Sir Patrick Stewart, Star Trek's Captain Picard, Dies; Outlets Mark His Career and Legacy

Sir Patrick Stewart, the British actor best known as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation, has died, with reports dating his death to Wednesday or Thursday. Stewart began as a stage actor who performed in many Shakespeare plays, and he first stepped onto the Enterprise bridge in 1987. He also played Professor X in multiple X-Men films. In 1988 he devised a one-man version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, adapting the script himself and playing around 40 roles in a single night. The idea began in 1985, when a delayed call time on the film Lady Jane led him to pick up a Dickens volume and abridge it for a church reading. In a 1993 newspaper interview, he said he did not want Picard to become an albatross around his neck. His Picard defended the android Data's rights and sought diplomatic solutions, and the show portrayed the Klingons as allies.

Vox, the left-leaning outlet covering the story, leads with politics. Its headline says Stewart showed what good men do with power, and it ties Picard to the end of the Cold War: the Berlin Wall still stood in 1987, and the Federation was the sole dominant power, with a Klingon, Lieutenant Worf, on the bridge. It dates the death to Wednesday and leaves out his theater work and X-Men roles. Right-leaning outlets had not reported this story at the time of writing, while left-leaning and alternative outlets had; those covering it focus on what Picard represented and on Stewart's career. Reason runs a short RIP headline, dates the death to Thursday, and calls Picard an embodiment of progressive liberal values, contrasting him with Captain Kirk. Like Vox, it notes the Klingon alliance. /Film differs most, focusing on A Christmas Carol and Stewart's own words.