This week we have lost 2 legends of the Science Fiction world. Walter Koenig died on Sunday and Patrick Stewart on Wednesday - only three days apart. Many articles have been written already about their lives and deaths. People have told stories and obituaries have been posted. So, I’m not gonna do any of that.
I have never met either actor in person and so I wouldn’t want to assume to have anything but a passing understanding of who they were as people, purely based on what they shared publicly, what could be seen on screen or stage and what people in their friend circles said about them. Instead I’m going to focus on what their lives, and deaths mean to me as someone who has been a lifelong fan of their work.
Chekov and Picard. Three days apart.
My first memory of Walter Koenig is of course as Chekov in Star Trek. I’m not 100% sure which movie I watched first, but most likely it was Star Trek IV - yes the one with the whales. I only saw him on Star Trek: The Original Series later, when I went back to watch it. As a kid of the 90s, I of course grew up with Star Trek: The Next Generation. More on that later. What stuck out to me about Walter Koenig was that he could be very serious one second, and then deliver a joke deadpan. I always got the sense that behind the serious facade that was Checkov, was a funny and kind Walter Koenig. And that’s exactly the sense I got when George Takei or William Shatner talked about him.
Many years later, I would discover Babylon 5, and through that my favorite role of Walter’s - Bester, the dark, scheming senior Psi Corps officer, a telepath who believes telepaths are in every way superior to “normies”, and a polished, menacing antagonist to the crew of Babylon 5. I loved how deep and complex the character was and how much it showed the incredible range and depth of Koenig. After all, Straczynski had written it for him specifically to show how great of an actor he was. To this day, he’s Bester to me first, and Chekov second. And it may very well be, that Babylon 5 is one of my all-time favorite Science Fiction shows (much better than DS9!) in small parts also because of Walter Koenig making such a good antagonist.
That brings me to Patrick Stewart, Sir Patrick. Best known for his role as Captain Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation. For many people in the Star Trek Fandom, he is THE Captain, THEIR Captain. He is not my Captain though. While there are many worthy candidates, Janeway, Pike and - yes - Picard, that honor goes to Burnham.
I still remember how I discovered TNG. I was staying at my grandparents in northern Germany for the summer school break. As there wasn’t so much to do during the day while my grandpa was at work and my grandma was mulling around in the house, I would go upstairs to the little guest apartment on the second floor and turn on the TV. It was a teeny-tiny TV, not much bigger than my 14" MBP (but with a worse quality CRT screen of course). And while channel surfing I accidentally discovered Star Trek. Now, I was not unfamiliar with Science Fiction at that age. My dad was a big fan of a crappy and low-budget German SciFi show from the 60s “Raumpatrouille Orion” (“Space Patrol Orion”) which was released on German television about 10 days after the first episode of TOS aired in the US. And since he watched the 7 episodes over and over and over again, the concept of a future where we travel through space to have adventures was not unfamiliar to me. So, long story short, TNG stuck. I would make sure to be upstairs for my daily dose of TNG, never missing an episode if I could help it. And so, Picard became sort of my Space Dad - the nickname the fandom gave him, and the one people have been saying all week. While he was not my favorite character on the show (that honor goes to Beverly Crusher, the show’s Medical Officer), I liked his calm and level-headed leadership style. No matter how crazy things got, no matter how desperate they might be, he would always stay calm, cool and collected, and trust his team to come up with an equally crazy solution to the problem of the week. He was not the best leader, definitely had his flaws and daemons, but he was all too aware of them and always tried his best to improve himself and his crew.
Over the years, as I would dive deeper into the Star Trek Franchise, and hear many stories from people who worked with Patrick Stewart, I got the sense that he was a man of many facets. Deadpan serious at times, only to belt into a song or make one of his typical British jokes. In that way, he and Walter Koenig were probably similar.
I could write about the many roles outside of Star Trek that Stewart played, and while I liked them, he is and will always be Captain Picard to me. The “Star Trek: Picard” version though. Wiser, a lover of dogs (Picard’s Number One was a pit bull, after Stewart’s own beloved rescue dogs), able and willing to love, but also all too aware of the person he is and the things he has gone through. And of course, Charles Xavier - Professor X, the role that took him back to the X-Men, and the reason a lot of us first saw him as anything other than a Shakespearean actor on a BBC drama.
Koenig and Picard, two actors who have lived full and interesting lives and brought so much joy to their fans. I will miss them.
And one last thing, because it is the title and it is the ending: their final Star Trek appearances were in the same place. The series finale of Star Trek: Picard, “The Last Generation”, is a direct echo of the TNG finale “All Good Things…” - and in it, Walter Koenig gave a last voice performance as Federation President Anton Chekov, son of Pavel, while Patrick Stewart played Jean-Luc Picard one final time. Both of them, in the same story, saying goodbye.
I guess “all good things…” must come to an end. No one is immortal - though I decided a long time ago I’m gonna live at least 10000 years - but their work and memory definitely is.
Thank you for Bester, and for Chekov. For Picard, and for Xavier. “Be seeing you.”, like Bester liked to say.