Highlights
- Star Trek: Strange New Worlds brings back the glory days of the series with self-contained episodes exploring new planets and cultures.
- Anson Mount's Captain Pike is a refreshing and unique captain who defers to those with more experience, bonds with his crew, and excels at cooking.
- Captain Pike struggles with the foreknowledge of his fate and attempts to avoid it, but the consequences of changing the future could be significant.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and the character of Captain Pike have given fans of Star Trek newfound hope in the franchise. The show takes the series back to its glory days, where each episode explored a new planet, culture, or issue. While the long-running serialized stories of Picard and Discovery are great storytelling, Strange New Worlds feels like a familiar pace for Star Trek. Anson Mount's Captain Christopher Pike is also a breath of fresh air, delivering a new kind of captain to the fans.
Before Christopher Pike took the reins of the U.S.S. Enterprise in Strange New Worlds, he appeared in Discovery's second season, where he commanded the ship and its crew to solve a recurring anomaly found across the galaxy. His adventures aboard Discovery put him face to face with his future. That future didn't look as promising as anyone would like, which led into the opening season of Strange New Worlds. This gave the new series an overarching story to follow through with each self-contained episode.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds May Fix A Plot Hole From The Original Series
A Star Trek alum has inspired a theory about what Strange New Worlds may be planning and how it answers a question from the original series.
Who is Captain Pike?
Quick Facts:
- From Mojave, California
- Second Captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701
- Starfleet named a medal after him.
- Lived in Montana at the start of Strange New Worlds
- Considered quitting Starfleet
- Loves to cook
Before Bruce Greenwood (The Fall of the House of Usher) appeared as the U.S.S. Enterprise's captain in J.J. Abrams' Kelvin films, few knew about Captain Pike aside from longtime Star Trek fans. Unlike Greenwood's version, Anson Mount's Christopher Pike plays more than a supporting role. Even in his debut on Star Trek: Discovery, Pike was a character getting things done, leading the charge, and putting himself in the line of fire.
Christopher Pike is the second captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701, after Robert April. Pike grew up in the city of Mojave, California, on Earth, before enrolling in Starfleet Academy. The young Pike excelled in his studies except for astrophysics, but he managed. He eventually graduated in Stardate 3201.14 and became a test pilot. He climbed the ranks and bounced from one starship to the next, including the U.S.S. Antares, Chatelet, and Aryabhatta, before finding himself as the First Officer of the Enterprise under Captain April's command.
After Starfleet promoted Captain April, Pike took his seat in the captain's chair and subverted all expectations. Unlike many captains before him, Pike leaves his ego at the door and defers to those with more experience when necessary. He exudes a laissez-faire demeanor while still maintaining a sense of control. He's a bit of a jack-of-all-trades, and excels at the culinary arts. He respects everyone regardless of background or culture, rarely pulling rank or acting superior to others. He frequently breaks bread with his crew, inviting them to his quarters for a large meal and drinks he prepares himself.
What Happens to Captain Pike?
Pike's Appearances | Actor |
|---|---|
Star Trek: The Original Series (1965) | Jeffrey Hunter |
Star Trek: The Original Series (1966) | Sean Kenney |
Star Trek (2009) | Bruce Greenwood |
Star Trek: Into Darkness (2013) | Bruce Greenwood |
Star Trek: Discovery (2019) | Anson Mount |
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (2022-Present) | Anson Mount |
Before fans saw Pike as the Enterprise's captain, CBS introduced him as the interim captain of the U.S.S. Discovery, tasked with investigating seven mysterious signals across the galaxy. Pike's brief time aboard Discovery landed him in a Klingon monastery on the planet Boreth, where the monks protect naturally occurring time crystals. The Captain needed one of these time crystals to complete his mission, but possessing one can give a person glimpses of their future. Unfortunately, Pike bore witness to a devastating accident that would rob him of all his hopes and aspirations.
His vision showed him in command of a training vessel that suffers a ruptured baffle plate. Pike manages to get all the training cadets to safety, but exposes himself to the leaking delta rays and suffers from severe radiation poisoning. Another brief vision shows him his life after the accident, where he's confined to a life-support wheelchair, and his face is badly scarred from the radiation. Viewers familiar with The Original Series will recognize this as the fate that he did eventually meet.
Pike has an opportunity not to take the time crystal, which would save him from the horrific event. But, being the person he is, he takes the crystal and completes his mission. He determines that his life is not worth all the lives that will perish if he doesn't follow his mission through.
Can Captain Pike Avoid his Fate in Strange New Worlds?
Ever since his tenure on Discovery, Captain Pike has struggled with the foreknowledge of his fate. He discovered that at present, the cadets he saves in the future are still children, giving him roughly ten years before he exposes himself to harmful levels of delta radiation. Throughout his time back on the Enterprise, Christopher Pike has contemplated ways to avoid his catastrophe. His Number One even shared her own insight, suggesting that he might have received the vision as a means for the captain to save the cadets and himself. Unfortunately, the big question Una Chin-Riley overlooked was the consequences of Pike avoiding his fate.
A different outcome sees Pike becoming an admiral and living a long, fruitful life might be possible, but at what expense? The show's season one finale, "A Quality of Mercy," shows Pike attempt to change the future when he encounters one of the cadets from his vision. The captain writes a letter in an attempt to discourage the young Maat Al-Salah from ever joining Starfleet. An older version of Pike from an alternate reality visits his younger counterpart to discourage such action and proceeds to show him the outcome. It's a future where Starfleet is in an endless war with the Romulans, and Spock suffers severe injuries that incapacitate him.
Time travel is a common trope in the world of Star Trek, and it's not usually taken lightly. Starfleet goes as far as to create a temporal investigation department to ensure timelines aren't altered. The Original Series dealt with time travel numerous times, most notably in the film Star Trek: The Voyage Home. Most often, the time-traveling crews do their best to stay out of sight to prevent significant changes to the timeline. Deep Space Nine showed Commander Sisko adopt the name Gabriel Bell, an essential figure in Star Trek's history, after he discovers the real Bell died due to his appearance in the past. Sisko keeps the timeline intact by assuming this new identity and using his knowledge of the Bell Riots to allow everything to play out as it should.
However, Star Trek writers also have a habit of using time travel to suit their needs when they need something changed. Writers for Star Trek: Voyager used time travel to end the series, having Admiral Janeway return to a pivotal moment in her time in the Delta Quadrant to save her crew and still return home. Most famously, J.J. Abrams used time travel to create his Kelvin timeline, giving himself a whole new sandbox to play in with familiar characters.
Could Captain Pike avoid his fate and live out his life with a happy ending? Absolutely. However, the writers are adamantly against that, and used the season one finale to give themselves some rules for Pike's situation. While Strange New Worlds might end with Pike in a life-support containment unit and a badly scarred face, he never saw beyond that part. That life-support unit might eventually help him return to the healthy Christopher Pike everyone knows and loves. According to IGN, Strange New Worlds showrunner Alonso Myers says:
My own philosophy as a writer, [...] is that if you say something's going to happen and then you don't make it happen, it's cheap. What makes something feel real is that you reckon with the consequences of it [...] We all love Pike and we all want to see him survive and we all want to see him live through every challenge that he's going to live through.
