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Tag: Joe Brozowski

Comic Treks: Star Trek (Marvel) #18 (Feb. 1982)

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On June 15, 2022

In Bags and Boards

Cover to Star Trek #18 (Feb. 1982). This is the final issue. Cover art by Joe Brozowski and Terry Austin.

“A Thousand Deaths” (22 pages)
Writer: J.M. DeMatteis
Pencils: Joe Brozowski
Inks: Sal Trapani
Letters: Shelly Leferman
Editor: Al Milgrom
Editor-in-chief: Jim Shooter
Cover artist: Brozowski & Terry Austin

Last issues are often unusual. It often seems like the regular crew jumps ship early, leaving the final issue to be cobbled together to be just good enough. And if it’s not? Well, there’s no next issue, no one to fire. That might explain why there’s no colorist credited on this issue — just a blank space in the credits that never got filled in before this went to press.

As I mentioned last issue, production on the upcoming movie sequel Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan began in November 1981. This issue would have hit newsstands just a couple weeks before that, meaning the work on this issue and Marvel’s decision to cancel the series came far in advance of any hint of what was to come.

The cover is better than it needs to be. I like the purple tones and the color holds to show the mental connection between Kirk and Spock.

Star Trek #19, Page 1
An odd splash page. It took me a moment to figure out what Kirk was even doing here.

This one starts with Kirk working out on a trampoline, drawn a little more like a superhero than not on the splash page.

Kirk’s workout is interrupted by a call from Spock, who reports a giant mechanical ship has just zipped up to the Enterprise and blocking its way. Of course, it’s 20.6 times the size of Earth, and it promptly sends ethereal probes to the bridge before focusing on Kirk and Spock and transporting them away.

Star Trek #18, Pages 2-3.
It’s deja V’ger! This looks much harder to draw than it is impressive.

I guess it was easier to rehash these points from Star Trek: The Motion Picture and call it a book end than to work out something more original. It fills the first few pages, at least.

Star Trek #18, Page 4.
The top panel foreshadows later encounters with the Borg. The rest of the page has decent art, and I quite like this version of Kirk and Spock.

Then it gets silly. Kirk and Spock appear aboard the vessel and meet a large robot who calls himself The Sustainer. (He sounds like he should play guitar in a hair metal band, but he looks like Box from the Logan’s Run movie crossed with the Superman villain Brainiac.)

Star Trek #18, Page 7.
Meet … The Sustainer!

The Sustainer calls the ship the Solopziz, and announces that one of the two men will die and the other return to the ship. He doesn’t say why, but Kirk and Spock soon find themselves in a holodeck-type experience aboard pirate ships. Of course, they’re set to duel to the death, but Kirk realizes the other pirates are all robots. Kirk and Spock fight them until a mast falls toward Spock. Kirk pushes it out of the way and is killed by the impact.

Star Trek #18, Page 11.
Pirate chic is a surprisingly good look for Spock.

The Sustainer then reveals he can revive Kirk and does so. A second scenario begins when Spock opens an unguarded door into the inner mechanisms of the ship. Fascinated with the layout, he deduces with logic the structure of the ship, how it works, and where they can find the equivalent of the bridge.

Note to aspiring comics artists: This panel layout does not work.
More interesting artwork, this time with a bit of a Klaus Janson vibe. I wonder if he pitched in

But while walking across a narrow gantry, it gives way and Spock falls to his death. Again, the Sustainer revives him, and proceeds to attack the Enterprise, heating its hull to 3,000 degrees.

The Sustainer says this time, one of them will die for sure. No revival. Spock tries to take one for team, using a nerve pinch on Kirk. The captain, however, fights through the effects of the pinch to push Spock out of the way of the killing blow … which never comes.

The Sustainer then explains the reason for all this. The Solopziz people had become intelligent but lost their morality. They had no empathy, so the Sustainer set out to record the feelings of sacrifice Kirk and Spock felt for each other so his people could learn to feel for each other once again.

And with this page, Marvel bids Star Trek au revoir.
They reunited in 1996, with results that were not much better.

Having got what he wanted, Kirk and Spock are returned to the Enterprise and the ship goes on its merry way, with Kirk reminding everyone that the human adventure is just beginning.

No letters column again, but there is a pinup page showing Terry Austin’s unpublished cover for Star Trek #2. Oddly, Star Trek is included in the list of Marvel titles you can subscribe to in this issue. Production work is so much quicker today with computers.

Star Trek #18, pinup.
I like this cover a lot, but I think the one they chose was a bit more dynamic.

It’s kind of nice to see the bit about Kirk and Spock being willing to die for one another, foreshadowing Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. But the plot suffered from the silliness and lack of original ideas that plagued the series from the start. Going into the far reaches of space to find haunted houses, gnomes, and pirate ships is pretty dull.

How much of that came down to the restrictions Paramount had on the license is unclear.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Pocket Books.
Star Trek: The Further Adventures of the Starship Enterprise!

While this was the last issue of the comic book, there was one last Marvel Star Trek project under the license. In January 1982, Marvel Illustrated Books published a paperback collection that reprinted issues 11, 12, and 7. The panels were split up and rearranged for the format. The color book ran 160 pages and featured a new cover by Bob Larkin that re-imagined the cover to issue #11. This was a follow up to a similar book published in March 1980 that collected the adaptation of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, also in color and including the glossary from Marvel Super Special #15.

Editor Al Milgrom must have taken on this title as he was transitioning away from a staff job. He’d already started Marvel Fanfare, which was a terrific project for its time and that he worked on as a part-time or freelance editor. He later went on to pencil long runs on Avengers and West Coast Avengers, before settling into a predominantly inking role in the 1990s and beyond.

Marvel’s success rate with licensed books was pretty mixed at this point. They started doing them in the 1970s with Conan the Barbarian, which was arguably the most successful of them all. TV and movie licenses such as Planet of the Apes, Logan’s Run, The Man from Atlantis, Battlestar Galactica, and Indiana Jones all had pretty short runs. Star Wars, of course, was a huge hit for Marvel, but interest in it petered out only a couple years after Return of the Jedi. The toy-based licensed did OK: Rom, Micronauts, and Transformers all had respectable runs, while G.I. Joe was a runaway hit.

Star Trek was certainly in an odd place at the time this comic series ended. The novels were doing well, but other licensing options had not. The original series was still a hit in syndication, and Star Trek: The Motion Picture had turned a profit despite its bloated budget. But I can’t imagine many expected for kind of comeback Star Trek had after The Wrath of Khan was on the near horizon.

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

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On July 18, 2021

In Bags and Boards

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 Treks: Star Trek (Marvel) #11 (Feb. 1981)

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On June 14, 2021

In Bags and Boards

Cover to Star Trek #11. Art by Joe Brozowski and Tom Palmer.

“… Like A Woman Scorned!” (22 pages)
Writer: Martin Pasko
Artists: Joe Brozowski and Tom Palmer
Colorist: Carl Gafford
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Editor: Louise Jones
Editor in Chief: Jim Shooter
Cover: Joe Brozowski and Tom Palmer

A much better effort this issue, though the plots continue to be plagued by the embarrassing and not-very-interesting trope of the Enterprise crew encountering ancient Earth myths in the depths of space. Star Trek’s gone there on more than one occasion, but these are rarely the best episodes. Time travel and more straight-on, traditional sci-fi conventions that are integrated with character are the real hallmarks of Star Trek. And Marvel just can’t quite get there.

This issue we get a decidedly new look with art by Joe Brozowski and Tom Palmer. This is Brozowski’s first work on a Star Trek comic, not it’s not his last as he contributed to a number of issues in DC’s first series.

Tom Palmer is a legendary comic book inker. He’s inked tons of Avengers for Marvel, as well as having inked Neal Adams’ legendary run on X-Men. He also did finishes over Walt Simonson’s breakdowns on Marvel’s Star Wars. His work is detailed and organic, and his style is unmistakable and always welcome in any comic book I read. He has a real talent for likenesses, as well, which makes him well-suited to Star Trek.

Now that’s a splash page!

This issue starts off with a great image on the splash page of Starfleet officers dying of exposure to Berthold rays on the planet Andronicus. It’s dramatic, and exciting! There’s actually something going on this issue.

The officers died a while back, but the Enterprise is headed to Andronicus because it’s the home of a clinic founded by psychiatrist Carl Wentworth. The clinic had protected Wentworth and his staff from the Berthold rays with a transparent neutronium shield that is now failing. The Enterprise is to transport the doctor and his crew to Starbase 28.

I have to mention Wentworth for a moment, because he’s described before his appearance in this story as the founder of the “anti-apologists movement.” McCoy calls him a con artist, Kirk admits some call him a cult leader. And Spock describes his teachings as training people base their conduct on “enlightened self-interest.” McCoy remarks that he senses disdain in Spock’s voice, which he denies.

Lots and lots of words on this page.

Enlightened self-interest is a philosophy that dates back to Alexis de Toqueville as a kind of “treat others as you would have them treat you.” But it also evokes Ayn Rand’s objectivist philosophy, which uses the term “rational self-interest” to describe the idea that improving and enriching yourself is the best way to improve the world. Like everything associated with Rand, her views are controversial and evoke extreme devotion among a small set of devotees and general derision from the rest of the world. And of course any discussion of Ayn Rand and comics leads back to Steve Ditko and the controversies associated with his career. Let’s see what happens …

The first member of Wentworth’s party to beam aboard is a lovely woman in a tiny wisp of a dress named Andrea Manning, who shares some unpleasant history with Scotty that he’s embarrassed by.

All of this, by the way, happens in the first three pages of this comic!

En route to Starbase 28, Spock notes a decrease in Scotty’s efficiency, while Wentworth gets a tour of the ship. Of course, he’s dressed like a cult leader: robes, sandals, balding with long white hair and a beard. And, of course, an attitude. On the bridge, he gives Uhura an earful about following orders when she should decide what she wants to do on a moment to moment basis. She dismisses him as a kook.

What the heck’s going on here? At least the art is pretty to look at.

Then this story gets really strange. The intruder alert alarm sounds in engineering as a “witch-hag” appears and rips through crewmen as it goes after Scotty. The hag is pretty powerful, redirecting and amplifying phaser fire back at crew members, then enlarging a security guard’s phaser so much that he’s pinned underneath it. Kirk jumps in and is knocked back, while Spock’s nerve-pinch goes right through the hag’s shoulder and she makes him dance like he’s in a Beyonce video before disappearing.

Spock gets jiggy with it in panel 4.

In sickbay, Bones says Scotty shows signs of fear but otherwise should be OK. While he’s out, he whispers “Black Annis” and Spock heads off to look it up in the computer banks.

Wentworth, meanwhile, is in the recreation deck telling Uhura and Sulu they should follow their whims and change course to Drexler II for shore leave. Somehow, they find themselves following his lead. And Dr. Chapel checks in on Andrea Manning to find her downing a bottle of saurian brandy by herself and going off on how much she loved Scotty and how much she gave up for him, only to less important to him than a rivet on a baffle plate.

Andrea Manning’s apparently a lightweight when it comes to drinking. No wonder Scotty left her.

Spock learns Black Annis is a character from ancient Scottish folklore that used to eat small children. Then Kirk finds the ship’s off course and headed to Drexler II. Kirk orders security to the bridge to arrest Sulu and Uhura and put them in the brig. And then another intruder alert comes in as another creature from Scottish folklore — a birdlike creature called a direach — is attacking Bones, Spock and Scotty. Spock tries to nerve pinch it, but it responds by kicking his ass. Bones shoots it with a phaser, to no avail. Kirk then tries to throttle it. Yes, throttle it! At that moment, Andrea Manning passes out from too much brandy and the creature disappears.

This page is all kinds of crazy: Kirk throttling a mythical creature and Andrea passes out drunk.

Chekov then reports that a full-fledged mutiny is underway as Wentworth takes control of the Enterprise. He rants about having leaned mind-direction techniques from ancient archives on Andronicus and he plans to create a new base on Drexler II, with the Enterprise at its command. Spock decides to mind-meld with Scotty to erase his memories of Scottish folklore as a way to cut off the source of Andrea’s power, while Kirk storms the bridge. Wentworth appears to win over Kirk, Andrea wakes up ranting about how much she hates Scotty and the ship is rocked by a giant alien creature wrapping itself around the ship.

Wentworth looks a little like Hitler in panel 5.

As the entirety of Star Trek up to this point has made clear, the only thing Kirk really loves is the Enterprise and his mission. So he overcomes Wentworth’s influence and decks him with a left cross. He realizes the creature is, of course, the Loch Ness Monster. Bones knocks out Andrea with a sedative, and the monster disappears. The Enterprise drops off Andrea, Wentworth and the rest of their people at a rehabilitation center. Kirk notes no charges against the crew because they were under Wentworth and Andrea’s influence, and the ship warps off to the next issue.

As you might expect from what I wrote above about the artists on this issue, I like the way this looks. The problem is the story, which tries to pack way too much into a mere 22-page comic to work. There are quite a few seven-panel pages in this book, and one nine-panel page — just to keep up! There’s also a lot of script to explain things going on that the art can’t convey.

But it’s just a mess, overall. The folklore creatures, the mutiny, Scotty’s bad breakup, the heavy drinking, the cult leader — it’s all too much. None of it has space or time to develop into anything of note. And the villain, who’s clear from the start and about as one-dimensional as you can get, is practically squeezed out of his own story. It evokes enough Star Trek flavor to feel kind of like a Star Trek story, but it’s too crammed full of elements for the story to deliver anything more than a surface experience.

No letters column appears in this issue, replaced by a house ad for Spider-Woman.

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