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sarahwatchesthings:

autisticchangeling:

irresistible-revolution:

so i finally watched “our man bashir” and while the gifsets and posts had primed me it being a gay asf episode i was still truly, utterly unprepared for just how fcking GAY the whole thing was, to the point where it’s not even queerbaiting, it’s just straight up an episode about queer desire and queer connection filtered through what was permissible to show on tv. like, literally it’s a parable of gay desire. you have the trope of james bond, an iconic fantasy character who is desired by gay men despite (or maybe because of) his suavely consistent heterosexual masculinity onscreen. queer desire “sticks” to characters like bond. and it’s the fantasy of bond through which julian explores his own inner desires, which revolve around the mystery and charm of garak, a former spy. he wants to be garak, but we know as queers that wanting to be like often slips into be with.

then you have fantasy and reality blurring dangerously close together, so that julian has to rely on garak’s knowledge, on the unglamorous, ugly work of being an operative that garak has lived firsthand. so the fantasy of the spy (bond) and the reality (garak) are now merging, collapsing the distance between julian’s desire to emulate garak and julian’s desire for garak. then, he shoots garak, drawing blood, reality pulsing through the fantasy in the form of bodily fluids and ruptured skin, fantasy and reality penetrating each other. and THEN you have julian saving the day by applying garak’s knowledge, by reciting garak’s words back to him while garak watches proudly and fondly. the circle is complete, julian has achieved union with the object of his desire, and the simulated scenario dissolves. julian repeating garak’s words in a room full of people is practically a confession of love: i see you, i admire you, i understand you.

and that’s not even touching on the inherent homoeroticism of garak watching while julian touches and is touched by beautiful, scantily clad women, NOR the homoeroticism of this being the second episode where garak plays a major role in julian’s psyche. in “distant voices” garak is the mask worn by an alien trying to destroy julian from the inside out - it’s garak’s image, his words and voice, that challenge julian’s deepest assumptions about himself, and ultimately strengthen them as he prepares to leave his youth behind. garak ushers julian through a rite of passage whereby he emerges stronger, more sure of himself, alive. garak represents things about julian he’s afraid to confront that, simultaneously, he can only confront in garak’s presence. and then there’s

[Image is someone looking unkempt and gesturing wildly to a complicated set of pieces of paper and red string on a wall. End]

Yes! I do also think it’s significant that at the end Julian is using Garak’s words, but in a context which means that they have basically the opposite meaning they did when Garak said them. I think it shows that Julian isn’t turning into Garak, but they’re mutually influencing each other, which in the equation of “do I want to be this person or be with this person?” ends up removing one option and making the other one clearer

aesthetic-trek-photos:

jonathanarcher:

jonathanarcher:

jonathanarcher:

Our Man Bashir is the funniest episode of all time. Imagine you’re trying to rp on your own private time and then your friend crashes it just to mock you and then one of your coworkers calls you up and says you have to keep rping or all of your other friends will die

Also the entire time your first friend is chanting “kill them! kill them! kill them!” every time you try to help one of your about to be dead friends

Valid points all

(ID: four different sets of tags. The first one says “#star trek #and you were gonna jack off”, the second says “#and the thing you’re rping is your friends incredibly traumatic previous career where his dad was his boss”, the third says “#Star Trek #ds9 #also your friend is like your little bondgirl #Queue” and the fourth says, “and also your friends who are about to die are all trying to kill you except the one who is trying to fuck you #star trek #and worf is also there ❤️”. End ID)

stopthatbluecat:

Bullets and Kisses

Julian finds a memento of Garak’s

ssnallygasterss:

Still thinking about in Our Man Bashir, Garak didn’t take Julian seriously until he straight up shot him. Furthermore, that’s when Garak started to cooperate. For anyone else that might’ve been incitement to end the program then and there. Instead, he was impressed.

The entire time he’d been critical of Julian’s fantasy, with good reason considering that he was letting slip his previous trauma associated with spywork while the dear doctor was playing out a Bond movie. When that’s exactly it, it was a Bond movie, and Julian’s fantasy. Not some mission courtesy of the Obsidian Order. He was in control the entire time, and had the luxury of knowing how the story ended. When he never made that clear enough for a Cardassian’s tendencies and lack of cultural context to understand, shooting him drove home the point. He was deadly serious. No one was going to die under his watch.

He was also willing to kill one person for the sake of allowing others to live, which was something Garak was trying to encourage him to do the entire time. Just probably didn’t expect it to be him.

Overall my favorite parts of the episode (Outside of the ridiculousness of the premise) were when Julian and Garak were arguing their ideology. Self-sustaining efficiency versus a controlled gamble for the sake of others. The best thing was it showed the stark differences in their characterization, and gave Garak a newfound respect for Bashir.

pyrrhic-victory1:

this was how our man bashir went right ?