Picking the best commander in Star Trek history is hard but we’re going to do it!
Every Star Trek film or show is defined by three things; its captain, its ship, and its story. Yet, if we had a fourth thing to add, it’d be the commander or second-in-command. The right (or left) hand of the captain is every bit of important as any other secondary-level item. And each captain has had an interesting one.
James Kirk had Spock, Jean-Luc Picard had William Riker, Benjamin Sisko had Kira Neryse, Kathryne Janeway had Chakotay, Jonathan Archer had T’Pol, Michael Burnham had Saru, and Christpher Pike had Una-Chin Riley.
The second-in-command is a very important character and sometimes, there can be two per captain. For instance, while T’Pol would relieve Archer, it was Chief Engineer Trip Tucker who was the ship’s commander. So when picking out who the best second was for a Star Trek captain, there are a lot of options.
Star Trek’s best commander/second-in-command is obvious
One of our sister sites,Bam Smack Pow, selected Spock as the franchise’s “best commander”, but we’re going to have to refute this. Spock is easily the most popular commander, but he isn’t the best.
Not as far as we’re concerned, anyway. No, we’re picking Chakotay as the one we think is the “best commander”. He came in fourth in Bam Smack Pow’s rankings, but considering he had to give up control of his own ship to integrate into the Voyager, serve under the woman who was actively hunting him, help his crew integrate into the Voyager’s crew, and did all this while fighting his feelings for the woman he really loved (Janeway), you can’t deny that Chakotay proved to be the best commander in Star Trek history.
Not only was he distinctly loyal to Janeway, but he often found ways of pushing back against some objectionable calls and doing so in a way that proved his fidelity to Janeway and the cause of getting back home.