I watched DS9 S1, e4 today and Rom is sharp as a knife in it, he's rather similar to quark. Perhaps that's why his character was modified at some later point to the slow version we all think of, anyone know for sure?
When and why did Rom become dumb?
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You're right about this point, but if you start from season 1 DS9 and go through season 7, major character changes(I don't mean character development, I mean total changes in character premise) are very common.
-Rom becomes some kind of mechanical whiz later in the series as well, which he certainly wasn't at the beginning.
-Dax was very different, much more of an aloof character than she became.
-Odo goes from being an almost anti-social, asexual character(he flat out tells Quark in a season 1 episode that he has no interest in "coupling," because it involves "too many compromises," to later seasons, schmoopy, lovey-dovey, schoolboy-crushing on Kira.
-Season 7 Dukat is nothing like season 1 Dukat.
Again, I'm not including characters like Kira, who just went through some development and growth.
So to answer the thread, they didn't have a handle on a lot of characters in early DS9 yet.
-Rom becomes some kind of mechanical whiz later in the series as well, which he certainly wasn't at the beginning.
-Dax was very different, much more of an aloof character than she became.
-Odo goes from being an almost anti-social, asexual character(he flat out tells Quark in a season 1 episode that he has no interest in "coupling," because it involves "too many compromises," to later seasons, schmoopy, lovey-dovey, schoolboy-crushing on Kira.
-Season 7 Dukat is nothing like season 1 Dukat.
Again, I'm not including characters like Kira, who just went through some development and growth.
So to answer the thread, they didn't have a handle on a lot of characters in early DS9 yet.
I don't think so. There's an early episode where Odo catches Quark in a lie because he mentioned Rom fixing something, and Odo says that Rom couldn't fix a bent straw.
I don't remember when it was decided that Rom was a mechanical whiz but it wasn't established from the beginning.
I don't remember when it was decided that Rom was a mechanical whiz but it wasn't established from the beginning.
This sounds like a setup for some fanfic to establish the complete backstory.
Maybe Rom went to night school? Maybe he realized Nog shouldn't learn more than he so he went to school like Nog?
Maybe Rom went to night school? Maybe he realized Nog shouldn't learn more than he so he went to school like Nog?
You're right that Rom was essentially rewritten. Dax was simply re-acted (because Terry Farrell is a weak actress, and never really knew what to do with the character.) You forgot Bashir, who was completely rewritten, going from being socially inept to being the most socially apt and witty character in the entire cast.
But you're wrong about everyone else - Odo and Dukat, like Kira, went through gradual and completely plausible character arcs. In fact, Odo's gradual shift is one of the most subtle and interesting acting displays in the franchise. It's completely believable. (And, by the way, when Odo says to Quark he has no interest in coupling, it clearly comes from a place of envy and loneliness, something that even Odo, at that point, is unaware of.)
I disagree with this. Bashir matured over this course of the show - he wasn't simply retconned into the character he was in the last few episodes of the series.
"Babel". Odo tracks the aphasia virus to a replicator Quark was using to fulfill his bar's orders.
Rom fulfilled the role in Ferengi culture of the dunce. He had gotten by just fine with that role for a long time, he had the protection of his savvy brother and all the benefits of that connection. All the had to do was to continue as Quark's dunce to make Quark look smart and keep wiping tables down. Having failed BIG TIME at the values that Ferengi hold dear finding this groove was a good thing for him, and he was almost knee jerk in that role. Don't be too smart, never smarter than Quark, don't show up the boss or anyone else for that matter and you will have a fairly cushy place in society under the benefaction of your brother.
But time spent around other species who did not see him as the dunce, for whom this role was not relevant enabled Rom to not be the dunce when he was around them. And finding a place in their social structure, not just Ferengi social structure gave him a different way of looking at himself and the freedom to pursue a role outside of the one he had been living. Eventually he has to make quite a dramatic break from his own society to leave behind the dunce role.
He wouldn't be the first person who finds a freedom in another culture they don't have at home.
No one knows for sure, because the writers are not forthcoming about this. They have made statements pretending that Rom was never dumb, yet the show clearly doesn't support their claims. Also, their claims ignore how the Rom character is presented in the early S1 episodes.
Rom started out as a generic talking head with average intelligence, then was re-written to be really dumb, then was re-written again to be really dumb but with engineering skills.
The only feasible answer is that these are writing mistakes that were made in large part because the writers were making the character up as they went along. But that doesn't explain why they thought he'd be a better character by making him dumb. Any answer to that would have to be speculation. I would guess that it's because being dumb gave him some uniqueness, but before he was dumb, he had nothing unique about him.
Or even before then, since he mentions having broken into Quarks "floor safe" while Quark was in the Gamma Quadrant.
Also, I'd say that Bashir was never socially inept. He was just overbearing and naive.
He talked too much which led people to try to avoid interacting with him: wouldn't that be inept?
To each their own. I don't get "envy and loneliness" from Odo in that scene, more of a sense of disdain.
Where you see believable character development, I see a change to make a character more agreeable and familiar to audiences.
As for Dukat, he went from a complex, layered character to a villainous cartoon.
I get the feeling that Rom was always smart, just in non-traditional ways, or at least ways that don't seem apparent because of his voice and demeanor. I'm reminded of one of the go-to scientist commentators on The Universe and he's got this huge naive streak to him, and he comes across as an unfocused doofus. But whenever he explains the phenomena through analogies and demonstrations (sometimes ridiculously), then you know why he's on the show.
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