This is a big problem with all live-action adaptations of animated movies/TV shows, race swapped or not.
Animation affords chunks of frames to exaggerated facial expressions that even the best actors/actresses cannot really emulate. Doesn't help that most performers these days have perpetual dead NPC look in their eyes.
And the firebombing of Tokyo etc. did way more damage and caused more casualties than the 2 nukes. In the end it was the Soviet invasion of Manchuria which spooked the Japs into surrender. They knew the Americans didn't have the will for an actual invasion, but Stalin did. So they choose to be occupied by proto-commies rather than actual commies. Not a bad choice at the time.
And remember when they went to save that hologram? At first he didn’t want to then he changed his mind.
You mean "Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang", the one where Vic's lounge is taken over by mobsters? Sisko's outburst about the racial realities of a period holodeck program was pretty random, and even more clearly driven by the actor. It was also dropped as quick as it came.
My takeaway from that scene is that black people must still be bitter about how their people were treated 500 years ago. I seriously doubt anyone now besides medieval/early modern historians could recall much less relate to social politics of the 1500's.
If anything the takeaway should be how far progressive politics had degenerated even from the 60s to the 90s, as when Uhura was called a "negress" by time traveling Abe Lincoln, she didn't even bat an eye, and when the unprompted apology came, she just said "why would I take offense? I don't fear words".
Really this scene is the ultimate counter to "Star Trek was always woke": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BBOWsWODX4
Since wokeness is the opposite of not fearing words, and not being bitter about a distant past (and being "delighted with who you are", as Kirk states, is anathema to the trans agenda).
"Far Beyond the Stars" (Sisko lives out a vision of himself as a writer in the 50s experiencing racial discrimination) was a good episode in spite of it's woke/progressive plot, not because of it. The connection to the actual story line of the show was extremely thin, but seeing all the regulars without makeup but still portraying similar-in-spirit characters was really neat. And as usual the show was extremely well written, produced, and acted (with possible exception to Avery Brooks magnum opus performance at the end "IT'S REEEEAL". I liked it cause I like over-the-top).
Despite Sisko being widely touted in the press as Star Trek's "first black captain" (before the second first black captain dropped in Discovery), the character's race was never mentioned previously on the show, nor did the show feature any plot lines or stories that could be construed as relating to contemporary racial politics (minor xenophobia towards aliens portrayed as literal space nazis was about as far as it went).
Because of that the "commentary" contained in the episode was pretty much "racism happened in the 50s, and it was bad". No allusion or allegory whatsoever to any present tense issue. Really the only reason the episode was made is because Avery Brooks wanted to make it (and direct it).
Of course nowadays with NuTrek it's even worse as contemporary woke politics is inserted for similarly zero reasons with regard to plot, but also with the assumption that those politics still exist in the exact same way 400 or 1000 years from now. And instead of being shoehorned into one or two episodes they are endemic. And the writing and acting suck.
First off, woke as it's understood today is far different than whatever they are claiming as woke back in the 60s or 90s. As far as Star Trek goes, I can probably count the so-called woke episodes on one hand (Kirk kisses Uhura (RIP) while being mind controlled, Riker dates a non-binary but clearly female looking alien, Dax makes out with another woman who was a man in a past life, Sisko complains and has visions about racism in the 50s).
Most of these episodes are completely forgettable and were forgotten until they started being incessantly brought up by woketards to prove the franchises they started watching 5 minutes ago have "always been woke". The reason people actually watched these shows back in the day was cause of the cool sci-fi stories and cool characters. I guarantee you nerds in the 90s weren't watching TNG for racial and gender politics.
Yes there was a bit of an anti-capitalist streak but it was actually limited in scope a lot more than people remember. The Federation not using money was only first mentioned offhand in Star Trek IV, before that money and pay and buying things was still talked about by the TOS crew, though it was never a significant aspect of the show.
The first season of TNG (the one most universally reviled) is where most of the socialist no-money vegan utopia lectures by Picard happened and it was always viewed as eye-rolling to insufferable.
By the time DS9 rolled around these concepts were routinely mocked and subverted even by Federation characters. Either way Earth being a perfect utopia was always stated a priori as fact, with any explanation, justification, or details being left to the fans.
Point is it was never that deep, fans just liked the idea of a future where people were not forced to work soul crushing jobs to survive but still were productive, responsible, rational, competent members of society. The biggest misfit ever portrayed on the show was Barclay and he was still a brilliant eminently useful person.
Honestly if society as a whole was as competent and amiable as the crews portrayed on Star Trek, just financial compensation would never be an issue to begin with.
Man, I even capitalized japs.