Begin the Countdown

By Adam Hunault

Hi, Trekkies! Whenever something interesting related to Star Trek happens, the wonderful editors of Pink Raygun let me put in my two cents because I’m the geekiest Trekkie they know (which is really saying something!). In 2008 commenting on Star Trek happenings wasn’t very much work: with the exception of a looming but top secret movie there wasn’t much to talk about except the deplorable state of Star Trek novels.

It has just occurred to me that 2009 is going to be REALLY DIFFERENT.  The sleeping giant is starting to wake up, as it were.  The forecast calls for Star Trek in all shapes and sizes from now until May which means I might regret that I work for free!

This week IDW Publishing published Star Trek: Countdown, billed as “the official prequel to the upcoming motion picture.”  It’s written right on the cover.  The comic, part one of a four part mini-series, is straight out of the minds of the film’s screenwriters Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman and it isn’t what you might expect.

Even if, like me, you’re trying like all heck to stay spoiler free about the new movie you probably know two things:  (1) It’s set in the 23rd century world of Captain Kirk and company;  (2) While it’s going to remain loyal to the TV shows in spirit, it will be violating the established canon where necessary.  So it was a surprise for me to find that this comic is set forty years after the Next Generation era and so far seems completely in sync with Star Trek canon.

Quick summary: It’s sometime in the first decade of the 25th century, as far as I can tell.  The scene is Romulus, post-Star Trek: Nemesis.  The Romulan Empire enjoys shaky but peaceful relations with the Federation and an elderly Spock, who has been leading the underground reunification movement (from the TNG episode “Unification”) for forty years, has finally come out from hiding and become the Federation ambassador.  He’s unsuccessfully trying to convince the Romulans that an unusual supernova threatens to destroy the Empire.  The Romulan Senate isn’t having it but Spock does befriend and enlist the aid of Nero, the civilian captain of a mining ship, to stop the supernova and save the Empire.  As they set out on their mission they run into some resistance from the Remans (the bitches in the Romulan Empire) and are rescued by the Enterprise-E, commanded by Captain Data.

WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON HERE? How can this story be a prequel to a movie that happens 150 years earlier?  How does the young, friendly, coiffed Nero become the bald, tattooed adversary of Captain Kirk we see Eric Bana playing in the Star Trek trailer?  What does this mysterious supernova have to do with anything?  And… the question that most fascinates me… how in holy heck is Data alive when he died in Nemesis?!?  It seems strange that this would violate canon when the rest of the story follows it so precisely, so I suspect there’s more to tell.

If you’ve been following Star Trek comics lately—and, Trekkies, you really should be—you know IDW Publishing got off to a rocky start in this well-worn comics franchise which has traveled from Key to Marvel to DC to Malibu to Wildstorm and back to Marvel before landing at IDW’s door.  But in the past year they’ve done some magnificent work, more than living up to their predecessors with Star Trek: Alien Spotlight, D.C. Fontana’s The Enterprise Experiment and John Byrne’s Star Trek: Romulans. Star Trek: Countdown looks like it might be the best of the lot and might be just the thing to get all of us through all the long, cold months between now and May 8.

Don’t let this funny picture distract you.  Go buy it now.

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Adam Hunault is a playwright and published short fiction writer who occasionally writes about Star Trek for Pink Raygun ’cause he’s a geek and he can’t help himself.

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