Board 8 > Eight Board-Eighters Rank Star Trek Characters

(+) Yeah! (+)

#48 Jake Sisko
"Daaaayad!"
"Jake-Oh!"

I think whether or not Jake Sisko ranks in the upper half of a Star Trek fan's character list is predicated on one thing and one thing alone: whether or not they consider DS9's fourth-season episode "The Visitor" a masterclass enough episode to justify it. I do not.

Jake is Benjamin Sisko's son. His mother died years ago thanks to the attempted Borg invasion of the Alpha Quadrant at Wolf 351. Now his father must raise him as a single parent whilst commanding a space station in contested territory at the galaxy's edge. This is a pretty great premise and for Captain Sisko it sometimes pays off in spades. For Jake himself, however, it's middling. As Anagram notes, he exists predominantly as a cipher for his father. There's nothing inherently wrong with that, but it puzzles me to this day that Cirroc Lofton remained on the opening credits list for all seven seasons yet the late Aron Eisenberg (RIP), whose portrayal as Nog far eclipsed anything the writers ever did with Jake, is forever credited as a guest star.

When we first meet Jake, we quickly learn that he likes baseball, girls, and being mischievous with his delinquent friend. Cool story, bro. As Deep Space Nine progresses, a lot of this basically remains stagnant, though "The Visitor" is enough of a one-off shakeup that for a lot of fans it singlehandedly makes up for it. To me, the episode is significantly overrated, though my complete lack of a father figure growing up (or even much of a mother figure) is the principle factor I contribute to my apathy on the matter. I have never once teared up during the episode; label me a monster.

In truth, I prefer the Jake of the Dominion occupation arc the most. Here, Lofton is given the rare chance to really test his chops as an actor. Jake's subplot involves a commitment to honest journalism (oh right, he becomes a writer; this is neat but let's not talk about the "muse succubus" episode please) and Dominion leaders insisting he tone things down and deliver galactic propaganda. It's pretty good stuff. Less impressive is the fifth season's allegedly special outing entitled "Nor the Battle to the Strong", which is another popular DS9 episode I don't really care about. It's like some kind of war story against the Klingons even though the brief war with the Federation has already ended and it involves Jake running around going AWOL until he meets a character whose shtick as a hard-as-nails type leads to some of the most overwrought bad acting outside of the early seasons of any Rick Berman spinoff series.

Jake basically disappears after the Dominion occupation arc, mostly only showing up whenever his father and Kasidy Yates need a domestic dispute scene together, but to his credit he does share the very last scene in a superb series finale alongside the (far superior character of) Kira Nerys. It's a scene that hits me like a ton of bricks every damn time in the best possible way.

Too bad Jake's fairly whatever elsewhere.

---

#47 Montgomery Scott
"Aye, Cap'n, I can do all that. And I can do it without La Forge's or Paris' inane technobabble too if ye'd like."

Scotty's alright. He's a fun, drunken Scotsman who gets into trouble for it nearly as many times as his expertise saves the day. So why is he kicking the write-ups bucket so soon when certain problematic characters remain? It's rather the same raw deal that has been handed to Uhura. Namely, I don't really care about the guy in most instances and I don't remember a ton of his scenes. Amusingly, the actor is more interesting than the character again, because James Doohan fought in World War II and James Doohan World War II stories are wild. Absolutely wild.

I like a lot of Scotty scenes. Especially in the movies. But I'm forever filled with a sense of slight apathy toward a lot of TOS and this corners and subdues poor Scott. "Hello, computer" is a timeless scene from Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, which is pretty damn ironic when considering that a lot of Scotty's "lol, he's from the 23rd century!" misunderstandings over a 1986 IBM computer are bizarrely relatable today. Scotty also shows up on TNG's "Relics", which is a very good episode only marginally diminished by Geordi.

In the Kelvinverse movies, Simon Pegg plays Simon Pegg, which is fortunate enough considering Simon Pegg is in some ways Montgomery Scott. He remains a fun bloke with some decent moral convictions occasionally tested by his appetite for pleasure. He has a little alien sidekick played by, I kid you not, a guy named Deep Roy. Said alien is often misinterpreted as some kind of pygmy Jem'Hadar; he is not, in fact, a pygmy Jem'Hadar.




---

this seems like a good place to ask

if I were to start watching the original series (never seen substantial amounts of anything Trek other than the reboot movies), do I go with the remastered version or the original?

---

AxemRedRanger posted...

this seems like a good place to ask

if I were to start watching the original series (never seen substantial amounts of anything Trek other than the reboot movies), do I go with the remastered version or the original?

Just do the remastered. Its just the same thing with better special effects.

---

Anagram posted...

Just do the remastered. Its just the same thing with better special effects.

In this case, it sounds like he should do original

---

clearly he should go in timeline order, lol

(would that be the worst viewing order possible or what)

---

18. William T. Riker
Why, hello, ladies.

I get what they were going for with Riker in season 1. Picard is the best of humanity in a philosophical sense: hes smart, diplomatic, and unfailingly ethical. Riker is almost that, but hes also young, handsome, and strong. Theres that one shot in the Ferengi episode where theyre all hunched over and look like rats while Riker, the human, stands tall above them. Its like a comical film student shot.

Everyone knows about growing the beard and all that, so I wont go into details. The important part is that Riker could have easily just been a guy on the bridge who says things Picard could have said instead. He could have easily been another Chakotay. Instead, Riker gets a lot of attention. Only Picard, Data, and Worf get more.

Riker gets a lot of flak for being Discount Kirk, and to an extent this is warranted. Hes brasher and more adventurous than Picard, and his literal role from a scriptwriting perspective is to go down to the planet, punch some guys, and get into trouble so we have a character we care about who needs help. I can accept that a lot of people dont see that much of a difference between them, but really, theres a huge gulf in terms of personality. Everyone remembers The Best of Both Worlds, but a lot of people dont remember that Picard isnt the protagonist. The protagonist is Riker. Hes the one whos like I dont know if I need a stalled career as the first officer of the flagship for the rest of my life and has to step up and prove that hes a capable captain in his own right. So while Riker and Kirk have similar roles in the story and sort of similar personalities, theres a huge difference in terms of inner conflict.

Id say Rikers biggest weakness may be Troi. The writers really needed to have put way more emphasis into their relationship or to put way less, but the way it comes off is kind of lame.

Speaking of kind of lame, no one suffers more in the movies than Riker. The writers clearly only had material for Picard and Data. Rather than try to fix this, they just shrugged and moved on. I cant think of a single thing Riker does in Generations or Insurrection, and all I can remember of him in First Contact and Nemesis is stunning Zephram Cochrane and personally fighting a Reman instead of sending a security guy to do it. At least Worf gets to shoot a Borg while saying Assimilate this.

---

Riker deserved better.

---

scarletspeed7 posted...

Riker deserved better.

Riker's pretty good. I wonder how he would have been if they'd gone with the plan of killing Picard in Best of Both Worlds.

---

17. Montgomery Scott
Och, aye, ohm inna woch nahw.

I will admit straight off the bat that Scotty doesnt deserve to be anywhere near this high, but I just love him anyway. Hes the most fleshed out of TOS non-core cast, which is to say that he gets more of a personality than nothing, and he has the benefit of having the best actor of the non-core cast. Unlike Uhura, Sulu, Chekov, Chapel, and Rand, Scotty has the benefit of having a very extreme personality that leads to a lot of silly overacting, so he ends up being way more memorable as a result.

Scotty exists for two reasons. The first is so he can say the ship will explode unless you do X, and then Kirk has to do X. The second is so that someone will be sitting in the captains chair when Kirk and Spock are down on the whatever planet. Thats it. Hes not so much a character as a plot device, and James Doohan made the wise decision to make him as wacky as possible to compensate for that.

You know who the closest analogy is? Emperor Palpatine. Imagine if Palpatine was just a run-of-the-mill evil emperor. You will obey me or Ill kill you. I survive on the shadows cast by goodness and love. I will conquer the galaxy. Hed be awful and no one would remember him. But because Ian McDiarmid plays him so ridiculous and hammy, everyone loves him, even in the prequels. I guess what Im saying is that weirdos like me like bad acting and silliness, and Scotty gives me that in spades. We havent gotten to Kirk yet, but boy oh boy will we have something to talk about then.

Speaking of acting, this doesnt relate directly to Scotty, but in the animated series, James Doohan was the only one of the core cast with experience voice acting, so almost every male character outside of the main characters is voiced by him. He tries to disguise his voice, but you can clearly tell that everyone in the galaxy is Scotty, which is wonderful.

---

I ag --

You know who the closest analogy is? Emperor Palpatine.

--

--

--

https://media.giphy.com/media/D1yfwrPcDUrFS/giphy.gif

-- okay fair

---

SaveEstelle posted...

I ag --

--

--

--

https://media.giphy.com/media/D1yfwrPcDUrFS/giphy.gif

-- okay fair

Heheh, only Scotty of the original crew would have said that.

---

16. Miles OBrien
We need an engineer character for our new show.
Okay, bring in that one recurring engineer guy from TNG no one really cares much about.
You mean Barclay?
No, the other one.

Ever wonder what Colm Meaney thought of that episode of TNG where they meet Space Irish? Probably the same thing he thought when that DS9 episode with the psychic aliens who materialize whatever youre thinking about had a script that said OBrien materializes a leprechaun because obviously Irish people think about leprechauns all the time, and he forced the writers to change it to Rumpelstiltskin.

Chief OBrien is the best accidental character ever. He went from literally an extra to a main character, appeared in two series premieres and finales, and married a Japanese hate ghost.

Fun fact: Miles OBrien is the Star Trek character with the second highest number of appearances, after Worf. Funner fact: I just made that up without checking, but its probably true. Ill level with you: this character is probably only this high because of a webcomic.
https://chiefobrienatwork.com/
Its the only webcomic in history that dares to ask What does Chief OBrien do when hes manning the transporter room and no one needs transporting? And why does he even have to do this job when the computer can do it just as well? The answers turn out to be unimaginably depressing.

To me, the definitive Chief OBrien moment isnt his friendship with Bashir, or how the writers tried to make him into the normal guy, or how he always got **** on by stories that needed a victim. No. to me, the definitive Chief OBrien moment is in Best of Both Worlds Part 2, when Geordi was written in the script as being the guy analyzing Locutus using a computer gizmo. At the last moment, LeVar Burton had to pull out, so they hastily stuck Chief OBrien in the scene. During the scene, Locutus goes crazy and starts beating up extras and trying to kill the other characters. The camera shifts to OBrien for one second, and they probably intended for Geordi to look alarmed and go help, but because OBrien isnt as big a star and because Colm Meaney isnt as good an actor, OBrien just looks over at a crazy Borg beating up a security guy, gives a look that can only possibly read as Glad thats not my job, and goes back to his computer. That, to me, is the ultimate OBrien move.

---

Anagram posted...

19. Nog
I cant think of any funny fake Nog quotes, so Ill just write this and see if anyone responds.

Booooo

---

The dream of catching up to Ana fades fast but Ill have some more soon regardless

---

Mega Mana posted...

Booooo

I was genuinely curious.

15. Kira Nerys
I see wacky space shenanigans every day, all of which are about as powerful as my gods and yet are easily explainable with science Im gonna keep believing anyway, though.

Kira and Riker are characters I like a lot, but have difficulty nailing down precisely why. I think the idea of a former terrorist becoming a soldier and having to deal with semi-normal life is really good, and I think Nana Visitor is a really solid actress. But if you asked me to tell you like the defining Kira moment, I can really only give a list of cool things I enjoyed about her.

Remember when she befriended a Cardassian, and a random Bajoran kills the guy, and she mourns his death? Remember when a Cardassian thought she was his daughter, later realized his real daughter was probably dead, and willed his secrets to her? Remember when she went to the Mirror Universe had by far the best evil version? Remember when a cranky old man refused to move when his moon was scheduled to become uninhabitable, and she told him to move, and he asked how she defeated the Cardassians, and she was forced to admit it was by ignoring authority? Remember when Kira had to have someone elses baby beamed into her and carry it to term because the actress got pregnant, and everyone treated her like a pregnant woman, and she got upset because she defines herself by being a badass?

Actually, I lied: if I had to pick out the definitive Kira Nerys moment, its probably when Dukat called her, dropped a I had sex with your mom, and she asked Sisko to borrow the magical orb of time travel so she could check if he really had sex with her mom, and then he lets her.

I would assume that if Jesus showed up and got like a normal job, like the manager at a Barnes and Noble, most of the employees would treat him with a little deference and respect? Kira offers Sisko exactly the amount due to her commanding officer and no more. I like how she is occasionally conflicted by the responsibilities of her job and her religion, I like how she stays true to her interpretation of it even when Kai Winn does her thing, I just generally like this character. She has a lot of good moments and depth, and she does a good job of showing insight into Bajoran culture and how they perceive the wacky space shenanigans going on around them.

If theres something I dont like about Kira, its her taste in men before Odo. Vedek Bareil and the other guy are the most boring men in the galaxy for sure.

I guess Kira also wins the first religious main character in Star Trek award, beating out Chakotay. In fact, Im going to go ahead and say shes better than Chakotay in every way.

---

14. Q
I have literally nothing better to do than mess with a bald mortal.

I sort of like more for what he represents than for who he actually is. Gene Roddenberry had a lot of bad ideas, but the core concept of humanity has conquered its bad attributes, moved beyond them, and now explores the great unknown is great. But its also great for those explorers to have challenges, and its an interesting idea to have a personification of those challenges who says Maybe youre not as great as you think you are.

Qs shtick is to find the greatest specimen of humanity and prod and poke him to prove how humans arent that great, and Picards shtick is to prove him wrong. Hes a literal judge who dresses up like a post-apocalyptic WWIII judge (by the way, I hate how later Qs show up and wear the judge outfits just because the writers thought that was generic Q equipment and not a historical thing he took). The idea of a trickster god in Star Trek is weird and interesting and clever.

The problem is that Q is only good like half the time, and hes only good period with Picard. Q is a character designed to test Picard specifically, and no one else. He shows up in DS9 and has no place in the episode. He doesnt care specifically about Sisko, Sisko doesnt care specifically about him, and everyone is just sort of annoyed at each other. And Voyager, ugh. As far as Im concerned, Q should have stopped existing after TNGs finale. His job was to judge humanity based on its best member, and thats what he did in All Good Things And then he just keeps showing up in Voyager. Janeway, have god sex with me and Ill teleport you home. Janeway, we super gods need a human to judge the morality of one member of our species who wants to commit suicide, but were willing to bribe you, the judge, rendering this whole exercise completely pointless. Janeway, we have god weapons that are beyond your understanding, so they look like Civil War-era muskets, and everyone will appear to you like Confederate soldiers. Thats all canon, by the way.

You know what completely inappropriate comparison Im going to make here? Q is like Jake Sisko. He exists for Picard, and in that capacity hes great. He shows up and makes some low diction jabs at the very educated and philosophical Picard, then reveals how Picard isnt as hot as he thinks he is. I dont really like every episode Q is in (hes in twelve episodes throughout all series, of which Id say maybe five are good), but Q himself is the definition of a good foil.

---

Sisko punching Q in that five second boxing thing was good though

---

NFUN posted...

Sisko punching Q in that five second boxing thing was good though

That's the only part anyone remembers.

---

He's NOT Picard.

---

13. Dukat
Yeah? Well I slept with your wife! I mean mother.

I really dislike how Star Wars stuff has crept into Star Trek over time. Superweapons and ancient prophecies and space magic. But call me a hypocrite, because I still love Dukat.

Star Trek doesnt have a lot of villains. It has a lot of one-episode guys who have goals opposite the heroes and a lot of omnipotent energy beings, but as far as Im in more than one episode and my goals are clearly evil and Im gonna getcha bad guys go, its basically Khan, Dukat, the Female Changeling, that one Khan rip-off in Enterprise, and the Borg Queen (I hate the Borg Queen, by the way, but thats a story for another time). And of all of them, Dukat is the bad guyest. Also, Im ignoring Discovery in that statement.

Dukats transformation from smiling, smarmy cog in the machine of fascism to giving up everything for my daughter to leader of the rebellion to leader of the fascist regime to insane megalomaniac to guy who sleeps with Kai Winn to physical incarnation of all that is evil is completely believable and makes total sense at every step. Theres never a moment when youre like well that was a big jump, but there are always crazy, surprising twists. Where Garak is someone who genuinely loves Cardassia and works for his vision of it, Dukat is clearly working for himself and, briefly, his daughter. If you actually pay attention to Dukats actions, he almost never accepts responsibility for anything or admits fault except with his daughter. Every other time, he either blames someone else or blames society or whatever. Hes the definition of an egomaniac, and its made funnier when he refuses any higher rank than Gul. Remember when he lies to Sisko about the distress beacon, Sisko realizes its off, and Dukat berates him for not trusting him? Remember when Sisko gets him to admit that he shouldve killed all Bajorans everywhere? Perfect moves for this character.

Part of what makes Dukat compelling is his willingness to do whatever it takes to achieve his goals. Hes like Khan in this way; what makes Khan interesting isnt that hes literally stronger and faster than you, its his cunning and cleverness and ability to win with inferior resources. Dukat is working from a disadvantage for most of the series (hes only really equal to Sisko at the beginning of the series, when he has Cardassias resources and Sisko only has a broken station, and when hes briefly in charge of Cardassia during the Dominion War), but he still always matches Sisko. This is as opposed to, say, a superpowered nanomachine computer that wants to mind control Section 31 into building a fleet of fifty ships, each of which belches out hundreds of manned space fighters, so it can absorb the knowledge of an ancient space ball.

I love how Dukat is a total egomaniac, but in the end, hes sort of proven right. Hes not really as smart as he thinks he is, but hes incredibly opportunistic and lucky. Remember when Kai Winn just straight-up poisons him, and hes saved by the Pah-Wraiths because he actually is the chosen one he believes himself to be? I guess youre not really an egomaniac if you think youre the chosen one and a god says yes, you are.

Lastly, because theres nowhere else on this list to put this, I love how Damar was supposed to just be killed in the last two episodes with no fanfare at all, then the writers decided actually, hes too important to die that way, so they changed it so he gets to dramatically utter half of a sentence before dying.

---

- Great Tier -
Great Tier characters are completely necessary for their shows. The shows are built around their presence, and if removed, it would be a completely different experience.

12. Leonard McCoy
Dammit, Jim, hes dead, not alive!

Poor, poor McCoy. Any non-Trekkie knows Kirk and Spock, but how many know McCoy? Probably some. If I asked my sister what she knows about Star Trek, she might say Hes dead, Jim, but shed have no idea who said it.

As the third member of the Kirk/Spock/McCoy trio, McCoy serves a very specific purpose: hes there to always be wrong. In that sense, hes like Worf, whose job is to recommend something Picard can dismiss. When Kirk has to make a decision, Spock says Do the heartless, logical thing, and McCoy says Do the right thing, Kirk obeys McCoy zero percent of the time. He rarely obeys Spock, to be fair, and instead finds a third answer, but the point is that McCoy is supposed to represent the emotional perspective. If you want to bust out your fancy college degree, you could even argue that he represents the id.

It was a genius move to make McCoy an old-fashioned country doctor type in a setting where everyone lives in a sterile spaceship encountering wacky science nonsense. Everyone else either has a thinned-sketched backstory or is Spock, whose race is couched in a lot of weird mysticism. Having a guy whos just a guy was brilliant, especially because it enables him to always argue with Spock.

In fact, McCoy is almost a satellite character to Kirk and Spock, though not quite. He has enough going on as a character on his own to avoid that, but like, I cant think of a lot of McCoy interacts with someone else moments. Remember when Uhura got her mind wiped? Heres what Memory-Alpha says: This assault required Dr. McCoy to use advanced medical and educational techniques to restore her memories. Im like ****, man, Uhura had no memories, and all he did was tell Nurse Chapel to read some books off of a computer until she was normal again, and it worked. Say what you want about your fancy 24th century medicine, but McCoy apparently knows how to handle every situation.

One McCoy moment I really like is when Khan wakes up on a surgery table (they dont know who he is yet), puts a scalpel to his neck, and McCoy is just completely unimpressed and tells him a better way to kill someone. Crusher and Bashir wouldve **** themselves in that situation.

Anyway, everyone wants me to talk about Kirk/Spock/McCoy, so I guess I will. Its the best-written Star Trek friendship, and we all know it. McCoy is constantly racist in a way he would not be if they made the show today, but Spock is so much smarter than him and always gets the last word in, so it still feels like theyre on equal terms. The show desperately needed a guy who just wants to do the right thing, but doesnt have Spocks weird philosophy and science skills or Kirks cleverness, charisma, and punching everything skills, and thats what McCoy brings.

Too bad about Mirror McCoy, though. Mirror Spock gets a ton of attention, Mirror Sulu and Chekov get a little, Mirror Kirk gets enough that we can tell hes just insane, and the rest get nothing. Its bad when youre relegated to the Uhura Pile.

---

11. Quark
Rule of Acquisition #203: Keep posting writeups even if you dont get responses.

I was going to make a joke writeup about the 1970s show Quark and about how awful it is, but Im probably the only person on B8 who even knows it exists, so I guess I have to do this the right way. A lot of people dislike Quark because his episodes are usually pointless and his supporting cast is not the best, but I disagree, hes pretty great.

Quark is the first attempt by Star Trek to have a character whos not in the Federation and judges Roddenberrys image of the perfect version of humanity by alien virtues. I guess thats actually the Klingon lady in Star Trek VI, but whatever.

So Quarks got a pretty standard character arc: greedy guy learns to be less greedy when people need his help. I like how Quark himself reflects on this and basically predicts it himself in one episode, when he laments to Garak that the Federation is insidious and slowly makes you like it by interacting with you. This was of course expanded upon and made much better by the Discovery character TKuvma.

You know what other science-fiction character Quark is closest to? Londo Mollari from B5. Both are nobodies on unimportant stations far away from anything that matters, then something happens that makes the station important, and suddenly theyre among the most important people in the galaxy. This parallel is heightened by the episode where Quark cheats at poker using his tentacle penises.

Can I just say that I love the Rules of Acquisition? Theyre one of my favorite ideas in all of science-fiction. The idea of an alien bible that just consists of Ayn Randian advice is one of the most brilliant ideas in Star Trek. The greatest Quark moment of all time to me is the episode where he uses it to out-logic a Vulcan and force her to help him.

One of the cleverer aspects of Quark as a character is that hes such a greedy, scheming bastard by human standards, barely tolerable, and yet by Ferengi standards hes so charitable and kind that they eventually have to blacklist his bar. Quarks got his relationship with Odo and the others where hes given a lot of latitude because they know he wont go too far. Theres that one episode where he unknowingly helps smuggle in some guys who are going to kill Jadzia to steal the Dax symbiont, Kira flips out at him, and Quark realizes that oh wait, actually Kira is right, this is basically my fault, and does some mildly heroic things.

Anyway, I dont want to make this writeup last forever, so Ill end it by asking what a Ferengi weapon would be like. I know they have those stupid laser whips in a TNG episode, but I mean for real. Would they just buy really efficient, boring guns, or what?

---

Anagram posted...

Anyway, I dont want to make this writeup last forever, so Ill end it by asking what a Ferengi weapon would be like. I know they have those stupid laser whips in a TNG episode, but I mean for real. Would they just buy really efficient, boring guns, or what?

Y'know, if you're curious, I've got a contact named Gaila who would be happy to sell you a demonstration

---

NFUN posted...

Y'know, if you're curious, I've got a contact named Gaila who would be happy to sell you a demonstration

I deserved that.

---

Don't like how dead this is getting apart from Anagram. I'll get some more in tomorrow!

---

I have been lurking, but in the name of making sure you know there is still interest, tag.

Quark is probably a top 10 character for me.

---

I've been lurking too.
---

This is like my favorite ongoing topic I read it at work when I poop

---

Anagram posted...

Rule of Acquisition #203: Keep posting writeups even if you dont get responses.

And you're the only one posting


@Eddv @scarletspeed7 @Vengeful_KBM

---

This is how all group lists go.

Although I think we did get close to having everyone finish a Mass Effect squadmate list once, but that's with like a quarter of the characters.

---

Also lurking, loving these writeups.

---

10. Elim Garak
Im not mildly sort of unimplying the inference that you might not have failed to realize the not-unspy-like qualities dubiously possessed by a certain tailor.

Garak is the poster child for just ignore whos in the credits when determining main characters, along with like half of Buffy the Vampire Slayers cast. This guy is more important than basically every character other than Sisko, Odo, and Kira, and hes in way more episodes than like Jake, and yet, always just a guest star.

I wonder if Cardassia would be the same if the show was made today. Cardassia is basically just a fascist planet, right? Like, fascism was a non-factor in the 1990s, but the show still managed to talk about it. I was going to make a comparison to how DIS handles modern politics, but Im honestly just tired of complaining about it, so I wont.

I like the idea of an exiled spy whos still loyal to his vision of Cardassia, even if it means working against the current regime and literally every other Cardassian in the galaxy. I like the idea of a guy who lets it be known that hes a former spy and then just plays with everyone, partly out of actual usefulness and partly just because why the hell not? I like the idea of cozying up to Bashir out of convenience and then genuinely getting to like the guy. I like the idea of Im willing to do whatever it takes, but Im not going to do more than that because Im not like a horrible monster, guys. I like the idea of him being a killer, but being completely affable. I like the idea of getting mildly offended by a James Bond holodeck program. I like how hes one of the two multi-episode characters Worf ever beats in a fight. Im not going to fact-check that, by the way.

I can see Garak being really bad if played by a lesser actor, but Andrew Robinson really brings it. Not much else to say, the guy really brings a charismatic smarminess to the role. Id say hes one of the characters who most benefits from having an A+ actor.

Im gonna say it: screw Star Trek Picard, give me Star Trek Garak, where its just about old man Garak dealing with extremely boring political issues on Cardassia as he tries to rebuild it as its new fascist dictator, but there are like democracy movements he cant squash because it would be bad for Federation relations.

---

Wow, glad there are lurkers!

---

#46 Rom
"Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.. brother?"

Rom's funny, though not always for the reasons which the writers intended. For starters, he's kind of a dark dude in the first season of the show. His dumbness is already established (although his smart-on-the-inside traits are not yet present) but he's also kind of a brooding, vengeful father/brother figure. He outright attempts to kill Quark in the first big Ferengi episode of the series. Would the Rom of any future season come within seconds of pressing the airlock button? Family is everything to him thereafter. He's also a hostile and unappreciative father to Nog at first -- another clash.

I can tell you all that fresh off my memory because I just finished season one in my latest rewatch. But of course, Rom doesn't really come into his own until later on. He's thrifty, innovative, and has a heart of gold -- not gold-pressed latinum. He's a good dad and an even better mechanic. The whole shtick gets old sometimes. Really old. For every genuinely hilarious Rom moment, there is at least one Rom moment in which his freak-outs and high-pitched wailing during an otherwise-serious occasion are like tripping in plaster. But hey, the good moments are good.

I've never been bothered by Rom becoming Grand Nagus in the penultimate episode of Deep Space Nine but I know some fans who absolutely hate it. (I think @Eddv is one of them.) I find it funny, and I don't tend to think of any Ferengi society episodes as attempting to be anything but funny. Quark keeps the bar; Rom and Leeta run off to radically rule the Ferengi Alliance. So be it. It's comedy.

---

Anagram posted...

I like how hes one of the two multi-episode characters Worf ever beats in a fight. Im not going to fact-check that, by the way.

He fought well... for a tailor!

(way, way too low a ranking, boooo)

9. Benjamin Sisko
Im the second most famous bald captain in Starfleet.

Every so often, you get a Sisko is the best captain person. Theyre rare, but theyre around. Sorry, guys. Siskos wonderful, but hes no Kirk or Picard.

Compared to the other captains, Id say Sisko is more defined by his past and stuff thats piled up in him over time. I never, ever got the impression that Picard and Janeway were really weighed down by decisions theyd made over time, by the wacky space shenanigans they had to deal with, or by their pasts. Kirk only feels that way in the movies. Only Archer also has a past that really affects his actions, and even his only comes into play when Vulcans are around. Sisko, though? Dudes got a dead wife, a son, and a stalled career, and all of that is just in the first episode. Even the trivial nonsense about him is eventually important, like his love for baseball. With Sisko, everything feels significant, and thats a big deal. No single-episode love interests for him.

God, can you imagine a Voyager where Janeway actually feels guilty about people dying under her command and is like What have I doooooonnnnneeee? Sisko gets that, and he also gets like a slow descent into doing things he could have never imagined, like framing the Dominion to get the Romulans to join a war.

This works the other way around, by the way. Theres an episode where Sisko gets so upset at Eddington for outstaging him that he bluffs and says Im going to release poison gas onto a Maquis planet if you dont turn yourself in, except its not a bluff. Its impossible to imagine any other captain getting so offended that he or she would resort to that. I guess when you have Jesus job security, though, you can do whatever you want and the Federation just has to accept it.

Sisko is also a little more casual and friendly with his high-ranking officers than the other non-Archer captains. People talk about how early Sisko and Picard are very similar, but I dont really see it. The dude smiled in a way that would be completely out of character for Picard.

Is the most unbelievable thing in DS9 that the Changelings never even tried to replace Sisko? Like, really, he has to be the most obvious target in the entire Alpha Quadrant. Its never even brought up as a possibility. Bashir, Kira, and OBrien get Changelings, but not Sisko.

I like the idea of just kind of a normal captain accidentally becomes Jesus and has to deal with it. Theres a lot of good stuff where Sisko is clearly uncomfortable with the idea and does his best not to abuse his power over the Bajorans. I also like the idea of him slowly warming to the Prophets and finally accepting his role. Sisko is the only chosen one narrative really possible in Star Trek, and it works in a way that no wait I told myself Id stop talking about Discovery.

---

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qKcJF4fOPs

---

One board 8er and some guy from resetera ranks all the star trek characters

---

8. Seven of Nine
The Borg have assimilated the technology from over three-thousand species, but it took until humans for us to learn the art of catsuits.

Theres an insane conspiracy theory out there that Jeri Ryan, the actress for Seven of Nine, is indirectly responsible for the election of Donald Trump in 2016. I thought I should let everyone know that.

Little girl turned into a monster, gets turned back into a human as an adult, has to relearn how to be a human. Done. Thats a billion times more compelling than a million Harry Kims or Beverly Crushers. You know how many zeroes that is? 1000000000000000. Thats how much more interesting her concept is than Harry Kim.

Seven is possibly the strangest thing in any sci-fi series. By the writers own admission, she was added to be sexy And yet she ended up as one of the two things on the show that actually worked. I suppose the Torn Between Two Worlds concept just works so damn well that its impossible to screw up, but either way, Seven is by far the most compelling character on Voyager. The show should have just been about her, and in a way, it is. Once she joins the show, everyone except Janeway and the Doctor gets edged out, and thank God for that. Characters like Seven and the Doctor make me wonder if Voyagers staff had some actual talent, or if it was all just a happy accident.

It really cannot be emphasized enough: this character was designed to another Deanna Troi, but ended up being another Spock. The fact that shes in a shiny catsuit has nothing to do with how good she is as a character, which is fascinating.

Thats not to say that shes without problems, of course. Anything on Voyager is tainted by its general Voyagerness, but Seven handles it the best in the show assuming you can forgive things like If Seven invented a cure for death, why does anyone die in the show after that? And when I said Seven becomes the new Spock, I meant that in more ways than you probably expect. Spock constantly pulled new powers out of his ass because they hadnt nailed down what Vulcans could do in TOS, and Seven does the same with Borg powers. Her nanomachines can do absolutely anything, which means shes the strongest, fastest, smartest, and toughest person on the show but it still works because of all of her emotional problems stemming from not knowing how to be a normal person. Like, I really like the idea of this woman with kind of stilted, formal speech just not understanding how normal people behave and being alienated both by her own inhibitions and her leftover proclivities as a Borg. And the only good use of the Borg Queen ever is with Seven, where she can be like Come back to us, Sevennnn, and Seven can be tempted and stuff.

I mean, hell, even her I still have Borg implants on thing is a not-very-subtle reminder of her Torn Between Two Worlds status. I wonder if the writers knew that or if they just thought durr looks cool. Seven also benefits from being joined at the hip to the only other good Voyager character: the Doctor. It was a good decision to make the AI who has some experience becoming human the one to help Seven along in her journey.

Overall, Seven perfectly encapsulates Voyager at its best: incredibly stupid and silly, but with some understanding of what science-fiction is underneath it all.

---

I've been following this topic even though I've never watched a Star Trek episode in my life.

I can't help but wonder who the other three rankers were supposed to be.

---

Tag

---

7. The Doctor
Please state the nature of the screenwriting emergency Terrible characters, hm? Let me fix that right up.

The Doctor is the only thing holding Voyager together. There, I said. Seven is great and all, but shes a little too weird. The Doctor has the perfect mix of eclectic traits, undeserved ego, and competent acting to make Voyager watchable. The first two seasons in particular, man, he is the only thing that makes some of it bearable.

Someone on Voyagers writing staff must have said: You know how Data is Spock in reverse? What if we did Data in reverse? And instead of making Spock, they got the Doctor. Data is designed to be an emotionless android who will find his own path, and decides that he wants to become human. Hes unfailingly polite and always does the moral thing. The Doctor is a slightly malfunctioning program designed to do one thing, but develops a personality mostly by accident, realizes hes the glue holding the ship together, and lets it go to his head. Hes rude and only mostly does the right thing. Data has the support of his entire ship; the Doctor has to prove to everyone that hes a living being, too. Its such a clever turnaround that it makes me wonder how intentional it is, because boy oh boy is the rest of the show not clever at all.

Theres a good rule of thumb to determine if a Voyager episode is good or not: does it star the Doctor, Seven, or both? Then its a good one. Does it not? Then its probably bad. And even the non-Doctor episodes are still made better by his appearances. Every human character was instructed to act stilted, Tuvok is a Vulcan, and the other aliens are just bad characters, which leaves the Doctor and Seven to pull all of the weight, and they do. Its kind of amazing.

I mean, yes, it also helps that the Doctor gets almost all of the good ideas for episodes. Hologram recreation of Doctor Mengele can help you save a friend, but are you willing to use his knowledge? Your daydreams of commanding the ship are intercepted by an alien who thinks you actually lead the ship, so can you bluff him by actually leading the ship? You were sent to an experimental super starship in the Federation being attacked by Romulans, can you figure out the controls on the fly? Your mild singing skills impress a race of aliens who dont know about music, so they invite you to be their greatest star, but then just program another hologram thats better than you, so you have to go back to Voyager and admit you were stupid. All of the weird sci-fi ideas were channeled into the Doctor, and thank God for that. Id rather have one interesting character and four boring ones that five slightly less boring ones.

It also helps that the Doctors grating, egotistical personality makes him easy to play off of any other character. Character X says something, the Doctor takes it as a compliment to his amazing skills, Character X has to tolerate the Doctor acting all self-satisfied, unless its Janeway, who just tells him to shut up. Even boring Voyager characters can still make that work.

Now that I think about it, there isnt a single bad bald character in Star Trek. Picard, Sisko, and the Doctor. We can count Kirk, too, but I dont think William Shatner will appreciate that.

And with that, I've finished all the Voyager characters.

---

I might have been tempted to rank the Doctor a little higher, personally, but fair!

---

MetalmindStats posted...

I've been following this topic even though I've never watched a Star Trek episode in my life.

I can't help but wonder who the other three rankers were supposed to be.

Man, what are you getting out of the topic if you've never even seen a Star Trek episode?

---

Anagram posted...

Man, what are you getting out of the topic if you've never even seen a Star Trek episode?

The same thing I get out of, say, scarlet's wrestling-related rankings. It would certainly be more fun following along if I was a Star Trek fan, but that doesn't mean it isn't interesting for me nonetheless.

---

6. Odo
Rrgh.

I think Odo wins the award for most Torn Between Two Worlds character. Its obviously between him, Seven, Spock, and Worf, but with Odo its the entire character, whereas the others all have other stuff going on. Odo also wins the dubious double title of Character Who Uses CGI the Most Often and Character Whose CGI is Most Babylon 5-Tier, but we wont talk about that.

So, Odo. I think the writers had no idea what they were going to do with him when the show started, because I know the decision to make the Founders Changelings happened after like season 2 or 3, and thats why that Vorta chick treats him so disrespectfully in that one episode. Can you imagine another path his character could have taken? Like what if the Founders were just robots or something, and Odo was just part of a random species no one knew about? The show would be a completely different beast.

I guess I should say right off the bat that the entire premise of this character makes no sense. Im fine with a species that hates humanoids and hides itself to avoid them, and Im fine with a species that sends 100 of its babies to explore the galaxy, but you cant be both. But fine, lets move on.

Odo is a really interesting character when it comes to the idea of compromise, I think. The Changelings are completely uncompromising dicks who cant really be reasoned with to a meaningful extent, who engineer their subjects to be ideologically incapable of opposing them, and who are just convinced of their beliefs. Odos sort of the opposite of that, which is what makes him compelling. Hes like I really want to be part of my people and just be normal and whatever, but like, theyre evil douchebags, so I cant, and it forces me to think about the world in a way that I dont want to have to. Man, isnt that a cool idea? Characters who have ethical conflicts that dont involve laser explosions? I guess the Dominion War actually does involve laser explosions, but whatever. The point is, Odo and Worf are the most argh what do I do characters in Star Trek, except with Worf, his code of honor makes him always certain of what he needs to do, whereas with Odo, hes a little more malleable (DO HO HO). Hell work with Quark and maybe overlook a few bad things if it results in some good things, which is really neat.

I like the idea of a species that feels an innate need for order in all things, where one member is like no way jose, my particular manifestation of order demands justice, so I dont really care much for laws. Remember Garrus? Same ****, except you can add a racism angle.

I like how the Changelings are so orderly and dedicated to their superiority that theyre repeatedly willing to compromise everything just for Odos sake. Like they wont call off the war, but theyll make incredibly stupid decisions to win him over or avoid putting him at risk. Like really, youd think the first thing theyd do is kidnap Odo, replace him with another Changeling, and just screw everything up. At least with Sisko you can say well maybe Sisko has really good security, hes an obvious target, but they have like a million opportunities with Odo. Thats great! Its such good implied characterization to their species.

Id also say that Odo is probably the most separate of the cast? Aside from Kira and Quark, there arent a lot of really good character interactions between Odo and someone else. Sure, he occasionally complains to Sisko about something, or asks Chief OBrien about the whatever-o-tron, but about the only thing I can think of like that outside of Kira and Quark is when he butts heads with Worf super early on. Its weird, too, because Odos story is still really woven into the rest of the show.

I think part of what makes Odo work is that hes played by one of the few real actors in Star Trek. Like can you imagine a Tom Paris-tier actor trying to play this ultra-guarded guy feeling half a dozen conflicting emotions at the same time? It would be worst. I think Rene Auberjonois is probably the best actor in Star Trek after Patrick Stewart.

Anyway, Odo. Pretty cool guy.

---

MetalmindStats posted...

The same thing I get out of, say, scarlet's wrestling-related rankings. It would certainly be more fun following along if I was a Star Trek fan, but that doesn't mean it isn't interesting for me nonetheless.

Fair enough, then, but I've been writing with the assumption that people have watched everything, so I imagine there are confusing details.

---

Top Five in casting order:
Kirk
Spock
Picard
Data
Worf

---

Pretty safe top 5

---