I remember watching the two part story “Past Tense” when it first aired in 1995 and thinking it must have come about because of the writers’ dejection over republicans taking over Congress in the recent election. Recall at the time progressives were horribly upset Newt Gingrich’s Contract with America has resonated with the voters that they feared we were on the road to a fascist state run by angry, white men who cared nothing for social justice.The powers that be at DS9 drew the most logical conclusion they could from the election: by 2024, the poor are being rounded up and sent to sanctuary districts in order to keep them away from polite society. Gee thanks, Newt.
That is not the only logical problem we encounter. The episode is littered with quitea few convenient contrivances. The Ds9crew takes the Defiant to Earth in order to brief Starfleet on Dominion activity in the Gamma Quadrant. Quark uses an emergency channel from the station to request Sisko look into a legal matter regarding the Grand Nagus’ nephew having been arrested by Starfleet security. The scene is awkwardly thrown in there solely so quark can make an appearance.
Sisko, Bashir, and Dax beam down, but disappear because of a fluctuation in the chromaton particles (yes, time particles) because of some combination of a natural phenomenon combined with some side effect of the cloaking device. Just go with it. I did…barely. O’Brien figures out they have beamed down into San Francisco the place, but not at the right time.
He is correct. The three wind up in 2024. Sisko and Bashir are unconscious above ground, but Dax is passed out As if you needed to be bashed over the head with the commentary on social class structure, the black and Arab guys are arrested and thrown in a sanctuary district while the pretty white girl is picked up by a Bill Gates-type (what is he doing riding the subway?) even though all three are strangely dressed vagrants with no identification.
So here we go with a preachy scribe about the haves and the have nots. Sisko and Bashir are throw into a walled, guarded by armed security, twenty block slum in which sisko, being a history buff, dutifully explains is the result of Americans forgetting how to care. But they will soon learn to care again because there will be a riot I a few days during which some guards will betaken hostage. A man named Gabriel Bell will sacrifice his life to protect them. His death will make him a national hero and prompy reform, social change, and eventually, Starfleet.
Meanwhile, Dax is living it up in high society while she uses her benefactor’s resources to find Sisko and Bashir. They are not in any hospitals, jails, or morgues, but it is not until the fifth act that it is suggested they might be in the sanctuary district. You know, because we have forgotten how to care to the point the sanctuary districts, an obvious place to look for missing friends who do not have identification, is a distant afterthought.
Things go frombadto worse when some thugs attack Bashir and he is rescued, at the cost of his life, by a stranger who turns out to be--you guessed it--Gabriel Bell. illogically enough, all traces of Starfleet, sans the Defiant, immediately disappear from 2371. Illogical because events in 2024 and 2371 are not happening concurrently. Sisko will take action to repair the timeline. Since he will ultimately be successful, there should never have been a noticeable change in the future. For theake of drama, we will just have to go along with that one, too.
The riots begin as inmates of the sanctuary district take hostages. Sisko decides he has to take Gabriel Bell’s place in order to preserve the timeline, even though it means sacrificing his own life.
Trek does time travel stories well, even when how the characters get to the past is often contrived beyond belief. I cannot say “Past Tense” is an exception. It is awfully preachy, but still compelling. Or maybe just amusing in consideration of the commentary.
Perhaps I am biased these days because of our current political climate. The reason sanctuary districts were formed is because of rampant unemployment and a lack of healthcare resources. Considering the impending economic collapse thanks to Barack Oama’s spending plans and the inevitable healthcare rationing bound to hit I the near future, the idea of lumping together the unemployed and the lower class sick people sounds much more plausible now with progressives in charge than it did with conservatives in power.
The gospel of progressivism gets much more obnoxious in part two. I will et to that tomorrow.
Rating: *** (out of 5)
