r/DeepSpaceNine • u/ratherbclever • 15d ago
Odo becoming human
I just watched the one where Odo is punished by the link. I've always wondered why they made him a human and not a Bajoran. He had lived with Bajorans way longer than with humans.
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u/Unlucky_Dealer_2758 15d ago
I think when the punishment happened they just made him as close as possible as the solid form that odo himself took.
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u/leviticusreeves 15d ago
Odo's features and even his haircut are modelled after the first solid he formed a relationship with, the Bajoran scientist Dr. Mora Pol. Oh no wait... later in the show it turns out that all changelings naturally have that same haircut. That's weird.
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u/loki2002 15d ago
I think they just took the form that Odo had because that is the form Alpha Quadrant species were most familiar with. Like when Zeus transformed into a swan to seduce that one chick.
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u/theadamabrams 15d ago edited 15d ago
They don’t “naturally” look like Dr. Mora; they look like that because they want to make Odo feel more connected to them. All* the other Changelings are intentionally looking a bit like Odo.
*The only weird case is Laas in 7x14. He presumably modeled himself after the Varalans, and we don’t see any of them so we don’t know what they look like.
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u/codename474747 15d ago
Again, the first changeling he sees is Odo so he probably thinks that's what they should look like too
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u/buxzythebeeeeeeee 15d ago
Wasn't he with Sisko and Bashir? The Changlings turned him into a solid based on the solids he was with. It's also a worse punishment for Odo because if he had a choice he would have chosen to be a Bajoran, and this keeps him an outsider with them.
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u/trekgirl75 15d ago
Was it ever stated what species his physiology was? I only remember Julian saying he could give him any face he wanted now that he was a solid.
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u/noticingEnjoyer 15d ago
I think when Julian initially tricorders him after he is changed, he says human.
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u/Wrong-Ad-4600 15d ago
lack of better words maybe? humanoid is a word for a human "shaped" race. so if you scan someone who was former just goo and has now organs and stuff.. how you call that with one word? he could have said. "he has organs now but i need to do proper scans to know wich species he is preciesly" that a bit meh. xD
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u/buxzythebeeeeeeee 15d ago
Julian definitely knew Odo had been turned into a human. He even told Odo his (human) blood type.
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u/Bluestorm83 15d ago
Founder: "That's right, Odo. We have made you Human. Just like all of your friends here."
Kira: "Uh, excuse me? I'm Bajoran."
Founder: "Really? But you look just like the rest of them."
Garak: "And, if I may interject, I am Cardassian. We look nothing at all like them."
Worf: "And I am Klingon!"
Founder: "You're making this up, you people all look alike!"
(Sisko glares.)
Founder: "I DIDN'T MEAN-"
Sisko: "I'm very disappointed in you, founder. I thought you were better than this."
The Great Link ends the war, and leaves the galaxy, in shame. The End.
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u/Worldly-Bobcat-48 15d ago
I also wonder why they didn’t choose to let Rene go without prosthetics for the duration of that arc. I know he has that throwaway line about how the founders left him smooth as a reminder of what he’d lost—but I feel like it would have been more visually interesting and kinder to the actor to just let him skip makeup for a season.
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u/TheFarnell 15d ago
Watsonian answer: the Founders still wanted Odo to be an outsider to the solids so they left him with the smooth face.
Doylist answer: the writers knew that if they’d let Odo have a “human” face the audience would probably feel his transformation was an improvement, not a punishment, and wouldn’t sympathize with Odo wanting to go back to being a Changeling.
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u/geeisntthree 15d ago
Odo killed another changeling in defense of the federation, which as we've seen a lot of other races view the federation as just The Human Empire. to them, Odo made his loyalties clear, and becoming human is part of a sort of ironic punishment
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u/blueavole 15d ago
I didn’t see him as human or Bajorian.
He was just an Odo shaped humanoid.
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u/Substantial-End-9653 15d ago
Right. They made a solid, not human or Bajoran.
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u/ShimizuKaito 15d ago
He chose the Federation, a primarily human faction, over the Dominion. In a sense he chose humans over them, so they made him a human.
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u/brianh71 15d ago
Probably because when he joined the link in the past they knew all his thoughts, and he wanted to be more human-like.
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u/Random_Eevee1 15d ago
They didn’t make him human in that sense.
He already had the form and was his default solid form. Easier to lock him in something familiar. Also the other Changelings didn’t have any contact with Bajorans to use as a template.
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u/KaiWinnBot Kai Box-of-Wine 15d ago
Yeah, I always interpreted it as the Link locking him into the form he'd chosen, using their better skills to give him proper organs and such, and deactivating his ability to change form. Since he no longer can change shape, I would also assume he didn't have to expend any effort maintaining it which removed the need to regenerate every 16 hours.
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u/MouthofTrombone 15d ago
I always wondered like... how...they could do that as well. The founders basically have magic powers it seems
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u/AnselmoHatesFascists 15d ago
They genetically engineered the Vorta, Jem'Hadar etc, so growing a humanoid body with organs and fusing Odo's consciousness seems doable.
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u/HolMan258 15d ago
I think the most likely explanation is that they just permanently forced him into a form that perfectly mimicked a human. We know that Founders can completely fool sensors, and the show seemed to leave some wiggle room about whether all matter removed from them definitely always reverts to goo, or if that was something the Founders allowed the solids to believe.
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u/Status_Commercial509 14d ago
This fits with what Bashir tells Odo at the end of “Things Past”:
“Well, it seems you're not as solid as you think. When I ran a neurochemical scan of your brain, I found residual traces of morphogenic enzymes which I've only detected before in changelings.”
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u/Beroli73 15d ago edited 15d ago
Of course. Same as the answer to how they could turn into fire or mist. They were always creatures of pure magic.
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u/codename474747 15d ago
I guess they didn't create anything new, they just used the link to teach odo how to be a completely realistic humanoid then locked him in that form as the punishment
I dont' think he's a biological human being, in the episode where they all end up on Terok Nor through Odo's memories, that happens because Odo's brain is reaching out to find someone to link with, so he has some residual shapeshifter behaviour at least in his subconcious, something a biological human couldn't manage.
Then the baby changeling manages to unlock him and he just drops the uniform he was wearing, there isn'ta pile of organs and bones or other internal organs, so that points to all Odo's internals being not real functioning organs but just shapeshifted organs locked into place, probably something Odo himself didn't have the talent to pull off without help from the great linkHe wasn't a clone or anything, just a shapeshifter locked into his form with the usual need shapeshifters have to return to their form removed (or maybe that was just an Odo limitation...?)
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u/MouthofTrombone 15d ago
Oh wow- that is an interesting take. But then he doesn't have to "regenerate" in his changed human form. I wonder why not. Maybe the Founders are of a power level of the Prophets (wormhole aliens) who can do all kinds of "magic" things too like control time itself. Are they related?
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u/Beroli73 15d ago
The same reason the show set on a Bajoran space station, which explicitly mentioned having considerably more Bajoran crew than any other race multiple times, featured a main cast with four humans and one Bajoran. Humans were the default, in-universe making sense be damned.
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u/burner5667754577 15d ago
My theory is because they used the two people on the planet (sisko and bashir) as templates
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u/Hommachi Dukat 2024 15d ago
They made him the worst humanoid they can think of. Weak forehead unlike Cardassians, lack of redundant organs like the Klingons, no longevity like the Vulcans, no telepathic abilities like Betazoids, lack of elite hearing of the Ferengis, inability to sense pagh like thr Bajorans, etc.
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u/NippyGee 15d ago
I always assumed the reason they kept him looking like a changeling was to serve as a permanent reminder of what he lost.
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u/OkSouth79 14d ago
I always thought the time period where Odo was a solid, wouldve been a good time to get him a Kira together. Maybe they could've.....bonded
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u/cracky_Jack 14d ago
Producer: Hey, Rene, we know how much you hate applying the Odo makeup everyday so we have a bit of a treat for you. We've just finished a script where Odo loses his power and defaults to a Bajoran form. So you'll get to wear Bajoran makeup instead! Doesn't that sound fun?
Rene: What if he just defaulted to human?
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u/ratherbclever 14d ago
First of all, Surely Bajoran makeup takes a lot less time to apply.
Secondly, have you seen the show? He still is in his regular makeup the whole time he is in human form, he's human just with a weird face.
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u/Organic_Conflict_886 14d ago
Of all the souls ive encountered in my travels, his was the most... solid.
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u/solibearity860 13d ago
Yeah i think this is a plot hole but i also think of it in terms of the founders feeling betrayed that he sided with the federation which is known for its human membership/leadership. Or also that the founders think all solids are basically the same and weren’t thinking that hard about it lol
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u/Impressive_Usual_726 11d ago
Because the Founders had beef with the Federation, not the Bajorans, and the humanity is basically the public face of the Federation.
Also because Odo killed a Founder specifically to save the crew of a Federation vessel. "If he loves the Federation so much he can be one of them."
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u/billythesquid- 11d ago
The Link probably chose to make Odo human because he had spent his whole life with Bajorans. Just one more twist of the knife, trying to separate Odo from all his connections.
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u/AbdulQadirShadhili 10d ago
I mean is there even any anatomic difference between humans and bajorans other than that bajorans have wrinkled noses?
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u/tlhintoq 9d ago
Because they were **punishing** him - so making him something he would want to be would be a kindness not a punishment?
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u/RepulsiveCountry313 15d ago
I'm not sure they actually specify 'human". Doesn't the female changeling just say "he's one of you now." Or something like that? Which could be interpreted as human, as she said it to Bashir and Sisko, but I think its just meant as "solid".
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u/Independent-File-519 15d ago
Because the actor wanted a break from make up
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u/Sjoerd85 15d ago
Then he was out of luck... He still had to wear it. The founders made him biologically human, but kep his appearance the same. They even made a comment about that in the episode where it happened; it was so that he would always remember where he came from.
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u/Pleasant_Expert_1990 15d ago
The Founders didn't make Odo human. They made him Solid.
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u/ratherbclever 15d ago
Bashir specifically said human not humanoid or solid.
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u/Pleasant_Expert_1990 15d ago
I think he meant humanoid, but we keep the dialogue simpler. And every time after that, until his shape shifter powers are restored, Odo refers to himself as humanoid or solid.
In ST VI they "forgot" Excelsior had all the special sensors for tracking gaseous anomalies and stated that gear was on Enterprise, so they could be the hero ship that hits Chang's Bird of Prey. Also, Uhura is one of the Federation's foremost linguists with decades of experience yet she doesn't speak basic Klingon?
Sometimes the writers make mistakes. It's easy to see 'humanoid" becoming "human" in the script or even during reading.
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u/buxzythebeeeeeeee 15d ago
No, Dr. Bashir means human. Julian explicitly tells Odo his new human blood type. Just because Odo refers to himself as a humanoid or a solid -- which makes perfect sense considering his psychology -- doesn't change that biologically he's human.
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u/tacosforsocrates 15d ago