Every geek dreams of commanding their own starship, but few get the chance.  I want to recognize the starship captains that have inspired us over the years.  They’ve shown up how to lead and how not to lead.  How to handle crisis and how not to handle crisis?  And most of all, how to speak every line with the gravitas of a Shakespearian actor.  Here’s to you, the 7 best starship captains and your gravitas.

7. Turanga Leela

The Planet Express ship might only be expected to deliver packages across the galaxy, but that hasn’t stopped Leela and her crew from stopped (and starting) interstellar catastrophes.  She’s help save the universe from random time skips to fighting giant bees, beetles, and women to doing with the nasty with an embarrassing cadre of space dorks.  All part of the job.

6. Captain Peter Quincy Taggart

So technically he’s a captain who isn’t a captain who becomes a captain but not really.  Well, for the sake of this list, Captain Peter Quincy Taggart can pretend to captain my ship any day.  Taggart captains the NSEA Protector on the classic TV series Galaxy Quest (best remembered in the documentary film of the same name).  On the show he foiled the greatest evil aliens the universe has ever seen, but his greatest triumph came in the 1999 Galaxy Quest film where he and his crew has to save an alien race from certain extinction.  Even though he was really an aging actor with no command experience except for lines in a script, Taggart rose to the occasion and saved the day.  Never give up. Never surrender.

5. Malcolm Reynolds

Mal might not be the nicest captain.  In fact, he’ll shoot you if you look at him.  Not just the wrong way, just if you look at him.  But for such a hard ass, Malcolm Reynolds inspires loyalty in his crew like none other.  His small firefly class starship Serenity carries a compliment of only five main crewmen, with occasionally passengers sticking around longer than expected, but those crew are a family trying to survive under an oppressive government.  They steal, swindle, loot, and pillage all to survive, and it seems like Mal is a bad guy, but he’s just trying to keep him and his safe and fed.  And this thief even has a moral compass to rival actual good guys, protecting two fugitives in need of protection and exposing on of the biggest cover-ups in (at least this universe’s) history.  Yes, Mal turned out to be quite the cuddly teddy bear.

4. Han Solo

Smuggler, wisecracker, and all around nice guy.  Han Solo, the technical captain of the Millennium Falcon, is a leader we can all get behind - one that runs the other way in a fight.  Yes, why die when you can live another day?  Yeah, but in truth this chicken of rebel became the hero we hero we all root for, saving the Rebellion and foiling the Empire, helping destroy the Death Star and teaming up with a bunch of teddy bears.  Only a true hero would be man enough to team up with teddy bears.  And Han Solo is that man and hero.  And captain.

3. Jean-Luc Picard

Now we’re getting serious.  Captain Jean-Luc Picard oversees the flagship of the Federation, the Enterprise-D, and its 1,000 crew members.  He’s gone face to face with the omnipotent Q, fought off the Borg even after becoming one, and helped stop massive wars with the Romulans and Klingons and the Federation on several occasions.  His diplomacy was always tempered with a strong sense of morals and the most determined French poise ever seen in space.  Yes, Jean-Luc not only led the Enterprise to great success and fame, but he made being French look cool.  And if that’s not great leadership, I don’t know what is. 

2. William Adama

William Adama commands the Battlestar Galactica and a fleet of about forty ships - the last remains of the entire human civilization.  Adama doesn’t simply command a fleet.  He watches over the human race’s home.  He’s had to make the toughest military decisions around, from using biological warfare on the genocidal Cylons to manipulating presidential elections.  His decisions might not be moral, but he recognizes he’s not supposed to be good.  He’s supposed to keep everyone alive.  And so far, he’s done he job.

1. James T. Kirk

Enemies around every nebula.  Women on every planet.  Cliches every episodes.  Yes, Captain Kirk is the captains and captain.  This man’s man made captaining a starship look sexy and suave, making out with females from every galaxy, ripping his shirt off at every scene change, and pontificating like no captain before him.  Kirk defines all the qualities a great starship captain must have, from his take-no-shit approach to diplomacy to marketing spoken-word music albums.  Yes, Captain Kirk is a jack of all trades yet to be matched or surpassed.