Jonathan Banks is the sort of actor that mechanically elevates no matter he is in. Many first found him by means of his function as fixer Mike Ehrmantraut on “Breaking Unhealthy” and “Higher Name Saul,” the place his soulful efficiency helped audiences care deeply for a troubled man in a despicable line of labor, whereas others discovered him by means of his function as cartoon duck drawing criminology professor Buzz Hickey in season 5 of the faculty sitcom “Neighborhood.” He is a implausible performer who brings some surprisingly completely different characters to life, and again within the Nineties, he stole the present in a visitor function on “Star Trek: Deep House 9.”
“Deep House 9” usually delved into darker matters than was typical for the “Star Trek” franchise, and in season 1, episode 12, “Battle Strains,” a number of members of the DS9 crew had been thrust into a really disagreeable scenario on a moon the place the inhabitants can’t die. Banks stars as Golin Shel-la, the chief of one in all two warring factions on the moon, and he is a standout even among the many common forged, who’re all nice themselves. Banks has been appearing on tv because the Nineteen Seventies and has so many visitor appearances on reveals that his IMDb itemizing feels prefer it goes on for an eternity. Even so, his function on “Star Trek: Deep House 9” is amongst his finest.
Jonathan Banks performed a bloodthirsty prisoner on Star Trek: Deep House 9
Within the episode, Commander Sisko (Avery Brooks) is taking the Bajoran religious chief Kai Opaka (Camille Saviola) on a visit by means of the wormhole subsequent to the area station Deep House 9 when their runabout crashes on an odd moon. Kai Opaka dies, which is devastating to DS9’s first officer, Bajoran freedom fighter Main Kira Nerys (Nana Customer), however quickly she’s alive once more, which boggles the thoughts of Starfleet physician Julian Bashir (Alexander Siddig), who tagged alongside for the trip. It seems that the moon is definitely a penal colony and that the individuals who left the prisoners there additionally left microbes that forestalls anybody on the moon from dying, in order to make sure the bloodthirsty warriors would possibly lastly study their lesson. As a substitute, the Nol-Ennis and the Ennis, led by Shel-la, have continued to battle each other time and again for eternity. It is a distress of their very own making, and when Shel-la learns that leaving the planet will kill anybody who has died on its floor, he tries to make use of that data to destroy his enemies as soon as and for all.
Banks is nice, managing to be completely convincing as a person who has died numerous instances but nonetheless craves battle, and his interactions with Main Kira are phenomenal. As he shares his hatred of his enemy, Kira begins to relive a few of her personal trauma from wartime and purge her interior demons. It is highly effective stuff, and only a trace of what “Deep House 9” would ultimately turn into.
Banks was an essential a part of a pivotal Deep House 9 episode
A few of the finest episodes of “Deep House 9” get into actually troublesome matters, and “Battle Strains” was one of many first instances the sequence dealt closely and overtly with battle. By season 5, the sequence would have an intergalactic battle of its personal to cope with within the type of the Dominion Wars, which brought on fairly a little bit of pressure behind-the-scenes since “Star Trek” creator Gene Roddenberry did not need the present to deal explicitly with battle. As a substitute, “Deep House 9” stared on the horrors of battle and the troublesome selections we should make within the face of these horrors, and “Battle Strains” was an early indicator of simply how far the present was keen to go.
In “The Deep House Log E-book: A First Season Companion,” producer David Livingston praised Banks’s capability to sort out all completely different sorts of roles:
“I labored with Jonathan Banks on ‘Otherworld’ at Common. That is the place I knew him initially. Then I knew his work with ‘Beverly Hills Cop,’ after which in fact on ‘Wiseguy.’ He’s a really odd and weird actor, and he wears this glorious make-up and did a terrific jobs [sic].”
“Wiseguy” was against the law drama sequence that Banks starred in on CBS from 1987 by means of 1990, and it was his first actual massive declare to fame earlier than his Emmy-winning efficiency on “Breaking Unhealthy.” Nonetheless, for this bizarre little “Star Trek” fan? He’ll at all times be the war-loving man who simply would not die.
