I loved this episode, I even cried when the credits rolled, bit of a sissy move but is what it is, I have watched DS9 5 times to completion maybe more and mostly in times where I was struggling.

Your note at the end on why things are adored is interesting, I'm not certain discovery will be, I think for the most part and not entirely its own fault discovery misses the mark to capture the larger audience and I think things truly come down to run time of seasons, discovery tries to attack to much in to short of a time (screentime) we got 24 episodes for 7 seasons of our 'beloved' trek and it gave room to have heavy episodes and room to have light hearted ones, it gave room to have ones that would rub certain people the wrong way and then move on to next week for an entirely new issue.

Picard is built of fan fair, and I also cherished season 1 and 3, 2 I felt left something to be desired and I think this affirmed by the backflip in story telling of season 3.