DS9: His Way

[Zor]

I am honestly suprised that people can to beleive that Chuck did not like Vic.

Zor

[Thanas]

Eh...you might want to retitle that. People might have no idea you are talking about the episode or the review. That said, Chuck is right - the episode stands or falls on whether you like Odo and Kira, or not. I for one liked the episode, but I can easily see why people would not.

However, I would like to point out that it seems to me that it depends even more on whether you like the music or not. People who hate Swing will hate this episode. However, I thought Nana Visitor was surprisingly good (I already knew Auberjonois could sing based on other work).

[Marcus Aurelius]

Eh...you might want to retitle that. People might have no idea you are talking about the episode or the review. That said, Chuck is right - the episode stands or falls on whether you like Odo and Kira, or not. I for one liked the episode, but I can easily see why people would not.

However, I would like to point out that it seems to me that it depends even more on whether you like the music or not. People who hate Swing will hate this episode. However, I thought Nana Visitor was surprisingly good (I already knew Auberjonois could sing based on other work).

I liked both Odo and Kira, but the whole Odo pining for Kira thing always seemed like a stretch for me, just like Chuck pointed out, too. I understand the writers point was the Odo had been raised by the 'solids' from a young lump of semimagical goo and therefore had even learned how to imitate their emotional processes, but still it didn't feel very believable.

The music is okay. I'm not a huge fan of Sinatra style smooth swing, but it certainly creates a nice period mood, and James Darren pulls it off beautifully. For me this would be a very average DS9 episode, so I suppose I liked it a bit more than Chuck did. As far as holodeck episodes go, this was still one of the better ones.

[Lusankya]

The biggest problem that I always had with Vic was that I felt that his story arc really took over where Quark's character development should have gone.

Not that I hate Vic, of course. He's a pretty swell guy, and if I were ever visiting DS9, I'd totally go and visit him. I just think it's rather superfluous to have both a barkeeper and a holographic singing lounge proprietor on the same show.

[Marcus Aurelius]

The biggest problem that I always had with Vic was that I felt that his story arc really took over where Quark's character development should have gone.

Excellent point. I suppose Armin Shimerman can't sing very well, though, and music is at least half what Vic Fontaine was all about. Nevertheless, it would have been good if Quark had shown even more of his non-profit chasing side, because it would have also made the Ferengi as a race a little less one trick ponies.

[Lusankya]

Well, it's not as though people tune into Star Trek for the singing in any case.

While the loss of Vic would require completely removing some episodes (the casino robbery, for example), some other episodes could have been much more interesting if Vic had been replaced with Quark. It's Only a Paper Moon, for example, could have had Quark caring for Nogg through his PTSD, and the episode could also have touched upon how difficult it is for the carers when someone they care for has mental issues. That option was not available with Vic, because, well, he's a hologram who's programmed to enjoy helping people.

[Lord Revan]

I have to say I agree with Chuck on the whole sexuality thing and to add to that even if an alien would precive "sex" being the same thing as we think of it, doesn't mean they have the same values and behaviours attached to it.

For example what if some alien culture though it was a mark of a "true man" to act like a gay stereotype, while still being very much straight, or to take it futher what if some alien culture had no conspect of sexuality categories, meaning the question "Are you gay or straight?" would be alien to them.

[OmegaChief]

Not to mention they may not even have genders like we do, they could have one gender be non-sapient or somthing, or even be a mono-gender race or the opposite and have somthing like five sexes, and you thought relationships with just two were bad enough!

[Prannon]

There's an interesting thought. A little off topic, but a five sex species... I can can imagine that any sapient species that required five different sexes in order to have intercourse would evolve very quickly and would have a relatively unstable genome. On the other hand, such a species would probably handle social problems much more competently since they'd be used to interacting with that many partners on a regular basis.

[OsirisLord]

Star Trek has never thrilled me with it's portrayal of extraterrestrial life, like Chuck said they feel like people with different cultures. And if that is the point of Star Trek, then I think it's wrong. Species evolve to adapt to their different enviroments, and as with humans, even they way they think and view the world will be driven by biological evolution. Shouldn't then an alien's mind be as radically different from ours as their bodies?

Anyway with Odo DS9 had the chance to do something different and write a sentient alien and for a long time, he worked pretty well. I always liked how Odo would comment on the strangeness of stuff we take for granite, like our preoccupation with cooking and making food presentable. Food is food, who cares as long as it's sanitary right? But this whole romance thing just rubs me the wrong way. Reproduction is the basis of this thing we call romantic love, so why would a changeling, whose kind do not reproduce, even be capable of feeling this way towards a female of a different species. Do changelings even have sex and gender? And on a character level, I just don't see any chemistry between Odo and Kira, and think in a way, the writers must have felt the same on some level, because it's pretty obvious the Odo/Kira plot couldn't carry the episode by itself. Except I don't see why they needed Vic. This is DS9, between the Bajorans, Cardassians, the unexplored Gama Quadrant, and the Dominion, you have tons of great material for a B plot.

[Big Orange]

A little off topic, but a five sex species... I can can imagine that any sapient species that required five different sexes in order to have intercourse would evolve very quickly and would have a relatively unstable genome. On the other hand, such a species would probably handle social problems much more competently since they'd be used to interacting with that many partners on a regular basis.

That's Species 8472.

Anyway while the Changelings seem to come from a completely different evolutionary direction to Milky Way hominid peoples who according to TNG's "The Chase" had a common ancestry seeded by a precursor hominid species, there is a theory that the Changelings were distant descendents of this mysterious race and given some credence when the holographic recording of a precurso woman is not only played by the same actress who played the chief Founder (Salome Jens) but even her general appearance is remarkably similar to a Changeling in "default" humanoid form. So Odo's social interactions with the "solids" may have some real biological basis, albiet very distant.

[Lusankya]

I could be remembering things incorrectly, but didn't Odo's forays into the world of interpersonal relationships all start after that period in which the Founders turned him into a human for a time?

[DaveJB]

That's when he actually embarked on a relationship with Kira, but he had feelings for her well before that. The first time that he explicitly said so, IIRC, was in Heart of Stone, the season before he got turned into a human.

[Thanas]

I could be remembering things incorrectly, but didn't Odo's forays into the world of interpersonal relationships all start after that period in which the Founders turned him into a human for a time?

No, there was a dreadful episode with Laxwana Troi (okay, it was quite good character work which basically played on Odo and his loneliness, but I can't stand her) way before that.

[JME2]

The first time that he explicitly said so, IIRC, was in Heart of Stone, the season before he got turned into a human.

On-screen, that was indeed the first mention.

IIRC, the writers and actors got the idea to go that route from the final scene of Season 2's "Necessary Evil", based on Odo's reaction Kira's confession.