Jeri

Jean-Luc Picard was a character who Meant Something. Both in the amount of tragedy he endured ... -Was stabbed in the heart in his youth, surviving with an artificial one -Successfully reversed his assimilation by the Borg in what seemed like the most helpless of situations (though still forced to endure whispers of the hivemind because of irrevocably altered DNA). -Had his consciousness abducted to live an entire second life as Kamin -- first defiantly, then begrudgingly, then wholeheartedly -- on the dying planet Kataan before being returned, just as abruptly, to resume his life as a Starfleet captain -Was captured and tortured, both physically and psychologically, by the Cardassians, only to be rescued at his most broken point -Flatlined on the operating table after being shot in his artificial heart, requiring Q to save him through a temporal intervention that forced him to confront his past regrets and ultimately reinvigorated his will to live -Was absorbed by, then escaped from the Nexus, where he was seduced by a manifestation of the life he most deeply desired but could never have -Realized far too late the importance of family and grieved for his missed opportunities ... And in the way he carried himself, with a poise and intensity that left no doubt whose ship it was. He *commanded* in a way that hasn't been depicted on screen before or since, and his unwavering competence and dutiful resolve made him one of my earliest role models. Patrick Stewart wasn't Jean-Luc Picard, of course, but he's the only actor who could have made Picard what he was. And that makes me eternally grateful to him.