Ro Laren, Kira Nerys, and how Nana Visitor (probably) changed everything.

First of all, I write this with deep affection and respect for Ro Laren. Because Ro Laren is important for a lot of reasons. Her arc is one of coming to terms with trauma. She is a ferocious, rule-breaking woman whose rule-breaking we are meant not only to empathize with but, ultimately, to esteem. (I’m trying to avoid spoilers here for my brand-new Trekster friend, but y’all know what I’m talking about.) But Ro Laren is also representative of an archetype of Tough Girls on television, especially in genre shows: so powerfully repressed that she can’t access her own emotions or forge adequate relationships. (That said, two important things that TNG does better than most: one, the person who helps Ro to resolve some of this is GUINAN, not some pushy dude-romantic-interest; and two, ‘Pre-emptive Strike’ is so intelligently the story of her learning this about herself and finding a path appropriate to herself.)

Now. It seems clear to me that the pilot of DS9 was written with Forbes’ (very brilliant) portrayal of Ro in mind. If you’re familiar with Ro, when you first meet Kira, gesticulating and shouting in Sisko’s office, Nana Visitor can come off as an incompetent ham. What the hell is this woman doing, I thought, the first time I saw ‘Emissary.’ Where’s Ro Laren? I miss Ro Laren. This lady’s overselling it, throwing a fit instead of seething at a low burn like she’s supposed to.

Because the pilot was written for Ro Laren, but Nana Visitor was already playing Kira Nerys. I have no way of knowing what went on in the minds of DS9’s writers and directors, or between them and Nana, in those early days. But I would be willing to bet cold hard latinum that they saw her explode into a role that had been written for repression and bitterness, and crafted the character to follow accordingly.

And that gift of Nana’s for a controlled performance of wild, complicated, sometimes self-contradicting emotion is what makes Kira Nerys as important as she is.

And Kira Nerys is important because she breaks the mold in which Ro Laren is stuck. Kira Nerys is a Tough Girl who shoots first and asks questions later, who’s all instinct, all impulse, and who is also entirely, availably emotional. And that part of her, the part of her that’s all feeling, is seen by the other characters and by the frame of the show as her strength. ‘Her presence,’ as Terry Farrell put it, ‘is her strength.’ You just do not see that on TV, that combination of toughness with feeling. (The sole other example I can think of is late-series Gabrielle of Xena: Warrior Princess.)

She also gets to have powerful, healthy relationships. Lots of them. Friends and mentors and lovers and co-workers and mentees, with whom she lives and learns. The key example, I think, is the evolution of her relationship with Sisko over the course of the first season. Sisko sees just how volatile she is, just how impulsive, and he trusts and respects her for it. Even when he knows she’s wrong – and she often is, those early days – he lets her play it out, whatever it is, lets her learn on her own terms, and never forces her hand. (Again, trying to avoid even minor spoilers, but see my ‘soph rewatches ds9’ tag for some recent installments in my incoherent thoughts on this.) 

She is a survivor of trauma, not a captive to it. This is the most important thing about Kira, and the rarest thing in women on television. No matter how much she loses – and she loses so much, over and over – she continues to grow, to be in feeling and in relationship in ways that allow her to grow, to survive in the fullest sense of the term.

And I think it’s all down to that explosiveness of Nana Visitor’s in the pilot. She took the frame she’d been given, and she broke it open into something new and revolutionary. I have never really been one to fangirl actors, but Nana Visitor is the one I truly want to meet in real life, if only to say: ‘Thank you. You made it possible for me to stop apologizing for being intense and emotional.’ I think she made that possible for a lot of women. I can’t begin to measure the value of that.