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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Willie the Duck" data-source="post: 9594181" data-attributes="member: 6799660">{'IMO' of course}Bashir and O'Brien fit very well as the stereotypical roommates/buddy cops who act like an old married couple and may in some ways be a metaphor for marriage, but aren't really a romantic dynamic (exemplified by The Odd Couple and spoofed by Scrubs). Bashir and Garak fit* much better as a subtle romance story. Garak is the not-so-closeted gay character, while Bashir vacillates between straight object of desire, closeted, and doesn't-realize-they're-gay** characterization, depending on when in the series we're discussing. I know they  (the actors) kinda stumbled into it when they realized that Bashir had no chemistry with Terry Farrell***'s Jadzia Dax but did have it with Garak. Also that as they ratcheted it up, Berman and Behr caught on and told them to tone it down. It's interesting to see them work within the confines of what they could get away with. *And of course all this is subtextual, done more by the actors than the showrunners, and in no way official (but that works for a gay love story in the 90s). **Another very 90s trope. ***side note: if you can find the footage of Farrell as a gender-swapped The Cat in the aborted American re-make of Red Dwarf's pilot-reshoot, it is well worth your time.While I love the Bashir/Garak dynamic for its transgressive qualities and the work-within-limits aesthetic, I kinda still the Bashir/O'Brien vibes more. Perhaps because tv and movies so often does male friendships so poorly, or maybe it's just a subtextual gay romance is superseded at this point. Either way, they make a great male buddy pair.</blockquote>

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