McCoy: Frontier Doctor....

[Warped9]

When I got home I found I'd received my copy of John Byrne's Leonard McCoy: Frontier Doctor. I've already read the first two stories.

So far I'm freakin' lovin' this! These are good stories and feels like genuine original Star Trek without actually being the original series. These are McCoy stories (him being the central character) with cameos from some of the other familiar characters.

The cover of this trade collection is misleading because the cover shows us a TOS era McCoy, leading you to assume these are stories of McCoy in his earlier years perhaps before his time aboard the Enterprise. But these are actually post TOS and pre TMP stories, of McCoy between the ending of the 5-year mission and before rejoining the refit Enterprise. And it's good stuff!

These stories remind me a bit of the Medical Man stories by classic SF writer Murray Leinster. McCoy's only companions as a Federation doctor visiting worlds in need is a fellow doctor/ship's pilot named Duncan and a female Andorian named Theela. They travel aboard an old starship assigned to McCoy and christened Joanna.

I must say I also love the alien designs! It's got something of an Alien Legion feel to it. Byrne really knows his classic Trek and this feels genuine and without all the name dropping and endless references to previous stories. If I have one quibble it's that McCoy is written a little too curmudgeonly all the time and we never (so far) see his lighter side.

But so far all-in-all I'm loving this. It's the best Star Trek fiction I've read in years and years. I'm liking it better than Byrne's Crew (the background adventures of Pike's First Officer Number One) which I liked better than and his Romulans. With each effort Byrne's Trek stories have gotten better and I've enjoyed them all.

I highly recommend this!

 

[Christopher]

I hadn't realized the trade collection was out. I'll have to get that.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

I thought this series was seriously awesome. And I'm glad I got the variant cover to one of the issues that had McCoy treating one of Larry Niven's Puppeteers.

 

[Mysterion]

Of IDW's Trek material, Byrne's has by far been the best of the lot, IMO. I hope we'll see more Trek from Byrne.

 

[Warped9]

The individual issue covers are reprinted in the back of this trade edition.

 

[sulfur]

Aside:

Byrne's "Angel" stories are coming out in hardcover in January from IDW.

 

[Warped9]

I'm now considering ordering Byrne's Assignment: Earth trade.

 

[Warped9]

Well, I just finished reading it all a few moments ago. It rocked. My only disappointment was that I wanted more! IDW should let Byrne write more Star Trek. He's got a feel, an affinity for it. Hell, I'd read a TNG story if Byrne wrote it.

 

[kirsten187]

I must buy this - it looks great.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Gotta love any comic with an Andorian co-star!

 

[sulfur]

Hell, I'd read a TNG story if Byrne wrote it.

I doubt you'd ever see one. I've read that Byrne only views TOS as "real Trek". (not quite those words, but the gist I believe is correct from my reading of his comments in interviews...)

 

[Warped9]

Hell, I'd read a TNG story if Byrne wrote it.

I doubt you'd ever see one. I've read that Byrne only views TOS as "real Trek". (not quite those words, but the gist I believe is correct from my reading of his comments in interviews...)

Awesome!

 

[Kelso]

Looks awesome.

 

[Therin of Andor]

This is a favourite scene, the first visual, licensed, intermingling of TOS and ENT Andorian antennae varieties:


TOS Delegation by Therin of Andor, on Flickr

 

[Warped9]

^^ I'm not entirely sure, but I swear I've seen that design of Andorian predating ENT. And we also see the TOS style Andorians in there too.

Although perhaps minor to some another thing I liked about this book was how the Constitution-class U.S.S. Yorktown was drawn. It looks right and doesn't look deformed as I've often seen in Trek comics. I also liked the design of McCoy's medical ship Joanna.

 

[BillJ]

^^ I'm not entirely sure, but I swear I've seen that design of Andorian predating ENT. And we also see the TOS style Andorians in there too.

Although perhaps minor to some another thing I liked about this book was how the Constitution-class U.S.S. Yorktown was drawn. It looks right and doesn't look deformed as I've often seen in Trek comics. I also liked the design of McCoy's medical ship Joanna.

Pretty similar to those seen in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.

http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/tvh/ch17/tvh1028.jpg

I believe Byrne was using CGI models he created then tracing those.

 

[Warped9]

^^ There you go. That's probably where I remember it from.

 

[Therin of Andor]

^^ I'm not entirely sure, but I swear I've seen that design of Andorian predating ENT. And we also see the TOS style Andorians in there too.

Various comics played with the ENT style of antennae, long before ENT, as they tried to reconcile ST:TMP tendrilled anntennae with the types seen in TOS, TAS and ST IV. The first was Chekov's girlfriend in the Marvel Comics' post-TMP stories.


Themon, Chekov's girlfriend by Therin of Andor, on Flickr. ["There's No Place Like Gnomes", #16, Star Trek Series I, Marvel Comics, 1981.]

What I'm saying is that, until "Frontier Doctor" #1, we've never seen variously antennaed Andorians before in the same shot. If a comic featured one style of antennae on one Andorian, any other Andorian they'd meet in the same story had matching antennae.

 

[JD]

So does he explain the differences at all? I see the mention of some House something, so does that mean they're different races?

 

[Warped9]

Well I must say that I like the diversity. It just seems more credible. Humans aren't all identical, at least in our eyes. One of the missteps in sci-fi is making all members of an alien race look alike.

However, as I understand it there is real world precedent for such a perception. There have been studies that seem to indicate that if someone is not at all familiar with people from another race than people of that race can indeed all look very much alike. This experience is far less common with individuals who live and work in more racially diverse environments. So I suppose it could be entirely possible that in our first exposures to an alien race that they could all seem to look alike or very much so.