Hotel Transylvania - 2012

Nope, sorry. I liked the idea and I liked the beginning, but then it became too loud and most of all they  reverted to the usual thing: the first guy the girl sees in her life is her true love.. :-/ I liked the idea of the story where the protagonists are the ‘monsters’ , I liked the father-daughter relationship, specially while she was growing up and he was a single father, and I liked how he wanted to protect her keeping her at the hotel... what I didn’t like was Jonathan, always so loud, and silly stuff like the battle with the floating tables, but generally everything involving Jonathan.

The beginning was really nice, starting in 1895 when this little vampire girl is born. We see that she has no mother growing up, and since her father wants to protect her he never lets her go out and has a big castle built in a remote place surrounded by a forest of ghosts and a cemetery of undead, where nobody, that is no humans, will ever go... the sweetest scenes of the movie were of Mavis growing up. :-D

We move to our time, when Mavis is about to turn 118, which they treat as 18. Her dad Dracula plans a big birthday party, as he does every year. The castle is a hotel, a refuge for all supernaturals away from the cruel and scary humans. 

The funniest scene of the movie was here, when all the guests arrive; there are all the usual ‘monsters’: there are skeletons and blobs and many others, and there is Frankenstein’s monster, but since he doesn’t really have a name and they can’t call it ‘monster’, in the movie he ‘is’ Frankenstein. There’s the wolf with his family, which consists in a lot of little wolves running around making a mess and eating everything. When the invisible man arrives, Dracula plays a little trick on him: he hands him a piece of bacon, the other wonders why until a lot of little wolves jump on him :lol: 

Dracula had promised his daughter that she’d be allowed to go outside the castle, and he pretends to agree, but when she reaches the nearest village she doesn’t know that it’s actually a fake village, full of fake people - played by the zombies - because he wants her to believe that all humans are cruel and only want to burn her and kill her, so that she might lose her desire to go away.

Unfortunately for Dracula, a young human reaches the hotel, a boy who likes adventures and travels everywhere with his backpack, and everything is cool and funny to him, so when he heard of ghosts in the forest he couldn’t wait to go and see. He comes in and he thinks everything’s normal, that they all wear costumes and stuff, until he realizes they’re for real. He’s scared only for a moment, but as soon as Dracula explains that he doesn’t drink human blood he’s not scared anymore but excited for the new adventure now that his life is no more threatened. He walks around pretending to be a distant cousin of Frankenstein, and Mavis likes him. He tells her he’s 121 years old (so can we guess he’s actually 21?), and that he’s been everywhere, to ‘live the life’, blah blah blah. In this movies everything’s simple and money don’t matter, of course. The usual stuff.

The cook and his mouse understand there’s something wrong with him (meaning: he’s human) and they kidnap him (Johnny) but Dracula saves him and then tells him of his great love and of the humans who killed her, and Johnny understands and wants to go away, but Dracula says that he must go after the party or she’ll be disappointed and the party ruined.

During the party Mavis insists on going back to the village so he confesses that it doesn’t really exists. The cook reveals that Johnny’s human, and Mavis says that it doesn’t matter, she wants to be with him, but Johnny says that he hates monsters and goes away. 

Mavis is sad, she thinks she’s in love with him - really, the only living thing her age in 118 years and she thinks she loves him - so Dracula asks the others for help and they try to bring Johnny back :-/

The little wolf-girl helps them: by sniffing Johnny’s shirt or something she can even say which plane he’s on... - the wolf eats all the sheep on the road to clear the path, and when they get into town.. well, they are in Transylvanya, so there’s a Monster Festival, everybody’s dressed up as one of them, everyone loves them and they clear a path for Dracula so he can move quickly, even raising their capes so he doesn’t have to fear the sunlight. 

Johnny’s plane is already in the air, so Dracula has to fly in daylight, he apologises to him and has the plane turn around. He’s a little burned up but not much, considering that as a little bat he was almost on fire.

Johnny is his gift for Mavis (oh my) and it ends like this, with everybody happy. I guess after the party she’ll be allowed to go around the world with him :-/ she’s a vampire too though, does she has to avoid daylight as well? and let’s not forget that when he’ll be 90 she’ll still look like a 30-year-old :-/

The first new face she sees in maybe 100 years and she falls in love with him :-/

They exchanged only a few words, and yet she says that they ‘zing-ed’ and therefore he’s her true big love, even though they don’t really know anything about each other :-/ the usual stuff :-/

Miss Peregrine's Home for peculiar children - 2016

I liked it, the peculiar children were cool and the movie was fun; I wish they’d spent a little less time making Jake act like an idiot or concentrating on the annoying love story and I was also rather annoyed at the nonsense of the grandfather being still alive, which would not be possible, but the movie was fun enough nonetheless.

I think that the grandfather-still-alive thing is absurd because even if they killed the murderer in the past, they killed him ‘after’ he had killed grandpa Abe, so why would he still be alive? That reasoning doesn’t make sense. The only possible way I can see is that Jake returned to his year 2016, yes, but six months before, and therefore he sees him still alive, but only for that amount of time, then he’ll be killed, because if he wasn’t killed Jake’s adventure would not have happened at all...

If someone has a better understanding of temporal dynamics, please feel free to enlighten me.

Anyway, movie details:

it starts slow, introducing Jake: he works at a supermarket, and he has a colleague take him home because his father called for him to check up on his old grandfather. When he gets there there are signs that someone might have broken into the house, and then he finds his grandpa almost dead and without his eyes. He loved his grandfather and is very sad, and also everyone’s worried because he saw a monster but nobody else saw it. His therapist says that it’s quite normal after a terrible shock, and when he finds a postcard sent to his grandpa by a woman that featured in all of his stories, and he wants to go to Wales to see if she’s still alive and if the Home for Children really exists, she tells him and his parents that it might be a good idea, that it’ll help him sort out what real and what’s not and also help him to move on. So his father takes him there. 

When Jake finds the home, the people there tell him that the house was destroyed by a bomb during the war in 1943 and everyone inside died. Jake doesn’t point out that the postcard was dated only two years before, so Miss Peregrine can’t have died, and on that subject it’s not clear to me how that’s possible, it can’t be possible, but it can’t be a trick either because the bad guys didn’t really know where she was, right?

Anyway, while Jake is taking a look around at what remains of the house, she meets the kids that his grandfather talked about when he told him bedside stories. 

They take him across the temporal loop to show him where they live, in 1943 before the house was destroyed. Because of the war, Miss Peregrine was forced to create a loop on that day, before the bomb hit. It’s a 24-hours loop, and every night she has to turn the clock back.

He meets them all: Emma the girl as light as air, Olive who wears gloves because she’s fire, Enoch the stupidly jealous guy who can put hearts into inanimate things and control them, and also: the little boys: the invisible one, the one with bees inside him, and the one who can project his dreams and sometimes has premonitions, and of course the twins; also the little girls: the very very strong one, the one with a mouth at the back of her head, and the one who can make flora grow very quickly.

When Jake runs back overwhelmed by it all, he lies to his father about what he did and when his dad finds out he calls the doctor saying that his son is having a breakdown... which seemed big nonsense since dad was the only one shouting and Jake did nothing particularly strange, after all it’s not like he’s the only teenager on Earth who ever lied to his parents about what he did during the afternoon. 

Now his father forbids him to wander anywhere alone, saying that he’ll go nowhere without him, so Jake has to sneak out. He runs back to the house, and Emma takes him to her secret place: when she wants to be alone she goes into the ship that sank; he has to swim but it’s easy for her to go down with lead-boots. Once down there, the blows air into a room to push out the water and fill it with air so they can breath - she’s so light because she’s full of air :-D - and shows her some pictures left by his grandfather Abe when he was with them back in the days. Jake recognises the man he saw the night Abe died. He’s the leader of the bad guys, Barron. She explains to him that Abe was special, like them, and like him. He always thought he was not special, but she says that nobody can cross the temporal loops if they’re not special, and that he has the same peculiar talent as Abe: they’re the only ones who can see the invisible monsters. 

Everyday Miss Peregrine has to kill the same monster that once killed Viktor, the strong girl’s brother, and that came back that day. Emma explains that Abe used to hunt down the monsters in order to protect them, that the monsters and the bad people with white eyes want to find all temporal loops and kill all the special kids. Abe retired when Jake was born because he wanted to keep him safe (I get that, but why he didn’t retire when his son was born, only when his grandson was born? Because he knew that Jake was peculiar too and his son wasn’t? )

A group of peculiars got tired of living isolated in temporal loops (why did they need to hide in temporal loops if back then there were no bad guys trying to kill them?) but they didn’t want to die either, they wanted to be immortals outside the loops. Since Miss Peregrine and others like her are the only ones who can create loops and also turn themselves into birds, the bad guys abducted a Miss and tried an experiment, I think that basically they tried to absorb her energy, but it went wrong and they became all invisible monsters. 

They discovered that by eating the Peculiar’s eyes, specially the childrens’, they could go back to being visible and in a more human form, so they hunted them down. 

Another Miss is found wounded (Judi Dench), and once cured she regains her human form and tells them all that Barron and the others found her loop in Blackpool, killed all the children there and now they want to try the experiment again.

Now they’re close, so Miss Peregrine tells the children that they all have to go away.

Jake goes back to his father, and he tells him that a man was found dead and without his eyes, just like Abe. Jake runs back to warn them that Barron and the monsters are much closer than they thought, and an ornithologist runs after him. When he crosses the loop Jake understands he must be a Peculiar too, and it turns out that he was Barron, a shapeshifter who turned into his therapist first and the ornithologist later to find out where the Home was. 

Now Barron shows up at the house holding Jake hostage, so Miss Peregrine has no other choice but let him cage her to protect them - why? why would Barron let them live? why does he leave them in the house caring only about taking Miss away? Maybe because he now cares only about the experiment and doesn’t bother anymore with the eyes?

There are some visible monsters, who already ate a lot of eyes, and there are invisible monsters who keep hunting for eyes to regain their human form - how many there are? We see something like ten in total, which more or less is the same number of them that we saw doing the experiment, so who has Abe been hunting for all those years? Twenty for sure, probably many more years, where did all those monsters come from?

After Barron leaves with Miss, an invisible monster attacks them and Jake’s the only one who can see it. He saves Enoch but the other Miss has been taken. The little girl makes a distant tree grow so much that they can get out of the house, in a hurry to escape both the monster and the bomb that will now destroy the house because there is nobody here anymore to set the clock back.

They need to reach Blackpool quickly in order to save Miss Peregrine, so Emma fills the entire ship with air so it re-emerges, and Olive starts the engine and off they go. 

They go to Blackpool and cross the temporal loop that brings them to January 2016. First they need to get rid of the invisible monsters, and they fight all together, with some help: Enoch revives all the skeletons in the ship and sends them to fight.

Now they must deal with Barron and the others like him, and this is really tough. They all fight, and we finally see what the twins peculiarity is: they take off their ‘masks’ to kill one of them, and they have strange eyes and scream like Banshees, and turn her into stone, which then falls down and crashes into pieces.

When they go looking for Jake, after he already freed five birds and also Miss Peregrine, Barron turns himself into a copy of him, so they can’t know which one is the real one, until Jake sees one of the invisible monsters coming towards them, one who fell in the water and was not destroyed. Jake says nothing until the monster is so close that it takes the fake Jake and eats him, because he couldn’t see it.

They all go away, without the Miss this temporal loop will end too, and they must go back to their time in 1943. Miss Peregrine is not strong enough to create a new loop, but at least they will live, growing old one day at a time until she’ll be strong enough.

Jake stays behind, because it’s his own time, and when he goes back to his house in Florida he finds Abe alive and tells him everything. Abe tells him to go back to Emma, that even if he doesn’t know where they went he knows for sure where they were at a specific date, so he goes to a loop in the California desert which brings him to Tokyo and another one brings him to 1942.

Now, why do the first two take him to a different place? They are temporal loops, what has the place to do with it? The loop in Wales took him to Wales in the past, then he went to the one in Blackpool which took them to Blackpool in the future, how come now he can enter one in California and come out in Tokyo?? 

Anyway, he finally gets to 1942, and for some reason he enlists himself in the Navy, maybe he didn’t know what else to do, what with being without a home, without documents, and without money?

Anyway, he had to wait a year and then he ran towards the ship right before the kids left and reached Emma, and now they kiss and go away together, with Miss Peregrine flying over them, in search of a new home.

It’s a fun movie to watch, but when it’s over and you think about it there are so many things that leave you puzzled, and so many things that don’t satisfy. Jake was rather plain and at moments very annoying - okay he was sad about Abe’s dead and worried that he might be mad and all that, but that doesn’t seem enough. He had believed Abe’s stories when he was very little, then had believed his parents when they told him there was no truth in it all and he was making it up, and now he is so overwhelmed to find out that it was all true? Shouldn’t he be relieved about that? Shouldn’t he be glad that he’s not mad and that Abe never lied to him, instead of running home like a scared little child? 

Ultimately, I didn’t like the love story, I really hoped for a moment there wouldn’t be any, specially with a girl who liked his grandfather before him, and most importantly not between two people - one of them a teenager and one who has been a teenager for 70 years - who have known each other for like a couple of days. Sure, he felt attracted to her, big surprise, a teenager attracted to a pretty girl, but seeing her fly and talking about monsters doesn’t really mean eternal true love. I really hoped she wouldn’t be his only reason for going back, I hoped he’d go back to be with them all, to get to know better those that meant so much to Abe, to feel sure that Miss Peregrine was fine or whatever, and not just because of one girl. What will happen if he falls out of love, leave them all?

Miss Peregrine-Eva Green

Jake-Asa Butterfield

Abe-Terence Stamp

Emma-Ella Purnell

Olive-Lauren McCrostie

Enoch-Finlay MacMillan

Therapist-Allison Janney

Ornithologist-Rupert Everett (I would have never guessed had I not read it in the credits)

微微一笑很倾城 (Love 020) - 2016

It’s a Chinese series in 30 episodes, 29 of which I loved very very much. The last one was a bit disappointing: it had very nice moments about the main couple, but thing is, it had nothing else. The last episode of a series, specially after they say “two years later”, should be to give us a glimpse of how all the characters are doing after the events that we followed during the previous episodes. Instead, it told us only about the main couple, wasting a lot of time is an attempt of comedy that I only found annoying (her father trying to break him or find flaws in him) and not giving us the slightest idea of how the others are doing, not even a quick mention, nothing. I was so disappointed about that, I kept wondering how were the others doing, are they still working with him? Is Mei still living with Ko? Is he still bragging about his goddess or thinking only of Ko now? What about Yu, is he happy? I liked him a lot. Did Zheng find his own way? Has YiRan found a friend? I’m not saying that they shouldn’t have concentrated on the protagonists, the whole series was 90% about WeiWei and Xiao Nai, but there were other important characters as well and I really expected to see how they were doing, but no, not even during the ending credits, which I watched carefully hoping there might be pictures of what they had not shown us, about the others: nothing. :-( I really can’t understand why they were never even mentioned!

But the other 29 episodes... I LOVED them. I loved the mixture between real life and video game, how the two things were strongly connected, and I loved the characters, all of them.. well, almost all of them. I couldn’t stand Cao Guang, and was very glad when WeiWei finally told him to his face what he was.

The best thing of all was seeing how Xiao Nai changed through the series. In the first episodes he was always serious, then he started smiling when seeing her , smiling more when they got together, and even laughing later on, always when he was with her.

It was exaggerated in certain aspects, of course, mostly on the way they depicted Xiao Nai: the most popular guy on campus, girls queueing trying to get a glimpse of him, everybody taking pictures of him, and of course he’s not only a genius, the best in his line of study, he has a basketball champion, a swimming champion, a loving and considerate boyfriend, and later on obviously a  successful businessman, there was never any doubt, he is young and good-looking and smart and rich and on top of that he is very much in love... 

All this is too much, that’s more unreal than the videogame, than anything else. 

Of course the female lead is unreal too. Not only Bei Wei Wei is beautiful and an excellent student, she’s also an angel on Earth apparently: she’s kind and considerate and loyal and good, she never lies, she supports her boyfriend and her friends...

The main couple is very unreal, but they are nice. Romance stories always have characters a bit unreal: how many American movies have male and female leads who are beautiful and smart and rich and nice and always ready to put love and family first? That’s what pleases the audience.

Anyway, it goes like this:

Xiao Nai and his friends Yu, Hao Mei and the third one are studying computer science and also developing their own mobile game, and Nai wants to start his own company to create new games.

ep1. 

We are introduced to Bei Wei Wei and her roommates Er Xi, Xiao Ling and Sisi, all studying computer science. We see that Wei Wei is very good at this online videogame, and rather dedicated too , other than being pretty and top-of-the-class-smart. She has scheduled a duel, but then her laptop breaks and so she goes to buy a new one but has a curious encounter at the shop, where she tried to help Meng YiRan who was being sold an expensive second-rate computer piece, but rich YiRan didn’t accept her help and paid the full price; Wei Wei then decides to go to an internet café where she is seen playing by Xiao Nai, the owner’s nephew.

He is captivated by her quick fingers and how good she is in the game. Her character LuWei WeiWei is left by her in-game partner Zhen Shui Wu Xiang and right after he remarries with a girl that has posted her pretty picture, Wei Wei meets, always in-game, the ‘legendary’ top gamer, the one ranked n.1, the best of the best of course, Yi Xiao NaiHe, and he asks her to marry him. 

ep 2

Not thinking too much about it and simply accepting his explanation, that she’s the female with the highest rank and he wants to win a quest for couples, she accepts. He plans a big ceremony and introduces her to his friends. Yiran talks to her roommate Nana about Bei WeiWei, who came second to her in the school beauty contest. Nana speaks ill of her. They study Foreign Languages and their classmate Cao Guang posts pictures of WeiWei coming out of a rich car, rather implying that she might have an affair with an older, rich man, so she finds him and speaks to him about it, very politely indeed, simply explaining that she’s tutoring a boy and his mother once gave her a ride home.

In-game, Naihe tortures a guy who insulted WeiWei: he chained him and she stabbed him automatically 1hp at a time, so it’ll take a long time..

ep 3

WeiWei and her friends try for an intern job for the summer, and they all go to Zhen Yi Technologies for an interview. Knowing that they’ll ask about their game experience, WeiWei instructs them to use her alternate accounts, but when it’s Er Xi’s turn she forgets hers so she says the only one she remembers, LuWei WeiWei. The boss’ son Zhen Shao Xiang is Zhen Shui Wu Xiang, so now he thinks that she’s WeiWei and says so to his girlfriend and her friends.

Understanding now that he made a mistake in judging her, Cao Guang apologises to her. 

In-game, Shao Xiang’s girlfriend the enchantress and her friends make a video to humiliate WeiWei, so NaiHe challenges Zhen Shui and he loses two combat levels.

ep 4

Cao Guang is now interested in WeiWei and asks her out but she refuses, and since he keeps insisting she ‘lies’, saying that she’s already in love with someone else, Xiao Nai.

ep 5

Cao doesn’t give up, and plans to get to know her online and win her over, and and asks a girl in the same dormitory to find out her account for him, but when the girl enters the room WeiWei is helping ErXi win a battle, so she gives him ErXi’s account instead.

YiRan, working at her uncle’s firm, is jealous of WeiWei and takes her name and XiaoLing’s and Sisi’s from the list of possible interns. Shao Xiang already picked ErXi because he thinks she’s LuWei WeiWei.

ep 6

WeiWei and Naihe make a video which wins first prize, and they keep meeting and chatting online. 

Erxi meets Cao online, and he becomes her apprentice.

ep 7

LuWei WeiWei and Naihe win the impossible quest that nobody won before. 

Since they refused their offer, Zhen Yi technologies try to poach the friends one by one, approaching Yu first, but they fail. 

ep 8

LuWei WeiWei and Naihe are about to win the big tournament, the one they supposedly teamed up for, but at the last battle he doesn’t show up and she’s heartbroken. Thing is, while Yu was driving they had a car accident and Xiao Nai was unconscious until the next day. 

ep 9

Yu was very touching here, feeling guilty about the accident and feeling that Xiao Nai saved his life, 

ErXi and Cao partner up online.

The guys explain everything to LuWei WeiWei when they finally find her online, and when Xiao Nai goes back online too he asks her to meet in real life, so she’s all happy and goes shopping with her friends, trying on a beautiful red dress...

ep 10

...that she doesn’t buy because she says it’s too revealing... it was not, it was a beautiful dress and she looked great in it, but since it showed neck and shoulders, making it clear where her breasts are, she refused to buy it and wanted something more innocent like her... which is what I don’t understand about this character. She’s always buttoned up to the collar, but then she wears shorts and skirts that are a very long way up her knees, but that’s apparently innocent...

Wei Wei goes to meet Naihe, and ‘instead’ she sees Xiao Nai. She goes to say hi, and he walks past her and then tells her that he came to meet her, revealing himself to be Naihe. She’s very surprised, even more so since he starts acting like they’re in a relationship, and she’s his girlfriend without the time to realise it. 

He takes her out to dinner and when his friends call he says he can’t go because he’s on a date, and then takes her to the basketball game where he plays too. After half a game he has to leave someone else play, so he goes to sit next to WeiWei, surprising everyone and becoming the talk of the school.

ep 11

Xiao Nai introduces Bei WeiWei to his roommates, that she knew in-game already. When a guy tells Cao that WeiWei is officially going out with Xiao Nai, he’s all angry and gets drunk speaking very ill of her, saying that she played with his feelings because she partnered up with him online, like: it’s a game, she doesn’t know who I am and we never talked about love or feelings, and yet she doesn’t feel bound to me for life? -/ he was so pathetic I couldn’t believe it. 

Nana happens to be there and she records everything on her phone.

YiRan is very sad that Xiao Nai has a girlfriend now because she likes him.

ep 12

Xiao Nai is very sweet with her, and he takes her to his office to show her the game they’re working on and tells her that he already knew who she was because he had seen her playing at that internet cafè. At night he calls her and he’s very sweet.

ep 13

To help her online friend Nini (apparently the only one not in Beijing, why did she joined a server called Beijing?) Wei Wei brings Naihe to fight together, but Zhen Shui and his enchantress are in the same guild as NiNi and join without knowing of them. They fight all together, but the enchantress is pretty useless, she does more damage than help. 

Xiao Nai travels with the Feng Teng Technology people, the same that launched the game they love so much. They are interested and offer a contract for his mobile game, and they say they are also interested in developing the current pc game.

YiRan attended the party with her uncle only to meets Xiao Nai, and she enters the room all dressed up. She’s all emotional and thrilled when Xiao Nai speaks to her - only to tell her that her uncle was looking for her - but he did it only because he heard a guy speaking of seducing her, but he won’t do it now knowing who her uncle is.

ep 14

In this episode I actually felt sympathy for YiRan, with her blogger friend on one side and her roommate Nana on the other, both trying to tell her what she should do to get Xiao Nai.

WeiWei’s roommates invite themselves to dinner, Xiao Nai’s treat, and ErXi choses a French restaurant.. but when they get there WeiWei understands why. In there she sees YiRan and her blogger friend, who posted something about her meaning that she’s just a pretty face. WeiWei refuses to go in and they change place, and the girls order a lot to eat but Xiao Nai only appears amused, not upset. He is upset, though, when WeiWei tells him about the blog story, but doesn’t give him YiRan’s name because she’s not really sure that she was involved in it.

WeiWei feels a bit weird about them, because for her it’s merely the start of a relationship, but he acts as if they’re already in one, and then he hugs her - it was supposed to be a romantic scene, and him closing his eyes and the music were indeed right, but she looked pretty much like a lifeless doll in his arms...

ep 15

Er Xi and Cao Guang must work together on a video for school; he’s still very angry at WeiWei.

Hao Mei takes his friend to dine at his cook friend’s place, but he says that he’s not the owner, only the cook, and more people more work, and tells him to come alone instead...

The guys graduate, and it’s no more school for them now. 

WeiWei has to leave for the summer holidays because she already has a ticket home and her parents are waiting for her.

ep 16

They say goodbye and she goes home. She has no money to buy a new cell phone and they tell her to earn it, so in the meanwhile she chats with him through the online game. 

At work, Hao Mei’s computer is hacked... by his cook-friend.

ep 17

Before knowing who the hacker is, Hao Mei goes to his restaurant to eat and gets drunk and sleeps there for a while. The next time the cook hacks into the computer Xiao Nai finds him and challenges, and it turns out that Ko is a known hacker and will come working with them. Xiao Nai assigns him to Mei :-p

After only a few days WeiWei comes back, he couldn’t stand to have her so far away. As they meet in his office, he kisses her, and keeps kissing her even after the guys call him because they have business partners visiting. She’s staying at Xiao Ling’s house since they don’t have the dorm room in summer, and he joins her there. She’s cleaning the whole house, and has him help her, although it already seems spotless to me...

ep 18

They go out to lunch together, then it starts raining (like, sun one second and pouring buckets the next) and he protects her from the rain, and he kisses her and smiles, and he seems to regret when it stops raining, and then they run away because they were outside and two little girls saw them kissing... so they run and stop to sit in a field.. (already dry??).

She starts her unpaid internship at Xiao Nai’s Zhi Yi company, and is put to work with A’Shuang, the one who they thought was scared of girls but it seems to me he just doesn’t like them because he thinks they cause trouble :-/ he’s one of those I guess, he has probably known ONE girl who caused trouble and takes it out on all girls :-/ 

He starts picking on her, giving her annoying and long tasks, but she resolves quickly and efficiently the phone-incompatibility-research task.

ep 19

ErXi is the only one who got the internship at Zhen Ji Technology, and she starts now. It seems like she’s going to get a lot of money for doing basically nothing, and she’s thrilled about it. The other interns think that she’s Shao Xiang’s favourite, and that’s why they treat her so well, and Nana hears all this and appears to be jealous.

She also starts working at Cao’s house to take care of his cat (why does he bath the cat? poor thing...) since she owes him a lot of money after they broke the videocamera.

We see A’Shuang taking an envelop of money, and it smells of betrayal.

Since he caught a cold and Yu has work to do and can’t go buy medicines, WeiWei goes instead, gets soaked wet and catches a bad cold herself. Xiao Nai takes care of her, he’s very protective, takes her home and kisses her again..

ep 20

Cao Guang keeps calling online-game-partnership as actual dating :-/

When ErXi is bitten by his cat, he takes her to the hospital for a vaccine (seriously? for a domestic cat’s bite?) and when he sees WeiWei’s number on her phone he calls her to come and convince her to take it. WeiWei has a fever but goes anyway. She faints and is hospitalised an they put her on a drip (well, it’s just a fever but if she faints in hospital of course they’ll do something; i guess)

YiRan feels ashamed thinking at how she acted trying to attract Xiao Nai. 

Having learned of her debt, Wei Wei immediately gives her some money so Er Xi can pay Cao Guang back, she still cares for her cat though. 

Xiao Nai kisses Wei Wei again, at his house, lying on her, and she’s more and more amazed at being his first girlfriend...

ep 21

Wei Wei’s former guild-leader asks her to meet and she’s amazed at how pretty Wei Wei is, since online the others are all saying how plain she looks (why?? some are just spreading vicious rumours, but Shao Xiang thinks that Er Xi is not pretty?? Why? She’s very pretty!), and when she says online how wrong they were because she has seen her and she’s beautiful, the Enchantress, Qing Qing and the other two friends insist that Shao Xiang takes them to his office so they can look at Wei Wei (actually Er Xi of course). They mistreat her, making fun of her and making her run back and forth while he’s not there, and to keep her job Er Xi can’t say anything and serve them in everything... to do him justice, when he comes back and sees her running he doesn’t seem too pleased or amused.

Now that those girls think that Wei Wei is actually rather plain (them too? Er Xi is very pretty!) and want to expose former-guild-leader’s lie, so they plan a guild meeting in real life and tell her to invite Wei Wei as well, even if she’s no more part of their guild, they still have spent a lot of time playing together, and she has no other choice but to say yes, she’ll ask her.

Xiao Nai is driving when he receives a phone call: he looks at the number - no name assigned to it - and tells Wei Wei to answer because he can’t do it while driving, and after she answers he tells her that it’s his mother’s number :lol:

ep 22

While the guys are eating together and Hao Mei is talking about a previous game he played, Ko admits that it was him that partnered up with him in that game, the one that Hao Mei left as soon as he realised that he was a guy. :-p 

Thinking that she wouldn’t consent to meet them all, being so shy, but still wanting to clear things up regarding how pretty she is, former-guild-leader sort of tricks her, telling her to meet for dinner. When Wei Wei arrives, they are all very surprised at how pretty she is. The girls immediately say that she’s not the real Luwei Wei Wei because they have seen her at work, so Wei Wei understands what happened, and also that they were the girls that mistreated her that day, so she proposes to prove her identity with some duels. She challenges the four of them. She defeats three and then the enchantress wants to get out of it saying yes, now we know it’s you, no reason to go on, but Wei Wei wants her revenge and insists on battling her too, and when they do, she takes her time, playing with her, even saying out loud that she wants to take it slow because tired after the three duels... the enchantress is quite humiliated.. when Xiao Nai calls, she asks him to pick her up right away, and the girls keep trying to find something against her, saying that in terms of boyfriend their friend surely wins, since Shao Xiang is handsome and rich, but then Xiao Nai comes to pick her up and of course he walks towards them like a God on Earth... still unwilling to give up, they try to humiliate her saying that she had other partners before him, but it’s a stupid attempt because he’s in the game too (but they don’t know it) and he says that he doesn’t care as long as she’s with him... 

yeah, talk about perfection...

ep 23

Er Xi finally gave her in-game gift to Wei Guang, her online friend she likes so much, and it’s all going well until he kills her character writing his own real name and calling her Wei Wei !!

She’s devastated and heartbroken, and when Wei Wei comes home with a chocolate cake for her Er Xi makes it fall on the floor and shouts to Wei Wei to go away. 

Yiran sees the video that Nana made of stupid Cao Guang, and thinks that such a deceiving character must be made known, but not to everyone because that would embarrass Xiao Nai, so she wants to show it only to him. She called him on the floor but he was not interested in any gossip about his girlfriend, so she showed up where he goes jogging. He watches the video but to her surprise he’s not affected by it because he knows she’s not like that (a true confident man doesn’t believe all the Jagos of this world) and then he shows it to her and she’s very upset with him because she never played a game with him... when she meets Cao Guang, she confronts him but he still feels in the right and actually names usernames, so she finally understands what happened. She does not give him the name of Er Xi, but she finally tells it like it is to his face, and that was rather satisfying, well done! Xiao Nai will then tell him not to ruin a friendship, and Cao Guang finally understands that Er Xi was the one he had played with, and goes to apologise - not too well I must say - but she’s still very hurt and thinks that he’s still very much in love with Wei Wei... 

ep 24

Shao Xiang asks Er Xi about Wei Wei and she feels even worse now because she realises that all she thought she had was only because everybody thought she was Wei Wei... she knows it’s not Wei Wei’s fault but she hurts so much it is difficult to be around her so she wants to leave, but Wei Wei leaves instead, and calls Xiao Nai. 

After seeing her Shao Xiang keeps thinking about Luwei Wei Wei, and now he breaks up with his girlfriend. He had taken out her and her friends to a restaurant but they kept talking about Luwei WeiWei and he has enough and leaves. 

ep 25

Shao Xiang approaches Wei Wei outside Xiao Ling’s house after she went to pick up her stuff, and then tries again to speak to her in-game, but she had fallen asleep on the couch in Xiao Nai’s place so he sees the messages instead, and reveals to him that he’s Nai He... so now Shao Xiang is very angry at him and wants to beat him so he takes charges of the development of the game in his father’s company. 

Cao Guang tells Nana and Yiran to stop spreading rumours about Wei Wei or there will be consequences.. 

A’Shuang is being blackmailed by Zhen Yi Technologies, but Shao Xiang knows nothing about his father’s bad plans and conduct.

ep 26

The deadline has been moved two weeks closer, so they must all work hard. It’s all Zhen Yi’s plan to make things difficult for Xiao Nai, but since Shao Xiang doesn’t know this he works hard too and becomes passionate about the work. 

Nana won’t give up and now wants to use Er Xi against Wei Wei, but when she speaks ill about Wei Wei in front of her We Xi understands that it must have been hard on Wei Wei being constantly harassed that way, and so the friends make peace. 

Nana invites Er Xi out for lunch planning on recording everything bad she might have to say about Wei Wei, but she doesn’t; the two friends had planned this together and Wei Wei shows up too.

ep 27

Er Xi and Wei Wei declare their friendship. Yiran storms out angry and humiliated and goes away alone in a taxi, but after a moment she feels bad about abandoning her friend so she comes back, and hears Nana’s true thoughts about her and realises that they were never really friends, and it’s even more painful seeing how Er Xi and Wei Wei’s friendship is so strong. 

Xiao Nai resolves the game problem that was so difficult while out with Wei Wei, and then the guys go out to pick new suits. The three guys want her to rate how handsome they look but she choses the fourth one stating how handsome Ko looks in a suit, so Xiao Nai becomes sort of jealous and tries one on too to show her how good he looks...

Wei Wei said nothing about seeing A’Shuang getting into a big car, and now he tells Zhen Yi that Xiao Nai made it, so they plan more tricks :-/

The school starts again so Wei Wei and the girls move again into the dorms and Wei Wei is escorted there by Xiao Nai’s parents. Xiao Nai arranged this, very much amused :lol: 

Xiao Nai and his friends leave for Shangai for their game presentation.

ep 28

Yiran apologises to Wei Wei before leaving to study abroad. 

Wei Wei goes with Er Xi to pick up her money of the internship and Wei Wei realises that the man she saw with A’Shuang was a Zhen Yi man. She tries to call Xiao Nai to tell him but of course they all switched off their phones for the presentation. When it’s their turn Zhen Yi tries sabotaging them, but Xiao Nai has thought of everything and they manage to show it anyway, and they win! Of course. 

Shao Xiang humbly admits his defeat, but then he hears his uncle talking on the phone with his father and understands that they were responsible for the sabotage. 

Xiao Nai explains to Wei Wei only what A’Shuang did because he already confessed to him everything - as I thought, ‘one’ girl caused trouble for a dear friend of his so that’s why he disliked all girls... 

ep 29 

Ko ‘bribes’ Hao Mei into choosing him as his roommate in his new house, by promising to cook for him :-) a real cunning plan, after such a good meal how could he say no :lol:

Xiao Nai takes Wei Wei and all the guys of his company out to celebrate. Ko and Xiao Nai have a swimming challenge: Xiao Nai wins one and Ko wins the other because Xiao Nai let him win so he’d cook barbecue for them..

They also duel with each other on the game to decide how much food everyone can get, and Wei Wei reads a goodbye message from Shao Xiang. It’s a goodbye message, he feels very ashamed about what happened but wants to continue making games because he developed a true interested, and I guess he’s leaving his father’s company to do something on his own.

Then we move to ‘two years later’, to see Xiao Nai on tv to talk of his success and calling Wei Wei his fiancée, and the girls graduating. We see that Cao Guang is becoming someone important, and he introduces Er Xi to some foreign people as his best friend...  and the show’s hinting there will be something more romantic between them.

ep 30

The last episode is all about Xiao Nai meeting Wei Wei’s parents. Her father is not too keen of this ‘sudden’ marriage and tries to find something wrong in him, but eventually he plays his best card and wins him over promising grandkids...

Her friend visit her at her new house, where we see her beautiful red and golden traditional dress. When alone, Xiao Nai helps her wear it, then they kiss and what do you know, she actually responds to the kiss now, and after two years of waiting he brings her now to the bed...

It ends with Xiao Nai telling her that he bought the old internet cafè where he saw her the first time, planning on moving there his company..

Love on the vines - 2016/7

A nice little movie, nothing special but nice, I didn’t much like the two protagonists but the side love-story was nice. The characters are: businesswoman with a love for technology and innovation Diana, control-freak vinery-passionate Seth, Amelia the cute waitress, rich vinery owner Grant, Grant’s son Paul, diner-owner Susie, lawyer and Susie’s mother Jill.
Details: When Hugh died Seth thought he’d inherit the vinery while Diana went to see Hugh’s lawyer thinking she’d only be there for two days to get some paintings she liked but.. surprise, Hugh left it 50-50 to both of them, on condition that they stay two weeks working together. If one of them leaves earlier, both of them lose it all. 
A long time ago they dated, before she left for the big city. Diana says she wants to do half of the work, even field work, but he’d rather do it all himself who knows what he’s doing, and anyway she spends all her time on the phone, or making conference-calls, and talking about online searches and technology. 
Grant made an offer to Seth already, who is adamant he’ll never sell, so now he tries with Diana who seems to leave her options open. When Seth hurts his ankle Diana finally helps a little more in the field. She starts taking care of the business-side of the vinery, and Grant calls her boss saying how she’s starting to feel at home here, hoping he’d get her back to the city. It’s finally harvest time. 
Grant tries to break them apart, again and again. 
Eventually Diana leaves her half to Seth and goes back to the city and the big job offer, or promotion, whatever it was that the guy came up with because apparently in that firm that can’t do without her, without even saying goodbye. She’s not happy though, so she goes back to Seth, and finds him when he was about to leave to go to New York because he wants to be with her more than anything.. so now they’ll run the vinery together as partners, in work and life.
Susie wants to do catering but Jill takes over very enthusiastically, rather overwhelmingly. She plans everything and until Susie insists on doing it her way. Jill was worried that if Susie’s diner wasn’t a success she’d leave again, and that’s why she cared so much. 
Paul likes Amelia and finally they start dating, and when Grant learns about it he invites her to dinner; he has no good intentions though, he tells her when they are alone that she’s not the right kind of girl for Paul, so she starts avoiding him.  Grant keeps trying to break them apart, again and again, yes them too. When Paul’s understands his father’s interference he quits working for him; his mother is very angry to learn this and Grant tries to put things right with his son. Paul won’t go back to working with him but at least they make peace. 
Diana-Margo Harshman
Seth-Steve Talley
Jill-Catherine Mary Stewart
Amelia-Brittany Underwood
Paul-Parker Harris
Liz-Erinn Westbrook (she was Diana’s friend in NY. Not really relevant to the plot, but she was nice so here she is)
Suzy-Samantha Figura

ITA un amore improvviso

World War Z - 2013

I liked this a lot. It’s not the usual zombie-movie, the creatures are very fast and there is no splatter involved,  but that’s why I liked it as a matter of fact. There are no stomach-revolting scenes but it’s a real thriller, it kept me holding my breath the whole time; also, it makes sense, there are good characters and it has a positive (as much as possible) ending. I also liked a lot how the infected moved and the sound they made (like sucking air). It’s not very zombie-like at all, but these are different zombies you know. They were very fast when hunting, and very slowly when dormant, and made twitching movements when searching and gasping. I like how all those actors played it, it was at the same time funny and scary :-P

Can I make a note here that Peter Capaldi’s character is listed as “W.H.O. Doctor” ? I love that :lol: That’s his role, but I mean, Doctor Who playing a Who Doctor :D 

It starts introducing the main characters: 
Gerry and Karin have two daughters; they are stuck in traffic when they start noticing something strange is going on. A bomb goes off, there’s total chaos, people running, and Gerry can see that strange-looking people are attacking other people, biting them, and in twelve seconds those victims become attackers too. He escapes with his family and head toward a supermarket or something, because they need a medicine for one of the girls’ asthma and like many others they took all that they might need. Gerry learns from his old contact Thierry that the plan to contain ‘the situation’ has failed, whatever it was and he must join them because they need him to go back working for them.
In Newark, Jerry sees a lot of ‘zombies’, or ‘infected’, run after other people and yet they pass a homeless man sitting down at the side of the road without even noticing him.
They find a bit of rest inside the house of little Tomas’ family. When it’s time to leave, Gerry tells them to go with him, that ‘movement is life’, and nothing more. Of course they refuse, who would risk their family’s life leaving a locked house to go wandering with a stranger, outside where all the monsters are? Now, here is detail n. 1. We don’t see Gerry explaining that they ‘simply’ needs to reach the roof, is it possible that he said that off-scene? It doesn’t seem like that at the moment, and it kinda felt that maybe had he explained that to the man, maybe he would have thought about it more, whilst ‘movement is life’ made one feel like walking and walking across streets full of monsters...
Anyway, Gerry’s family goes but find monsters while trying to go upstairs. Meanwhile Tomas’ house has been attacked and he’s escaped running to join Gerry. Karin and the girls are out but Gerry has to fight a zombie and some of its blood falls on his face and mouth. As soon as he frees himself and steps on the roof he immediately runs to the border, ready to jump if he felt he was turning I suppose. It’s a very good scene, I liked it. He counts, then explains that he drank their blood, but for some reason that’s not enough and he’s fine, he doesn’t turn a zombie. A helicopter brings them aboard a ship; the US President is dead, many are missing, and since Gerry was once a war investigator they ask for his help now in escorting a young brilliant doctor to try and find out a cure or something.
Gerry doesn’t want to go, he wants to stay with his family, so he’s told in plain words that if he doesn’t agree they won’t be allowed to stay on the ship. To guarantee his family the safety that ship can give them, Gerry agrees and leaves for South Korea. The first case they know of was from there, so the doctor is sent to investigate this ‘infection’. As the plane lands they go out and it’s not long before the first zombies appear, and the doctor panics and turns to run inside, but he slips and falls down and accidentally shoots himself... yes, he didn’t even land properly and he was already dead. Now, they sent Gerry and other soldiers because they knew he couldn’t make it on his own, so who the hell had the brilliant idea to give him a loaded gun? 
Gerry starts his investigation: the base doctors had looked at a dead soldier, obviously not noticing when his eyes rotated in a funny way (aaargh) or his fingers started itching, and finally attacked him. 
They tell him of one of them, a soldier walking with a limp who was in the room with infected people and yet they never touched him.
They have there a CIA man who seems a bit crazy, locked up because he sold weapons to North Korea, and he says that in Jerusalem they knew it before it happened, that they contained the situation with big big walls keeping the infected out. That’s why Gerry’s next stop is Jerusalem. 
They need to refill the plane and use bicycles to move silently because zombies are attracted by noise (screech screech screech is not exactly silent but anyway) . They are halfway when Karin calls... so the zombies wake up and attack. The captain is turned and shot down :-(
Once in Jerusalem, he asks how could they know it. They had intercepted an Indian message talking about zombies, and investigated.. anyway they build big big walls and accept inside new people everyday because one more person saved means one less zombie to fight. Outside the walls there are many many zombies, but inside the walls people feel secure and they sing and shout and anyway make a lot of noise :-/ and Gerry doesn’t say anything until it’s too late. There’s so much noise that the zombies are irresistibly drawn to them and they start piling up along the wall outside, until some manage to get to the other side and it’s total chaos. Gerry is escorted away but some soldiers; he notices an old man and a very very thin boy being completely ignored, with lots of zombies running past them.
They must fight their way out: a soldier, infected, blows himself up, another one is with Gerry and when she’s hurt he quickly cuts off her hand trying to save her and yes, she doesn’t turn. 
Running away together, they see a plane who was supposed to land there but seeing the situation was starting to fly away and the two of them board it. 
Gerry thinks about all the things he saw and reaches the conclusion that the monsters don’t attack the sick. He calls Thierry and asks where he can find vaccines and stuff like that and his new destination is now the World Health Organization. They all thought they were safe but it turns out that somehow, who knows how, there was a zombie in a closet and when it comes out the infection starts spreading. Gerry and Segen the soldier try their best to fight them off, but there’s too many, basically everyone on the plane but the two of them and the two pilots, so Gerry uses Segen’s grenade and when it goes off the monsters are all sucked out of the plane. Of course now the plane crashes down. Gerry wakes up badly hurt because something got stabbed in his side, through and through, but Segen helps him walk until they finally reach the W.H.O.  
They cure him there, but he remains unconscious for three days. After 48 hours had passed without him calling, someone ordered Thierry to send Karin and the kids away... wow that was quick :-/
After three days Gerry wakes up to two suspicious faces, the doctors want to know who he is and why he is there, so he has Favino-doctor make the call and Thierry explains that he is with the UN, and of course Thierry has also to explain that he answered the phone because Karin has been sent to Nova Scotia. Gerry explains why he’s there: at first they misunderstand and say that they thought of that but there is no chance to infect the monsters, but he explains that he’s reached the conclusion that they don’t attack the ill, so they need lethal diseases that can be cured. Of course it’s not a cure, but merely a disguise, but still it’s the only hope they have at the moment.
The problem is that all the samples are in another room, and there are 80 zombies between them. 
Gerry goes with Segen, and the Favino-doctor goes with them to show them the way or he might get lost in there. They try to keep as quiet as possible, but in a big empty place it’s easy sooner or later to make a noise, and the zombie attack. Gerry tries to distract the monsters so that they can get to room 139, but when they are almost there there are so many zombies between them and the door that they have to run away, and they run back to safety, with the others opening the door just the time to let them through. Gerry now makes it to the room, and he starts taking all sorts of stuff into a box intending to take it to the doctors and they’ll know what all that is. Problem is, outside the door there is now a zombie, he has no weapons and no other way to go, so all that remains is to test his theory himself hoping he gets lucky, because he doesn’t know what he’s injecting himself with. Still, he does that, injecting one at random in his arm, and then he waits a while, who knows how long, basically until the zombie makes a noise waking him up... and then he opens the door.. and the zombie doesn’t want him, doesn’t bite him, and he can simply walk his way back. There’s still a lot of them at the door where Segen and the doctor escaped, so Gerry makes some loud noise to get them away from there. All the zombies run towards the noise, running past him completely ignoring his presence. 
As soon as he reaches them he is injected with some antidote to whatever he had used and then Gerry and Segen leave. I must say, whatever it was he didn’t look ill at all.
Gerry goes to Nova Scotia to reunite with his family of course, but his voice narrates the ending, saying that this is not the end, that entire cities have been lost but now they have a chance. The cold slows them down so they’re still fighting them in Moscow, and there are survivors here and there all around the world, and with this new discovery they can all rise and fight them and destroy them all, and this is actually the beginning of the war to take the world back. It’s been ‘almost’ the end of mankind, but not quite, and people can now fight back and burn them all.

Gerry-Brad Pitt
Karin-Mireille Enos
Thierry-Fana Mokoena
Segen-Daniella Kertesz
W.H.O. (o centro di ricerca dell’OMS) doctor: Peter Capaldi e PierFrancesco Favino

Forest fairies - 2015

It was nice, more suitable to a teenage girl than an adult one, but still nice, enjoyable even if I’m past my teen years. It’s a pity that the ending didn’t make sense at all, which is why I’m not at all keen on seeing it again. I like things that make sense, and this one didn’t. I know it’s a movie about fairies, but that doesn’t mean that there are no rules, it only means that they set their own rules, and I would have liked them to respect those rules.
It starts with a small village of fairies preparing for a big wedding, planning everything with care and enthusiasm, when all of a sudden their queen Aleeda comes saying that they made a mistake and there will be no more contact between fairies and humans, and her gift necklace is left hanging there, on a rock, as a reminder. 
Amanda is sad because her grandfather recently died. He had secretly turned their house into a bed & breakfast, and had left it to his daughter, not to his wife, asking her to run it instead of going back to the big city, and he left a video to explain that in the end it’s her choice, and she can leave if she want, or she can “grant a dying man his wish” ... so she can’t really say no, can she? 
He also left Amanda a horse because she loves horses. Amanda’s happy to stay and her grandmother tells her of her ‘fairy friends’. 
Amanda’s mother Patricia keeps being unpleasant to Dylan the handyman when she meets her old friend Turk after twenty years. He asks her out but he has something on his mind; Amanda hears him saying on the phone that Patricia ‘will be no trouble’  and then he tries to pay her off or stop her from telling her mom so she runs away on her horse and falls. Cali the fairy talks to her and takes her to her village. Afterwards her mother finds her and Amanda tries to tell her everything but she just talked to her about fairies that Patricia can’t see so it’s not strange if she doesn’t believe her. What’s actually weird is that Amanda makes a big deal out of her mother not believing her, she’s old enough to understand that all that talking about fairies is not exactly ‘normal’.
Cali and her fairy friends Harper Emilyn and McKenna go to see her because they want to help her.
Turk owes money to a man and somehow wants to buy Patricia’s farm, charming her to get her to sell . The fairies play tricks on him in an attempt to get rid of him, but it’s not enough. McKenna comes up with the right plan: they should set Patricia up with Dylan and it’d be a win-win.
They make his hair and they change his clothes while he’s unconscious... he’s surprised but also pleased when Patricia tells him that he looks good. 
They get along well from now on, and when Turk acts like a jerk raising his voice at Amanda she sends him away. 
Mysterious and rather sinister Mr Green appears from nowhere to reclaim his money back.
Aleeda finds out everything and forbids them to see each other again. After Amanda’s grandmother dies, Patricia sells the property to Turk making Amanda very upset. Rightly so, I’d say, how could she? Anyway, Amanda finds her grandma’s diary of her days from when she was a child until she got married, saying how much she loved Aleeda for making it all happen, and when she got married she wondered if Aleeda had moved away because she didn’t see her anymore.
The farm actually belongs to Mr Green, not Turk, and he wants to take the horse away so Amanda rides him again into the forest. She tells Aleeda the truth: Aleeda had thought that ‘grandma’ had forgot about her but she hadn’t, she had simply grown older in that in-between age when they can’t see fairies. 
The fairies try to help and when Mr Green tries to set fire to the farm Aleeda and all the fairies come to fight him off with arrows, and the question is finally settled when the sheriff comes to say that Patricia only owned her dad’s half, but Amanda owns her grandma’s half, so unless she signs too the sale is not valid, and then he arrests Mr Green for trying to burn it down.
And now the stupid ending: Amanda’s grandmother becomes a fairy, who knows why, and we find out that the fairy that all this time wasn’t ready to come out is actually her grandfather, who was waiting for his wife to join him. Patricia and Dylan can see it too, because Amanda told them to believe, apparently :-/ It’s an ending so horrible it ruins whatever this movie had. First of all, it’s not so easy to really believe something simply because you’re told to believe it, but anyway that couldn’t possibly be enough, because grandma always believed in her ‘fairy friends0 and she missed Aleeda a lot when she couldn’t see her anymore, so why couldn’t she? If it’s a simple matter of believing? Because it wasn’t until now, they said more than once that adults can’t see fairies, it’s not just a matter of ‘believing’ so it is stupid that Patricia and Dylan can see them now. 
Also, for Amanda’s grandparents to become fairies is totally absurd and annoying, why should they? Everyone who dies becomes a fairy? No, just them, they’re the only elders around, but even if they were special for some reason - which is rather unfair to the rest of the world - the worst thing of all is that they didn’t show us fairy-grandma meeting Aleeda again, which at least could have been a nice moment, absurd but nice, but they didn’t :-/
Amanda-Emily Debowski
Patricia-Adrian Cowan
Cali-Winny Clarke
Emilyn-Emily Agard
Aleeda-Lora Burke
Mr Green-Graham Gauthier
Dylan-Gary McKenzie
McKenna-Mercedes Morris
Turk-Jeremy Ninaber
Harper-Rebecca Perry

The Christmas dragon - 2014

I’ve seen worse, but if you’re not a child it’s not really appealing. I love fantasy stories so I tried it, but honestly the plot is very poor, the acting is very poor - the two girls were those who did their best, all the others were not very good I’m afraid. Nobody as bad as the bad soldiers though, aaargh. The effects left a lot to desire, the make up was at children-movie-level, the story lacked depth...
Anyway, details:
We see a happy family, father mother and daughter, when some soldiers come asking for his taxes. He says that they’re stealing them, and that he’ll personally pay his taxes to the Lord in person. They are to be arrested because of this, and they fight, until the little girl screams and her parents stop fighting because worried about her: ‘ok but don’t hurt her’. Children can be put to work in the mines so they go after her too. Mom screams “run!” and she does but then falls down. The soldiers see some dragon eggs, much more valuable, and want to take them too. They steal the eggs, making one dragon very angry. The dragons kills everyone but the little girl and the two bad soldiers. 
We move to ‘six years later’. The little girl Ayden lives in a village, in a home for orphans, and her arm hurts every time a dragon approaches . She speaks to the other children about Christmas and making a wish, but Rosalynne says she’s being cruel to lift their hopes up. 
While outside, a strange man tells her that the magic is gone. He’s actually an elf and he tells her that a magic stone led him to her and he gives her the stone telling her to follow it, to find the magic and save Christmas. Without the stone he turns immediately dark and she runs away. 
She explains it all to the other children, and some of them agree to help her. Early next morning they try to sneak out. Garrett stays behind because he won’t go without Rosalynne, but when the bad soldiers come Rosalynne joins the others, saying that Garrett won’t come and nothing’s alright now.
When the boys try to fish they are attacked by some kind of water dragon and they lose the boat. The elf called that stone a compass, and it shines when pointed the right way. They go to a tavern where Ayden recognizes the bad soldiers so they try to escape. One grabs Ayden but Rosalynne helps her. A thief takes the stone and when he does it shines. Ayden frees him and he goes with them. Finally Rosalynne tells them that as orphans become of age they are sent to work, and she’s supposed to go to the mines. The thief is called Airk, according to the credits, but I always understood Erik. Anyway.
The stone led them to Airk, he knows where the magic is. The magic comes from a crystal orb but now an ogre has it. They find the ogre, lure him out and go grab the orb, and then they run. Two days to get the orb to Father Christmas. He can lead them to the North border, Airk says. 
When a young dragon is shot down by bandits, two of the children want to help it. They pretend to be goblins to scare the bandits away :-/ and they set traps, unleash bees, and generally try to send them away. Ayden stayed behind with the dragon, and when the bandit leader and three of his men find her, she’s helped by a warrior girl with a sparkling stone. Saerwen knows Airk and we learn that the orb controls time and Airk wanted to try bring back time to save his mother and so he stole the orb. 
The dragon is a she and Ayden tries to cure her wings and then tell her to stay and rest and they go.
They go north but are attacked by goblins - elves gone dark because the magic’s gone - and the children as well as Rosalynne have to actually save the others...
The dark woods weaken Saerwen but luckily the dragon comes to help them. Still, Saerwen’s weakening too much and Airk uses the orb and this time it works for him and she feels better. 
It’s Christmas eve, Rosalynne and Ayden ride the dragon. Ayden says “follow us”... really? :-/
They get to Father Christmas: without the orb he aged a lot and is now very very old, and won’t even wake up. They say that their wishes coming true was actual magic (like, having a family, not going to the mines, that sort of stuff), so it’s not gone yet. They use the dragon to lead the sleigh and they stop at their own town and deliver gifts using Father Christmas list; some are left out of the door and some are left inside, for some reason, and they even go to the orphanage, but people see the dragon and want to kill it. 
Two children and Rosalynne are taken by the bad soldiers, but she manages to ring the bell so all children wake up and find their gifts (some of them outside the door, and why would they think of opening the door in the middle of the night I really don’t know..)
The bad soldier n.1, the woman, shoots the dragon but Ayden tries to put herself in the way to protect it, but Father Christmas slows time down enough to save her. He banishes the bad soldiers - ta very much says the rest of the world - and the children go live with him. Ayden, Rosalynne, and Garrett too. Saerwen marries Airk and it’s the end.

Ayden-Bailee Johnson
Rosalynne-Paris Warner
Saerwen-Melanie Stone
Father Christmas-Adam Johnson
Garrett-Talon Ackerman
Airk-Jake Stormoen

A rose for Christmas - 2016/7

A simple Christmas movie with an unsatisfying ending. It wasn’t too bad but it leaves you thinking ‘that’s it?’, so... :-/
We have businessman Cliff who is sent to supervise the construction of a float for his company, for the Rose Parade. Andy is an artist and an art teacher who is afraid to show her work to anybody since she failed her first and only gallery. Her father Big Al has always been in charge of the float-construction business but now his doctor tells him that he needs to take it slow so she takes charge of that  and therefore has to deal with Cliff, who’s all like “how difficult can it possibly be?” ...
They find a small bunch of volunteers to help and they try to work out their differences. He helps decorating and gets everyone a Christmas present, then he spends Christmas with her family.
He wants the float to be a success because his goal is to get a promotion and go to Shangai. It’s all going well and nice between them until Cliff’s boss shows up and critics everything they’ve done and reveals that Cliff said that with her in charge it would be a disaster, which she takes rather too seriously. He said it when he barely knew her, but she feels hurt and says “you never believed in me” and storms out. Cliff tries to defend her work with his boss but his own future is uncertain at this point. He must go back to Chicago but when she learns about him leaving she runs to get him back. 
I hate the big speeches American movies love so much, and there are a lot here, they spend more time doing speeches than actually working, and only now that the deadline is near one of the volunteers, Eric, thinks of calling his friends to help. They manage it in time of course and the boss is satisfied alright and offers him that job in Shanghai but he turns it down to stay in Pasadena with Andy. 
Well, the ending was rather disappointing. First they spent a lot of time trying to get the bear on the float to move, and then when it was ‘parading’ it didn’t move at all, so what was that all about? Just a boring waste of time, it seems.
Second, at the end Cliff himself repairs the little engine that makes the bear move, but if he could do it why didn’t he even look at it before now? At first he was like ‘I’m the boss and you’re the hand-labour’ but then he started helping them with the work and after all he cared a lot about it being a success so why didn’t he even take a look ? :-/
Third: after 80 minutes of story they just kiss like a couple that’s been together ten years, and then he turns out the big goal he’s been working for and talking about all that time - not really sure what he intends to do here - and she simply agrees saying that she’ll show her paintings in a gallery and he’ll be the new manager of her dad’s float-construction business... just like that, and it ends... I mean, was that her father’s only job? They needed volunteers, you telling me he supported a family doing that? Because if he did, why didn’t they hire workers? Those people worked for weeks and only got a Christmas present - a nice one but still. 
I don’t know, the ending was boring and disappointing for me.  
Andy-Rachel Boston
Cliff-Marc Bendavid
Big Al-Michael Kopsa
Emily-Venus Terzo

Eric-Austin Obiajunwa

Star Trek Deep Space 9 - season 2

last episodes still missing-    24

My favs: eps 22 and 5, then 18, 13 , 14.

1 - The homecoming - 421 on my dvd. 
Quark helped Odo so now Odo is totally puzzled: does it mean truce? friends? Of course Odo doesn’t believe it. 
76th rule of acquisition: every once in a while, declare peace. It confuses the enemies”
Rom is puzzled too, but then he always is. A sexy woman with purple hair has something to take to Bajor: a Cardassian on Cardassia IV gave her a Bajoran earring. Quark goes to Kira and gives it to her. She goes straight to Sisko to ask for a runabout to go to Cardassia IV to rescue a Bajoran war prisoner. The earring is apparently the insignia of Li Nalas, the resistance leader, a sort of hero. On the station there are emblems of the Alliance for Global Unity painted here and there (well, I saw one but I guess there must be more in such a big station), called “The Circle”, they want Bajor for Bajorans, and all foreigners out... just change the name of the place and we’ve heard this too many times :-/
Since the Cardassians swore they had released all Bajoran prisoners, Sisko accepts, sending O’Brian with her. 
I like the friendship between Dax and Kira :-)
They go but find multiple readings of Bajoran life forms, there is still one labour-camp! They land and what do they do? They enter with a pretence: Kira as a prostitute and O’Brian... well I’m not sure how the Cardassian justified in his mind the presence of a human there, it was all a bit pathetic if you ask me. They enter the force-field this way, and attack the guards. Three guards down and they rescue ten or eleven people, but more guards arrive so four Bajorans volunteer to stay behind to guarantee Li Nalas’ rescue. Gul Dukat calls Sisko to say that “the Cardassian High Command has issued a formal apology to the people of Bajor. We had no idea that Bajoran prisoners were still being held on Cardassia IV. Such detentions are a direct violation of Supreme Directive 2645 and I assure you the camp prefect will be chastised accordingly” and the prisoners that stayed there? “they are already en route to Bajor”. Wow, that was easy, wasn’t it?
Li Nalas is cured and washed, but is not thrilled to talk about past battles. Minister Jaro comes to meet him. The Bajorans are all excited, much more than he is. Well, I don’t know what will be of him, but for now I like this minister Jaro, his calm and his voice.
Quark is attacked by masked figure: the Circle. Jake had a date with a Bajoran girl but her father didn’t let her go because he’s not Bajoran :-/ 
Li Nalas is discovered on a ship trying to run away, so the truth comes out. Li was a member of a resistance cell, and totally by chance he killed a Cardassian, a Gul, and all his men declared him a hero “and I had done nothing but shoot an unarmed Cardassian in his underwear. I’ll never forget the look in his face when he died. He was so... embarrassed” and “I am not the man they think I am” but Sisko tells him people don’t need a man but a symbol. Now the Government puts Li Nalas on Kira’s post! I guess he didn’t expect that, now, did he?
2 - The circle - 422
I never understand why they so often say “you need to come here and see this”, even now, Jake called Sisko, he went to their quarters and there was a Circle-symbol on their door= why couldn’t he just say it when he called him?? Sisko knows what they are, or maybe Jake didn’t? Well, he knew it was important though, so... and this happens a lot, in Star Trek as well as in other movies. I hate all those “can’t tell you on the phone, you’d better come here”-why? Just say it!!
Odo, Dax, Julian, Miles, even Quark are all in Kira’s quarters to say goodbye when Vedek Bareil comes. He invites her to come and stay at his monastery for a while. She goes, but it’s not the place or the time that can give her peace. Bareil takes her to see the Orb of prophecy and change. I don’t know the meaning of what she saw, other than her having a story with Bareil :-) Maybe it meant that she should enter politics?
Winn is unpleasant as always. Odo hides in a Kressari ship to find out who gives the rebels their weapons, and discovers it’s the Cardassians! Kira is abducted and finds out that Jaro is the leader of the Circle.
Sisko, Li, Bashir and Miles go to her rescue and bring her back to DS9. It’s no surprise to see that Winn and Jaro are... supporting each other..
An admiral orders Sisko to evacuate, but he plans on staying behind and fight.
3 - The siege - 423
Sisko makes a speech to his Federation people, and I thought: there are not many of them here, did he make several speeches for lots of groups or is it simply that they could not include more people in one scene in Ops? A speech in a cargo bay would have been better maybe? Or maybe these were only the superior officers and the others are not important? Anyway, not a lot of them huh?
 All non-Bajoran leave the station, the evacuation is under process. Nog and Jake are sorry to leave each other, Keiko and Molly leave angry that Miles is staying. Kira needs to go to Bajor to present proof of the Cardassian involvement, and Dax goes with her because her second host Tobin knew how to repair a ship - the seat-of-the-pants-technology was funny :-)
Quark sold fake tickets to Bajorans, but Li Nalas calms them down with a great speech, and Quark has to stay because Rom gave his ticket to a Dabo girl. Good one Rom.
The army arrives to find no resistance, but Sisko has left his baseball in his office. 
O’Brian calls the doctor “Julian” now.
Rule of acquisition n. 31 “never make fun of a Ferengi’s mother” :-)
Kira and Dax get to the Chamber of Ministers with Bareil’s help, and Winn is quick in turning against Jaro, as the wind changes. I’m very sorry Jaro is on the wrong side, I still like his manner and his voice.
General Krim is convinced by Li Nalas, but his colonel won’t accept it and tries to shoot Sisko, but Li comes between them and dies : “off the hook, after all”. He was ready to die for Bajor, living was more difficult for him. Still, they were not fair towards him, he was neither a coward or a bad man or someone who doesn’t care, he simply didn’t ‘want’ to be a hero, to lead people, to be responsible for other lives, but he was brave after all. He acted instinctively when he saved Sisko’s life.
Everyone’s back to DS9, Kira mourns Li Nalas. I’m sorry, I liked him. 
4 - Invasive procedure - 424
47182.1 DS9 is evacuated due to a plasma disruption, only a few people are in. 
Miles has two brothers, I never knew this.  As always Odo is very boring.
A ship arrives and attacks them: there are a Klingon, T’Kar (Tim Russ), another Klingon, Yeto, a woman, Mareel, and a Trill, Verad (John Glover), who wants the symbiont: “I want Dax”, as simple as that. Only one Trill in ten is chosen to be joined, and he was found ‘unsuitable’. 
Dax has a sister, I didn’t remember that either.
Bashir performs the operation. 
What kind of a Klingon is that if Sisko wins so easily! :-/ On the other hand, Mareel beats Kira: well, never challenge a woman in love, I guess.
Jadzia wakes up, so scared and feeling so alone. Verad Dax talks to Sisko: eight lifetimes of memories. Verad lies to Mareel, he’s changed too much, but he was never meant to be joined, he could die or go crazy so Mareel surrenders to help him. They put Dax back into Jadzia, and now she remembers Verad’s life too.
5 - Cardassians - 425
Garak! Yeah! Bashir keeps playing spies with him.
Cardassian boy Rugal comes to the station with a Bajoran man, but he’s scared of other Cardassians, he’s been brought up to hate them, and he bites Garak’s hand. It might be a war orphan abandoned when they left. Dukat about him “poor Garak, an amiable fellow as ever there was one” :lol: Now Dukat wants to bring all the orphans home. A man tells Bashir: “Rugal is their revenge, their revenge against all Cardassian”. At the mention of Dukat’s friendship for him Garak laughs sarcastically and says that Cardassians have a big attention to details: “do you think we forgot about those poor little orphans when we left Bajor? Who was in charge of the Cardassian withdrawal from Bajor?” so Bashir asks Dukat : “I did not choose to leave them behind, I was ordered to”.
Dukat says that Rugal is the son of a  politician and thought to be dead. Garak wakes Bashir up at night to go to Bajor, they go to a resettlement center. Garak is adorable, in a certain twisted way, given the circumstances :lol: The woman there: “I was in the Underground, eight years ago” and Garak: “really? Perhaps we ‘have’ met!” :lol:
The computers don’t work, so Garak repairs them. There are other Cardassian children there, and Garak is sweet, in his own way, calling a girl ‘child’ and the woman ‘madam’, but it’s sad when they have to go leaving the kids there. What a sweet voice that girl had when she said “excuse me sir, have you come to take us back to Cardassia?”; what a moment, when both Garak and Bashir feel compassion for those Cardassian children, but can do nothing for them. “Children with no parents have no status on Cardassia” :-/
Garak: “I believe in coincidences. Coincidences happen every day. But I don’t trust coincidences”.
This civilian leader says “on Cardassia, family is everything”. He comes for Rugal, but Rugal doesn’t want him, doesn’t want to go back to Cardassia. This thing will end Pa’Dar’s career.
Gul Dukat and Pa’Dar are political enemies. Garak and Bashir find that Rugal was not found, he was brought in by a military woman stationed at Terok Nor. Terok Nor was DS9’s Cardassian name.
47178.3 Sisko allows Pa’Dar to take Rugal to Cardassia. 
Garak: “I never tell the truth because I don’t believe there’s such a thing”
6 - Melora - 426
47229.1 A cartographer arrives, ensign Melora Pazlar, the first Elaysian to join Starfleet. She needs anti-grav units and a wheelchair. She’s very strong-minded. She will go to the gamma quadrant with Dax. First, Julian takes her to the new Klingon restaurant on the promenade. She knows Klingon food and language: “there’s nothing worse than half-dead racht”.. ok, I’d never eat Klingon food :-/ (probably better than ferengi though :-// )
Julian’s father was a Federation diplomat. Before medicine Julian tried tennis.
In the morning, Melora doesn’t leave because she had a ‘minor accident’, she didn’t see a step and fell. She invites Julian into her quarters, turns down the gravity and gracefully flies around the room. He tries too, and they kiss while floating :) then she goes with Dax. She puts on Delvok’s vulcan music, very pretty. Dax tries to be optimistic about love “I knew a hydrogen-breathing Lothra who fell hopelessly in love wit an Oxygene” then how could they even be in the same room? “40 minutes a day without their breathing apparatus. 57 years they were together” (well, of course they could see and talk to each other more often, staying alternately in room where one could breath and the other would wear a breathing apparatus, those 40 minutes were probably just the time they needed when any device would have made things uncomfortable....)
Back on DS9, Bashir tells her of a new process to adapt her body to this gravity once and for all. Problem is, she can’t use the low-grav and fly anymore.. she’s confused, she wants it, the independence it can give her, but she misses her old self, the idea of never going back to her own world saddens her (of course). Dax thinks of the little mermaid’s fairytale “did she live happily ever after?” and Jadzia doesn’t answer because of course it didn’t, I know the ending was horribly sad..
Fallit Kot visits Quark after eight years in prison saying that he’s come to kill him. 
Rule of acquisition n. 16 “a deal is a deal”. Quark offers Fallit Kot payment to save his life. They close a deal and get 199 bars of gold-pressed latinum, but Fallit Kot is not satisfied. He kills the guy and takes Quark prisoner, and also Melora and Dax and their runabout Orinoco. He shoots Melora to convince Sisko he’s serious. Because of the treatment, Melora is not dead: she turns off the gravity and beats Fallit Kot. Melora must give up the treatment now, or more clearly, she doesn’t want to start it again, because she wouldn’t be herself anymore. Bashir and Melora say goodbye listening to a Klingon serenade..
7 - Rules of acquisition - 427
Morn is sleeping on the promenade :-p The ferengis are playing together with Dax, the Tongo game when they say “confront, evade, acquire and retreat”. Ferengi women don’t wear clothes, don’t talk back, don’t play games :-/
There’s a new waiter, Pel, who is very good.
56th rule of acquisition “free advice is seldom cheap” and 22nd “a wise man can hear profit in the wind” and 33 “it never hurts to suck up to the boss” . There are 285 rules total.
Zek gives Quark a job, to negotiate a deal for him with the Dosi. Zek gives Kira some nitrate to fertilize Bajor. 48th rule: “the bigger the knife, the sharper the knife”. Pel helps him but Quark doesn’t know she’s a female...
Quark wants to buy 10.000 vats of tulaberries, but the Dosi offer 5.000, then the Nagus Zek wants 100.000 vats! 
Zek gives Kira a latinum earring as a gift but she returns it. 
Pel is very nice and loyal to Quark, and Jadzia is suspicious, being a woman she understood at once that Pel was in love with Quark, although she didn’t know Pel was a woman, having never met one.
The Dosi leave DS9, Zek is furious and Pel proposes to travel to the gamma quadrant with Zek’s ship. Quark and Pel travel together.  
Jealous, Rom searches Pel’s room and finds her fake ears (women have smaller ears). She had two pairs apparently, since she already had one pair on... 
Quark insists on his contract, but the Dosi don’t have the quantity he wants, only 10.000. 
21 Rule “never place friendship above profit” - 103 “sleep can interfere..” either that’s the whole of it or Pel didn’t finish it. 62: “the riskier the road the greater the profit”
Pel kisses Quark and he’s quite shocked! A Dosi tells Quark to see the Karemma, an important part of the Dominion. That’s what Zek wanted, to learn about the Dominion.
Fortunately Rom tells Quark alone about Pel, not Zek. Females cannot earn profit or quote the sacred rules :-/ Quark doesn’t want anyone to know about Pel. Wearing clothes is a crime for female ferengis, so Quark sends her away but she comes back to see the Nagus and unmasks herself in front of him. Zek wants her in prison, Quark defends her and Zek takes him out of all the gamma quadrant profits..
Jadzia knows Quark enough to know that he’s suffering for losing Pel. 
As Ferengi stories go, this one was not too bad after all. Still, I’m not too fond of ferengi stories.
8 - Necessary evil - 428
A Bajoran woman wants Quark to retrieve something for her, and Rom helps him, revealing himself to be good at something after all. The someone that she sends to retrieve it from him, shoots Quark.
Bashir saves him, but it takes time. It’s always a wonder to me how they can save some people and not even try with others... in real life it’s a matter of treatable wounds vs fatal wounds, but in St it’s a bit more complicated.
rule 139 “wives serve, brothers inherit” Ferengi are so much like humans, they like to have slaves :-/
We see Odo during the occupation, before he was chief of security, when he first met Gul Dukat and was given a task to investigate a murder. It was the husband of Mrs Vaatrik, the woman that hired and then betrayed Quark. She said the murderer was her husband’s lover: Kira, with long long hair, cute :)
47284.1 it was five years ago. She started then calling him Constable. 
Odo does the ‘Columbo trick’ :lol: coming back when he’s already at the door saying “there is one other thing” :-p
Odo also met Quark investigating. The list of names was of collaborators, and she’s been blackmailing them for money. Kira said she didn’t kill him, of course, she was there to sabotage the station. Only now Odo knows the truth. Someone else sabotaged it while she killed him looking for the list of collaborators. “what you think of me matters a lot” so she never told him the truth.
9 - Second sight - 429
47329.4 It’s been four years since Wolf 359. Sisko can’t sleep and takes a walk and meets beautiful Fenna in a red dress. They talk when she mysteriously disappears. In the morning he orders something different from his usual raktajino (chiraltan tea) .
There’s a terraformer on the station: Gideon Seyetik. Sisko meets her again, and shows her around the station. They seem to hit it off greatly, but when he asks her about herself she runs away. He likes her a lot, so he asks Odo to find her. He only knows her name, though, and all he can say is: “I’d say she’s about 16. metres tall “ metres? no feet? Thanks, that’s easier for me, although unexpected :)
Dax saw them together, and wants to talk about her with him :p 
Seyetik wants to ignite a dead sun, and by his own admission he’s a “raging egomaniac”. He introduces them to his wife, and what do you know? Nidell appears to be Fenna! Nidell acts like she doesn’t know Sisko, so he approaches her alone “it would have been a lot easier if you’d told me you were married” - “commander, I’ve never met you before tonight” and Odo tells him “with the exception of professor Seyetik, no one has left the Prometheus during the entire time it’s been at the station”. Out of nowhere Fenna reappears, they kiss then she literally disappears into thin air in front of him! When Seyetik and Dax leave, he goes too. 
The poem “The fall of Kang” by Klingon poet G’Trok is required reading at the Academy : “so honour the valiant who die ‘neath your sword, but pity the warrior who slays all his foes” - pretty.
Seyetik met Nidell at New Halana, daughter of a local dignitary. Sisko meets Fenna again on board, and Dax analyses her: she’s pure energy. Nidell can’t wake up, and Seyetik knows Fenna: “she’s an illusion created by my wife’s unconscious mind. Nidell is a psychoprojective telepath. Fenna’s just another one of her projections”. Nidell doesn’t know, when she’s emotionally distressed she loses control of it. Seyetik is hard to live with, all his previous wives left him but Halanas mate for life, so she can’t leave. Sisko talks to Fenna, she loves him. Seyetik takes a ship and leaves alone. “this is the only way I can set her free. I owe her that”. He launches himself towards the dead sun making it live again. Fenna sees him die then disappears and Nidell doesn’t remember anything about her. She wants to go back to her world. “I can remember for both of us” says Sisko. Nidell: “what was she like?” - “she was just like you” and then she leaves..
10 - Sanctuary - 430
A Bajoran musician, Varani, works at Quark’s because Kira asked him to hire him to play. They both want Bajor to rebuild the “jalanda forum”. A ship comes through and they save them and repair their ship. Four people with a strange language, so strange the universal translator has difficulty in translating it. The boy makes a strange face and is aggressive. The only woman of the group leads the way. Odo shakes his head. When  they finally understand each other, Hareek (the woman) explains that her people need saving, that their leaders are all women and that they’re looking for Kentanna, where the Skreean want to go. Her people was under the T’rogans power for centuries until they were conquered by a member of the Dominion. Hareel and Kira like each other, then more Skreeans come. That same boy is very prone to fighting. :-/ Sisko and Kira find them a place to go, a planet, but Hareek has found Kentanna: Bajor. 47391.2 They request to immigrate there but Bajor refuses, they can’t take care of three million Skreeans, with all the trouble they have of their own now. The boy, Hareek’s son, steals a ship and heads towards Bajor with his friends, and opens fire on Bajor ships trying to stop them, but their still broken ship explodes. 
The Skreeans all leave for Draylon II. Kira goes to say goodbye. Hareek tells her: “you still believe we would have been a burden to your people? I think you’ve made a terrible mistake. Maybe we could have helped you. The Skreeans are farmers, Kira. You have a famine on your planet. Perhaps we could have made that peninsula bloom again. 50 years of Cardassian rule have made you all frightened and suspicious. I feel sorry for you”. Which is a nice speech and indeed possible, yes, but what if it didn’t work out? Once Bajor accepted them, it would have been stuck with them, and look at those troublemaking boys, and just imagine millions of them. It’s not that simple, is it?
11 - Rivals - 431
Martus Mazur, refugee from the El-Aurian system, a people of listeners. He’s a con-man and Odo puts him in jail. In jail a prisoner dies and Martus takes a toy he had. With that toy Martus finds his luck. Martus opens a gambling place, making bigger copies of his toy. He’s having lots of luck, and the station is now full of bad-luck episodes. All Martus’ customers win, meanwhile. When Martus’ luck changes, he invests all his money in the project of a woman he wanted to trick, but this is her own trick! Martus’ machines were distorting the laws of probability, so Sisko and Dax destroy them. 
47th rule of acquisition “don’t trust a man wearing a better suit than your own”
109 “dignity and an empty sack is worth the sack”
Julian plays raquetball with Miles, who still calls him ‘doctor’, by the way. Miles is angry because Bashir beat him badly and Bashir is worried for his health. 
Miles plays again but Bashir loses on purpose, upsetting him even more. Quark organizes a match between Bashir and O’Brian. Everyone’s betting on Bashir, so Quark wanted to drug him to make him lose. 
12 - The alternate - 432
Dr Mora Pol comes to DS9, the Bajoran scientist assigned to Odo when he was found. Along with Dax, the two of them go to the gamma quadrant to investigate a planet. That might be Odo’s origin. They come back with something to study. A life-form sample escapes loose on the station, and when they find it it’s dead. Incidents don’t stop, however. Dr Mora knows it’s Odo, and tells him, and scares him and wants him to go back to the lab with him, and Odo transforms again and becomes dangerous, out of his own control. He goes after Mora again and they trap him. When he regains control, he talks to Dr Mora. He had not understood how terrible he felt about this lab thing, and neither had Dr Mora. Only now he understands that Odo will never go back to the lab, that he hates it deeply, and asks only one favour, that they might keep in touch, at least, and Odo agrees.
13 - Armageddon game - 433
Bashir and O’Brian help the T’Lani and the Kelleruns eliminate their biochemical weapons - that they call ‘harvesters’ - now that their war is over after centuries. They’ve been there for a week and tried everything, when they finally succeed in finding a way to destroy it. They still call each other ‘doctor’ and ‘chief’. 
When they are completing their work, they are attacked. All the scientists are killed, but Bashir and O’Brian make it and run away, but Miles has been contaminated.
How stupid to attack before ‘everything’ has been destroyed! The job was not finished! 
The ambassadors of T’Lani and Kelleruns tell Sisko that they both died, because O’Brian activated something that killed everyone. They bring a video that shows what happened, but Keiko can’t accept it. She watches the video and says that it’s a fake because it shows Miles drinking coffee at 3pm and she says that “Miles never drinks coffee late in the afternoon. It keeps him up all night” and “I know my husband, he never drinks coffee late in the day”, she’s very sure of that and says the video was altered, so Sisko and Dax leave immediately. 
Bashir tells O’Brian he doesn’t think that marriage is a good thing for career officers because their lives are too dangerous, and Miles “you career officers don’t know what you’re missing” :)
Miles shows signs of fever, and Julian understands he’s sick, he’s been infected. All the officers mourn for them. 
57th rule of acquisition “good customers are as rare as latinum, treasure them”
Miles and Bashir talk a lot, he remembers the only time he was in love, truly, with Palis Delon, a ballerina, then he graduated, but he wouldn’t give up his Starfleet career; “listen to me Julian, you were wrong about marriage, you’re the one who’s always talking about adventure. Marriage is the greatest adventure of them all, it’s filled with pitfalls and setbacks and mistakes, but it’s a journey worth taking because you take it together” ...
they repair a machine and send a distress signal, thinking the Kelleruns betrayed the T’Lani - I think, or maybe the other way around - anyway, he was wrong, they both felt the need to kill everyone who knew how to recreate the harvesters, including them. Miles is very sick, but he stands up “I want to die on my feet” but right before being killed Dax and Sisko beam them up on the runabout. Since the sensors are useless, after all communications have been jammed, they trick them. Sisko makes them believe they killed them destroying the runabout, while actually they were on the other one, and ran away before anyone could understand the trick. Miles is cured, and then he asks Keiko for a cup of coffee “Miles, you never drink coffee in the afternoon” - “sure I do” - “you do?” :lol: still, she was right about the video alteration :p
14 - Whispers - 434
47581.2 Miles’ log about the last 52 hours. He talks about some strange conspiracy, and that he’s going to warn the Paradas. Then the flashback: one morning he wakes up to a puzzling situation: Keiko seems to avoid him, Molly won’t kiss him, repairs are done without consulting him first, Keiko secretly talking to Sisko, Julian insisting he has his annual physical now and saying strange things, like not remembering that his mother died and his father remarried last spring.
(Miles birthday is in September). When Miles asks him, Sisko tells him that Keiko told him Jake has problems with his grades, then Jake told him his grades are actually great: so Sisko didn’t warn his son :-/
O’Brian keeps noticing they’re lying to him, all of them. He even starts thinking Keiko might have been trying to poison him and thinks “this was not my Keiko”.
Miles had been to the gamma quadrant and had to arrange secutiry for the Paradas to arrive, for some peace talks with their rebels. Miles talks to Odo about his suspicions.
Miles thinks “they’ve got to Odo too” and when Sisko Kira and Bashir come to take him he runs away, steals a runabout and heads for the Parada system, where we’ve seen him at the start, chased by another runabout, now firing on him. Miles thinks someone might have infiltrated not only DS9 but all Starfleet. They lose him and beam down on Parada II, and he follows them, where we see he was actually just a replicant. The real Miles had been abducted by someone wanting to sabotage the peace talks. The replicant is killed and real Miles saved.
Rule of acquisition “one of the high numbers, 194 I think” is “it’s always good business to know about customers before they walk in your door” it’s not good that Quark doesn’t remember his rules perfectly!
15 - Paradise - 435
47573.1 O’Brian and Sisko survey a star system near the wormhone after questions about setting up colonies there. Sisko wants Jake to work with O’Brian, to see what Starfleeet work is. Miles wasn’t good at mechanical engineer until he was at the front against the Cardassians and he had to make things work quickly, and that’s how he got the ‘gold suit’. They find a suitable planet, but there are already people there. They go down to meet them. Once down nothing works anymore and they can’t go back up. They are greeted by a man with bow and arrows. They are humans, stranded there ten years ago. Even if nothing works, they’ve made there their home. Alixus is the leader of the community. She is sure they’re to stay there, now, with no hope to go back. They’ve created a world without technology. Admiral Mitsuya is coming to DS9, Jadzia knows him as a good poker player, like her; because of this Kira tries to call Sisko but can’t reach him. A woman in the community is sick: she’s the fourth already, three have already died because of this disease brought by a local insect. Miles and Sisko want a way to go to the runabout to get the medical kit, but Alixus opposes the idea. She doesn’t even want him to talk about it. They’re put to work in the field. Miles thinks about Keiko, as he always does :) the punishment for every rule broken is a day inside a metal box, in the heat of the day. This is Alixus’ paradise, she never liked technology, never used it. 
Kira and Dax go to the runabout. The sick woman dies. O’Brian is found trying to activate his technology devices, so Alixus puts Sisko, as his commanding officer and therefore responsible for him, in the box. Miles makes a sort of compass and finds what he’s looking for. A device that blocks technology, controlled by Alixus. She caused their ship to crash there. She says she did it all for their ideal community, and now she must respond for her actions. They took away her and her son, but the others chose to stay - still, I guess now they can use technology, so nobody else will need to die in vain, right?
16 - Shadowplay - 436
47603.3 Odo and Dax are together in the gamma quadrant, and she likes to talk “intimate questions” :p they investigate a strange place, which seems to be a village where people are disappearing: 22 already. Odo and Dax try to help, and then they find out that the villagers are all holograms. Dax repairs the holoprojector, seen that the older man is the only real person there. He created it all thirty years ago.
Sisko convinces Jake to take the job with O’Brian, because it’ll look good at his Starfleet application... Jake is not excited, but what can he do? Miles tries to teach him what each color of isolinear rods is for, but Jake confesses that he doesn’t want to join the Academy. Miles was supposed to join a music academy as a cello player :p Jake finally confesses to his father too, and he understands of course. 
Vedek Bareil comes to DS9 :) Kira and Bareil play springball together, and she wins. After dinner they kiss and she realizes Quark is behind his visit to DS9, to keep her occupied and run his ‘business’ without her and Odo, but he fails and she stops his traffic.
17 - Playing God - 437
A Trill candidate, Arjin, comes to DS9, assigned to Dax; he finds her at Quark’s :) and she likes to drink Ferengi’s Black Hole, and starts her days wrestling...
O’Brian is hunting down Cardassian voles throughout the station :p
Jadzia takes Arjin to the Klingon restaurant where she sings with the owner. She soon thinks that he’s not preparing himself the right way and Quark comforts him. 
rule of Acquisition 111 “never have sex with the boss’ sister” , that’s how Quark blew his brilliant career ... (well, that is if you hurt her; if you two fall in love that’s different, being the boss’ brother-in-law might be useful)
During a flight, Dax and Arjin’s runabout has something from the subspace pocket stuck to it. It turns out to be a growing universe.. a protouniverse, and they can’t destroy it. “it’s like stepping on ants” but Odo says “I don’t step on ants, major. Just because we don’t understand a life form, it doesn’t mean we can destroy it” He’s right of course. They try therefore to bring it back where they got it. Dax and Arjin take it to the gamma quadrant in a runabout; he goes too even if it’s dangerous because he’s a better pilot (level 5, she’s only level 3). They are now at peace. He was very hurt when she told him she was concerned, she had doubts that he was preparing well for the joining, but now she explains how she was before, how Curzon’s rejections lead her to try harder, with new passion, how important it is that the host has its own goals and dreams, and a strong mind so not to be overwhelmed. Only thing is: they go to put back the protouniverse and next scene they’re saying goodbye already. Does this mean he only stayed here two days, or simply that they did not show us all the other days? Didn’t Jadzia say she spent two weeks with Curzon, back then?
When they parted, it felt like they just had that conversation, it certainly didn’t feel like ten days we know nothing about had passed. Well, it wouldn’t be the first detail out of place in Star Trek anyway. They tend to overlook little things like these sometimes..
18 - Profit and loss - 438
Cardassian Natima comes to the station with two students, leader of a rebel movement against the military power. Quark loves her very much, and is ready to help them escape for free if she stays behind, with him. Unfortunately Bajor makes a deal with Cardassia. They are to be delivered to the Cardassians in exchange for Bajoran prisoners, apparently (wasn’t it said in the Li Nalas episode that there were no more Bajoran prisoners at all, officially???). Garak was the one informing Cardassia of their presense, suggesting a prisoner-exchange solution, but now Gul Toran tells him to kill them. Garak hopes to be rewarded with the permission to go back home. I like Garak, how he talks and how he moves his arms and hands smoothly. 
Odo arrests the three of them; Quark begs him to let them go, and Odo accepts “in the name of justice”. Garak was about to stop them, to kill them, when Toran came to tell him his reputation would not be restored by this simple act, so instead Garak shoots him, because he loves Cardassia, he says. Quark says goodbye to Natima and lets her go with her students. Poor Quark, they were truly in love :( 
This episode showed how Garak is not at all comfortable here, he’s in exile and he misses his home world. 
19 - Blood oath - 439
Three Klingon arrive at DS9: Kor (John Colicos) drunk as a skunk; Kang (Michael Ansara) and Koloth (William Campbell), all three Da’har Masters, or something like that.
Hearing Kor and Koloth’s names, Dax goes to them immediately. As Curzon Dax had made a blood oath that she intends to keep. After 81 years Kang has found the Albino. Kang releases her from Curzon’s oath, but she talks to KirA. Back then the Klingon captured some predators, and when the Albino escaped he swore revenge and later on he infected their three children with a lethal virus: one of them was Kang’s son, Curzon’s Godson, and along with the three fathers Curzon took a blood oath to avenge their death. Kira “when you take a life, you lose part of yours as well”. She insists with the Klingons, she wants to go too. Kor is easily convinced, Koloth comes around but Kang won’t let her. She insists harder, and only when they’re all on their way she learns the truth about why he didn’t want her to go. The Albino knows they’re coming, Kang expects to die. Jadzia is of a different opinion. She turns their chances when she proposes to disable all weapons. Now it’s different, they can battle with bathlets, and with her help they succeed. Still, Koloth dies first, then Kang too. Kor is wounded, I think, but the last time we see him he’s still singing, so maybe he didn’t die. I’m not sure, though. 
Next scene, she’s back on the station. I liked Kor, if he didn’t die we might see him again.
20 - The Maquis part 1 - 440
Dax has a dinner date with captain Boday, the Galamite with a transparent skull: “he happens to be brilliant, his brain is twice the size of yours and mine”; Kira “I know, I’ve seen it”
A Cardassian ship explodes right after leaving DS9. Sisko and Dax’s old friend Calvin Hudson comes to DS9. 
Gul Dukat comes to Sisko to make him see what’s going on. Colonies in the demilitarized zone, Cardassians and Bajorans, are not at peace. A Vulcan woman wants to buy weapons from Quark, and it’s a fun pair to watch :) “I do find you intriguing Quark”.
People on DS9 abduct Dukat “they call themselves the Maquis” and the Badlands are their hideout. Sisko goes after them and sees that Hudson is one of them, he’s with the Maquis.
There are 285 rules of acquisition. Dukat has seven children. Did they say all this already?
21 - The Maquis part 2
Hudson and Sisko were at the academy together, and wanted to be captain by the time they were 30 and admirals by 40. They walk in a circle while talking: Calvin says that the Cardassians are smuggling weapons to their colonies, Sisko says there are better ways to prove it, and that the treaty is important, which is of course true, and that Calvin only wants revenge, which Calvin himself calls "retaliation". Back on the station, he doesn't tell the admiral there about Hudson's betrayal. 
The admiral said "we never should have allowed those colonies to remain on the Cardassian side of the demilitarised zone" and that's one thing, then she goes on, "talk to the Maquis, they're still federation citizens, I'm sure they'll listen to reason" .... is she for real or what? 

I didn't like Sisko's speech to Kira, kind of in favour of the Maquis' situation.
He's troubled because he understands his friend's reasons, but doesn't approve of his methods.
 Odo arrests Quark who confesses to having sold weapons to the terrorist group. "how long do I keep him here?" - "forever" and Odo walks out smiling. Quark: "this isn't funny, Odo!". A Cardassian legate now says that Dukat doesn't need saving because he was smuggling weapons into the demilitarised zone, and that Cardassia has no desire to go to war again against the Federation. When he goes away he says "I'm afraid this place has lost its charm since the last time I was here" ...
Sisko takes it to mean that Calvin was right and Central Command is smuggling weapons! Sisko goes to rescue Dukat, against Kira's will, because if Central Command wants him dead it's reason enough for them to want him alive. The Vulcan woman fails to establish a mind meld with Dukat "it would appear he has the ability to shield his thoughts" - "it's simply a matter of discipline"...
Sisko arrives to free Dukat and takes him back to DS9. He arrests the Maquis there but one, sent to tell Hudson he can still come back. Dukat finds our justice system "barbaric", he says "in Cardassia, the verdict is always known before the trial begins, and it's always the same" - "in that case, why bother with a trial at all?" - "because the people demand it, they enjoy watching justice triumph over evil, everytime, they find it comforting" and he adds "Cardassians don't make mistakes".
Dukat wonders why it was him and not his people who rescued him : "why wasn't the station surrounded by Cardassian ships demanding my release?" and so Sisko tells him he'd been blamed with the smuggling and that either the Maquis executed him or they would, "after a comforting trial, I'm sure", which was brilliant :-p Dukat is uncharacteristically speechless for a few seconds :p Dukat really didn't know about the smuggling: "they never bothered to tell me" and "if I help you stop the smuggling, will you help me stop the Maquis?" - "you have a deal". Dukat:"thank you for coming to my rescue" - "I'm sure you would have done the same for me.." :p Dukat tells the which species is smuggling weapons, and when they contact one he steps forward to demand they surrender and confess: "I don't understand, you're a Cardassian!" - "I'm not just any Cardassian, I'm Gul Dukat, Commander of the second order" and when He starts a countdown, the other gets scared: "stop counting stop counting!" and surrenders :p Cardassian threats are not to be taken lightly :p
Quark speaks to the Vulcan woman in jail, and I liked that conversation on logic and the price of peace  :-) brilliant :)
Sisko gives Hudson his uniform back but he listens to no reason, he wants to win his war at all costs. Calvin won't stop his attack. Sisko: "I can't let you start a war". Both sides open fire; the Maquis eventually retreat and to Dukat's anger Sisko lets them go: "you're a fool, a sentimental fool". 
Kira tells him "you prevented a war " - "did I? or did I just delay the inevitable?" which is useless speculation, for he avoided one right now, which is what matters, and in the future whatever will be will be...
Third rule of Acquisition "never spend more for an acquisition than you have to".
22 - The wire
Bashir is tired because he was "reading the last few chapters of the Neverending sacrifice". Garak "isn't it superb? without a doubt the finest Cardassian novel ever written" but Bashir found it redundant, meaning very boring: it's about seven generations of the same family "but it tells the same story over and over again, all of its characters live selfless lives in duty to the State, grow old and die, then the next generation comes along and does it all over again" - "but that's exactly the point doctor!" he thinks that repetition makes for the most elegant "form in Cardassian literature"... 
Garak becomes impatient when there's a queue at the restaurant, then he looks obviously in pain and Bashir wants to take him to the infirmary, but Garak keeps saying that he's perfectly fine and goes away. 
Garak and Bashir "have been having lunch together once a week for more than a year now, you'd think he had come to trust me a little" he says, but Dax: "why should he? it's not like the two of you are really friends". Garak asks Quark to procure something for him, but later Quark calls Bashir because Garak is getting drunk and he still refuses to go to the infirmary but then he collapses and says "make it stop!". Bashir finds "some kind of implant" in his head, and it's been there for years. Quark contacts someone on Cardassia and gives him the code of what Garak wants, and the man gets upset "Quark you idiot!" and "I'm ruined, my career is over" and he says that it's classified biotechnology. "Maybe they won't trace the request back to me" - "who?" - "The Obsidian order" and at the name Quark too gets scared. It's a sort of secret service in Cardassia. 
Odo: "even the Romulan Tal'Shiar can't compete with them when it comes to intelligence gathering and covert operations". Bashir finds Garak in his quarters, taking some kind of anaesthetic drug. "there's nothing you can do for me" and he wants more drugs after Bashir tells him that Quark won't get him what he wanted. Bashir and Odo think that the implant might be a punishment device, but Garak laughs at this "I suppose in a way that's what it's become" and "it can't be removed" and "that's the whole point, if it could be easily removed it would be useless; you see, on Cardassia I was entrusted with certain information, information that needed to be kept safe regardless of the situation. My implant was given to me by Enabran Tane himself, the head of the Obsidian Order. If I was tortured it was designed to stimulate the pleasure centers of my brain, to trigger the production of vast amount of natural endorphines; I do hope you appreciate the irony doctor, the whole purpose of the implant was to make me immune to pain" but "it was never meant for continuous use" and "living on this station is torture for me doctor, the temperature is always too cold, the lights always too bright, every Bajoran on this station looks at me with loathing and contempt, so one day I decided I couldn't live with it anymore, and I took the pain away" and "I created a device which allowed me to trigger the implant whenever I wanted it. At first I only used it a few minutes a day, and then I began relying on it more and more until finally I just turned it on and never shut it off". It's been two years since, but it's breaking now but his body has become dependent on it. Bashir yells that he's just giving up, letting "them" win. "Doctor, did anyone ever tell you that you are an infuriating pest" - "chief O'Brian, all the time, and I don't pay any attention to him either" which may very well be Bashir's best moment :lol:
"Has it ever occurred to you that I might be getting exactly what I deserve?" and "you couldn't even begin to fathom what I'm capable of" and he tells him that during the occupation he was a Gul, and shortly before withdrawal a group of prisoners escaped. "My aid, a man named Elim, tracked them" but couldn't stop the ship because it was under Dukat's orders, so he destroyed the ship, killing the prisoners, Elim and 97 Cardassian civilians. He followed orders but the daughter of someone important died too so he was stripped of his rank and exiled. Bashir still wants to save his life, shutting the thing off. Bashir never leaves him but he has no information on Cardassian physiology. Garak suffers terribly when he wakes up, and he's angry "I've been calm long enough, look at this place, it's pathetic" and "this is what my life has been reduced to" and "there was a time when I was in power, the protegée of Enabran Tane himself, you have any idea what that means?" - and "you don't know much of anything. Tane 'was' the Obsidian order, not even the Central Command dared challenge him and I was his right hand, my future was limitless, until I threw it away" and they talk again of that shuttle-incident. "I only wish that I had stopped them" and "my disgrace is worse than that" and "I let them go, it was the eve of the Cardassian withdrawal, Elim and I were interrogating five Bajorans, they were children doctor, none of them were older than 14 years old, they knew nothing" and "all I wanted was a hot bath and a good meal, so I let them go, I gave them whatever latinum I had in my pockets, opened the door.." but "Elim looked at me as if I were insane" and "I was a fool, I should have completed my interrogation and turn them over to the troops for execution, but because I was chilly and my stomach was growling I failed in my duty and destroyed everything I had worked for" so he was exiled and they "left me to live out my days with nothing to look forward to but having lunch with you" - "I'm sorry you feel that way, I thought you enjoyed my company" - "Oh I did, and that's the worst part" and "I hate this place and I hate you" then they fight until Garak has another seizure, but Bashir has trouble helping him, it would take weeks to synthesise what he needs but Garak only has a few days like this. A nurse suggests turning the implant back on to gain time, but Garak refuses "no, I won't allow it, I never want that thing turned on again" and "you've done enough doctor, more than I deserve" and tells him 'the truth' :p "I've about given up on learning the truth from you Garak" - "oh don't give up on me now doctor, patience has its rewards" :p He says that Elim was his friend, closer than brothers, they were called "the sons of Tane", even the Guls feared them, then the scandal of someone letting prisoners escape, Tane had retired already and couldn't protect him, but Elim had betrayed him first and so he was exiled, and he deserved it for what he had tried to do to his best friend, and he's saying that now so Bashir can forgive him "I need to know that someone can forgive me" and Bashir takes his hand "I forgive you for whatever it is you did", then Bashir leaves to find Tane, who of course knew about him coming, and even knows that he always drinks Tarkaelian tea :p extra sweet.
Bashir gives him the name of the Cardassian who was talking to Quark, and I thought that was not nice of him; I mean, Tane knows of course, but in the off-chance he didn't or pretended he didn't, giving him the name out loud was cruel. "How sick is Garak?" - "he's dying" and Tane says that as a friend he should let him die because for him a life in exile is no life at all. Bashir asks information on Cardassian physiology, Tane says what made Garak special was that he never had to order him anything, meaning he volunteered and understood. Tane gives him all the data he needs to save Garak because "he doesn't deserve a quick death" and "I want him to live a long miserable life". Bashir asks about Elim and it turns out that's Garak's first name :p
"Tell Garak that I miss him". Later, Garak feels fine, it's been ten days. He denied to Odo that he was in the Obsidian order of course, and he tells Bashir "I've given you all the answers I'm capable of" but all answers were different "which ones were true and which ones weren't?" - "they were all true" - "even the lies?" - "especially the lies" ..
23 - Crossover
Bashir and Kira are on a runabout together. He talks a lot, she'd like to meditate as she does every day but he won't stop talking :p so she prefers some music :) Bashir tries hitting on her but she's like "forget it!" :p they have problems crossing the wormhole and immediately see something's wrong. The station is not where it should be, it's orbiting Bajor now. Two Klingons board her ship but seeing her they're apologetic. On the station they meet the 'other Kira'. They are at the Terok Nor station, "the center of authority for the Bajoran sector"; whose authority? "The Alliance, of course". Humans are called Terrans. The other Kira is the leader, the Intendent. The other Odo is the Supervisor, humans are slaves in the mine. The other Kira knows the story of Kirk: he had an effect on the other Spock who became commander in chief of the Empire, preaching peace, and thus he soon was no longer able to defend it against them, the Alliance of Klingons and Cardassians, and after the occupation Bajor requested to join it and became a strong part of it. Garak is the first officer there. When our Kira names Kirk to Bashir of course he understands immediately. There's an O'Brian there and Bashir tries to have him help them, using a transporter; Kira tries to enlist Quark's help but he's arrested. Sisko works for the other Kira because she likes him; he calls O'Brian Smiley and he is sort of her pet. The other Kira wants Kira's love: "if you can't love me, who can?". She sentenced Quark to death right before joking about a party and "what shall we wear?". Garak wants our Kira's help to become himself the new intendent, but she tries instead to get to Sisko. Bashir shoots Odo killing him and escapes by chance, and Miles helps him and wants to go too. The other Kira is upset over Odo's death and orders that Bashir and Miles be killed , but Sisko takes up weapons against them and escapes with his crew, our Kira following. Kira and Bashir leave, the others and Miles stay there to change things.
When they get back through the wormhole, Bashir is all dirty and Kira is wearing a hot purple dress, and she says that they've been "through the looking glass".
I never liked much the stories in the mirror universe :-/ 
24 - The collaborator
25 - Tribunal
O'Brian goes on vacation and is worried about leaving; Kira: "we are perfectly capable of running this place by ourselves for a week". Sisko has to say "you're on leave, please disembark the station" or he wouldn't let go :p
Before he can do that, he meets an old friend, someone he served together with on the Ruthledge, Boone, who now lives on the Cardassian side of the demilitarised zone. It's his first vacation with Keiko in five years and he brought technical update manuals :p Molly stayed behind with 'the Petersons', so it's just the two of them. A Cardassian patrol ship approaches and they search the ship and then arrest Miles. They don't explain anything, he has no idea what he's being accused of. Keiko is returned to DS9 and is desperate for him. Even to Sisko they say nothing, only that the charges will be presented as the trial begins and that the verdict is already out: guilty. "The trial will reveal how this guilt was proven". The trial will be in two days, but Sisko won't be allowed there, only the spouse. Odo volunteers as his Nestor, 'advisor to the offender', and since he is "an officer of the court" the Cardassian judge has no choice but to allow it. 
O'Brian's execution "is scheduled for next week" because "we believe in swift justice". Even his lawyer won't tell him anything, saying that "it doesn't matter". Sisko and the others work on the station to find out what happened: two dozen photon warheads have been transferred off the station. 
Odo asks Miles who knows nothing about weapons and Maquis. He makes a good speech to make Odo understand that he'd never do anything like that.
Dax discovers that the voice used to steal the weapons was indeed O'Brian's, but it was recorded and constructed, and Kira finds the man who talked to him last, Raymond Boone. The trial is shown on big screens all over Cardassia, but the lawyer only thinks of the last year of his career. 
Boon denies knowing anything. A Maquis tells Bashir that Boone is not one of them and they know nothing about those weapons. They discover that Boone left his wife, his parents and the Federation eight years ago, so now Bashir examines him and Sisko brings him to the trial (how they got in is a minor detail that they don't reveal to us..)
As the archon sees them, she declares that the trial was successful but she saw "potential for rehabilitation" and to strengthen Cardassia-Federation relations she sets aside the verdict and releases him "to the custody of his commander".
Boone was a Cardassian, surgically altered to replace the real Boone eight years ago, who had been killed in detention. He was spying for them, and this whole thing was to discredit the Federation. 
Sisko will drop Miles and Keiko at their vacation destination before reaching DS9 :)
26 - The Jem’Hadar

Sisko takes Jake to the Gamma Quadrant for a working-vacation, so he'll be able to work on a science project there. Sisko wants to spend some time alone with Jake, but Jake invited Nog too to work on the project together. They are friends and Jake wants to help him with his grades. When Nog tells Quark, he sees the opportunity to get closer to Sisko because he wants to sell merchandise using the station monitors, and he joins them too... they explore a planet with on predators and no animals, but lots and lots of flora, ideal for their science-project, not so much for Quark who can only see "exploitable resources". He's allergic to nature :p and he has to put a green cream on his ears.
As night comes, Quark loses it and lets out how miserable he is, embarrassing Nog. 
(I don't like Nog, so loud and screamy and panicky, but still, poor kid).
A woman comes out of the woods, Quark says it's just the two of them because the kids are not present at the moment, and she speaks of the jem'hadar, and all of a sudden a group of them appears out of thin air and takes them prisoner. Sisko thinks she's a scared prisoner too and tells her about the Federation and the wormhole. He says the Jem'hadar are overconfident, putting only four guards on duty, but honestly this sounds a bit silly, four armed soldiers against three unarmed prisoners doesn't seem so careless....
A Jem'hadar talks about the Founders who created the Dominion. They already know all about our quadrant's races and politics. A Jem'hadar appears on the station to inform them that Sisko is being detained, indefinitely, wanting them to stop "invading their territory', and says that they destroyed the Bajoran colony on their quadrant... A rescue party leaves DS9, the big starship Odissey and a couple of runabouts, the Orinoco and the Mekong. They meet and rescue Jake and Nog, but are then attacked by Jem'hadar ships. 
The woman has a collar that inhibits her powers, and they take it off and try to escape. Once in the woods, they are beamed aboard the Riogrande, and they all head home (Sisko's runabout). They were leaving when a Jem'hadar ship did a kamikaze attack crashing on the Odissey, destroying it. Quark picked up the collar before escaping, and analysing it he discovers that there's nothing in it, only a complicated lock, and it was all a plan to make them think that she was on their side, take her here so she could spy on them. Sisko thinks she might be one of the Founders: "you think the Founders would waste their time with you?" and "you have no idea what's began here" and simply touching something on her wrist she teleports herself out of there... but they'll be back, so Sisko and the others better be ready for them :)
Rule of Acquisition 102 - "nature decays but latinum lasts forever"

Garak-Andrew Robinson
Winn-Louise Fletcher
Molly-Hana Hatae

Weyoun-Brunt-Tiron - Jeffrey Combs
Damar - Casey Biggs
Bareil - Philip Anglim
Zek - Wallace Shawn