IDW's January releases, and other Star Trek comics news

IDW have released their solicitations for January releases, which include two new Star Trek titles:

Star Trek (ongoing) #29
Written by Mike Johnson, with art by Yasmin Liang, and a cover by Cat Staggs, or a subscription variant photo-cover.

The all-new Five Year Mission of the Enterprise continues as Captain Jane Tiberius Kirk and her crew encounter a never-before-seen enemy in deep space! Wait... Jane Kirk? What's going on?! All will be revealed in the first chapter of this new two-part story overseen by STAR TREK writer/producer Roberto Orci!

WildStorm's Jane T. Kirk

This looks and sounds fun! Some sort of character twisting plot, perhaps in a similar vein to TOS classics such as Mirror, Mirror and The Enemy Within. Believe it or not this isn't the first time Jane T. Kirk has popped up! A supposed alternate universe female version of Kirk also appeared briefly in WildStorm's TOS comic All of Me.

The above art-only version of Cat Staggs' brilliant cover for this issue was posted by Staggs on her DeviantART account. For more behind the scenes comics stuff, you might also like to check out David Messina's blog, where you can find pages of his art, sans-text, from the first issue of the new Khan prequel series. Speaking of which, the other comic out in January:

Khan #4
Written by Mike Johnson, with art by David Messina, and cover by Paul Shipper, or a subscription variant cover by David Messina.

The Eugenics Wars are over... but the next chapter in the life of Khan Noonien Singh has just begun! Only in this all-new mini-eries are the secrets of Khan's revival in the future by Admiral Marcus and the agents of Section 31 finally revealed! Don't miss this exclusive tie-in to the blockbuster Star Trek Into Darkness, overseen by the film's writer/producer Roberto Orci!

Praxis? The wreck of a Klingon moon seen in Into Darkness.

The cover for this one has me intrigued, the thought that immediately leapt into my mind is that the exploding planet might be Praxis. If so, hopefully the comic might shed some light on it's premature destruction, as seen in Into Darkness, and maybe Khan's involvement while spying on the Klingons for Section 31, as partially described in the leaked Starfleet document which was part of the viral campaign around the release of the film (or maybe it's nothing to do with any of that!):

Looking further ahead than January, John Byrne has been continuing to post updates on his forum from his work on follow-ups to his forthcoming Star Trek photo-comic. He apparently has ideas for as many as three more stories in the format, and has also started to work on virtual sets, to expand the possible locations he can use. Here's his design for a Klingon bridge:

You can read back through the evolution of this design, and the entire photo-comic project, on Byrne Robotics.

UPDATE: A little bit more comics news, in the form of the latest omnibuses to be listed on Amazon. Coming in March will be Star Trek Volume 7, the latest omnibus from the nuTrek ongoing series, which will most likely contain the current four part Klingon-Romulan war story, The Khitomer Conflict.

Amazon also list a new endeavour from IDW: Coming in April will be Gold Key Archives Volume 1. The description for the omnibus states they will be presented "fully remastered and under a new throwback cover". It will also be a hardcover release.

I wonder how far along this series will get; the previous Enterprise Logs and Key Collection reprints of the Gold Key comics never quite got through the entire run. This new collection will be going at a slower pace than the previous series too, with six issues in volume one, compared to the eight issues a book in the older reprints.

New details of Enterprise, TNG, and movie bluray releases

CBS have started to release details of forthcoming releases in their Star Trek bluray efforts. Now scheduled for release in January, the Enterprise, Season Three box set will as ever include all the old DVD extra features as well as two new documentaries, "In A Time Of War"and "Temporal Cold War: Declassified". There will also be several audio and text commentaries, some of which come from previous home video releases, but a few new ones too. Bluray.com doesn't list which episodes they are attached to, but does list the following contributors for commentaries with the set

Select Episode Audio Commentaries by David A. Goodman, Chris Black, Connor Trinner, David Livingston, André Bormanis, Mike and Denise Okuda, Mike DeMeritt, Mike Sussman, Tim Gaskill and Manny Coto

Select Episode Text Commentaries by Michael and Denise Okuda

There's also news on the next TNG release, TrekCore posted a press release for TNG, Season Five (due in November), which includes descriptions of all the included extras:

In addition to all-new commentary tracks on select episodes with some of the franchise’s most notable names, deleted scenes and a gag reel, the high-definition collection includes the newly produced featurette, “Requiem: A Remembrance of Star Trek: The Next Generation.” This two-part documentary explores the making of the series’ fifth season and focuses on the effect the passing of creator Gene Roddenberry, which took place halfway through the season, had on the show as well as the production family. The tribute to the late creator includes key cast and crewmembers sharing their favorite memories of working with Roddenberry and bidding farewell to the Great Bird of the Galaxy.

The collection also includes the exclusive featurette, “In Conversation: The Music of Star Trek: The Next Generation.” Jeff Bond, author of The Music of Star Trek, moderates the conversation between the show’s composers Ron Jones, Dennis McCarthy and Jay Chattaway as the group discusses the challenges for writing each episode’s original score, working with a live orchestra and the team’s creative approach to scoring the series. The featurette also shares stories from behind some of the most beloved musical cues including the legendary Ressikan flute melody from “The Inner Light.

Pre-order: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, Amazon.fr, Amazon.it, Amazon.co.jp, Things From Another World.

While not specified in the press release, TrekCore reports that the episodes with new commentaries will be "Cause and Effect", "The First Duty", "I Borg" and "The Inner Light", featuring variously Mike and Denise Okuda, with Brannon Braga, Ronald D. Moore, and Morgan Gendel.

TrekCore also posted details of the stand-alone release of Unification, which they expect to include a commentary by Jeri Taylor. Here's the press release description of the extra features:

Along with audio commentary and an exclusive deleted scene, the STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION – UNIFICATION BLU-RAY includes the exclusive documentary, “From One Generation to the Next.” This newly produced special featurette takes fans behind the scenes at the making of the classic two-part episode and the introduction of Spock to the 24th century saga of the hit series.

Pre-order: Amazon.com, Amazon.ca, Amazon.co.jp.

It appears Japan will be getting a different cover for this release. A more appealing composition I think, although they seem to have made Spock a bit youthful:

CBS aren't the only ones in the Star Trek game of course, Paramount continue to look after the movie releases, and have yet another repackaging of the prime movies on the way in the UK in November. Exclusive to Amazon UK, the new 5000 edition "Limited Collector's Edition" will include a one-hundred-and-twelve page photo book including "rarely seen original studio production manuals and behind the scenes stills". There will also be a set of film cells, story board reproductions, a fabric Federation badge, and an Enterprise-D schematic. Amazon recently updated their listing with images of everything included. The disc artwork featuring the posters, aligning with the cases, is a nice touch:

Sadly this appears to be otherwise a re-issue of the previous releases. If you're listening Paramount, all we really want is for you to give us the director's cuts on bluray!

New Data book coming, and other Trek-lit news

There is some interesting news and discussion about Star Trek books coming out via various interviews around the web lately. The biggest news item comes from David Mack, who was interviewed by TrekCore. He revealed a new Data novel is in the works, but not from him:

I have it on good authority that a writer who understands Data quite well is working on a new novel that will chronicle what happens to Data and Lal after the events of Cold Equations, Book III: The Body Electric. However, because it’s not my book, I’m not going to tell you anything about it—not the title, not even the author...

My obvious guess would be Jeffrey Lang, returning to Trek to follow up Cold Equations, which itself built upon Lang's Data-centric novel Immortal Coil. Whoever it is, more Data sounds good to me!

Mack did of course talk about his own work too, going right back through his career, and giving some interesting insights into life as a writer. Coming right up to date he gave a pretty lengthy description of his forthcoming The Fall novel, A Ceremony of Losses:

As some readers might recall, in Dayton Ward’s Typhon Pact novel Paths of Disharmony, the Tholian Assembly revealed to the Andorians that, for more than a century, Starfleet and the United Federation of Planets have suppressed information from Operation Vanguard that might have helped lead to a cure for their fertility crisis. The uproar from this revelation led to the rise of the Treishya, a reactionary political party on Andor, and to a vote (by a narrow majority in a plebiscite election) to secede from the Federation.

Now it’s a few years later, and the Andorians seem no closer to finding a cure, even with the intelligence provided by the scheming Tholians. Everyone tries to manipulate the crisis for political gain. Meanwhile, Andor’s scientists, including Thirishar ch’Thane, are desperate. Unless the declining birthrate is reversed within a year, the Andorian people will hit a tipping point, one from which they might never recover.

In this fearful climate, Shar reaches out to his old friend, Doctor Julian Bashir, for help. There isn't much Bashir can do without access to the restricted Operation Vanguard data. Though there is a way he might gain access to it, even the attempt would mean risking not just his career but his freedom if he’s caught by Starfleet—especially considering the belligerent foreign policy of the new president pro tem, who has decided to stand as a candidate for the presidency in the upcoming special election.

If Bashir somehow finds a cure, his life will be in danger if the Tholians or the Andorian reactionaries in power learn of it—because his mercy mission would threaten their control over Andor and its people. All Bashir wants is to do the right thing—and every major power between him and Andor is prepared to use deadly force to prevent him from doing anything at all.

He also gave a briefer description of the new Vanguard spin-off series, Seekers:

Well, we’re keeping the plot under wraps for the moment. The current plan is for the first two books to tell a two-part story that will serve as a re-introduction to the crews of the Archer-class scout ship Sagittarius and the Constitution-class cruiser Endeavour.

Meanwhile, David R. George III appeared on both Literary Treks and The G and T Show. Both discussions talked at length about his entry in The Fall, Revelation and Dust. Some interesting discussion of the multiple threads in the book, but listen at your peril if you haven't read it yet, they're very spoilery. If you haven't yet picked it up, George offered this summary of the different areas he aimed to have the book cover in his discussion with The G and T Show:

I had to introduce the new Deep Space Nine. I had to begin The Fall, and set some plot lines up. And I had to continue this story of Deep Space Nine. And to a smaller extent, I also wanted to pay tribute to Deep Space Nine, because it was the twentieth anniversary year of the show.

In both interviews he compared the idea at the core of The Fall to an "Archduke Ferdinand moment", here's how he explained that to Literary Treks:

...the editor came to us, with, initially had the notion that perhaps we would have an Archduke Ferdinand moment. Which is to say, when Archduke Ferdinand was assassinated, it actually spurred World War One. And so, there was this idea that perhaps having an event like that in the Star Trek universe, would be a good launching point for a series.

Talking with Literary Treks he also talked a bit about the design process of the new Deep Space 9, including some of the changes that came about thanks to the visualisation of the design for the cover happening concurrently. For instance the new command center, the hub, moved, and changed names, during the course of the design:

I decided early on that the new control center of the new Deep Space Nine was not going to be easily vulnerable by being outside, exposed, on the top of the station. So I buried at the very center of Deep Space Nine, and I called it "the core"...

...for my own reference, I created a blueprint of the core. What it looked like, where each of the stations were. I created that, then I sent that off to the artists - Just so they would have an idea of what I was writing; not that they were going to produce a picture of that or anything.

I don't remember exactly how this happened, but somewhere along, their input made me relocate the core. Which, once I'd moved it out of the very center of the space station, I felt I could no longer call it the core, because that just didn't work. But I moved it once again to the top of the station. I did it because the exterior that they created, made that control center I had created (that blueprint), it just fit physically, perfectly at the top of the station, where there are four rings...

...it was just the perfect place, because the control center happened to have four turbolifts. It was perfect up there, so I relocated it up there, and decided to call it the hub; because that's what it was, and it just made more sense.

One final bit of news, Jens Deffner (my regular tipster, and contributor to Unreality SF and The G and T Show), pointed me towards a tweet made by Paula Block a while ago:

@jvancitters FYI, rumor has it a proposal for DS9 ebook will be coming your way from pocket soon. U know the authors. #almostlikebeingthere
— Paula Block (@rockblocky) August 10, 2013

So I guess that's a pretty decent clue that Paula Block and Terry Erdmann's forthcoming ebook novella, their first fiction entry in their Trek bibliography, might be a DS9 tale.

Khan #1 preview

Out this week is the first issue in the new Khan prequel series. Continue down for a seven-page preview of the issue. But first, the writer, Mike Johnson, recently spoke to SFX about the series. Here are some highlights of what he had to say. His take on the character of Khan:

Trying to capture what Montalban brought to the character which is kind of a charm, like he’s very sort of manipulative and charming in the original episode. But then in Into Darkness especially, he’s so angry, he’s like a bullet firing from a gun in that movie. And you’re gonna see why he is like that, because the scope of the mini-series will be the Eugenics wars, up and through the opening of Into Darkness. We’re going to see him get woken up. We’re going to see Admiral Marcus, and we’re going to see how John Harrison came to be. And a lot of that has to do with, not only why he looks different, but why he’s so angry.

I kind of like evil for evil’s sake, like some people are just bad dudes. And I think Khan, you know, you can sympathise with the fact that in Into Darkness at least he was woken up and his 72 brothers and sisters were being held hostage. In Wrath Of Khan, you can sympathise because he was left on the planet to die and he felt betrayed by Kirk. So you can sort of sympathise, but at the end of the day, he’s a megalomaniac who wants to take over the world. Or the galaxy. And I love that sort of straight, simple, direct some guys are just bad.

My favourite two words in the movie are “Cold corpses”. And the way he enunciates it – that’s Khan. “I’m going to walk over your cold corpses.” And you believe him. There’s no posturing there. He’s going to enjoy asphyxiating the entire ship and walking over your corpses. So I definitely – and you’ll see in the mini-series even from when he was very young, even when he was a child, that inclination was there. Just a certain mercilessness was there. And that as much as he was made to become what he is, he was born that way too.

He also explained who and what else will feature in the series:

Kirk and Spock show up. There will be an explanation for something that we saw on Qo’noS, that I can’t really explain or reveal. The first half of it is the past before the Botany Bay [Khan's 20th century ship], and the second half is really all the scenes that were happening alongside what we saw in the movie. So, leading up to him going to the hospital and telling the guy that he can save his daughter. So we’re going to show all those things, we’re going to see more of the inner workings of Section 31, we’re going to see the Botany Bay, we’re going to see how they found it, we’re going to see why he was woken up, and why they decided to give him the name John Harrison. It’s gonna fill in some nice… I don’t want to call them holes. It’s just you only have so much you can do in two hours. And just for fans of the movie, it’ll give them more, hopefully.

The series kicks of with the trial of Khan, but quickly goes into flashback mode to show us Khan's childhood, as he explains to the trial why he doesn't look like classic-Khan. Having read through the first issue, I found it one of the most satisfying nuTrek comics to date - Khan is menacing even as a child! I really look forward to seeing how the rest of the tale unfolds, with the Eugenics Wars and Section 31 stuff to look forward to. The preview continues after the jump:

Trek Toys, loads of them!

All of a sudden there seems to be an abundance of new Star Trek toy information! So here's a look at the many varied Star Trek play things on the way:

First up, just when maybe you were thinking the nuTrek toy range might be winding down after Into Darkness, Hasbro have released another set in the Kre-O collection. This Toys'r'us exclusive appears to be a reissue of the USS Enterprise set, but come with battle damage stickers, and a wholly new Klingon battle cruiser model! Also included is the first Chekov Kreon figure, and new uniform variants of other characters.

Square Enix will be giving us another rather stylised take on the Trekverse, with their new Star Trek action figures, from their Play Arts KAI range. They displayed the painted versions of these for the first time at the New York Comic Con. The photo below comes from Cool Toys Review's coverage of the display. You can get a closer look at them in other photos in Cool Toys' gallery, and if you really want to scrutinise them, Toy News International, Toy Ark, and Tomopop have all posted galleries too!

Continue after the jump for news of many more figures and ship models on the way:

Bye Bye Robot's latest Trek-art

Bye Bye Robot have recently added three new pieces to their collection of Star Trek art poster prints. A new artist to Bye Bye Robot, Cliff Cramp, has two images available: A Good Day to Die, a lovely dramatic TOS space battle. And Deep Space Nine (you can probably guess the subject of that one). He has a gallery full of other Star Trek art on his Facebook page, so who knows, maybe these are the first of many:

Speaking of recurring artists, Tracie Ching has a second piece available from Bye Bye Robot; a 20th anniversary DS9 ensemble, a perfect partner to her 25th anniversary TNG print:

Latest look at 2014 Hallmark Keepsakes

Earlier in the year Hallmark previewed their 2014 Star Trek Keepsakes, but at the time only showed artwork for two of the designs. Now at the New York Comic Con they have the next stage on show. Like the past few years, the 2014 range includes three ornaments: a starship, the USS Vengeance, a little scene, in this case Spock's encounter with the Horta, and a single figurine from their Star Trek Legends series, which this year is Mr Sulu. All three were on show, although the Vengeance model isn't painted yet. The following images are from Toy News International's coverage of the display:

You can see more of the Star Trek ornaments, and other items in Hallmark's 2014 range, on Toy News International. And of course the 2013 range, including the USS Kelvin, is available now.

TNG uniform robes and pajamas

After so long wondering around in your TOS uniform robes, it's surely time to progress to, the next generation... Thankfully The Robe Factory are ready for you, with their new range of TNG uniform-style robes, and pajamas, soon to available in all the uniform colours. StarTrek.com posted these images of the new range:

First look at Starships Collection Bajoran lightship

The Official Starships Collection's project manager, Ben Robinson, has previewed another forthcoming model, on the series' Facebook page. The Bajoran solar sailer, is due for release as issue eighteen of the series, in the first half of next year, so is currently still being worked on. The photos below are not the final paint job. Robinson highlighted some things he plans to change:

...there's too much shading and the main body of the ship is just far too yellow and the windows need work

He also revealed that this particular model will require some assembly, with it being delivered in the standard box, but then needing the sails to be attached to make it the rather large model you see. He also noted that they considered making the sails out of fabric, but ultimately settled on resin.

UPDATE: One more little bit of very exciting news: The series' Twitter, replying to a question about ships in the series, has suggested they are considering including the USS Titan in the series!

@BenMurphyF1 We're thinking about the Steamrunner and USS Titan but nothing certain yet. Stay tuned for more info!
— Star Trek Starships (@StarTrekModels) October 14, 2013

For an previews, reviews and a complete listing of issues in the Starships Collection, check out my index page.

More Trek-tech made real in new Samsung adverts

Samsung have released a new series of adverts, which draw from multiple pop-culture sources, including Star Trek. Two adverts highlight their new Gear smart watch, by relating it back to similar futuristic ideas from old TV shows, including the wrist communicator from Star Trek: The Motion Picture. The third advert has one of their smart TVs recommending programs, and it's clearly a very smart TV as it points the viewers towards watching Star Trek!

I've put all three in the playlist below. The first one is especially nice, with spinning models of the smart watches of fiction past. Very stylish: