lodessa:

v-e-l-v-e-t-g-o-l-d-m-i-n-e:

lodessa:

v-e-l-v-e-t-g-o-l-d-m-i-n-e:

This scene above it’s the reason of why I detest so much the arc of Julian being so in love with Jadzia in the late sixth season and during all seventh season. The scene above belongs to “Starship Down” - a fourth season episode - and it deals perfectly with their feelings.

As they huddle together for warmth, Julian remembers his younger fantasies, from the time that he had a hard crush on Jadzia, and he actually agrees with Jadzia when she says that he just tried too hard and never gave her a chance of getting to know him. Better yet; not even Julian acknowledges his crush and his almost forceful approach, he says that he got over it and that he didn’t feel that way anymore. There’s a bit of teasing at the end, but it’s playful, and it’s a perfect close for his behavior with Jadzia in the first season.

That’s why it’s really annoying when Julian started to mope around because Jadzia didn’t love him in the sixth season. It felt so off and coming out of nowhere, and it pisses me off that they cheapened their friendship like this and the character’s development of six seasons.

See I didn’t love that plot line  but I disagree about the import of this scene.

Julian has not gotten over Jadzia, but over his immature fantasy about them being brought together by some external force.  As I recall there is also a bit of dialogue attached where she says she kind of misses him chasing her and he’s basically like and now I know I don’t have to all pleased.  He values their friendship for itself and he isn’t pining over her, but that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t be 2000% into her turning around and deciding to pursue him in that way.

It’s not that he has stopped having a romantic interest, but that he knows her now as a real person who he has a real (platonic) relationship with.  He’s grown up a lot and what is cheapened in not that he stopped having those feelings for Jadzia but that he was no longer angsting about it or trying to force it.

I can see your point, but I’ll have to disagree, too.

I agree that Julian was over his fantasy of Jadzia - the kind of fantasy of her that he had in episodes like If Wishes Were Horses - and started to see her like the woman he really was.

But for me, it wasn’t just the fantasy of Jadzia he was over; he seemed to me that he was over any other romantic feelings till late Season 6.

Why is that? For me, it’s the old rule of storytelling. Show, don’t tell. And we really didn’t see Julian indicating that he still liked Jadzia in that way in any significant form during a long time.

Julian didn’t seem to pine for her anymore when she was single, didn’t show jealousy when Jadzia started dating Worf, and not even in her wedding. If I can make a big stretch I can even accept that his speech to Odo in ‘A Simple Investigation’ was about Jadzia (it doesn’t really fit for me but I can accept), but that’s pretty much about it?

And that’s why I don’t buy Julian’s epic love forJadzia. They told us it, but they didn’t show us it.

And it’s not like DS9 didn’t knew how to do it. They did it with Odo and Kira in a brilliant way. Odo always loved Kira, and I never doubted it. Their main relationship was the friendship and Odo didn’t told Kira how he feel for a long time, but we could see Odo longuing for Kira, we could see him jealous and heartbroken and pining, and it felt real. It didn’t feel like something that the writers pulled off out of nowhere, like Julian’s everlasting romantic love for Jadzia.

I love discussing this stuff, so I hope you won’t take my continued responses as aggressive.

I would certainly not describe Julian’s feelings for Jadzia as “epic love”(I wouldn’t even call the romantic/sexual aspect love… I specify that part because I do think they were at that friendship love level) and I don’t think he was doing the creepy nice guy thing and just trying to wait her out/always be there so that he could seize on whatever moment of vulnerability or something.  I do think there is a difference however, between not actively seeking something and losing all interest in it. 

You mention him not being jealous about Worf, and I agree that he wasn’t to begin with (which doesn’t surprise me because Jadzia was constantly dating someone… even if that was the first time it was a main cast member and so we saw more of it) but I do recall that he and Quark have themselves a little emo session when she gets engaged; because, that’s different.  It’s final.

Which seems to me, to indicate that he maybe was not as over his feelings as he wanted to believe.  As long as there was still the possibility he didn’t have to face that truth because it could still happen someday.

It’s very different to think “if it’s meant to be someday it will be” than to accept “okay, I guess it isn’t meant to be after all”, and I think we can attribute the resurgence of exploration of Julian’s Jadzia feelings to dealing with that perhaps? (Which is an interpretation not wholly text but makes sense to me.)

Now to get into show not tell issue in general. I’m a big fan of that but I wouldn’t laud DS9′s writers as total masters.  As you mention, they did a great job with Odo’s feelings for Kira but they completely failed on the opposite end. 

The lack of development of Kira’s feelings has been a pet peeve of mine since  I watched the show. It is one of those things that eats at me.  Kira is shown as caring about Odo as a friend but there is no equivalent demonstration of a transition to love from her. There is so much time devoted to showing Odo loving/realizing he loves Kira but none to her discovering she loves him. The only realization moments she gets are about HIS feelings.

It makes me feel like the writers didn’t think her feelings were actually all that relevant.  The plotline is about Odo and his “humanity” and Kira is just a vessel/recipient of said feelings who must naturally fall into line.  Which ruins for me, what is otherwise a good relationship development.

None at all, I love talking about DS9 with people and seeing their point of views, because they can be interpreted in several ways.

I wouldn’t either, but the narrative of s7 tries to sell us the idea that Jadzia was an epic love from his part or at least a very strong love, which is… bullshit, really. I don’t think Julian was purposely being a nice guy with Jadzia in early season, but he sort of was behaving this way, he noticing or not, but I’ll agree he drops this behavior in later seasons. I do think there is a difference too… but the DS9 narrative simple doesn’t make it clear for me.

For what I remember (I may be wrong because it’s been a while since I watched DS9 in its entirety), their moping phase started to become really visible to the viewer in very late s6, when the writers already knew they were going to kill Jadzia… which makes me think that the return of Julian’s romantic interest for Jadzia was a way to already initiate Julian’s future romantic interest for Dax/Ezri in the narrative, and this is… yikes.

Again… I think this is the idea that the writers were trying to show, that he wasn’t so over her like he wanted to believe… but the narrative really did such a terrible job with it? At least for me? It really, really doesn’t convince me of it. Maybe it’s a personal problem that I cannot interpret in other way, idk I have to really think hard when I try to make sense of it, and I shouldn’t have to do it, because it was the writer’s job to make it way more clear in the episodes, which they didn’t.

My point with Odo was more that the show really showed us that he was never over his feelings for Kira, even if they didn’t mention it in every episode. It was believable and clear because the text actually showed us that he still felt this way towards Kira, unlike what they showed us with Julian’s feelings for Jadzia, but other wise I agree with you. I love Odo and Kira’s relationship as friends and as lovers as well, but they should have done a much better job in showing Kira’s feelings for Odo changing if they were going to put them together romantically.

And it’s a shame that they didn’t develop it so well like they did with Odo, because it would make more sense. They should have discussed more Odo and Kira’s situation after Odo betrayed everyone in early s6, and the episode where they got together should have been about then talking face to face, not with Vic Fontaine’s doing almost all the job to get them together. They could have done a much better job showing that Kira started to see Odo in a romantic way, really, and it’s unfair because otherwise Kira is a character so well developed. But still, I think this is a hundred times better than the whole Julian/Jadzia/Ezri mess that the writers tried to do.