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COUNTDOWN TO DARKNESS 5-page preview

Not digging the ship design (although that might just be artist confusion) and the uniform schenanigans, but the story seems interesting.

I don't see where there's any artist confusion, it's basically a primitive variation of the Abramsprise.
The only thing primitive about it is the extra doodads they slapped on it and the wonky aztecking. I guess I shouldn't be surprised, since they came up with an Abrams-ized NX that was basically rearranged Abramsprise parts, but I expected a little more originality than "the same ship, just with greebles to make it look primitive."

Okay, but that sounds like laziness, not confusion.
 
Interesting gap in the timeline, here as laid out by the comic:
-- Starting with the year in the comic being 2258.
-- April disappeared and was declared dead in 2238.
-- April's Enterprise was decommissioned in 2256.
-- That leaves an eighteen year gap where there had to be another captain or captains of the Enterprise April had commanded. Alex Marcus (Peter Weller)?

April also says he was a captain for ten years until his last mission. He doesn't say if all of that was on his Enterprise, but if it was, that means it was built before Nero changed the timeline. Or, it could be April's Enterprise was built any time shortly after the Kelvin incident, and the ST09 Enterprise is the second Enterprise built in that timeline.
 
Interesting gap in the timeline, here as laid out by the comic:
-- Starting with the year in the comic being 2258.
-- April disappeared and was declared dead in 2238.
-- April's Enterprise was decommissioned in 2256.
-- That leaves an eighteen year gap where there had to be another captain or captains of the Enterprise April had commanded. Alex Marcus (Peter Weller)?

April also says he was a captain for ten years until his last mission. He doesn't say if all of that was on his Enterprise, but if it was, that means it was built before Nero changed the timeline. Or, it could be April's Enterprise was built any time shortly after the Kelvin incident, and the ST09 Enterprise is the second Enterprise built in that timeline.

Any inconsistencies I'll just chalk up to time-travel shenanigans in the new timeline. Best to just not think about it. :lol:
 
Not digging the ship design (although that might just be artist confusion) and the uniform schenanigans, but the story seems interesting.

I don't see where there's any artist confusion, it's basically a primitive variation of the Abramsprise.
I agree. NCC-1701 may be "just" an upgraded version of this previous Enterprise, and in this new continuity, there's really nothing that says it can't be, IMO.
 
I like the bridge, perfect blend of TOS and Abramsverse. Especially the captain's chair. Why are they all wearing the uniforms from the present, though? Twenty years yearlier, shouldn't they still be wearing the uniforms the Kelvin crew were wearing?

It probably took some time for the uniform changes to 'ripple' through Starfleet.
 
Interesting gap in the timeline, here as laid out by the comic:
-- Starting with the year in the comic being 2258.
-- April disappeared and was declared dead in 2238.
-- April's Enterprise was decommissioned in 2256.
-- That leaves an eighteen year gap where there had to be another captain or captains of the Enterprise April had commanded. Alex Marcus (Peter Weller)?

April also says he was a captain for ten years until his last mission. He doesn't say if all of that was on his Enterprise, but if it was, that means it was built before Nero changed the timeline. Or, it could be April's Enterprise was built any time shortly after the Kelvin incident, and the ST09 Enterprise is the second Enterprise built in that timeline.

Any inconsistencies I'll just chalk up to time-travel shenanigans in the new timeline. Best to just not think about it. :lol:

Maybe Marcus captained it for a while (which would be interesting because of the rumors -- just rumors -- that came out long before this comic that Weller plays Carol's dad), then Pike captained it until its decommissioning. After that, Pike was given a ground assignment at Starfleet Academy as well as overseeing the construction of the new Enterprise, which he was to captain. Yeah. I like that. I'll go with that. That's MY canon!
 
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Wasn't there a rumour sometime ago that Cumberbatch's villain was a protege of Weller's character? Or in an unexpected twist involving deaging, perhaps it'll turn out to be the other way around...

An influence mash-up of TNG's "Too Short a Season" meets TOS "The Omega Glory", infused with some "Wrath of Khan" style coming back from exile with a vengeance.
 
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The story in Countdown 2 is more or less this.
20 years ago April and his Enterprise arrived on Phaedus on a routine survey mission. They encountered an iron-age level civilization and watched a genocide in progress. The Shadows, as April's calls them, were killing (sometimes eating too) members of their own species but of different color.
At some point April had enough of watching and obeying the Prime Directive, took as many weapons as he could and beamed down to help. Alex Marcus, his first officer and best friend, agreed to declare him dead and hide the truth from Starfleet.

But it appears there was someone else now helping the Shadows and supplying them with advanced weapons. So April is hiding with the last of his native army and wants Kirk to use the Enterprise and bombard the Shadows from orbit. Kirk doesn't agree and just wants to get Sulu and Cupcake back and leave. They are prisoners of the Shadows.

The issue ends with Spock on his own. He's left Kirk without saying a word and is running towards an unknown destination.

alex macus.....is that carol's dad?
 
The story in Countdown 2 is more or less this.
20 years ago April and his Enterprise arrived on Phaedus on a routine survey mission. They encountered an iron-age level civilization and watched a genocide in progress. The Shadows, as April's calls them, were killing (sometimes eating too) members of their own species but of different color.
At some point April had enough of watching and obeying the Prime Directive, took as many weapons as he could and beamed down to help. Alex Marcus, his first officer and best friend, agreed to declare him dead and hide the truth from Starfleet.

But it appears there was someone else now helping the Shadows and supplying them with advanced weapons. So April is hiding with the last of his native army and wants Kirk to use the Enterprise and bombard the Shadows from orbit. Kirk doesn't agree and just wants to get Sulu and Cupcake back and leave. They are prisoners of the Shadows.

The issue ends with Spock on his own. He's left Kirk without saying a word and is running towards an unknown destination.

alex macus.....is that carol's dad?

I believe so.
 
The story in Countdown 2 is more or less this.
20 years ago April and his Enterprise arrived on Phaedus on a routine survey mission. They encountered an iron-age level civilization and watched a genocide in progress. The Shadows, as April's calls them, were killing (sometimes eating too) members of their own species but of different color.
At some point April had enough of watching and obeying the Prime Directive, took as many weapons as he could and beamed down to help. Alex Marcus, his first officer and best friend, agreed to declare him dead and hide the truth from Starfleet.

But it appears there was someone else now helping the Shadows and supplying them with advanced weapons. So April is hiding with the last of his native army and wants Kirk to use the Enterprise and bombard the Shadows from orbit. Kirk doesn't agree and just wants to get Sulu and Cupcake back and leave. They are prisoners of the Shadows.

The issue ends with Spock on his own. He's left Kirk without saying a word and is running towards an unknown destination.

alex macus.....is that carol's dad?

Could be. The ages match pretty well.

We also have a smuggler by the name of Mudd. Relative to Harcourt, maybe?
 
So Mom and Grandpa, and then even Dad, all worked in Starfleet, and that's how David Marcus hated Starfleet?

Well in this new universe, Carol must've followed her dad into Starfleet. In the Prime Universe, she apparently didn't, or at least didn't make a career out of Starfleet. Poor David probably won't even be around in the new universe to have an opinion about Starfleet one way or the other, as it looks like Kirk and Carol don't get together.

As far as David's attitude towards Starfleet in the Prime Universe goes, if Carol had been in it at all (no way of knowing), then she left for some reason that may have tainted his opinion of the institution. Maybe her opinion soured. One way or another, why can't David hate (or at least be skeptical of) Starfleet?
 
as it looks like Kirk and Carol don't get together.

It does? They probably won't get together in this movie based on what we know so far, but we also know the attraction is there so nothing stops them from getting together in the future.
Unless Cumby kills her of course.
 
We also have a smuggler by the name of Mudd. Relative to Harcourt, maybe?

Perhaps Harry's daughter or wife. And if she is a business woman, as indicated, that might mean she's a partner of Harry.... who is the CEO of a company... which might imply Peter Weller plays him, based on earlier interviews where he describes his character.
 
Wasn't there a rumour sometime ago that Cumberbatch's villain was a protege of Weller's character?

I heard a speculation to that effect, but it didn't sound like anything more than some fan's wild guess.
Oh, I remember now. It was around the same time, Peter Weller was cast, and Benicio Del Toro was briefly courted. There was some impossible talk about him reprising Paxton and that the main villain could be Colonel Green. Just the usual join the dots fan theory in the absence of actual evidence to go on. Based on who he'd played previously in Star Trek and the WWIII era person they revered.

I think there'll be a close relationship between Weller and Cumberbatch's characters though. The protege thing, I recall reading along with the CEO description, "Do I look like an alien?" and "he has his own ship" details that came from Weller at some red carpet event appearance Trekmovie.com covered. He showed Anthony Pascale an image of his son sat in a Captain's chair, on a bridge not unlike the current Enterprise set. There was no online posting of that personal momento. Just described for those in search of clues. CEO wasn't to do with Paxton being a business man but rather Executive Officer, with the actor's agent more used to talking with the former, confusingly putting Chief in front of it.

Therefore Alex Marcus as areference to April's first officer, seems to be a piece that's fitting into place.
 
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So Mom and Grandpa, and then even Dad, all worked in Starfleet, and that's how David Marcus hated Starfleet?

I've been thinking this matter over. Keep in mind, in TWOK Carol was a civilian. It's possible she was in Starfleet in the Prime timeline, but when she left it wasn't under the best conditions. Her bitterness about Starfleet obviously rubbed off on David which is why he hates Starfleet.

Of course even today you have people who serve in the military but their children develop a dislike of it. No reason that won't change in the future.
 
^There's a popular fan conjecture that Carol Marcus was the "little blond lab technician" that Kirk almost married according to "Where No Man Has Gone Before." And a number of tie-ins have proposed that she and Kirk met at Starfleet Academy. One, DC Comics's "Star-crossed" by Howard Weinstein, had Carol as an Academy cadet who resigned upon becoming pregnant with David. Though another, earlier version from DC, an annual by Peter David, had Carol as a civilian college student that cadet Kirk got involved with.
 
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