Jadzia Dax from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Jadzia Dax is my favorite incarnation of Dax. Jadzia is a joined Trill, which means she has a living sentient worm in her belly that shares its memories and experiences and that of its previous hosts with the humanoid body.
This makes Jadzia both a young scientist and a wise woman at the same time. She is the newly minted Chief Science Officer of Deep Space Nine, over 300 years old, and has lived 7 lifetimes. Jadzia loves adventure, hanging out with her friends, and loves strongly and deeply (friends and lovers). She has perhaps the warmest personality of the entire main crew.
I wasn’t looking to fall in love. I was perfectly happy by myself. I had friends, a career, adventure. Then one day, this Klingon with a bad attitude walked into my life – and the next thing I know, I’m getting married! After 356 years and seven lifetimes… I still lead with my heart. — Jadzia Dax
While Jadzia marries and plans to have children, you never get the sense that she settles down. She still wants to go find a new star or repay oaths to old friends. Jadzia drags everyone on vacation to Risa, the pleasure planet, and stays up all night gambling and playing dom-jot at Quark’s. She tends to be the woman in the boys’ club of space and exploration, except that this is Star Trek, so she rarely runs into acceptance problems.
Jadzia is a character who leads with her heart and then her mind. Except of course, when she’s solving a work-related problem with science. Jadzia’s not afraid of breaking rules either. She almost loses her ability to pass on her Trill when she falls in love with Lenara Kahn, her former wife when they were both different people.
Jadzia adds a sense of spunk and fun to a show that sometimes was bogged down with themes of war, occupation, and religion. This isn’t to say that she doesn’t have a serious side or can’t make you cry. Jadzia’s unconventional personality made her a wonderful character to bounce off the other sometimes too serious characters, such as her best friend Benjamin Sisko and her husband Worf.
Get to know and love Jadzia Dax, buy Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: The Complete Series
To this day, I cannot fathom why the writing staff felt the need to kill off Jadzia. Fair enough, negotiations between Terry Farrell and Paramount broke down (isn’t that the rumour?) but killing off one of the strongest female characters in modern sci-fi? In such a crappy way, too? *shakes head* And Ezri wasn’t anywhere near as entertaining or well-written.
Anyway, ranting aside, I fell in love with Jadzia. She was smart, funny, wise, beautiful, but most of all, she was strong. The relationship between her and Sisko (and later, Worf) is why I kept watching DS9, even in its shakier moments (Move Along Home, I’m looking at you).
Oh, it was pretty clear that Farrell left to be on Becker. But I’ll never understand the bitter “let’s kill off the actor that we’re kind of pissed at.” Yes, she was one of the strongest female characters in sci-if, and her death was so boring. I was actually glad when Worf went off the deep end to give her a proper funeral because at least he got it.
I loved how Jadzia was all those things. So many times writers limit characters to one or another and don’t see how a woman character can be more, but with Jadzia, it all worked so beautifully.
I think Jadzia’s death was the point at which I looked at the franchise and thought, ‘really?’. Season 7 just wasn’t the same without her. And you’re absolutely right about her character being an example of a well-written woman character. And Worf’s getting her into Sto’vo’kor was really touching.
I love Jadzia and I agree with everything you said. She was my favorite character in the series for so many reasons: she was so passionate, strong, beautiful inside and out, she could look beyond a person’s appearance and cultural differences, she leads with her heart, she could be friend and play tongo with the Ferengis and fight with the Klingons. In my opinion she represents Star Trek’s basic ideals: to look beyond prejudices and accept the others for what they are even if you don’t agree with them. This is why I didn’t enjoy the final season so much. I believe the show lost a core character. Her relations with Sisko, Worf, Quark, Kira and others defined so many of the aspects of the show.
ps: excuse me if my English don’t make sense sometimes, it’s not my mother language.
@Alexandra — Thank you. Yes, I loved her so much for all those reasons too. You are very right in that she was Star Trek’s basic ideals realized in a person. Which made her being a scientist that much more perfect.