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4 Jadzia Dax
One of the Star Trek universe’s most ingenious inventions are the Trill, an alien race who have earned our interest and respect despite the fact their name makes us think of bird food. Basically a Trill is two people: a person and a symbiont, a little worm-thing which lives in their belly. When the host body dies, the symbiont can be neatly slipped into another one, thus prolonging its life and preserving all its memories.
So far, so good – but what if you’re married to a Trill named Jadzia Dax, who is horribly murdered? And what if Jadzia dies, but her symbiont is saved and shoved into another body, thus ensuring that this new woman – Ezri – is both Ezri and Jadzia? She’d remember everything about you but she wouldn’t really be Jadzia… Awkward.
Thus Deep Space Nine introduced Ezri Dax (see the clip above, with the teaser for her first episode given extra “oomph” by Gravelly Voiceover Man). We saw some of Jadzia in her, and she knew everybody on DS9 and all the adventures Dax had been through, but she was entirely new. It was such a clever way of shaking up a character without actually killing the character completely – and the Worf/Dax tension that ensued was delicious .
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