Alexander was repeatedly abandoned, of course I feel bad for him. Also I feel bad that when the Ent-D crashed he hit his head and dropped about 40 IQ points.
Do you feel sorry for Alexander?
- Thread starter Romo Lampkin
- Start date
I thought the implication from Emissary was that it was the second time she had refused to marry. Implying the second time they got it on.
Yep - until the episode ended and the reset button was hit. The same way Worf took responsibility for Jeremy Aster. I was frequently frustrated with the way these matters were dealt with on TNG. I don't care for how they handled Alexander on DS9 - but at least they didn't forget he existed altogether.
Yes, however being raised by one's birth parents is not the invariable practice on Earth, let alone alien cultures.
For instance, when my grandmother's mother died of the 1919 flu epidemic, her father turned her over to her grandparents and a favorite pair of aunts. Her father traveled a lot for his work and didn't really feel up to raising a girl anyway, so rather than quit his well-paying job, he supported her financially and saw her occasionally but the day-to-day living wasn't with him.
Another example, the English comic writer P.G. Wodehouse. His father was a magistrate in the British colony of Hong Kong when he was born in 1881. His parents come "home", i.e. England, for his birth and turned him over to aunts from both his mother's and father's side to raise a matter of days after he was born. His parents went back to Hong Kong, which was considered to be not a suitable environment for children. The journey was long and expensive, so he hardly ever saw them again and they didn't form a bond at all. The aunts raised him in strict Victorian British fashion until he was old enough for boarding school. This was not a unique thing. Lots of upper middle class parents had a small if any role in raising their own children then, and most of them turned out okay.
For instance, when my grandmother's mother died of the 1919 flu epidemic, her father turned her over to her grandparents and a favorite pair of aunts. Her father traveled a lot for his work and didn't really feel up to raising a girl anyway, so rather than quit his well-paying job, he supported her financially and saw her occasionally but the day-to-day living wasn't with him.
Another example, the English comic writer P.G. Wodehouse. His father was a magistrate in the British colony of Hong Kong when he was born in 1881. His parents come "home", i.e. England, for his birth and turned him over to aunts from both his mother's and father's side to raise a matter of days after he was born. His parents went back to Hong Kong, which was considered to be not a suitable environment for children. The journey was long and expensive, so he hardly ever saw them again and they didn't form a bond at all. The aunts raised him in strict Victorian British fashion until he was old enough for boarding school. This was not a unique thing. Lots of upper middle class parents had a small if any role in raising their own children then, and most of them turned out okay.
My paternal grandmother passed away when my dad was eight years old and his sister was ten. They were the youngest of eleven children. Their father married late in life...he wasn't up to raising two young children at his age so they wound up being basically raised by their older brothers and sisters...some of whom already had families of their own.
Alexander and Worf were getting on so well towards the end of TNG. It's a shame that they had grown alienated by the time Alexander had arrived on DS9. It's actually a pity Alexander didn't arrive on DS9 with Worf and we'd see some interaction perhaps between Jake and Nog.
Anyway, the way he was portrayed on DS9 is probably a fairly authentic way of portraying a fractured relationship with an absent father and a deceased mother. He's a conflicted guy and screws up for a time in his life and we eventually see him start to embark upon a road were he gets his act together. It's not very satisfying see Alexander embarrass himself and be petulant and so on but taken in context of a guy who's trying to find his place in the cosmos after a turbulent upbringing it's a portrayal that's probably not far off the mark in terms of authenticity.
Anyway, the way he was portrayed on DS9 is probably a fairly authentic way of portraying a fractured relationship with an absent father and a deceased mother. He's a conflicted guy and screws up for a time in his life and we eventually see him start to embark upon a road were he gets his act together. It's not very satisfying see Alexander embarrass himself and be petulant and so on but taken in context of a guy who's trying to find his place in the cosmos after a turbulent upbringing it's a portrayal that's probably not far off the mark in terms of authenticity.
I actually agree with this. At the time I was always a little dubious about what they did with Alexander as a character over on DS9, especially the idea that he'd "go Klingon" after he seemed pretty much disinterested in that whole side of his parentage whenever Worf used to rant on about tradition on TNG. But over the years I've actually come to think of it more like the above: Alexander in his 'teenage years' (not the human teens, but you know what I mean
) turns to tradition as a sort of comfort for his feeling so alone and abandoned throughout his childhood. Not unlike his father, who may very well have been an anti-Klingon Klingon when he was growing up with the Rozhenkos, but then became the ultimate strictly 'trad' Klingon noble when he started exploring his heritage more. Worf and Alexander actually share a lot in common history-wise, both basically being orphans (of sorts).Do we think the Alexander we see on DS9 could evolve plausibly into the older version we saw travel back from the future in TNG: "Firstborn"? The more I think about it, the more it seems likely. Albeit, perhaps, a version who is a better fighter and able to defend his father on the floor of the council when the time comes.
He probably just never worked out. I've got fat genes but I'm thin because I run 40 miles a week.
I don't think it's implausible for the Alexander of DS9 re-devoting his life to peace after the war. He was probably drummed out of the military once the war ended and man supply once again exceeded demand.
Kurn definitely got it the worst, I think. And it was a story that could have been revisited, too.
He went from the guy who basically saved the Klingon Empire (Worf, sure techically called the shots, but couldn't do it without Kurn's ships and allies), to having all he had taken from him, including his honor, because of the impossible decision Worf had to make. Didn't seem right. Then he was denied an honorable death. So he has his memory wiped and surgically altered to live out his life as a nobody. Then a year later, Worf gets his honor back, under Martok's house. A few years later, Worf could have even been Chancellor.
I always thought they could have revisited Kurn. What if the memory wipe didn't completely take? Would he have wanted to join Worf in the house of Martok, or exact his revenge?
Gowron's story ended badly, too. In the beginning, Worf clears the way for Gowron's rise to power, and Gowron stabs him in the back and takes his honor. Then Gowron becomes dishonorable and Worf is forced to kill him.
Yes, I felt sorry for the character, younger and older. I always thought the thinking behind Worf and his son was that they'd both been brought up in a similar way but developed quite differently, where Worf had had the stabilising influence of Starfleet and had grown up into a solid officer poor old Alexander suffered more from abandonment issues and so wasn't the shining example his father was.
But as someone pointed out earlier Worfs family as a whole was treated very badly on DS9. Poor old Kurn.
But as someone pointed out earlier Worfs family as a whole was treated very badly on DS9. Poor old Kurn.
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Gowron died in combat! What better death, for a Klingon?
^ And Worf even performed the death howl over Gowron afterward. So it seems clear that even though Gowron was a prick towards the end of his life, he still died honorably, and probably gained entrance to Sto-Vo-Kor.
This was fairly common, even into the 1950's.
In 1932, my Dad (infant) and his brother (1 YO) were adopted away (ie: taken) from their somewhat unstable Mother after/around when their father had died. The story is, their father signed over rights on his deathbed for his sister to raise the older one and some friends to raise my Dad.
Then, 10 years later, my Dad's adoptive mother died and adoptive father signed him over to another friend/acquaintance because he felt he couldn't raise a child alone.
I'm sure legal papers were filed, but in this day and age, they couldn't just take the kids and figure out the legal stuff later in that manner.
OK Point taken. Maybe not dishonorable by Klingon standards and law, but Gowron definitely turned heel, from a narrative perspective. I just didn't like how he was portrayed towards the end.
I felt sorry for Alexander only because Worf seemed to keep dumping him on his parents doorstep because he didn't know what to do with children; later when on DS9 when Jadzia and Worf were together , other than the wedding and some time on a ship it was like Worf didn't even have a son.
I never felt sorry for Alexander. He was written so poorly after Reunion that I couldn't develop enough of an attachment to feel anything greater than annoyance. Of course his story is tragic, but you never feel that because his episodes center around the problems he creates for Worf.
I felt he was given a rough, unsatisfying endpoint. Being a good/true Klingon is necessarily inclusive of being a good fighter, and in fact his character was rather inept in that regard. That was a shame, especially without a secondary skill that he showed mastery of to compensate for his deficiency.
