Synopsis: After being promoted, Captain Sisko and the crew of the Defiant are manipulated by a changeling in an effort to start a war.
This episode can be seen as a physical manifestation of Trickster-like energy and how it can relate to the compensatory aspects of the psyche, as another way in which the Logos-driven rational conscious ego can experience different bits of material from the Eros-driven irrational unconscious, to become stronger and the psyche more whole.
“The Adversary” begins with Benjamin Sisko being promoted from the rank of Commander to that of Captain, and at the same time, a changeling posing as an ambassador sends him and the crew of the Defiant on a false rescue mission. The changeling’s plan is that their presence will be seen as an act of war, which will weaken the Alpha Quadrant alliances in any efforts taken against the Dominion, which is ruled by the changelings. The plan is thwarted when Sisko threatens to destroy the Defiant rather than allow her to be used to start a war, forcing the hand of the changeling who is then destroyed at the hands of Odo, although he has never harmed another of his race.
Here the changeling posing as an ambassador, would represent Trickster-like energy. Not only did he not allow Sisko to become inflated by his newfound position, but he also created the circumstances by which Odo did something that his rational conscious ego would never have let him do, in an instinctive drive to save the crew. Trickster energy can promote transformation in the psyche, just as both Sisko and Odo are changed by the actions they were forced to make because of it.
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