Deep Space Nine welcomes a new Elaysian officer, Melora Pazlar. Coming from a low-gravity planet, she uses a wheelchair and exoskeleton to move around the station. They're the only assistance she wants; Melora is quite prickly to any who would coddle her. But Dr. Bashir slowly breaks through her defenses and a romantic relationship develops between them. With it comes an intriguing offer: the doctor has developed a treatment that will allow Melora to function normally in standard gravity.
The idea for Melora (the character) came during the original development of the series. Rick Berman and Michael Piller became intrigued with the idea of a character from a low-gravity world, confined to a wheelchair in most parts of the station, but free to fly around in her normal environment. It was simply too expensive and impractical an idea to achieve on a weekly TV budget at the time, and ultimately they would give up on the idea and create Jadzia Dax to be their science officer. But "wheelchair officer" went up on the board for potential episode ideas.
Evan Carlos Somers was a Writers Guild intern who worked on Deep Space Nine during its first season. Though he wasn't kept on for season two, he was invited to come back and pitch story ideas. He was eager for a sale, and thought he had the inside track. He knew about the background ideas the writing staff were considering, and was sure he had something to bring to the "wheelchair officer" idea: he himself was confined to a wheelchair.
In particular, Somers felt a "response" of sorts was called for to the Next Generation episode "Ethics." Even though Worf was an alien from a different culture, the idea that he saw himself as worthless, that he would rather kill himself than live with paralysis got "a little under my skin," according to Somers. He wanted a story about a disabled character accepted for who they are, one who's even given a chance at a cure for the disability only to turn it down. He sold the idea, but not the script. His draft was flawed, and rewritten several times (by several writers) before filming.
But several flaws remain in the final episode. One is that everything I just laid out describes a character arc, but not a story. "New character arrives, ultimately doesn't undergo a change, and is never seen again" isn't much of an hour of television. Attempts to graft more of a story into it don't seem to take successfully.
First, there's a romantic angle with Bashir. It's difficult to embrace because Bashir's a bit icky in this episode. We've already put up with a season of his hound dog pursuit of Dax. Now he turns his stalkery vibe to Melora, "Googling her" obsessively before she arrives on the station and asking her about the picture of her "husband? boyfriend?" Ugh. (Stalking wasn't a good look for Geordi either when he did it.) Bashir gets a bit more smooth and empathetic as the episode progresses, but he's certainly starting in a hole.
Second, there's a subplot involving an old associate of Quark's showing up to threaten his life. From this thread, we get a great smile from Odo (mocking Quark's predicament) and a moment of realization for Melora. She saves the day with her ability to fly around in low gravity, and decides that's core to her identity. What makes it weird is how little consideration is given to the whole "cure" before this moment. Bashir doesn't even tell her about the side effects (she can't go back to her planet again) until after the treatment has begun, and she really doesn't seem to spend any time thinking about them until it's time for her to abruptly change her mind and end the episode.
The writing of Melora herself is mixed. You certainly sense the experience Evan Carlos Somers infused into the episode, and there's a lot of support for it online from fans with disabilities. Melora is brusque, with sharp edges. Your offer to help comes off like pity, and she does not want it. But Melora is in a formalized command structure, and very low ranking. She acts like she owns the place, and is very casual/familiar/belligerent with superior officers. If she were a civilian, her demeanor would make more sense. As a Starfleet officer, I'm not buying it.
The "mechanics" of Melora don't quite make sense either. What we're told is low gravity sure seems like NO gravity whenever they depict it. And she doesn't seem as fragile in Earth-standard gravity as she should be. She isn't seriously injured when she falls. When she catapults herself across the runabout to ram Quark's would-be killer, she ought to break like half the bones in her body. But a lot of the science around her is swept away with a hand wave.
She does get a few good moments. The scene in the Klingon restaurant is great all around. Just when you're about to ask yourself if the date protocol of a "man ordering for the woman" is still seriously a thing in the 24th century, Melora unleashes fluent Klingon and takes charge of the situation. After the meal, Bashir opens up with his background, talking about almost becoming a professional tennis player. And in a TV show that almost never gives us original "source music" (music the characters can actually hear), we get samples of both a Vulcan instrumental and Klingon singing!
Ultimately, the episode doesn't "get rid" of Melora by either killing her off or shipping her out. Nevertheless, we never see her on the show again.
Other observations:
- Quark and an alien do a fun "handshake" by bumping elbows.
- Dax seems quite expert in helping Melora back into her chair. It feels like she has some sort of experience here.
- Easy week for Nana Visitor. She shows up only in the last act, and then only for two or three lines.
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