Captain Pike & Archer: Leadership At Our Worst & Best

Easily, one of the most successful aspects of all of modern Star Trek has been the character of Captain Pike, played by the ineffable Anson Mount on Star Trek Discovery’s second season. Captain Pike, for many, represents everything we love about Star Trek. A commanding figure who knows how to encourage diverse conversations, opens himself up to new possibilities and ideas around him, knows how to be humble and when to take charge, and generally stands up for humanity at it’s best. But, actually is most similar to perhaps Star Trek’s most forgotten captains...Jonathan Archer from Star Trek Enterprise. And the similarities and differences between Archer and Pike help illuminate the very core ethos of Star Trek.

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Mail: Jessie Earl
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Seattle, WA 98145

[markmalebranche]

Little known fact about Anson Mount's quarantine beard; it's actually played by Jeffrey Combs.

[trekjudas]

Pike is awesome. He's empathetic and caring while still being rugged and masculine. He's just too cool!

[Lil-Dragon]

Pike I generally like as he saw the future disability as something not to run from. As a disabled person who knew I would get reliant more on the wheelchair it made me happy he knew his fate and while it took a while he accepted it.

[arklestudios]

Season 4 Archer: Someone you'd trust to lead you into battle.
Season 1 Archer: Someone you wouldn't trust to run a Dairy Queen.

[artemisiatheta]

I would say that Pike has the potential to have the biggest growth of any captain in the franchise since Archer and Sisko. Pike also grew a lot from the time before his time on Talos. (Yes, I know different actors, different writers, etc. However, as Anson Mount said, "The Cage" is sort of the pilot episode for SNW.) When we first meet Pike inside the Trek timeline, he is a man who is being crushed by the weight of command and even contemplating retiring. He is afraid that his ability to command will always be hampered by his fear of losing crew members. By the time we see him in "Brother" (DISCO S2E1) he has changed a great deal.

[greysapocalyptic]

Thank you for giving Archer credit ☺☺☺ you are the only Star Trek channel that gives him any love 😎 he is my CAPTAIN!

[Lia-ufir]

In the German version, Archer was the only one besides Kirk to address his friend with the informal second person pronoun, which I always enjoyed. Because every other characters, even when they were close friends, would be so formal with each other that it just sounded wooden! I've never been in the military (thank God!!!) but I doubt that the soldiers who got to know each other would be that formal in private situations! It's bad that I can't even properly translate it because this would be the perfect place for a joke...

[TRSMediaCanada]

Anson Mount is a great example of an actor who can elevate the quality of a show based purely on his performance. His Pike is the definitive Pike for me now.

[janistransbian]

in janeway's defense, she had it tough. she was in the delta quadrant, trying to get her crew home. and she wasn't always rigid. sometimes she was able to work with 7 of 9 and other crew members for a workable compromise. speaking of which, joining with now former maquis, that was the ultimate compromise.

[greysapocalyptic]

I was so disappointed in CBS on Star Trek day, CBS didn't even feature Archer in the main poster😐 he was the only Captain Missing😐... I also pointed that out at a "Trek Central" live stream and "Captain Jack" bit my fracking head off and then reamed me out for like 3 minutes on air "that how dare I be upset that Star Trek didn't feature Captain Archer" and some other BS like that... so you are the only Star Trek Channel who treats their fans wonderfully! Thank You❤🖖

[tednunja]

Finally, someone willing to give Archer his due! I enjoyed and agreed with your take on both captains. I think you captured what I like best about Archer, that he is flawed but grows and gets to be a better human being with effort. We could sure use a lot more of that in our world today.

[lilithfairxo]

As a lesbian, I'd let Pike "go down" on me. Lol Jessie. Can't believe you said that with a straight face.

[veggiet]

I'd say Janeway falls in between Picard and Archer. She did towards the beginning take a step, perhaps a small step, in treating her crew like friends, it feels almost like she's continuing Picard's growth from the last TNG episode where he joins the Poker game, one of the first Voyager Episodes begins with her joining in the Pool game with the crew. Yes she is still reserved and she still makes the final call, but baby steps. She also was able to overcome her prejudice against holos with her relationship with the Doctor over the season

Also consider this: She has the distinction of captaining a trimmed down, more militaristic, starfleet vessel, yet she decided to give her crew a lot of room for recreation, even allowing the holodeck to be kept running for weeks at a time.

Granted she did this because she realized that they would be the only humans for lightyears, but this is also the reason that Archer gives for taking so much personal interest in his crew, because they were the first humans in long distance space and there wouldn't be any ports of call to stop at.

[euansmith]

"...Archer would be the first go down on an away mission..." I bet that made him popular. ;)

[keithasaur]

Personally loved both Enterprise and Archer. I found him very relatable because of how flawed he was, seeing how I could also get easily frustrated and stubborn in the face of rigid or unpredictable obstacles. That’s one of the main things I loved about the show: seeing Archer and his crew struggle to overcome their limited knowledge and experiences to solve their problems. This is EXACTLY why I excitedly clicked on this video the second I saw the title🤣🤣

[OpinionsNoOneCaresAbout]

That Kirk clip made me realize that now, every time I see a Gorn, the immediate reaction in my head is "Ahhhh! Gorn wedding!"

[katmatally]

I agree with you on Pike, but as a former member of the military, I disliked the dialogue "And skip ranks, they're not important." Umm, yes, they are. Those people busted their humps to get where they are! A simple change like, "Skip your ranks for now, I already know them. I want to know YOU." I was also a bit irritated that he called Owosekun "Owo." I wish she had said, in introducing herself, "You can call me Owo." In the military we used to jokingly shorten people's names, but that was usually a cameraderie situation, not the CO to the junior person. It just seemed insensitive of Pike to shorten her name. Who knows, stuff may have ended up on the cutting room floor >_<

Archer shows remarkable growth, and thank god! But he is very emblematic of our difficulties as a species.

[Hzzard]

ST: SNW prediction: It would be a bit of a cop-out cliche, but if Pike mentions that Archer was an inspiration for him then I'd be just about okay with that.
I don't think it would take anything away from who Pike is as a person (that we've already gotten to know), and it would be enough of a reference to make me happy.

[paulkinnear]

Always nice to see ENTERPRISE get some love. It's my second favourite Trek after TOS, and it's a source of constant annoyance to me that it's the only show that's had no comic series or guide/reference books... at all. Even DISCO has more material out there!! Hopefully, the fact that it's the twentieth anniversary of ENT this year will change that.

[kevinrussell]

Star Trek Enterprise probably my third favorite Star Trek series. I probably put DS9 and TNG in front of Enterprise in that order respectively. But I still enjoy Enterprise to this day. I've been rewatching the excellent Xindi War (Season 3) during the last couple weeks after rewatching most episodes of seasons 1 and 2 again. This show does not deserve the hate or indifference it gets