Star Trek’s Picard : humanity’s conscience

Abstract

Star Trek is a rolling and seemingly endless adventure, a continual reaffirmation of the Campbellian monomyth, a universe in which Captains Kirk, Picard, Janeway, Sisko, and Archer are still one with Jason, Odysseus, Sinbad, Columbus, Cook, Ahab, Armstrong, and every other sea- or spacefarer, real or fictional, that has ever left (or will ever leave) the comfort and safety of home port in search of what’s lurking “out there” and waiting to be discovered. Several captains have led in Star Trek but arguably none have been imbued with more integrity and authority than Captain Jean-Luc Picard, the epitome of a twenty-fourth century Starfleet captain in Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG) and related films.

Picard’s deontological leanings reify him as a moral paragon, a role model whose decisions and actions resonate with our individual desire to do the right thing, emphasizing the “ultimately liberating feature of Star Trek’s mythos . . . its emphasis on the growth of understanding. . . . Gene Roddenberry’s belief in humanity’s potential for self-transcendence”. In all of these ways, it will be demonstrated that Picard’s handling of the ship has certainly made “sure history never forgets the name, Enterprise”.