Character Insight No. 263: Kelby

Welcome back to Character Insight!  This week, we review Kelby, a recurring character from the final season of Enterprise.

https://archive.org/details/CharacterInsightEp263

Commander Kelby served aboard Archer's Enterprise and was selected to take over the chief engineer position when Charles "trip" Tucker decided to leave for the same post on the Columbia.  However, this stint at chief engineer does not go well for Kelby.

Before Kelby can even get fully adjusted to the leadership role, a Klingon sabotage threat causes him to become overwhelmed.  Trip ends up needing to return to Enterprise to help purge a series of subroutines added to the control system by the Klingons that prevented Enterprise from dropping out of warp.  Trip then decides to stay on board to help out with repairs, and Kelby takes offense to this decision.

Over a couple episodes, we see Kelby and Tucker come to odds with one another over various situations in the engineering department.  This leads up to a fist fight in the episode Bound, when the pheromones produced by three Orion females on board the ship allows the frustrations of both characters to move to physical conflict.  As Kelby feared, Tucker does end up staying permanently as chief engineer following these events.

Kelby does remain on the engineering staff as a senior officer, and we see him later in the episode Terra Prime take over as acting chief when Tucker is kidnapped by the Terra Prime terrorist group.  Kelby is suspected of sabotaging a shuttlecraft in this episode on behalf of the terrorist group, but it is later discovered to be an ensign who took Kelby's role on the shuttlecraft team when Trip came back from the Columbia.  So in the end, Kelby remains a loyal crew member.

QUOTE (from Terra Prime)
Reed: On your feet, sir.  Shuttlepod One was sabotaged.  We nearly crashed!
Mayweather: Is this your signature?
Kelby: Yes. You think I had something to do with it?
Malcom: Is there any reason why we shouldn't.
Kelby: That's a shuttlepod maintenance log. Commander Tucker took me off that team when he returned from Columbia.

Kelby is one of those characters who briefly shows up in an arc of episodes, but has a well-developed story that adds to the tapestry for one of the main characters, in this case, Trip.  It's one advantage in character development and storytelling seen in the more modern Trek shows, as compared to the fully episodic earlier versions.

Commander Kelby was played by Derek Magyar.  He continues to act today, with mostly television series credits on his resume.  Other than Enterprise, his longest recurring roles have been on the soap Days of Our Lives, and on Boy Culture.  When not acting or directing in LA, he is an avid Dodgers fan.

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Character Insight No. 262: Azan and Rebi

Welcome back to Character Insight!  This week, we review Azan and Rebi, twins who were recurring characters on the latter seasons of Voyager.

https://archive.org/details/CharacterInsightEp262

In the episode Collective, Voyager discovers a Borg cube that is disabled with a pathogen, leaving only five drones in charge.  Voyager rescues these drones and Seven of Nine helps bring them back to individuality, including two twin children Azan and Rebi. 

After rescue, Azan is often seen in a blue shirt and brown overalls, while Rebi is in a red shirt and blue overalls, so they are kind of like an alien Mario and Luigi.  Interestingly, the outfit Rebi wears is the same one Jake Sisko wore in initial episodes of DS9, so that's an interesting legacy of costuming.

While on board, these two twins are only involved in a small handful of episodes and adventures.  One of these is caused by a power failure to the deck with the Borg regeneration alcoves, and Neelix has to keep them company by telling ghost stories.  In another episode, Voyager runs a science fair and the twins initially want to clone Naomi Wildman as their project.  Seven of Nine thankfully steps in and guides them to clone a potato instead.

QUOTE (from Child's Play)
Janeway: Why Potatoes?
Seven: They originally wanted to clone Naomi, but...

Azan and Rebi are Wysanti, and Voyager encounters their original people a few months after rescuing them from the cube.  These twins rejoin their people, along with Mezoti, who decides to help look out for the twins as they grow up in Wysanti culture.  One figures it will be an interesting life re-adjusting to the home culture, just like we saw for Seven.

Although some of the episodes featuring these characters felt a bit like late-season filler, the concept of repeating the success of saving drones from the Borg was a natural conclusion of stories that had stemmed all the way back to TNG.  Reclaiming drones from the Borg Collective is just one of the many ways the Federation gained the upper hand on one of their greatest adversaries.

Azan was played by Kurt Wetherill, who had limited child acting roles before becoming a cinematographer and production assistant from 2001-09.  His actual twin brother Cody Wetherill played Rebi, and Cody also followed a similar career path by working on many of the same projects as Kurt.  Little info can be found on Kurt online, but Cody is living a normal life in Portland Oregon now, as revealed by mother's day and golf outing pictures on Facebook.

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Character Insight No. 261: Ishka

Welcome back to Character Insight!  This week, we review Ishka, a recurring Ferengi character from Deep Space 9.

https://archive.org/details/CharacterInsightEp261
https://archive.org/details/CharacterInsightEp261

Ishka, also referred to as Moogie in the show, is the mother of Quark and Rom.  She was introduced in the episode Family Business, in which it is revealed that her business prowess was far superior to Quark and Rom's deceased father, so much so that she conducts many business transactions and accumulates more profit than Quark has in his entire lifetime, contrary to the social rules and norms of the Ferengi race.  She also does not buy into the other seemingly backwards Ferengi norms, like women always being naked and mothers chewing food for their children.

This interesting counter-culture take on Ferengi women was so successful that the character came back in a recurring role in a big way.  To this end, Ishka happens to fall in love with Grand Nagus of the Ferengi Zek, and she ends up assisting him with all business matters behind the scenes when he begins to lose his marbles.  It's as close as she could reasonably come to her dream of a female Grand Nagus, an interesting allegory to the leadership politics that continue to play out in the U.S. and other modern countries.

QUOTE (from Profit and Lace)
Ishka: "I predict that one day, a female will enter the Tower of Commerce, climb the forty flights of stairs to the Chamber of Opportunity, and take her rightful place as Grand Nagus of the Ferengi Alliance."

Based on Zek's love for this different woman and her influence, many cultural reforms were enacted during the waning days of Zek's tenure.  Thus, Ishka is a positive force for change in the Ferengi Alliance, and one of the most unique and interesting characters in a show with a lot of Ferengi stories.  In the final season of this show, she makes sure her son Rom takes over for Zek as Grand Nagus to assure that her reforms remain intact for many years to come.

The character of Ishka provided some real narrative punch that became a prime storyline for the Ferengi in DS9, while also serving as a good allegory or role model for those in oppressive situations.  That makes her one of the most influential characters of the series despite having only about 5 appearances.

Ishka's first appearance was played by actress Andrea Martin, and all further appearances were then played by Cecily Adams because Martin was no longer available.  Both these actresses were in the same age range or much younger than Quark's actor Armin Shimmerman, so both had to wear very heavy and elaborate prosthetics to show their higher ages.  Martin still acts and writes screenplays today, with recent appearances in Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Difficult People.  Adams was a successful acting coach until her untimely death at age 46 in 2004 of lung cancer, but her spirit may live on in her now 16-year old daughter Madeline Beaver, who is also pursuing acting.

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Contact me with segment suggestions @BuckeyeFitzy on Twitter! Thanks!