Star Trek: Every Captain Ranked Worst To Best (2023)

Cristóbal Rios left Starfleet as a commander after an incident aboard his former ship, the Ibn Majid, left him with post-traumatic dysphoria. His captain was ordered to kill two innocent people (who we later learned were synths) by Commodore Oh, otherwise the Ibn Majid would be destroyed with all hands. Rios confronted him and, in his grief, the captain killed himself. Rios then covered up for the murders, just as his captain was ordered by Commodore Oh, and reported that his captain died by suicide for no apparent reason.

This trauma stayed with Rios his whole life. He left Starfleet and became the captain of an unregistered freighter named La Sirena, which he ran with the help of several holograms of himself.

After helping Picard find Bruce Maddox, and exposing Commodore Oh as a Zhat Vash agent, Rios had a change of heart. He rejoined Starfleet with the official rank of captain, and took command of the USS Stargazer. He was instrumental in restoring the timeline in the second season of Picard, but chose to remain in the 21st century to live a calm life with his new family, Teresa Ramirez and her son Ricardo.

As captain of the La Sirenna and the Stargazer, Rios was able to move beyond his past mistakes and become a truly great captain. He does however display a blatant disregard for the temporal prime directive by choosing to stay in the past.