Inspired by the marathon that aired on Spike TV yesterday afternoon:
In Season Three of DS9, Odo finally realizes who he is when he discovers the Founders in the Gamma Quadrant. Up until that time, he had spent all his life wondering who he was, what his species was like, and what his purpose in life was and suddenly found that out upon his discovery.
My question is: why didn’t one of the numerous Gamma Quadrant species that visited DS9 in the three years before the discovery of the Changelings recognize him for what he was? After all, the Dominion is pretty much all-powerful on the other side of the wormhole and never shied away from contact in any cases we ever saw so why didn’t anyone see Odo, do a double take, and then ask his travelling mate what a Founder was doing 70,000 light years from the Great Link?*
Well, up to that point in the series, everyone they’d met in the Gamma Quadrant thought of the Founders as some sort of semi-mythical race that probably didn’t even exist. No one really knew who they were or even what they looked like. The only contact most races had with the Dominion was the Jem-Hadar (sp?) and maybe the Vorta.
Of course, in the show, once we discovered who the Founders were, they were all over the place, which doesn’t really fit, but whatever.
When the Federation first opens the wormhole, the Dominion had no strong presense in the area near the wormhole opening. It took a certain period of time before word reached the founders and they decide to investigate. (Admittedly, this was probably not a large period of time). Then followed a period of infiltration/intelligence gathering. They questionedx those who had been over and probably sent a few of their own over in disguise. Maybe even infiltrated the Federation, the Romulans and the Cardassians. After they determined the Alpha quadrent was an opportunity, they made a more visible presence.
Just a theory.
Either that or the writers just sort of winged it.
Also the Founders were very low key for two reasons- mistrust of other species and then later because they wanted to use their abilities to start a war between the Federation and the Klingons.
Plus that they’re shapeshifters. Yes, I know they all kind of have that Odo look when they take humanoid form, but perhaps that is just a look they adopted later on.
Furthermore, I can’t quite remember if this was in an episode or a book or in my mind but I seem to remember that Odo once explained that he looks the way he does because he doesn’t do human faces very well. Anyone remember this too? This would beg the question why the Founders, who CAN do human faces very well all look like him. So maybe it’s even that they are mimicking his look deliberately and didn’t look anything like that before.
I seem to recall that Odo looks the way he does because he doesn’t do human faces very well. Other Founders can and do do human faces extremely well; on Earth at one point, Sisko runs into a founder imitating Chief O’Brien, and doing so extremely well.
It’s never made very clear why the female Founder takes on the “Odo Look.” Perhaps it’s to establish some sort of visual kinship with Odo, for the viewers’ sake.
It also occurs to me that Smeghead has a pretty good point… how many Gamma Quadrant visitors–
(a) knew that the Founders were shapeshifters, and
(b) saw Odo change shape?
Furthermore, the movies and original series have established that there are several races of shapeshifters. Why would they think a Founder would be working as chief of security on a Federation outpost on the other side of the galaxy?
I could actually see this one. More likely, though, its simply not natural for them to put in all the exquisite details that go into a human face. So Odo was simply assuming the natural level of detail for species, although they could do more with effort.
Ah, you and Smeg bring up good points that I never really thought about. They very well might have been semi-mythical and if they take on Odo’s shape just to show him loyalty, then any species seeing him but not knowing his abilities would be unaware of his identity.