One of the more divisive characters in the Trek canon, Wesley Crusher has come to Star Trek Fleet Command. He’s a rare engineering officer in the TNG Crew.
Captain’s Maneuver
When the Bough Breaks – Wesley Crusher increases Weapon Damage against Hostiles and Armadas by 100% of Crew Attack.
While he won’t replace Kirk, Spock, Khan (KSK) for your top armada crew, or Pike, Moreau, and Chen as your primary hostile killing crew, he can still be useful as an officer for a secondary crew in either hostile or armada events.
With synergy, you can pop this bonus up to 200%, so make sure you’re loaded for attack below decks. The rub when going against hostiles or armadas is that you generally want to think defensively, to minimize the damage your taking so you can kill in bulk. So if you want to maximize your kills here, you might want to aim a level or two below what you’d do with your KSK or PMC crew. I did this with the June events that gave bonuses for using Wesley as captain, and it worked well.
But as always, there are so many variables in terms of ships, research, station, etc, etc, etc, that you should do a little experimenting to see what works best for you.
Officer Ability
Traveler’s Scion – Wesley Crusher increases his own stats by (20%, 40%, 70%, 100%, 200%)
So you’ll get a big increase for Wes’s officer stats with this ability. While not the flashiest ability, this will pair well with any of the other TNG characters, and you’ll really get a boost when pairing him with Picard. Since his stats are all fairly consistent, he’ll be a good throw-in with any officer whose boosts depend on officer stats, like Spock‘s shield ability for example.
The name of the ability, of course, comes from Wesley’s interaction with the character, The Traveler, a rather sedate alien who was something of a tourist in “our reality.” Wesley left with the Traveler at the end of the fittingly named episode, Journey’s End.
The Traveler was played by actor Eric Menyuk, who was a runner-up for the role of Data.
Wil Wheaton
And now we’ve come to Wil Wheaton. Yes, Wil Wheaton. Wh-il Wh-eaton.
Wheaton was born in 1972 in Burbank, California. Wheaton has said that he had an abusive childhood. You can read his own story of it here, as I think this is a subject best told in the person’s own words. It’s not easy to read, but it’s important to read.
His first acting role on television came in the 1981 TV movie, A Long Way Home, playing the lead role as a child. The adult version of the character was played by Oscar-winner Timothy Hutton.
His first cinematic role was in the 1982 animated film, The Secret of NIMH as the young mouse, Martin Brisby. (NIMH, by the way, was the second most disturbing cartoon movie from my childhood, obviously coming second to Watership Down.) But I highly recommend watching it. It really holds up.
By the way, if you’re ever playing Six Degrees of Separation with anyone on next Gen, The Secret of NIMH is like cheating. It featured Shannon Doherty, Dom DeLuise, in addition to legendary actors John Carradine and Derek Jacobi. And it had two performers from Mary Poppins, Hermione Baddely and Arthur Malet. It even had Edie McClurg (Grace from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,) who was in She’s Having a Baby with … Kevin Bacon. Of course, Wheaton was also in She’s Having a Baby with Kevin Bacon, so there you go.
Wheaton went on to appear as Louis’s friend extremely briefly in the 1984 sci-fi movie, The Last Starfighter. I loved that movie as a kid, I’ll have to go back and see if it holds up too. I hope it does. But the most notable thing about that movie was that it was the last cinematic role for the great Robert Preston. Ironically, it was the first thing I saw Preston in, and it’s the first thing I think of when his name is mentioned. Most of civilization who remembers him thinks of him as Professor Harold Hill in The Music Man, and I go straight to Centauri from Last Starfighter.
But his big break came in 1986 when he was cast in the lead role of Gordie in Stand by Me. The movie helped bring all four of its young stars, Wheaton, River Phoenix, Corey Feldman, Jerry O’Connell to prominence. It also featured Kiefer Sutherland, John Cusack, and Richard Dreyfuss.
It seems strange to say it now, but when Star Trek: The Next Generation came out in 1987, perhaps the second most well-known actor in the cast was Will Wheaton (after LeVar Burton.)
The Creation of Wesley Crusher
The character of Wesley Crusher was envisioned in creator Gene Roddenberry’s mind, as the representative of Roddenberry himself onscreen. Said Roddenberry, “I identify probably more so with Wesley because he is me at seventeen. He is the things I dreamed of being and doing.”
This led to Roddenberry and Wheaton developing a friendship. Star Trek’s creator acted as a mentor to the young actor. Wheaton’s blog has a great story about the relationship, and Roddenberry introducing Wheaton to William Shatner, and Michael Dorn offering to kick Shatner’s ass.
At one point in the development of The Next Generation, Bob Justman convinced Gene that there Wesley should be a female character, “Leslie Crusher,” but eventually Roddenberry changed the character back.
Casting Wesley Crusher
Thousands of young actors auditioned for the role of Wesley Crusher.
J.D. Roth was a finalist on Star Search and later made numerous guest appearances on Charles in Charge, As the World Turns, and The Equalizer. After his acting career, he made the transition to a game show host.
John Champion from the Mission Log podcast auditioned for the role. You can hear him tell the story on an episode of The Trek Files with Larry Nemecek.
Most notably, Jonathan Del Arco. He didn’t get the role of Wesley, but the producers remembered him when casting the role of Hugh in the episode, I, Borg, and later returning for the two-parter Descent. He turned up on an episode of Voyager playing Fantome, before coming back as Hugh in Picard. Apart from Trek, Del Arco has made appearances on Miami Vice, The Wonder Years, and The Sopranos, to name just a few.