Seriously? The STO ships are terrible. They even took the 1701-F, which wasn't bad (especially for an amateur contest submission), and utterly trashed the thing.
These characters seem to cling on as Captain as long as possible, I would like to see Picard as Captain, and I would hope they would try to stay away from the fan service... which I know this whole CBS Access projects are simply fan service, but I would like to see this Picard series mention what happened to the cast and move on immediately. I don't want to see special guest stars from TNG cast but I would like to see John De Lancie as the co-star, and just go crazy with it... like Farscape. Just keep going out there and never come back, but please don't make Picard a God or something ridiculous like what was done on DS9.
Who doesn't aspire to be like Boothby? It's an honor. You're not just the groundskeeper. You're keeping the ground. You're shaping the minds of tomorrow. The leaders of tomorrow.
Which is a shame, because they are two of the most interesting characters in TNG. If the actors did have a change of heart, it would be possible to explain the aging. Q could say that he wanted to not make Picard feel uncomfortable, but obviously in a sarcastic way! Data, sorry, B4 could say he added an aging subroutine so as to fully experience the human condition. But whadda I know?
With the reverse-aging tech they've been using in recent films (including Stewart himself in the X-Men films) there is no reason why Spiner and de Lancie couldn't easily reprise their respective roles.
So, if the betterment of humanity involves working with the next generation (pun not intended) how is that not a promotion?
The "promotion" would be giving Picard a tenured professorship at SF Academy, so he can bestow his knowledge and experience on future generations. This kind of thing happens all the time with e.g. former Cabinet officials who end up teaching government issues at prestigious law schools. They usually don't end up working as janitors (well, up to now, anyway). Boothby wasn't hired because he was a sage. The point of his character was that he taught the students about life in ways they wouldn't learn in books. But at the end of the day, he was part of the school's maintenance staff, not an academic.
DeLancie would probably return as Q if Sir Patrick asked him personally. As for AGT: That whole thing was a Q-generated illusion, so there's no reason anything in it has to be reflected in The Picard Show.
If Picard regards that as bettering himself and humanity then that is a promotion. Again, this has to be framed within the context of the Federation, not our own real world. If Picard passing on knowledge, then what does it matter what his title is?
Because the groundskeeper isn't hired to pass on knowledge. He's hired to do menial labor. There was no Life Skills 101 class taught by him. While the odd student might have gotten along with him, I sincerely doubt most of the cadets paid an iota of attention to his "teachings".
Bill Clinton was never my favorite President* but he had a quaint philosophy: "That depends on what your definition if is is." I guess that can be applied to anything. Including promotions. * Those would be Washington, Lincoln, Teddy, and JFK.
The way they've pitched this show from the start it doesn't seem like a "nostalgia romp". One of the very first things they said, from Stewart himself, that this would be a Picard 20 years later and not the same person we remembered. It's the next chapter in his life. That to me tells me this is not being advertised as a look back. This is why I've tried to say when people ask about this show that it's not TNG 2.0 or another season of TNG. It's going to be something new and don't expect Picard to be like how he was in TNG or the end of the TNG films. It's going to be the same man but he's going have to 20 years of life impacting how he is in the present and that can go in a number of different directions and all those directions can be 100% valid depending on what his life was like. I know some people want to think of this new show as an extension of TNG but I think that's the best way to set one's self up for disappointment at this point.
It's really uncharted territory. We've never had a sci-fi series before with someone who's 80 as the lead, playing a character who's 94. That alone is offering something different. It's essentially the flip-side of the Kelvin Films. Instead of a reboot with a new beginning and a main character in early adulthood, we have an un-reboot after everything that's already happened and with a main character in a much later stage of his life.