TrekInk: Review ST:NF#2 + News On Comics DVD

This week we have a review of the second New Frontier comic from Peter David, where he continues the story of the stolen prototype timeship. Plus, we have news on a new DVD, coming out later this year, that will have digitized versions of every Trek comic from 1967-2002. And IDW are branching out from Trek into Trek parody with their new Galaxy Quest comics!

REVIEW: STAR TREK NEW FRONTIER – TURNAROUND #2

As this second issue in the Turnaround series begins, some amount of time has passed  Star Trek: New Frontier – Turnaround 2: After a surprising end to the first issue, Captain Kat Mueller has arrived at Station Bravo to help protect it from its future destruction seen in the vision sent by Mark McHenry to Captain Calhoun. History between the two characters is introduced quickly in dialogue so that those of us without a strong background knowledge about the New Frontier series can easily understand why there is friction between them. Some other relationships play out in a similar manner, with enough background information given to provide the new reader an idea as to the context.

Similar to the first issue, this book is chock full of dialogue, making it feel like a longer read than a number of the other IDW Star Trek comics. At the same time as making the story longer, it also seems that less action occurs and that the story is primarily dialogue and exposition driven. The major exception to this rule is the closing sequence of the story. Unfortunately, the payoff there is not as good as is could be. Despite that, it manages to leave things on another cliffhanger, teasing us for the next issue.

The entire bridge crew tries to get Professor Kebron’s attention (click to enlarge)

Unlike the other ongoing Trek series from IDW, this one does not feature a lot of trivia references to the various Trek series, but does feature some good tie-ins to recent events in the New Frontier novels. This includes Robin Lefler dealing with the loss of her husband, Si Cwan.

Stephen Thompson returns for the artwork, doing both pencils and inks, and, like the first issue, he does not limit himself with standard comic panels, filling entire pages with color from edge to edge instead, and placing panels of story over top of sections of the images. I did have one problem with this issue though, in that the drawings of people, for some reason, seemed a bit rougher to me than in the prior issue. That, however, may be due to the fact that I read two other Trek issues in the interim: "Intelligence Gathering", with the Tiptons’ clean artwork, and "The Enterprise Experiment", with Gordon Purcell’s classic artwork.

Apparently it is weird to be cloaked (click to enlarge)

Now that the main introductions are complete, we’ve started to get into the meat of the story and the threads are being laid out to be gathered up over the course of the next three issues. David leaves us with a strong cliffhanger that worked even for me, someone who had (and still has) no idea of the relationship between the characters in question. The one problem I still have with this series is that, to me, it does not really feel like Star Trek. One of my friends termed it best the other day when he said that it feels like Peter David is trying to bring Star Wars into the Star Trek universe. While this mix may work for some people, I’m not yet convinced as to its effectiveness.

Star Trek New Frontier – Turnaround #2 is in comic stores this week

ST:NF #2 main cover by Stephen Thompson (L) and retailer incentive cover by J.K. Woodward (R), (click to enlarge)

COMICS NEWS

All Past Trek Comics On DVD!
Graphic Imaging Technology recently announced that they have gotten the licensing sorted out to release a set of DVDs with the digital versions of every pre-IDW Star Trek comic. This includes the original Gold Key series, the Marvel series that was placed around the first motion picture, the two volumes of DC releases through the 1980s, Marvel’s second run, and the Malibu and Wildstorm runs to close out the license before IDW came along.

This is a great way to affordably read past Trek comics, many of which are hard to find collectors items. The Star Trek comics on DVD will be broken out into two releases; in the Fall GIT will put out the complete series priced around $50, and in early 2009 a second release featuring only Original Series comics priced around $20.

Best Buy’s Geek Squad interviewed one of GIT’s staff members (wearing a TNG uniform) at the recent New York Comic Con about their products and Star Trek specifically.

By Grabthar’s hammer: Galaxy Quest comics!
IDW recently announced a five issue mini-series telling the story of the crew from the Galaxy Quest movie after the events of the movie. A full press release is also available.

Next week on TrekInk: More! More! More! Covers and comics, oh my!