8 Star Trek Characters Who Are Master Manipulators

The Star Trek universe is filled with all manner of personalities. These individuals are some of the franchise’s master manipulators.

Highlights

• Vash is a skilled archaeologist and profiteer who manipulates others using her charms to acquire valuable artifacts. Her deceitful actions have caused her to be banned from different planets.
• Quark is an opportunistic Ferengi businessman who never lets a good opportunity for profit go to waste. He doesn’t shy away from using manipulation and the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition to get what he wants.
• Harcourt Fenton Mudd is known as a notorious swindler and con man, Mudd uses deception and manipulation to further his criminal schemes. His exploits have earned him a bounty and a reputation that attracts other citizens of the galaxy.

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While the USS Enterprise and the United Federation of Planets uphold their missions to boldly go where no man has gone before, the crews of various ships and space stations across the Star Trek series have encountered their fair share of charismatic characters. Aside from daily interactions between captains and their crew, these new faces bring an element of unpredictability throughout the Star Trek franchise.

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Unfortunately, certain characters in the series are notorious for being master manipulators, capable of bending others to their will using various methods. However, while many of these master manipulators tend to be some of the franchise’s most compelling villains, other manipulators in the cast have delighted audiences as background characters or even as part of their respective series’ protagonists.

1 Vash

Will Choose Profit Over Science Any Time

Known initially as one of Captain Jean-Luc Picard’s former love interests in The Next Generation, the attractive Vash is primarily known for being a skilled archeologist. However, unbeknownst to others, Vash is more notorious for being a vicious profiteer. While fans got to know Vash’s capabilities of using her charms to distract and manipulate Picard and even the Ferengi Sovak to acquire the Tox Uthat artifact, the archeological community is more than displeased with Vash’s exploits. Not only was her membership of the Daystrom Institute Archeological Council suspended twice, but her actions caused her to be banned across different planets.

Vash’s penchant for deceit to gain profit isn’t always demonstrated in the series, but it’s enough to pique the attention of the omniscient Q and even attract Quark from the space station Deep Space Nine. This relationship was highlighted in “Q-Less” of DS9, where Vash knew just how to manipulate the Ferengi Quark into helping her sell her recent acquisition of illegal artifacts.

2 Quark

Always Grabs The Opportunity To Make A Profit

Never one to let a good opportunity go to waste, Quark is known throughout the series as a Ferengi who will run someone’s coffers dry given the chance – and as Ferengi Rules of Acquisition dictates. Nothing is done for free when it comes to Quark, always ensuring that things he does are done for his self-interest. While not a treacherous character, Quark is an opportunistic businessman willing to trade in illegal goods and even throw his business partners under the bus if it meant securing profit.

Most Ferengi-centric episodes of Deep Space Nine involve Quark capitalizing on a situation to provide him with some kind of profit, with “The Magnificent Ferengi” perhaps a highlight of his skills. While essentially an episode where Quark gathers the station’s resident Ferengi to rescue his mother, the episode embodies what Quark does best. On top of withholding information about a reward, Quark is forced to use the Ferengi’s skills in negotiation and individual strengths to outsmart the station’s Dominion occupation.

3 Harcourt Fenton Mudd

Notorious Swindler And Con-Man

Very few Star Trek characters outside Starfleet have regular appearances across the series, with Harcourt Fenton Mudd gracing three series of the space opera with nothing but trouble to offer. Nothing of note has been stated of Mudd’s past, except that he said he’s been “screwed over” since birth so his schemes’ prizes were deservedly his. Aside from a failed romance with Stella, the daughter of arms dealer Baron Grimes, not much is known of Mudd’s personal life.

However, Starfleet does have quite a record of Mudd’s exploits. Even as he managed to get together with the woman of his dreams, “The Escape Artist” of Short Treks stated Mudd left her to pursue a life of crime and made a rap sheet that earned him a bounty of 100,000 Credits. Mudd was such an opportunist that he even used this to his advantage, luring bounty hunters with lookalike androids to swindle them of the reward. While Mudd couldn’t outwit Starfleet officers, his notoriety meant other citizens of the galaxy hadn’t been so lucky.

4 Khan Noonien Singh

The Best Of Earth’s Tyrants, The Enterprise’s Most Dangerous Adversary, A Temporal Point Of Interest

Despite the infamy of Khan Noonien Singh even among temporal agents from the future, not much is known about the iconic Star Trek villain’s history. A byproduct of Project Khan, the Star Trek villain was considered an Augment, a modified human with a stronger body and immense analytical capabilities. Even among Augments who amassed power in the 1990s as Earth’s leaders, Khan was considered the planet’s “best tyrant” before he and his fellow supermen were deposed and exiled.

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After his rediscovery by the Enterprise in “Space Seed” of The Original Series, Khan instinctively attempts to take over the ship through his charm and manipulation. Even after being exiled for a second time by his new rival Captain James Kirk, Khan manages to manipulate members of the traveling USS Reliant into allowing him to hijack their ship for his quest for vengeance. While Khan eventually dies in The Wrath of Khan, Starfleet still considers Khan the deadliest enemy the Enterprise had faced – to the point where temporal agents would try to manipulate Khan’s relationship with the past to manipulate the future.

5 Benjamin Sisko

Willing To Risk The Lives Of Billions On A Bluff, Unorthodox Leadership Style

Unlike the more honorable Picard or the adventurous Kirk, Commander Benjamin Sisko is known for his pragmatism bordering on ruthlessness. As Commander of DS9, Sisko is not above using bribery and extortion, or even working his way around Starfleet orders if he thinks certain methods can still achieve things more efficiently. Sisko’s use of ruthless manipulation is seen in “For The Uniform,” where he chases the traitorous Michael Eddington of the Maquis and attempts to save Cardassian colonies from being attacked.

Since Eddington taunts Sisko by comparing himself to Val Jean and Sisko to Javert, Sisko manipulates the former into a surrender by a “villainous” act. In the episode, Sisko threatens to poison a Maquis colony just like what Eddington has been doing to the Cardassians, stating he will do the same to other Maquis colonies if Eddington doesn’t surrender. Eddington attempts to call Sisko’s bluff, only to surrender when Sisko deploys poison in the atmosphere and forces the Maquis to evacuate.

6 Elim Garak

Tailor On The Outside, Exiled Assassin On The Inside

When it comes to manipulators in Star Trek lore, Elim Garak comes to mind simply by his very nature. While at first a seemingly simple tailor and owner of Garak’s Clothiers, higher-ups in DS9 would eventually discover his dark past: a former member and assassin of the Cardassian’s Obsidian Order. In turn, Elim is trained in the art of subterfuge and espionage, willing to kidnap, torture, and even kill to achieve his goals.

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Part and parcel of his objectives is the constant misdirection of DS9 staff on the many truths surrounding his past. In “The Wire” of the Deep Space Nine series, he’s told at least three different stories of what led to his exile, all of them seemingly half-truths. Another demonstration of Garak’s talents would be “In The Pale Moonlight” where, in Sisko’s desperate attempt to get the Romulans to aid the Federation and the Klingons against the Dominion, not only did he forge information but he also bombed a Romulan senator’s shuttle as insurance – all to ensure the Romulans join the Dominion War.

7 Winn Adami

Willing To Throw People Under The Bus For Her Ambitions

The series Deep Space Nine shows how Winn Adami demonstrates the folly of using one’s faith to further one’s ambitions. It’s speculated that her opposition to the Federation’s new school wasn’t just to encourage anti-Starfleet sentiments, but also to make room for the assassination of her rival to the Kai position, Vedek Bareilk. She also conspired with Jaro Essa to install him as the Bajoran’s new leader in exchange for her being Kai, only to throw him under the bus when it’s discovered he was helped by Cardassians, the Bajoran’s former enslavers.

Even Winn secured the Kai position through manipulation, threatening to soil the beloved late Kai Opaka’s name as leverage to force Bareil to drop out of the race. Despite more of the series showing Winn’s depths of treachery, “Life Support” shows how Winn weasels her way in and out of things, even at the cost of others. When her negotiations with the Cardassians were too much for her to handle, she let the qualified Bareil manage to handle the treaty, only to claim credit for herself when the latter died of injuries.

8 Seska

Used Her Child To Blackmail Their Potential Fathers

Introduced in the Voyager series as a former love interest and subordinate of Chakotay, events while being aboard the USS Voyager forced Seska into admitting her true nature: a Cardassian Union spy tasked to infiltrate the Maquis and leak their secrets. Seska’s disdain over Starfleet policies made her ally with the Kazon, a warrior species native to the Delta Quadrant. Seska tapped into the thirst for power of her new mate, the Kazon sect leader Culluh, to secure a foothold in the unknown Delta Quadrant.

It’s in her ark with Chakotay where Seska shows just how manipulative she can get. She managed to steal Chakotay’s DNA after successfully predicting his presence in a retrieval mission for a Voyager part she stole. After using this DNA to impregnate herself, she told both Chakotay and Culluh that they were the fathers of the child she was carrying, emotionally blackmailing them into doing her bidding. Even in her last appearances in the two-part “Basics” season finale and premiere, Seska had planned to use her child to rope both father figures to do what she wanted.

Star Trek

Created by Gene Roddenberry Latest Film Star Trek Beyond Latest TV Show Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Creation Year 1966

Fuente: successacademy.edu.vn
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