C aptain Jean-Luc Picard has done it all over again. In 1987, Patrick Stewart beamed in to sprinkle Shakespearean gravitas all over Star Trek: The Next Generation. He would go on to prove there was a future for the franchise beyond Leonard Nimoy waggling his eyebrows and William Shatner chatting up green-skinned aliens.

Now, with Star Trek at a historically low ebb on the back of a decade of awful movies, he is repeating that interstellar feat. His new series Star Trek: Picard has been widely acclaimed by fans and critics as thrilling, affecting and intriguing. Just as he did 33 years ago, Jean-Luc has breathed vitality into a sci-fi saga that has for years drifted through deep space in suspended animation.

Picard is Star Trek for grown-ups. The interstellar romp was, of course, never really for kids. But the new series brings an irresistible melancholy as we catch up with Picard in old age (the character is now 92, Stewart himself 79).

This is Trek with phasers set to pensive. There’s less charging headlong into the fray than in the old days. We are instead treated to many, many scenes in which Jean-Luc stares into the distance, wishing he could travel back in time and change the past (if only he’d watched Star Trek IV: he’d know how to do exactly that).

Star Wars films – ranked worst to best Show all 11 1 /11 Star Wars films – ranked worst to best Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 11. Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002) The prequel trilogy has lived on in infamy, but the true low point of this low point in the Star Wars franchise must be Attack of the Clones, the dry, crusted middle of the cinematic sandwich. While Revenge of the Sith has some sense of completion and The Phantom Menace has some sense of wonder, all Attack of the Clones has is a CGI Yoda bopping about the screen like an unswattable fly while battling Christopher Lee’s Count Dooku. It’s a film driven by unnecessary desires: from the space politics, to Boba Fett’s backstory, to Padmé and Anakin’s romance. The latter is the most insufferable, since George Lucas never had much of an ear for dialogue, as notoriously pointed out by Harrison Ford when he declared on set: “George, you can type this s***, but you sure as hell can’t say it.” Which leads us to one of the worst line readings in cinematic history, when Hayden Christensen’s Anakin laments: “I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating – and it gets everywhere.” Rex Features Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 10. Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (2005) Hollywood has increasingly made the assumption that “darker” means better when it comes to cinema – it explains why the Harry Potter films look like they were made while someone gradually turned down the dimmer switch on the studio lights. Of course, audiences know that “darker” sometimes means that your protagonist-turned-villain becomes a “youngling”-murdering, amateur street magician-looking sourpuss. Anakin’s arc here comes to a whimper of an ending, underlined by the much-derided decision to have Darth Vader’s first moments onscreen involve him howling “Noooooo!” up to the sky like a mournful hound. That said, Ewan McGregor confirms here that he managed to escape the franchise largely unscathed, as this instalment sees him have the most fun with the clunky dialogue (see: “Hello there!” and “I have the high ground!”). Rex Features Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 9. Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999) The Phantom Menace escapes slightly ahead of the rest of the prequel trilogy, if only for the fact it remembers these films are meant to be fun once in a while. The pod race – it’s a good scene! Darth Maul is all looks, zero follow through – it’s embarrassing to act like you’ve won, only to be cut in half and sent hurtling down an exhaust pipe – but his inclusion in the film did introduce one of the best musical themes in Star Wars history, John Williams’s “Duel of the Fates”. However, the space politics are a particular drag here, with all the talk of trade disputes, and, of course, it's obligatory to mention the terror that is Jar Jar Binks. Rex Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 8. Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018) Although it’s the weakest of the new generation of Star Wars films, Solo still holds up as a fun romp worthy of Han Solo’s rascal reputation. Alden Ehrenreich picks up on enough of Harrison Ford’s mannerisms to sell the character without sliding into imitation, while Donald Glover is a scene stealer from the very moment he walks on screen as Lando Calrissian. It’s a lost opportunity, then, that the film is otherwise slowed down by an impulse to offer backstory to as many aspects of Han’s character as possible. Did we really need to know how we got the name “Solo”? Really? Rex Features Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 7. Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker Director JJ Abrams, like the hero of an ancient prophecy, was destined to make both enemies and allies with Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. There will be arguments. And there will be arguments about the arguments. There will be obsessive deconstructions and over-interpretations of each frame and intake of breath. But, at the end of the day, this is still a Star Wars film in its very bones, muscle, and sinew. Whatever controversy Abrams might have brewed up with his artistic choices, he still captures magnificently the soul of this series: that unwavering hope that the powerless can win, despite the odds. Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 6. Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983) There’s a lot to wrap up in the concluding chapter of the original trilogy. The result is a few odd turns for the sake of plot convenience. What does one do with a character as enigmatic as Boba Fett? Why, have him topple into the Sarlacc pit within the first 20 minutes! How does one put to rest the love triangle hinted at in A New Hope? Why, insert a revelation that Luke and Leia are, in fact, brother and sister! Even the second Death Star oddly feels sillier than The Force Awakens and its third attempt at a giant ball in space, since The First Order at least had the excuse that their obsessive admiration of the Empire may have clouded their judgement. That said, there’s still plenty of charm to be found here and the Ewoks aren’t all that bad. Before you dismiss them as irritating merchandise opportunities, it’s worth remembering that they have absolutely no qualms about killing and eating people. Rex Features Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 5. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016) If Rogue One is any indication of Disney’s plans for the franchise and its future, then there’s no cause for concern. The first of the “A Star Wars Story” spin-offs, it shifts into gear with ease, soothing audiences by not straying too far from the familiar timeline while introducing a full set of new characters and a grittier tone. Stylistically, it feels more like a Vietnam War movie and is proof of how far a gifted director like Gareth Edwards can stray from the franchise’s usual formula and still feel grounded in the same world. Plus, you have to admire the guts it takes to deliver an ending like that… Rex Features Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 4. Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015) Disney made a very smart move with The Force Awakens. As the first Star Wars film of a new generation, it not only had to make its own mark, but feel familiar enough that it welcomed fans back with open arms. The balance is hit perfectly here. That’s largely due to the film’s new trio of central heroes, who radiate the same kind of warmth, bravery, and spirit that carved a special place in people’s hearts when they were first introduced to the franchise’s original stars. Daisy Ridley’s Rey, John Boyega’s Finn, and Oscar Isaac’s Poe honour Star Wars's past while striding into its unknown future. It also helps that the film has landed on a villain like Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), whose drive and complexity may see him surpass even Darth Vader by the end of his story in Episode IX. Rex Features Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 3. Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi (2017) Any divisiveness the film attracted certainly proved one thing: here’s a Star Wars film that actually took a creative risk. And what a bold, ambitious, and ultimately beautiful risk that was. Director Rian Johnson took the cinematic legacy presented before him and added a new richness to its textures. He allowed heroism to go beyond the clean divide between good and evil; through Luke and Rey, we were taught not to be ashamed of our doubts but to grow stronger because of them. We were taught not to use destiny as a crutch, but to know when to forge our own paths. The Last Jedi is a soulful film told through some of the most striking cinematography of the entire franchise. Rex Features Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 2. Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977) It’s the place where it all began. The Star Wars franchise has only become the success it is today because of how purely revolutionary the first instalment was as a piece of Hollywood filmmaking. It is, to this day, one of the most successful examples of the modern epic, endlessly imitated but so rarely with the same heart or ambition. George Lucas tapped into one of the most timeless qualities of storytelling: its ability to let us see and understand our own world through the eyes of another. Star Wars has become so iconic because, even on such a grand scale, we know and relate to the emotions at hand – fear, love, or a desire to do what’s right. Rex Features Star Wars films – ranked worst to best 1. Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980) The Empire Strikes Back is remarkable in its ability to pursue real emotional stakes. Its closing moments, the final note to its symphony of sacrifice and tragedy, leaves us with the single, delicate emotion that is hope, blooming in the darkness as our heroes set out to save Han and restore the Rebel Alliance. What A New Hope built up by making us fall in love with these characters, The Empire Strikes Back recouped in sharing with us their pain and their fears. Darth Vader’s reveal that he’s Luke’s father has, of course, found its place in history, but there’s an equal sense of emotional resonance in the moment Leia and Han depart, moments before he’s trapped in carbonite. When Leia’s “I love you” is returned by Han’s “I know” – a line written by Harrison Ford himself – we’re reminded of how magical Star Wars’s sense of storytelling can be, condensing everything that these two characters feel for each other into five simple words. Rex Features

Yet Picard is more than an autumnal final hurrah for both actor and character. Its arrival has given a warp-speed boost to Trek at the very moment its great science fiction nemesis, Star Wars, has crashed and burned with the spectacularly, almost surreally awful Rise of Skywalker.

Star Wars/Trek is one of the great rivalries in pop culture: Blur v Oasis for pointy-eared people in jumpsuits. Lightsaber or phaser? Millennium Falcon or USS Enterprise? Darth Vader, with his heavy breathing and Nazi leathers, or Ricardo Montalbán’s Khan Noonien Singh with chest-hair dancing in the light?

Such are the binary choices that have for decades divided the geek community. Star Trekkers have historically pitied Star Wars fans as callow and interested only in the surface level distraction (ie slow-motion explosions, Carrie Fisher being perved over by Jabba the Hutt, duels with fancy laser swords). Meanwhile Star Wars diehards despaired of what they regarded as Trek’s creaking production values and terrible acting.

The strangest aspect of the rivalry is that it was possible to belong to both camps simultaneously. Many of us flitted between Star Wars and Star Trek fandom according to whichever we were watching at the time.

Daisy Ridley, John Boyega and Oscar Isaac star in ‘The Rise of Skywalker’ (Walt Disney Studios Motion Picture)

Star Wars was obviously better at the gosh-wow stuff. And yet there was always that inner voice telling us Star Trek was smarter, sharper and deeper. As a teenager, I devoured Star Trek novels while reserving pride of place in my bedroom for a replica Millennium Falcon. Trek was for the brain, Star Wars for the heart.

With Picard, however, the Star Wars/Trek debate has for now been set to rest. Rise of Skywalker was so bad that time seemed to shudder to a standstill as you watched. Worse than that it retroactively ruined George Lucas’s original trilogy. All the sacrifices by the Rebels in Empire and Return of the Jedi had been rendered redundant with the return of – sheesh! – Palpatine.

With that cheeky resurrection, director JJ Abrams was essentially stamping his muddy boots all over our childhood. And that had followed the sneery, revisionist junk of Rian Johnson’s The Last Jedi: Star Wars brought to you by the kind of people who laughed at you in the schoolyard for liking Star Wars.

Picard, by contrast, does nostalgia perfectly. As with Rise of Skywalker it brims with call-backs. It is no surprise to learn Picard’s show runner Michael Chabon fell in love with Trek aged 10. He maintained that passion even as he rose through the literary ranks in America, culminating in his Pulitzer Prize for 2001’s The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (itself a sly defence of nerd culture before it became fashionable to nurture the geek within).

Star Trek: Picard trailer

He gets the nods and winks just right in the new series. Picard’s obsession with his glory days captaining the Enterprise NCC-1701-D manifests as haunting visions of his old android friend Data. The first episode references interplanetary cubists the Borg, the 2002 movie Star Trek: Nemesis, and the recent Star Trek films (the first two directed by, of all people, JJ Abrams). Further in, we are promised cameos by Seven of Nine from Star Trek Voyager and Will Riker himself, Jonathan Frakes.

It’s all so seamless. Picard is in many ways a meditation on nostalgia: how our yesteryears can shine a light on our present but also shackle us. It is a truth with which Jean-Luc is him slowly coming to grips. But Chabon is also, perhaps, interrogating fandom’s tendency to wallow in an idealised vision of the past. It adds depth to the action without clanging you over the cranium with an agenda.

Contrast that with the clunking fashion in which Rise of Skywalker raids our formative years. Mark Hamill is arm-twisted back into the frame as Luke Skywalker, despite dying in Last Jedi. Harrison Ford as Han Solo is back as well and just as grumpy as in 2015’s The Force Awakens. R2-D2 and C-3PO are still tottering around in the background, as if conjured from the void through the sheer willpower of Star Wars fundamentalists. Darth Vader’s melted helmet has another guest spot. Boom, boom, boom – Abrams cracks us again and again across the back of the head with a big rolled-up book titled “Beloved Childhood Memories”.

All that thwacking is in vain, however, as Abrams’ fan service is appended to a flailing and incoherent story. Picard, by contrast, picks and chooses what it is nostalgic for and is clear about wishing to weave a new tale rather than plod over old territory.

The outlook isn’t entirely bleak for Star Wars, it should be acknowledged. The Disney+ TV series The Mandalorian, already available in the US and coming to the UK in March, is a worthy addition to lightsaber lore and has already contributed positively to human civilisation by giving us a lifetime supply of Baby Yoda memes.

But it has been so thoroughly eclipsed by the terrible Rise of Skywalker as to neuter much of its good work. Which means, with Picard, Star Trek for now has the upper hand. It wins this round by remembering that geeks cannot live on nostalgia alone and that even the most beloved sci-fi heroes need to keep moving forward. That is a lesson Disney, as custodian of Star Wars, has neglected to its cost.