Should Geordi have moved on?

[GalaxyClass1701]

After Indistinguishable from Magic do you think Geordi should have requested his own command? He entered Star Fleet as a command officer so he obviously wanted to go that route at one time?

Going back to engineering seems like a step backwards?

[King Daniel Into Darkness]

YES YES YES he should have. He should have stayed captain of the USS Challenger and become a cameo character, popping up every now and then with his crew.

[Bry_Sinclair]

He really should be a Captain by now.

It would be another novel spin-off series.

[snakespeare]

Yes, and re-boot SCE.

[WarsTrek1993]

I've never read IFM-but I have to wonder why Geordi was demoted?

I mean, Spock still remained a captain even when Kirk commanded the E-A. Why can't Geordi still be captain while working as the E's engineer?

[Deranged Nasat]

I guess we'll find out what's going on with La Forge in The Cold Equations; I'm sure the reasons for his "setback" will be explored there. That said, I would have liked it if he'd kept the Challenger at the end of IFM. I like big changes, and I'm a little disappointed that he ended up back on the Enterprise.

I'm hoping he'll end the new trilogy as something new; we'll have to wait and see, won't we?

[Bry_Sinclair]

It does seem to be a problem, having the same characters staying with a ship for decades and not letting them advance further. Look at the TOS crew, you would have thought that after at least three decades of service the likes of Uhura and Chekov would have been given their own commands as well.

I know that the Enterprise is always going to be a sought after posting, but it should be a rung on someones career ladder to help them get higher faster, not a plateau where they dwell for years before finally moving on.

In TNG, when they were having difficulty with developing/doing anything more with Riker, they had an automatic out with him. Give him his own ship, that way he can return for the odd guest appearance without killing him off.

[Mage]

Well, I am glad that, after choosing to remain on Enterprise, he decided to step back to commander. It felt weird, two captains. I know, it was done in the TOS movie, but I didn't really like it.

That being said, I'd love to have Geordi in command of his own SCE ship!!!!!!

[Christopher]

Bry_Sinclair wrote:

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It does seem to be a problem, having the same characters staying with a ship for decades and not letting them advance further. Look at the TOS crew, you would have thought that after at least three decades of service the likes of Uhura and Chekov would have been given their own commands as well.

Well, it's not realistic to expect starship command to be the end goal of every officer's career path. A military hierarchy is basically pyramidal; the higher the rank, the fewer positions there are available. (After all, a starship has hundreds of crewmembers, sometimes more than a thousand, but only one captain.) So only a small percentage of people in the service, probably less than one percent, would reach command rank; the rest would just keep on serving at a lower rank until they retired. And by the same token, presumably, not every career path has command as its end goal. There's evidence that the command track is a specialized career path within Starfleet, one you have to choose to pursue in order to become eligible for a command post.

(Although the novels haven't done much to dispel this misconception that every officer reaches command rank eventually, since they've established both Uhura and Chekov as admirals in the 24th century, meaning that all of the big 7 have reached at least captain's rank. Which is just as unrealistic as having them all serve together on the same ship for over a quarter-century.)

[Lonemagpie]

Mage wrote:

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Well, I am glad that, after choosing to remain on Enterprise, he decided to step back to commander. It felt weird, two captains. I know, it was done in the TOS movie,

With more than one character - Captain Spock, and Captain Scott, Captain of Engineering.

That being said, I'd love to have Geordi in command of his own SCE ship!!!!!!

Would be cool. But enough of the TNG crew have split off already.

[tomswift2002]

Christopher wrote:

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There's evidence that the command track is a specialized career path within Starfleet, one you have to choose to pursue in order to become eligible for a command post.

There's also evidence, in terms of Dr. McCoy and the medical field anyway, you can still be a command officer, but not have been in command of any starship. So I don't see why La Forge couldn't have been a Captain of Engineering, and not been forced into the command chair.

But I recall that LaForge's demotion in rank was mentioned in Plagues Of Night as being a personal choice instead of being demoted for punishment, since I remember that he mentioned that Starfleet wanted to give him command of a ship because he was at Captain rank and Starfleet felt that, with its recent losses to the Borg, they shouldn't have anymore than one Captain aboard a ship, and that Geordi would be of better use on another ship.

[Ronald Held]

Perhaps Starfleet cannot afford officiers of the rank of Captain and qualified not to command a vessel?
Would it really be a good fit for Geordi to command an SCE ship but not be the head of the SCE team?

[C.E. Evans]

LaForge was my favorite TNG character from day one and while I would love for him to be a captain and get his own ship, I also think that I'd probably see less of him if that happened. I just don't see Pocket doing a new book series with LaForge as captain, so he'd probably be reduced to occasional brief cameos (if not just brief mentions in passing) in other books. I'd rather him be a continually stronger presence in the TNG books as the Enterprise's new second officer.

[Sho]

I really like the idea of rebooting SCE with LaForge involvement ..

[Mr Silver]

Ronald Held wrote:

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Perhaps Starfleet cannot afford officiers of the rank of Captain and qualified not to command a vessel?

But why?

A Captain doesn't need to command a starship, just as a starship commander doesn't need to be a Captain. Sure, it seems to be the most regular of protocols, for a person to take command of a ship as a Captain, but that's not to say that many officers who are ranked as Captain, don't spend a long period working at non-starship command assignments.

I don't see why Starfleet would hold off promoting somebody to Captain, just because they might decide not to pursue starship command, or there wasn't a suitable ship available (surely a person's experiences and skills dictates the kind of vessel they command? It would be illogical for an officer, whose experience lies in the field of battle tactics, starship combat and defensive manuevers to be given command of a science ship).

At the same time, why promote somebody to Captain, just because they happen to command a starship. Dax was acting Captain of the Defiant, whilst still a Lt. Commander. Matt Decker captained the Constellation, whilst ranked as a Commodore. Let's not forget that Sisko, first received command of the Defiant, whilst ranked as a Commander.

It all comes down to the fact that many instances in Trek, (live action, in particular) have stressed that a person must be a Captain to command a strarship.

I'd rather that Star Trek mirrored real-world military sometimes. In the sense that in real-world military, rank is greatly determined by years of service. You'd be hard pushed to find a traditionally promoted General (not some dictator who has bestowed the title upon themselves) that is under the age of 45. A person can be given command of their own units, vehicles and entire squadrons sometimes, regardless of rank. It all depends on competence, and their suitability for the role. That's how it should be in Star Trek, rather than people being elevated to Captain in their late 20's, (Ezri) because they happen to command a starship.

ETA: I also never liked the idea that Kirk couldn't command the Enterprise, because he had accepted promotion to Admiral. The promotion in rank, shouldn't mean having to accept a desk job, rather the "desk job" should be seen as a job that only an Admiral (or member of Starfleet Command) could take on. In this scenario, Kirk could have simply declined the promotion to Chief of Operations and carried on serving as commander of the Enterprise.