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Comic Treks: Star Trek (Marvel) #16 (Oct. 1981)

“There’s No Place Like Gnomes!” (22 pages)
Writer: Martin Pasko
Pencils: Luke McDonnell
Inks: Gene Day & Sal Trapani
Letters: Janice Chiang
Colors: Carl Gafford
Editor: Allen Milgrom
Editor-in-Chief: Jim Shooter
Cover artists: Luke McDonnell & Allen Milgrom

This post has been in draft form for months, mostly because this issue is a real chore to get through.

Why?

Just take a look at the cover, with the awful brown color hold background and the strange proportions of the attacking gnomes versus the one in Spock’s hand.

It gets just a little bit better on the first page, which is nicely colored.

Star Trek #16, Page 1.
By far the best-executed page in the book. It’s all downhill from here …

The story begins with Kirk, Spock, McCoy and some guards beaming down to the planet Valerian — Pasko must be a fan of Christin and Mezieres — for an annual check-in with Federation colonists who have not replied to hails.

Scans on the surface and from the bridge show there are humanoid life forms, though they are only 15 centimeters high — too small to be part of the Andorian colony — and they’re coming from beneath the surface.

Star Trek #16, Page 3, panel 5.
Is Chekov a serial harasser? Or is he the victim of bad writing? You decide!

The encampment is abandoned and Chekov comforts Themon, a female Andorian who is on her first planetside assignment. Pasko was clearly trying to echo the season two episode “The Apple.” Today, Chekov’s pattern of romancing junior female officers during landing party missions just looks creepy.

Star Trek #16, Page 5.
I don’t know where to begin outlining what’s wrong with this page.

A shambling humanoid creature appears, trying to speak. He’s zapped with some kind of energy flare, and McCoy takes him back to the ship for examination. Just then, similar creatures grab Themon, Chekov fires his phaser, and a fight breaks out. The creatures, however, appear only interested in disarming the Starfleet officers.

Star Trek #16, Page 6.
Kirk fights an ape-like creature, which is good. The gnomes coming out of the ground are just bad. And it’s a shame there’s no equivalent to “red shirt” for this era of Trek (at least that I know of).

Back at the beam-down point, security guard Sternbach is watching over the supplies when gnomes rise up through the earth and toss him into a tree.

This continues for a few pages, with the humanoids at one point dragging away Themon by her hair (or perhaps her antennae), and gnomes popping up out of the ground wielding crossbows and hammers.

They drive off the humanoids, which Spock identifies as trolls and the little people as gnomes. Back on the ship, McCoy’s annoyed to find his patient is shrinking in height.

Star Trek #16, Page 9.
The inking on this isn’t bad. It’s definitely got a Terry Austin influence to it. But the anatomy is strange, and Kirk and McCoy both look deformed in the first and last panels.

Kirk is bemused and annoyed by the whole thing. Me too.

The crew checks in with Sternbach and decide to take the supplies back to the ship. Once they beam up, though, a little armed troll on a flying bat escapes from the boxes and starts wrecking the transporter room.

Star Trek #16, Page 11.
Security is just as weak as it’s always been on the Enterprise. Imagine how bad this would have looked with 1960s or 1970s-era special effects if this was a TV episode!

On the surface, Kirk and Spock meet with the gnomes and Spock deduces that this alien race must have visited Earth in the past and inspired the legend of the gnomes. This is another of Pasko’s echoes from the original series (“Who Mourns for Adonais?” for example).

The bat-mounted dude on the ship makes it to the bridge, where he dive-bombs Uhura’s station and is at last captured by security. He starts speaking Irish-accented English and surrenders, but communications are out with the surface.

Down below, Kirk, Spock and Chekov follow sensor readings for Themon into a cave populated by Trolls, who attack.

Star Trek #16, Page 15.
Do universal translators even work with dialects like this? I may use that scan of the last panel to reply to online trolls — perhaps the only lasting contribution this issue makes to, well, anything.
Star Trek #16, Page 16, panel 1.
Someone’s reference model was built incorrectly.

Back in space, aboard a ship that bears no resemblance to the USS Enterprise, McCoy and Chapel’s patient continues to shrink. The bat-riding critters are put in the brig, and when zapped by the force field, lose their red caps and transform back into regular looking gnomes.

The landing party finds Themon, who’s just fine. McCoy calls and says the creature he beamed up had an alien virus that caused his transformation. He’s got a cure, of course, which returns the troll to his natural form as a human. He beams down and gives the cure to the trolls, who are revealed as the missing Andorian colonists.

I can’t even begin to summarize the ending of this issue, but it turns out that there’s only two gnomes, and their caps give them powers of illusion, etc. Kirk puts on one of the hats and beats the little shits at their own game, then high-tails it out of this miserable issue.

Star Trek #16, Page 21.
Thank god they did this story in the days of one-and-done issues. Today, this would have been six issues and cost you about $24 to “enjoy.”

Closing it off is a terrible pun from Scotty, again an echo from the final scene in “The Trouble With Tribbles,” though completely lacking in humor or originality.

Star Trek #16, Page 22.
Scotty, you’re demoted.

There’s no letters page this issue, because it’s clear the series is on its last legs awaiting cancelation. Only two more issues to come, but this one is clearly the nadir of the series.

I don’t have much to say about the art. It’s not the worst art I’ve ever seen, and a lot of the time it’s recognizable as Star Trek of this period. But it’s not good, either.

I have to say that I’m glad later versions of Star Trek were able to move past the original series’ predilection for tales in which Earth fantasies turn out to have been inspired by real aliens in space. I know that budgetary and technical limitations drove the need for those stories, but they generally do not hold up well as TV shows or comics.

And with that, I can at last file away this ugly cover and stop looking at it. Blech!

Comic Treks: Star Trek (Marvel) #15 (Aug. 1981)

Cover to Star Trek #15.
Cover to Star Trek #15 (Aug. 1981). Art by Dave Cockrum.

“The Quality of Mercy” (22 pages)
Writer: Martin Pasko
Artist: Gil Kane
Letters: John Morelli
Colors: Carl Gafford
Editor: Al Milgrom
Editor-in-chief: Jim Shooter
Cover artist: Dave Cockrum

Al Milgrom takes over as editor of Star Trek. That lets Louise Jones focus on Star Wars, X-Men, and the upcoming X-Men spinoff — eventually titled The New Mutants.

This issue is clearly a rush job. Martin Pasko’s script is a jumble of plot elements and twists from classic episodes of the show. Gil Kane is one of the all-time great comic-book artists, but his work here is sketchy. It looks like the whole issue was cranked out over a weekend to make deadline.

The problems start with the cover. Dave Cockrum draws a menacing, satanic-looking figure in shadow threatening McCoy, Spock and Uhura. My first thought was this would rehash the previous issue, and have Kirk turn into some version of Satan.

Or maybe it would be an alien posing as the devil. The idea dates back to the original Star Trek series. It was developed for the unmade Star Trek: Phase II series, and resurrected as the basis for the 1991 Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “Devil’s Due.” A three-part comic-book sequel to that episode appeared in DC’s Star Trek: The Next Generation #36-38 (Late Aug.-Late Sept. 1992).

Turning to the splash page shows Pasko has something different in mind. It’s almost impossible to synopsize this issue, but here’s what I think happens:

This is the best page in the issue, which isn’t saying much.

Wearing an alien disguise, as in D.C. Fontana’s excellent “The Enterprise Incident,” Kirk fools his crew into not recognizing their own captain. The alien design is pure Gil Kane — straight out of Silver Age Green Lantern. It’s also painfully generic, and only vaguely resembles the cover image.

The over-stuffed tale begins with the Enterprise engaging a cloaking device on a secret rescue mission to Miaplacidus V, a prison planet where death-row inmates are painfully executed. There’s an unexpected benefit to this, in that it allows Kane to avoid drawing the Enterprise. He doesn’t have the knack or the interest, and the iconic ship never looks right — or even like the same ship — throughout this issue.

One of many pages of talking heads in this issue, plus a terrible version of the Enterprise.

Kirk reveals to his officers his orders for the Enterprise to intercept a shuttle taking new guards to Miaplacidus. Spock will brainwash the guards, who will be returned home while Kirk, McCoy, Spock, Sulu and Uhura take their place using a replacement shuttle. This has to be explained, so Spock volunteers that this will prevent the proud, xenophobic Miaplacidan guards from committing suicide. Right.

Spock and Sulu take two pages to beam over and subdue the guards using a combination of martial arts and nerve pinches. It’s generic as hell, but somehow the inking here reminds me of the work of Walter Simonson. More on him in a few issues.

Hikaru Sulu: Master of Kung-Fu! Plus, nerve pinch! Those uniforms never stop looking like pyjamas.

In the issue’s second briefing-room sequence, Kirk reveals the reason for all this subterfuge: Starbase 9 commander Commodore Markessan married a woman from Antos IV, whose inhabitants have mastered molecular metamorphosis and can take on any form they wish. The commodore’s 18-year-old son, Tak, was involved in some sort of recent tragedy and fled in a small spacecraft headed for Miaplacidus V. The Enterprise crew is to infiltrate the base, find Tak, and bring him home. The Federation can’t be publicly involved — hence the cloaking device, coy disguises, and elaborate plots.

Having studied the Miaplacidan language and customs, Spock telepathically transmits that knowledge to his disguised teammates as they approach the prison planet. They’re greeted by Deputy Supervisor Kohll, who takes them to his boss, the imaginatively named Supervisor Viermann. He delights in showing the newbies the most recent execution in all its gruesome detail, thereby confirming his villain status.

As if the dialog wasn’t enough, you know Viermann is a villain because he holds his hands behind his back.

Viermann orders the newcomers to track down a woman convict who’s escaped. Not trusting them, he commands Kohll to follow them.

Kirk and pals quickly find her remains, and deduce she was melted by the acidic spit of a creature known as a desert-devil — which then attacks the Enterprise crew.

There’s a fight. Kirk is trapped and loses his mask while escaping. How this happens is not shown or explained.

No one in the known universe knows exactly what’s happening on this page.

Meanwhile, Spock fires at some rocks containing magnesium, which explode in a blinding flare. McCoy deduces that Spock isn’t really Spock, because his inner eyelids would have protected him, as they did in “Operation — Annihilate!”

That introduces Tak, the subject of the mission, who has been using his powers of metamorphosis to masquerade as the disguised Spock.

And then it gets very 1980. Tak explains that the tragedy on Starbase 9 involved a girl he loved very much. He was driving home with her from a party and they crashed and she was killed. Tak was exonerated, but the truth is he was stoned on cordrazine. He feels guilty and wants to die. Using his powers to make himself look like “empty air” — this is, unfortunately, the exact term used — he vanishes.

The moral is clear. As any kid alive at the time this comic was published remembers: Don’t drink (or do drugs) and drive (or anything else). Especially if you’ve been shooting up hits of cordrazine!

This message brought to you by AACD: Antosians Against Cordrazine Driving.

Kohll shows up and wants answers, but the real Spock appears to nerve pinch him. Turns out Spock had spotted Tak a ways back — always a sign of poor plotting — and the youth used his powers to lure Spock into a pit used to trap desert-devils. Spock says it took him a while to climb out. I think he just wanted a break for a few pages.

Stuck in a plot he can’t get out of, Kirk orders everyone back to the prison complex. There, Tak has morphed into the woman convict who escaped earlier. Viermann orders her executed, but Kirk arrives with the crew to stun the guards just before they throw the switch on poor, confused Tak.

Add in your mind a Wilhelm scream in that last panel.

There’s another weak fight scene. Viermann shows up and is ready to kill the invaders, but Kohll shoots him in the back and identifies himself as a man of peace who wants to stop executing the prisoners. He illustrates his sincerity by explaining the woman convict was royalty on her planet, but still was sentenced to death for — wait for it — falling in love with a commoner. Silly nameless royal dead woman.

Is Kohll a good guy? Or is he just mad he was shut out of the family retail empire?

Despite all this, Kohll has to follow the law and execute the outworlders for intruding. But Kirk and crew are beamed up by Scotty on a pre-arranged schedule — quite lucky timing that — and zip out of orbit at warp factor 12.

The last page features two panels in which Kane mutilates the Enterprise like a pretzel, while Kirk and McCoy wonder if Tak will ever be — “okay.”

It’s over. Thank you!

Forget Tak — I don’t know if I’ll ever be okay after reading this issue.

If you’ve read this far, it’s clear that this issue is an over-plotted mess. It has to jump through hoops to make sense of itself, rehashing the show’s most tired tropes along the way to make it “Star Trek.” There are no character moments to speak of.

And the art deviates so far from the established Trek esthetic, that most pages would not be recognizable as being from a Star Trek comic. This could be a barbarian comic, a fill-in issue of Green Lantern, or some other generic sci-fi comic. There’s nothing Star Trek about it. Gold Key would have loved it.

I don’t know if it’s my particular copy of this issue, or something that affected the entire print run, but the printing on this issue is terrible. The lettering is at times illegible, and the whole thing is a muddy, ugly mess.

There’s no letters column this issue, which is just as well. The writing is on the wall. The series is fading away gently into cancelation after only three more issues.

How much worse can it get? Well, next issue has gnomes in it. Yes, gnomes. Read on, bold friend, read on.

‘Nothing Changes … On New Year’s Day’

U2 performs New Year's Day in 1983.

Happy New Year. I hope 2022 is good to us all. Headline courtesy of my favorite band, which I hope puts out an album of new music sometime soon. I don’t know if their songs saved my life, but if any band’s music has ever done that for me — it’s theirs.

I have been busy with life and unable to find the time to post regularly to this blog. I’m currently holed up in a mountain home near Lake Arrowhead, with more than a foot of snow expected in the next 24 hours. It’s like old times for this ex-pat Canuck, and my kids are loving their first exposure to winter fun.

If you’ve been reading the blog, or wanting to see what I have to say about the last few Marvel Star Trek comics, I apologize. I promise they’re not that great, which is probably why I haven’t been keen enough to write them up to get it done.

Mage 2 cover
Cover to Mage #2, by Matt Wagner.

Comics-wise, the year’s end saw me go on a big Matt Wagner kick. I’m not sure why, exactly, but I’ve acquired a full run of the original Mage series. I’d read that story before, when Image reprinted it in the late 1990s. But those prestige-format reprints had issues with the glued binding, and I wasn’t a fan of the re-colored and re-lettered pages. The original issues, as soon as I saw one, was the only proper way to read it. The wraparound covers are fantastic.

Cover to Mage #5. Art by Matt Wagner.

Having just acquired right before Christmas the final issues of that 15-issue run, I’m ready to read through The Hero Discovered, the original issues of The Hero Defined, and then finish it off with the relatively recent The Hero Denied series. It’s 47 issues in all, and I’m looking forward to it.

Cover to Mage #9. Art by Matt Wagner.

Along the way, it was impossible to not reawaken my interest in Wagner’s other major character, Grendel. I found in some long boxes the first 12 issues of the color Comico series from 1986 or so and read them — I think for the first time. It’s becoming clear that I’m going to be happier going forward reading rare 1980s gems than most of the current crop of comics being published by Marvel, DC, etc.

Cover to Mage #15, the series finale. Art by Matt Wagner.

I acquired via eBay a cheap copy of the 2007 collection, Grendel Archives, which collects the original black-and-white Grendel tales from Comico Primer #2, and the original Grendel #1-3. That was a fun read. You can really see the early elements of Wagner’s art and writing style that quickly matured over a few short years into Mage and the later Grendel projects.

Cover to Grendel Archives, a hardcover collection published by Dark Horse Comics in 2007. Art by Matt Wagner.

It may seem strange for a grown man to say this, but as I face a new year that promises great successes alongside tremendous challenges, I take great comfort from this strange hobby of reading and collecting comic books. It is art. It is story. And it offers experiences no other medium comes close to offering.

So, thank you, comics. Happy New Year.

Comics Letters Pages, Part 3

In 1990, with few journalism classes under my belt, I decided to write a letter good enough to get published in a comics letters page.

I loved the letters columns in DC’s Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation. I think editor Bob Greenberger did the most professional, fun and informative letters columns I’ve ever seen. Not only was this letter column the best place to discuss the comic, but for Trek in general.

I wrote off one letter, commenting on Star Trek #5 (Feb. 1990). And another on the following issue.

The first was printed in Star Trek #9 (June 1990).

Star Trek #9 letters page.
Letters column for Star Trek #9 (June 1990)

And the second letter showed up in the following issue.

Star Trek #10 letters page.
Letters page to Star Trek #10 (July 1990).

I wanted to write a serious letter. I had just read and had some criticisms of Wolverine #25 (June 1990), which had a spiffy Jim Lee cover. This is a fill-in issue written by Jo Duffy and drawn by John Buscema. In it, an old friend of Logan’s named Morrow calls in a debt. He needs Wolverine to protect his son, Gabriel, during the climactic battle of a gang war. Logan reluctantly accepts. He tells Gabriel a story about a boy lost in the Canadian wilderness who is raised by a pack of, uh, wolverines. That inspires Gabriel to “help out” when the gang war comes home, allowing Logan to decide the battle in Morrow’s favor.

I really disliked the story at the time. Wolverine had become quite the success as a solo character and the number of writers now contributing to his ongoing story had grown far beyond the vision of longtime X-Men writer Chris Claremont.

Plenty of interviews quoted Claremont as saying he saw Logan as a man of mystery. It was better to never know his origin because no story could measure up. (See 2001’s six-issue Origin series for proof.) I agreed with Claremont, and therefore disliked this story.

And raised by wolverines? Really? I am a big fan of Jo Duffy’s work, but this was goofy.

So, I wrote up a letter, mailed it and — to my surprise —  it saw print in the pages of Wolverine #31 (Late Sept. 1990). My letter was printed without editing — and there was a response from the editors!

Wolverine #31 letters page
Letters page to Wolverine #31 (Late Sept. 1990).

And then my letter got a response two issues later.

Wolverine #33 letters page.
Check out the second letter. This is the letters page from Wolverine #33 (Nov. 1990)

Two issues after that one, there was another reference to my letter.

Wolverine #35 letters page.
This time, it’s the last letter that replies to mine. Letters page from Wolverine #35 (Jan. 1991)

I didn’t write more letters until after I had graduated and had started a career as a newspaper editor.

It was this period when I could finally afford to subscribe to the Comics Buyers Guide, and its weekly letter column was a real highlight. I was deeply into comics now that I could afford them to some degree. I even wrote a few articles about them at the newspaper, and made my first trek to San Diego Comic-Con in 1993.

Copies of those issues of CBG my letters appeared in are long gone, but I do have a couple of printouts I made before sending them.

Here’s the first, which discusses the issue of ratings systems for comics that was controversial in 1994, the era of the V-chip!

Letter to CBG, May 26, 1994, page 1
Letter to CBG, May 26, 1994, page 2

Amazingly, I don’t cringe when I read that, and I still mostly agree with what I said.

And here’s another letter, from 1997, that’s more critical of CBG and the industry as a whole.

Letter to CBG, Sept. 3, 1997, page 1
Letter to CBG, Sept. 3, 1997, page 2

I received the following reply from Peter David, though I don’t recall exactly what I wrote in the letter he was replying to.

I had a couple of comics creators or publishers send me samples of their work. In particular, I remember receiving copies of an indy black-and-white comic called Hilly Rose from B.C. Boyer. It had a Pogo/Bone vibe to it, and I ordered subsequent issues after liking what Boyer had sent.

Letter from B.C. Boyer, circa 1996.

Those also were the early days of the internet, and like everyone else, I used my Macintosh Performa 630CD to log on to America Online and check out its comic book areas.

If you weren’t around in those days, AOL charged a monthly fee of something like $12, and that got you, say, five hours of connection time. Once you went over that five hour limit, they started charging you by the minute. And it quickly became clear that five hours a month was nothing, and it only took a few big bills to switch to an ISP that charged only a flat rate.

Anyway, I was in a comics group when someone from Dark Horse Comics was asking for volunteers to read a new first issue and write a letter about it so they had some letters to put into that first issue. I immediately signed up, and soon a package from Dark Horse arrived with black and white copies of a comic called Heartbreakers, by Anina Bennett and Paul Guinan.

Letter from Jamie S. Rich, Jan. 15, 1996.

I wrote up a letter, sent it back, and it was published in that first issue.

Heartbreakers #1 letters page.
Letters page from Heartbreakers #1 (April 1996).
Cover to Heartbreakers #1 (April 1996).
Art by Paul Guinan and Tony Akins.

A number of years later, I met Anina and Paul at a dinner a mutual friend threw at Comic-Con. I told them this story and we all had a laugh. Stopping by their booth the next day, Anina had a copy of that comic on the table and I was able to show her the letter.

I forget exactly when letters columns faded away from most comic books, but I miss them. Even when they crop up these days, they lack the kind of thoughtful missives and discussion that turned up back then.

Comics Letters Pages, Part 2

Cover to Avengers #289
The cover to Avengers #289 (March 1988). Art by John Buscema and Tom Palmer.

It was 1985 when I returned to comics reading and collecting. I still dug the comics letters pages.

The letters in Marvel’s Star Wars series — the book that got me into the hobby — were solid. I remember seeing in issue #103 that the next issue was coming in 60 days, instead of the usual 30. I thought it was a typo. The two month wait revealed the book’s schedule had been demoted to bimonthly. Not long after that, the series was canceled.

I also read V, which DC published based on the TV miniseries and then regular series. The original miniseries was terrific, and the followup, V: The Final Battle, was five-sixths great — the ending left a lot to be desired. The weekly TV series was a disaster and put out of its misery after one season. But I really wanted the show to succeed and stuck with it. There was nothing else sci-fi related on TV. If you liked that stuff, V was it.

The comic book version ran 18 issues — long past the series’ cancellation. And it had its high points: The covers by Jerry Bingham were terrific. Carmine Infantino penciled the series and his art had many of the same qualities I had come to like from his Star Wars run. And the letters pages also were lively, with lots of fans writing in and good engagement from the editor, Bob Greenberger. More on him later.

Cover to X-Men Annual #10 (1986). Art by Arthur Adams.

I wrote one fannish letter to X-Men editor Ann Nocenti and writer Chris Claremont in autumn 1986, after we had moved to Arizona. I was trying to work out the continuity of the Mutant Massacre storyline, and where X-Men Annual #10 occurred in the run. I’m still not clear on that point, but I’m also glad they didn’t publish it.

A year later, I was a student at the University of Arizona. My initial major was general business, mostly because I had to pick something and had no idea what else to choose.

In Canada, I had been a strong science and math student. But my interest in those subjects was frustrated by the way they were taught at the Arizona high school where I finished my diploma, and in my freshman year at university.

I had intended to take calculus in high school in Alberta, but Arizona — to no one’s surprise — lacked that option. In university, it was taught in an auditorium with 600 freshmen. The weekly session with a teaching assistant was not helpful. Teaching my group was a thick accented man unskilled at — and apparently uninterested in — helping us make sense of the topic.

Buying a set of notes for the class from a local copy shop, I basically re-took the class at home in the last weeks before the final. I got an A, but none of it stuck, and I was already looking at other interests.

I enjoyed being a university student, and liked taking classes on topics as diverse as psychology, world literature, and military history. Few of the other students in my classes, however, seemed to have any real interest in learning about these things. They loved the social scene, but classes were merely tolerated. They were something to get through on the way to the degree and job that would afford them the flashy car they wanted. It was disheartening to see so many people just going through the motions and failing to take an interest of any kind in the amazing world we live in and the opportunity we had as students to learn so much about it.

I also had always liked current affairs, history, and politics. In school, we had studied the history and culture of Canada, obviously, but also places like Africa, India and China. We also studied the industrial revolution, the Reformation, the Renaissance, and the Russian Revolution. Given the threat of global thermonuclear war, the latter fascinated me as much as it scared me. For more than a year after watching “The Day After,” I had to distract my mind with the radio to fall asleep each night.

At university, I took advantage of being a student to read lots of newspapers, magazines and books I had never had access to before. I often stayed up late to watch Nightline, with Ted Koppel. That was a great show, though I always wished he had more time to discuss things — an hour instead of a half.

All this inspired me to put more effort into my writing at college and the results were immediate — good grades and some very flattering compliments from teachers. That had never happened before. I also was really enjoying it, following topics down a rabbit hole and using the power of revision to refine ideas. It was at minimum very satisfying, and more often than not a lot of fun.

I also was reading as many comics as I could get my hands on. I was particularly fond of the X-Men titles and the writing of Chris Claremont. He had a strong style, but he also told complicated stories and defined his characters in ways other comics and books did not. I was a fan. It made me think that one day I could do something related to comics. Maybe.

I would read the Writer’s Market — a guide to publications that buy freelance work — in the university bookstore. It reported at the time that top talent at Marvel earned six-figure incomes. That seemed unreal to me.

But a career related to comics just didn’t seem like a viable goal. And certainly not a serious one you could confess in Tucson, Arizona, in 1987.

All of this came together in the pages of Avengers #289, which came out in November 1987. The book’s editor, Mark Gruenwald, had a series of columns he wrote, called Mark’s Remarks, that ran in the titles he edited. And in this one, he was talking about what it takes to be an editor at a company like Marvel. He wrote that comics require highly structured writing, like journalism. So knowing something about journalism was helpful. Read the whole thing here, especially section 3:

The Mark’s Remarks column from the letters page of Avengers #289.

That stuck with me. It definitely played a role in my decision to switch my major to journalism. It wasn’t the biggest or most important reason. I had noticed in reading so many publications of all types that the people who worked on them seemed to really enjoy what they did, and that they felt it was important and worthy work. And that seemed like the right reason to point myself in that direction.

That choice was the right one for me. And I’ll never forget that moment of clarity, of the fuse that led to that decision being lit by reading that column.

I never had a chance to meet Mark Gruenwald, who died unexpectedly at the age of 43, in 1996. But I owe him at least a thanks for some simple words of encouragement. It’s amazing what a little of that can do — most people hear so little of it.

Next: Writing letters that actually got printed!

Cover to Battlestar Galactica #22

Comics Letters Pages, Part 1

In the days before the internet, comics letters pages were important to fans. It was one of the few places you could connect with other fans and read what they thought about recent issues, the art, the quality of the writing, etc.

Letters pages also gave most fans their first insights into how comics are made and who made them.

I first read the letters columns in Marvel’s Star Wars comics starting sometime in 1978. Those comics were for a while one of the few Star Wars products available, and the only official new stories. I read and re-read those comics — and re-read them again.

I specifically remember reading the first arc with Archie Goodwin as writer and editor. It was issues #11-15 (May-Sept. 1978). The art was by Carmine Infantino and Terry Austin. I bought each issue as it came out and loved it. It was the first time I read an extended story over multiple issues of a comic book and I was hooked.

Eventually, I noticed the letters pages, and read those, too. It was then that I began asking questions like, “Who’s Archie?” “Who’s Carmine?” “What’s an inker?” Discovering the credits finally clued me in that there were actual people writing and drawing these comics. And they were different. I had read the previous issues by Roy Thomas and Howard Chaykin, and I probably was even vaguely aware of having seen their names in the book. But it wasn’t until seeing the completely different outcome that Goodwin and Infantino brought to the comic that it became clear just how much impact the writer and artist had on a comic book.

Putting pen to paper

I remember only once writing a letter of my own. It was after reading Star Wars #26 (Aug. 1979), which had this really cool sequence where Luke Skywalker flies a stolen TIE Fighter into the gas giant Yavin to take out a hidden Imperial base. The story ruled, but Infantino’s art had become increasingly abstract. I’d looked at other comics with more conventional art styles and wanted the characters and ships in Star Wars to look a little more like they did in the movie.

Cover to Star Wars #26
Star Wars #26 (Aug. 1979). Cover art by Carmine Infantino and Bob Wiacek

I have since changed my mind about Infantino’s art on Star Wars and love it unconditionally.

Being that into Star Wars at the time meant I was really down for Battlestar Galactica. In Canada, the pilot was shown in theaters months before it aired on TV. I saw it several times and was excited for it to become a TV show that would air every single week.

Of course, it also became a comic. A friend had the treasury version that came out with the movie release, but Marvel re-adapted it for the first three issues of its monthly comic series. The next two issues after that saw Walter Simonson draw an adaptation of “The Lost Planet of the Gods,” and it was better than the show. I read that comic for the next two years — long past the show’s cancelation — and in particular loved the issues Simonson drew. He later started to write the book as well, and it somehow got even better.

It was at the time a special thing for me — almost like the show hadn’t really gone away. Of course, that didn’t last.

I read on the letters page of Battlestar Galactica #22 (Dec. 1980) that the series “isn’t much longer for this world. Next issue will be the last.” I was bummed. And the next issue, #23, was indeed the last.

Battlestar Galactica #22 letters page.
This letter in Battlestar Galactica #22 (Dec. 1980) is how I learned the series was being canceled.

Shortly after that, I stopped reading comics — and letters pages — for a few years. When I resumed reading and collecting comics in the mid-1980s, the letters pages were still there to inspire.

More on that next time.

Comic Treks: Star Trek (Marvel) #14 (June 1981)

Cover to Star Trek #14
Cover to Star Trek #14. Art by Ed Hannigan and James Sherman.

“We Are Dying, Egypt, Dying!” (22 pages)
Writer: Martin Pasko
Artists: Luke McDonnell & Gene Day
Letters: John Morelli
Colors: Carl Gafford
Editor: Louise Jones
Editor-in-Chief: Jim Shooter

Parallel civilizations became a Star Trek cliche during the run of the original show. Episodes like “Who Mourns for Adonais?” “A Piece of the Action,” “Patterns of Force,” “Bread and Circuses,” and “Spectre of the Gun” established the convention firmly within the Star Trek premise.

Of course, the reason for doing this was obvious: It saved the production lots of money. Any time they could use stock sets or costumes instead of making new ones, the show saved money. Within the limitations of 1960s TV production, the show did as much as it could with this trope to good effect — mostly.

One of the advantages of doing any sci-fi or fantasy TV or movie property as a comic has always been that those restrictions were nonexistent. It costs just as much to make a comic with new costumes as it did anything else. In fact, it was probably easier, given that there was no need for the artists to research something vaguely accurate. They could just make it up.

But here we go again, anyways. This time, it’s ancient Egypt, and this comic is lot more fun if you imagine the Star Trek crew is raiding the wardrobe and sets of the 1963 classic Cleopatra — perhaps to avenge Star Trek alumna Joan Collins’ losing out on the lead part to Elizabeth Taylor.

Kirk strikes a pose, but Spock is not impressed.

The story starts off simply. The USS Enterprise arrives for the first time at Zeta Reticuli II, and discovers a civilization similar to that of ancient Egypt on Earth. A meteoroid shower composed of siderites will bombard the planet within two days. Made mostly of iron, they will strike the planet’s surface with catastrophic effect. The crew needs to warn the inhabitants of their impending doom — and save them, if possible.

All this is established in only two pages. It seems like today’s comics would spend half an issue on that. As Bill Clinton sort of said, it’s about economy, stupid!

The rapid storytelling continues as Kirk leads a landing party and discovers a burial chamber with statues of Khnum, the Egyptian god of creation, and lots of mummies.

Star Trek #14, Page 3
Bones has been working out! Plus, some solid telling of a pretty strange story. And that odd bit of Kirk’s finger just barely breaking the panel border is distracting to people like me who notice such things.

Of course, there’s technology behind the ancient gods, in the form of a powerfield! And then a giant statue comes to life — that’s comics for you. Kirk stumbles and grabs Khnum’s scepter and it transforms him according to an ancient prophecy. Again — that’s comics for you. The statue zaps some security guards while Chekov rants in transliteration of his accent while he, Uhura and Sulu manage to destroy it. But then, the transformed Kirk shows up.

Star Trek #14, Page 6
Solid art on this page, though not really consistent with the overall Star Trek look.
I especially like the last two panels.

Back on the ship, Spock and Scotty are tracking the meteoroids, and check in with the overdue Kirk. The captain, alas, is possessed by an ancient spirit and now wears a nemes. Spock and Scott notice the change.

But not as much as they notice down on the planet. Kirk announces he’s Menteptah II, descendant of the pharoahs, and he will to save his people from the death that comes from the sky.

I can’t help but read this page and think of how great it would have been on the original series to have William Shatner play Kirk as King Tut from the Batman TV series, a la “The Enemy Within.” It would have been epic on TV. But here, it’s pretty meh.

Star Trek #14, Page 8
Luke McDonnell and Gene Day obviously like McCoy. They give him lots of visual attention.

Kirk confiscates the communicators, but misses one that Bones collected from the killed security guard. While Kirk destroys what he thinks are all the communicators, Spock is slowly reaching the conclusion he needs to beam down to find out what’s happening on the surface.

And then it starts to get both weird and predictable. Kirk prays to a statue of Khnum, which responds in a voice I personally hear as the same as that of the Guardian of Forever from “City on the Edge of Forever” when I read it. He explains, in pure Erich von Daniken mode, that the people of Zeta Reticuli II originated on Earth and traveled across the galaxy on a spaceship and would one day return to their homeworld. Of course, it also evokes Jack Kirby’s work on The Eternals, etc.

Star Trek #14, Page 10
Very strange for Star Trek, but I rather like the inking on this page. It’s very 1970s, Terry Austin stuff.

So it turns out Khnum has chosen Kirk to lead the people of Zeta Reticuli II back to Earth. And if it hadn’t started to unravel by now, the story is definitely unraveling now. Spock gets through to the communicator McCoy took from the security and receives a call for help. So of course, McCoy gets caught and Spock beams down to the planet to help — all by himself.

Meanwhile, Kirk takes Uhura as his “queen.” This is not explained. But they take the now-captured McCoy to join the other landing party members, who are laying on stone slabs with intravenous contraptions that infuse them all with the “Elixir of Obedience.”

Right.

Star Trek #14, Page 14
Comics are sometimes produced in a rush that doesn’t bring out the best work from creators. This page might qualify, based on that terrible version of the Enterprise in panel two and what seems like off anatomy in panel four.

Spock arrives and hears from Scotty that a beam from the pyramid is shrinking the Enterprise, but not its crew. That means everything’s becoming more intimate by the second — and Kirk’s not there to enjoy it! Also, wouldn’t the air pressure increase to the point that people would be crushed?

Spock and Kirk fight it out, while McCoy slips free and makes the ensorcelled Uhura take him to his medical kit — so he can giver her a shot of cordrazine that returns her to normal. Of course, there’s only one drug anyone remembers from Star Trek, and that’s cordrazine. Thank you, Harlan Ellison.

Cramming this much story on one page is a sure sign of an overstuffed plot.

Spock breaks free of Kirk’s death grip long enough to grab a phaser and take out the statue of Khnum. Kirk’s now free, but the ship is still shrinking, and McCoy has freed the rest of the landing party.

At this point, not much sense remains of the plot. Whatever decent ideas it once may have contained are now just tossed out for any reason that will wrap this up by page 22.

Star Trek #14, Page 19
Bring out your dead!

It’s mummy time. The mummies were actual aliens in suspended animation and they come to life to attack the infidel invaders. This scene reminds me of a much better comic, X-Men #56 (May 1969), the first issue of that series with art by the great Neal Adams.

Giants on one side, a shrinking ship on the other! Who doesn’t love this?

Of course, Spock looks at the alien technology and figures out how to reverse the ray affecting the Enterprise, while Kirk “reprises” his role as Menteptah II to get the mummies to stand down.

At long last, page 22 arrives. The landing party beams up, the Enterprise destroys the approaching asteroids and a lame joke from McCoy at Spock’s expense wraps up yet another weak issue of Star Trek.

Star Trek #14, Page 22
At least the Enterprise isn’t massively deformed on this page.

This issue sports a letters column, with several missives complimenting the improved artwork on issue #11, and more than a few complaining about the high prevalence of Star Trek cliches in each issue. (They’re not going to find much improvement by this issue.) There’s no reply from editor Louise Jones, who bows out with this issue to focus on more successful Marvel titles, like The Uncanny X-Men and Star Wars.

Comic Treks: Star Trek (Marvel) #13 (April 1981)

Star Trek #13 Cover
Cover to Star Trek #13 (April 1981). Cover art by James Sherman and Larry Hama.

“All the Infinite Ways” (22 pages)
Writer: Martin Pasko
Artists: Joe Brozowski & Tom Palmer, and “D. Hands”
Letters: Joe Rosen
Colors: Carl Gafford
Editor: Louise Jones
Editor-in-Chief: Jim Shooter

The final monthly issue of the series focuses on one of the better-known bits of apocrypha from the original series: Dr. McCoy’s daughter, Joanna.

The idea originated way back in the days of the original series. According to writer D.C. Fontana, she proposed to DeForest Kelley the idea of McCoy having a son. Kelley suggested a daughter, instead, and Fontana added it to the series bible. She named her Joanna and established that she is a nurse.

In 1968’s The Making of Star Trek, series creator Gene Roddenberry stated plans for an episode featuring Joanna in the third season. You can read a synopsis of Fontana’s story here. Joanna was originally one of the “space hippies” in what became “The Way to Eden,” but that was lost in revisions.

She almost got a reference in an episode of the animated series, and was frequently mentioned in Star Trek fan publications for decades to come despite never appearing in an episode or movie.

Writer Marty Pasko, as a serious Star Trek fan, obviously read about Joanna and somehow got permission to incorporate her into this issue of the Marvel series.

Marvel’s familiar touch

The story starts in the typical way: The Enterprise has arrived at Hephaestus, a neutral resort planet blessed with plenty of dilithium and pergium. Kirk’s job is to negotiate a mining treaty with the inhabitants, who are intelligent and peaceful simians. But Klingon Commander Kagg is here to counter the Federation’s offer.

Star Trek #13, Page 1
It’s difficult to start a Star Trek comic without doing a “ship orbiting the planet with Captain’s Log summary,” but this at least looks good. The art team does a good job of solid storytelling with that nice polished Tom Palmer finish.

A resort planet means there’s a chance for shore leave and lots of wealthy species from all over the galaxy hanging out to enjoy the spa. Among them is a Vulcan ambassador named Suvak, and his companion, Joanna.

StarTrek13-Page2
At last, we see Joanna.

Of course, this means there’ll be conflict. And Sulu and Chekov immediately find themselves in a melee between a Klingon and one of the Hephaestans.

Star Trek #13, Page 4
That spa looks awful. Chekov’s accent is always strange in print.

Joanna approaches her father, who is surprised and thrilled to see her. She’s less excited, and tries to pull away. She’s engaged to Ambassador Suvak, and Bones is not exactly happy to learn his daughter plans to marry a blasted Vulcans.

A Star Trek family affair

For most of page 7, McCoy and Joanna have it out. Of course, he was an absent father who spent most of his time on starships exploring distant planets instead of being with her. Right at the key moment, of course, Suvak falls over ill.

Star Trek #13, Page 7
A good example of an emotional scene told with concise and dynamic art. Also, I love the way older comics artists drew women. Yeah, they cried too much, but they were pretty and their faces always expressive.

Meanwhile, Kirk and Kagg argue over who killed the Hephaestan. They head to the clinic to determine the cause of death and find McCoy and his daughter tending to Suvak. Bones tells Kirk that Nurse McCoy is no relation because according to her she has no father.

Chimps with chips?

McCoy finds a chip implanted in the neck of the dead Hephaestan that he deduces means the intelligent simians are symbionts. Caught in their lie, the Hephaestans explain an alien race visited them thousands of years ago and gave them intelligence through such implanted chips. They make the chips in a secret location and implant them in their children just after birth. Spock thinks the Klingons are looking for the manufacturing center as their primary objective.

Star Trek #13, Page 10
This must be an homage of sorts to 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The body of another murdered Hephaestan body is brought in, this time with the chip removed from his neck. Kirk accuses Kagg and the Klingons of the crime, prompting Kagg to order his ship to use a “stasis-field” weapon to immobilize the Enterprise in orbit.

McCoy suspects the real cause to Suvak’s ongoing oxygen deprivation is not good and awaits test results from the Enterprise.

Plots on a collision course

The story jumps around here more than in current comics.

In one page, we have a Klingon vaporizing one of the simians. Hephaestan Dr. Sikaar then stabs that Klingon, and we transition to Joanna thinking Suvak won’t make it. Bones asks her if that’s so bad. What kind of life would it be to marry an emotionless Vulcan who mates only once every seven years? She snipes back and McCoy — in the time-honored tradition of 1960s TV series — slaps her.

Star Trek #13, page 15
To quote Kirk: “Don’t mince words, Bones. What do you really think?”

From this point on, it’s all about wrapping up the plot. The Klingons have planted an explosive device at the manufacturing center, prompting the Hephaestans to fight them. It’s futile, of course, but Joanna rushes in to see what’s going on and Kagg takes her hostage. (You did see the cover, right?)

Star Trek #13, Page 17
Joanna gets captured by Kagg. Panel 5 is a tough one to read — I keep thinking someone’s clubbing Dr. Simaya instead of freeing him from rubble.

Kirk and Spock go after the Klingons, while McCoy diagnoses Suvak’s illness as choriocytosis, which means he’ll be dead in 24 hours. Kirk and Spock decide to dump the data from the manufacturing center into the Enterprise computers to preserve it. And then Suvak decides he wants to save Joanna as his final act.

Star Trek #13, Page 20
Suvak to the rescue!

There’s a standoff between the Klingons and Kirk’s crew, with Joanna caught in the middle. Suvak jumps in and attacks Kagg, holding him down while Kirk and his team — including Joanna — beam up to the Enterprise just before the explosive device detonates.

Star Trek #13, Page 22
Another overcrowded, extremely average issue comes to an end.

Wrapping it up, McCoy has a heart to heart with Kirk, confessing his own shortcomings in his relationship with Joanna. There’s a weird moment where McCoy admits that Joanna is his daughter to Kirk, which shouldn’t come as a surprise because McCoy told him that on page 17. The issue ends with McCoy beaming down to talk to her.

The human adventure is just beginning … to end

One year after the series debuted, the future of Star Trek as a comic book was on fumes. As with previous issues, this one tries too hard to be a TV episode and not play to the strengths of a comic book.

This is a strange period for Star Trek. On the surface, it looked like Star Trek: The Motion Picture had failed to fully resuscitate the franchise. Toy lines and other merchandise had failed to match the success of Star Wars.

But underneath, more was going on: Novels were doing well. The movie drew solid ratings on TV. There was some kind of audience there. But the vision of Star Trek presented in The Motion Picture had done little to inspire a clear vision of what Trek could become. That would change with Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, which was still 18 months away at this point.

A comic on course for cancelation

There’s no letters column this issue. And no notice that the next issue won’t arrive for 60 days instead of 30. Bimonthly comics were still a thing in the 1980s, but fans knew that it was a good sign when a series goes from bimonthly to monthly — as X-Men did in 1977 — and a sign of trouble when it’s demoted from monthly to bimonthly. The same thing happened to Marvel’s Star Wars and Further Adventures of Indiana Jones series just before cancelation.

The same fate awaited this series, which limps along for five more issues before calling it quits.

Comic-Shop Memories: Fantasy Comics, 1989-90, Tucson, Ariz., Part 1

I don’t remember why I stopped shopping at AAA Best when I started my junior year at the University of Arizona. Instead, I starting shopping weekly in Tucson at Fantasy Comics, which is located at 2745 N. Campbell Ave.

Fantasy was in an unremarkable one-story building, with a glass case at the front full of its more expensive comics. New releases were racked to the immediate right. The rest of the current comics were stocked in alphabetical order in racks that stretched to the back of the shop. The main floor featured lots of back issues. Charlie Harris, a frequent DC “letter hack,” either owned the store or worked there.

One of the most memorable things for me about shopping at Fantasy was that back issues were in heat-sealed bags. To get them open, you needed scissors, so there were lots of discarded comic bags in my trash.

Into the Trek comics wormhole

I fell deep into Star Trek at the time. DC published in August new Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation series that I really enjoyed. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier had done poorly at the box office and with critics, but Star Trek: The Next Generation‘s third series debuted in September and was by far its best to date.

But it was the classic Star Trek comic that really caught my eye. It had clever scripts by Peter David and slick art printed on good paper from the team of James Fry and Arne Starr. And nothing beat those covers by Jerome K. Moore. They are spectacular and I never tire of looking at them or admiring the skill Moore brought to those illustrations.

My Star Trek obsession led me to a Star Trek convention experience that cemented my fandom for that franchise. It was a weekend Creation Convention at the Tucson Convention Center, with special guest Patrick Stewart.

Prior to Stewart’s entrance, Gene Roddenberry’s assistant, Richard Arnold, previewed upcoming episodes of The Next Generation. These were sneak peeks at some of the best in the series’ run: “Deja Q,” “Yesterday’s Enterprise,” “Sins of the Father” and “Captain’s Holiday.”

Stewart appeared for a charming Q&A session at the end of the day. Among the secrets he revealed: He had accepted a teaching job at the University of Arizona. But the offer slipped through through the cracks and after landing the role of Captain Picard, he never looked back. What might have been!

Marvel’s X-Men on the rise

The other hot franchise was X-Men. It had been a best-seller for years at this point, but new artists raised the excitement to a new level. Jim Lee’s arrival on X-Men seemed inevitable after lengthy runs on Alpha Flight and Punisher War Journal. He did a few issues here and there at first, before taking the full reins in the summer of 1990. At the same time, Rob Liefeld also was pitching in on X-Men titles and getting some heat. He took over the penciling chores on The New Mutants in 1990 and introduced Cable, another high point. Erik Larsen took over penciling The Amazing Spider-Man from Todd McFarlane, who was set to launch a new Marvel title. With Marc Silvestri jumping from X-Men to Wolverine, the seeds of the Image revolution were taking root.

But Star Trek had sort of taken over my mind. I collected the first DC series, re-watched the movies and original TV shows, and even enjoyed some of the Star Trek novels. “Writer of Stuff” Peter David was the creator whose work I most enjoyed, leading me inevitably to The Incredible Hulk.

Lost in the aisles of Bookman’s

Fantasy was but one of the shops I frequented that year. Another mainstay was Bookman’s, a used-book store that filled a former grocery store space with tons of fascinating objects. Each visit took hours, it seems. I’d start with out-of-town newspapers and move on to a newsstand section full of old and new magazines. Then there were aisles full of used books, cassettes, CDs, and bargain low-grade comics. I always flipped through Comics Scene and the Comics Buyers Guide, catching in the latter news of a Peter David signing at All About Books and Comics in Phoenix. I skipped out on school to drive up from Tucson in time to hit the Thursday evening event.

The Hulk tour hits Phoenix

The signing was part of a tour promoting David and artist Dale Keown’s work on The Incredible Hulk. Keown had only drawn two issues of Hulk at this point, and the signing was sparsely attended. That gave everyone a chance to hang out with David and Keown and chat about a lot of things. David signed several Star Trek issues for me, a Next Generation novel he’d written, and some Hulks. He joked about calling his editor back in New York to rave about the warm Arizona weather.

To my surprise, Keown hailed from Alberta, so we talked about Canada and Arizona, as well as comics. I remember he sold the splash page to The Incredible Hulk #367, his first issue, for about $150. A few years later, I saw the same page for sale in another Phoenix-area store for many multiples of that.

The signing was part of a mini-tour that continued that weekend to comic shops in Los Angeles and Las Vegas. All About produced a poster for the signing similar to the McFarlane one I wrote about previously. Mine is framed but in storage.

Hunting for back issues in Tucson

After that, I started seriously looking for back issues of The Incredible Hulk. David had been writer on Hulk for about three years, and I began by tracking down his back issues. I often visited a Tucson shop called Comics and Things, located in a strip mall at 3934 E. Grant Road, in search of Hulk and Star Trek back issues. It had a good selection of recent back issues but soon vanished into the ether.

The writing and art on Hulk surprised me. David started with a fairly conventional Hulk story with McFarlane on art. Their collaboration ended with a satisfying climax that completely changed the series’ premise. David next turned the Hulk gray and got him a job as a high-end Las Vegas bouncer named Joe Fixit. Jeff Purves drew this run and did a fabulous job before disappearing from the world of comics.

Hulk was so good that Sam Kieth drew the fill-ins — if you could call them that.

Keown drew Hulk for the next three years, and it became was a huge hit. David stuck with the title for years after, and still writes new Hulk stories from time to time. Great stuff.

How much is too much Batman?

This also was a time when Batman was still riding high on the popularity of the Tim Burton movie. So Batman was super-hot and DC released in the autumn of 1989 Legends of the Dark Knight #1. Promoted as the first new solo Batman book since 1940, this series set free top talent to do their ultimate Batman story.

The first issue also marked the first time I remember variant covers from a major publisher, as DC promoted the book with a second cover that came in four different colors. They said in the book that it was “just for fun,” but the result surely made DC’s accountants happy as fans decided they needed to have a copy of each color — and therefore bought four copies of that first issue.

Pointing out the differences between Tucson and Phoenix, that first Legends of the Dark Knight sold out immediately down south. The same was true of The New Titans #60 and 61, which were key parts of the current Batman storyline, “A Lonely Place of Dying.” I easily found both on my first comic shop stop on my next trip to Phoenix.

Next: My short career as a “letter hack.”

Comic Treks: Star Trek (Marvel) #12 (March 1981)

Cover to Star Trek #12 (March 1981). Cover art assumed by Comics.org to be penciled by Joe Brozowski and definitely inked by Tom Palmer.

“Eclipse of Reason” (22 pages)
Plotter: Alan Brennert
Scripter: Martin Pasko
Artists: Luke McDonnell & Tom Palmer
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Carl Gafford
Editor: Louise Jones
Editor in Chief: Jim Shooter
Cover artists: Joe Brozowski & Tom Palmer

This issue is notable in that it’s one of the first comic book credits for Alan Brennert, who has written many fine novels and episodes of TV series like the 1970s Wonder Woman, Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, The Twilight Zone and L.A. Law, for which he won an Emmy award in 1991. He also wrote episodes of Stargate Atlantis and Star Trek: Enterprise under the pen name Michael Bryant.

It’s clear this is a pretty difficult comic to write for, mostly because too many of the scripters are trying too hard to do a TV episode instead of a comic. It’s also a good example of the original series format creating too much of an echo chamber. There’s a lot of repeating in these stories and not a lot of original ideas coming through. Not that that’s not normal for comic books, but it’s not done with sufficient energy or verve to work here.

Not a bad splash page. Good details and likenesses. But I have no idea what that pyramid thing Kadan is in is supposed to be.
I don’t think any of the proportions in this panel are corrct.

The art struggles to keep up with the story. There’s some very nice work here as far as likenesses. Palmer, clearly, has a few moments to shine. But the rest of the story lacks clarity and dynamism, and in a few places, just looks like it was done under rushed circumstances or by an artist whose skills weren’t up to the task of, say, drawing the Enterprise correctly.

Storywise, this issue sees yet another Kirk romance gone sideways as he learns his former yeoman, Janice Rand, has fallen in love with and married a being of pure energy named Kadan of Phaeton. Kadan is captain of the USS Icarus, which is tasked with exploring beyond the energy barrier at the edge of the galaxy. Rand is going along with Kadan on this mission as the lone human aboard, tasked with doing what the bodyless Phaetonians cannot. The mission will take 1,000 years, so Rand will live out the rest of her life aboard the Icarus, with her husband, who will outlive her by many hundreds of years.

Sad, no?

Nice page, especially that middle panel. It’s well drawn and the color use is interesting, too.

The Enterprise regulars check out the Icarus to ensure it’s in good operating condition. Kirk confronts Rand about her radical choice, reminding her that she’s a woman and her husband doesn’t even have a body. (Kirk’s nothing if not subtle, right?)

After the farewell, the Enterprise heads off to its next mission, while the Icarus hits the barrier and it drives the Phaetonian’s insane and makes Rand telepathic.

The plot’s wonky, but I do like this page. It’s one of the few uncrowded pages in the entire series and shows that it is indeed possible to draw good-looking Star Trek comics.

Now, this is where you have to wonder about this plot. Clearly, everyone in this story remembers what happened when the Enterprise tried to pierce that barrier in the classic second pilot of the series, titled “Where No Man Has Gone Before.” That was the episode where Kirk’s best friend Gary Mitchell, played by Gary Lockwood, gains god-like abilities when the ship tries to pass through the barrier. He’s joined shortly thereafter by Dr. Elizabeth Dehner (Sally Kellerman), and Kirk is forced to kill them both before their powers go out of control. It was one of the best episodes of the show, and one whose message would be hard to ignore. But ignore it Starfleet does, and the results are equally disastrous.

Rand seeks out Kadan for help, only to find he’s gone mad and is projecting an image of what his body-bearing ancestors once looked like into her mind for added effect.

The Icarus quickly destroys a cargo vessel and heads on a direct course to the Phaetonian homeworld. Far away, Spock receives a telepathic message from Rand and passes on what has happened to Kirk, who cancels his current mission to help out.

That first line of dialog in panel three is unintentionally hilarious. It’s also unclear what exactly is happening to Rand.

Aboard the Icarus, Rand is trapped on the bridge when the crew shuts down the turbolifts and drives the ship into a “white hole.” The Enterprise follows and both ships enter a strange dimension and attempt to disable each other with phaser fire. Rand gets a signal through and tells Kirk the Phaetonians are like salmon swimming upstream — they want to return to their home planet and “land” the Icarus, meaning it’ll crash into the surface and the anti-matter explosion will kill billions.

Kirk, Spock, McCoy and Chekov beam over through a hole Scotty shoots in the Icarus’ shields and are trapped there as the Icarus damages the Enterprise and is able to speed off.

Another mix of good and bad art — so much so that this could have been a page from the old Gold Key comic book series.

The Icarus itself starts fighting the crew, which it has to because the Phaetonians have no bodies. That means force fields enacted, artificial gravity giving out and training devices attacking the crew.

Nice top panel, but the rest looks like it was adapted from a rejected X-Men story set in the Danger Room.

Rand detects her old shipmates and crawls through a Jeffries tube to reach them, while Scotty prepares the Enterprise crew for his new orders: Ram the Icarus to prevent it from reaching its homeworld.

Spock and Rand manage to telepathically communicate with Kadan and help him regain his senses at the same moment Kirk turns the gravity and life support back on — just in time to avoid a ramming from the Enterprise.

Um, yeah. No comment.

The story ends with less than a page explaining that the Phaetonians are off to an asylum on Elba II. Rand’s decided to seek an annulment and asks Kirk if she can have her old job back as the Enterprise transporter chief.

At least she’s not going back to getting Kirk coffee.

Rand’s story ends worse than it began. I get why that happens — characters like that might always be needed in the future and so you can’t really send them off on a 1,000-year mission. But nothing is added to her story. Her relationship with Kadan isn’t believable, nor her continued pining for Kirk. The captain fares no better, coming off as a complete jerk who expects Rand to be available to him on an ongoing basis — even though he has no intention of being with her at all.

And nobody else in this issue gets any more than that. The title lacks any kind of emotional connection with or between its characters and I can’t imagine that anyone other than a die-hard Star Trek fan finding much to enjoy with it.

I will add that this is one of several Marvel comics published this month that features the little gag at the end called “The Former X-Men,” which is a parody cover of The Uncanny X-Men #142’s cover. Cute.

Jim Salicrup and Terry Austin’s parody of the cover to The Uncanny X-Men #142.

One year out from the start of this series, it’s not looking good for its future. Star Wars was riding high, based on the success of The Empire Strikes Back and the anticipation for Return of the Jedi. It was hard at this time to think much of Star Trek: The Motion Picture or the future of Star Trek as a franchise, as The Wrath of Khan was still a year and a half away. But Marvel had another year on its license, so the comic book was still on track to publish through 1981.

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