How Would you Change S7 Dukat?

[Nightdiamond]

The whole ending seemed very comic bookish IMO, even to the part with Sisko falling down the shaft.

I know the budget for special effects were limited, but??

I like the Prophets and the Pah Wraiths, particularly in episodes like "The Reckoning".

But the ending seemed too tacked on, at least to me it did. It seemed rushed in order to find a reason to "break up" the crew while leaving a possibility that they will reunite one day.

I wanted DS9 to go out with a spectacular bang, and was a little disappointed, but just a little.

Ironically, it was Damar who seemed to have the biggest impact.

 

[Admiral Shran]

I'm actually thinking of this:

Round 3 is named Ptolomaea, probably after Ptolemy, son of Abubus, who invited Simon Maccabaeus and his sons to a banquet and then killed them.[54] Traitors to their guests are punished here, lying supine in the ice, which covers them, except for their faces. They are punished more severely than the previous traitors, since the relationship to guests is an entirely voluntary one.[55] Fra Alberigo, who had armed soldiers kill his brother at a banquet, explains that sometimes a soul falls here before Atropos cuts the thread of life. Their bodies on Earth are immediately possessed by a demon, so what seems to be a walking man has reached the stage of being incapable of repentance (Canto XXXIII).

And there you go...while the particular type of treason is not exactly the same, the punishment most definitely is.

Ah okay. But when do think this "possession" took place? After he became a true believer in the Pah-Wraiths or not until he was literally possessed by one in the Fire Caves?

 

[Dale]

I believe I have read that Marc Alaimo was unhappy with the late-season changes in and resolution of Gul Dukat. He was much more conflicted and deeper to begin with and became more moustache-twirlingly cartoonish as the end neared, but in the end he had to serve the story.

I greatly enjoyed DS9.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

I'm actually thinking of this:

Round 3 is named Ptolomaea, probably after Ptolemy, son of Abubus, who invited Simon Maccabaeus and his sons to a banquet and then killed them.[54] Traitors to their guests are punished here, lying supine in the ice, which covers them, except for their faces. They are punished more severely than the previous traitors, since the relationship to guests is an entirely voluntary one.[55] Fra Alberigo, who had armed soldiers kill his brother at a banquet, explains that sometimes a soul falls here before Atropos cuts the thread of life. Their bodies on Earth are immediately possessed by a demon, so what seems to be a walking man has reached the stage of being incapable of repentance (Canto XXXIII).

And there you go...while the particular type of treason is not exactly the same, the punishment most definitely is.

Ah okay. But when do think this "possession" took place? After he became a true believer in the Pah-Wraiths or not until he was literally possessed by one in the Fire Caves?

The first time he literally got possessed by one...I think that even though the Pah-Wraith withdrew that first time, it did something to his mind that in effect took or at least severely damaged his free will. I think that he was in effect forced to believe, and was unable to change his mind.

 

[DevilEyes]

I believe I have read that Marc Alaimo was unhappy with the late-season changes in and resolution of Gul Dukat. He was much more conflicted and deeper to begin with and became more moustache-twirlingly cartoonish as the end neared, but in the end he had to serve the story.

I greatly enjoyed DS9.

In every interview and con report I've seen, he says that he enjoyed playing Dukat throughout all 7 seasons. Maybe he is just being polite, but to my knowledge, all accounts of disagreements between Alaimo and Behr on Dukat's characterization come from Behr's interviews.

 

[flemm]

I would start with retouching the Pagh Wraith rather than Dukat. There are moments in the episode Covenant that show how interesting this storyline could/should have been. Basically, the Pagh Wraiths were driven from the Celestial Temple because they wanted to take a more active role in the life of Bajor, presumably a more domineering one (that might be seen as misguided), but one that would have prevented the Occupation (at least so the Pagh Wraith would have us believe).

In other words, they have a legitimate gripe with the Prophets and do not perceive themselves as evil, but as misunderstood. The parallel with Dukat is clear, as is the attraction he might feel to these kindred spirits, especially since his "covenant" with the Pagh Wraith would allow him to fulfill his fantasy of being the benevolent, beloved ruler of the Bajorans.

I disagree with some of the thoughts earlier in the thread suggesting that Dukat's obsession with Sisko post-Sacrifice of Angels makes no sense. On the contrary it makes perfect sense: Sisko inspires intense jealousy on the part of Dukat because he is the revered figure among the Bajorans that Dukat has always wanted to be. What's worse, his link to the prophets shattered Dukat's ambitions of conquest at the very moment when victory was about to be achieved. All of this makes the Pagh Wraith connection even more attractive from Dukat's point of view, because only they might allow him to defeat Sisko and simultaneously supplant him as Bajor's primary spiritual figure.

Jealousy of Sisko is something Dukat has in common with Winn (as well as their mutual resentment of Kira), which makes their final alliance another logical step. Winn was always a believer, but in a selfish manner: she wanted the power and privilege that comes with being an important religious icon. This makes her defection to the Pagh Wraith's cause a natural step, since they are willing to speak to her while the Prophets never did.

There are so many good ideas here, why doesn't it add up to much in the end? Mainly, I think the problem is that the Pagh Wraiths are never properly characterized outside of a few good lines in Covenant. We need to know more about them than simply that they are evil, and the Pagh Wraith themselves need to disagree with that assessment, just as Dukat never agreed with the perception that he was a cruel tyrant during the occupation. DS9 is good at building characters and handling complex issues in an intelligent manner but, for whatever reason, the Pagh Wraith were neglected.

I don't really mind Dukat vacillating a bit between mental clarity and instability. He was traumatized by his defeat at the hands of the Emissary, as well as the death of Ziyal, and that type of experience can break a man, or change him permanently. It can also lead an individual to reassess his values and even bring about a religious awakening. However, the writers needed to decide where they were going with this sooner, so that it felt more consistent.

The disagreement between the Prophets and the Pagh Wraith needed to be substantive, and the Pagh Wraith's perspective needed to make sense. In Covenant, it actually does: didn't the Prophets abandon Bajor during the occupation? Wouldn't the true gods of Bajor have intervened? These are questions that Bajoran believers might legitimately ask.

And finally: what's with the comic book villainy all of a sudden during the final confrontation in the Fire Caves? I'm just not sure what happened here. We know the DS9 writers have no trouble handling ambiguity and nuance when they feel like it. I guess they just made a bad creative choice in this case. The only other explanation I can think of is that Ira Behr had a hard time convincing the suits to allow him to do edgier stuff like ItPM, Siege and Inter Arma, and that this was his way of assuring them that DS9 was not losing its moral compass: there would still be some clearly defined incarnations of good and evil. Meh. Whatever the reason, a purely manichean conflict was the least interesting of available choices.

To summarize: I would retouch this storyline, and deal with the more substantial questions that it raises, but I wouldn't change the overall pattern.

 

[DevilEyes]

I would start with retouching the Pagh Wraith rather than Dukat. There are moments in the episode Covenant that show how interesting this storyline could/should have been. Basically, the Pagh Wraiths were driven from the Celestial Temple because they wanted to take a more active role in the life of Bajor, presumably a more domineering one (that might be seen as misguided), but one that would have prevented the Occupation (at least so the Pagh Wraith would have us believe).

In other words, they have a legitimate gripe with the Prophets and do not perceive themselves as evil, but as misunderstood. The parallel with Dukat is clear, as is the attraction he might feel to these kindred spirits, especially since his "covenant" with the Pagh Wraith would allow him to fulfill his fantasy of being the benevolent, beloved ruler of the Bajorans.

(...)


The disagreement between the Prophets and the Pagh Wraith needed to be substantive, and the Pagh Wraith's perspective needed to make sense. In Covenant, it actually does: didn't the Prophets abandon Bajor during the occupation? Wouldn't the true gods of Bajor have intervened? These are questions that Bajoran believers might legitimately ask.

We seem to think alike. This is very similar to my ideas about the Pah-wraiths posted earlier in another thread:

My idea about how the Pah-wraiths could have been written:

I'd make the Pah-wraiths and the Prophets the same species, who clashed over the issue of what kind of relation they should have to do world outside the Wormhole, and how much they should interfere with linear races like the Bajorans (and by 'interfering' I mean possessing the bodies of corporeal beings and getting directly involved in their affairs, instead of just sending them Orbs and - to some of them - visions and letting them work it out for themselves). You could draw parallels with the Prime Directive, or speculate whether the "Pah-wraiths" were only after power and control over the rest of the galaxy, or if their POV was worthwhile and legitimate. There was a civil war that ended with the losing faction - hitherto known as "Pah-wraiths" among the Bajorans - being exiled and confined to the place that, because of its peculiar electromagnetic properties, could support their life in their original form when outside the Wormhole, but had security measures installed to ensure that they cannot break free and try to possess a corporeal being, or return to the Wormhole; this place would become known among the Bajorans as "the Fire Caves".

Stories about the conflict have existed in ancient Bajoran manuscripts, but - in my version - there have always been underground minority Pah-wraiths worship groups and apocryphal texts that support the Pah-wraiths version of events. In my version, the Pah-wraith worshipping would become more popular not because the Wormhole was sealed in season 6 finale - it would gain popularity during and after the Occupation of Bajor. While most Bajorans would stick to their faith in Prophets and would argue that there is a grand scheme of things that makes present suffering necessary, that the Bajorans have to fight for themselves and that it would all turn out right in the end (and they would see the end of the Occupation as a proof of that), there would be those who would resent the Prophets for not doing more and not coming to their salvation, and would argue that the Prophets are those distant beings who do not really care for them. They would claim that the Pah-wraiths should be their true gods, since they would not hesitate to do a lot more and save the Bajorans from all the suffering and the millions of death during the Occupation. This could create a more believable religious schism, without making the Pah-wraiths worshippers look like idiots.

I disagree with some of the thoughts earlier in the thread suggesting that Dukat's obsession with Sisko post-Sacrifice of Angels makes no sense. On the contrary it makes perfect sense: Sisko inspires intense jealousy on the part of Dukat because he is the revered figure among the Bajorans that Dukat has always wanted to be. What's worse, his link to the prophets shattered Dukat's ambitions of conquest at the very moment when victory was about to be achieved. All of this makes the Pagh Wraith connection even more attractive from Dukat's point of view, because only they might allow him to defeat Sisko and simultaneously supplant him as Bajor's primary spiritual figure.

It's not that jealousy of Sisko doesn't make sense, it does, but not an obsession of such a ridiculous magnitude that seems to overshadow or obliterate almost anything else in S7, and especially not when the writers try to support it with absurd plot points such as Dukat blaming Sisko for Ziyal's death (?! ). Suddenly Dukat doesn't seem to remember that there is a Cardassia, that he was 7 children there, that there is a war going on, and so on. The only moment when he shows any kind of interest is a scene of him visiting Damar, where Damar asks him to come back to be the leader of Cardassia, and Dukat tries to convince Damar that he can be a real leader; but conveniently, he neglects to express any kind of attitude as to what is going on and what Damar is supposed to do as the leader.

I don't really mind Dukat vacillating a bit between mental clarity and instability. He was traumatized by his defeat at the hands of the Emissary, as well as the death of Ziyal, and that type of experience can break a man, or change him permanently. It can also lead an individual to reassess his values and even bring about a religious awakening. However, the writers needed to decide where they were going with this sooner, so that it felt more consistent.

The problem is that he vacillates exactly the way the plot demands it. As Temis said earlier, it's a classic example of insanity being used as an excuse to have your villain do any kind of dumb shit you need him to do for your plot to work, which is lazy writing.

And finally: what's with the comic book villainy all of a sudden during the final confrontation in the Fire Caves? I'm just not sure what happened here. We know the DS9 writers have no trouble handling ambiguity and nuance when they feel like it. I guess they just made a bad creative choice in this case. The only other explanation I can think of is that Ira Behr had a hard time convincing the suits to allow him to do edgier stuff like ItPM, Siege and Inter Arma, and that this was his way of assuring them that DS9 was not losing its moral compass: there would still be some clearly defined incarnations of good and evil. Meh. Whatever the reason, a purely manichean conflict was the least interesting of available choices.

It seems that it wasn't the suits, but Behr himself who felt he needed assurances about 'not losing the moral compass'. See this interview: http://trekweb.com/stories.php?aid=SdNrK8202hgIc&mailtofriend=1

 

[flemm]

We seem to think alike. This is very similar to my ideas about the Pah-wraiths posted earlier in another thread:

Yes, I like your ideas on the subject as well. Basically the concept of a religious schism linked to a rebellious prophet is a good idea that never gets the intelligent treatment it derserves outside of a few lines in Covenant.

It's not that jealousy of Sisko doesn't make sense, it does, but not an obsession of such a ridiculous magnitude that seems to overshadow or obliterate almost anything else in S7, and especially not when the writers try to support it with absurd plot points such as Dukat blaming Sisko for Ziyal's death (?! ). Suddenly Dukat doesn't seem to remember that there is a Cardassia, that he was 7 children there, that there is a war going on, and so on. The only moment when he shows any kind of interest is a scene of him visiting Damar, where Damar asks him to come back to be the leader of Cardassia, and Dukat tries to convince Damar that he can be a real leader; but conveniently, he neglects to express any kind of attitude as to what is going on and what Damar is supposed to do as the leader.

To be fair, though, Dukat's wife and children were never very important to the character, other than Ziyal. We know he cheated relentlessly on his wife with various Bajoran women he claimed to be in love with. He states that he has seven children as part of the "humanizing" of the character in the early seasons, but the show never deals with them onscreen, and Dukat doesn't seem to show much interest in them (for example, when he is living as a renegade fighting the Klingons, Ziyal is there, but where is the rest of his family?). So, this neglect didn't begin with the Pagh Wraith storyline.

As for blaming Sisko for Ziyal's death, I wouldn't call that crazy: Dukat losing DS9 is what forced Ziyal to either leave with him or stay with Garak. Exonerating Damar is the part that seems a little odd, but Dukat is focusing on the bigger picture at this stage, due to his, errr... "enlightened" state of mind.

I think nuance and consistency in Dukat's portrayal is the main issue, by which I mean there wasn't enough of either.

The problem is that he vacillates exactly the way the plot demands it. As Temis said earlier, it's a classic example of insanity being used as an excuse to have your villain do any kind of dumb shit you need him to do for your plot to work, which is lazy writing.

Yeah, though he really doesn't veer wildly from one thing to another post-Waltz. Overall, it's pretty straight-forward: a traumatized Dukat has a religious awakening and seizes upon the Pagh Wraith as a new path to power and fantasy-fulfillment. The basic idea is sound, it's just handled in a choppy, unsatisfying manner.

It seems that it wasn't the suits, but Behr himself who felt he needed assurances about 'not losing the moral compass'. See this interview: http://trekweb.com/stories.php?aid=SdNrK8202hgIc&mailtofriend=1

Well, if it was Behr, then he screwed up. The Pagh Wraith stuff, intelligently handled, could have been excellent. I think some of it works as is, especially the false vision in early season seven that brings Benny Russell back into the picture. Also certain aspects of Covenant. But most of the potential is wasted.

 

[Yassim]

If you really want to rework S7 Dukat, you need to start with Waltz.

That's the first time that Dukat dances to the tune of the writer's needs, not the dictates of his character. Admittedly, he's had a breakdown, so his character may be unsteady... but the shame of it is, he was such a great character, and replaced with ... meh.

I agree with Temis - he needs to keep believing that his own power and success are essential, and that he can advance himself while earning the respect of others. I like the idea of him negotiating with the Pah Wraiths better than him worshipping them, each trying to outmaneuver the other.

He also needs a better reason to kill Jadzia, and a more brutal scene to do it in. The flashing lights with an apology... who cares? The audience hardly blames him, it's so ineffectual. There's no resonance at all, when Sisko takes him down, that Sisko is avenging the Old Man.

 

[Praxius]

The Pah-Wraith stuff was silly and bordering on boring.

I wouldn't change a thing to be honest.

To me, it made sense. Through DS9, he was continually portraying himself as a great man, a savior/hero of Cardassia, the kind and gentle benefactor of Bajor and continually sought out approval from everybody around him, completely self-centred around himself and his legacy.

He had moments through the series where he was actually kind and generous, friendly, funny, an ally, etc.... but through all his efforts, those he sought approval from, mainly Sisko and Kira, they continually shot him down and treated him like crap.

Eventually he lost everything..... Cardassia, his wife and children, Terok Nor for the second time and then his only daughter that gave a damn about him and gave him stability, Ziyal, was murdered by his pupil, Damar.... which lead to him losing his mind and being captured by Starfleet when they recaptured DS9.

After a while, when he finally seemed to gain back some of his sanity, he had the opportunity to escape the federation and landed on a planet with Sisko as his prisoner..... in which he once again sought out approval from Sisko.... but ended up having Sisko unravel his mind further and expose him for who he truly was......

..... having nothing left, he sought out a purpose for his existence and at the same time, sought out a way to not just get revenge on Sisko, but on the Bajorans whom he felt were ungrateful for his generosity during the occupation..... he found his solution in the Bajoran's religious beliefs in the prophets and sought a way to destroy them, which he felt would in turn destroy the Bajorans and their way of life, as well as his nemesis, Sisko.

Made sense to me.

And the whole thing about him not believing in the Pah-Wraiths and such..... well originally he didn't. He didn't have a clue what they were or what they were capable other then the Bajorans feared them and if the Prophets worked for Sisko, then he could "Use" the Pah-Wraiths for his advantage..... but when he cracked open that idol, it possessed him in order to close the wormhole and in that time, he had direct contact and experience with them, which was also the moment that he not only began to believe in them, but felt he could indeed use them for his goals to have power and authority once again, which he lost.... but in the end, they used him and his self-centred omnipotent mentality.

Added:

in regards to him killing Dax while possessed, I didn't like the idea of killing Dax, but considering the actor's contract was toast and they had to get rid of the character, they tossed in this situation where Dukat killed her....... and while I think it was a good concept in regards to Dukat killing her, I agree that they could have killed her in a better way besides some special effects..... But, through that entire episode, they built it up to get the viewer's hopes up about Dax and Worf having a baby. She was so happy, everything was going great, everything was turning for the best for them...... then suddenly Dukat comes along and rips that away from fans and viewers..... he just tears the heart out of the viewer as if to say "nope.... not gonna happen"

My wife, who was a fan of Dax was mortified she was killed off..... so in that sense, I think they did a good job (the writers that is)

 

[flemm]

It seems that it wasn't the suits, but Behr himself who felt he needed assurances about 'not losing the moral compass'. See this interview: http://trekweb.com/stories.php?aid=SdNrK8202hgIc&mailtofriend=1

Follow-up: I didn't get a chance to follow the link earlier, but just got back to it. I've read these comments before. It's complicated, because many of the concerns raised by Behr in that interview are legitimate.

I don't like how Dukat's involvement with the Pagh Wraith was handled, especially at the very end, but becoming apologists for the racist ideology Dukat espoused, as the show risked doing in the middle seasons, notably in Indiscretion, would have been ten gazillion times worse.

Whoever wrote Indiscretion (I don't actually recognize their names, but anyway the producers signed off on it), seem to think there might actually be some disagreement about whether or not the Occupation was beneficial for Bajor, and therefore justified. Riiiiight. Next we will be hearing about how the Holocaust was justified because it led to the birth of modern Israel. And the brutal colonisation of Africa was actually what inspired those nations to seek independance, and so was actually beneficial to them

Watch that scene in Schindler's List where Ralph Fiennes' character is fascinated with the beauty of his Jewish captive, who he has been taught to believe is an inferior being, then let's talk about how much Dukat must have truly loooooved Ziyal's mother and his other Bajoran mistresses during the Occupation. These comparisons are inevitable because the show itself drew these paralells in Duet and elsewhere.

No wonder Nana Visitor could hardly stand being around Alaimo in make-up, even during the middle seasons when the writers were convincing themselves that Dukat was such a decent chap at heart despite his unrepentant racism, and flatly refused to allow Kira to have an affair with Dukat, as the writers had at one time envisioned. We can thank her for saving the writers from themselves.

These discussions make me sad that Peter Allen Fields had to leave the show when he did, as he seemed to have the best grasp of these matters. This is also what makes Waltz an important DS9 episode, as it recgnizes the need to return to the spirit of Duet and delve deeply into the psychology surrounding the occupation, as well as Dukat's patronizing attitude toward the Bajorans, his hatred and fascination.

None of this really explains, however, the comic book villainy of the final arc. Recognizing the ugly underside of Dukat's personality didn't need to lead to mustache-twirling. It could have been handled intelligently, as it is for the most part in Waltz (save for the very end), and the character could have moved on from there.

EDIT: Indiscretion is the season 4 episode I was referring to, in which Ziyal first appears, not Return to Grace, as I had originally written by mistake.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

He had moments through the series where he was actually kind and generous, friendly, funny, an ally, etc.... but through all his efforts, those he sought approval from, mainly Sisko and Kira, they continually shot him down and treated him like crap.

Am I supposed to feel sorry for him for that, because he refused to repent for the actions that Sisko and Kira hated him for?? I don't.

Eventually he lost everything..... Cardassia, his wife and children, Terok Nor for the second time and then his only daughter that gave a damn about him and gave him stability, Ziyal, was murdered by his pupil, Damar.... which lead to him losing his mind and being captured by Starfleet when they recaptured DS9.

And ultimately THAT was his fault too...Ziyal wouldn't have been in that situation in the first place if it hadn't been for decisions HE made involving the Dominion.

As I've said before, he sold his soul and he paid the price, as he deserved.

 

[Praxius]

Am I supposed to feel sorry for him for that, because he refused to repent for the actions that Sisko and Kira hated him for?? I don't.

Did I say you had to?

No.

I was just saying that there were times where in earlier seasons before he joined the Dominion, that he seemed like an ally, he helped out the Federation, and seemed like he was eventually going to turn into a good guy.

There were times when even Kira started to respect him on some remote level, such as when he took it upon himself to fight the Klingons, or when both of them were off to save the Bajorans captured by the Breen.... we got to see a more personal, "Human" side of him (thorns in the arse), and when he couldn't abide by Cardassian standards of killing his daughter...... or when he met Sisko and Jake at the edge of Cardassian space as they glided there in the Ancient Bajoran space craft and shot off the fireworks.

That's not to say that this all changed who he was at the core, but for someone who hasn't seen the end of DS9 and how he ended up (watching the series through the first time) early on, it's difficult to place him as a good guy or bad guy.

And ultimately THAT was his fault too...Ziyal wouldn't have been in that situation in the first place if it hadn't been for decisions HE made involving the Dominion.

Once again, where was I excusing all that as not being his fault or him being partly responsible? I was just listing the things that happened to him that led up to him going nuts.... I wasn't focusing on who's fault was what.

As I've said before, he sold his soul and he paid the price, as he deserved.

Agreed.

 

[DS9 Gal AZ]

Dukat was a great villian precisely because, at times, he actually seemed to have the potential not to be a villian - he was complicated. He had moments of kindnes, generosity, "humanity," doing the right thing, etc. In season 4, it seemed they were doing a redemption arc for him, so that made it all the more compelling when they steered him back into villian territory with the Dominion alliance. I thought "Waltz" was great but seven 7 and the pagh-wraiths sort of stripped him of his complexity and turned him into a mustache-twirling 1-dimensional villian. I still enjoyed his descent into madness though. I'm not sure how it could be "fixed."

 

[DevilEyes]

To be fair, though, Dukat's wife and children were never very important to the character, other than Ziyal. We know he cheated relentlessly on his wife with various Bajoran women he claimed to be in love with. He states that he has seven children as part of the "humanizing" of the character in the early seasons, but the show never deals with them onscreen, and Dukat doesn't seem to show much interest in them (for example, when he is living as a renegade fighting the Klingons, Ziyal is there, but where is the rest of his family?). So, this neglect didn't begin with the Pagh Wraith storyline.

I never said that I believe there was any 'true wuv' between Dukat and his wife, but I wouldn't say that he doesn't show interest in his children, certainly not before season 6 when the writers seemed to forget about them. In Defiant he talked to Sisko about his son Mekor and taking him to some sort of Cardie version of Disneyland. While he was on Ghourmal fighting the Klingons, Ziyal was the only family he had, because his wife had left him and taken the children with her. He whined about it to Kira throughout Return to Grace. Presumably, since his status had diminished so much in Cardassian society due to the 'shame' of bringing home a half-Bajoran child (even his mother had renounced him), there was little he could do about it. This may have changed when he managed to become the leader of Cardassia, but the show didn't address the issue, apart from having Dukat talk about his youngest son in his speech in By Inferno's Light, which seemed to suggest that he is at least still in contact with them. The fact that we never saw them onscreen doesn't say anything about his relationship with them. We know that Garak had something to do with the death of Dukat's father and it kinda seems a big deal to Dukat, but we still never find out anything more about it. We rarely see family members even of the characters in the main credits (apart from Sisko, of course) until they show up in an episode, and Dukat was a recurring character, after all. Damar was in the show since season 4, but we didn't even know he was married until late in season 7, and I think the first time we ever learned we had children was when they were murdered. And we still know more about Dukat's and Damar's families than we know about Jadzia's.

As for Dukat's desire to win approval/respect/adoration... The idea that Dukat was exclusively obsessed with winning the approval of Sisko, Kira, or the Bajorans, seems to come from the late season 6/season 7, when the writers of the show conveniently forgot that she had always also been just as (if not more) concerned with winning and retaining power and status on Cardassia; one of the most memorable Dukat moments in The Maquis is when he learns that the CC wasn't trying to save him, and when he looks deeply hurt because they didn't tell him they were smuggling weapons to the colonists in the DMZ (and it's obvious that he is hurt not because they were smuggling weapons, but because they never told him); in Return to Grace, he is angry because of some gul who is courting his ex-wife and laments that that guy would've never dared to try it while Dukat was still influential (and it doesn't seem that this has much to do with any real feelings on Dukat's part for the ex-wife, as much as with his feelings of pride and possession and the loss of status). Dukat was always a kind of man who wanted to be powerful, respected and adored by pretty much everybody; he did have a special thing for Bajor and maybe even more so, Terok Nor, as both the places he spent a big and important part of his career on, and as symbols of his failure, which he sought to reclaim and prove himself again. But the idea of Bajor and Sisko being the objects of a single-minded obsession to the exclusion of everything else, is a late retcon, and to me, not really convincing. Although it seems that it worked for some other posters.

Overall, the problem with Dukat's characterization is that apparently nobody sat and worked it out at the start, or at least halfway through - basically, they started off just wanting to have a bad guy and never meant to make him particularly complex; then they figured "oh, this guy can act" and started writing some more interesting stuff for him, and for a while they were probably happy for having created a multi-dimensional and popular villainous character, since they liked to think of their show as a more morally complex, "shades of gray" kind of Trek; but as they kept reading the Internet feedback, they (or at least some of them - like the showrunner) thought "oh crap, many people actually like this character - some are even defending his actions!" and got frustrated and alarmed that the show's "moral compass" was lost, so they tried to rectify this by hammering home the point that Dukat was evil... and they went overboard with it.

edit: added because I've only now read flemm's last post

It seems that it wasn't the suits, but Behr himself who felt he needed assurances about 'not losing the moral compass'. See this interview: http://trekweb.com/stories.php?aid=SdNrK8202hgIc&mailtofriend=1

Follow-up: I didn't get a chance to follow the link earlier, but just got back to it. I've read these comments before. It's complicated, because many of the concerns raised by Behr in that interview are legitimate.

I don't like how Dukat's involvement with the Pagh Wraith was handled, especially at the very end, but becoming apologists for the racist ideology Dukat espoused, as the show risked doing in the middle seasons, notably in Indiscretion, would have been ten gazillion times worse.

Whoever wrote Indiscretion (I don't actually recognize their names, but anyway the producers signed off on it), seem to think there might actually be some disagreement about whether or not the Occupation was beneficial for Bajor, and therefore justified. Riiiiight. Next we will be hearing about how the Holocaust was justified because it led to the birth of modern Israel. And the brutal colonisation of Africa was actually what inspired those nations to seek independance, and so was actually beneficial to them

Watch that scene in Schindler's List where Ralph Fiennes' character is fascinated with the beauty of his Jewish captive, who he has been taught to believe is an inferior being, then let's talk about how much Dukat must have truly loooooved Ziyal's mother and his other Bajoran mistresses during the Occupation. These comparisons are inevitable because the show itself drew these paralells in Duet and elsewhere.

No wonder Nana Visitor could hardly stand being around Alaimo in make-up, even during the middle seasons when the writers were convincing themselves that Dukat was such a decent chap at heart despite his unrepentant racism, and flatly refused to allow Kira to have an affair with Dukat, as the writers had at one time envisioned. We can thank her for saving the writers from themselves.

These discussions make me sad that Peter Allen Fields had to leave the show when he did, as he seemed to have the best grasp of these matters. This is also what makes Waltz an important DS9 episode, as it recgnizes the need to return to the spirit of Duet and delve deeply into the psychology surrounding the occupation, as well as Dukat's patronizing attitude toward the Bajorans, his hatred and fascination.

None of this really explains, however, the comic book villainy of the final arc. Recognizing the ugly underside of Dukat's personality didn't need to lead to mustache-twirling. It could have been handled intelligently, as it is for the most part in Waltz (save for the very end), and the character could have moved on from there.

EDIT: Indiscretion is the season 4 episode I was referring to, in which Ziyal first appears, not Return to Grace, as I had originally written by mistake.

I agree that some of the concerns he raised in the interview are legitimate, and I completely understand his frustration with the reactions of a portion of fanbase - because I'm also read and been majorly annoyed by musings of those fans who, while they like the explosions and/or romance and "cool" characters on the show, can't stand the "boring" "whining" about such things as mass murders, slavery, oppression and genocide, who think that Occupation wasn't that bad, and that Kira was judgmental bitch because she didn't throw herself in Dukat's arms. But, while I understand where Behr is coming from, I am not able to excuse him for trying to answer those problems by adopting a ridiculously cartoonish approach to the issue of good and evil.

For all the legitimate concerns he had, that interview is also full of misguided views, and attitudes that I would've never expected from a showrunnner of a show like DS9. These are the parts of the interview that really make me roll my eyes every time I read them:

"The problem I find with a lot of writers, including myself, is that once you get involved with a character you start to get to know him and you humanize him. Michael Piller did the rewrite of 'Defiant' where he had Dukat talk about his children; My reaction was, 'Uh oh, we've crossed the line.' I realized that he was going to lose all credibility as a villain; we were going to shower him with our usual writerish empathy, and, like all good liberals, we'd see him as neither fish or fowl." "I really responded against that. Here was the guy who had been in charge of Bajor, and right away we were looking for excuses for him.

But actor Marc Alaimo, who had become quite popular with the show's fans, had a different view of the character, seeing him as ultimately redeemable. Behr explains how this actually helped feed into creating the character the way he wanted: "What made it perfect, what made it beautiful, and that no writer could have conceived of, was that Alaimo took it in his head that he was the hero of the series - that Dukat was really just misunderstood; that he was sweet and kind.
"Whenever I think of the character, I think of Renoir's line from 'The Rules of the Game': 'The tragedy of life is that every man has his reasons.' Dukat could logically explain away everything he did, he could find justifications for all of it, and that's the horror; that's the thing Alaimo and I were always in disagreement about. His attitude was, 'We all have this inside of us, we're all many different people, and no one is truly evil.' Then I'd say, 'OK, if you take that to its conclusion, then no one has to stand accountable for their actions.'"

In the end, Behr says he's mostly pleased with how the character met his end fittingly: "I think he got what he deserved, let me put it like that. I can't say I feel sorry for him, I really don't. He and Wynn were two characters I just could not sympathize with. Though we tried in all fairness to give them their points of view and give them their attitudes, they were very deluded, and they did horrible things."

They tried in all fairness to give them their points of view and attitudes? As if that is such an amazing concession. That's what a good writer is supposed to do. Unless your intention is to write a cartoonish show with evil overlords who do things just for the sake of being evil - in that case it's OK to have muhahaha villains without their POVs and attitudes. But then decide right from the start that this is what your show is, and write accordingly. But if you're writing a show that is trying to be realistic, mature, challenging, relevant to the real world, you're supposed to write realistic characters, and realistic characters have motivations and their own point of view, because that's what people have in real life. Hitler and Pol Pot and Idi Amin didn't decide to be evil, they believed they were doing the right things.

And yes, every real life criminal and despot was human, they weren't devil-possessed and they weren't an aberration from an otherwise wonderful human race. And most of them had some good qualities, and loved their children or their dogs or whatever. How does that effect their guilt for their crimes? If you think that conceding they were human, or understanding what they were about is the same as excusing or justifying them, you have a very warped view of morality.

But this is the part that really baffles me the most:

His attitude was, 'We all have this inside of us, we're all many different people, and no one is truly evil.' Then I'd say, 'OK, if you take that to its conclusion, then no one has to stand accountable for their actions.'"

I actually happen also to believe that we all have a capacity for good and a capacity for evil inside. And - I don't know how to put this more diplomatically - the conclusion Behr derives makes no sense at all. How the hell does that mean that people are not accountable for their actions?! I would say it's exactly the opposite: whether you are going to do good or evil, while influenced by many factors, is ultimately a matter of personal choice - not a consequences of being "good" or "evil" by nature. And everyone bears responsibility for their own actions and is accountable for them.

I'm always baffled by the belief that some people have, that understanding what evil people are about makes it impossible to denounce or fight evil. I would say that it's exactly the opposite. Sure, it is much more comfortable, and it feels so much safer to believe that people who do evil things are some sort of alien monsters who have nothing in common with us nice folks. But that attitude only blinds you to see the roots of evil and notice it developing. If you look better, you can see seeds of evil in your neighbors and relatives and co-workers and all those nice and normal people. I've heard nice and normal people say things that Hitler would've been proud of. It may be disturbing to think how many of those nice people could become Hitler or Goering or Eichmann under right circumstances, just like Hitler might have ended up being just another loser WW1 veteran and failed painter and Eichmann could have been just another nondescript clerk.

But such views are really disappointing from a writer. I expect from true art to be provocative and challenging and not afraid to explore the roots of evil, rather than to be offer safe and simple conclusions and to imply that evil is something that has nothing to do with us, something that it's impossible to relate to.

(And let's not get into how borderline unprofessional I think it is for a producer/showrunner to start a one-sided public debate with an actor, with none of the alleged arguments from the other side available in their original form.

Although probably not as unprofessional as it is for certain interviewers to keep repeating quotes from Behr's interview about what Alaimo was supposed to have thought, according to Behr [which I would take with a grain of salt, as people usually tend to exaggerate and misunderstand the views of people they disagree with...], and state them as facts; i.e. if you're going to start a question to every ex-DS9 cast member who currently plays a villain with: "Are you like Marc Alaimo, who believed that Dukat was the real hero of the show..."., how about first checking if there is any interview with Alaimo, any convention report, anything with a direct quote where he actually stated that or something like that? Hint: to the best of my knowledge, there is no such thing.)

Incidentally, Ron Moore's comments on Dukat tend to sound more reasonable than Behr's - and I think he hits the nail on its head here (http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Dukat):

"I don't think of him as being completely evil through and through to the point where every thought, every impulse is shaded by a nefarious agenda or horrid motive. We've seen other aspects to this guy over the years. He can be charming. He can be generous. He can do the right thing. All of that somehow makes his "evil" actions all the more despicable, because we know that there was the potential in there for him to be a better person. But sometimes the clichés are true: Hitler loved his dog. No human being (and by extension, no Cardassian) is one hundred percent pure evil. But there is a "critical mass", if you will, where the dark deeds attributed to one person become so overwhelming that they swamp all the redeeming characteristics. Dukat is a bad guy. A very bad guy. He has a lot of blood on his hands and it's hard to see how his smile and innate charm can wipe that clean." (AOL chat, 1998)

 

[flemm]

Overall, the problem with Dukat's characterization is that apparently nobody sat and worked it out at the start, or at least halfway through - basically, they started off just wanting to have a bad guy and never meant to make him particularly complex; then they figured "oh, this guy can act" and started writing some more interesting stuff for him, and for a while they were probably happy for having created a multi-dimensional and popular villainous character, since they liked to think of their show as a more morally complex, "shades of gray" kind of Trek; but as they kept reading the Internet feedback, they (or at least some of them - like the showrunner) thought "oh crap, many people actually like this character - some are even defending his actions!" and got frustrated and alarmed that the show's "moral compass" was lost, so they tried to rectify this by hammering home the point that Dukat was evil... and they went overboard with it.

The part I don't really agree with above is the idea that Dukat is morally complex or ambiguous as portrayed in seasons three and four (when he is at his most overtly likable). If anything, I think the problem is that he is not morally ambiguous enough at this stage.

Take the question of Dukat's family. It's no great revelation that tyrants, or conquistadors, or officers in the SS, or whatever, might have families that they care about, so pointing this out about Dukat doesn't really score many points in the complexity department. The issue is how these individuals can simultaneously love their family and treat their fellow sentient beings as lower lifeforms to be brutally exploited. That is the ambiguous part, and that is the aspect of Dukat's character that the show is unwilling or unable to deal with credibly until Ron Moore finally gets around to tackling the issue in Waltz.

The episode I tend to pick on is Indiscretion because it drifted the furthest toward outright apology for the ideology behind the occupation. The portrait of Dukat's involvement in the occupation that's presented here isn't ambiguous and complex, it's simple-minded and naive.

Basically, the writers at this stage wanted Dukat to be a more sympathetic character, so they wanted to detach him from the Occupation as much as possible. The problem was that his involvement was too well established earlier in the show for it to be ignored. So they end up with a point of view that amounts to something like: Yes, he was involved, but maybe the occupation really wasn't so bad after all, maybe it was good for Bajor, and maybe he didn't really mean any harm, and he dearly loved one of his Bajoran mistresses, so you see, he's not such a bad guy after all. Err, no. There's simply nothing intellectually or artistically credible about that point of view.

On the other hand, I agree with you that post-Waltz Dukat seems to have been an act of over-compensation on the writers' part for what they had (correctly) begun to perceive as the shortcomings and inadequacies of Dukat's portrayal in the middle seasons. In fact I think I expressed a similar idea in a discussion of this topic at some point not too long ago. It's as if somebody sat down with Ira Behr and pointed out the implications of an episode like Indiscretion, and he panicked a bit, since I don't suppose he really wanted his show to be about how colonialism and the Holocaust are really not so bad, and it's all just a matter of perspective, and men who like to seduce their slaves/victims/underlings truly love them and aren't in it for the power trip, etc. And look! When he sits on a spike and then rubs his ass, that's funny, just like with any other person. Um, yeah... But WTF does that have to do with anything?

So, with that in mind, the issues raised in Waltz had to be raised for the show to retain any credibility on these matters. I do think the writers overreacted, though, since a misstep like Indiscretion doesn't invalidate all the intelligent work DS9 had done on complex issues up to that point, and there was no reason to start repeating over and over again that Dukat is evil, don't you get it? EVIL! (Granted, that is an exaggeration.)

I expect from true art to be provocative and challenging and not afraid to explore the roots of evil, rather than to be offer safe and simple conclusions and to imply that evil is something that has nothing to do with us, something that it's impossible to relate to.

I agree, but while some fans are enamored of Dukat's portrayal in the middle seasons, I don't find it provocative or challenging either. Quite the opposite. The most probing study of Dukat's character is actually Waltz, though this might not have been necessary had the writers done a better job with the character in seasons three and four.

I think Dukat is actually at his best in Necessary Evil and The Maquis, then again from In Purgatory's Shadow to Waltz.

Incidentally, Ron Moore's comments on Dukat tend to sound more reasonable than Behr's - and I think he hits the nail on its head here (http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Dukat):

He chose his words more wisely than Behr, but I think the point he is making is actually quite similar: they both think that the show didn't do a credible job of exploring the implications of Dukat's involvement in the occupation, his unrepenant racism and his fascination with the Bajorans in the middle seasons of the show. For a while, the writers were too ready to accept simplistic notions along the lines of "it's all a matter of perspective" or "brutal dictators are people, too" or whatever, because that was easier than thinking about what Dukat's involvement might really mean for him psychologically, morally, ideologically, etc.

 

[Nightdiamond]

Dukat was a great villian precisely because, at times, he actually seemed to have the potential not to be a villian - he was complicated. He had moments of kindnes, generosity, "humanity," doing the right thing, etc. In season 4, it seemed they were doing a redemption arc for him, so that made it all the more compelling when they steered him back into villian territory with the Dominion alliance. I thought "Waltz" was great but seven 7 and the pagh-wraiths sort of stripped him of his complexity and turned him into a mustache-twirling 1-dimensional villian. I still enjoyed his descent into madness though. I'm not sure how it could be "fixed."

Dukat would have to go down as one of the most complex villains/characters in Trek, if not TV series history.

That voice of his and half charming manner- he can fool you into thinking "he's changed" or even some type of semi hero, but then he does something that reminds you he's always looked out for himself.

 

[DevilEyes]

Take the question of Dukat's family. It's no great revelation that tyrants, or conquistadors, or officers in the SS, or whatever, might have families that they care about, so pointing this out about Dukat doesn't really score many points in the complexity department.

Well that's something that seems obvious, but it seems that different rules apply to fiction, where any attempt to portray a villain as having a family, normal life, whatever, tends to be seen as 'humanizing' the villain - because, I guess, we're either not supposed to think about them as human (yes, I know it's kind of ironic since we're technically talking about aliens here, but you know what I mean). Dehumanizing the enemy is an old tactic, look at Eisenstein's "Alexander Nevsky", where you the Teutonic Knighs look all the scarier because you don't even get to see their faces under the helmets; it's a neat trick to put across an image of an inhuman monster or a machine. You can't go that far in most movies for obvious reasons, but you usually get German soldiers in WW2 movies just shouting "HALT! WOHIN?" and being brutal or getting killed by our heroes. And evil overlords from James Bond movies and similar stuff, who seem as removed from normal life as possible.

I point you again to Behr's interview, where he expressed the idea that having Dukat talk about his children amounts to finding excuses for him. How so?

The issue is how these individuals can simultaneously love their family and treat their fellow sentient beings as lower lifeforms to be brutally exploited. That is the ambiguous part, and that is the aspect of Dukat's character that the show is unwilling or unable to deal with credibly until Ron Moore finally gets around to tackling the issue in Waltz.

I agree that the show didn't do that properly in the middle seasons (though I still think that, while Indiscretion was a bit naive, Return to Grace was a better episode and that it's portrayal of Dukat, while more 'heroic' than usual, isn't that simplistic), If they were worried that Dukat's "human" side was making him likable, they should have explored his crimes earlier in the show, rather than letting them stay mostly off-screen. "Show, don't tell."

He chose his words more wisely than Behr, but I think the point he is making is actually quite similar: they both think that the show didn't do a credible job of exploring the implications of Dukat's involvement in the occupation, his unrepenant racism and his fascination with the Bajorans in the middle seasons of the show. For a while, the writers were too ready to accept simplistic notions along the lines of "it's all a matter of perspective" or "brutal dictators are people, too" or whatever, because that was easier than thinking about what Dukat's involvement might really mean for him him psychologically, morally, ideologically, etc.

I
But they didn't do that at all in Tears of the Prophets & entire season 7. What did the entire Pah-wraiths story arc have to do with the Occupation and Dukat's involvement in it, and how did that speak to the issues of racism and colonialism? Oh look, Dukat is evil, because he went crazy and get possessed by an evil spirit. WTF does that have to do with anything? Not to mention how stupid the storyline is.

 

[flemm]

But they didn't do that at all in Tears of the Prophets & entire season 7. What did the entire Pah-wraiths story arc have to do with the Occupation and Dukat's involvement in it, and how did that speak to the issues of racism and colonialism?

Virtually nothing, though there are moments in Covenant where its unrealized potential is clear. We are in agreement that Dukat's involvement with the Pagh Wraith was not well handled, and that it was overcompensation or some sort of panic reaction. The point I am making is that earlier, more popular portrayals of Dukat were flawed as well, though in less obvious ways.

Moore's thoughts on the subject undoubtedly led to Waltz, which does handle many of these issues in a much more credible manner (albeit in a way that is perhaps a bit overly melodramatic at times).

As for Behr's comments, his thoughts on the subject are a bit jumbled, but what he means (I think we can infer) is that putting a lot of emphasis on how much Dukat dearly loves his family while making excuses for his involvement in the occupation isn't very honest, intellectually speaking. And he's right, it isn't. Leaping from there to EVIL, I tell you, EVIL! was an unnecessary and misguided act of penance, however.

 

[DS9 Gal AZ]

Personally, one of the things I always found jarring about Dukat was how he seemed to love Ziyal to the exclusion of all his other children. He told her "You're all I have, all I care about," right before she died. Which would have been touching ... except he had seven other kids! True, he was estranged from them when he brough Ziyal back to Cardassia in season 4, but I would imagine becoming the new head of the Cardassian government under Dominion rule would've meant they were kissing his ass again, since he was the most powerful man in Cardassia. I think it would have been more poignant, if they said Dukat's family was wiped out by the Klingons or something. All his actions - joining the Dominion, going crazy after Ziyal died - make more sense. And yes, it would also make him more sympathetic, but frankly, I don't think making a villian somewhat sympathetic is really a bad thing. People are complicated; the fact that Dukat had a family and was capable of love and goodness makes his dark side all the more chilling.