Duras & The Dominion War

[Ryan8bit]

So your only evidence is that Duras was a bad guy, and since he was a bad guy, Gowron couldn't possibly be a bad guy as well?

No, that's not the only evidence. Go back and read several posts back where I do cite more.

Regardless, that kind of evidence is all that's necessary for writers of TNG. It's not the same as DS9. There aren't intricate layers or complex characters. They're all very archetypal and simple. Duras is the traitor bad guy, and Gowron is the red herring. To assume that there was more to Gowron than that at that point is to assume too much of TNG writers.

Please tell me how Gowron was a good guy? He tried to bribe K'Ehleyr, and threatened her. He always seemed as an asshole and a corrupt power-hungry politician. What we late saw of him in DS9 was completely in character.

I never said Gowron was a good guy, just that he wasn't meant to be the one to do the poisoning. He was placed there completely as a red herring to throw people off. It's a very common plot device. But that's looking at things completely from a point of view that this is strictly fiction and that the writers don't care about things as much. Many in-universe reasons why Gowron is the least likely to have been the assassin have already been mentioned though.

 

[DevilEyes]

So your only evidence is that Duras was a bad guy, and since he was a bad guy, Gowron couldn't possibly be a bad guy as well?

No, that's not the only evidence. Go back and read several posts back where I do cite more.

Regardless, that kind of evidence is all that's necessary for writers of TNG. It's not the same as DS9. There aren't intricate layers or complex characters. They're all very archetypal and simple. Duras is the traitor bad guy, and Gowron is the red herring. To assume that there was more to Gowron than that at that point is to assume too much of TNG writers.

...some of whom happen to be the same people.

Please tell me how Gowron was a good guy? He tried to bribe K'Ehleyr, and threatened her. He always seemed as an asshole and a corrupt power-hungry politician. What we late saw of him in DS9 was completely in character.

I never said Gowron was a good guy, just that he wasn't meant to be the one to do the poisoning. He was placed there completely as a red herring to throw people off. It's a very common plot device. But that's looking at things completely from a point of view that this is strictly fiction and that the writers don't care about things as much. Many in-universe reasons why Gowron is the least likely to have been the assassin have already been mentioned though.

Like what?

He would have challenged K'mpec to a fight instead? Pure conjecture. And I've already stated good reasons (which nobody has been able to successfully refute) why he couldn't - because he would have needed a cause for a challenge first.

He didn't have a chance of gaining the position after K'mpec's death if Picard and the Enterprise hadn't interfered? He was up for the position along with Duras, so obviously he believed he did have a chance.

 

[Ryan8bit]

...some of whom happen to be the same people.

That's pretty irrelevant given the direction of the shows being so different. Basically, you'd never get an "In the Pale Moonlight" with the TNG writers/staff/producers/etc. Their direction was largely episodic and far more archetypal.

Like what?

I guess I'll go over this again.

1. Gowron was an outsider. He had no political ties or ins with the High Council. Killing K'mpec would surely have been in Duras' favor given his political power, which his family was established as having a great amount of. Enough so that any split against him could in turn cause a great civil war, which the Empire did not want.

2. Normally, arbitration fell to a member of the High Council. A large part of the council was loyal to Duras, which is why K'mpec said they couldn't be trusted. Because of that, he appointed Picard, which was an extremely unorthodox move that could not be predicted. It's extremely likely the assassin was not counting on that, and was thinking the council would arbitrate. Given Duras' position within the council, it is likely that he would have been the successor. Certainly, the council would not oppose Duras since they feared the civil war.

3. Duras was shown to have a pattern of cowardice and dishonorable behavior. He tried to have Kurn and Picard assassinated, but he didn't try to carry it out himself. He also tried to kill Gowron with a suicide bomber. He didn't want to risk his life in a confrontation, so he used others to achieve his goals. Unless it came down to killing or threatening more defenseless women. He killed K'ehleyr and threatened to kill Kahlest just to cover up his own dishonor. With a track record of such behavior, poisoning someone doesn't seem out of the question.

4. Despite the reasons for his potential dishonor, he still engages in the crimes of his father. He had help from the Romulans in the form of technology for his suicide bomber. Allying with the Romulans was obviously perceived by many Klingons as one of the worst things that could be done. And Duras engaged in such alliances purely to gain an edge in grabbing power.

5. Duras (or one of his operatives) had the proximity to K'mpec to deliver a sustained poison. Gowron did not.

6. Duras constantly challenged K'mpec's authority and did not respect his decisions. The latter could also be said of Gowron though.

7. If Gowron was the next to lead the people with no more opposition, it is likely that there would be those out to discredit him. Surely someone followed up on the investigation of the poisoning, and they likely found it to be done by Duras, which they would keep quiet about given how his family still had power. If it were Gowron, it would have been known very quickly.

These don't completely rule out Gowron, but they very heavily point towards Duras. Given these, the admission of the writer himself, and the predictable nature of TNG, it's a really safe bet to say it was Duras who did it.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

I always thought that it was Gowron, too. It was hinted in the scene when he comes to speak to K'Ehleyr and unsuccessfully tries to bribe her. When she refuses his offer with contempt ("You speak like a Ferengi!"), he gets angry and says that K'mpec was also stubborn and didn't listen, and now he's dead. K'Ehleyr herself later says at a meeting with Picard, Riker and Worf, "He implied I would end up like K'mpec if I didn't cooperate".

Gowron always seemed shifty and slimy, he wasn't a "good guy" but just the "lesser of the two evils" compared to Duras. But the problem is, when you have to choose the lesser of the two evils, you still end up with an evil.

At the time the eps first aired, I thought the Romulans were running a "double blind" operation. Duras the obvious public collaborator and Gowron the actual collaborator unbeknownst to everyone else.

IIRC there was something fishy about the placement of the man with the bomb in his arm in the room when the bomb went off. It's been a long time since I've seen those eps so I don't remember exactly what it was.

That plus the other stuff made me wonder if the Romulans weren't playing a deeper game than anyone suspected, but subsequent events didn't seem to bear that out.