Deep Space Nine Crew Makes the Rounds Ahead of What We Left Behind Release

As we near the theatrical release of the highly-anticipated Deep Space Nine documentary What We Left Behind next week, the actors and producers involved in the film are making the rounds.

TrekMovie.com sat down with Armin Shimerman to talk about his character, Quark, and why he feels Deep Space Nine is one of the best Star Trek series.

When TrekMovie asked what he thought fans would take away from the documentary, he said: “What I think they will get and hope they take away, is the amount of love that was put into the show. I know love is a word that is overused, but it really is part and parcel of what we did, and not just love, but hard work.”

That sentiment was echoed later, when Shimerman was asked why he believes Deep Space Nine to be superior to the two shows before it, The Original Series and The Next Generation. He said: “I think we dealt more with human issues. The two shows that came before us were wonderful shows and I am a big fan of both. But, they were about solving problems on other worlds.”

They also touched on the character arc that Quark, Deep Space Nine’s resident bartender, went through during the course of the show. Shimerman said of the finale: “Up until that final episode, I was a little deflated I didn’t think my character had matured or changed as much as some of the other characters. When I got to that episode [...] the amount of change I had not been aware of was suddenly obvious to me, and I was enormously gratified by that. It was one of the great gifts that the writers gave me, to make me see clearly how far my character had come, even though I hadn’t been aware of it over the years.”

Armin Shimerman wasn’t the only one giving an interview...Nana Visitor talked to Bleeding Cool about life after Deep Space Nine, and Major Kira as feminist role model.

When asked about the masculinity of the character of Kira Nerys, Visitor said: “The first time I read the sides at the audition, and it just said ‘Major Kira’, and I thought maybe they’d made a mistake, that this wasn’t the character. This is a male character. [...] And this was at a time when I was being sent out for either the victim or the killer, or the mother, [...] those were the roles I bounced around from. Then to read this, this huge personhood, this faulty strong truthful person, I couldn’t believe I was getting the chance to read for it.”

When asked about the experience of filming the documentary, Visitor said it was an organic experience, everyone coming together again, adding, “this show is really different than everything else because it never really ended. [...] It’s almost like being in a club. [...] It’s been a part of my conversation for the last 20 years.”

AV Club also wrote a short piece showcasing a clip from the DS9 Doc, featuring the women of Deep Space Nine, and the women fans who were inspired by them, and it’s definitely worth a watch. Plus, if you’re a Star Trek Las Vegas regular, you might just see a few familiar faces!

The Star Trek: Deep Space Nine documentary What We Left Behind is in cinemas for one day only, Monday, May 13th. Tickets are available at FathomEvents.com.