Wil Wheaton's Wesley Crusher is one of the most divisive characters in Star Trek: The Next Generation, and it is because he is better suited to be a Traveler than a Starfleet officer. He is Star Trek's boy wonder who doesn't fit in anywhere on the Enterprise and makes fatal mistakes in his time at Starfleet Academy. Ultimately, Wesley's skills and talents are a poor fit for Starfleet, but a mysterious being known as a Traveler sees a place for him and offers a better path for his future.
Wesley's teenage years in Star Trek: TNG are spent as the child prodigy on the Enterprise, where he doesn't have many friends. He is simultaneously praised and pressured by Dr. Crusher and Captain Picard. They believe that becoming a cadet at Star Trek's famed Starfleet Academy is best for Wesley, and he agrees because he wants to please them. When Wesley does enter Starfleet Academy and finds friends there, he will do anything to keep them. This has tragic consequences in his second year at the Academy. But being part of the Travelers takes away that pressure while also allowing him to explore and use his unique gifts with beings that can truly appreciate them.
Starfleet Brings Out Wesley's Worst Traits
On the Enterprise, Wesley is given extraordinary privileges because of his mother and his prodigious intellect. He is permitted the flexibility and freedom to use the ship's resources for his experiments and interests. These experiments and his inability to control them threaten the Enterprise on more than one occasion, such as when his warp bubble experiment nearly kills Beverly Crusher in Star Trek: TNG, season 4, episode 5, "Remember Me."
Once he gets to Starfleet Academy, he is honored to join the legendary Nova Squadron and is awed by the charismatic team leader. Wesley agrees to participate in a dangerous flying stunt that kills a classmate. He then bows to pressure from the squadron leader to cover up the reason for his classmate's death. It takes Captain Picard threatening to tell the Academy inquiry commission what really happened for Wesley to tell the truth. A year later, Wesley resigns from Starfleet Academy.
Wesley's Gifts Fit With The Travelers
However, there is a good path for Wesley Crusher. Star Trek: TNG season 1, episode 6, "Where No One Has Gone Before," is the first time Wesley or anyone from Starfleet interacts with a Traveler. Wesley asks the Traveler whether "space and time and thought... aren't the separate things they appear to be? I just thought the formula you were using said something like that." The Traveler is impressed but admonishes Wesley not to say that to anyone else. He later tells Picard that Wesley belongs with the Travelers but not to tell Wesley or Dr. Crusher. The season 4, episode 5, "Remember Me," proves that the Traveler knows what he is talking about when Wesley can "see beyond the numbers" and rescue his mother.
Finally, In Star Trek: TNG, season 7, episode 20, "Journey's End," Jack Crusher, Wes's father, appears to him in a vision to tell him that Starfleet isn't the best path for him. Wesley shows up in a Starfleet uniform in Star Trek: The Next Generation movie Nemesis when he attends Troi and Riker's wedding. However, in Wesley Crusher's cameo in Star Trek: Picard season 2, episode 10, "Farewell," Wesley shows up as a representative of the Travelers to recruit Kore Soong. Clearly, life as a Traveler is a far better fit for Wesley than his ill-fated attempts to fit in with Starfleet.