1. Laura Roslin - Battlestar Galactica
Youre the Secretary of Education, recently diagnosed with breast cancer, emotionally crushed by the not-that-long-ago untimely death of your father and two sisters (one of whom was pregnant), and youre doing the Presidents grunt work at the opening of an antiquated battlestar turned museum. Oh, and your entire civilization has now just been nuked by Cylons making you the new President of a small civilian fleet of ragtag ships with 50,000 survivors (give or take). If that which does not kill us really does make us stronger, than Laura Roslin is truly an inspirational woman. It is under these circumstances that we meet Laura in the 2003 reimagined Battlestar Galactica series. Over four seasons of slouching towards Earth we saw President Roslin faced with hopeless odds and unprecedented situations time and again. From her decision to abandon surviving ships lacking FTL drives as the Cylons closed in to faking the death of a Cylon-human hybrid newborn, Roslin frequently had difficult days in the office. During her reign, Laura had a decent track record when it came to doing the right thing, particularly when it came to Dr. Gaius Baltar. Remember when Commander Adama suggested making Baltar quietly disappear after the Cylon occupation on New Caprica? Despite how appealing tossing Baltar out an airlock seemed, Roslin sought to maintain the fleets integrity and her own by holding a fair trial for the former President turned Cylon collaborator. None of this is to say that President Roslin was perfect and we have several incidents, including ballet tampering, to prove it. The only thing better than a character we want to be is a character that is like us: a flawed work in progress. She did her best to stand firm against the Cylon threat, her cancer, and, at times the fleets patriarch, Adama. Former President Laura Roslin tops this list of women of power because she could make the choices so few could, sacrificed her own wellbeing for the greater good, and left us wanting to write her in on our own Presidential election ballot.
Are there any more sci-fi women you find inspirational we've left off? Let us know in the comments below.