Picard and Crusher, of the Stargazer. And Beverly. Did Beverly Crusher serve aboard the Stargazer too? I wonder what the crew was like. In my head canon, at least one of the command crew was non-humanoid.
Michael Jay Friedman has written extensively about the Stargazer, and most other novels on the subject stick to what he outlined. But onscreen we have scant little information. No, we were never told Beverly Crusher would have joined the crew. She met her future husband through a mutual friend who was a Starfleet employee (Keel); the couple then befriended another (Picard). The implication might be that Beverly was working in a setting close to Starfleet, if not within said organization. It does not follow the couple would share an assignment. Indeed, when Jack got killed, Picard "brought the body home" to Beverly, rather than, say, just taking Beverly's hand as the two examined the body at the very spot of the death two minutes after the fact. We further know that Beverly graduated some time after having met Keel and Picard, so the connection to those characters was not that of a practicing Starfleet medical officer and his patients or colleagues yet. Might be Beverly practiced on Keel and Picard anyway, in a civilian capacity. But civilian doctors probably wouldn't serve aboard starships (although Diane Carey once suggested Sarah April never was a Starfleet employee) or wear uniforms like the one hinted at in the comic snippet. Timo Saloniemi
I never thought that anyone would ever reference the old Playmates toys cadet uniforms. I wonder if the artist just googled "Cadet Beverly Crusher" and picked up the first image that came up.
IIRC, Beverly briefly visits the Stargazer in the Picard Autobiography version of the Stargazer events.
Ships of the era and general size were known to host civilian relatives or close ones, as per the Saratoga. So it's difficult to see how the authors could go wrong here. Although Cadet Crusher's indoors pressure suit comes close... Timo Saloniemi
It does show Picard as an Ensign and Jack Crusher as a Lieutenant (j.g.) so I'd say that should be taken with a pinch of salt.
Weren't early reports fuzzy about whether Picard was actually Captain of the Stargazer at the time of Jack's death, though? Possibly Jack was a superior officer, and Picard became skipper later at some point. He was aboard her for something like 20 years IIRC. Also, if Beverley's (induced) recollections of the day her husband came home are to be believed, as well as the flashback ghosts of the Stargazer crew in "The Battle", then the crew will need to change out of those monster maroons and into TNG season one unis at some point.
We have the timeline on those things more or less down pat now. But we can always argue. Picard was wearing four pips on his early TNG style uniform when delivering Jack's body. This was also true of his dreams of the Battle of Maxia. But both of those were dream sequences... Jack was wearing the turtleneck-free tunic uniform when holo-dictating to his son, but his theoretically unseen dying uniform featured TNG pips for Lieutenant Commander, delivered to Wes in a box for real. Picard's history with the ship is mostly unknown. He graduated in 2327. At some point, he served aboard the Stargazer before serving aboard any other ship. At some point, he took charge when the regular CO was down for the count. As of 2354, he was the CO himself. Everything else is open to speculation, including the idea that Jack Crusher held the rank of Lieutenant when Ensign Picard came aboard and decided to sit down on the center seat, against the advice of Cadet Howard who worried the CO might see. (A special extended version of "Measure of a Man" adds a dialogue mention of a starship named Reliant to Picard's service record, back when he was still Ensign. So a punctuated presence on the Stargazer is canon in that "extended universe"! Still, nothing tells us when Picard returned to the Stargazer or when he took command or earned the rank of Captain.) Timo Saloniemi
IDW is notorious for using visual references from the show a bit too exactly. They likely referenced Tapestry for Picard and Family for Jack Crusher, with their rank insignia reflecting accordingly. IIRC, the only fuzziness is now long Picard actually commanded the Stargazer. We know he served on the ship for twenty years, but since Q says he took command of the bridge in an emergency after the Captain was injured, it's clear he wasn't the ship's captain the whole time.
Even this is both overstating the case, and contradicting the evidence, alas: 1) We know Picard started out his starship career on the Stargazer, but we don't know exactly when. That is, no mention of "He first came aboard in 2333". 2) We don't know how long Picard was associated with the Stargazer in the sense of a sum total of years, either. That is, no mention of "20 years". 3) We know Stargazer was his first, but that once-cut scene from "Measure of a Man" states there was the Reliant, too. And back when he was but Ensign to boot! This eats into his Stargazer years, but again we don't know how badly. To postulate a moment where Jack is Lieutenant and Picard Ensign is not particularly difficult - the two could be of roughly the same age, and Picard is the one with the skyrocketing career. To add Cadet Howard takes a bit of doing, as Beverly supposedly enters Starfleet Academy late enough to graduate in 2350. Even if he spends eight years at it, doing all of her medical studies in Starfleet, 2342 should see Picard at higher rank... Well, yes - the specific images are copy-pasted from the respective Memory Alpha pages. Jack's is the first image that comes up at his page. Timo Saloniemi