When Good Characters Go Bad

[RainKing]

I've watched every episode of TNG, DS9, VOY and ENT at least three times, most of them five or six times. During most rewatches, I'm usually struck by how horrible the actions of a particular (regular) cast member actually are in a few episodes.

I'm wondering what/who people think the worst of the worst is, regarding a regular cast member that was supposed to be a "good guy." People like Dukat obviously don't count.

Not having seen TOS, my vote would have to be for Odo for the episodes Children of Time and Favor the Bold. In one episode he erases the existence of 8,000 people just to save Kira and in the latter he completely disregards Kira, Rom, the station and pretty much the entire Alpha quadrant because he's still coming down off the high from dipping his tendrils in the Great Link.

Has anyone collectively done any worse?

 

[Timewalker]

By saving Edith Keeler from being run over by a truck, McCoy erased a whole timeline. Edith's survival made it possible for Hitler to win WWII, and so the Federation never existed.

Mind you, he was coming off a cordrazine overdose and didn't do it on purpose...

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

By saving Edith Keeler from being run over by a truck, McCoy erased a whole timeline. Edith's survival made it possible for Hitler to win WWII, and so the Federation never existed.

Mind you, he was coming off a cordrazine overdose and didn't do it on purpose...

It could have been solved by just taking her with them in the 24th century though, just like they unwittingly did with Gillian the marine biologist in one of the movies.

 

[Melakon]

By saving Edith Keeler from being run over by a truck, McCoy erased a whole timeline. Edith's survival made it possible for Hitler to win WWII, and so the Federation never existed.

Mind you, he was coming off a cordrazine overdose and didn't do it on purpose...

It could have been solved by just taking her with them in the 24th century though, just like they unwittingly did with Gillian the marine biologist in one of the movies.

There was no indication that it was possible to take someone from the past into the future via the Guardian, however. And Kirk & Company were in the 23rd century.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

By saving Edith Keeler from being run over by a truck, McCoy erased a whole timeline. Edith's survival made it possible for Hitler to win WWII, and so the Federation never existed.

Mind you, he was coming off a cordrazine overdose and didn't do it on purpose...

It could have been solved by just taking her with them in the 24th century though, just like they unwittingly did with Gillian the marine biologist in one of the movies.

No. See this thread for a previous discussion on this.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Archer's decision in "Dear Doctor" was utterly stupid. This man should not be allowed to make decisions like this, he does not have a clue.


*waits for someone to mention Tuvix*

 

[RainKing]

Something I either heard or read when I was much younger always stuck with me - about how people tend to judge others by their actions, but we judge ourselves by our motivations. I could google it, but I'm feeling lazy.

Although I didn't see the episode, it's difficult to judge McCoy too harshly for saving a woman's life, even if it did create a horrible alternate timeline because that was never his intention. Also, if he was truly out of his head, then he isn't even really accountable for being indifferent about the possible consequences.

Janeway, Harry Kim and Chakotay don't have that excuse.

 

[2takesfrakes]

Ensign Ro was handled very badly. Joining the Maquis wasn't completely out of the realm of possibility, but she started out as a very strong character and the quickly deteriorated into one that always seemed to have to find things of interest to do, until the very end.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

I was creeped out by Bashir hitting on his recently catatonic and mentally, socially and emotionally challenged patient. Ick.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

By saving Edith Keeler from being run over by a truck, McCoy erased a whole timeline. Edith's survival made it possible for Hitler to win WWII, and so the Federation never existed.

Mind you, he was coming off a cordrazine overdose and didn't do it on purpose...

It could have been solved by just taking her with them in the 24th century though, just like they unwittingly did with Gillian the marine biologist in one of the movies.

No. See this thread for a previous discussion on this.

Which post contains a refutation of what I said in particular? Not that I doubt it does, but it would help me understand.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

Archer's decision in "Dear Doctor" was utterly stupid. This man should not be allowed to make decisions like this, he does not have a clue.


*waits for someone to mention Tuvix*

I agree, denying medical treatment on such a large scale is criminal. In a real world, Archer would have deserved a Nuremberg like-trial for his crimes. Letting people die by the millions when YOU HAVE a cure for their disease, is comparable to what the Nazis did during the war. Too bad the writer(s) were too stupid to realize that.


Archer: I could save these people by ordering my doctor to give them the cure, even if he doesn't want to, but I won't because I am a moron that doesn't understand a thing about ethics. I could tell this denobulan that he's insane because evolution is by its very nature unpredictable, but I won't because my writer doesn't know the first thing about it.

 

[Melakon]

I was creeped out by Bashir hitting on his recently catatonic and mentally, socially and emotionally challenged patient. Ick.

That was totally unethical of Bashir, and the writers play with it by having Miles try to argue with him about it, with Julian convinced he knows what he's doing. It was perhaps the most damaging thing ever done to the character, and may be a reason DS9 is my least favorite of the series.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

I was creeped out by Bashir hitting on his recently catatonic and mentally, socially and emotionally challenged patient. Ick.

That was totally unethical of Bashir, and the writers play with it by having Miles try to argue with him about it, with Julian convinced he knows what he's doing. It was perhaps the most damaging thing ever done to the character, and may be a reason DS9 is my least favorite of the series.

Yes, it was, but there is something boyish and innocent about Bashir that makes it somehow acceptable. He's totally without malice.

 

[RainKing]

I was creeped out by Bashir hitting on his recently catatonic and mentally, socially and emotionally challenged patient. Ick.

Good one.

How about the holographic Doctor? He got up to all kinds of stuff - posing as various command staff, sticking crew members in stasis chambers, assisting rogue holograms... but all of that was done with mitigating circumstances. The worst of his character always seemed to come down to his vanity.

The very idea that he had been willing to abandon Voyager and leave the ship without a real doctor in order to go on an American Idol singing tour was just messed up.

 

[Melakon]

I was creeped out by Bashir hitting on his recently catatonic and mentally, socially and emotionally challenged patient. Ick.

That was totally unethical of Bashir, and the writers play with it by having Miles try to argue with him about it, with Julian convinced he knows what he's doing. It was perhaps the most damaging thing ever done to the character, and may be a reason DS9 is my least favorite of the series.

Yes, it was, but there is something boyish and innocent about Bashir that makes it somehow acceptable. He's totally without malice.

Except he's a genetically altered human to make him a supergenius (another writers' betrayal of the character). When even average dolts like ourselves know he's violating medical ethics, why can't he see it?

It would have been perhaps more believable in earlier seasons, but once that genetic alteration business came into play, he can't be forgiven for it.

 

[Cyke101]

That was totally unethical of Bashir, and the writers play with it by having Miles try to argue with him about it, with Julian convinced he knows what he's doing. It was perhaps the most damaging thing ever done to the character, and may be a reason DS9 is my least favorite of the series.

Yes, it was, but there is something boyish and innocent about Bashir that makes it somehow acceptable. He's totally without malice.

Except he's a genetically altered human to make him a supergenius (another writers' betrayal of the character). When even average dolts like ourselves know he's violating medical ethics, why can't he see it?

To me, the revelation that he was a genetically altered human damaged the character the most. That means that, up to that point, all his foibles and grand mistakes were made rather nonsensically, and all his accomplishments trivialized.

 

[Melakon]

The writers basically destroyed Bashir as a character, and poor Siddig didn't even find out about it until he read the script.

 

[T'Girl]

It could have been solved by just taking her with them in the 24th century though ...

There was no indication that it was possible to take someone from the past into the future via the Guardian, however. And Kirk & Company were in the 23rd century.

Or Kirk could have stayed in the past with Keeler and prevented her from causing a peace movement. Just moving with her to another city might have been enough.

I could tell this denobulan that he's insane because evolution is by its very nature unpredictable ...

Except that it isn't in the Trek universe.

Intelligence in some species is preprogrammed to be a end result. If Phlox knew this, and knew what to look for (things like genetic markers perhaps) then he could have been able to forecast a species rise to greater intelligence centuries before it happened.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

It could have been solved by just taking her with them in the 24th century though, just like they unwittingly did with Gillian the marine biologist in one of the movies.

No. See this thread for a previous discussion on this.

Which post contains a refutation of what I said in particular? Not that I doubt it does, but it would help me understand.

It's not a long thread. The basic idea is that the Guardian will return Kirk, Spock, and McCoy only if the future has been restored, and the condition for restoring the future is that Edith must die in the way reported in the newspaper scanned by Spock's tricorder before Kirk and Spock go back in time. There's no alternative way to restore history. There has to be a body that people of the 1930s will recognize as Edith's from a traffic accident, and there have to be witnesses to that accident, so that the newspaper story can get written to match what was scanned by Spock's tricorder. That means that there's no alternative.

 

[Nightdiamond]

In some ways I'm not bothered the Dr. Flox's decision because the race that was in danger of dying out was heavily exploiting the other race.

On the other hand, he was spouting some serious pseudo science by saying that the Valakians was meant to die out-- that appears to be a judgment, not a scientific analysis of the situation.

After revealing he knows the cure, but won't share it, that could be interpreted as a form of malpractice.


Captain Sisko ordering a biological weapon fired on the planet the Maquis colony is on.-- But being 'the bad guy' is exactly what Sisko wanted Eddington to think he was, in order to catch him---and his performance is so shocking and good you just can't fault Sisko with that.



Captain Picard ordering- or strongly pressuring Riker to not use his newly given Q power to bring back to life, a little girl who had been crush to death.

In some ways, it could be interpreted as cold blooded, just to prove a point. Self righteousness taken a step too far?