A Look at Odo

[MerelyAFan]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VF_SqnbWXok

I think Odo was the last time Trek really successfully executed the outsider commenting on humanity character. Neelix was far too happy go lucky and inane to offer any interesting impressions and even Seven of Nine fell into her socialization arc to really bring anything deep in commentary. Phlox and T'Pol weren't much better, with the former never feeling remotely insightful and the latter too inconsistently written.

Odo though, while certainly being influenced by those around him, still felt like someone who offered nuanced views on the nature of the Federation/Starfleet and along with (ironically given their conflicts) Quark felt like characters whose contrasting values informed them without entirely defining them.

[Taurian Patriot]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VF_SqnbWXok

I think Odo was the last time Trek really successfully executed the outsider commenting on humanity character. Neelix was far too happy go lucky and inane to offer any interesting impressions and even Seven of Nine fell into her socialization arc to really bring anything deep in commentary. Phlox and T'Pol weren't much better, with the former never feeling remotely insightful and the latter too inconsistently written.

Thinking on it, one of the things that seemed to make DS9 interesting was that the whole show was about that outside perspective. Quark stepped into the role frequently along with Odo, Garak and Kira got some shots in once in a while, and even Sisko starts feeling like an outsider after the first few seasons. The fact that all of them were willing and able to dunk on humanity's presumptions was kind of refreshing.

Just the other day I was watching "Crossfire" - the episode where Kira falls in love with Shakaar - and Auberjonois's ability to express himself wordlessly through a face full of putty makeup was fantastic. He's just sitting there listening to her talk, and through his eyes you can watch his heart breaking.

[MerelyAFan]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VF_SqnbWXok

I think Odo was the last time Trek really successfully executed the outsider commenting on humanity character. Neelix was far too happy go lucky and inane to offer any interesting impressions and even Seven of Nine fell into her socialization arc to really bring anything deep in commentary. Phlox and T'Pol weren't much better, with the former never feeling remotely insightful and the latter too inconsistently written.

Thinking on it, one of the things that seemed to make DS9 interesting was that the whole show was about that outside perspective. Quark stepped into the role frequently along with Odo, Garak and Kira got some shots in once in a while, and even Sisko starts feeling like one after the first few seasons. The fact that all of them were willing and able to dunk on humanity's presumptions was kind of refreshing.

Just the other day I was watching "Crossfire" - the episode where Kira falls in love with Shakaar - and Auberjonois's ability to express himself wordlessly through a face full of putty makeup was fantastic. He's just sitting there listening to her talk, and through his eyes you can watch his heart breaking.

It was his ability to sell those emotional depths in little moments that might have entirely created the eventual Odo/Kira romance way back in season 2. His moment of subtle sadness at hearing her say she's in love with Bariel was not in the script for the Collaborator, and even if it was director Cliff Bole's idea, it entirely works because of Auberjonois' expressing and immediately hiding Odo's pain.

[clearspira]

The thing about Odo that always got me (and his race in general) was that he felt sexual attraction to Kira. I find it hard to believe that such a creature would have such a concept. He may have a personality and has taken male form, but he is still a puddle of goo. This would be like a giraffe finding Kira sexy.

And on that note, why is it only women he finds attractive and no one else? He can choose his genitals. How did he form a gender in the first place? And to go back to my giraffe example... He is a creature that can become any animal. Is it not just as likely that a puddle of goo would find ALL sex with ALL creatures equal? And before anyone says it, no, i am not trying to write a weird porno. I actually got the idea off the Greek gods - Poseidon spent half his life as a horse banging other animals. And why not? He's a god and thus not bound by our concepts. Odo is goo, therefore not bound by our concepts either.

"To become a thing is to know a thing". Odo knows how to be a heterosexual human/Bajoran man - and that's about it. His powers are wasted on him imo.

[Nightbeat74]

you know i can see some dissident vorta might come see odo as the GOD of justice.The one who went against all other GODS and the dominion because he judged them as evil. it is fittingly ironic for odo.

[Orel]

The thing about Odo that always got me (and his race in general) was that he felt sexual attraction to Kira. I find it hard to believe that such a creature would have such a concept. He may have a personality and has taken male form, but he is still a puddle of goo. This would be like a giraffe finding Kira sexy.

And on that note, why is it only women he finds attractive and no one else? He can choose his genitals. How did he form a gender in the first place?

I think a lot of it has to do with the Bajoran scientist who studied him. Since the overwhelming majority of his early interaction with humanoids was with that one fellow, and since we do see that other Changelings, when isolated from the Link when they first become conscious, have a tendency to mirror those around them (that one changeling Odo picked up and adopted), it is likely that Odo presented as male in imitation of the scientist who, for all Odo's resentment of him, was a guiding figure. Or out of habit--consider that Odo was only conscious for, what, 20 years before the end of DS9? For 7 of those, he lived in a laboratory. If his first humanoid presentation is modeled on that Bajoran scientist, it's entirely possible that he just "got comfortable" in that shape. It might be something analogous to neural plasticity in humans and the oft-stated idea that children have much easier times learning multiple languages than adults.

Which might actually explain a lot of Odo--his difficulty imitating faces resulting from a limited range of faces to imitate, for example. Odo is akin to a feral human child--lacking the right stimuli at the right developmental times, he's always going to be at least a little hampered compared to the others.

[Taurian Patriot]

you know i can see some dissident vorta might come see odo as the GOD of justice.The one who went against all other GODS and the dominion because he judged them as evil. it is fittingly ironic for odo.

Something like that happens in season 7's "Treachery, Faith, and the Great River." A Weyoun clone turns out to be "defective" and tries to escape the Dominion with valuable information, surrendering himself over to Odo with information that could end the war. He believes Odo to be the best of the Founders and practically begs him to take over the Dominion and reform it.

One of my favorite episodes just because it highlights the contrast between the Founders who demand respect and Odo who earns it.

[clearspira]

The thing about Odo that always got me (and his race in general) was that he felt sexual attraction to Kira. I find it hard to believe that such a creature would have such a concept. He may have a personality and has taken male form, but he is still a puddle of goo. This would be like a giraffe finding Kira sexy.

And on that note, why is it only women he finds attractive and no one else? He can choose his genitals. How did he form a gender in the first place?

I think a lot of it has to do with the Bajoran scientist who studied him. Since the overwhelming majority of his early interaction with humanoids was with that one fellow, and since we do see that other Changelings, when isolated from the Link when they first become conscious, have a tendency to mirror those around them (that one changeling Odo picked up and adopted), it is likely that Odo presented as male in imitation of the scientist who, for all Odo's resentment of him, was a guiding figure. Or out of habit--consider that Odo was only conscious for, what, 20 years before the end of DS9? For 7 of those, he lived in a laboratory. If his first humanoid presentation is modeled on that Bajoran scientist, it's entirely possible that he just "got comfortable" in that shape. It might be something analogous to neural plasticity in humans and the oft-stated idea that children have much easier times learning multiple languages than adults.

Which might actually explain a lot of Odo--his difficulty imitating faces resulting from a limited range of faces to imitate, for example. Odo is akin to a feral human child--lacking the right stimuli at the right developmental times, he's always going to be at least a little hampered compared to the others.

Good point. Lars was far more wide-ranging than Odo.

I wonder if Odo's inability to mimic faces is story balancing - a bit like why Troi cannot read minds properly. You could end a lot of stories in five minutes if Odo could just become anybody.

[TGLS]

With regard to Changeling conception of gender and such, I've had a silly idea. The Founders are established as masters of genetic engineering, and have existed for an absurdly long time (apparently 2k-10k years old). Is it not possible that the Founders engineered themselves into shapeshifters thousands and thousands of years ago, which is why they still seem comfortable as humanoids and have a conception of gender?

[Mickey_Rat15]

The thing about Odo that always got me (and his race in general) was that he felt sexual attraction to Kira. I find it hard to believe that such a creature would have such a concept. He may have a personality and has taken male form, but he is still a puddle of goo. This would be like a giraffe finding Kira sexy.

And on that note, why is it only women he finds attractive and no one else? He can choose his genitals. How did he form a gender in the first place? And to go back to my giraffe example... He is a creature that can become any animal. Is it not just as likely that a puddle of goo would find ALL sex with ALL creatures equal? And before anyone says it, no, i am not trying to write a weird porno. I actually got the idea off the Greek gods - Poseidon spent half his life as a horse banging other animals. And why not? He's a god and thus not bound by our concepts. Odo is goo, therefore not bound by our concepts either.

"To become a thing is to know a thing". Odo knows how to be a heterosexual human/Bajoran man - and that's about it. His powers are wasted on him imo.

More like a slime mold finding a human female attractive. A giraffe is at least a mammalian species with two sexes and a placental reproductive strategy. The Changelings reproduction would seem to be so different from most humanoids that there should not be any common ground to base sexual attraction on. On the other hand, there was some expostion that suggested they had been humanoids at one time, so perhaps some left over instinct from when they were solids? The Changelings were perhaps a post-Instrumentalilty civilization (from the original Evangelion).