For some reason, Miles O'Brien is constantly getting the most traumatic stories thrust upon him. He's been forced to live a lifetime in a matter of hours, has been hunted across a space station by his friend, was infected by a bioweapon, kidnapped, tortured, forced to watch a duplicate of himself die, possessed, framed for a crime he didn't commit, lost his daughter to a time anomaly, while himself was thrust through time and died, but came back.
The man's been through enough. It's ok to write a story where he and his wife are living a quiet life in nature with a bunch of small dogs, as they debate if they should go into town that night for dinner or stay home and cuddle by the fire.
We don't need to keep giving this man trauma. Yet, some among us still want to torment this man.
Despite not being in a new Star Trek episode for over 25 years, O'Brien is still being forced to suffer. While he played a starring role on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, his usual gimmick was that of the most tortured crew member. Sure, some others went through traumatic moments and some may even be able to trade stories with O'Brien, yet it's pretty well regarded that no one suffered like the Irishmen.
So much so that there was a running gag where "O'Brien must suffer" in any episode that featured him, it's made for some funny tongue-in-cheek chokes, but ultimately, it just made the character super-depressing.
You'd think, now that the show is over, some decades have passed, and new writers have entered the fray that people would leave O'Brien alone finally. Nope. The Star Trek comics by IDW are going out of their way to give this man even more trauma. From being baselessly called a war criminal, to now having to live through an accidental execution, O'Brien continues to suffer. And needlessly to boot.
You read that right, O'Brien is now on the hook for killing a person, by accident. In Star Trek: Defiant issue #20, we find out that O'Brien and a Cardassian soldier were fighting during the battle of Battle of Setlik III. During the struggle, O'Brien got his hands on his phaser, and assuming it was set to stun, shot the Cardassian in the head.
It wasn't on stun and instead of knocking out his foe, he sliced a hole through the alien's forehead. Making it dang sure that once again, O'Brien must suffer.
The desire to put O'Brien in these, at times, absurd moments of emotional anguish is a bit tired. Yes, we all had a laugh at the joke that O'Brien just seems cursed, but can't we do something against type? It's so cliche to tell a story that subverts expectations, but it's still ok to give characters something new to do. Especially when they're not hamstrung by the endless limitations of television or film.
Maybe, just for once, O'Brien can heal. Now that'd be a story that would be worth telling.