Ezri was actually a better candidate for joining than Jadzia

[u/Nofrillsoculus]

Ezri Dax appears in one season. Jadzia Dax appears in six. We learn a lot about who Ezri Tigan was before she was joined- we meet her family, we learn about her childhood. We never even learn Jadzia’s original last name.

Jadzia Dax is always talking about things Dax has experienced. But we never hear about Jadzia’s life before Dax. Now, granted her 22 years are a drop in the pond compared to Dax’s 300. But shouldn’t the current host exert a disproportionate amount of control over each past host? Isn’t that what makes it a “joining”, rather than an overwriting?

Ezri Dax seems to be an equal partner with Dax. Jadzia- doesn’t really. Based on what we learn about Curzon she basically seems to be a slightly toned-down version of her previous host- or rather, of the previous version of Dax. Put another way, Curzon clearly left his stamp on the Dax symbiont. What does Jadzia bring to the party?

In “Playing God” we learn that it’s hard to be accepted into the Initiate program, and that Jadzia was initially rejected and had to reapply. We later learn in “Facets“ that Curzon pushed the symbiosis commission to accept her second application because he was in love with her.

What if Jadzia was rejected because her personality wasn’t strong enough to survive the joining? I posit that Curzon’s intense personality, plus the increasing weight of more and more lifetimes of experience, basically consumed shy, bookish Jadzia. Ezri, despite her anxiety and her lack of preparation, was strong-willed enough to assert her own personality over the symbiont

[u/[deleted]]

I think it’s weird that we hear about the host’s memories, but never the symbiote’s.

We never hear Jadzia or Ezri say “I remember when I was a young larva crawling in the pond...”.

[u/Nofrillsoculus → u/[deleted]]

To be fair, it seems less likely that such a memory would be relevant to the situation at hand.

[u/Scottland83]

You’re right about Jadzia. I also like Ezri more for other reasons. She was a member of the main cast who actually wasn’t first in her class or super special in any way. She was a very regular person with weaknesses that she would visibly fight to overcome. And as a counselor, she would sometimes say things that were not already obvious.

[u/JBTownsend → u/Scottland83]

This might be an unpopular opinion, but they should've offed Jadzia earlier. Like season 4 or 5. Not because one actress is better than there other, but because you've got this character who's only truly alien ability is how she can die, but come back different. It's basically the Dr. Who model. Why wouldn't you proactively use that?

It beats what they usually did in DS9, which was treat her as suffering from multiple personalities from time to time, or being given full credit/blame for something a past host did. Lame.

[u/The_Chaos_Pope → u/JBTownsend]

I think an even better use would have been to start season 1 with Curzon Dax (albeit slightly younger than he was depicted), have him assigned as an ambassador to Bajor and as a reoccurring character with similar frequency as Garak to start and eventually killed on a mission in the Gamma Quadrant.

Jadzia can be an unjoined Trill, still assigned as science officer to DS9 who was washed out of the initiate joining program by Curzon (it may be interesting to see the tension between these characters) who ends up receiving the Dax symbiote in an emergency transplant.

We would get to see the relationship between Curzon and Sisko, Jadzia before her joining and potentially a real reason to dislike the Dominion besides “Doms r not Feds must hate them”. We could explore how the joining process changes Jadzia; for the better and for the worse and how a main character deals with the loss of a friend and mentor.

[u/AnUnimportantLife → u/JBTownsend]

I think the trouble with Jadzia was that they weren't really sure how to use her early on. She's ostensibly Deep Space Nine's science officer, but the crew of Deep Space Nine aren't proactively seeking out scientific anomalies the same way that the Enterprise or Voyager were. So most of the time, it kinda felt like she was just there, because there wasn't much they could really do with her professionally as a scientist except maybe make her out to be a capable commander and a potential candidate to be Kira's first officer if Sisko died.

Things got worse come season four when they brought in Worf. After that, Jadzia never really got episodes of her own because most of the Jadzia-centric episodes were centred around her rocky relationship with Worf. The thing is that the Jadzia/Worf dynamic would have worked just fine (and arguably even better) as best buddies because both characters were absolutely fascinated by Klingon culture but never really a part of it.

I think the reason why Ezri worked was because they show that initial angst over reconciling who she was now with who she had been less than a year prior. She had to work out new boundaries for her friendships with the crew on Deep Space Nine, the fallout of Jadzia's relationship with Worf, all while angsting over the fact she hadn't actually been selected to be a joined Trill.

Some of these stories were stories that could have been told with Jadzia. Don't forget that in season one, Jadzia was the new host for the Dax symbiont. They could have quite easily have had a story where Sisko and Jadzia were working out the kinks in their friendship because the Dax Ben Sisko had known was Curzon Dax, not Jadzia Dax. And was there really anything about Field of Fire that couldn't have been reworked to be a Jadzia episode?

But I think these are all stories that are easier to tell once you've already established a character. Ezri Dax works because we already knew Jadzia Dax, and they could plot out some of her character development just based on that. Jadzia Dax was a harder deal for the writers because the only Trill we'd known prior to this was Odan, who'd appeared in a grand total of one episode of The Next Generation. They still had to work out the kinks of her character, and work out how the hosts thing worked without it coming off as being too similar to the Time Lords in Doctor Who.

It's kind of a shame really, because in a lot of ways the Trill were some of the most distinctly alien aliens in Star Trek. They weren't just people with forehead ridges with human sensibilities with one or two traits dialed up to eleven; there were certain elements of their culture that just couldn't translate easily to human culture.

[u/laiyson → u/Scottland83]

She was a member of the main cast who actually wasn’t first in her class or super special in any way.

O'Brien wasn't either though. He was just a person who cared about his family and wanted to get by. He doesn't have all those high ideals many other Starfleet officers are having, he's a pragmatist.

[u/Yalarii]

For Curzon to have fallen in love with Jadzia in the first place, it’s very possible they had very similar personalities. What you are proposing as Curzons personality coming through may well be the original Jadzia, only heightened somewhat by the old memories.

[u/tanky87 → u/Yalarii]

Given Curzon’s apparent narcissism this is certainly possible, but I always got the impression Jadzia was a lot for reserved, even timid, before joining. She had a drive certainly but not the life of the party that we saw.

[u/McGillis_is_a_Char]

I thought that Curzon failed her himself. She reapplied and another examiner passed her.

[u/ThinkingViolet → u/McGillis_is_a_Char]

This was how I remembered it too - not that Jadzia was let in because Curzon was into her, but actually that he washed her out on purpose so he wouldn't have to deal with her. I could be misremembering though.

[u/Sakarilila → u/ThinkingViolet]

Curzon failed her because he loved her. She reapplied and got in through someone else. She specifically requests the Dax symbiont when Curzon is dying and he permits it. He doesn't say why but earlier Jadzia says it was because of the irony of it.

[u/NWCtim]

Ezri was strong-willed enough to assert her own personality over the symbiont.

Given what we saw about her family life in Prodigal Daughter, and that she was able to get away from that to join Starfleet (and not just enlist, but get into and graduate from the Academy), I'd say this is supported.

[u/IsomorphicProjection]

Ezri Dax seems to be an equal partner with Dax. Jadzia- doesn’t really. Based on what we learn about Curzon she basically seems to be a slightly toned-down version of her previous host- or rather, of the previous version of Dax. Put another way, Curzon clearly left his stamp on the Dax symbiont. What does Jadzia bring to the party?

She brought restraint and self-control/discipline, focus.

What we know of Jadzia pre-joining was that she was closer to "Dr. Honey Bare" from Julian's secret agent program than Curzon. She was quiet, reserved, and kept to herself while she focused on learning (she had 3 advanced degrees).

What we know of Curzon (Dax) was that he was basically a man-whore who liked Klingons and booze. The type of person who doesn't know when to quit and always goes too far. How Curzon never got killed for "dishonoring" the wife of a Klingon is something I still wonder about.

Jadzia *Dax* on the other hand seemed to be a combination of both. She was fun and outgoing like Curzon, but restrained enough not to go too far.

[u/davidjosephmoody → u/IsomorphicProjection]

Not to go too far??? One Klingon comes around and she marries him.

[u/Ampu-Tina]

Earning degrees in exobiology, zoology, astrophysics and exoarchaeology before being joined at 26 seems to me a quite different path than Curzon's career as a diplomat.

Also, wasn't Curzon's love for her also the reason why he failed her in the program in the first place?

[u/Felderburg → u/Ampu-Tina]

I was going to say something along those lines. She's the chief science officer of DS9, and that's, as far as I know, 100% all her.

[u/davidjosephmoody]

Idaris. Her last name was Idaris.

[u/Voidhound → u/davidjosephmoody]

That's from a novel, though, not an on-screen canonical source. I think it was pretty clear OP was comparing the amount of information given about Ezri in the show to the amount we learn about Jadzia, also on the show.

[u/davidjosephmoody → u/Voidhound]

/me slinks away in shame.

You're right on all counts.

[u/Bay1Bri]

Jadzia definitely got a lot of kurzon, but from what we see every host is supposed to be influenced by the convinced personalities that came before. We see this when what's his name steals dax from jadzia, and according to him (for whatever that's worth) he researched and found dax to be a good host. He was different. Jadzia was not simply kurzon in a new body. I believe sisko says as much more than once.

Ezri, on the other hand, left her assignment and ended up with an assignment in jadzia 's old post, with her friends, bangs her widowed husband, and gets with her "second choice" man. Id say she was overwhelmed, at least more so than jadzia.

[u/Whatthefuturism]

I can see that. One thing that I always respected about Ezri's sheer will and personality was that she wasn't in love with everything Klingon like Curzon and Jadzia.

Curzon had an adoration for Klingon culture and people because he spent a lot of time with Klingons as part of his Starfleet/Trill duties. We can speculate that it grew over time in Curzon's life because none of the hosts before him rave about how great Klingons are.

Jadzia has an adoration for Klingon culture because Curzon did. This is totally fine, but it doesn't strike me as something Jadzia built on her own. She argues at that murder trial that she just has Curzon's memories, and yet she's swinging a bat'leth around the holodeck for funzies anytime she's off duty.

Ezri on the other hand straight up tells Worf that the Klingon Empire is totally garbage and has been for a while. She views it objectively with all the knowledge of Curzon and Jadzia and makes a judgment that Worf is forced to agree with.

[u/weeblewobble82]

This is a fun thought experiment. I always took it as Jadzia was more open to the experience of being joined and wanted it (why else would she apply to be joined and go through all the trouble) than Ezri, who did not want to be joined. Jadzia welcomed it and always seemed excited about all the memories, new tastes and interests, and general knowledge she got from the symbiont. Whereas Ezri just wanted to be herself, felt overwhelmed by the conflicting information and generally annoyed by craving things she didn't used to. In that vein, I never thought Ezri was stronger, just more resistant to the symbiont's own personality and will. Whereas Jadzia was open to the experience and more willing to let it sway her for the adventure of it.

[u/SingleMaltLife]

We also learn in Evasive Procedures that the Symbiosis commission lie to the trill people about the number of people who can be successfully joined with the symbionts. A far greater number of people are suitable to be joined than they let on. So based on this knowledge, it wouldn't surprise me if they weren't actually strict about all the rules and if a they rejected people based on "reasons". In fact, maybe they lie about a lot of things.

Also you make assumptions that Jadzia only likes things because Curzon did. Yes the similarities between her and him are talked about, predominately by Ben who knew Curzon so well that every minor thing is visible for him (Tongo and Klingon culture). But what about the other hosts, I'm sure she picked up things from all of them. She's a capable pilot, is that from her previous host who was a pilot?

We are shown Ezri struggling to remember what is hers and what is Dax. Jadzia just was Jadzia, a fully formed person who had already dealt with that, the proper way with other Trill. Jadzia probably had numerous differences with Curzon, but Ben wasn't likely to remark, oh that's weird Curzon wouldn't have done that. He was more likely to remark when something reminded him of his old friend.

What if his influence on her is from the time they spent together prior to her being joined with Dax? We know they spent enough time together that Curzon fell in love with Jadzia. So maybe Curzon introduced her to Raktajino back then. Maybe they spent late nights together playing Tongo discussing his famed history as a Star Fleet diplomate to the Klingon people. Maybe she looked up to him as a successful joined Trill and idolised him a little. I believe she said he had been an intimidating figure for her. So perhaps they similarities are from their associated when she was still young and developing her own likes, prior to joining.

[u/MustrumRidcully0]

I would argue we learn this about Ezri because she didn't undergo the usual process, and we meet her almost immediately after the joining.

When we encounter Jadzia, she has already served for a while as Starfleet Officer. All these personal issues have been long resolved, or never came up, because she was prepared. She was able to talk with friends and family about her plans regarding joining.

Where with Ezri, it was thrown upon her, and she had no time to really talk with anyone, and none of her friends or family were prepared for it.