Gauntlet

Prequels are a tricky business. We already know the ultimate fates of the characters featured in them, so a lot of the drama is taken away from them, and instead we have to focus on how the decisions they make ultimately inform the versions of the characters that we already know.
Unfortunately, we don't really get any of that in Gauntlet, the story of Jean-Luc Picard's first starship command. Instead we get a very paint-by-numbers pilot story, where all of the characters are introduced and given equal focus, which means that we don't really get to know any of them in any real detail. The plot fizzles somewhat, as well. Picard and co. have to track down a space pirate who, we learn, really isn't a pirate, and it's made clear that if he doesn't succeed, his career his career is doomed to failure. So he lets the not-really-a-pirate-but-a-heroic-ethnobiologist White Wolf go, which as we can tell from later books and TV series has no real affect on his career.