Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

How do?

Yes, it’s another poorly conceived and somewhat daft comment from the foetid quagmire that is my Brian.

So, lots of us love Star Trek. And why not. Sure when it’s having an off day it’s pretty awful. But when it’s good, it’s so damned good.

And within that canon, there are named characters that keep getting the poopy end of the stick. Which means, for the purposes of this thread, no nominating Ensign Anonymous in his rather dashing red shirt. Named characters only, regardless of how many episodes they appeared in. If they had a name badge (thank you, Nigel Powers), they’re fair game.

I’ll kick you off with oh loooooook! The lowest of low hanging fruit.

First? Miles O’Brien. No matter what he does, no matter his staggering competence at his job, the Galaxy does conspire to ensure ‘O’Brien Must Suffer’. And when you follow his story across TNG and DS9, he really doesn’t deserve it. At all. He’s a thoroughly decent bloke and a very excellent Dad.

Second? Poor Old Harry Kim. The Eternal Ensign. He Who Shall Not Be Promoted.

I mean, jeez. Even Worf, who disobeys orders and does actual bad murders. Multiple of them. And he still earned greater rank.

Harry Kim? Cack as Voyager was, it’s his lack of career progression that irks me. He started off perfectly competent, and only got better. But would Captain Buttmunch give him a break? Nope!

How. How can you find your crew thrust into untold adversity, watch them all pull together, and then utterly fail to offer promotion? Surely Voyager should’ve ended up with a Command Staff of grizzled veterans?

And it’s not as if Harry doesn’t suffer in ways that might make O’Brien wince? Sure, it’s not as often, but still.

Here, I can’t put a Rizla between them. So debate that, but don’t forget to throw in your own nominees!

Data’s cat. He never once got to go outside.

Pfffffrrrrtttttt.

Evil Cats don’t count.


Only Doggos, like Porthos count.

In fact, maybe it sucks to be Porthos the most? Having to do a live in the worst series ever?

Right. New rule. Can’t be a pet.

Porthos got to go where no dog has gone before, so he had it pretty good, actually.

No pets count!

As you were.

Barkley. Literally everything sucks for him.

Worf actually has it pretty bad as well. Whenever the writers need to show how badass the antagonist of the week is, Worf gets beat up.

O'Brien is the unluckiest Irishman ever, though.

Sucks to be? Every red shirt guy.

Quark has to be the most unlucky Ferangi! He started DS9 as a bar owner on a spacestation - he ended the series as a bar owner on a spacestation, in the very same bar! Basically he didn't profit nor grow his position!

He even could have become Grand Nagus (actually he was for a time) and gave it up. He basically hasn't made huge profits in any way shape nor form; indeed most of his big profit ideas backfired on him very fast.


And yet he had all the opportunities; the Grand Nagus is in love with his mother etc....





Of course we always saw his people-person side of him. Indeed in many ways whilst he was raised a true Ferangi, its clear that profit wasn't really the only thing in his heart. So within the context of a purist Ferangi he had seriously bad luck; he had great luck in many other respects. Heck through him and his family he's been part of the biggest social changes his people have had in likely millennia.

didn't Harry die at some point and get replaced by a t'other universe Harry ? Maybe Mrs Columbo was biased against folks from other universes

Sucks to be ... anyone in a blue uniform. To quote SFDebris’ review of First Contact, “I only wanted to study comets!” and now all those unfortunate xenobotanists, astrographers and linguists are getting assimilated by the Borg or blown up by jem’Hadar.

Jake and Kassidy got screwed over by the Prophets, now I come to think of it. And the Ocampa for having such a terrible life cycle. The entire species must’ve been terrible people in a prior life. Perhaps they’re all reincarnations of Neelix.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
Perhaps they’re all reincarnations of Neelix.

This is one thing I really don't get. Why all the hate for Neelix? Everyone treats him like he's the Jar Jar Binks of Star Trek or something. I personally enjoyed his character on the show. He was always cheerful despite the bad situations Voyager and its crew found themselves in. And the interplay between him and Tuvok was often fairly entertaining, seeing as Neelix was perhaps the one person who could almost get an emotional response from the stoic Tuvok (like when he and that Klingon woman had a "romantic evening" in Tuvok's quarters!).

Personally he's probably my favorite character on the show after The Doctor.

Sorry for the off topic rant, but I had to get that off my chest.

Neelix was responsible for a lot of Voyager’s problems, starting with “Get this cheese to sickbay.” SF Debris (I think it was them) had a pretty good summary on how many lives Neelix’s lies cost.

On the other hand, nBSG’s Starbuck got a lot of innocent people killed and the fans never seemed to hold it against her.

 ZergSmasher wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
Perhaps they’re all reincarnations of Neelix.

This is one thing I really don't get. Why all the hate for Neelix? Everyone treats him like he's the Jar Jar Binks of Star Trek or something. I personally enjoyed his character on the show. He was always cheerful despite the bad situations Voyager and its crew found themselves in. .

That's part of the problem. His cheerfulness comes across as blank stupidity, and he doesn't really have a direction, goals or a character arc.
They let him tag along on the idea that he's a native guide (despite actively deceiving the crew multiple times with false pretenses and agendas), but he doesn't seem to know very much beyond food and they quickly move outside his local knowledge of space and species.

Of course the real bell around his neck is he's functionally a pedo until his victim gets tired of him, and wanders off for other relationships and then ascension.
Yes, yes, weird aging rates, but... she's two. And ridiculously sheltered, and its really creepy and inexplicably gets a pass.

Everyone in Discovery except Burnham and Tilly

That horrible dawning awareness that nothing you say or do matters, that one of the two above is better than you at everything you do and will not heistate to tell you so......... and everyone in the universe only really cares about the existance of Burnham.

All those yong woman that lusted after Spock.....

 Overread wrote:
Quark has to be the most unlucky Ferangi! He started DS9 as a bar owner on a spacestation - he ended the series as a bar owner on a spacestation, in the very same bar! Basically he didn't profit nor grow his position!

He even could have become Grand Nagus (actually he was for a time) and gave it up. He basically hasn't made huge profits in any way shape nor form; indeed most of his big profit ideas backfired on him very fast.

It is like the universe plays Quark's suffering for laughs. Miles and Harry mostly suffer for drama.

How about Hugh Borg?

OK Hugh, we’ve cut you loose from the Hive Mind that’s been all you’ve ever really known.

LATERS, LOL!

*roll credits*

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
Sucks to be ... anyone in a blue uniform. To quote SFDebris’ review of First Contact, “I only wanted to study comets!” and now all those unfortunate xenobotanists, astrographers and linguists are getting assimilated by the Borg or blown up by jem’Hadar.

I think all of the 'non-career military' side of Starfleet have a hard time - wasn't there a researcher in Voyager who was only meant to be on the ship for a few weeks but ended up stuck in the Delta Quadrant for years?

Remember, named characters only!

Sacrificial Redshirts are allowed, provided they’re actually given a name prior to, I dunno, getting bummed off a shapeshifting, salt vampire made out of concrete that also gives your descendants piles.

I always felt sad for TNG Tasha Jar. It's not that much of onscreen suffering, but I personally liked her as kind of tough security chief and then she is killed of by a Sheliak (was it called that way?) in some random episode without any meaning to her death. For me personally it always felt like "What? Couldn't you use a redshirt to show how evil that thing is?" If they wanted to replace her I think she would have deserved to at least heroically give her live to save the crew or a planet or something.

[Edit: honestly it's been years... decades since I saw this episode, so if my memory is clouded I beg your forgivness]

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
Porthos got to go where no dog has gone before, so he had it pretty good, actually.

And he got cheese (even though he wasn't supposed to)!

Tasha was a big shame to lose as I felt she brought something to the series none of the other characters had, which was a dark past. Almost all the others (even worf) had a fairly nice upbringing. They grew up on stable worlds with a stable life and generally lived pretty good at least what we'd consider "middle class" to upper class lives.

Tasha was basically a street rat saved by the Federation. It gave her a slightly more mature angle and a fresh take on the world. I think her developing things like a relationship with Data and more were big steps, especially for the time in which TNG was going out (and remembering this was early season stuff).


I don't think we ever really got a character like her again until Kira in DS9.

That’s true.

I feel that in terms of narrative potential Worf turned out more interesting.

But given we can’t know what didn’t happen? Could be that we saw some of DS9’s ‘sure, we’ve created paradise, shame about everyone else’ perspective in TNG. Could’ve been an interesting voice of dissent among the command staff.

Still, at least she chose to leave, unlike Dr Crusher. How they thought Pulaski would be better, I don’t know. As ever, not knocking the actress, just the show runners.

beast_gts wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
Sucks to be ... anyone in a blue uniform. To quote SFDebris’ review of First Contact, “I only wanted to study comets!” and now all those unfortunate xenobotanists, astrographers and linguists are getting assimilated by the Borg or blown up by jem’Hadar.

I think all of the 'non-career military' side of Starfleet have a hard time - wasn't there a researcher in Voyager who was only meant to be on the ship for a few weeks but ended up stuck in the Delta Quadrant for years?

There was. I can't remember his name. Not even sure if he ever actually got seen on screen, it might have been a throwaway line from Janeway?

Chief of secuurity Tasha Yar in Star Trek Next Generation. She get's worfed harder than any worf before or after her.

epronovost wrote:
Chief of secuurity Tasha Yar in Star Trek Next Generation. She get's worfed harder than any worf before or after her.

Yeah, she got screwed over hard in two different timelines, not counting the rough time she had growing up.

On a lighter note, what about Riker? He was supposed to be the ladies man of the show, but Picard got more action than he did.

I have a pet theory that starfleet really only exists to push all the super ambitious and driven people off of earth. In a post scarcity world, why have a bunch of try hards running around? Give them a uniform and a gun and ships with laughably lax safety protocols, and let them be heroes while everyone else just writes poetry or cooks Cajun food.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
but Picard got more action than he did.

On that point - what about Nella Daren? She got her dream job (Head of Department on the Enterprise) and found her perfect man (Picard) but had to leave because neither of them could act in a professional manner.

Gul Dukat. Tenatious, resourceful, erudite; there was a lot to love about the character. Of course as a 'baddie' he was never destined to win, but the writers really seemed to take pleasure in torturing him.
Multiple major career setbacks, disowned by his family and Cardassian society, daughter murdered by his closet friend, driven to madness by the last minute frustration of his plans by space magic and to top it off he wasn't even allowed to die in the service of his beloved Cardassia, being trapped for all eternity with Bajoran space ghosts! Now that's a bad day at the office...

Sucks to be Odo.

Raised apart from his people, forever 'alone' and not really able to emotionally connect with people and takes up a security position on space station where he's at least effective and respected. Then he finally finds his species and it turns out they're sitting atop an empire by using purpose engineered supersoldiers as cannon fodder that decide they need to 'conquer' his adoptive home, which is a functioning (if not perfect) utopia that could have actually accepted his species for what they were (because the Federation has been shown working with at least one species capable of effective shapeshifting in that TNG episode where Wesley falls in puppy love with one).