Synopsis: Odo falls in love with a beautiful woman who arrives on Deep Space Nine under mysterious circumstances.
This episode can be seen as an illustration of how individuals fall in love, by projecting their own inner ideal other onto the beloved.
In “A Simple Investigation” a beautiful woman, Arissa, comes to Deep Space Nine. Odo, the security chief, falls for her not realizing that she is attached to the Orion Syndicate, which she is risking her life trying to leave. She is to meet an Idanian, Tauvid Rem, who has something for her. He is killed before he can give it to her. However, Arissa does acquire the object, a crystal. She tells Odo the truth and Odo gives the crystal to Lt. Commander Jadzia Dax and Chief Miles O’Brien to try to decode. Meanwhile, Odo keeps Arissa safe in his quarters and they become romantically involved. Before Dax and O’Brien can access the information on the crystal, two Idanians come to the station and tell Odo that Arissa is an intelligent agent and does not know that because her real identity is what is on the crystal. When her true identity is revealed, Arissa tells Odo that she has a husband and Odo says that he fell in love with a woman who didn’t exist.
In this episode, when Odo tells Arissa that he fell in love with a woman who doesn’t exist, he is actually expressing what happens in the beginning every time an individual falls in love. Carl (C. G.) Jung called this process projection. When we are immediately attracted to someone, it is because they seem to match the image of the ideal inner mate that we all have inside ourselves. When that person accepts the projection of this inner ideal other, romance can ensue. But at some point, if this is to become a stronger and truer relationship, the projection will have to be dropped so that individuals can be seen for who they really are, rather than what we want them to be.
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