#also as much as i usually hate that fucking hologram i do find vic's interactions with her kind of charming

[fatalism-and-villainy]

I actually love Ezri in “It’s Only a Paper Moon” - I think she handles the situation with Nog retreating into Vic’s hotel as best as she can, and is clearly trying to split the difference between giving Nog the time and space he needs and avoiding enabling a potentially destructive form of escapism. She asserts her authority with Vic (she does own herself, despite what Garak said before) but also is able to be strategic in her approach to him and convince him to get Nog out of there. Especially in this exchange:

I see. You’re going to get Sammy to convince him that it’s time to leave the holosuite. Oh, forget it. I should know better by now than to ask you to give away your secrets. You probably have the whole thing mapped out. I mean, what am I thinking? That this new casino is anything more than just a ploy? That you’d actually let him live out the rest of his life in a holosuite?

It’s odd to me that people interpret this face value, and assume that she’s truly and naively starstruck by Vic’s therapy skills. Because to me it seems very obviously designed to persuade Vic to go along with her belief that it’s time for Nog to leave. She’s trying to smooth things over with Vic after their prior argument, and does so by acknowledging the ways he’s genuinely been helping Nog, but she’s also strategically using those compliments to nudge him away from getting swept up in his adventures with Nog, and hint in the direction of “hey, remember we have an actual objective here that you’re possibly forgetting.” And her delivery of “that you’d actually let him live out the rest of his life in a holosuite” does contribute to that impression for me - it’s very pointed, and there’s a moment where her face slips and you can see her frustration coming through.

She is genuinely earnest and conciliatory in her dealings with people (and I don’t think she holds a grudge against Vic) but I think the seeming naivety on display is something she’s deliberately leaning into to smooth their interactions and avoid being too confrontational. And she shifts tack from demanding to talk to Nog to hinting to Vic that he needs to use his established dynamic with Nog to convince him, because she knows that’ll be more likely to get through to Nog.

(This is interesting to contemplate in relation to what we see of her family dynamic in the next episode, because so much of her mother’s controlling tendencies are expressed through these very pointed compliments that are used to project her wishes and expectations onto others. Obviously Ezri doesn’t have the same abusive tendencies, but it does seem possible that she picked up some of those interpersonal habits from her home life and uses them for more collaborative forms of persuasion.)

And Ezri is completely right! Because that conversation with Vic is the catalyst for him confronting Nog and forcing a reality check on him, which in turn prompts Nog to finally voice his feelings and acknowledge that he’s not okay. (And Vic echoes Ezri saying the new casino is just a ruse when he tells Nog that the casino is “just a fantasy”.) She handled the situation and anticipated what Nog needed entirely correctly.

I would have liked to see more direct interactions between Ezri and Nog, and would have much preferred if he’d been able to eventually open up to her instead. But within the episode we have, I think she's pretty competent.