With issue #35 of the ongoing Star Trek run (July 2014), which features the new cast of the reboot movies, we get an old fan favorite thrown into the mix: Q – the benevolent, childlike, and often quite dangerous extra-dimensional being. This begins a six-part story arc titled The Q Gambit. This won’t be collected into a volume until March, but here’s my review!
The story follows James T. Kirk and the crew of the the parallel universe Enterprise. Q visits them, but more specifically Kirk, to present them with the ultimate Kobayashi Maru, or a no-win scenario. He removes Kirk and the Enterprise from his timeline and shoots them forward a hundred years. It becomes quickly apparent that the events they encounter in the future are vastly different from the events we’re familiar with in TNG and DS9, despite the fact that many of the familiar faces from both series show up. Klingon’s have taken over earth and Starfleet. The Dominion are conquering the Galaxy. It’s a huge mess, and the Enterprise crew is caught at the breaking point of upheaval, war, and unknowable entities.
I’ll just throw it out there, so we’re on the same page. I love Star Trek: The Next Generation. But I’ve never watched any Deep Space Nine. I just haven’t gotten around to it. Although I recognized the characters, I had no emotional attachment to them, and as such much of the pairings just seemed overly cluttered. But had I watched DS9 I think I’d still feel the same way. The cast of characters was far too large for your average comic issue. As I read the six issues together, however, it flowed slightly better, and I didn’t mind the huge cast. But the novelty of merging casts from different series lost its weight with me long ago.
The artwork, by Tony Shasteen, is photo-realistic and gorgeous. I couldn’t believe how well each actor was captured in the small panels. The expressions on Picard’s face were so good.
The pacing was excellent as well. I never once felt the urge to put the book down, and was thoroughly entertained throughout. At the end of the day, it was just a bit forgettable. Nothing popped out at me and blew me away. The revelation that the no-win scenario actually applies to Q was brilliant writing however. Well thought out.
ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Geekritique
With a bit of story editing, this could be a really good idea for a 50th anniversary. Have the Alternate Reality Enterprise crew projected forwards in time by Q (still have John de Lancie, he’s an inter-dimensional being), and have them meet a new version of the Next Generation crew (still have the original cast and set it as many years after the events of TNG as years have passed since its broadcast). It could really work, and would allow the continuity to be set back onto the Prime Reality timeline. Somehow.
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That actually would be a rather clever way of introducing the new TNG guys.
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While it’s nice to see the comic telling new stories, rather than the episode recaps it started as (no idea how long this lasted) I agree that this episode felt cluttered and a little pandering. It reminded me of when they launched the Ultimate Marvel Universe and they said that should they ever cross over it would show that they were completely out of ideas.
I know the comic can’t do anything in fear of contradicting the next movie to come out but it would be nice to see someone doing something with this brand new universe we’ve created.
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