Jean-Luc Picard is someone we recently met in Star Trek: The Next Generation, and producer Gene Roddenberry had the aim of differentiating him significantly from the infamous Captain Kirk that we have all grown to love. Being different from the charm and swagger that James Tiberius Kirk was all about, Picard was different. He was bald, patrician, and above all, French.
AMP in the post
Looking back at some of the earlier seasons of “The Next Generation,” it was abundantly clear that Picard had a thorough dislike of children. He only showed a few times that he was willing to be an uncle for Rene whilst being conformed to being a mentor for Wesley Crusher, which made the big final twist something unexpected.
The latest season made clear to everyone that the boy of Beverly Crusher was not the son of her late husband, Jack Crusher, which came as a massive surprise to all the viewers. Thinking back to the previous few seasons, we can pick up on the will they or will they not romance between Beverley and Jean-Luc, but plans were left to revisit the romance for the final season.
Keeping it a secret throughout the season is something that producers grappled with to eventually lead up to the big reveal. No one would have guessed that the romance would be reignited thanks to a son sired by Picard. After all, the TNG movie Nemesis did not show them as being interested in one another by any stretch of the imagination.
Writers also played it well by indicating that Beverley has been away for numerous decades, and the Jack Crusher (Ed Speelers), being in his mid-thirties, made it even harder for the most skilled mathematician to predict this solid twist.
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Unfortunately, it is still hard to explain how this all came about, but if we look back at the Star Trek franchise, especially Wrath of Khan, we see a similar situation where Captain Kirk uncovers that Dr. Carol Marcus, the scientist with whom Jim had a relationship had a son. Kirk could eventually tie the puzzle together to determine that Jim was the father.
While David had a significant effect on his son before eventually being killed by the Klingon Captain, it is still the early days of the third season. We are all eagerly anticipating to see whether Jack would have a significant impact in switching his father’s opinion of children.