Quartile rating: 8/10 · 1 rating
On Quartile, What We Left Behind: Looking Back at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine scores 8/10 across five categories — strongest on Plot (Well Above Average), weakest on Acting (Above Average).
Ranked among Quartile’s Top Plot.
A documentary exploring the legacy of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the reasons it went from the black sheep of Star Trek to a beloved mainstay of the franchise, and a brainstorm with the original writers on what a theoretical eighth season of the show could look like.
A passionate and well-structured documentary that serves DS9 fans admirably, blending retrospective interviews with an imaginative writers-room segment sketching a theoretical Season 8. The talking-head format is competent but cinematographically unremarkable, typical of TV-legacy docs. The novelty lies in the writers-room conceit, which elevates it above a standard 'making-of,' though the format itself isn't groundbreaking. Acting scores reflect the candor and warmth of the interview subjects rather than performance craft. The ending satisfyingly closes the loop on the Season 8 brainstorm, leaving fans with a bittersweet sense of what might have been.