Miles O'Brien was a recurring minor character in Star Trek: The Next Generation. He was an NCO who ran the main transporter room. He was in that room, alone, for long, long periods of time. Cartoonist Jon Adams suspects that O'Brien felt unfulfilled and deeply depressed. He has created a series of comics showing O'Brien's lonely existence in that room. They are funny! You can read the first one here.
Eventually, O'Brien was promoted. He became Chief of Operations on the space station Deep Space 9 on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. That's awesome, right? No. For seven years, the writers of that show played a constant game of "How can we destroy O'Brien's life this week?" One of the more inventive responses was to lock him in prison for 20 years.
-via Nerd Approved
P.S. Do you like this illustration? Then you can buy the t-shirt right here at the NeatoShop!
"The engineer gets it in the ass!"
TNG = Geordi. Zero luck, all of his stories revolve around him getting the short end of it, somehow.
Voyager = Well, B'Elanna was the engineer on Voyager (and all was not complete shit for her) but she got the job after the original died! Use Harry Kim (wearing Engineering yellow) and the "Engineer gets it..." theory holds. Show me one Harry episode that works out ok for him (without serious mental scars).
Enterprise = Trip has the ill-fated romance with a Vulcan and.. **SPOLIERS** dies in the end!
Chief O'Brien = Worst. Of. All.
From having to send his 1st Gamma Quadrant pal (Tosk) to die, to 20 years in mind-prison, to his daughter growing up feral after falling through a time-vortex (which they fixed but only after they thought she was lost forever!), to having to sell out his criminal pal when he went undercover... If it's an O'Brien episode, get ready to cry or pull your hair out in frustration!!
I think I'd almost rather try my luck as a Red Shirt!