Star Trek has a long history of iconic captains, from William Shatner’s James T. Kirk to Kate Mulgrew’s Kathryn Janeway to Scott Bakula’s Jonathan Archer and everyone in between. Every Captain brings something new and interesting to the table — different styles of leadership, different hobbies, and different approaches to problem-solving. You’d be hard-pressed to argue that any of them are outright bad (with a few notable exceptions — looking at you, Lorca), and by the same token you’d probably find it difficult to argue that any one of them was unilaterally better than any of the others. However, there is one Star Trek Captain who rises above his peers to represent the best of Starfleet and humanity.
Anson Mount’s Captain Pike Is a Revelation
Since his introduction in the second season of Star Trek: Discovery, Anson Mount’s Captain Christopher Pike has embodied everything Star Trek stands for. Mount isn’t the first actor to have portrayed Pike — he’s following in the footsteps of Jeffery Hunter (in the unaired Star Trek: The Original Series pilot) and Bruce Greenwood (in 2009’s Star Trek and its sequel Into Darkness) — but he’s quickly become the definitive take on the character, blending Hunter’s version’s capable leadership with Greenwood’s version’s wisdom and warmth. His take on the character in Discovery’s second season was so well received that Paramount+ released a spin-off show centered on his time commanding the Enterprise.
Collider Exclusive · Sci-Fi Personality Quiz Which Sci-Fi Hero Are You Most Like? Paul Atreides · Captain Kirk · Princess Leia · Ellen Ripley · Max Rockatansky
Five iconic heroes. Five completely different ways of facing an impossible universe. One of them shares your instincts, your values, and your particular way of refusing to back down. Eight questions will tell you which one.
🏜️Paul Atreides
🖖Capt. Kirk
✊Princess Leia
🔦Ellen Ripley
🔥Max Rockatansky
01
How do you lead when the stakes couldn’t be higher? The way you lead under pressure is the most honest thing about you.
02
What is your greatest strength in a crisis? The quality that keeps you alive when everything else fails.
03
What is the thing you’d sacrifice everything else for? Your deepest motivation is your truest compass.
04
How do you relate to the people around you? Who you are to others under pressure is who you really are.
05
You’re facing a threat that no one else believes is real. What do you do? How you respond when you’re the only one who sees it defines everything.
06
What has your heroism cost you personally? Every hero pays. The question is what — and whether they’d pay it again.
07
How do you feel about the rules of the world you’re in? Every hero has a relationship with the system. What’s yours?
08
When everything is on the line, what keeps you going? The answer is the most honest thing about you.
Your Hero Has Been Identified Your Sci-Fi Hero Is…
Your answers point to the iconic sci-fi hero who shares your instincts, your values, and your particular way of facing the impossible.
Arrakis · Dune
Paul Atreides
You carry a weight most people would crumble under — the knowledge of what you’re capable of, and the burden of what you might have to become.
You see further ahead than others and you plan accordingly, even when the vision frightens you.
You are driven by loyalty to your people and a sense of destiny you didn’t ask for but can’t escape.
Paul Atreides is not simply a hero — he is someone who understands the cost of power and chooses to bear it anyway.
That gravity, that willingness to carry what others won’t, is exactly you.
USS Enterprise · Star Trek
Captain Kirk
You lead with instinct, warmth, and an absolute refusal to accept a no-win scenario — because you’ve always believed there’s a third option nobody else has thought of yet.
You take the mission seriously without ever taking yourself too seriously.
Your crew would follow you anywhere, not because you demand it, but because you’ve earned it.
Kirk’s genius isn’t tactical — it’s human. He reads people, bends rules with purpose, and wills outcomes into existence through sheer conviction.
That combination of warmth, audacity, and relentless optimism is unmistakably yours.
The Rebellion · Star Wars
Princess Leia
You are the kind of person who holds the line when everyone else is losing faith — not because you’re fearless, but because giving up simply isn’t something you’re capable of.
You lead through conviction. Your voice carries because your belief is unshakeable.
You gave up everything ordinary the moment you chose the cause, and you’ve never looked back.
Leia is not a supporting character in her own story — she is the moral centre of the entire rebellion.
That same fierce, principled, unbreakable core is what defines you.
The Nostromo · Alien
Ellen Ripley
You are not reckless, not grandiose, and not particularly interested in being anyone’s hero — you just refuse to stop when it matters.
You see threats clearly, you document the truth even when no one listens, and when the time comes you handle it yourself.
Ripley’s heroism is earned, not performed. She doesn’t have a speech — she has a flamethrower and a plan.
You share her composure under the worst possible pressure, and her refusal to pretend the monster isn’t there.
When it counts, you don’t flinch. That’s everything.
The Wasteland · Mad Max
Max Rockatansky
You have been through fire that would break most people — and what came out the other side is something the world underestimates at its peril.
You don’t ask for help, don’t need validation, and don’t wait for anyone to tell you the rules no longer apply.
Your loyalty, when it finally arrives, is absolute — but it’s earned in silence and tested in action, not in words.
Max is not a nihilist. He is someone who lost everything and found, against his will, that he still has something worth protecting.
That bruised, stubborn, ultimately human core is exactly yours.
What made Mount’s take on the character so appealing? Part of it was the way Pike was the antithesis of Discovery’s previous captain, the scheming Gabriel Lorca (Jason Isaacs). Lorca was manipulative, focused on his mission to a fault, and ultimately directly antagonistic to his crew once they stopped being useful to him. By contrast, Pike’s leadership style was focused entirely on the crew. He understood that it wouldn’t be easy for the crew of Discovery to accept him after Lorca damaged their trust in authority, so he made every effort to put them at ease.
He immediately made it clear that he valued the crew of the Discovery individually, calling them by name rather than rank and deferring to them when their experience gave them an insight into a situation that he didn’t have. And the entire time, he carried himself with the class and self-confidence of all the great Captains that had come before him (from our point of view, at least, since he predates all but Archer in canon).
Pike Is Everything You Could Want from a Starfleet Captain
strange new worlds anson mount star trek 110 social featuredImage via Paramount+
In all of Pike’s appearances throughout Discovery and its spin-off Strange New Worlds, he approaches every challenge with this same mix of empathy, emotional intelligence, and his crew-focused leadership style. As Captain of the Enterprise, he hosts regular meals with not just his command staff but also regular members of the crew so he can get to know them personally. In Strange New Worlds’ “Children of the Comet,” he invites Cadet Uhura (Celia Rose Gooding) to dinner with his senior officers and asks her about her past and plans for the future. This created an opportunity for Uhura to feel more comfortable with the senior officers, helping her to feel confident enough around them to save the day on the titular comet later that episode.
This isn’t a one-off event either, as we see him throwing a party to celebrate Uhura and several other regular crew members later that season in “All Those Who Wander.” Pike takes a similar approach to dealing with those outside of his crew. In “Spock Amok,” he convinces the R’ongovians to join the Federation by recognizing their diplomatic strategy (which he describes as “radical empathy”) and implementing it in his approach to the negotiations. In “The Serene Squall,” he offers to make a meal for the pirate crew that took him hostage and uses that opportunity to gain insight into the pirates’ dynamic that he uses to trigger a mutiny so he can escape.
Before prestige TV became the norm, one sci-fi series took a storytelling risk that changed everything.
But it’s not just his ability to connect to others that makes him a good Captain. He’s also capable of keeping a cool head in seemingly impossible situations. In Discovery’s “Through the Valley of Shadows,” he’s forced to choose between saving the galaxy from the imminent threat of Control or saving himself from a serious accident he saw in a vision of his future (an accident that was first referenced in the Original Series two-parter, “The Menagerie”). Despite the steep personal cost, Pike chooses to accept his future to save the galaxy, without hesitation. Less personally, the Strange New Worlds premiere forces Pike to decide between holding fast to the rules of Starfleet or acting in the best interests of the planet Kiley 279.
The people of Kiley 279 had developed weaponized Warp technology due to Starfleet’s actions in Discovery’s Season 2 finale. Pike beamed back down to the planet and tried to convince the people of Kiley 279 to not use the weapon and pursue peace, using Earth’s violent history as an example of where they would be headed if they did not change course. While technically this violated General Order One (later known as the Prime Directive), Pike decided it was better to try and right the wrong that had already been done rather than let the people of Kiley 279 slaughter each other. Pike always chooses to prioritize life and connection, no matter the cost.
Anson Mount as Captain Pike in Star Trek Strange New Worlds extending his hand toward the camera in the musical episode.Image via Paramount+
The above descriptions might make Pike seem like an impossibly heroic and unrelatable figure, but Mount’s performance is compelling and human. Neither Discovery nor Strange New Worlds shy away from showing the toll his job takes on him. The accident he saw in his future in “Through the Valley of Shadows” hangs over him for all of Strange New Worlds’ first season as he grapples with his mortality. During his time on Discovery, he struggles with his guilt over the fact that the Enterprise was kept away from the fighting during the Klingon War.
These struggles, as well as more one-off conflicts in episodes like Strange New Worlds’ “Lift Us Where Suffering Cannot Reach,” highlight how human he is despite his strengths. And it’s all elevated by Mount’s performance, which simultaneously presents Pike as a paragon of Starfleet’s ideals and immensely approachable, the sort of boss you’d love to have.
What’s most compelling about Mount’s take on Pike is that his true strength lies in his moral character. He is kind and understanding, even with those who have given him little reason to be. He doesn’t just stand up for what he believes in; he consistently acts to change the world for the better. He’s slow to violence, quick to diplomacy, and even quicker to help someone in need. Starfleet could not ask for a better Captain. And if all that wasn’t enough, he’s a great cook and has fabulous hair. What’s not to love?
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is available to stream on Paramount+.
