I'd like to dedicate this bile-filled recap to Couch Baron's appendix. May it rest in peace more than Buffy ever has.

A metal-studded glove bangs the Klingon sparkly gavel-ball (I've always loved that thing!) on the bench as the judge orders, "Bring in the prisoner!"

Hertzler's more-than-adequate performance aside, that there pretty much ruined the whole episode for me. Despite Shatner's Ham It Up Sandwich, the tribunal scene in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country was so effective because: one, you never glimpsed the judge's face until the end; two, you only really saw the one claw-like hand banging the neato sparkly gavel-ball; and three, the tribunal hall in the movie was much more awe-inspiring. Every scene was darker, more sinister, and downright forbidding. Not getting a clear view of the judge or his other hand really added to the menace. Furthermore, the TUV judge looked like he was on some topmost tier waaaaay up above Kirk and Bones. This judge looks like he's just on some measly parapet a few feet up, and the scenes in this episode really suffer for it. I mean, how hard would it have been for them to turn a few lights out, throw a blanket over the judge, and create a little atmosphere? And maybe I've just watched too much television my whole life, but did anyone out there really think Quantum wasn't going to escape from the "inescapable" Rura Penthe? Even his crew's breakout plan was swept under Tension's Carpet simply by paying lip service to T'Pol's diplomatic contacts. Ugh. Please -- give me something, SOMETHING to prove that the Star Trek deserves to live on in all its former glory!

Anyway, Quantum is brought in to shouts of "Gagh! Gagh! Gagh!" and charged with some crime of conspiracy we're already certain he didn't commit. The penalty is death. I'm shivering, are you?

Mathra: Oooh, a Klingon trial scene -- are they going to commute a death sentence after being found guilty and still have him end up in Rura Penthe?
Keckler: Okay, buddy? It's not going to be exactly like last time.
Mathra: I was just trying to help.
Keckler: Yeah, well, "help" by acknowledging the fact that Bermaga do have one original bone in their body. It might be the stirrup or the hammer, but it's there.
Mathra: What about the anvil?
Keckler: I was trying to be subtle.

Faith. Heart. Stakes. Vampires. Wrong. Show.