Classic Trek Comics Come To The iPhone

Today IDW, along with iVerse Media, announced the availability of Star Trek Comic Archives for the iPhone and iTouch. Available today is issue 1 from "The Best of Peter David", with additional reprints from Star Trek comic history planned over the coming months. TrekMovie has a quick review and more Trek on iTunes and iPhone info below.

 

iComics
Starting today iVerse will begin issuing ‘greatest hits’ comics, with each issue costing 99 cents. They will start with comics from IDW’s ‘Best of Peter David’ Trade Paperback. The first (of five) issue reprints is Star Trek #13 (originally published by DC Comics) – "The Return of the Worthy: Part One" by Bill Mummy, Peter David, and Gordon Purcell. The story stars the Original Series cast, and is set between the 5th and 6th Star Trek feature film.

The second issue from ‘The Best of Peter David’ should be out in a couple of weeks, and they hope to keep to that frequency moving forward. After doing five issues from ‘The Best of Peter David’, they will movie on to ‘Best of the Borg’, ‘The Gary Seven Collection’ and ‘The Best of Deep Space Nine’, with around five issues from each volume.


Read classic Trek comics on your iPhone

Mini-review
You launch the Comics Archive from your desktop like any other application. Following the cover page is an instructions page on how to view, which is pretty simple. Most pages are in landscape format and you move from panel to panel by sliding across the screen (you can go forward or back). There is an ‘info’ button at the bottom right that allows you to choose how you like your transitions and lets you skip right to a page. The app is also clever enough to remember where you were if you close it down and open it up again later.

The panel scans are very clear and easy to read. The navigation is very simple, although it would be a nice option to have it ‘auto play’ with a preset time delay for each panel (something iVerse tell TrekMovie they are looking into). If you have any Trek music loaded into your playlists, then you can listen to that while you read the comics to get the full Trek experience. All in all, this is a fun and cheap Star Trek ap and recommended for Trek comic fans with iPhones and iTouches.

Star Trek Archives #1 is available now in the iTunes App Store for 99 cents (http://www.apple.com/iphone/appstore/), and if you have iTunes installed, CLICK HERE for a direct link.
 

 
Screenshot from ‘Star Trek Archives’ Best of Peter David Vol. 1, Issue 1

 

Star Trek Remastered Season 2 on iTunes
While we are on the subject of Apple and Star Trek, the entire second season of the remastered Star Trek The Original Series is now available on iTunes. (CLICK FOR DIRECT LINK).  The first season of TOS Remastered has been iTunes for a while now, as has the original (non remastered) version of TOS Season 1. iTunes also has the first seasons of Enterprise, Voyager and Deep Space Nine, but not Next Generation. iTunes also has all 10 Star Trek feature films and both of the Trekkies and Trekkies 2 documentaries.

 

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Not sure I could enjoy them on the small screen

Nice, but who wants to read tiny print on that small screen?

The size of the screen could make reading the comics difficult, but it’s a great idea, and one I’m surprised no one’s tried yet. Tho the iStore does offer books as well, perhaps they’ll have ways to compensate for the reading on the iPhone screen.

It looks like it’s divided into individual panels instead of pages.

Cool, hope we can get them in the UK unlike the TOS remastered episodes!

Makes me think how interesting it would be to see a comic written/illustrated specifically for the iPhone/iTouch — something that would factor in the small screen (otherwise a problem) and also work along with the interface, the accelerometer, etc.

A very cool new form of comics could be aborning here —

Just bought it, going for 59p in the UK.

$.99 per installment? No thanks, I’ll procure them digitally some other way.

#8

What’s wrong with $0.99? That’s $2.99 cheaper than the regular Star Trek print books – and even if you bought the entire series it’ll cost you about $5.00 – while the trade from Amazon cost $14.00.

How much cheaper do you think it can get?

Oh dear!

I just tried it out and it works very well. The text is easy to read and the photos looks pretty darn good. I look forward to more of these.

#9

I think he was suggesting just downloading them through a type of torrent. Which is a shame.

Return Of The Worthy was from a good period in the comics but really not Peter David’s best work. It was a belabored Lost In Space tribute.

I hope they include “Once A Hero” that came soon after, possibly the best single issue Trek comic ever written.

Remember this, what you Google can be used against you in a court of law!!!
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15519811/

Finally, a useful, practical reason for the iPhone to exist!!

screen size isn’t an issue TBH

isnt it the story that counts?

I almost bought it, but not if I have to wait a few weeks for part 2!

the few panels that are on display look great, and WHY is it that I had De’s voice in my head when reading ??

REALLY odd because I watched SFS last night :D {taps side of head}

I highly recommend the DVD-ROM that came out a few months back that includes these issues and every other Trek comic in existence except for the current IDW stuff.

I have all those comics anyway. I subscribed to DC’s Trek ever since it started.

Is there a good way of uploading the comics from the DVD-Rom onto an iPod touch? Is that even possible?

Season 2 of TOS-R has been on iTunes for several weeks now; it must have gotten lost in all the movie trailer hoopla.

The entire collection of the originals is going for like 22.99 on amazon. thats a great deal for HUNDREDS

Sallah, Give me a few weeks till i get my touch haha. Anything is possible if you are clever enough.

Seriously…if you figure it out PLEASE shoot me an e-mail! thepowersword@hotmail.com

I read the New York Times and several news sources on my iPod Touch and the screen is fine (this from a guy who is nearly 42 years old). I could never read anything for an extended period of time on my computer. I think that is generational, but on the Touch it is not an issue at all. I think it is the ability to manipulate the screen, as you would a book, and the resolution of the screen.

You can do so much more trek oriented things with an Iphone. Control your appliances, scan things, and you can even make the interface look exactly like an lcars display. Reading comic books on it seems rather lame by comparison.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIzrIyPCtw4

‘The Gary Seven Collection’? ‘The Gary Seven Collection’? That must be the DC stories someone wrote me about. I might have to look into that. Wonder if Richard at Bedrock City Comics can help me out. Wonder if it’s worth it. Think they’d be better to hold for real even if I did have an I-phone.
When are they going to make this into a series for real?!

Wow, think they’d have picked a better story than “The Worthy”..

You gotta love those Landing Party Jackets, though!

Those of you complaining about the “tiny screen” obviously never held an iphone in their hand.

I just read 5 books in PDF format on the iPhone. Granted, they were “print” books, not comics, as with all letters and no pictures. But if I can read print at 12 point in real life size on the iPhone (which I did) it certainly is also big enough for comics, let alone individual panels.

This is posted used an iPhone, btw. ;)

just a couple hours of screen time before the battery goes dead, Its also the reason that the game: Doom isnt on my ipod.

I’m on an iPod now. Don’t listen to those saying too small to read. You can read easily and zoom in. The resolution is fine.

Can you get it if you have an iTouch?

Does anyone know that?

You just made me love my iPhone even more. I didn’t think that was possible.