DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed?

[SomniumRabidum]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

Rationalizations, I know, but that's what we Trek fans do best.

Heh, ain't that the truth! I was crackin up the other day while explaining this little aspect of being a real Trek fan

We see the cheesy lack of attention to detail in things like wardrobe, dialogue, chronology, technology, weaponry, diplomacy, choreography, etc..... but we find ways around letting it affect our enjoyment of the show(s). We'll construct some pretty impressive rationalizations for why the obviously cheesy and neglected is actually legitimate and reasonable

 

[flemm]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

Regarding the fluidity of characters' jobs on DS9:

In the later seasons especially, it becomes increasingly difficult to associate a given character with a specific task or job, but this isn't a sign of laziness or carelessness on the part of the writers, but rather a conscious choice to focus on defining the characters by their personality/emotions/goals/longings/failures/struggles, etc. and not by their jobs.

On shows like Voyager and ENT, it's easy to identify whose job is whose, but that's because if you take away the characters' jobs, then there is very little left to define them. That is a stronger sign of lazy writing than the situation on DS9, where by the later seasons especially, the characters' jobs are often superfluous or at any rate not each character's defining trait. TNG is somewhere in the middle, as under Michael Piller's guidance, the show did center on the individual characters during its best years. The characterizations are generally more limited overall than on DS9, but certainly better than on Voyager or ENT (TOS is a tougher comparison, as always, for a variety of reasons).

It's just another case where the DS9 writers ditched the standard Trek cliché, where each character has a clearly defined job, and went in another direction. (They do have jobs, but that is not the focus.)

This works as a general rule, but also for specific cases, such as Kira taking command of the Defiant rather than Worf at the end of Tears of the Prophets. It's significant for her character to help the Emissary at his moment of weakness, whereas that simply doesn't apply to Worf. Characters appear where they appear for dramatic or plot-related reasons, not because they are tied to a specific imaginary console in order to perform the specific fictional task that defines them.

 

[Pemmer Harge]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

I'm going through B5 for the first time right now and I'm glad someone likes Tracy Scoggins; I keep hearing she's a terrible actress.)

She most certainly isn't. She was never less than competent on B5.

 

[Saito S]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

Rationalizations, I know, but that's what we Trek fans do best.

Heh, ain't that the truth! I was crackin up the other day while explaining this little aspect of being a real Trek fan

We see the cheesy lack of attention to detail in things like wardrobe, dialogue, chronology, technology, weaponry, diplomacy, choreography, etc..... but we find ways around letting it affect our enjoyment of the show(s). We'll construct some pretty impressive rationalizations for why the obviously cheesy and neglected is actually legitimate and reasonable

This did make me lol, and I think it's true to some degree. Buuuuut... personally, I don't try to rationalize everything.

Having a discussion (whether with a fellow Trek nerd in real life, or here) on how we might rationalize this or that can be fun and interesting, which is why I participate in such discussions. And sometimes we even arrive at a satisfactory conclusion - one that may not quite be what the creators of the shows were thinking at the time , but one that works nonetheless. However, some things are just hard to explain away in-universe, without resorting to either A) something that is a REALLY huge stretch, or B) taking the thing at face value for what it is. I find neither A nor B to be palatable in many instances (an example that I've been using a lot lately for these kinds of discussions is the phasers firing out of the torpedo tube in TNG "Darmok"). So in those cases, I just say "Well... it's a TV show. It's written by humans and produced by humans, and they make mistakes. In-universe, if it 'were real', the phasers WOULDN'T fire out of the torp tube because that makes no sense, and there are no 'writers' or 'effects guys' to mess it up."

Regarding the fluidity of characters' jobs on DS9:

In the later seasons especially, it becomes increasingly difficult to associate a given character with a specific task or job, but this isn't a sign of laziness or carelessness on the part of the writers, but rather a conscious choice to focus on defining the characters by their personality/emotions/goals/longings/failures/struggles, etc. and not by their jobs.

On shows like Voyager and ENT, it's easy to identify whose job is whose, but that's because if you take away the characters' jobs, then there is very little left to define them. That is a stronger sign of lazy writing than the situation on DS9, where by the later seasons especially, the characters' jobs are often superfluous or at any rate not each character's defining trait. TNG is somewhere in the middle, as under Michael Piller's guidance, the show did center on the individual characters during its best years. The characterizations are generally more limited overall than on DS9, but certainly better than on Voyager or ENT (TOS is a tougher comparison, as always, for a variety of reasons).

It's just another case where the DS9 writers ditched the standard Trek cliché, where each character has a clearly defined job, and went in another direction. (They do have jobs, but that is not the focus.)

This works as a general rule, but also for specific cases, such as Kira taking command of the Defiant rather than Worf at the end of Tears of the Prophets. It's significant for her character to help the Emissary at his moment of weakness, whereas that simply doesn't apply to Worf. Characters appear where they appear for dramatic or plot-related reasons, not because they are tied to a specific imaginary console in order to perform the specific fictional task that defines them.

Ehhhhhh... I see what you're getting at, but I don't buy it.

One, I don't think it was in any way an intentional decision. I've never heard anything in interviews or what have you suggesting that the writers were actually saying "let's muddy the waters with respect to who does what so the personalities shine through." So out-of universe, even if some viewers might get something positive out of the way things were depicted, it was still caused by bad writing.

Two, if you want the character's personalities to shine through more, this is not the way to do it. "Downplaying their technical roles" is one thing; pretending that people don't HAVE technical roles in this universe (when they very clearly do), or that specialized skillsets don't matter when figuring out who the best person for a job is (when they very clearly do) is another. You don't sacrifice believability to promote character development, and in Trek (as in a real life military), Starfleet officers DO have jobs, they ARE trained in specific ways, and they ARE better than one another within their specializations. There does seem to be a good amount of cross-training, but not to the point of "anyone can do anything, it really doesn't matter".

 

[flemm]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

One, I don't think it was in any way an intentional decision.

We can just look at the results. Obviously, if the writers had wanted to create a situation where everyone was performing a very clearly defined task the majority of the time, they could easily have done so. We know this because that was standard operating procedure for all modern Trek shows, as it was in TOS.

No matter how bad, derivative and formulaic the writing got on Voyager, we always knew who was doing what on the bridge. Why? Because that is part of the stale formula that the show was employing every week. Just as much as "the shields are down to 40%!"

All the other Trek shows are a testament to the fact that not assigning clearly defined jobs to everyone on a Trek show is what requires effort.

"Downplaying their technical roles" is one thing; pretending that people don't HAVE technical roles in this universe (when they very clearly do), or that specialized skillsets don't matter when figuring out who the best person for a job is (when they very clearly do) is another.

Even the phrase "downplaying technical roles" is an overstatement. There's actually never any doubt about what the characters' main jobs are overall. The show just doesn't spend a lot of time worrying about assigning specific jobs to specific consoles on ops or on the bridge of the Defiant, or a lot of time making sure that a specific member of the command crew is assigned to the same task on every occasion. Because those are trivial points and not worth parsing out.

DS9 made better use of its airtime. It didn't have to clearly define each character's role on the bridge or in ops on every occasion because the characters were clearly defined as characters.

 

[Saito S]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

We can just look at the results. Obviously, if the writers had wanted to create a situation where everyone was performing a very clearly defined task the majority of the time, they could easily have done so. We know this because that was standard operating procedure for all modern Trek shows, as it was in TOS.

No matter how bad, derivative and formulaic the writing got on Voyager, we always knew who was doing what on the bridge. Why? Because that is part of the stale formula that the show was employing every week. Just as much as "the shields are down to 40%!"

All the other Trek shows are a testament to the fact that not assigning clearly defined jobs to everyone on a Trek show is what requires effort.

Even the phrase "downplaying technical roles" is an overstatement. There's actually never any doubt about what the characters' main jobs are overall. The show just doesn't spend a lot of time worrying about assigning specific jobs to specific consoles on ops or on the bridge of the Defiant, or a lot of time making sure that a specific member of the command crew is assigned to the same task on every occasion. Because those are trivial points and not worth parsing out.

DS9 made better use of its airtime. It didn't have to clearly define each character's role on the bridge or in ops on every occasion because the characters were clearly defined as characters.

I'm sorry, but I don't agree at all. To say that simply because it happened,while it would have been easy to make it not happen, doesn't automatically translate to it being an intentional creative decision. Simply because paying more attention to who was doing what from moment to moment was the standard on all the other Trek shows doesn't automatically make NOT paying attention to it the better choice, or the more creative choice, or the choice that requires more effort. To me, it's a dropped ball (though a minor one; as I said in my original post in this thread, this is hardly a deal breaker for me, as DS9 is still my favorite), and all these excuses are just spin.

That said, it ISN'T a crippling issue, and it's pretty clear that we're at loggerheads with it. I don't think either one of us is going to suddenly come about on it, so we'll just have to agree to disagree.

 

[flemm]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

'm sorry, but I don't agree at all. To say that simply because it happened,while it would have been easy to make it not happen, doesn't automatically translate to it being an intentional creative decision. Simply because paying more attention to who was doing what from moment to moment was the standard on all the other Trek shows doesn't automatically make NOT paying attention to it the better choice, or the more creative choice, or the choice that requires more effort. To me, it's a dropped ball (though a minor one; as I said in my original post in this thread, this is hardly a deal breaker for me, as DS9 is still my favorite), and all these excuses are just spin.

I don't see any reason to assume that the writers' goal was (or should have been) to be consistent about bridge assignments and such things. In fact, it's pretty obvious that this wasn't their goal and that, on the contrary, they wanted the situation to remain relatively fluid, i.e. it was a creative choice.

Largely this was probably a practical issue: for example, they wanted Ezri to be on the bridge and didn't want to have to spend a lot of time justifying her presence. But whatever, it's still a creative choice (imo a good one).

That said, it ISN'T a crippling issue, and it's pretty clear that we're at loggerheads with it. I don't think either one of us is going to suddenly come about on it, so we'll just have to agree to disagree.

Ok

 

[Quinton O'Connor]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

I like DS9. *nods sagely*

 

[Navaros]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

Even the phrase "downplaying technical roles" is an overstatement. There's actually never any doubt about what the characters' main jobs are overall.

DS9 made better use of its airtime. It didn't have to clearly define each character's role on the bridge or in ops on every occasion because the characters were clearly defined as characters.

I agree with your argument except when it applies to Jadzia and in a different way, Ezri. In Jadzia's particular case, the points you make are defeated because her job is not defined at all other than by its vague title. In practice, Jadzia performs no useful job or function on the show, and accordingly, has no useful reason for being on the show. Just about 100% of Jadzia's job-related dialogue is entirely interchangable with O'Brien's, and all the rest of her dialogue is useless in providing any plot or entertainment value. To add insult to injury, Jadzia has nothing going for her to define her as a character, other than being promiscuous, which is an uninteresting trait that doesn't help her worth as a character any.

The Ezri character strengthens your argument because unlike the other DS9 characters, she is defined by her job, and that makes her a bad character. Her job as counselor is an irrelevant function to the show and certainly not a fitting one for a bridge officer, and she has nothing else going for her.

For the other characters, you are right. DS9 excels because they are characters rather than merely names attached to job descriptions, as is the case on the other modern Trek shows.

 

[G2309]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

There's things ds9 had which I wish the other shows did.
Good acting from all characters
story arcs
lack of techno nonsense solutions to problems

 

[flemm]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

DS9 excels because they are characters rather than merely names attached to job descriptions, as is the case on the other modern Trek shows.

I don't dispute that one can debate the effectiveness of DS9's approach with regard to specific characters. But anyway, yeah, your sentence above succinctly summarizes the point I was making about the show's approach overall.

 

[CmndrSela318]

Re: DS9 Fans: What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed

What do you wish DS9 had that other Trek shows possessed?
The answer is over <----there in my location. I would've liked to seen an episode featuring a 24th century Saavik. I would've also liked for Sela to have shown up on DS9. Maybe become a recurring character on DS9, like Dukat. I definitely would've loved to have seen how Worf and O'Brien reacted to 7 of 9. I know DS9 had a Q episode in season one but they needed a Q episode each season, like NexGen.