You ready to make an objective judgement? We already had the “which Shahrukh do you want to marry” question a while back (which descended in to anarchy once the element of money/house was added, we all want the Goa house). No, this is purely objectively looking at his behavior as a life partner, in which film is he the BEST life partner?
Don’t think about “who do I want to be with?” (probably Harry) and think about more “who do I want my daughter/mother/sister/friend to be with?” (definitely not Harry)
Okay, I’m gonna start just by limiting our options to films where he had an actual REAL relationship with his love interest. So not Don, not Darr, not Devdas, nothing where it was unrequited or incomplete. And not Pardes or DTPH or Happy New Year where they only get together at the very end. But if they actually confessed their mutual love well before the end of the film and we got to see them in a relationship, then they are included.
Deewana: marries a widow, waits patiently and lovingly until she is ready to participate in the marriage, moves in to her house, accepts her mother-in-law as his own mother, and so on.
Dil Aashna Hai: helps his brothel-raised girlfriend find her illegitimate parents with almost no judgement and lots of support.
Raju Ban Gaya Gentleman: Cute, flirtatious, a little bit pushy on the sex side of things, and slightly unfaithful and unreliable.
Maya Memsaab: Will embezzle for you.
King Uncle: Will leave his family for you and get a job in a garage to support you both.
Baazigar: Great at cheering you up after your sister’s death, bad at not killing your sister.
Karan-Arjun: Lots of fun to play with, tends to get distracted by past-life issues while you are waiting to be rescued.
Zamaana-Deewana: Very sexual relationship, high drama, not a lot of talking.
Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayange: Will force you out of your comfort zone while still keeping you safe, will follow you around the world, will put almost no sexual pressure on you, but is a bit old-fashioned and patriarchal.
Koyla: Funny caring loving protective, but tends to be forgetful when childhood angst and vengeance issues come up.
Yes Boss: Loving, funny, devoted, everything good. But a bit passive and forcing you to take the lead.
Kuch Kuch Hota Hai: Charming flirty fun devoted. But slightly hung up on his friend.
Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani: Someone who will challenge you to be your best.
One 2 Ka 4: Sexy, emotionally open, trusting of you. But a little bit impulsive and unreliable as a partner.
Asoka: Not great at staying in one place. Also, the hair.
Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham: A great provider, a loving support for your family as well as his, keeps the spark alive into the 10th year of marriage, only downside is his obsession with his family.
Hum Tumhare Hain Sanam: Sexy, loving, present. But a bit unpredictable and untrusting. And possessive.
Saathiya: Calm, supportive, intelligent, loving, nonjudgmental while still treating you as an equal.
Chalte Chalte: Quick to anger but also quick to forgive, keeps the spark alive, appreciates your career achievements as much as his own. But that temper is a problem, and so is his low self-esteem.
Swades: Not demonstrative but steadily present, reliable, willing to stop smoking for you (or at least try).
Paheli: Honest, loving, supportive, cares about you and the rest of the family too, always available for fun and enjoyment. A little bit of a challenge in terms of contrasting backgrounds and life experiences.
Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna: Used to be sexy? Has a great mother? Not a lot of good here.
Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi: Will put your needs over his own, is enormously loving and loyal and patient, can be fun when he puts his mind to it. A little old.
Dulha Mil Gaya: Endlessly giving, patient, reliable, always there.
My Name is Khan: Enjoys sex, has a lot of love to give, will accept anything you tell him without question.
Ra.One: Terrible hair. But interested in your interests, a great father who tries hard, someone who has a lot of friends and a lot of zest for life.
Jab Tak Hain Jaan: Apparently a really great kisser. And excited to show you his world and his part of life.
Chennai Express: Irritating and immature on the surface, but a lot of bravery and strength underneath.
Dilwale: Let’s his heart guide him, perhaps too self-sacrificing.
Fan: Likes to be in control, unlikely to share things with you if he thinks he can fix them by himself.
Raees: Funny, sweet, respects your strength and intelligence, perhaps a bit too close to his best friend.
Jab Harry Met Sejal: Will keep you safe, support you, make you happy. But has a dangerous self-destructive and depressive element that can cause him to lash out and try to hurt you and drive you away.
You ready for my choices?
Best partner: Saathiya, all the way. He doesn’t minimize what Tabu did, but he also doesn’t make it worse for her. And he steps up and accepts that this is a “we” problem not a “you” problem, because that’s what marriage is.
Worst partner: Probably Baazigar. Or KANK. Murder is bad, but then cheating is bad too. Although in a way I suppose he both cheated and murdered in Baazigar. So yes, Baazigar.
dontcallitbollywood 
Cant believe you didn’t list Mohabbatien 😦 ; Sharukh was best in it. He loves her so much so that event after her death he bears with grumpy Amitabh whole movie… that movie was pure love!
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But they never have an actual relationship! Would he remember anniversaries? Call every night? Help with the housework?
On Thu, Aug 1, 2019 at 6:44 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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The best are RNBDJ and Swades . Definitely my type. Good-at-heart, serious man you can count on.
The worst KANK (the opposite of my type – undependable, rude, not good with kids, cheater) and Raees – I haven’t seen the movie but he is a criminal, can be killed or arrested everyday, I don’t want this for my kids.
I think Baazigar shouldn’t be on the list, because c’mon he was a killer, and he never was sincere with Kajol. they never were together for real, she was dating the guy he created.
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Okay, if we drop Baazigar, than I agree with you and make my back-up KANK the worst Shahrukh.
To be fair to his Raees character, he is in a setting of such economic depression that his only hope of making a good living is by turning to crime. And besides that, he fits in your requirements, he is a good father, a loving husband, and cares deeply about his community. Basically Shahrukh from Swades, if the only hope for helping people was starting a criminal business instead of electricity.
On Fri, Aug 2, 2019 at 3:13 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Yeah, I want to put in a good word for Raees too, he was actually trying to lift up his community and loved his family…I think he was a good guy at heart
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The one in Dulha Mil Gaya remember how he jumped in the water to save the toy doggo 😅
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Yes! He is so great in that movie. Maybe because it is just a cameo? They didn’t need to give his character flaws?
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This is my pick, too! I love him in this
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The worst: tied between Maya Memsaab and EBDM. The best: Surinder, lighting up our lives.
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Haha, I answered before I read your post. Raees made me lol!
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And you agree that Harry, while a partner you might want for yourself, is never someone you would ever want for a friend/sister/daughter/etc.?
On Fri, Aug 2, 2019 at 12:59 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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That’s fair to say, yes. Though I think my actual sister would be a pretty good match for Harry. She’d balance him out nicely. If I were with Harry we’d both go down a depressive hole at some point and never come out again.
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According to my rules, EBDM wouldn’t be included because they didn’t have a real relationship. And would we really say that Shahrukh was a worse partner in Maya Memsaab than in KANK? To Preity in KANK I mean?
The only flaw I can find with Surinder, and it is pretty minor, is that he is 40 and still unmarried. Do you want to train a partner who is that old?
On Fri, Aug 2, 2019 at 12:56 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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My husband was 41 when we met. He had lived with someone for a few years though. Generally it has worked out well!
I purely hate Shah Rukh’s character in MM. He never even knows her, he’s just in love with love (and lust), then he’s mean to her, then he displays complete moral cowardice. I guess EBDM doesn’t follow your rules, true.
I almost included Dev in a 3 way tie. He’s a pretty terrible partner for Preity, but one thing I like about KANK is that it’s clear they are both at fault in the marriage. The relationship has degraded over time, the death of 1,000 cuts. Dev is worse than Preity because he’s a lousy dad (and son) too, while Preity is a good mom and daughter-in-law.
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Oh, now you have me thinking about KANK and marriages again! I like your point that it is clear Preity and Shahrukh both killed the marriage together in a million small ways. On the other hand, I was going to say Abhishek is a great husband. But the thing is, that marriage started with an original sin on his behalf and never recovered. He guilted and pressured Rani into marrying him until she felt she couldn’t say no. And ever since he has tried to make up for it by being the most perfect understanding husband possible, while Rani has passive aggressively let her misery out in a million small ways. I don’t want to be married to anyone in that movie! They are all terrible partners!
On Fri, Aug 2, 2019 at 3:11 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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K3G and I’ll post my full reply later!
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But all that crying? Blech.
On Fri, Aug 2, 2019 at 3:46 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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I love that he goes from fully expressing real emotion to hand on head I will take care of you and damned be the consequences.
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This is why he’s so appealing to women. Remember the interview where Kajol says that every woman in the world feels that Shah Rukh was made just for her? He’s a romantic chameleon. Whatever it is you want, he can give it to you. Like a sensitive man? Check. Tough guy but still respects women? Check. Sexual energy that shows he loves and wants you but can hold back when needed and let you lead until you surrender with complete abandon when you are ready? CHECK!
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I’d go for K3G too, only the in-laws give me pause. Poor Kajol, trying to lighten up those family dinners. Everybody weeping into their desserts…
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Ha! So true!
On Fri, Aug 2, 2019 at 11:24 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Even though Surinder (RNBDJ) seems like the best partner on paper…living with a saint is so difficult…I mean he is sooo nice and self-sacrificing you will forever live with guilt for doing anything slightly improper…will just make me feel like a devil…
So I am going to pick Paheli as the best partner…I mean he is kind, supportive, believes in equality, playful and he can do MAGIC!
For the worst, I’m going to pick all the ones where he is a ‘man-child’ like Chennai Express…I mean do you really want to wait around for him to mature and stop the silliness…it took like weeks of goons chasing him through jungles for him to finally grow up and take responsibility…maybe that can be the honeymoon plan…the Bollywood movie scenarios that will make the man grow-up…
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Oh man, wouldn’t that be a great Asmeez (sp?) Bazmi type movie? 3 new couples on honeymoon, constantly troubled by problems, and at the interval we learn it was all a plan made by the wives, they paid off a service to make the honeymoon horrible in order to force their husbands to grow up and learn about love. The husbands still don’t know, but after they return home it becomes harder and harder for the wives to keep up the lies, both because of the guilt and because there are so many flaws in their story (the husbands keep looking for reports in the newspaper about the evil gangster who held them hostage and so on). Also, they are all pregnant (why not?). The wives go to greater and greater extremes to keep up the story, but ultimately the husbands find out the truth. They are furious and ready to confront their wives, but during the confrontation, all three of them simultaneously go into labor. In a panic, all is forgotten and forgiven, and post birth the husbands admit that they were selfish and shallow and not ready for marriage, so the wives were right to test them.
Okay, moving on! I see your point about Surinder versus the Ghost. And the man-child type. But then the question is, would we rather have someone like Surinder who starts out saintly and slowly loosens up, or someone like Raj from Chennai Express who starts out worthless and slowly grows up?
On Fri, Aug 2, 2019 at 6:53 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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That story is hilarious! I think you should tweet that paragraph to Akshay Kumar…he will sign it in a heartbeat!
The choice is easy…rather have a saint who slowly loosens up…introducing him to the dark side will be fun and you will be control of what aspects you want to change or keep saintly…. trying to make a man-child grow up will be exhausting…you have no clue when his epiphany will happen…you have no control over the progress…you will be like Deepika in YJHD hoping that one day the man comes to his senses…no thanks!
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Ha! Yes! Weeks of goons chasing through the jungle and still his plan is to take her home to grandma and…have her sleep in the spare room. Exasperating.
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But on the other hand, saintly Surinder actually DID take her home and then gave her the main room and took the spare himself. So maybe the Paheli ghost is best after all, at least they share a terrace.
On Fri, Aug 2, 2019 at 11:28 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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ADHM? My nominee for worst husband and even worse ex hb. When we meet him, he seems to be dangling the carrot, turning on the charm, subtly trying to lure Aish back, without actually promising anything in return, while behaving as the epitome of the modern cosmopolitan supportive exhb-friend. Expressing, almost bragging, to complete strangers that she introduces him to, that (his) unrequited love (for Aish) is beautiful *because* it is one sided and therefore is “surf mein”. We know the marriage ended because of his cheating, but we can guess from his exhusbandry how manipulative and headgamey he must have been during marriage, thus making him my nominee for worst husband. No wonder Aish is a mess and will subconsciously place her love wherever else she can, in order to protect herself from placing it back with SRK. His kind of mindf*ckery is narcissistic if not sociopathic, so ingrained in him that he might not fully realize that he’s doing it, or that there is something wrong with doing it. This is the one where I would actually warn all my friends and relatives to “run, don’t walk!”, because without prior knowledge one could easily fall prey to his urbane charms, sexiness, and pursuit. By contrast, I feel like there is a partner out there for each of his other characters, even the flawed ones mean well (maybe not baazigar but the rest).
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Ooooo, good choice!!!! And like KANK, I think it is one of those moments where Shahrukh found the truth in the character that even Karan didn’t see. Karan intended him to be wise and sacrificing and all that. But Shahrukh said the lines the way they made sense, and they make sense as a passive aggressive evil ex who is keeping his ex-wife confused and on the string instead of moving on.
But I like to think his character could be fixed if he just found someone new who forced him out of this self-pitying pose. I wrote a fanfic that has him ending up with Anushka’s older sister, a mature woman trapped in a loveless marriage who he befriends and helps.
On Sun, Aug 4, 2019 at 10:32 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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