Suck It, Kirk and Picard: The Best ‘Star Trek’ Captain Is Pike

Annoying Star Trek nerds, like me, will always cringe at this question: “Who’s the best Star Trek Captain?” When I started watching Star Trek, back when we still played Game Boys and enjoyed this new show called The Simpsons, the answer was refreshingly binary: James T. Kirk (William Shatner) or Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart). But in the years since then, the question has become more complex.

Or it would be, if the answer weren’t so obvious. Christopher Pike—played by Anson Mount in the currently airing Strange New Worlds, Star Trek’s twelfth series—is the best Star Trek captain. Story over.

With decades of baggage, it might come as a shock to learn that one of Star Trek’s newest captains is the best. But Pike’s folksy demeanor and warm, paternal leadership style makes him stand apart. Mount’s abundant, positive, dad-like energy distinguishes his take on Pike. He’s not just his crew’s dad—he’s all of our dads.

Don’t believe me? Ask the multiple petitions begging CBS to develop a spin-off for Pike in the wake of Star Trek: Discovery’s second season. These are the same petitions that had a major influence on Paramount+ greenlighting Strange New Worlds in the first place, with fans clamoring for more of the dynamic between Anson Mount and Ethan Peck’s Spock in a show of their own.

Pike became a fan favorite immediately after his debut in the second season of Star Trek: Discovery, where he took over from the more taciturn Gabriel Lorca (Jason Isaacs) after Lorca betrayed the crew of Discovery. While Mount’s rendition of Pike is new, the character is a staple of the Star Trek universe. When he first appeared in the Original Series episode “The Menagerie,” Pike was played by Sean Kenney; there were also flashbacks to his appearance in the original, unaired pilot “The Cage,” in which he was played by Jeffrey Hunter. Later, in J.J. Abrams’ movies Star Trek and Into Darkness, Bruce Greenwood briefly took on the mantle of Pike. But Mount’s feels like the most rounded version of Pike, and it’s the first time that he’s helmed a Star Trek iteration on his own.

Why Pike is not only popular, but also so good at his job, however, is less simple. By the time we meet Mount’s Pike, the 50-year-old has been with Starfleet for more than 30 years. He started first as a test pilot, then became a security officer, before ascending to first officer of the Enterprise under Robert April (Adrian Holmes) and, ultimately, command. He’s the model Starfleet officer: a personable, warm leader. And as noted by Vice Admiral Pasalk (Graeme Somerville) in the recent episode “Ad Astra Per Aspera,” Pike’s even one of Starfleet’s most decorated officers. He even has a medal of valor named after him—not bad for a dork from Mojave who named his horse Sir Neighs-a-lot.

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But even Mount acknowledges how important dad vibes are to his character’s success, more than his bonafides. Speaking to TVLine ahead of Season 2’s premiere last month, he said, “It's more comfortable for him, sometimes, to throw the question to the room and say, ‘I'm out of ideas. Who wants to come up with a solution?’ But in a weird way, that's a great dad personality, isn't it?"

It’s a personality that breaks down the walls that leadership might otherwise place between Pike and his crew; barriers that hampered the paternal impression of every captain before him. So powerful is that effect that one gets the sense that Erica Ortegas (Melissa Navia) is one slip-up from calling him “dad” on the bridge. But that dad energy doesn’t just come from his proclivity for aprons or perfectly coiffed dad hair. It’s also the result of him being the most positive example of leadership we’ve ever seen in a Star Trek series.

As Mount suggests, Pike doesn’t wear the mantle of leadership as easily as past captains, like Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) or Picard. That solemn, natural authority just doesn’t come naturally to him as it does for those TV forebears. It means he doesn’t treat his crew as subordinates, but as family, which he demonstrates in his first act as temporary captain of the U.S.S. Discovery. Pike learns everyone’s names and verbally pats them on the head to let them know he’s not going anywhere after the betrayal of previous captain, Lorca. He then immediately makes the most dad-like impression he can by flagging how badly he did in school, endearing himself to the group.

Where Picard took seven seasons to play poker with his crew, one of the first things Pike does to make his crew comfortable is cook for them, bringing them together over good food and informal conversation. Even in these small decisions, Pike is working for the good of his space kids, understanding that he has to fight for people who aren’t, or can’t be, in his position. He defends the children sacrificed to environmental stability in “Childhood’s End” and goes to bat for his first officer, Una Chin-Riley (Rebecca Romjin)—also known as “Number One”—in Season 1’s finale “A Quality of Mercy,” among other selfless pursuits. He doesn’t always get things right, but Pike always tries to do right—and he can admit when he’s wrong.

That’s most explicit in “A Quality of Mercy,” when Pike’s compassion and tendency towards diplomacy almost proves disastrous in dealing with the Romulans. Instead, he’s happy to admit that Kirk’s (Paul Wesley) more aggressive approach may be correct, though the show stops short of ever suggesting Pike’s willingness to see the best in people is wrong. That’s the case even when it’s directed at Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green), arguably the most disgraced Starfleet officer after she started the Klingon War and led to the death of her captain.

Still, though Pike will always credit someone who has a better idea than him, he’s ready to deploy his “dad voice” as soon as things become unproductive. You know, the one that lets you know he’s not angry, just disappointed. But he’ll always sit his crew down for a meal after, ask about their lives outside of the Enterprise, and make sure they’ve all peed before a mission.

Pike maintains empathy for those around him, even as he deals with his own demons. In the Discovery Season 2 episode “Through the Valley of Shadows,” Pike watches himself become disabled in the process of saving cadets from a training accident. The revelations about his future, and the possibility that he could change it, continue to haunt him throughout the first season of Strange New Worlds. But as he comes to terms with his fate, Pike continues to put his crew’s needs ahead of his own, whether it’s his acceptance and defense of Number One’s augmentations or how he uses humor to calm his captured crew in “The Serene Squall.”

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All of this is driven by Anson Mount’s performance. I admit, I’d never heard of Mount before he made his debut as Pike on Discovery—not caring about Motorbikes (he spent five seasons on Hell on Wheels) or being uncool enough to know he was in Smallville that one time, how could I? But in the three seasons of Star Trek he’s led, including one on Discovery and his two seasons on Strange New Worlds, we quickly understand that Mount is an actor that does the small things so well. He’s the master of little humanizing gestures, like portraying the sense of sorrow in his eyes during the funeral for the crew that died in Season 1’s ninth episode, “All Those Who Wander,” and the stoic terror he feels when watching Number One’s trial in “Ad Astra Per Aspera.” Thanks to his facility for facial expressions, the dad in Pike is obvious, even when he’s silent. He’s even prone to ruffling his crew’s hair with his eyes and smirking in constant pride.

Compared to the Shakespearean flair portrayed by many of our favorite captains, Mount’s is a surprisingly understated performance. He offers a sensitive examination of masculinity in leadership that’s at odds with Kirk’s first-first approach and Picard’s weirdly forest-like chest hair. These may remain appealing to some viewers, but they also feel like they belong to the 20th century, not a more progressive 23rd. Pike, with his wealth of emotional intelligence and lack of ego, comes across as a more modern man—one that feels both more familiar and welcoming than the Gorn-thumping machismo of Kirk.

Perhaps the reason Pike isn’t more readily recognized as the best of Star Trek’s captains is his relative newcomer status. So many of us grew up with Kirk and Picard, giving them a nostalgic hold over us. But the authority of Star Trek’s classic captains, which so often removes them from their crew, could alienate us viewers from them. Kirk had his clique of Spock and McCoy, and Picard always kept an aloof air with everyone but the robotic Data. Even Sisko (Avery Brooks), perhaps the most paternal of captains before Pike—he was literally a father for the entire run of Deep Space Nine—kept his counsel close to his own chest. By comparison, Pike’s collaborative attitude to leadership, in which his warmth isn’t a facade but an encouragement, feels fresh, desirable. It forms a connection not just with his crew but with us, the viewers.

Star Trek is a lot of things at its best. We want humanistic sci-fi; we want adventure and bright lights and wonder; and we want a meaningful reflection of society. Strange New Worlds is all of that. But we also want comfort. Star Trek, even as the better world it portrays feels further away than ever, feels like a safe place at its best—and in Strange New Worlds’, that sense of safety is all thanks to Pike. Where once we followed the voyages of the starship Enterprise, now we’ve got the voyages of the starship’s Space Daddy to look forward to.

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