Dukat... too many plot twists?

I have been thinking about Gul Dukat... and how he had so many personas and so many different reasons to hate him. From being a hated space station commander, a heartless father, a reformed father, a helpful yet harmful man stranded with Sisko, a Paghraith vessel... did the creators of the show paint him with too many brushes?

 

Dukat was a great character, until Waltz.

His role as the anti-Emmisary was super-forced.

 

Given his megalomaniacal and delusional tendancies, him appointed himself as the Pah Wraith 'Emissary' actually fits in quite well, given that he wouldn't settle to be anything less than Sisko's equal/opposite--I'm surprised he didn't start calling himself the Lord High Master of the Pah Wraith, so that he was better than Sisko.

 

I think Dukat was just fine right up until he had the plastic surgery to look Bajoran. I thought it was perfect irony Ki Winn slept with him, but find it hard to believe no one said "Oh wait, that new guy we don't trust that is always hanging around the Ki. The one we never heard of before, and no one remembers during the occupation. He sure looks a lot like Gul Dukat." I mean that is like having Hitler sneak into Israel with a Groucho Marx mask on, befriending and sleeping with Golda Meir, with everyone none the wiser.

 

Dukat was a great character in Seasons 1-5. Heck, I've been thinking about Into Darkness lately and if the writers had left Khan as a character like early Dukat, and Peter Weller's character being the real villian of the movie, it would have been so much better than what we got.

 

In general, the Pahwraiths story was both forced and generic. That Dukat wiuld be part of it was at least understandable. OTOH, Mark Alaimo was deliciously creepy seducing Kai Winn.

 

Would we really want another character introduced? TUC gets critisied for introducing Valeris as the mole, would it have come as more of a suprise if Savvik had been used, probably.

Sure perhaps they could have done things slightly different with Dukat.

 

It does make sense for Dukat to want to become the Anti-Emmisary, but the way they did it with the glowing red eyes shooting beams out of his arms, all ending up in chanting an ancient ceremony was tacky.

 

The Pah-wraith "red eyes" were introduced in "The Reckoning", which Dukat wasn't it.

 

But, the many masks of Dukat were perfect! Throughout all of them, his paranoid megalomaniacal narcissism shone through. He always hated the Bajorans for not loving him because he thought he was being benevolent by not being more merciless. His motivations for trying to kill Ziyal and later loving Ziyal were entirely selfish; he wanted to kill her to preserve his status and he only embraced her when he lost everything. As for being the anti-Emissary or the Emissary of the Pah Wraiths, I think that was the crown jewel. Sisko was everything he wasn't: selfless, kind, and beloved. They were the perfect foils for each other.

As for the Hitler-in-a-Marx-mask-sleeping-with-Golda-Meir analogy, yes. That's exactly what it's like. That's why it's so sinister!

 

Eh... I look at Dukat as someone who wants to control and be a ruthless dictator, etc...but at the same time he wants to be thanked for it by those he oppresses. I think he DOES have a heart somewhere in there, but his version of caring is just really twisted. I think deep down he just has a twisted obsession with the Bajoran people and wanting their love and trust but in a sick demented sort of way.

They might have went overboard in his changing personas...but at the same time all of his personas sort of boil down to the same thing.

 

As I've said in other threads, I really liked Dukat but my enjoyment of the character waned after he let the Pahwraith in him.

 

But...but...that was like his final twisted and sick ultimate connection to Bajor in the end. He actually surgically altered himself to appear Bajoran...and then he thought he was becoming some sort of Bajoran God. LOL

 

^They could have given the megalomaniac a better send off, perhaps doing what they did to Damar to him.

 

I wholeheartedly agree with this. Dukat's character arc should have ended with "Sacrifice of Angels."

Like I mentioned in the TNG forum (that I think TNG should only have been five seasons), I also think that DS9 could have told its story in five as well. Take the first six episodes of season 6 and place them at the end of season five (and eliminating other silly season five episodes like "The Ascent" and "Dr. Bashir, I Presume?"), then make "Sacrifice of Angels" the end of the series (reworking it so that the Dominion surrender and end the war).

 

I think Dukat's role at the end of the series was the biggest letdown for me. It was enjoyable to watch but the writers even said themselves that they moved too quickly with him at the end and ran out of material. The Big Showdown between him and Sisko was underwhelming for me. I enjoyed it, don't get me wrong, and it's still a lot better than a lot of stuff that's out there today, but considering the quality of everything that came before it was subpar.

The other major disappointed, not to get off topic, was that Bajor's role in the series was kinda forgotten in the last couple of seasons. Would've been nice for some closure there, but I digress.

 

Maybe the War arc could have been told more tightly in fewer seasons, but I can't imagine ending the series without the Cardassian rebellion arc, having Kira the former terrorist school the former enemy in terrorism.

 

^I'm not saying that I wasn't happy with how it turned out (except for the ridiculously rushed Sisko/Dukat ending in the finale). I'm just saying that things could have been shortened to five seasons, eliminating the need for such things as a new character (Ezri), and other silly "revelations" like Bashir's genetics and Sisko's wormhole alien mom.

 

^ I agree, at least Dukat's arc should have wrapped up with that episode, although that would also mean that we would have missed out on Waltz, which has both excellent writing and performances.

Except for the end. To me Sisko's pronouncement of Dukat as "pure evil" in that episode is the beginning of the degradation in the overall narrative of the series that you refer to. Granted, as you say there were a number of really great episodes and moments toward the end of the series - and overall I was actually satisfied with how it all turned out in the end.

 

I honestly didn't mind any of it until "What You Leave Behind" when he suddenly gained super powers and made Sisko bow down to him. Could he have been any more cliche?