Commodore Geordi La Forge (LeVar Burton) redeemed Star Trek’s Commodore problem in Star Trek: Picard season 3. Throughout its nearly 60-year history, Star Trek has introduced so many bad Starfleet Admirals that it became a trope that popped up across several different Trek shows. While they have not been quite as common, Star Trek’s Commodores do not have the best track record, either. Above the rank of Captain but below Admiral, a Commodore could oversee multiple starships and hold important positions within Starfleet.
Several Commodores appeared throughout Star Trek: The Original Series, but few of them played a major role. Perhaps one of the most recognizable is Commodore Matt Decker (William Windom), who lost his entire crew to the planet killer in TOS season 2, episode 6, “The Doomsday Machine.” Decker’s guilt and grief drove him mad, causing him to make an ill-conceived suicide run in an attempt to destroy the planet killer. Some Commodores served on Starbases rather than Starships, like Commodore José I. Mendez (Malachi Throne), who served as the commander of Starbase 11 in the TOS two-parter “The Menagerie.”
Geordi La Forge In Picard Season 3 Is Star Trek’s First Good Commodore In Decades
Geordi Singlehandedly Helped Redeem Commodores In Star Trek
In its third and final season, Star Trek: Picard reunited Admiral Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) with his Star Trek: The Next Generation crew. The season revealed that Geordi La Forge had risen to the rank of Commodore and served as the Head Curator at the Starfleet Museum. As a sort of pet project, Geordi had spent the last twenty years painstakingly rebuilding the USS Enterprise-D, after its catastrophic crash landing in Star Trek Generations. This proved to be incredible foresight on Geordi’s part, as the Enterprise-D became vital in the fight against the Borg/Changeling plot to destroy Starfleet.
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Positioned between Captain and Admiral, a Starfleet Commodore plays a vital role in Star Trek, but not everyone has as good a reputation as Geordi.
Unlike many of the Commodores who came before him, Geordi La Forge has always been on the side of the heroes, representing the best of Starfleet and the United Federation of Planets. La Forge kept the Enterprise up and running throughout Star Trek: The Next Generation, coming up with creative solutions to any engineering problems that arose. In Star Trek: Picard season 3, Geordi was hesitant to join Admiral Picard and his former crew members when they showed up at the Fleet Museum, but his daughters ultimately helped convince him to do the right thing.
Geordi Followed Star Trek’s Most Evil Commodore In Picard Season 1
Commodore Oh (AKA General Nedar) Remains One Of Trek’s Most Evil Villains
Star Trek: Picard season 1 introduced arguably Star Trek’s most evil Commodore in Tamlyn Tomita’s Commodore Oh. A Vulcan/Romulan hybrid, Oh was a general within the Romulan intelligence agency known as the Tal Shiar. She infiltrated Starfleet, eventually becoming a Commodore and serving as the director of Starfleet Security. Loyal to the Zhat Vash, Oh sought to eliminate all synthetic life. In pursuit of this goal, Oh helped orchestrate the synth attack on Mars, resulting in the Federation banned synthetic lifeforms. Oh eventually abandoned her cover identity and led a Tal Shiar squadron to destroy the androids on Coppelius.
Star Trek has not revealed what became of Commodore Oh after she fled from Coppelius in defeat.
In command of the USS Zheng He, Captain William Riker (Jonathan Frakes) arrived just in time with a fleet of starships to thwart Oh, who soon fled the scene. With nearly 100,000 casualties, the synth attack on Mars remains one of the most devastating disasters in Starfleet history. The attack also led the Federation to call off the Romulan rescue efforts, leaving many Romulans to their fate when their sun went supernova. This easily makes Oh Star Trek’s most evil Commodore, but Geordi La Forge proved that not all Commodores are bad.
