Oh, and interesting old shippy thread.
TBH... I am not sure that I would call anyone her "match made in Celestial Temple". :/ There are problems or deficiencies in each pairing and I didn't really get the "wow, they are so perfect for each other" vibe with any of her pairings on the show. Nevertheless, Kira and Bareil seemed the most suited to each other and I liked their relationship at the time, but on rewatching DS9... I see that it would probably have become a bit boring if he hadn't died. He did not have her spunk... (Maybe this shows how much I've changed, I had a crush on Bareil the first time I watched DS9, now I like him but not that much... But I also used to be in love with a "strong silent" type back in high school, and now I am happy that we never actually ended up together because I realize that he would have probably started to bore me very soon, and the present me would probably not even be that interested in someone like him.)
Kira and Odo, while I'm not sure if they were that well matched (and I am not referring to the ages of the actors at all), was the deepest and most interesting relationship she has had, due to their basic biological differences combined with the strength of their frienship/connection.
She and Tom Riker had chemistry, but it was too short to judge whether they would have worked in the long run. I've never really thought about it before, but they might have been interesting together, being too damaged people. I really felt for him in "Second Chances", he was more likeable than Will Riker, maybe because it was easy to feel sorry for him.
The relationship with Shakaar was just dull, safe and they lacked chemistry. Maybe because the show's writers were never really invested in it and only used it to drive Odo crazy. I don't regard Bashir or O'Brien as serious candidates.
Oh, and by the way, I hope no-one votes for Dukat as Kira's perfect match. The mere thought of her having feelings for him is just disturbing.
You say it like it's a bad thing.
I wouldn't have wanted to see a Kira/Dukat hookup not because it would be disturbing - I
love disturbing - but because a romance would never happen as long as both characters stayed in character. I just wouldn't buy it.
But I can see it in an alternate universe kind of story... an AU "good Dukat" could actually be Kira's perfect match (not so sure about The Intendant and canon Dukat - I suspect they would only be a "perfect match" in a "Dangerous Liasons" kind of way, and would probably end up killing each other
).
I'm not a fan of the Odo/Kira relationship, but it was never about the age of the actors. We don't know how old Odo is chronologically, but in the 7th season episode "Chimera", I'm pretty sure he said he had been in humanoid form for about 30 years or so. This puts the characters at a similar age, even if the actors aren't.
I agree with PKTrekGirl about why Odo/Kira shouldn't work. It's not in character for Kira to forgive Odo's collaboration with the Dominion, or his collaboration with the Cardassians during the occupation, for that matter. Kira has consistently had no tolerance for collaborators. She was prepared to break off her relationship with Bareil when she thought he collaborated with the Cardassians, and she went back in time and almost killed her own mother for being Dukat's mistress.
From a drama standpoint, I also prefered it when Odo's love for Kira was unrequited. It made for some great angst.
re: Odo's status during the Cardassian occupation fo Bajor: why is Kira being romantically involved with "collaborator" Odo any less plausible than Kira trusting him and being his closest friend for years?
We've known from day one that she doesn't view his actions during the occupation in the same harsh light as you do (and apparently, neither did most other Bajorans). Kira apparently believed that he was fair and honest and working for justice, not for Cardassians. If she had not, she would not have been his friend in the first place. And this seems to have been the opinions of most other Bajorans (with exceptions such as the lynch crowd guys in "A Man Alone", but that never happened again). Maybe the fact that he is not Bajoran played a big part in this, as well.
I would not have prefered it to have Odo's love for Kira unrequited, especially nto when she didn't even know about it. It made for some great angst for Odo, but it did nothign and said
nothing about Kira's character. She was just an unwitting object of his love. So it was good to have her finally know, whether she decided she wanted him or didn't want him.
^ Well, if you like it, who cares what Nana Visitor thought? But yeah...she didn't really like it much at all.
I'm not sure Rene is much on record about it...but Nana was not in favor of it.
That's not entirely true. She was against it at first - because, as she said, she prefered to think that a woman and a man can be just friends - and didn't like "His Way". But eventually she changed her mind, because she liked the way the relationship was dealt with in season 7, and the fact that they did not give them a cheesy happy ending. She didn't want them to be the happy couple of the station. She said she came to see it as a mature relationship born out of friendship, and after all, she had an experience of that kind (with Siddig - they were close friends for a couple of years before getting romantically involved).
I seem to recall Rene saying something like, "It was reasonably well-written and all, but neither Nana nor myself were that crazy about it." So take that for whatever it's worth.
But what did he say that about? About the relationship in general, or just about "His Way"? I've read a couple of his interviews where he talked about it, and I didn't get the impression that he was opposed to the relationship. I remember he also said that it often felt that teh writers "did everything to write away from it".
I might look for those interviews with Nana and Rene later.
edit: I forgot to comment about Sisko. Theoretically he could be a good match for her, but they just showed no romantic/sexual interest in each other and did not have that kind of chemistry. Sometimes people just don't feel that way about each other. And when it's not there, it's just not there.
I found it refreshing that a man and a woman on a TV show could have a strictly professional and friendly relationship without anything else. Building up some sort of sexual tension between them would've been too predictable.
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