Debate of the Day: Who’s Your Favorite Captain?

Behold, the Holy Grail of Nerddom. I’m told this is the first time that all five TV Star Trek captains have been in the same photo where it wasn’t crudely photoshopped, and that’s one hell of an accomplishment. Throw Chris Pine in there and you’ve got yourself a stew, but you might upset some die hard fans including him.

Strangely enough, I was raised on Voyager, which was the popular sci-fi show when I was growing up. Naturally I had a giant crush on Seven of Nine, and I thought all Vulcans were black for a while. Which captain was your favorite? I’ll assume Kirk or Picard, but I could be wrong. Did anyone actually like Enterprise? I’m not being sarcastic, as I’ve never seen it. Was it anywhere close to as good as the rest of these?

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18 Comments

  1. Rank:

    1:Sisko- The most realistically flawed “human” captain and on the best series.

    2:Kirk- The funnest and most heroic captain. Yet a little reckless

    3:Picard- Stoic and confident but a bit to rigid and “holier than thou”

    4: Janeway She was pretty much Picard with boobs, but in a more derivative series.

    4:Archer was dull and never got a chance to define himself as a distinct character.

  2. Rank:

    1. Picard. I mean come on, it’s Jean-Luc!

    2. Kirk. His friendship with Spock can melt the coldest heart.

    3. Janeway. She was surprisingly fierce, considering the notion that stereotypically women are more in-tune with their emotions etc. (we’re looking at you Troi) it was quite refreshing for Kathryn to actually be in some ways the biggest bad ass of all!

    4. Sisko. When I was younger Deep Space Nine was my least favourite of the Treks, I distinctly remember where all the characters were very static figuratively, and quite literally as events transpired on this one space station. It was only after coming back to it a few years later to see how the later seasons proved me wrong. The entire arc of the Dominion and the Cardassians proves to be some of the most compelling story telling I have ever seen in Star Trek. And Benjamin Sisko provides an amazing character in which to experience it all…it’s just he’s not Janeway, Kirk or Picard.

    5. Archer. Of course it was going to be Archer. But I would argue he is no where as bland or dull as some might describe him, there were some moments (too few unfortunately) that showed the inner strength of a pioneer of the Federation.

    And in terms of Star Trek: Enterprise (and funnily enough I’ve only very recently had this conversation with a friend) I had a very similar situation with it that I did with Deep Space Nine. I watched the first two episodes and was bored out of my mind, and this is coming from a fairly hardcore Trekkie. Then a few years down the line I watched another episode where Archer meets Andorian Commander Shran for the first time and was convinced to start watching the third season that had just begun to air.

    What I watched blew me away. The entirety of season 3 is essentially one of the most epic storylines of Star Trek there has ever been, it was as if an entire movie was too big and too amazing to squeeze down into a two hour running time and so instead we the audience were graced with an entire season. I don’t want to spoil what happens for those who haven’t seen it, but briefly it involves the hunting down of a race known as the Xindi who have made a super weapon for the sole purpose of destroying Earth, and the seeds of the Federation.

    Then we were treated to Season 4! It may not quite live up to the gravitas of the third season arc, but it introduced several small arcs each very deserving in their own right: Data’s grandfather’s clone insurgents; a Vulcan terrorist group; a xenophobe trying to rid Earth of all extraterrestrials; and probably most interesting all a mysterious force trying to incite civil war across the quadrant. It was brilliant! However, it was greatly let down by its very lacklustre ending, where the final ending was more about Riker of all people! Instead of three characters that deserved a very great amount of closure: Trip, T’pol and Archer.

  3. I gotta agree with Carmelo, Sisko was definitely the most “human” of all the captains, which to me made him a lot easier to relate to. Definitely my favorite, although there’s always going to be a special place in my heart for Kirk.

    Janeway would be my least favorite, though. As much as I enjoyed Voyager, she was most of the reason I stopped watching the show. Well that and the fact that the last two seasons may as well have been the “Seven and Doctor” show.

  4. 1. Kirk.
    2. Sisko.
    3. Picard.
    4. Janeway.
    5. Archer.

    That’s probably the best I can do. I was never all that fond of Picard b/c it just seemed like more of a ‘manager’ as opposed to a captain. Janeway was a bit too bipolar for my tastes. Archer? Meh. I’m one of those rare folks who loved the idea of going back in time to tell stories set at the dawn of the Federation, but I just didn’t care for Enterprise’s writing.

  5. this is a bit hard with #1, sometimes I prefer Kirk others Picard; i’ll go with Picard at the moment, simply because if I had to pick someone who would I rather be like, I would pick him.

    1. Picard
    2. Kirk
    3. Sisko (best Star Trek episode ever “In the Pale Moonlight”) this episode alone especially in the whole Dominion war made me love Capt. Sisko….just simply amazing.

    And I don’t even care about the other 2. Voyager was a good series, but Janeway bothered me since day 1. And the show only started to became good because of 7 of 9.

    But as far as the show’s their selves, DS9 had the best series. And TNG had the best standalone episodes.

  6. I grew up watching original Star Trek reruns loving Spock, yes, I know he wasn’t the cpt. but still….
    Then Next Generation came out and of course I was impressed with Picard and his number 1 hot officer.
    Not far behind was Deep Space Nine which I watched every week, and then almost every week, and then on occasion with mom if I had nothing better to do. It wasn’t the captain. I really liked Sisco. I just got bored with being on the station all the time. Wander lust I guess.
    Saved by Voyager and Janeway’s complexity of a strong captain and vulnerable woman I loved watching a female captain. Maybe the closest I’ve ever come to a t.v. role model. And Seven of Nine’s exploration and discovery of her humanity was always a perk.
    Enterprise… at first I wasn’t very happy about it. Just it’s existence seemed offensive and disrespectful to the classic. Eventually I made myself watch it. I have to say I do like Archer. He made mistakes like Kirk did and was a little like him in that he was ready to go out and explore and to the winds with any regulations.
    If I had to rank them… I’m not sure how I would start. I would not want to put Kirk anywhere but first because he was the first captain we met. The is no Star Trek without Kirk. In the same token I could not put him first because he was not (I’m sooo sorry! really!) my favorite. He seemed more interested in meeting aliens for the exotic women than exploring the galaxy. So my list may go something like this;

    1. Picard
    2. Janeway
    3. Archer
    4. Sisco
    5. Kirk (you skirt chaser you!)

  7. I feel I should expand on Picard, being that I gave him the #1 spot and said little of why. I simply felt that he, and also Janeway, had the most depth as characters. I mean, Picard listened to music and played some of his own. He was well read and had expressive ideas. He had a… a knights code, I guess, besides what the Federation laid out. By the end I felt I really knew him and had experienced his trials and joys. Plus, he’s pretty attractive for an old, bald guy ^_^

  8. People are too quick to dismiss Enterprise in my opinion. It’s definitely not the space opera you expect a Star Trek show to be, but it has some compelling characters and at times it really tries to delve into the realm of hard sci-fi, which some people probably find bland, I personally like it.

  9. I liked Picard best as a *captain*, because he never forgot about his job and was a complete human. I liked Kirk best as a *character*, though, because he was a risk-taker and occasionally a bigot.

    The first two seasons of Enterprise suffered from the same cancer as almost all of Voyager: a failure of imagination. Rather hackneyed story lines perpetually recycled, no broader-term consequences of anyone’s actions, and a continual sense that I was watching a TV show instead of a story. 3rd and 4th seasons of Enterprise were WAY better, with much more imagination and relevant ties to the previous series (instead of gimmicky references jammed in at the last minute. But by then, no-one was watching, ratings were down, and it got canceled suddenly. The finale was accordingly slapdash.

  10. its always going to be kirk.. anyone who has seen the star trek film with kirk and picard side by side knows that shatner totally outclasses him in the role… as for voyagers captain.. set with the task of getting her people home .. she denied them that chance by refusing to use certain alien technology and stopping to explore every nebula and anomoly she found.. id have mutanied long ago on that ship…

  11. 1. Archer (Just get rid of the theme song gaaaa I hate it)
    2. Malcolm “Mal” Reynolds oh wait thats Firefly
    3. Picard
    4. Christopher Pike (portrayed by Bruce Greenwood)
    5. Kirk (portrayed by Chris Pine)
    5. Sisko
    6. William Riker
    7. Kirk (portrayed by William Shatner)
    8. Janeway

  12. vonVanir; I agree completely about Enterprises’ theme song. I should be more like the others if it’s trying to be part of the Star Trek family.
    Nice Firefly drop there. ^_^

    will; I’ve seen every start trek movie ever. I don’t think Picard was outclassed. Nor was Kirk. They’re different people, and in the movies Shatner did much better than he did in the series. That makes it even.

  13. 1 — Kirk
    The original — The standard against which all are measured
    Expanding Federation, new situations, good vs evil

    2 — Archer
    New technology, going boldly into the unknown
    Like George Washington, knowing that everything was setting a precedent

    3 — Borg Picard
    The decisive version of the TNG’s captain.

    4 — Janeway
    Independent command in an unknown land, never quite knowing if her Marquis crew would revolt or not

    5 — Sulu
    “Its a big ship” … “But not as big as her Captain”

    6 — Worf
    “Today is a good day to die”
    Who else would take an armed shuttle craft up against a Borg Cube? [Well, Kirk would if he had to]

    7 — Riker
    Wait, wasn’t he the real leader of the Enterprise?
    I mean, he gave all of the commands, got the good looking women and had the most fun
    Sure, Picard had more shiny little circles on his collar, but all he ever did was advise Riker (“Make it so”) and get the older women

    8 — Picard
    a Frenchman to manage the decline of the Federation
    No heart, lots of regrets for not having a family
    Unlike the other ‘captains’, he needed two co-equals with command chairs to get things done, one of which was the future version of a psychiatrist

    Sisco — come on, he wasn’t even a captain for most of the series, just a REMF running a shopping mall.

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