As I write this, we are just two days away from something many Star Trek fans thought would never happen: the return of Patrick Stewart to the role of Captain Jean Luc Picard. While we haven’t seen even an episode of the show yet, it’s clearly not The Next Generation, whether fans want that or not. But what does it mean to revisit such a classic, impactful character in a sequel series all these years later? Why is now the time, and what can Picard bring to us that some other character couldn’t? And, for those of us who’ve dealt with major franchises before, what makes a series like this different from just another spin-off, like Voyager or Stargate Atlantis? Let’s take a look, here in 2020.