Prophet Motive 

Grand Nagus Zek is acting bizarre by giving away money and rewriting the Rules of Acquisition. Quark attempts to get the old Nagus back.

Director:

Rene Auberjonois

Writers:

Gene Roddenberry (based upon "Star Trek" created by), Rick Berman (created by)

Stars:

Avery Brooks, Rene Auberjonois, Alexander Siddig

Cast

Episode cast overview:
Avery Brooks	...	Commander Sisko
Rene Auberjonois	...	Odo
Alexander Siddig	...	Doctor Bashir (as Siddig El Fadil)
Terry Farrell	...	Lieutenant Dax
Cirroc Lofton	...	Jake Sisko (credit only)
Colm Meaney	...	Chief O'Brien
Armin Shimerman	...	Quark
Nana Visitor	...	Major Kira
Max Grodénchik	...	Rom
Juliana Donald	...	Emi
Tiny Ron	...	Maihar'du
Wallace Shawn	...	Zek
Bennet Guillory	...	Medical Big Shot

Storyline

Quark and Rom get a visit from a rather strange acting Grand Nagus Zek. He shows them a book with the rewritten Rules of Acquisition to include rules like 'If they want their money back, give it to them' and 'Latinum tarnishes, but family is forever' isn't concerned anymore about profit and devotes his life to charity. Quark is worried and tries to find out what is wrong with the Grand Nagus, especially since he suspects Zek will be thrown of the Tower of Commerce and he and Rom with him when he presents the new rules. Meanwhile Bashir is nominated for the prestigious medical Carrington Award. Bashir thinks he's too young to be a serious contender and tries not to pay too much attention to it. To his dismay the subject is constantly brought up however.

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Plot Keywords:

24th century | directed by star | philanthropy | 

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Drama | Sci-Fi

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Certificate:

TV-PG

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

20 February 1995 (USA)

Filming Locations:

Paramount Studios - 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Paramount Television

Technical Specs

Runtime:

46 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

To recreate the same visual style for Quark's scenes in the wormhole as had been seen in the pilot episode, "Emissary", director Rene Auberjonois and director of photography Jonathan West went back to the original shooting method as developed by "Emissary" director David Carson and then director of photography, Marvin Rush. As had Rush in the pilot, West overexposed the images and used diffusion filters to create the dazzling white which seems to 'bleed' onto the actors' faces. However, while the white is the same as in "Emissary", there is a subtle difference to the rest of the wormhole footage. Visual Effects Coordinator David Takemura used two versions of every shot: a slightly out-of-focus version, and a clean version. He layered the clean version on top of the out-of-focus version to create an effect that is not quite out-of-focus, but is not quite focused correctly either.

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Quotes

Rom: #285: A good deed is its own reward.

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Connections

Spoofs Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Emissary (1993)

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Soundtracks

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - Main Title
(uncredited)
Written by Dennis McCarthy
Performed by Dennis McCarthy

User Reviews

Is the Grand Nagus losing his mind?!

Once again, Wallace Shawn plays the Grand Nagus in yet another comic episode of "Star Trek: Deep Space 9". However, this time something clearly is going wrong the with the man. After all, he's re-written the Rules of Acquisition--and the re-write clearly violates all the basic beliefs of the Ferengi. For example, the new revised rules encourage Ferengi merchants to give refunds to dissatisfied clients as well as values friendships and family over profits!! Clearly the Nagus either is using this as part of some complicated scheme or he's lost his mind! Quark and his brother clearly are very disturbed by all this and they struggle to figure out what to do next.

This is one of the funnier episodes of the series. While it's rather inconsequential in the overall scheme of things for the show, it's very cute and a nice change of pace. Not to be missed.