Book bits: New DS9, Wrath of Khan side story, Into Darkness, and M'Ress.

Lots of books bits and pieces to share, starting with a very exciting first look at the cover of Revelation and Dust, the first book in the five-part 24th century crossover series, The Fall. This DS9 focused book in the series will be the first story set on the new, Starfleet built, Deep Space 9; the cover gives us a first look at the design of the new space station. According to the author, David R. George III, who posted this on Facebook, this isn't quite the final version of the cover yet:

Pre-order: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.es, Amazon.it, Amazon.co.jp.

UPDATE: Credits for the cover and new DS9: The new station was designed by Andrew J. Probert and David George III, with the model was built by Douglas E. Graves. The nebula in the background comes from Ali Ries, while Doug Drexler put the cover design together.

If you missed what happened to the original Deep Space 9, you'll need to check out George's previous 24th century books, Plagues of Night, and Raise the Dawn. Indeed now is probably a pretty good time to have a look at the reading order flow chart, and see what you need to catch up on before DS9, TNG, Titan and the Aventine all return in The Fall.

Meanwhile on the G and T Show, Michael A. Martin revealed some details about his forthcoming TOS ebook novella, Seasons of Light and Darkness:

It's centered around Doctor McCoy, and the bulk of it actually takes place interstitially early during Wrath of Khan; sort of between scenes. There's an entire story that I teased out of a brief sequence at the beginning of the film.

Martin mentioned he is expecting it to be released in June or July, although so far there are no listings for it on Simon and Schuster's website, or online retailers.

Meanwhile something that just come out is the novelization of Star Trek Into Darkness. StarTrek.com have posted an interview with Alan Dean Foster discussing his work on the book, including how, like the previous instalment, he was able to see the actual film to guide his work:

I always start with the script. Also, in the case of this one and the previous films, I was fortunate enough to be able to see the film as it was being made and edited. That, of course, is an enormous help, which I’d almost never previously had when doing novelizations.  I was very grateful for that. I had a long chat with Bob in his office at Universal. I expressed some thoughts and he came back (with his thoughts). It was a very unusual project. Usually, the people making the film have either very little interest in the book version or the interest they have is solely critical. And, in this case, there was considerably more back and forth than you usually get, which I think results in a better book.

 He also noted some of the changes he wasn't allowed to make:

I had the character Keenser, who is the little alien who is Scotty’s assistant, talking. I gave him some dialogue, which I thought would an interesting way of expanding his character. The scene in the bar with the two of them, Scotty is just bouncing his misery off Keenser. Keenser doesn’t say anything. He just stares back at him. I originally had given Keenser some dialogue. I forget who was vetting things at the time, but I got a note saying, “Keenser doesn’t speak in the film. Can you please take the dialogue out?” I was happy to do that because I wanted the scene in the book to accord with the scene in the film.

You can read the full interview on StarTrek.com. The audiobook version of the novelization is also out; TrekMovie posted this recording of Alice Eve describing her work narrating the audiobook:



I've also got news, via my German reporter, UnrealitySF's Jens Deffner, that there will also be an audiobook version of Cross Cult's German translation of the novelization, due out in June. It will be read by Sascha Rotermund, the voice of John Harrison in the German dubbed version of Into Darkness.

Finally, in another bit of news from German, Cross Cult's regular artist, Martin Frei posted a new version of his M'Ress character portrait, which will be coming to a German New Frontier book's spine at some point. The updated version is much more cute-cat than the lion-like draft that was released a few months ago:

Latest additions to the Trekkies' wardrobe

There's a pretty constant stream of Star Trek T-shirts and other clothing from licensees all around the world. Here are some of the recent highlights for the discerning Trekkieista. Starting with one of the coolest Star Trek clothing makers, Her Universe, who cater exclusively for female trekkies. Their latest Star Trek T-shirt has a great all-the-way-round Khaaaaaan print:

All new from Her Universe is the latest variation on the TOS uniform, a command-style dress:

ThinkGeek are offering another variation of the uniform, their latest T-shirts have the division colours, with a TNG badge:

As part of a co-branding effort between CBS and Warner Brothers we've already seen Starfleet uniformed Big Bang Theory Wacky Wobblers, and now we're going to get a load of T-shirts too. Including this one of the Big Bang Theory boys in Starfleet uniforms:

This one of a range of designs from Ripple Junction, which will be available from Hot Topic. You can see a few more designs on StarTrek.com.

Continue after the jump for red-shirts, Gold Key, retro, and Into Darkness designs...

QUOGs turn to the dark side

We all love QUOGs right? Those cute animated style versions of the TOS crew that occasionally adorn T-shirts, greetings cards and other assorted Trek-tastic merchandise. Sarah Trefny of Klickitat Street certainly seems found of them, but isn't content to let them mull about in the Star Trek universe, so has given them a Star Wars make-over, as designs on cookies. Here choices of characters are great, especially tribble-Chewbacca, with Kirk as Han Solo:

As both series are rather lacking in female characters, Uhura of course becomes a rather snazzy Princess Leia:

Spock is our wise old Jedi master, while our new whiz-kid Chekov becomes the apprentice Luke:

C-3PO and R2-D2 are filled by the ship's specialists, McCoy and Scotty:

Meanwhile Sulu makes best use of his piloting skills for the Rebel Alliance:

And a Klingon is that pesky Darth Vader:

Check out some more images of the set, and making of photos, on Klickitat Street.

QMx's Into Darkness extravaganza

QMx were in the pretty cool position of making several of the props used in Into Darkness, and have now announced plans to make many of those items available to use lot in the real world. Because they made them in the first place they are also able to offer them super screen accurate replicas.

Those props include no less than fourteen different aeroplanes, spacecraft, and starships that made up the history of starflight collection in Admiral Marcus' office. The models stretched back from the Wright Brother's first plane through to the USS Vengeance. QMx will be offering several of them as collector's models (which tend to be around the $100 mark) and/or high end studio filming miniature style models (which are several thousand dollars a go). We already knew the Kelvin was coming as a collector's model, and now she will be joined by the Vengeance, which will be released in both formats. The ring-ship will also be offered as a high end replica in limited numbers at Comic Con, and the NX-01 is also planned as a high end release. Here are the starships from the History of Flight display, check out QMx's gallery for the historical vehicles. Update: Added a couple more angles of the Vengeance posted by io9:

 

 

 

 

 

The ships are just the start though, QMX will also be offering phasers, rings, flags, and badges. Check them all out after the jump (and watch out for spoilers in the comic strip at the bottom of the page):

Starship model magazine coming to the US

This time last year I was very excited to discover Eaglemoss were launching a new Star Trek part work magazine. Coming with each issue of Star Trek: The Official Starships Collection, will be a little model ship. That magazine was meant to have started in the UK in February, but issues with the factory producing the ships delayed the start of the collection. It is now due to begin in August, and the extra time has allowed Eaglemoss to work out distribution for the US as well as the UK and Ireland! No news yet on the rest of the world though.

Eaglemoss have relaunched their website for the series, so you can now subscribe in the UK and Ireland, or in the US.The UK price is £9.99 an issue (after the first two issues at introductory prices), while in the US it appears to be $20 each fortnight. There is now going to be a digital version of the magazine for subscribers alongside the print releases too.

There are also slightly different offerings with the subscription extras:  The same "gifts" are offered, but come at a different rate. In the UK you'll have a binder, dedication plaque, All Good Things... version of the Enterprise-D, and a Borg Cube all by the time you've got your sixth delivery, while in the US these are staggered at six monthly intervals, so you'll be eighteen months into the collection before you get a Borg Cube.

The site also has a listing up for the first few ships in the series, it's very similar to the list I posted some months ago, but there are some tweaks. It starts off with many of the more familiar ships that we've had many models off, but very quickly we'll start to get some real treats such as the Akira class, the Dauntless, Bajoran solar sailor and the Krenim temporal weapon. They so far list twenty-three of the seventy ships currently planned:

1. USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D (Galaxy class)
2. USS Enterprise NCC-1701 (Constitution class refit)
3. Klingon Bird-of-Prey (B'rel/K'vort class)
4. Enterprise NX-01 (NX class)
5. Romulan D'deridex class warbird
6. USS Voyager NCC-74656 (Intrepid class)
7. Klingon K'Tinga class battlecruiser
8. USS Excelsior (Excelsior class)
9. USS Defiant NX-74205 (Defiant class)
10. Borg Sphere
11. USS Reliant (Miranda class)
12. Akira class
13. Jem'hadar cruiser
14. Cardassian Galor class
15. USS Equinox (Nova class)
16. Ferengi Marauder
17. "USS Dauntless"
18. Bajoran Solar Sailor
19. USS Stargazer (Constellation class)
20. Klingon V'orcha class
21. USS Enterprise NCC-1701-E (Sovereign class)
22. Krenim Temporal Weapon Ship
23. Nebula class

Home video round up: First Into Darkness details, TNG details, and hope for DS9!

Amazon have now made their listings for Star Trek Into Darkness on Bluray and DVD available for pre-order, and updated them with the first details of the various releases. Like the previous film, there will be a high end bluray release with a collectable. Last time it was a model of the USS Enterprise, this time it appears to be a new version of the QMx phaser, and unlike the current version it seems this phaser has the rotating stun/kill barrel function. Very cool!

 

 

 

If you don't want something so fancy, there are currently three other options listed: Either 3D bluray, standard bluray, or DVD. No news yet of what extra features there will be. The previous film had many more releases, issues with other collectables, and in single or multi-disc options; so I wouldn't be too surprised if more options appear over the coming months.

Here is the current Region A cover design for the 3D bluray. Amazon are currently using a poster as stand-in for the other releases:

And here are the current Region B designs, again for 3D bluray, standard bluray, and DVD:

Into Darkness in expected in September. Before then we have Enterprise Season 2 (currently available to pre-order for less than £25 in the UK!), and TNG Season 4 to look forward to. Continue after the jump for details of those releases, and positive news for the potential of DS9 on bluray:

Star Trek art from the Bad Robot Art Show

Gallery1988 in Los Angeles recently held an exhibition of art inspired by the work of Bad Robot, featuring pieces based on the likes of Lost, Cloverfield, Super 8, and of course Star Trek. If you didn't have the opportunity to visit the exhibition, here is some of the cool, weird, and wonderful Star Trek art that was on show. Links from the artist's names take you to their own sites (where I could find one), while links to titles take you to Gallery1988's listings, where some of the pieces are still available to buy if you like them:

The bad robot itself found its way to the Enterprise in Stephen Andrade's Bad Robot On Board. Andrade also did a really cool pulp fiction style cover using this image.

Andrew DeGraff made the Path Of The Trek, a map version of the first nuTrek film. I've previously featured his similar Star Wars maps on one of my other blogs, it's such a cool way to illustrate a story:

There were some really nice poster designs, such as Mayra Fersner's Hire Orion Tutors:

Scott Derby's TAS inspired To Boldly Go:

Ian Glaubinger's recruitment poster style Launch Into Your Future:

Sam Gilbey's The End Of Vulcan:

Ryan Berkley's nuTrek version of the Star Trek: The Motion Picture poster, Refresh:

Continue after the jump for loads more:

Check out Star Trek Into Darkness concept art

Star Trek Into Darkness production designer, Scott Chambliss, has posted a gallery of concept art, set photos, and behind the scenes images, showing off his work on the film as part of his online portfolio. Hopefully these will soon make their way to a book, similar to the previous film's Star Trek: The Art of the Film. But until then, I've picked out a few of my favourites below, including some really nice images of the USS Vengeance, Nibiru, Qo'noS, new Enterprise sets, and some of the other ships and locations in the film. Check out the full gallery on Scott Chambliss' website. And if you've not seen the film yet, watch out for spoilers!

I'll start with some USS Vengeance concept art, more after the jump:

 

 

Comics round up: After Darkness, August releases, timeline, and latest covers

Lots of comics new for you, starting with news of a new comic series tie-in to Into Darkness, Roberto Orci tweeted to confirm there will be a four-part prequel series exploring the character of John Harrison, coming in the fall:

Ask and ye shall receive. IDW Pubishing IS going to do a 4-issue John Harrison miniseries this fall!

Before then though, we're heading into events after the film. Here's a first look at After Darkness; the three-part comic sequel to Into Darkness, which will comprise issues twenty-one to twenty-three, of the Star Trek ongoing series. Wired posted these two preview pages (pages 10 and 13 from Part 1):

 

Pre-order: Things From Another World, Forbidden Planet.

Wired also posted an interview with the series writer, Mike Johnson, where he gave a vague outline of where he'll be going next:

You’ll see immediately on the first page of [the story] that it’s very much a sequel in terms of plot. Things happen in the movie that can’t be ignored going forward, and we will see the repercussions play out over the months to come. It’s also a character-based sequel, as we see how the crew reacts to the events of the movie, and what it means for their relationships going forward.

I’m aiming for a combination of two things going forward. First, all-new worlds and stories that expand the galaxy as we know it, and second, a larger epic story about the clash of civilizations. And I’m not just talking about the Klingons vs. the Federation. The map of the Star Trek galaxy is divided into established empires and the great unknown. I want to explore both.”

IDW have also given us some idea of where what's next with the release of their August solicitations, which give us the first details of Star Trek ongoing issue twenty-four, a sequel to Star Trek: The Video Game:

Star Trek (ongoing) #24
Written by Mike Johnson. Art by Claudia Balboni. Cover by Tim Bradstreet, with retail incentive sketch and photo covers.

The adventures of Kirk, Spock and the Enterprise crew continue in an all-new adventure that follows the events of the hit film STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS and the new STAR TREK video game! A classic enemy returns in this story overseen by STAR TREK writer/producer Roberto Orci. Beware... THE GORN!

 

IDW have also released an interactive timeline, explaining the timeline divergence, and placing all the ongoing comics.

They suggest the following chronological order for the ongoing series:

• 2256: #20 - Red Level Down
• 2257:
• #18 - Uhura origins
• #19 - Scotty origins
• 2258:
• 2009 movie
• #15 and #16 - Mirrored
• #1 and #2 - Where No Man Has Gone Before
• #3 and #4 - The Galileo Seven
• #5 and #6 - Operation: Annihilate
• #7 and #8 - Vulcan's Vengeance
• #9 and #10 - The Return of the Archons
• #17 - McCoy origins
• #13 - The Redshirt's Tale
• #14 - Keenser origins
• 2259:
• #11 and #12 - The Truth About Tribbles!
• Countdown to Darkness
• #21, #22, and #23 - After Darkness

If you've missed the ongoing series so far, IDW are going to try and tempt you with their latest 100 Penny Press release (reprints of their comics for one dollar), which is Star Trek (ongoing) #1. Details of that and other upcoming reprints, after the jump:

Star Trek Into Darkness spoiler-filled review

After watching Star Trek Into Darkness for the first time last week I posted a spoiler free review, tip toeing around the details, while generally smothering it with praise. I have now seen it a second time, and actually enjoyed it even more this time around; viewing it aware of all the twists and surprises let me step back a bit and admire some of the really clever things the film-makers did. What follows is a completely spoilerific review, if you haven't seen the film yet I strongly advise you read no further, as there are some brilliant surprises, which certainly made my first viewing that much more enjoyable. So I shall continue after the jump, and the following poster sized gap. Avert your eyes if you wish not to be spoiled: