Q-Less
"Q-Less" is the sixth episode of the first season of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (DS9), and aired February 8, 1993.
This episode features guest appearances from two recurring characters from Star Trek: The Next Generation: Vash (Jennifer Hetrick), a former love interest of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, and the powerful trickster Q (John de Lancie).
In the episode, Vash arrives at Deep Space Nine after traveling with Q in the Gamma Quadrant for some time, trying to avoid Q and sell artifacts including a mysterious alien crystal.
While it would be Shearer's last Star Trek credit, Wolfe's work on the script led to him joining the writing team on DS9.
The producers wanted to introduce Q to the show in a seamless manner; when Shearer proposed a Vash-centric story, Q was added to the script.
"Q-Less" highlights the differences between DS9 and TNG by comparing the reactions of Commander Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks) and Captain Picard to Q.
Reception was mixed, with reviewers criticizing the imbalance of time spent with Vash and Q in contrast to the rest of the cast, as well as the unnecessary technobabble in the story and the MacGuffin-like plot device represented by the crystal.
Lt. Jadzia Dax (Terry Farrell) returns from the Gamma Quadrant in her runabout with a woman that Chief Miles O'Brien (Colm Meaney) recognizes as Vash from his time on board the Enterprise.
Meanwhile, the bartender Quark (Armin Shimerman) arranges to auction off items Vash found in the Gamma Quadrant, including an unusual crystal that might fetch a high price.
O'Brien spots Q on the station, recognizes him from the Enterprise, and warns Commander Sisko, speculating that Q may be responsible for the power drains.
[3] Because certain aspects of Q's character are left unexplored, de Lancie found that "the style, the quips and the panache in which things are done become very important".
[6] John de Lancie offered a similar opinion: "Q's relationship with Picard has always been a battle of wits, but I come into Deep Space Nine, and Sisko just bopped me on the nose!
[4] Hetrick underwent ten hours of make-up for the sequence where Q shows Vash what could have happened if he did not save her life following an insect bite in the Gamma Quadrant.
[4] Hetrick thought that if she returned to DS9 as Vash, then something could be built around the Vash-Quark relationship: "That would be a really nice pairing, because you have these two different backgrounds but they're both after the same thing.
[3] The comedic elements of the episode required precise timing, with Lynch comparing it to the television series Moonlighting.
Also, the pairing of Vash and Q took up too much screen time compared to the main cast, Handlen noted, while the overall plot involving the "stealth alien" embryo "plays like an abandoned script from early in TNG's run, and an example of a fascinating concept reduced to a perfunctory MacGuffin," Handlen wrote.
Like Handlen, DeCandido also felt that Q did not quite fit in DS9, but acknowledged that his performance in this episode was an improvement over his later appearances in Star Trek: Voyager.
[13][14] The episode is also included in the Star Trek: Q Fan Collective compilation DVD set, which was released in the United States on June 6, 2006,[15][16] and later that year in the UK on September 4.
[17] On February 8, 1997 this episode was released on LaserDisc in Japan as part of the half-season box set 1st Season Vol.
