life and how he was unable to help Sisko. In Deep Space Nine, Sisko regularly felt limited by Starfleet. With his passing, someone high-ranking like Picard would have had access to his personal logs. 

Seeing a Picard who felt like he still owed Ben Sisko something would be incredibly powerful, both to fans of the series and to establish a lasting connection between these incredible characters. This could even present itself in the form of a conversation with Ben Sisko's son Jake, especially with how engaged actor Cirroc Lofton is in the Star Trek fandom though his podcast recaps of every Star Trek episode.

Or maybe, just maybe, Jean-Luc should take a swing at Q the next time he sees him and tell him it was advice he got from someone he respected a great deal more than the godlike alien in front of him.

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Published Jun 7, 2020

O Captain, My Captain: On the Importance of Ben Sisko

We're celebrating the anniversary of DS9's finale by looking back at the legacy of Commander Benjamin Sisko

StarTrek.com

[This essay was originally published in 2012 on Racialicious.com. It has been reprinted with the permission of the original author.]

"Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, is like The West Wing. But in space. With a Black president. Kind of."

That’s normally how I find myself trying to describe the show to the uninitiated, as I firmly believe that it’s the Trek series you have to use when trying to get people into Trek canon — especially Black nerds, before Discovery' s rise. Deep Space Nine causes a strange division in the world of Trekkies. I’ve always found (non-scientifically?—?I just spend a lot of time at cons) that people either love it or loathe it. Meanwhile, I can’t wait to show it to my kids.

DS9 has your aliens and spaceships, and characters do occasionally say things like “set phasers to stun.” But all of that is more often than not outweighed through the gravitas brought to the show by the intricately laid political, wartime thriller plot, its critisisms of 20th century history and race relations in America, and its lead actor, Avery Brooks, who stars as Captain Benjamin Lafayette Sisko ?—? the first and only African-American captain to lead a televised Star Trek franchise.

The Star Trek franchise has always featured Black actors and actresses, well-developed Black characters, and even featured the first televised interracial kiss in the TOS episode "Plato’s Stepchildren." On Trek , racism is often dismissed on Earth as being as outdated as using money. Instead, racial politics between alien species are highlighted, rather than humans.

This model may have continued through DS9 had they hired any other actor to portray Captain Sisko. However, Brooks —? a Shakespearean-trained actor, graduate of Oberlin College, and the first Black student to earn an MFA in acting and directing from Rutgers University, where he was also a professor ?—? brought much of himself to the role, and that included an emphasis in the importance of the African-American and Black American experiences. Even nearly 300 years in the future, whether Star Trek fans were ready for it or not, DS9 brought the topic of race closer to home.

While I suspect the show's direct tone is one of the reasons DS9 isn’t as popular as its predecessors? —? along with the heavy emphasis on backroom politics instead of “seeking out bold new worlds”? —? if you didn’t like TNG chances are you’re going to love a show that goes out of its way in the pilot to distinguish Sisko from Captain Jean-Luc Picard . In the premiere, we learn Picard (while under control of the alien species The Borg) has killed Sisko’s wife.

In a meeting between the two, Sisko speaks to the TNG captain in a tone he’s likely never heard from a non-superior officer before, and Sisko’s dislike of the man ?— ?and the Deep Space 9 station itself? —? is made apparent. With that, Sisko distinguishes himself immediately as one of the few people with the mettle to speak openly to Picard. While the scene was likely included to make the segue from TGN to DS9 as smooth as possible with familiar faces, Picard does not exist to emerge the hero of the scene or to bring Sisko back into line, so to speak. Sisko is allowed his outrage, an incredibly rare thing for a Black man on television in the 1990s.

The meeting also introduces what would be one of the series’ most important subplots: Sisko is a family man in a way that neither Picard or Kirk ever were. He’s left a widower with an 11-year-old son, Jake Sisko (Cirroc Lofton), who is one of Sisko’s main motivations for not wanting the Deep Space 9 assignment. In William Shatner’s documentary The Captains , Brooks said it was important to him to portray a Black father on television that plays a positive role in his son’s life.

“I read the pilot, and said 'Well, this is very interesting to me,'” Brooks said. “A man dealing with loss, having to raise a child ?—? indeed, a male child?—? by himself, and be brown as we spin this tale in the 20th century about the 24th century.”

The depiction of the black father continued to be an important dynamic to Brooks through the show’s finale, when he initially thought writers were going to have Sisko abandon his son and unborn child. Upset by this decision he’s quoted as saying, “The producers told me, ‘Look we thought you’d be thrilled…The difference, of course, is you have Sisko with another child on the way. You still have Sisko with a young man [Jake Sisko] trying to find his way… That wasn’t fair.” [Shortened for Spoilers]. This view on ‘Parenting While Black’ is unique in the sci-fi fantasy genre. Often, Black parents tend to die off or abandon their children early in their lives, leaving unhappy, lonely and revenge-hungry children behind. Robin Wood ( Buffy ), Kendra Young ( Buffy ), Charles Gunn ( Angel ), Bonnie Bennett ( TVD ), and Walt Lloyd ( Lost ) come to mind immediately.

Even with an intergalactic war raging around them, Sisko was always there for Jake. They’re often shown having dinner together and Sisko is always eager to read over and help edit Jake’s stories and articles. He supports Jake’s decision to become a writer instead of going to the Starfleet Academy, even though that’s perhaps what he would have preferred. Episodes like "The Visitor" (guest starring Tony Todd as an older Jake Sisko) and In the Cards (where Jake tries to acquire a 1950s baseball card to cheer Sisko up during a stressful week) highlight the strength of the bond and loving relationship between father and son.

With a highly educated and vocal actor in the lead it’s no wonder you get get seven seasons of a series that takes the Black American experience to heart; Sisko’s character is specifically written to acknowledge the implications that the color of his skin bring. Not only do they write him an African-American girlfriend, Kassidy Yates , there are there are references to his New Orleans heritage, soul food, his love of baseball (particularly players Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson), and the various bits of African art we see decorating his quarters are all acknowledgements of his background throughout the show. But they never shy away from the cultural history of racism either. Sisko is still acutely aware of his past.

When his crew becomes infatuated with visiting “Vic’s,” a holosuite program set in a 1960s Las Vegas casino and lounge, Kasidy asks Sisko why he doesn’t want to join in on this Away Team Rat Pack Cosplay. His response is telling:

S isko : You want to know … you really want to know what my problem is? I’ll tell you: Las Vegas 1962, that’s my problem. In 1962, black people weren’t very welcome there. Oh sure, they could be performers or janitors, but customers? Never.

Kasidy : Maybe that’s the way it was in the real Vegas, but that is not the way it is at Vic’s. I have never felt uncomfortable there, and neither has Jake.

Sisko : But don’t you see? That’s the lie. In 1962, the civil rights movement was still in its infancy. It wasn’t an easy time for our people, and I’m not going to pretend that it was.

Kasidy : Baby? — I know that Vic’s isn’t a totally accurate representation of the way things were, but… it isn’t meant to be. It shows us the way things could’ve been ?— ?the way they should’ve been.

Sisko : We cannot ignore the truth about the past.

Kasidy : Going to Vic’s isn’t going to make us forget who we are or where we came from. What it does is reminds us that we are no longer bound by any limitations ?—? except the ones we impose on ourselves.

It’s a small moment in a 45-minute episode, but the fact that it’s acknowledged is important. Sisko is initially displeased with his crew’s little Mad Men fantasy and he’s allowed to express it, no matter how uncomfortable it may make the viewer feel.

In season five, Avery Brooks would direct " Far Beyond The Stars ," an episode that spends an entire 45 minutes dealing with race relations in mid-20th century America. The episode reimagines Sisko as a science-fiction writer named Benny Russell working for a racist and sexist New York magazine in the 1950s, where racism is present, but somehow subtler; it's more deceptive and innocent as it casually rolls off the tongues of people that Benny considers friends and colleagues. The magazine refuses to publish his stories about the character Benjamin Sisko, a Black starship captain.

When Benny’s editor finally does agree to publish his stories, he insists that the stories must be revealed to be the dreams (not the reality) of a poor Black man in their present time ?— ?because everyone knows the idea of a Black sci-fi hero is that unrealistic. With that, "Far Beyond the Stars" also reminds the viewer that despite the inclusive attitude the Trek franchise has embraced, science-fiction is still very much a white man’s world. For every single Octavia Butler there are five Joss Whedons. More pointedly, for every one Captain Sisko, there’s a Captain Picard, Captain Kirk, Han Solo, John Carter, and… well, you get the picture. With Sisko in the lead DS9 is self-aware and capable of criticizing the flaws of its own genre, and that’s something to appreciate.

I’m struck by how much more I understand this show at the age of 24, compared to when I rewatched it at 17, and before that when I originally watched from 1993 to 1999. I was only 11 when the finale aired (and grounded for a good deal of the season, but that’s another issue entirely) and while I vaguely understood the significance of Sisko, I admit to taking his presence ?—? the presence of a starring Black man ?— ?on my screen as normal. I like to think that Brooks would have appreciated that, knowing that part of his reasoning for accepting the role of Sisko was his belief that, “Brown children must be able to participate in contemporary mythology.”

In some ways the 1990s were a better landscape for a kid of color to get into science-fiction and fantasy. Not only did I have Sisko, there was Carl Lumbly as M.A.N.T.I.S , Wesley Snipes was Blade , Spawn aired on HBO and was made into a film, Cleopatra 2525 starring Gina Torres debuted in 2000, my favorite book series, Animorphs , starred Black and Latino teens, and Will Smith was king of the Summer sci-fi box office. When one looks at the scope of white genre heroes this isn’t a large number in comparison, but because Sisko was always there and when I felt the burden of whiteness in other genre media, I could always come home to DS9 .

My First Contact: Kendra James

Kendra James is the Managing Editor of StarTrek.com. Follow her on Twitter @ KendraJames_.

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• Episode aired Jan 3, 1993

When the troubled Commander Sisko takes command of a surrendered space station, he learns that it borders a unique stable wormhole. When the troubled Commander Sisko takes command of a surrendered space station, he learns that it borders a unique stable wormhole. When the troubled Commander Sisko takes command of a surrendered space station, he learns that it borders a unique stable wormhole.

• David Carson
• Gene Roddenberry
• Rick Berman
• Michael Piller
• Avery Brooks
• Rene Auberjonois
• Alexander Siddig
• 28 User reviews
• 9 Critic reviews

• Commander Benjamin 'Ben' Sisko

• Constable Odo

• Doctor Julian Bashir
• (as Siddig El Fadil)

• Lt. Jadzia Dax

• Chief Miles O'Brien

• Major Kira Nerys

• Captain Jean-Luc Picard …

• Jennifer Sisko

• Tactical Officer

• Ferengi Pit Boss

• Cardassian Officer

• Ops Officer
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• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

Did you know

• Trivia The first officer aboard DS9 would have been Ro Laren, but she was replaced by Kira Nerys (Nana Visitor) because Michelle Forbes did not want to commit to a six-year contract working on DS9. Indeed, the reason the producers had decided to set the show on Bajor in the first place was because of Ro.
• Goofs The "Prophets", when speaking to each other, say "The creature must be destroyed before it destroys us", and "Destroy it now" when referring to Sisko, but the words "before" and "now" describe concepts of linear time, which the "Prophets" do not understand.

Sisko : [on the image of his dead wife on the Saratoga] I don't know if you can understand. I see her like this, every time I close my eyes. In the darkness, in the blink of an eye, I see her... like this.

Jennifer Prophet : None of your past experiences helped prepare you for this consequence.

Sisko : And I have never figured out how to live without her.

Jennifer Prophet : So, you choose to exist here.

[Sisko nods]

Jennifer Prophet : It is not linear.

Sisko : [sobs] No. It's not linear.

• Crazy credits The opening credits in the originally aired two-hour television movie format appears per normal for the first three seasons of the series with one change: the Bajoran wormhole is not shown. This is presumably as a way to maintain the secrecy of that revelation.
• Alternate versions The two-hour pilot was cut into two parts for re-airing during the DS9 run, and in syndicated reruns.
• Connections Featured in Star Trek: The Next Generation: Birthright, Part I (1993)
• Soundtracks Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - Main Title (uncredited) Written by Dennis McCarthy Performed by Dennis McCarthy

User reviews 28

• Jan 29, 2008
• January 3, 1993 (United States)
• United States
• Official Site
• The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens - 1151 Oxford Rd, San Marino, California, USA
• Paramount Television
• See more company credits at IMDbPro

Technical specs

• Runtime 1 hour 30 minutes

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Interview: ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Writer Carlos Cisco On Unmasking The Breen And Revisiting The ISS Enterprise

| April 28, 2024 | By: Anthony Pascale 30 comments so far

The fifth episode (“ Mirrors “) of season 5 of Star Trek: Discovery was co-written by Carlos Cisco, working with Johanna Lee. Cisco joined Discovery in season 3 as a writers’ assistant, moved up to staff writer during season 4, and is now a writer and story editor in season 5.

In our SPOILERS interview, TrekMovie had a chance to talk to Cisco about getting a chance to expand on some big pieces of Trek lore in “Mirrors” and more.

Can you give a bit of background on your fandom and how you came to work on Discovery ?

I am a huge fan now, but I wasn’t always that way because I didn’t have TV growing up in the ’90s. I had seen some of the original movies, a handful of Next Gen episodes and the J.J. Abrams movies before coming onto Discovery . It was intimidating because didn’t know the franchise really well but I love sci-fi and genre. Once I started on season 3, I began to watch Next Gen episodes and when it became clear we were dealing with Andorians and Orions, our then-staff writer Brandon Schultz suggested I watch Enterprise because that is when they were the most featured and I really came to appreciate it. I had been a huge fan of Jeffrey Combs before any knowledge of Trek, and to find how deep he was in Trek was a delightful surprise. So I watched Enterprise all the way through, I watched all of Next Gen , DS9, TOS, I got up to season 4 of Voyager …

So you did an almost complete binge of the franchise during your first year as a writers’ assistant?

Yeah, I was watching like two to four episodes a day. It was a lot. I am an extremely online person and understand how fandoms work and understand that Trek is the fandom that created the sort of framework for all modern fandom. I also love researching things. I love fake histories of and diving into the lore of something. So yeah, I went through all of it and eventually finished up Voyager during the pandemic and kept on, I am current with all the Trek shows.

Was this just extra obsessiveness because it was your job, or because you were you getting into it?

I really enjoyed Next Generation . Deep Space Nine is among my favorite TV series of all time and the one I go back and rewatch the most because it’s just that good, I love it. I will go back to other ones like if we are referencing it in the room.

Carlos Cisco beamed to the set of Star Trek: Discovery

So having watched it all so recently, did you find yourself as one of the quasi-experts in the room?

Yeah. I would have upper level writers texting me asking like, “What’s something I can inject in here?” Yeah, I became one of the experts in the room. I feel like the most passionate people about a religion are the recent converts, and that became one of my positions in the room. So I was always trying to push how could we recontextualize Trek canon for the 32nd century? How can we better worldbuild each season? That was something that was important to me.

For an episode like “Mirrors,” it must occur to you that you are about to double the page on Memory Alpha for the Breen and also the Kelleruns and even the Mirror Universe. Do you find that exciting or terrifying?

Both. Trek fans, they know their shit. It’s a really terrifying and great responsibility to get to be that additive to canon. The Breen were one of my strongest pushes for the season. Early on a couple of us who were really into the lore were asked for ideas on the season big bads and [staff writer] Eric [Robbins] was pushing for the Vidiians and I was like we should do the Breen.” Because, A: They’re not going to have horrible makeup, and B: We can just put a bunch of big guys in suits and they don’t need to talk. Being mindful of the COVID protocols, the suits and masks would be really great. And then there were all the possibilities for the Breen because in every season Discovery is trying to do something we have never seen before. And getting to unmask the Breen was a really big privilege.

“Mirrors” showed how there was more to just unmasking them with the two faces. Can you talk about the look and inspiration behind that?

I don’t remember where in the process we landed on “gelatinous” but when we hit the art team with that they came back to us with deep sea fish like the Barreleye Fish with a see-through head. We got really excited about that. So we started talking about what is this species? Why do they wear the suits? So, the thing we landed on is they have this soft gelatinous form and also a hardened form. Our thinking was that the Breen came up on a very harsh planet with a harsh environment. So they developed a way to protect themselves which was hardening their outer shell into basically a skin, but that takes an immense amount of concentration and energy, making them slower, more sluggish, less intelligent, basically. Over time, they compensated for that by creating the refrigeration suits. Then culturally, it became anathema for them to display that solid face, especially to outsiders, because it was essentially a sign of weakness.

L’ak in his gelatinous state

This idea of a taboo reminded me of episodes like “The Outcast.” So L’ak is part of a segment of Breen society that chose to go against this norm?

Yeah, I think that the Breen that would do that would be outcasts in their society. We still wanted to leave a lot of mystery with the Breen. One of the most appealing parts of being a writer in Trek, is you can see something that was mentioned once in Trek and go, “I’m going to build a whole episode about this, or a whole character arc that explores this.” The Breen started as a single line in TNG and then got one of the most important arcs in DS9. Getting to build and expand off that of that was really cool.

One quick question: Is this the same Breen ship we saw next to the destroyed Federation HQ in the future in the time travel episode?

Yep, that big honking thing next to Federation HQ is the Breen ship. It’s not a space station, it’s a ship. That was one of the things I was super proud of pitching. I had been looking at Breen ship designs, including the Star Trek Online ones, which were these colossal, city ships that could house entire armies and fleets inside of them. And again, talking about what haven’t we seen and what could we have as our adversary. Like, Osyraa’s ship was big in comparison to Discovery, but we wanted to do something – this thing was just a behemoth. Like a Discovery-sized ship could fly into its shuttle bay.

Using the ISS Enterprise was a way to sort of visit the Mirror Universe again. What came first: a creative way of using the available Strange New Worlds set in Toronto, or the decision to revisit the Mirror Universe?

We were given access the sets so we could pitch ideas that could take place on those sets, whether it is the Enterprise or not. There were a few pitches, like one with an old science vessel from the 23 rd century stuck inside a planet of liquid mercury. And one pitch was it was a Mirror Universe ship sort of trapped like a ship in a bottle, which became the pocket of dimensional space. We even considered fluidic space, trying to bring in one more little reference [laughs]. So once it was settled to do the Mirror ship, the opportunity to define what happened to the ISS Enterprise after the events of “Mirror, Mirror” was really cool.

Was there any talk about also bringing in some Mirror characters?

We had considered Ethan [Peck] as Mirror Spock early on but there might have been availability issues, I don’t know.

Burnham and Book on the ISS Enterprise bridge

So you say you are the lore guy, so how about a nitpick speed round? Starting with: The Breen aren’t supposed to bleed, right?

They don’t have a circulatory system, it’s just the jelly spilling out. I know they don’t bleed! Come on. [laughs]

The solution to open the wormhole was to replace the photon torpedoes with antimatter, but aren’t photon torpedoes anti-matter torpedoes?

I think they were adding more, okay? [laughs]

Final sort of nitpick: Owo and Detmer were tasked with taking the ship back to HQ, but the warp drive was disabled.  We don’t see it go to warp, so are they not going to show up at HQ for years?

In my headcanon, they are being met by a Federation tug, the 32 nd century version of the California-class like the Cerritos. They are heading off to meet them and it will tug them to spacedock. [laughs]

ISS Enterprise leaves for Starfleet HQ

We have talked a lot about lore, but season 3 was a way for the show to kind of jump past all of Star Trek canon. Now in season 5, it feels like the show is reembracing the lore, is that by design?

Yeah, I think the studio and Secret Hideout, [co-showrunners] Alex [Kurtzman] and Michelle [Paradise] all wanted this season to sort of connect Discovery back to the greater body of Trek a little more. That didn’t mean we had to really dig into canon, but there was a greater desire to see what we are familiar with from the past and what it looks like in 32 nd century and how it’s different or how it’s not different, and why. Obviously, this is a season that has focused on an episode from the 24 th century [TNG “The Chase”] and so naturally because of that, every episode focused on the clues is going to be focused on the whims of a 24th-century scientist. So that is naturally going to have more connections back to what people would consider classic Trek.

Discovery is ending and the writers room wrapped up a while ago. Are you hoping to return to the franchise? If there is a second season of Academy , are you hoping to get back to the 32 nd century?

I’d love to, if they’d have me. But if this is the last episode I get to write of Star Trek, I’m very proud that this is my final contribution. I’m hoping to pitch some games to the franchise and stuff like that as well down the line. I’m a game designer on the other side of my career. But yeah, I would love to come back and write for Trek, anytime. We’ll see if that happens.

Finally, last year you played a big part in organizing for the WGA strike, which included rallying Trek writers. Can you talk about that?

Yeah, one of the proudest things I’ve contributed to the franchise didn’t even take place while I was employed on Star Trek. Or [employed] at all. I was a lot coordinator and strike captain. Followers of the strike might remember we did theme days to boost morale and turnout. I, along with fellow captain and Strange New Worlds writer Bill Wolkoff was one of the architects of the Star Trek strike day in May. It was one of the first theme days, and we didn’t advertise. But the turnout from franchise was immense. We had actors, writers, and designers from every single Trek TV show attend. It was, as a fan and a writer, an immensely emotional day and an incredible few hours where folks who worked on the show could fan out on other folks whose shoulders we stand on. There were reunions that hadn’t happened in years and it was a really joyful celebration of the shows we all put our blood, sweat, and tears into.

Carlos Cisco (highlighted) at Star Trek-themed picket day in May 2023 (Photo: JW Hendricks)

The fifth and final season of Discovery debuted with two episodes on Thursday, April 4 exclusively on Paramount+  in the U.S., the UK, Switzerland, South Korea, Latin America, Germany, France, Italy, Australia, and Austria.  Discovery also premiered on April 4 on Paramount+ in Canada and will be broadcast on Bell Media’s CTV Sci-Fi Channel in Canada. The rest of the 10-episode final season is available to stream weekly on Thursdays. Season 5 debuted on SkyShowtime in select European countries on April 5.

Note: The interview has  been edited for brevity and clarity.  

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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
• 2 ISS Enterprise (NCC-1701)

Why Ethan Peck Didn't Appear As Star Trek: Discovery's Mirror Universe Spock Revealed By Writer

Warning: This Article Contains SPOILERS for Star Trek: Discovery Season 5, Episode 5 - "Mirrors"

• Star Trek: Discovery's "Mirrors" reintroduces ISS Enterprise, but Ethan Peck as Mirror Spock didn't happen due to availability issues.
• Co-writer Carlos Cisco explains the missed opportunity for Peck's cameo in the Mirror Universe as Spock.
• Discovery's latest episode explores Mirror Universe history when the ISS Enterprise is found in interdimensional space.

Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5, "Mirrors", reintroduced the ISS Enterprise, but co-writer Carlos Cisco reveals why a cameo by Ethan Peck of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds as the Mirror Universe's Spock didn't happen . In "Mirrors", which was co-written by Cisco and Johanna Lee and directed by Jen McGowan, Captain Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Cleveland Booker (David Ajala) find the Mirror Universe's 23rd-century Starship Enterprise in interdimensional space and pilot it into Star Trek's Prime Universe 23rd century. However, the ISS Enterprise was abandoned, although a plaque told some of the Mirror Universe's history .

In an interview with TrekMovie , Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5 co-writer Carlos Cisco says that Star Trek: Strange New Worlds ' Ethan Peck appearing in some fashion as the Mirror Universe's Spock was "considered" but didn't happen. Cisco speculates that "availability issues" may have been the reason Discovery missed out on Peck playing his goateed Mirror Universe Vulcan doppelganger. Read his quote below:

We had considered Ethan [Peck] as Mirror Spock early on but there might have been availability issues, I dont know.

Ethan Peck did lend his voice as Spock for several episodes of Star Trek: very Short Treks .

Star Treks 10 Most Evil Mirror Universe Characters

What an ethan peck cameo as mirror spock in star trek: discovery would have meant, star trek: discovery reveals what happened to mirror spock.

No Ethan Peck cameo as Mirror Spock in Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5 is, unfortunately, a missed opportunity. Captain Burnham did think of Spock when she was on the bridge of the ISS Enterprise . Michael told Cleveland Booker that she never met Spock's Mirror Universe counterpart, adding that he was "probably just as ruthless" as everyone else in the alternate reality. Ethan Peck appearing either as a hologram or simply via his voice would been a powerful moment for Burnham and for viewers, although perhaps it also would have distracted from Michael's mission of retrieving the next clue to the Progenitors' treasure from L'ak (Elias Toufexis) and Moll (Eve Harlow).

Michael Burnham saw footage of the older Ambassador Spock (Leonard Nimoy) in the 24th century in the Star Trek: Discovery season 3 episode, "Unification III."

Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5 did reveal the fate of the Mirror Universe's Spock . After meeting the Prime Universe's Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) in Star Trek: The Original Series "Mirror, Mirror", Spock followed Kirk's counsel to become High Chancellor and institute reforms to prevent the inevitable collapse of the Terran Empire. Unfortunately, Spock's reforms were perceived as weakness and the Vulcan High Chancellor was assassinated. While Star Trek: Discovery season 5 wasn't originally planned as the final season, not getting Ethan Peck to cameo as Mirror Spock is a shame as, in retrospect, it would have been the last chance for a reunion, of sorts, between Captain Burnham and Spock.

Source: TrekMovie.com

New episodes of Star Trek: Discovery season 5 stream Thursdays on Paramount+

Cast Blu del Barrio, Oded Fehr, Anthony Rapp, Sonequa Martin-Green, Doug Jones, Wilson Cruz, Eve Harlow, Mary Wiseman, Callum Keith Rennie

Streaming Service(s) Paramount+

Franchise(s) Star Trek

Writers Alex Kurtzman

Directors Jonathan Frakes, Olatunde Osunsanmi

Showrunner Alex Kurtzman

Where To Watch Paramount+

Screen Rant

Star trek: how ds9 saved jake sisko from wesley crusher's fate.

With episodes like "The Visitor," Star Trek: Deep Space Nine realized Jake Sisko's character potential, avoiding TNG's mistakes with Wesley Crusher.

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine' s smart and careful writing turned Jake Sisko (Cirroc Lofton) into a great character and avoided the mistakes Star Trek: The Next Generation made with Wesley Crusher (Wil Wheaton). As the son of Captain Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks), Jake was a series regular on DS9 , and although his character wasn't part of Starfleet, classic Jake-centric episodes like "The Visitor" allowed him to grow up in front of fans' eyes and regard Jake as an integral part of DS9 .

Comparatively, Star Trek: The Next Generation bungled Wesley Crusher from the start. The 15-year-old son of Dr. Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden) was part of TNG since the series premiere, but he was done no favors by being presented as a boy genius who often saved the U.S.S. Enterprise-D from disaster and irritated Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart). Wesley was widely derided by Trekkers and he was written out as a series regular by TNG season 4. Wesley made occasional guest appearances such as becoming embroiled in a scandal at Starfleet Academy in TNG season 5's "The First Duty." Finally, Crusher was written out a second time when he resigned from Starfleet to join The Traveler's (Eric Menyuk) galactic ventures in season 7's "Journey's End." Though Wil Wheaton always did his best with the material he was given, Wesley isn't generally considered a fan-favorite character, and "Shut up, Wesley!" is still a favorite insult of TNG fans.

Related: Why Jake & Nog Are Star Trek's Best And Most Believable Child Characters

But from the start of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine , when 14-year-old Jake was introduced alongside his father Commander Sisko, the writers were careful not to make the same mistakes TNG made with Wesley. Jake was no "boy genius," but he was a bright and appealingly normal kid. His friendship with the Ferengi Nog (Aron Eisenberg) gave him a partner-in-crime during DS9 's early years and their dynamic only improved and became more endearing as the series progressed, with both enduring realistic growing pains that still never broke their bond. But by DS9 season 4, Lofton had obviously grown to be among the tallest members of the cast, and DS9 's writers led by Ira Steven Behr also saw his growth as an actor, which was cultivated by Cirroc's real-life relationship with Brooks. Brooks treated Lofton as his real son, protected him behind the scenes, and gave Cirroc the benefit of his wisdom and years of experience.

The classic DS9 season 4 episode "The Visitor" isn't just one of the best hours of Star Trek , it's also the episode that truly tapped into Jake Sisko's potential as a character. Lofton was joined by Tony Todd, who previously played Kurn, the Klingon brother of Worf (Michael Dorn) on TNG;  Todd portrayed the older Jake as he mourned the "death" of his father and labored for decades to find a way to bring Captain Sisko back from being trapped in subspace. On The 7th Rule podcast Cirroc Lofton co-hosts, where he reviews each episode of DS9 , Lofton recalled that Todd followed and observed him on set so he could learn Jake's mannerisms and accurately portray him as an older man, and it was an honor for the younger actor to be mimicked by the veteran star of Candyman .

DS9 's producers initially tried to have Lofton play Jake at every stage of his adult life in "The Visitor" with the use of prosthetics, but at 18-years-old, the lanky youth couldn't convincingly portray Sisko in his '50s and '70s. But bringing in Tony Todd was an ingenious move: with Lofton and Todd playing Jake in his youth and into old age, fans literally got to see Jake grow up on-screen. The episode's powerful writing and performances by Lofton, Todd, and Brooks conveyed one of DS9 's unique and most laudable virtues by portraying the enduring love between father and son.

"The Visitor" also established Jake's future career as a writer, setting him apart as a character who doesn't need to follow his heroic father's footsteps into Starfleet. Unlike Wesley Crusher, Jake was never written off his show; although he doesn't appear in every DS9 episode, the younger Sisko became even more important after "The Visitor" and found ways to remain in the thick of the action during the Dominion War storyline. Whether it was comedic episodes with Nog or witnessing the horrors of war firsthand as a Federation news correspondent, Jake Sisko was a vital part of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine until the end, when he was forced to say goodbye to his father Captain Sisko one last time.

Next: Star Trek: Discovery Has A Touching Deep Space Nine Actor Tribute