Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Actress Terry Farrell States Her Jadzia Dax Character Was Pansexual
Former Star Trek: Deep Space Nine actress Terry Farrell revealed to the Star Trek Las Vegas convention that her character Jadzia Dax was pansexual.
According to TrekMovie, during a panel appearance promoting her new documentary titled “What We Left Behind at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine,” Farrel stated her character Dax was pansexual. She stated, “The only rule was ‘are you interesting to me, and do I want to know more about you?'”
#STLV @4TerryFarrell says Jadzia Dax was pansexual. “The only rule was ‘are you interesting to me, and do I want to know more about you?’” pic.twitter.com/icT21Y0pNN
— TrekMovie.com (@TrekMovie) August 1, 2019
This is an interesting take, but one that might not give the complete story. That’s because her character played a dual role. She wasn’t only just a humanoid Trill, but one that was joined with a Trill symbiont.
For those who aren’t familiar with Trek lore, the Trill race is a group of humanoids that are from the planet Trill. A unique and major part of their society is the ability to join with other sentient beings simply called Trill symbionts. The symbionts are tear shaped alien creatures that when bonded with a Trill humanoid could transfer their memories and experiences to their new host. Trill symbionts have extended lifespans and would be transferred through a surgical process across different hosts. In fact, they could die if they are outside of their host body for too long.
In the case of Jadzia Dax, she was the eighth host for the Dax symbiont. Joining with the Dax symbiont allowed her to take on the experiences and memories of both male and female hosts before her. This means Jadzia had experienced being married twice as a male, and four times as a female. So it would make sense that for their society sexuality would be much less rigid than a normal bi-sexual species like humans.
The question of Jadzia Dax’s sexuality has been looked at before during the series’s original run.
For example during the episode “Rejoined” Jadzia was ready to enter a relationship with another female, Nilami Kahn. The problem with their relationship wasn’t due to their shared gender, but the fact that within the Trill society it is taboo to become reassociated. In the case of Dax, Lenara Kahn was married to the wife of one of Dax’s previous hosts, thus the taboo was against the rekindling of a relationship between a current host and a past host’s loved one. This would cause the host and symbiont to be ostracized from Trill society meaning that once the host died, so would the symbiont because they would no longer have access to the surgical procedure required to transfer to a new host.
As we can see, love within the Trill society is quite different from what you’d see with humans. And the response from Terry isn’t all that surprising.
What do you think of Terry Farrell’s comments? Does it make sense or do you have any counter points? Let me know your thoughts!
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