I can’t stop thinking about Gaia Odo.
discussion of DS9 and transgender subtext
TLDR: As a trans man I related to Odo building himself out of the men around him, and that's pretty cool!
The weird thing about DS9 is that, although the writers had no such intention, it's surprisingly good at offering LGBT+ rep. As a trans man, I found a lot of Jadzia and Odo moments to actually be incredible rep without any of the mishandling you might see a cis writer commit had they included this rep intentionally. Whether it be Jadzia correcting people who misgender her, or Odo mimicking the men around him, the amount of trans subtext in the show almost felt intentional at times. I think that's what made me connect with Odo so quickly. In the episode where we first meet Dr. Mora, it's made visually obvious to us as viewers that Odo copied Mora's hair style. I knew this was because he was a changeling and because of Mora's role in Odo's early life, but as a trans man it felt significant. He reminded me of the ways I've built myself out of the men around me over the years -- the way I've seen a man on the street's walk and tried to mimick it, or the way I've tried to mimick the wsy a man I admire dresses, or maybe the way he carries himself -- it was an episode that affirmed for me that Odo had undergone these experiences and knew what it was like. In a later episode, we see a younger Odo and younger Kira interacting on the station prior to the federation take over. He starts the conversation with her in a way he has seen other men do, and mistakenly makes her believe he is flirting with her. He's directly mimicking the mannerisms of men he's observed, which reasserted this feeling of transness for me.
A lot of people wish Odo had been romantically involved with Quark, or simply that he hadn't been involved with Kira at all, but leave his potential existence as a queer person at this. In fact, most of why I'm choosing to write this is because I've only ever seen people discuss Jadzia's transgender subtext.
It could be argued that Odo is poor representation because his transness, or lack thereof, is linked to his race. As a changeling he technically has no assigned gender -- if the star trek writers had declared all changelings as trans/enby rep I think many of us would be annoyed because of the commonness of claiming aliens, monsters, and the like as enby rep rather than providing human nonbinary characters. This being said, none of the other changelings seem to cling to gender like Odo does. He identifies as a man constantly in the show despite his race not seeming to have a gender binary. In this sense, I honestly don't think it would he unreasonable to argue him as canonically trans, but maybe that's taking it too far. The way he clings to gender could also be argued as just a piece of him clinging to solids' cultures. Regardless, as a trans man I connected with Odo very strongly throughout the series, and wanted to share a bit of my perspective because I've yet to see anyone else discuss this.
Another major change in the series [brought on by the third season] was the decision tor reveal the secret of Odo’s past. While this, too, seemed to address the viewers’ desires (a large percentage of the more vocal fans stated that Odo was the DS9 character they wanted to learn more about), it was, again, a plot twist that had been in the making for some time. […] “We joked around all second season about the Founders being Odo’s people,” says Behr, “but we never thought they’d go for it in a million years. And then we were talking to Michael [Piller] one day, and Michael said, ‘I have this crazy idea and you’re going to think I’m nuts, but what if the Founders were Odo’s people?’ We just cracked up, and Michael said, ‘What’s so funny?’” Informed that they’d had the same idea for several months, Piller responded with some colorful references to their immediate lineage, then concluded that great minds obviously think alike. Piller and Behr took the concept to Berman, who agreed that it was a great idea. And then they called Rene Auberjonois and invited him to lunch. When an actor is invited to lunch by his producers, it can mean any number of things, from the very positive to the very negative. In this case, the discussion was a very positive one, although there were some troubling aspects to it for Auberjonois, at least initially. “Up until that point,” says Auberjonois, “I’d always joked that the day we found out where Odo is from is the day that they will be writing me out of the show. Because that was always the most interesting aspect of Odo’s character, that search for who he was. So Michael Piller and Ira Behr called me before the third season started, and we got together, and the first thing they did was to reassure me that they had no intention of writing me out of the show. But I still had some concerns, because I thought if we solved that mystery about Odo’s character, I didn’t know where we’d go with him. “But it quickly became clear to me that these writers are very shrewd and very clever,” Auberjonois admits, “because what they did was to make the character more complex. This just added to Odo’s angst and to his depth, and it made him more challenging and interesting to play. And then they added into the mix his feelings about Kira. And the fact that he ultimately comes to understand that he can’t go back to his people, that he can’t go home again. They opened up more avenues for me to travel as an actor.”
— Terry J. Erdmann, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion
Dark circles duo. Armin Shimerman as Quark and René Auberjonois as Odo.
“Some species burn their dead, others pack them in blocks of ice. Some even surround themselves with the company of family corpses. But the Ferengi ritual of chopping up their loved ones and selling them? I find that irresistible.”
Odo’s voice!
I’m starting to watch DS9 from the beginning and always watched it in german. But today I heard Odo’s voice in english and boy I need to watch that in english immediately!! That voice!!!!! (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻
What We Left Behind ds9 documentary and bonus content stream 01/01/20
I will be hosting a stream (on mycircle.tv) for the ds9 2019 documentary What We Left Behind along with bonus features from the DVD on Wednesday, January 1st at 1pm central time (-6). A link will be posted on this blog around then, and any and all are welcome to come watch and chat. Hope to see you there!
Sometimes, with Betazoid babies, you can actually sense their thoughts. Such contentment.
