Jake Sisko - Completely Unlikeable

[STEPhon IT]

starfleet.com has a birth year estimate for Ezri that would make her 21 during season 7. I think that makes her too young. Usually a counseling program today is a 3-year graduate program following a 4-year bachelor's degree. That would have made her only 14 entering college! It has happened, but Ezri doesn't strike me as the amazing prodigy type. Even allowing for a degree to be entered early and waiving the final year of her training, I'd still say she's more like 23 or 24 during season 7. Compared to Jake, there's a huge difference in maturity between 20 and living in the same station with Dad vs. 23 and completed college and mostly completed a graduate program and living away from home for 5 to 6 years.

I didn't like the Ezri-Bashir pairing either. Bashir would have been quite a bit older. Memory Alpha estimates he was 35 in season 7. My estimate agrees: 4 years undergrad, 4 years med school and 3 years residency, if he started at 17 because he was gifted he was 28 during season 1, or 35 during season 7. He's really robbing the cradle. I suppose it's better than Serena, but that's a low bar. The chemistry seemed a bit forced too. Ezri seems patronizing about the games, I mean models, he makes and the combat-simulation holosuite programs. I'd give it about 6 months before she called it off, less if they were no longer on the same station. But I can see a really great scene of Bashir visiting O'Brien on Earth and them getting drunk together while Bashir unloaded about how sad it was.

The age difference in relationship was not what I was referring to, I believe if your an adult LEGALLY you can find love at any age in the adult spectrum. During the 7th season of DS9 war times, Ezri had stories dealing with older people most of her run like with Sisko and his mother journey, Garak suffering from a disorder, having a Silence of the Lambs moment with her older self, Worf and her confliction being Dax and marriage, I thought the crew were too old for her to have some common ground with. I like the idea of Jake being with her and having stories with her, it sure would've made Jake interesting in that season where he wasn't around much. Also, I love seeing interracial relationships and they're no different than any other relationship.

 

[DonIago]

I can't really imagine Ezri Dax (much less Papa Sisko) being okay with Ezri dating Jake though.

 

[kkt]

The age difference in relationship was not what I was referring to, I believe if your an adult LEGALLY you can find love at any age in the adult spectrum. During the 7th season of DS9 war times, Ezri had stories dealing with older people most of her run like with Sisko and his mother journey, Garak suffering from a disorder, having a Silence of the Lambs moment with her older self, Worf and her confliction being Dax and marriage, I thought the crew were too old for her to have some common ground with. I like the idea of Jake being with her and having stories with her, it sure would've made Jake interesting in that season where he wasn't around much. Also, I love seeing interracial relationships and they're no different than any other relationship.

Just because it's legal doesn't make it a good idea. Relationships are more likely to work if they're at approximately the same stage of life.

 

[Gelnon]

Post-season 3, I found Jake Sisko outstandingly annoying and rather unlikeable as a human being. To the point that it almost defies belief that Captain Sisko, caring as he was, wouldn't have disowned him as a son. (Ok, that's hyperbole.)

Some characters are meant to be unlikeable, of course. But I don't the writers intended Jake to be such a twerp. I hate to say this too, but he couldn't have been so unlikeable without Cirroc Lofton being a bona fide terrible actor too.

I love DS9. Have watched the whole series probably 5 times.

Anyone else despise Jake Sisko? :-)

SPIN

I quite liked him, he wasn't as annoying as Wesley Crusher for staters

 

[Oddish]

I didn't find it objectionable, and not all romances have to be amazing. Besides, if you go by the novelverse, it doesn't ultimately work out anyhow.

I didn't find it objectionable either... I didn't find it anything at all. It was the romantic equivalent of a rice cake: flavorless and unsatisfying.

 

[Richard S. Ta]

Jake's alright by me. Better than Wesley and I don't even mind Wesley.

 

[amp]

In 1999, Nicole de Boer looked young for her age (and still does today). But she still looked a lot older than Cirroc Lofton did. Pairing them just wouldn't have looked right onscreen.

 

[Oddish]

In 1999, Nicole de Boer looked young for her age (and still does today). But she still looked a lot older than Cirroc Lofton did. Pairing them just wouldn't have looked right onscreen.

Fair enough. If there wasn't a hint of controversy about the pairing, it would be as meh as E/B.

I am personally of the opinion that even introducing Ezri at all was a mistake. It gave us a new character with very little time to get to know her (though they tried mightily), it cheapened Jadzia's death by effectively bringing her back a la Superman, and it made the bizarre decision to give us a counselor who was more neurotic than her patients.

Though YouTuber Steve Shives and I are at odds both religiously and politically, we agree about most things Trek... he mentioned that Ezri is one of the worst examples of a character with wasted potential, one of DS9's very few examples. He's right.

Some might argue that Jake is another, but honestly, since Jake was a writer rather than Starfleet personnel, involving him might have been difficult. And he certainly served his purpose in fleshing out Sisko's character... thanks in part to Jake, Ben Sisko was one of the most truly dynamic and multifaceted characters in Trek. The Sisko we see in "What you Leave Behind" is very different from the one we are introduced to in "Emissary".

 

[Bad Thoughts]

De Boer and Lofton may have been ten years apart, but from all the background information from the producers, Ezri Tiegen was supposed to be "fresh out of the Academy." If we call that within a year of graduation, and considering how young kids can enter Starfleet, Ezri could have been as young as 21 years old.

However, I think that Ezri Dax matured too fast in her one season. In the first few episodes, she feels young. By the start of the arc, she seems a lot older, closer to Jadzia in age. Had they stuck with the inital age, I think that a relationship with Jake could have made sense.

 

[kkt]

I quite liked him, he wasn't as annoying as Wesley Crusher for staters

No one is as annoying as Wesley Crusher

 

[kkt]

De Boer and Lofton may have been ten years apart, but from all the background information from the producers, Ezri Tiegen was supposed to be "fresh out of the Academy." If we call that within a year of graduation, and considering how young kids can enter Starfleet, Ezri could have been as young as 21 years old.

However, I think that Ezri Dax matured too fast in her one season. In the first few episodes, she feels young. By the start of the arc, she seems a lot older, closer to Jadzia in age. Had they stuck with the inital age, I think that a relationship with Jake could have made sense.

Her confusion early in season 7 was due to being freshly joined with no preparation, plus still mourning being with Worf.

Counseling is pretty much always a graduate program, not an undergrad program. I don't really see that changing. Counselors need some life experience in order to be useful to their patients.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Counselors need some life experience in order to be useful to their patients.

Which really doesn't explain Ezri in her first few episodes, does it? She is clearly someone without experience.

If she needed a graduate program, that still only adds one or two years to her degree (probably only one if integrated).

 

[Oddish]

No one is as annoying as Wesley Crusher

Wes was only annoying because of the role he played (15-year-old kid saves the ship. Again) -- DS9 learned a lesson from him, and made Jake a real kid instead of a prodigy.

 

[kkt]

The writers wrote Wesley to be annoying. Instead of writing a real kid, a little unsure of himself and unsure how to relate to others, they wrote him to be a prodigy. I'm known a few prodigies, and their genius in academics absolutely did not help them relate to their peers better.

 

[dupersuper]

No one is as annoying as Wesley Crusher

Neelix accepts your challenge.

 

[Captain Zog]

So I liked him. It would've been easy to write the character as a strong, confident, mini-Sisko ready to walk in Dad's Starfleet Command footsteps.

Instead, he's complex. He makes mistakes. He's smart, and yes -- fairly dramatic and annoying, but he's a real character. And he commands his father's love and respect regardless of his path, which makes the Sisko character better, as a result.

So do I like Jake Sisko? Not particularly. Do I like his character and place in the show? His character development? Definitely.

Well said. It's a credit to the writers that they chose not to make Jake a younger version of Ben Sisko. He has no interest in joining Starfleet and often goes against his father's wishes. It's a believable relationship. He's a flawed character and maybe not an especially likeable one, but he's real.

 

[Oddish]

Here's a thought... put Wesley, Neelix, Jar Jar Binks, and C3PO in a small room full of large blunt objects, then let them battle it out Hunger Games style. The survivor gets a one way trip to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

 

[dupersuper]

Here's a thought... put Wesley, Neelix, Jar Jar Binks, and C3PO in a small room full of large blunt objects, then let them battle it out Hunger Games style. The survivor gets a one way trip to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

...I like C-3PO...

 

[DonIago]

I liked Neelix when he wasn't being used for comic relief. As supporting evidence, I submit "Jetrel" and "Fair Trade".

I liked Wesley in "The Game" and understood him in "First Duty" even if I didn't necessarily support his decisions. He was decent enough in "Parallels" as well. He really followed a bell curve for me, where his initial appearances and final appearance I found terrible, but the rest weren't so bad.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Neelix accepts your challenge.

Here's a thought... put Wesley, Neelix, Jar Jar Binks, and C3PO in a small room full of large blunt objects, then let them battle it out Hunger Games style. The survivor gets a one way trip to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

...I like C-3PO...

Among all of them, Neelix earned his traits from experiences and hard work.

Neelix wins.