30 Reasons Why Captain Picard is Better than Captain Kirk

Picard failed his entry exam but came back and excelled

Jean-Luc Picard failed his entry exam into Starfleet academy but that didn’t change anything for him. He just went back and tried again and got in and then excelled. Kirk got in and then cheated because he didn’t accept a ‘no-win scenario’. Honestly, it is just two different sides of the coin.

On one hand, you have Kirk. He cheated because of his beliefs. The Kobayashi Maru is designed for the captain and crew to fail. It teaches them about no-win scenarios. But that isn’t how Kirk operates. So he fixes it to benefit him.

While that isn’t how the world works, it is admirable that he was smart enough to fix a no-win situation into one where he easily wins. For Picard, he excelled as you are meant to at the academy and went on to be a great captain.

This one is a little more gray than most other situations about which captain is better. It just depends on you as a person. (Honestly, I think Kirk is better in this situation because he doesn’t take no for an answer.)

But Picard excelled in the way he was meant to and there is something very admirable about that.