Garak was initially intended by actor Andrew Robinson to be omnisexual. Indeed, Garak’s first encounter with Bashir is very clearly sexually charged, which Robinson has stated was intentional. Though the pair would eventually become good friends, his primary interest in Bashir at the outset was sexual. That aspect of the character was eventually dropped for some disappointingly cowardly reasons.
The idea of a queer character on a Star Trek show was routinely vetoed by executive producer Rick Berman. Berman believed any hint of non-heterosexuality on Star Trek would have alienated a significant portion of the franchise’s fan base across America in the '90s. It’s an unsurprisingly reductive point of view, especially for a franchise as famous for its progressive politics and social messaging as Star Trek. It also flies in the face of the views of Star Trek franchise creator Gene Roddenberry, who was advocating for LGBT representation by the early days of Star Trek: The Next Generation in the late '80s.
The Garak -> Bashir -> O’Brien -> Keiko -> Worf -> Jadzia -> Kira -> Odo -> Changeling Orgy love polygon (polyline? graph?). Truly a classic. Everybody is doing it and nobody is happy.
The term I’ve used for graphs of poly relationships is “polycule” because they look a lot like chemical diagrams: Multiple nodes connected in different ways, different kinds of bonds.
And I would say that even if the novel is not considered canon, the way the actors (and I do not believe it was just Robinson who felt this way) chose to play the roles is valid as part of canon as long as it doesn’t actually violate anything continuitywise.
If I found out that James Doohan had played Scotty as if he were an alcoholic… well, I wouldn’t have personally seen it that way, but he notoriously loved booze, so sure. Scotty was an alcoholic.
There’s a whole episode where Scotty drank a Kevlan under the table, the Kevlans were shown to be basically supermen, so… I’m pretty sure it would take an alcoholic to do that.
Edit: Oh, and the TNG episode where he got mad because everyone drank synthahol…
Sure, but if, alternately, I found out that he played Scotty as if he wasn’t an alcoholic- that he could go for months between scotches, he just had an amazing tolerance for alcohol when he drank, fine. It still doesn’t affect continuity.
Exactly. The actors aren’t robots or AI, running solely off the prompts of directors and writers. They are part of the collaborative art project that is the show. Their input, motivations, intentions behind the character are just as valid as the writer’s. Garak is queer, because Robinson says so. During the pandemic, Bashir and Garak did a video where they exchanged letters, and they made it clear that they romantically involved in that. Regardless of if physical sex occurred during the timeline of the series, suggesting that it could not have because none of the characters, in the tiny fraction of a percent’s time we actually see them during that year run, never outwardly exclaimed “bee tee dubs, me and Garak are banging” is such an insult to the actors who put so much of themselves into that role.
I said basically the same thing too. We see a fraction of their life for part of the about 45 minutes the episode is on. For all we know, everyone was complimenting Garak and Bashir on what a cute couple they made as they strolled down the promenade holding hands. Just not at the time we see them. Which makes sense because most couples aren’t about PDA all the time. Even if they’re on a date.
Especially Julian, tbh. He strikes me as the “but what would people think!” Type when it comes to dating a Cardassian. Lol. Not that he’s prejudiced… But simple Garak may well be a spy for the obsidian order!
You’re right. If there were any reason to not make that relationship public, if that was the case, it would have nothing to do with both of them being men, it would be because of who Garak is and who Julian is and the whole security issue there. I’m sure they wouldn’t want Odo checking up on them when they were trying to have a romantic moment.
But in the end, I know the look of two people who have a mutual attraction.
If Alexander Siddig wasn’t supposed to be attracted to Garak, at least in the minds of he and Andrew Robinson and their motivations in that scene, he did it very wrong.
And I think he knows what it’s like to be attracted to a man, because he apparently described himself this year as “not quite straight.”
Oh my God, you’ve just given me the idea for the best trek fanfic ever. Julian and Garak keep trying to secret away for a date, and whenever they do, Odo interrupts them to question their behavior. They sneak into a supply closet, Odo is the door. They slip away to a cargo bay, and suddenly a crate of self sealing stem bolts morphs into the familiar security officer. They finally get a nice table at a Holo restaurant under someone else’s name and Quark’s promised discretion, and lo and behold Bashir tries to take a drink of his champagne for it to suddenly become the changeling, relentless in his need to discuss this aberrant behavior. Finally they give up.
Bashir: yes, Odo, what can we do for you?
Odo: I need to discuss this sneaking around. It has become a security concern.
Garak: Trust me, Mr. Odo, had we been involved with anything concerning to the security of this station, you would never have discovered us.
Yes Robinson played Garak as gay despite that not being the character. However, Bashir was skirt chasing throughout the entire series until finally setting down with Ezri.
Just because Bashir preferred women doesn’t mean he didn’t also have a romantic interest in Garak. They absolutely played it as though it were more than just friendship, at least at the beginning.
For all we know, Bashir fucked anything he could like Mariner. Like I said to someone else, we see these people’s lives for less than 45 minutes at a time. And only even close to that if they’re in every scene, which rarely (maybe never) happens. So all we know is that we see Bashir going after women. He could have been going after everyone else, he could have made an exception for Garak because it’s the 24th century and people aren’t restricted to heterosexuality like that anymore… who knows?
But they sure as hell played it as if it was more than just friendship, at least at first.
And remember, Garak was shown as being interested in women as well.
Fuck Rick Berman for a lot of reasons, but I think some people who weren’t alive then don’t realize how deeply unpopular homosexuality was around that time. Still room to grow, but the fact even that homophobia just isn’t the accepted norm now… It’s amazing how much progress we’ve made in my lifetime. Sad and still a coward, but back then Rick was probably 100% correct.
I don’t agree. Firstly because Roddenberry himself wanted queer representation on TNG in the 80s, but also because there was a lot of precedent with queer characters becoming more normalized on TV going all the way back to the 70s when Billy Crystal played a decent, caring gay man on Soap with toned-down stereotypical mannerisms.
But also, Garak was introduced in 1993. Look how many queer-themed TV episodes had happened in the 90s by then on mainstream shows like Roseanne and L.A. Law. Even gay recurring characters were on TV by then. Roy’s gay son on Wings showed up multiple times and did not fit any gay stereotypes, which was kind of the point of the character. The, again not stereotypical, gay couple that opened the bed and breakfast in Cicely in Northern Exposure debuted in 1991 (the town’s founders were also revealed to be a lesbian couple that year). I already mentioned Roseanne above. Sandra Bernhard’s character, a member of the main cast, came out as gay in 1992.
Because… approving of romances between two men from the way they reacted to each other on the screen is bigotry? Because I thought it was recognizing two people clearly attracted to each other when I see it?
Seems to me that the bigoted position would be assuming two characters did not have an attraction to each other just because it wasn’t stated overtly. The assumption that every character in Star Trek is 100% heterosexual unless otherwise stated is not exactly a position that accepts queer people as being common in the future.
Assuming two guys that hangout are secretly in a relationship is homophobic. I dont understand how you cant see that. It has to absolutely be intentional ignorance. Asserting that two dudes who have never expressed physical desire toward one another are gay simply because they are close friends is homophobia.
As a gay man, my head canon with Garak and Bashir has always been that Garak was some form of bi/pan/Omni/what have you, and that Bashir was the clueless straight guy that teaches every gay man the valuable lesson that “he’s not into you, you’re just so totally unaccustomed to men being nice and decent”
However, your comments in this thread have convinced me that Garak bangs Bashir nightly.*
Secretly? I never said it was secret. Just because you don’t see them kissing or whatever on screen doesn’t mean it was secret.
Again, assuming every character is heterosexual just because you don’t see them do anything physical with someone except in a heterosexual way while the episode is being shown doesn’t mean they aren’t doing it when you don’t see them or that everyone isn’t aware of it.
For all we know, they were together for at least a year and threw a big one year anniversary party. Why just assume such a thing never happened? We don’t see what happens to anyone on any Star Trek show for more than a total of around 45 minutes at a time, sometimes spread out over weeks.
And, as I said, I know what two people being attracted to each other looks like.
Is the only way you can engage in conversation by blatantly making up stances for your counterpart because you have nothing intellectual to say regarding my actual point?
It’s not nonsense:
https://screenrant.com/star-trek-ds9-garak-queer-rick-berman-veto/
And I choose to headcanon that we just didn’t see any of the physical affection on screen.
The Garak -> Bashir -> O’Brien -> Keiko -> Worf -> Jadzia -> Kira -> Odo -> Changeling Orgy love polygon (polyline? graph?). Truly a classic. Everybody is doing it and nobody is happy.
Wait, Bashir liked O’Brien?
I thought nobody liked O’Brien, not even his wife. That is why he was in the jeffreys tubes and teleporter rooms so often.
Well O’Brien did say he preferred Julian to Keiko
The term I’ve used for graphs of poly relationships is “polycule” because they look a lot like chemical diagrams: Multiple nodes connected in different ways, different kinds of bonds.
The novel (written by Andrew Robinson) A Stitch in Time also confirms this physical attraction, if not specific examples of physical affection.
And I would say that even if the novel is not considered canon, the way the actors (and I do not believe it was just Robinson who felt this way) chose to play the roles is valid as part of canon as long as it doesn’t actually violate anything continuitywise.
If I found out that James Doohan had played Scotty as if he were an alcoholic… well, I wouldn’t have personally seen it that way, but he notoriously loved booze, so sure. Scotty was an alcoholic.
There’s a whole episode where Scotty drank a Kevlan under the table, the Kevlans were shown to be basically supermen, so… I’m pretty sure it would take an alcoholic to do that.
Edit: Oh, and the TNG episode where he got mad because everyone drank synthahol…
Sure, but if, alternately, I found out that he played Scotty as if he wasn’t an alcoholic- that he could go for months between scotches, he just had an amazing tolerance for alcohol when he drank, fine. It still doesn’t affect continuity.
Exactly. The actors aren’t robots or AI, running solely off the prompts of directors and writers. They are part of the collaborative art project that is the show. Their input, motivations, intentions behind the character are just as valid as the writer’s. Garak is queer, because Robinson says so. During the pandemic, Bashir and Garak did a video where they exchanged letters, and they made it clear that they romantically involved in that. Regardless of if physical sex occurred during the timeline of the series, suggesting that it could not have because none of the characters, in the tiny fraction of a percent’s time we actually see them during that year run, never outwardly exclaimed “bee tee dubs, me and Garak are banging” is such an insult to the actors who put so much of themselves into that role.
I said basically the same thing too. We see a fraction of their life for part of the about 45 minutes the episode is on. For all we know, everyone was complimenting Garak and Bashir on what a cute couple they made as they strolled down the promenade holding hands. Just not at the time we see them. Which makes sense because most couples aren’t about PDA all the time. Even if they’re on a date.
Especially Julian, tbh. He strikes me as the “but what would people think!” Type when it comes to dating a Cardassian. Lol. Not that he’s prejudiced… But simple Garak may well be a spy for the obsidian order!
You’re right. If there were any reason to not make that relationship public, if that was the case, it would have nothing to do with both of them being men, it would be because of who Garak is and who Julian is and the whole security issue there. I’m sure they wouldn’t want Odo checking up on them when they were trying to have a romantic moment.
But in the end, I know the look of two people who have a mutual attraction.
If Alexander Siddig wasn’t supposed to be attracted to Garak, at least in the minds of he and Andrew Robinson and their motivations in that scene, he did it very wrong.
And I think he knows what it’s like to be attracted to a man, because he apparently described himself this year as “not quite straight.”
Oh my God, you’ve just given me the idea for the best trek fanfic ever. Julian and Garak keep trying to secret away for a date, and whenever they do, Odo interrupts them to question their behavior. They sneak into a supply closet, Odo is the door. They slip away to a cargo bay, and suddenly a crate of self sealing stem bolts morphs into the familiar security officer. They finally get a nice table at a Holo restaurant under someone else’s name and Quark’s promised discretion, and lo and behold Bashir tries to take a drink of his champagne for it to suddenly become the changeling, relentless in his need to discuss this aberrant behavior. Finally they give up.
Bashir: yes, Odo, what can we do for you?
Odo: I need to discuss this sneaking around. It has become a security concern.
Garak: Trust me, Mr. Odo, had we been involved with anything concerning to the security of this station, you would never have discovered us.
I think I somehow missed this! Do you happen to have a link? A quick YouTube search didn’t help me out.
Yes Robinson played Garak as gay despite that not being the character. However, Bashir was skirt chasing throughout the entire series until finally setting down with Ezri.
You can have a gay friend without being gay.
Just because Bashir preferred women doesn’t mean he didn’t also have a romantic interest in Garak. They absolutely played it as though it were more than just friendship, at least at the beginning.
We all know that once Bashir’s gene modification secret was out, he would want to share himself with everyone just to show off.
For all we know, Bashir fucked anything he could like Mariner. Like I said to someone else, we see these people’s lives for less than 45 minutes at a time. And only even close to that if they’re in every scene, which rarely (maybe never) happens. So all we know is that we see Bashir going after women. He could have been going after everyone else, he could have made an exception for Garak because it’s the 24th century and people aren’t restricted to heterosexuality like that anymore… who knows?
But they sure as hell played it as if it was more than just friendship, at least at first.
And remember, Garak was shown as being interested in women as well.
Fuck Rick Berman for a lot of reasons, but I think some people who weren’t alive then don’t realize how deeply unpopular homosexuality was around that time. Still room to grow, but the fact even that homophobia just isn’t the accepted norm now… It’s amazing how much progress we’ve made in my lifetime. Sad and still a coward, but back then Rick was probably 100% correct.
I don’t agree. Firstly because Roddenberry himself wanted queer representation on TNG in the 80s, but also because there was a lot of precedent with queer characters becoming more normalized on TV going all the way back to the 70s when Billy Crystal played a decent, caring gay man on Soap with toned-down stereotypical mannerisms.
But also, Garak was introduced in 1993. Look how many queer-themed TV episodes had happened in the 90s by then on mainstream shows like Roseanne and L.A. Law. Even gay recurring characters were on TV by then. Roy’s gay son on Wings showed up multiple times and did not fit any gay stereotypes, which was kind of the point of the character. The, again not stereotypical, gay couple that opened the bed and breakfast in Cicely in Northern Exposure debuted in 1991 (the town’s founders were also revealed to be a lesbian couple that year). I already mentioned Roseanne above. Sandra Bernhard’s character, a member of the main cast, came out as gay in 1992.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_1990s_American_television_episodes_with_LGBT_themes
Berman was just a bigot.
Whatever you need to tell yourself to excuse your bigotry and homophobia.
Sorry… how is it either bigoted or homophobic to go against Berman’s “no gay people on Star Trek” edict and agree with the actor who played the role?
Garak can absolutely be a gay character. Insisting that there was a sexual romance between the two is homophobic and bigoted.
Because… approving of romances between two men from the way they reacted to each other on the screen is bigotry? Because I thought it was recognizing two people clearly attracted to each other when I see it?
Seems to me that the bigoted position would be assuming two characters did not have an attraction to each other just because it wasn’t stated overtly. The assumption that every character in Star Trek is 100% heterosexual unless otherwise stated is not exactly a position that accepts queer people as being common in the future.
Assuming two guys that hangout are secretly in a relationship is homophobic. I dont understand how you cant see that. It has to absolutely be intentional ignorance. Asserting that two dudes who have never expressed physical desire toward one another are gay simply because they are close friends is homophobia.
As a gay man, my head canon with Garak and Bashir has always been that Garak was some form of bi/pan/Omni/what have you, and that Bashir was the clueless straight guy that teaches every gay man the valuable lesson that “he’s not into you, you’re just so totally unaccustomed to men being nice and decent”
However, your comments in this thread have convinced me that Garak bangs Bashir nightly.*
Homophobic indeed. What bullshit.
Edited to reword slightly
Secretly? I never said it was secret. Just because you don’t see them kissing or whatever on screen doesn’t mean it was secret.
Again, assuming every character is heterosexual just because you don’t see them do anything physical with someone except in a heterosexual way while the episode is being shown doesn’t mean they aren’t doing it when you don’t see them or that everyone isn’t aware of it.
For all we know, they were together for at least a year and threw a big one year anniversary party. Why just assume such a thing never happened? We don’t see what happens to anyone on any Star Trek show for more than a total of around 45 minutes at a time, sometimes spread out over weeks.
And, as I said, I know what two people being attracted to each other looks like.
Im done conversing with you. Youre simply dishonest and its not worth it.
Cool. If I see you violate our civility rule with anyone else, you’ll be banned.
I also never said garak wasnt gay. Quit being dishonest.
But you are assuming Bashir is heterosexual. Why?
Internalized homophobia?
Is the only way you can engage in conversation by blatantly making up stances for your counterpart because you have nothing intellectual to say regarding my actual point?
Okay, this is the last time I am going to allow you to violate our civility rule.
Now please explain why you are assuming that Bashir is heterosexual.
I’m genuinely curious: how does “insisting that there was a sexual romance between [two guys]” make anybody homophobic and bigoted?