Captain Jean-Luc Picard and Q have a long and complicated history through Star Trek history. They have met several times over the years, and their interactions have ranged from playful to deadly serious. Now, new information shows that that one confrontation could have ended very differently.
Q was first introduced in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Encounter at Farpoint." He is a member of the Q Continuum, a race of beings with god-like powers. He takes an interest in Picard and the crew of the Enterprise, and over the years he has appeared to them several times, often causing trouble. Picard and Q have an interesting relationship; Q is fascinated by Picard and his humans, while Picard is often annoyed or even scared by Q's power.
The 2019 comic miniseries Star Trek: The Q Conflict written by Scott and David Tipton, and illustrated by David Messina, Elisabetta D’Amico, Carola Borelli, Silivia Califano and Giorgio Spalletta, crosses over across multiple eras of the Star Trek franchise. The IDW Publishing series centers around Q initiating a competition among the universe's most powerful beings. He is finally destroyed when the Federation is able to use Q's weapons and shoot him, causing him actual injury and bleeding. It's later suggested that Q set up this crisis so that he'd have an excuse to call off the fight and resolve it peacefully. He simply seems shocked that they were able to harm him, and the injury appears legitimate enough for even his Continuum counterparts to believe it.
The Continuum are one of the most powerful forces in the Star Trek universe, and they don't usually show any vulnerability. This scene is shocking because it's the first time fans have seen Q bleed. The implication that Q is willing to show any type of weakness in order to end the conflict is also major. The fact that Q's peers are so easily fooled by the idea of an injury speaks to their existential dread that someone could actually harm one of them. This scene also raises the question of whether Picard could have killed Q if he wanted to. Picard is a highly skilled marksman, and he has shown before that he's willing to kill in order to protect his crew or achieve a goal. If Picard had been aiming to kill Q, it's possible that he could have succeeded.
Of course, fans never know for sure what would have happened if Picard had tried to kill Q for his history in meddling with Starfleet. This reveal does change the dynamic of their relationship, though. It shows that Picard has the power to hurt Q in a way that no one else can. However, it's interesting to think about the possibility that Captain Jean-Luc Picard could have ended Q's life, and what that would have meant for the Star Trek universe.