Zanthi Fever

Story: Fascination
Written By: Ira Steven Behr, James Crocker and Philip Lazebnik
Series: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Year: 1994

Lwaxana comes to the station for the Bajoran Gratitude Festival, Keiko also returns from Bajor. Lwaxana has got something going on, and everyone is feeling lovesick over the first person they see, because her telepathic abilities are sending her feelings for Odo to everyone else. The episode is kind of terrible.
The episode could have worked had it just focused on the characters and their issues rather than making it a jokey episode…because they crossed the line on the comedy angle, making it come across as unbelievable and unentertaining. But I think had it focused on the strained marriage of Keiko and O’Brien, on the long distance of Bareil and Kira…I mean a lot of the stories started off with long distance relationship plots…and yet that theme gets dropped quick for Cupid-love stories. Lame.

NEXT TIME: Sanctuary Districts