In honor of the newest installment of the Star Trek series, Star Trek: Picard, let’s take a look back on the career of Patrick Stewart. He went from a Shakespearean actor who was little-known in the U.S., to one of the most important characters in Star Trek canon. Not to mention the man turns 80 this year.

Picard could give fans something they have been wanting since Voyager returned from the Delta Quadrant and a skinny Tom Hardy played his clone (nearly 20 years). This, of course, is a future continuation of the story in the prime timeline. Let me say that again, the PRIME TIMELINE! This is not another prequel, not some alternate universe so the writers can be lazy and do whatever they want.

The trailers have been very careful to show us not only Picard (Patrick Stewart), but Riker (Jonathan Frakes), Data (Brent Spiner), Troi (Marina Sirtis), Hugh (Jonathan Del Arco), and Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan). All original cast playing their own characters. This is probably as good as we are going to get, unless CBS lets me write the canon from now on.

So what’s Patrick Stewart been doing for the last 40 years?

Charlie’s Angels

If you think a guy pushing 80 is slowing down, think again. Not only is Stewart in Picard, but also 2019’s Charlie’s Angels as John Bosley. We probably didn’t need another re-boot, and I honestly had no idea that movie even existed until now. Somehow Elizabeth Banks roped Djimon Hounsou into that as well.

Green Room

Patrick Stewart does a lot of voice acting and family-oriented movies, but he also played Darcy in the 2015 horror/thriller Green Room. Guess who is first-billed – Anton Yelchin. Yeah, the Kelvin Timeline Pavel Chekov.

Gnomeo and Juliet

He really does have a long list of voice credits to his name, and Gnomeo and Juliet is one of them. Stewart was the voice of Bill Shakespeare – how very appropriate. Gnomeo was voiced by James McAvoy – both actors portrayed Professor Charles Xavier in the X-Men universe.

Frasier

Stewart has even more television credits than he does in film. One of my favorites was his appearance on Frasier as Alistair Burke. Not only is Kelsey Grammer also part of the X-Men universe as Beast, but he played Captain Morgan Bateson on The Next Generation.

X-Men

You knew this was coming. Save for Picard, Stewart is probably most recognizable as Charles Xavier. He played Professor X in no less than seven X-Men movies from 2000-2017, and wasn’t even credited for a few of them.

The Pagemaster

In 1994, there was an animated movie that I never saw called The Pagemaster. It starred Macaulay Culkin before he went into exile, and Christopher Lloyd – the guy who played Klingon Commander Kruge in The Search for Spock. Patrick Stewart was the voice of ‘Adventure’.  There is a whole other article in the works, but I’ll say this: Robert Picardo, Leonard Nimoy, Frank Welker, Ed Begley Jr. and Whoopi Goldberg are all credited as well.

Robin Hood: Men in Tights

Now this one I did see, because… Mel Brooks. 1993’s Robin Hood: Men in Tights brought us Patrick Stewart as King Richard. He’s not the only ‘Trek actor here though. We also get Brian George as the Dungeon Maitre D’, who was on Voyager and also played Richard Bashir on Deep Space Nine. Clive Revill was the Fire Marshall and Sir Guy of Gisbourne on the TNG episode Qpid. Last, but not least, we also have Chase Masterson, a.k.a. the rather attractive Bajoran Leeta and Rom’s wife from Deep Space Nine.

Dune

Sci-Fi nerds unite! Patrick Stewart was in the 1984 David Lynch film adaptation of Frank Herbert’s Dune.  He played Gurney Halleck years before he was Captain Picard. Does that other guy look familiar? Dean Stockwell was on Quantum Leap with future ‘Trek Captain Jonathan Archer (Scott Bakula) and later appeared with him on Enterprise. Brad Dourif and Virginia Madsen were also in Dune, and would both later have roles on Voyager.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Ok, first of all, Patrick Stewart is my age in this picture. Hmm. This is Karla from the 1979 show Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Twenty years later, the 124th episode of Voyager would be called Tinker Tenor Doctor Spy, centering around Robert Picardo’s character. Another famous guy was on this show too: Alec Guinness. For all you new Star Wars kids out there, he was the original Obi Wan Kenobi.

The Next Generation

You were probably wondering why I haven’t even mentioned The Next Generation yet. This is a little out of chronological order with the rest of the list, but it is the reason Star Trek: Picard got made in the first place.

Patrick Stewart would become universally known as The Most British Frenchman in the Galaxy – Captain Jean-Luc Picard. From 1987-2002, he portrayed Picard in 179 episodes of The Next Generation, the premier of Deep Space Nine, and four feature films. He even lent his voice to what seems nearly every Star Trek video game made since the dawn of time… or dawn of video games at least.

Mr. Stewart seems to keep pretty busy, and I didn’t even get to his vast number of cameos, or the first 15 years of British television and theater.

I could write an entire article on how Stewart’s Picard has influenced popular culture. I probably will. If you have your doubts, just think of all the Picard memes you have seen. Heck, this guy changed the way Americans pronounce the word ‘futile’.

Star Trek: Picard warps into our universe today. Engage.