SOLAR SISTERS - THE NEW BREED OF STAR TREK WOMEN
                         ARE CONFIDENT, COURAGEOUS & COMMANDING
	                 (by Michael Logan - TV Week magazine)
  They are the "Star Trek" women of the '90s --- hear them roar!  Back
in the free-love '60s, most of the females on Gene Roddenberry's classic
sci-fi series were busty bombshells wearing micro-minis and beehive
hairdos.  With the Reagan-era '80s came "Star Trek: The Next Generation",
the most acclaimed and intellectually challenging of the Trek series, 
yet one populated with docile women who were medics and shrinks --- in
other words, caregivers to the male crew members of Starfleet.  But as
the new millennium approaches, it's interesting to note that every single
one of the female regulars on the two current series --- the syndicated
"Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" and "Star Trek: Voyager" --- is strong,
smart, complicated and commanding.  And they can kick your keister from
here to Ursa Minor.
  "We are not Stepford women in space," says actress Terry Farrell, who
plays "DS9" science officer Jadzia Dax.  "We're proud, and we've really
got it together, and I'm thrilled that little girls can tune in and see
that."  Farrell's character is a Trill --- a joined species comprising
a 356-year-old symbiont worm encased in the body of a young female host.
The resulting new life-form still carries the personalities and memories
of the worm's previous seven hosts, some of them male, and is arguably
the most provocative, dizzyingly layered role ever created for a
television actress.
  "Until "DS9" came along, the other parts available to me required little
more preparation than working out my bod," says Farrell, who made her
TV debut in the 1984 fleshy nighttime soap "Paper Dolls".  "To be cast
as Dax was overwhelming.  This part worked out my brain."
  The highly hyped arrival of Jeri Ryan as "Voyager's" drop-dead gorgeous
Seven of Nine, who is part human and part evil cybernetic Borg, brought
the show its best ratings since its phenomenal premiere January 1995.  
"It's so refreshing to play something other than a doormat, the victim,
or the leading man's girlfriend," says Ryan, who is not remotely apologetic
about her overtly steamy character --- or her seemingly sprayed-on,
Barbarella-esque wardrobe.  "She's sexy but not a sexpot," notes Ryan.
"And there is no reason sexy women should always play the bimbos.  
Intelligence comes in every possible physical package, and it's time
we show that."
  She credits much of the success of Seven to "Voyager" executive producer
Jeri Taylor, the only woman ever to earn a top command position on a 
"Star Trek" series.  Says Ryan: "I'm not suggesting that the male execs
would run wild and create sexpots all over the place if left unsupervised
by Jeri, but having a woman's presence has made a big difference."
  Taylor, who co-created "Voyager" with Rick Berman and Michael Pillar,
is a former housewife who joined the 'Trek' universe in 1990.  "I have
always been protective of the image of women," she says.  "I did what I
could to shore up Deanna Troi [Marina Sirtis] and Beverly Crusher [Gates
McFadden] on "TNG" and move them beyond their caregiver roles --- sending
them on more away teams, for example.  But I never had to fight Rick 
Berman about it.  He felt exactly the same way."
  Berman, executive producer of all three 'Trek' spin-offs and the
official keeper of the Roddenberry flame, bristles at any condemnation
of the female image as portrayed on "TNG".  "The show was never conceived
by Gene to only have caregiver women," he says.  "It just turned out that
way.  People forget that we started out with Denise Crosby as Tasha Yar,
who was a real kick-ass security officer.  No one expected the actress
to leave during the first season, so the fact that the two caregivers
were the ones who remained was coincidental."  Still, no effort was made
over "TNG's" seven-year run to replace Tasha with a similarly powerful
female.  "True," concedes Berman, "and when it came time for us to create
"DS9" and "Voyager", we didn't want to make that mistake again."
  But don't accuse him of caving into pressure.  "We are not doing
anything because we have to," Berman insists.  "Nobody said to us, 'You
can't have mindless women on your shows.'  It just doesn't occur to us,
any more than it would to have mindless men."  Still, one must ask: What
took so long for the tide to turn, especially in such a progressive, 
high-minded format as 'Trek'?  
  Opines Taylor: "I'd like to think it's about enlightenment, but the
skeptic in me suspects that television is always looking for that which
it hasn't done before.  Traditionally, women have not been action figures
on TV, so that's why we're seeing it now.  But does the motivation really
matter?  It's a good, healthy idea whose time has come."
  She gets no argument from Nana Visitor.  The "DS9" actress plays tough
cookie Kira Nerys, a former Bajoran freedom fighter who gave birth last
season to a surrogate child.  "What's remarkable is that we are using a
futuristic setting to reflect on the lives of contemporary women," says
Visitor.  "A baby in one arm and a phaser in the other is an analogy a
lot of women today understand perfectly."
  But longtime feminist Kate Mulgrew isn't doing cartwheels just yet.
"TV women may finally be stepping up to the plate, but the game has
barely begun," says Mulgrew, who, as "Voyager's" Kathryn Janeway, is
the first woman ever to captain a 'Trek' series.  "The public still 
wants to see female sexuality paraded.  I'm about as far, looks-wise, 
as our society is willing to go where a commanding heterosexual female
is concerned.  I don't think you're going to see a 200-pound, plain-
looking woman in a position of command on "Star Trek" or anywhere else."
  Curiously, romance has also been slow to take hold on these shows. 
In a recent "DS9" episode, Dax wed her grinch-like Klingon boyfriend,
Worf (Michael Dorn).  It's the first marriage between two major characters
in the entire 31-year history of the 'Trek' franchise.  Notes "DS9's"
executive producer, Ira Steven Behr: "Captain Kirk was a swinging '60s
bachelor --- that was the point of the show --- so it was never going
to happen there.  And I don't think the "TNG" characters were ever truly
developed enough to get to the level of a marriage or even heavy dating.
But with "DS9", which is a much more character-driven series, it just
seems like a natural outgrowth."
  And only now is love blossoming on "Voyager" --- a little odd, considering
that the crew has been lost in space for three years and would presumably,
at this point, be regarding each other with acute interest.  "The audience
is just salivating --- they've been waiting for dinner just a little too
long," says Roxann Dawson, whose hotheaded character, chief engineer 
B'Elanna Torres, has become romantically involved with the show's resident
heartthrob, Tom Paris (Robert Duncan McNeill).  "If something hadn't 
happened to somebody this season," she says, "we'd all have to be proclaimed
saints or eunuchs."  But sex scenes proved tricky for Dawson, who was in
her third trimester of pregnancy when the season began last fall.  "Because
of my stomach, Robert and I could barely kiss!"
  Neither will Janeway be doing the wild thing, if Mulgrew has anything
to say about it.  Both the actress, who has been adamantly opposed to a
romance for her character, and the "Voyager" writing staff have been
vilified by a growing contingent of female viewers who want the noticeable
sexual tension between the captain and her first officer, Chakotay (Robert
Beltran), to trigger some bedroom action.
  "There seems to be a great desire among female viewers to see their 
heroines romantically engaged, and some of them resent that I'm so ardently
against it," says Mulgrew.  "I find it surprising that they cannot clearly
see that Janeway already has a very full plate.  There is little time
for a breath, much less a sex life.  Let's face it: 'Trek' has never been
famous for romance.  It cannot become the essence of our sci-fi show any
more than it should become the essence of a medical show like "ER"."
  Other viewers, though few of them male, have complained about Seven,
citing the curvaceous character as a sexist attempt to attract the 
"Baywatch" demographic.
  "We have nothing to apologize for," insists co-creator Taylor.  "Sure,
we could have put Seven in some dumpy outfit, but what would be served
by that?  Would a few militant feminists have like it better?  Maybe.
But Jeri Ryan has a spectacular body, and I was very happy to say, 'Let
people see it'."
  "Besides," Taylor says, "dodging fan bullets comes with the paycheque.
You learn to take it in stride.  "Star Trek" is always under fire for
something.  If we were the kind of people who ran scared of criticism,
we'd have gone away a long time ago."
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