30 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episodes we recommend you watch to celebrate the show hitting 30

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is 30 years old and these are the 30 episodes we would recommend checking out.

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is 30 years old. A show about a man named Benjamin Sisko, who is raising his son in a space station on the edge of nowhere. All while mourning the loss of his wife and rebuilding his reality while trying to help an entire planet heal from an illegal occupation of a foreign army. To say it drops you into the middle of it right away would be an understatement.

The show hits all the right notes a lot more often than most shows and features several amazing characters beyond Sisko who are just as interesting and dynamic as the lead of the show. It is an embarrassment of riches when it comes to storylines, heroes, villains, ideas, and the like.

With Star Trek: Deep Space Nine turning 30, we’re listing 30 episodes we feel you have to watch at some point in your life. This is our list, and your list will look different, so don’t even with “what about…” Put it on your list. In fact, tell us what 10 Deep Space Nine episodes you’d recommend in the comment section. But for now, check out our 30 most recommended list.

1. A Time to Stand
2. Apocalypse Rising
3. Broken Link
4. By Inferno’s Light
5. Call to Arms
6. Duet
7. Favor the bold
8. For the Uniform
9. Hard Time
10. Homefront
11. Improbable Cause
12. In the Pale Moonlight
13. In Purgatory’s Shadow
14. Inquisition
15. Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges
16. Little Green Men
17. Paradise Lost
18. Rocks and Shoals
19. Sacrifice of Angels
20. Tacking into the Wind
21. The Changing Face of Evil
22. The Die is Cast
23. The Jem’Hadar
24. The Search Part 1
25. The Search Part 2
26. The Siege of AR-558
27. The Visitor
28. The Way of the Warriors
29. Trials and Tribble-ations
30. What you Leave Behind

The Star Trek: Deep Space Episode that you should start with

Now, there are two usual trains of thought when it comes to Deep Space Nine’s starting point. You can either start with the episode that most, if not all fans consider “the best”; In the Pale Moonlight, or you can start with the first episodes; Emissary Part 1 and 2.

I do conquer, by the way, that In the Pale Moonlight is the best episode, but if you’re new to the show, you’re going to need a lot of prior information for it to land as it should. For me, however, if you want to know truly what is possible on this show, I suggest starting with Trials and Tribble-ations.

One of the worst parts of watching decades-old science fiction is seeing how janky the special effects look. Not in this episode. This episode is a monument to how good the special effects crew really was on the show.

It’s a nice, loose episode, that doesn’t require much in the way of prior viewings, and tells a wonderfully cheeky story along the way.