Star Trek: To Boldly Go

Star Trek: To Boldly Go 

By various (Titan Books)
ISBN: 1-84576-084-0

As the live action segment of the monolithic fantasy brand ended once again, the ancillary merchandising machine swung inexorably into action to provide succour to all the stunned and hungry aficionados as they gathered, organised and restarted the campaign for its inevitable return.

For comic fans this is not such a bad thing since the show has spawned a number of comic-book tie-ins over the decades, and many of these are really rather good. Case in point being DC Comics’ early 1980s tandem series featuring not only the then new and risky venture Star Trek: The Next Generation, but also the much more canny proposition of a comic-book series featuring the original characters in adventures set in the aftermath of the film The Wrath of Khan.

To Boldly Go collects the first six issues of that series and starts off in rattling fashion with the destruction of a Federation Starship at the hands of those villainous Klingons, necessitating the dispatch of the Enterprise to thwart whatever new secret weapon the rogues have this time. With nary a breath to spare it escalates the Galactic Cold War into an interplanetary conflict involving the Excalbians and Organians. You probably don’t know who they are and don’t need to. The fans do and casual readers are kept fully in the loop by the accessible and capable scripting of Mike W. Barr.

This romp is swiftly followed by the more traditional tale of a Star Fleet officer who goes native and breaks the Prime Directive, and the volume ends with an intriguing thriller featuring a diplomatic mission and a metamorphic assassin. Solid entertaining stuff, capably and seamlessly illustrated by the brilliant and much missed Tom Sutton, with inking from Ricardo Villagran and Sal Amendola, the only fly in the ointment is a fearsomely coarse printer’s dot-screen that makes some pages look as if they’re being viewed from inside a stocking mask – and no, I’m not telling you how I know that. Use your imagination.

I’m always banging on about getting more people into reading comics, and this sort of material is one of the easiest and most efficient methods. Quality material that needs waste no space on back-story is our most valuable commodity, and one we should be happy to support and extol.

® & © 2005 Paramount Pictures All Rights Reserved.