Characters doing things they just wouldn't ever do

[PTRACER]

I've watched all but the final 12 episodes of Star Trek DS9 now and I have come to realise that from time to time, the writers made the characters do something, or behave in a way that just didn't fit with the character.

I don't mean the occasions where Quark fires a phaser or when Odo kills another changeling after insisting a changeling would never harm another, but the times when you just think "He/she just wouldn't do that!!! )

Two examples here - one I just mentioned in another thread, about Jadzia Dax's behaviour in the episode Meridian. I just don't think she would ditch her friends, family and career for a random man she met and fell in love with just a few days before, on a planet that appears for a few hours every sixty years. Dax is too "old" and experienced to go off on a whim like that.

The other is Worf's behaviour in Let He Who Is Without Sin... I know he's a grump, but I seriously do not believe he would get so upset with some minor irritations that he would lend support to a radical political movement group who scare holiday makers with propaganda, terrorism and vandalism. Worf is a security officer, why would he ever in a million years join forces and support people like that?

Any other suggestions?

 

[Vulcan Princess]

Many people will disagree with me, but I think Kira's behavior in His Way (and the whole Odo/Kira relationship in general) was totally out of character for her. She has shown consistently that she has no tolerance for collaborators. When she believed Bareil to be a collaborator, she was ready to break off her relationship with him. She went back in time and almost killed her mother for being a collaborator. Odo not only worked for the Cardassians during the occupation, he collaborated with the Dominion when they occupied DS9. When he let the resistance down, Kira was rightfully extremely upset at him. I just don't see her falling in love with him and having a relationship with him.

 

[PTRACER]

True, but Odo was always portrayed as a VERY neutral character - that's why he was asked to be the umpire in their baseball game against the Vulcans in Season 7. Kira also HATED Cardassians, yet formed deep feelings for Tekeny Ghemor. The other thing is, Odo kind of hinted his "love" for Kira quite a long time before they actually got together and she appeared pretty uninterested then.

 

[Navaros]

- Worf murdering an unarmed Weyoun 7. He can't both do this, and be honorable. That's incongruent.

- Sisko harboring sour grapes about the racism in the 1960's.

- Quark resenting Vic because Vic is "competition"; utterly ridiculous, Quark owns the holosuite Vic lives in therefore he could make sure it is run his (Quark's) way or not at all!

- Nog not wanting to bother to save the life of his own grandmother. Nog cannot both be an admirable person, and an evil Ferengi who doesn't even care about his own grandmother's life. Again, that's incongruent.

- Odo not disobeying the Sisko's orders to keep the cure to the genocide disease from the Founders. Odo's morality would dictate that he must deliver the cure to them no matter what, regardless of any immoral orders not to which he was given.

- Bashir lusting after Serena. He's supposed to be a battle-weary doctor by this point, not a dopey young man who lusts after his patients.

- Female Founder surrendering a few moments after saying she would fight to the last man (I don't buy the common reason given for this that 'she had to so TGL would be cured' because as aforementioned, Odo would have had to cure them regardless, otherwise he wouldn't be Odo).

- Odo banging the Female Founder.

- Kira letting Odo off the hook right away for banging the Female Founder.

- Various Jem'Hadar in later seasons are shown to be mindless cattle who are easily defeated due to plot contrivances making them so. This is incongruent with their early portrayals; wherein each of them is a huge threat and intelligent individual in and of himself.

- Weyoun giving some unintelligent saracastic remarks to Garak in his final scene. Weyoun is much more interesting than that and should have had some fascinating dialogues with Garak in that scene. This is probably the only scene in the series in which Weyoun's dialogue is dumb & generic. I guess they did that so he wouldn't take up a lot of time in that scene...but it sure suffers.

- Fubaring of Dukat in Waltz and foor the rest of the series. Alaimo played Dukat much more complex that how they assasinated his character like that. He never would have done any of those things had the writers not arbtraily decided to fubar him into an 'evil' caricature.

- The Sisko having sex with Mirror Jadzia under false pretenses; which is very much akin to rape..., really, really sick. In fact I'm surprised how little attention this digusting matter gets.

- The Sisko flipping out because Eddington is a Maquis traitor, yet not caring at all that Kasidy is one too. Again, incongruent.

- The Grand Nagus agreeing to fubar the Ferengi race and turn them into humans just because Ishka told him to.

- The Ferengi people as a whole not refusing to tolerate these reforms.

 

[AdmiralGarak]

- Worf murdering an unarmed Weyoun 7. He can't both do this, and be honorable. That's incongruent.

To be fair, Weyoun was holding him prisoner and scheduling his execution. That's enough to make anyone a tad grumpy. We've seen Worf's temper get the better of him-- striking the Klingon lawyer, for example. If Worf had bragged about killing Weyoun to O'Brien later on, then it would be out of character.

- Sisko harboring sour grapes about the racism in the 1960's.

Are you forgetting what he went through as Benny Russell? It's first hand experience for him.

- Quark resenting Vic because Vic is "competition"; utterly ridiculous, Quark owns the holosuite Vic lives in therefore he could make sure it is run his (Quark's) way or not at all!

True enough, though people that drink and gamble in the holosuite aren't spending their latinum to do the same in the real bar.

- Bashir lusting after Serena. He's supposed to be a battle-weary doctor by this point, not a dopey young man who lusts after his patients.

He's a very lonely man, who found someone he could relate to on a level that nobody else could. The battle-weariness you mention would only make him more vulnerable.

- Female Founder surrendering a few moments after saying she would fight to the last man (I don't buy the common reason given for this that 'she had to so TGL would be cured' because as aforementioned, Odo would have had to cure them regardless, otherwise he wouldn't be Odo).

Odo was a realist, and he knew that the Founders' war had to be stopped. I wouldn't make any bets on him delivering them the one thing that would prevent the war's end.

Meanwhile, the Founder wasn't about to risk her entire species on trusting someone who turned his back on them multiple times. At the worst, she know that ending the war to save the Founders would only delay the conquest of the Alpha Quadrant. There were more than enough Jem'Hadar to defend the Wormhole, after all.

- Kira letting Odo off the hook right away for banging the Female Founder.

Definitely. The writers fessed up to this mistake in the DS9 Companion. Well, specifically, his colaboration with the enemy rather than just the banging.

- Various Jem'Hadar in later seasons are shown to be mindless cattle who are easily defeated due to plot contrivances making them so. This is incongruent with their early portrayals; wherein each of them is a huge threat and intelligent individual in and of himself.

I'm not sure I'd agree with the cattle quip, but I agree that the writers lost the Jem'Hadar as characters.

- Fubaring of Dukat in Waltz and foor the rest of the series. Alaimo played Dukat much more complex that how they assasinated his character like that. He never would have done any of those things had the writers not arbtraily decided to fubar him into an 'evil' caricature.

Agreed x1000. As one of my favorite characters, I wish he had never returned after "The Sacrifice of Angels". His story ended brilliantly with that episode.

Maybe they could have brought Alaimo back as a recurring Jem'Hadar character. That would have killed two birds with one stone.

- The Sisko having sex with Mirror Jadzia under false pretenses; which is very much akin to rape..., really, really sick. In fact I'm surprised how little attention this digusting matter gets.

I agree, again. It was wholly out of character for Ben Sisko, done for a cheap joke.

- The Sisko flipping out because Eddington is a Maquis traitor, yet not caring at all that Kasidy is one too. Again, incongruent.

Kasidy was smuggling food supplies, Eddington was using classified tactical information. He also committed several acts of sabotage and terrorism. Kassidy, meanwhile, surrendered and served her time peacefully.

Also, Eddington's lousy in the sack.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

- Sisko harboring sour grapes about the racism in the 1960's.

YES. THANK YOU.

Seriously, Sisko was acting like a Bajoran who had actually LIVED the Occupation. I could see Kira, for instance, getting upset if the program were some Cardassian historical fantasy where Bajorans were treated with the same respect as the rest--because she LIVED it. But Sisko...if we're to believe the Federation propaganda, racism should've disappeared by the 22nd century, making that a 200-year-old grudge.

- Quark resenting Vic because Vic is "competition"; utterly ridiculous, Quark owns the holosuite Vic lives in therefore he could make sure it is run his (Quark's) way or not at all!

Well...I can kinda see this, if deep down (and we DO know Quark's an old softy at heart even if he won't admit it), Quark realizes Vic is sentient. In a way, seeing Vic as competition means he's giving him the same regard he would a flesh-and-blood merchant.

 

[Vykan12]

making that a 200-year-old grudge.

There are blacks who are still mad about slavery, which is an even longer grudge. And who's to say the Sisko wasn't subject to any form of racism in his career, or as a child? Being discriminated based on the pigmentation of your skin is something that's quite understandable to get really upset about.

 

[Zeppster]

I'm sorry but from Sisko's past character that seemed to be the last thing on his mind most of the time.

7th season really went away from giving a damn about the characters and only cared about a stupid story line.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

making that a 200-year-old grudge.

There are blacks who are still mad about slavery, which is an even longer grudge. And who's to say the Sisko wasn't subject to any form of racism in his career, or as a child? Being discriminated based on the pigmentation of your skin is something that's quite understandable to get really upset about.

But the anger about slavery does at least make sense considering that racism in general continued--legalized, in fact--until the 1960s. These days it's getting better, but in the early 21st century, there does seem to be more logic to it than in the 24th century. Hell, even in the Trek series WRITTEN in the 60s, we never saw Uhura subjected to racism. (Sexism, however...that would be a different argument.) Nor did we see Mayweather treated that way (and this in spite of his being weakly written).

So that's 200 years of even 21st century racism not existing anymore. The continuity is lost, that some in our time feel.

 

[Vykan12]

Well even if it could be incongruous to Sisko's character, I guess the writers of DS9 wanted to deliver a more explicit message about racial equality to the viewers than simply having Sisko be captain of the station. I found it appreciable at least.

 

[AdmiralGarak]

- Sisko harboring sour grapes about the racism in the 1960's.

YES. THANK YOU.

Seriously, Sisko was acting like a Bajoran who had actually LIVED the Occupation. I could see Kira, for instance, getting upset if the program were some Cardassian historical fantasy where Bajorans were treated with the same respect as the rest--because she LIVED it. But Sisko...if we're to believe the Federation propaganda, racism should've disappeared by the 22nd century, making that a 200-year-old grudge.

Again, I reiterate. This is not an academic issue for Sisko. He lived it. He experienced it. As Benny Russell he was marginalized, he was beaten, and he was broken. How could you expect him not to care?

 

[od0_ital]

^

Ya know what really bothered me about that scene with Sisko's racial anger?

That he was readin' a real book, and bent the spine when he began to show his temper!

 

[AdmiralGarak]

^

Ya know what really bothered me about that scene with Sisko's racial anger?

That he was readin' a real book, and bent the spine when he began to show his temper!

And hundreds of lightyears away, Jean-Luc Picard shed a single tear yet he knew not why.

Not to worry, I'm sure there's some flashy-light-ma-bob that repairs books in the future.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

- Sisko harboring sour grapes about the racism in the 1960's.

YES. THANK YOU.

Seriously, Sisko was acting like a Bajoran who had actually LIVED the Occupation. I could see Kira, for instance, getting upset if the program were some Cardassian historical fantasy where Bajorans were treated with the same respect as the rest--because she LIVED it. But Sisko...if we're to believe the Federation propaganda, racism should've disappeared by the 22nd century, making that a 200-year-old grudge.

Again, I reiterate. This is not an academic issue for Sisko. He lived it. He experienced it. As Benny Russell he was marginalized, he was beaten, and he was broken. How could you expect him not to care?

I might be a little more sympathetic to him if he hadn't taken it so far that he was willing to let a sentient being die in the process...Vic being every bit as sentient as the Doctor on Voyager, or Data. To me...well, Vic couldn't help the form he was programmed into. He's a photonic intelligence, not a 20th-century white man! For Sisko not to recognize that...major fubar, if you ask me.

 

[AdmiralGarak]

Sisko had never met Vic, and had no evidence that Vic was anything more than a particularly lifelike holographic toy.

Eventually, when push came to shove, he did the right thing.

 

[McCoy]

Well even if it could be incongruous to Sisko's character, I guess the writers of DS9 wanted to deliver a more explicit message about racial equality to the viewers than simply having Sisko be captain of the station. I found it appreciable at least.

Yup, and that's the point of this thread. Characters acting "out of character" so the writers can accomplish something without having laid the proper groundwork ahead of time.

 

[Vykan12]

^ I think the OP was going more for "out of character" moments that were just strange, and could easily be seen as a screw-up by the writers.

 

[Deckerd]

- Worf murdering an unarmed Weyoun 7. He can't both do this, and be honorable. That's incongruent.

On the other hand, it was funny.

 

[Vykan12]

I just stumbled upon an unexpected character inconsistency in S1.

In Babel, Odo says that Rom cannot fix a replicator because he's an idiot who couldn't fix a straw if it were bent. Of course, later on in the show, we find out Rom becomes an engineer based on his ability to fix things.

 

[Zeppster]

I just stumbled upon an unexpected character inconsistency in S1.

In Babel, Odo says that Rom cannot fix a replicator because he's an idiot who couldn't fix a straw if it were bent. Of course, later on in the show, we find out Rom becomes an engineer based on his ability to fix things.

Rom was a completely different character from season one to season 4 or 5. He even talked different.