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IDW's "Vulcan's Vengeance" (ST Ongoing)

Therin of Andor

Therin of Andor

Admiral
Moderator
(VERY) MINOR SPOILERS.

Well, it's out! Part 1 of "Vulcan's Vengeance", the first all-new adventure of the "ST Ongoing" comic series, set in the new timeline of JJ Abrams' movies.

Strangely beginning in "a forgotten corner of the Delta Quadrant", writer Mike Johnson reintroduces some characters we know from the first movie (and the "Nero" comic mini-series prequel). Even red matter returns!

I really don't want to say too much more than that. Yet. It is "many months" since the events of the movie. Someone who resembles Rand. Boma is back! Sarek features on the cover and we know he'll pop up before the first issue ends in the inevitable cliffhanger. And some Andorians (and a Tellarite) cameo! Yay!

Enjoyable enough, and how cool to finally have a new adventure with these characters. Joe Phillips' art is of a similar standard to most IDW stuff.
 
Therin of Andor said:
(VERY) MINOR SPOILERS.

Someone who resembles Rand. Boma is back! Sarek features on the cover and we know he'll pop up before the first issue ends in the inevitable cliffhanger. And some Andorians (and a Tellarite) cameo! Yay!

Enjoyable enough, and how cool to finally have a new adventure with these characters. Joe Phillips' art is of a similar standard to most IDW stuff.
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This ticks a lot of boxes for me, especially if they are re-using guest characters and I hope we see some recurring alien crew beyond Spock and Keenser more regularly.

Nice if Rand gets another guest spot but (unless the Andorians and Tellarites include a fair few females) it still looks like they might have an issue with ongoing sexism in the comic. I will have to wait until Saturday to get my copy. I'm looking forward to it.
 
How many parts is the story arc?
Countdown was suppose to be "canonical" by Oris has refuted some of it, AFAIR.
 
Ronald Held said:
How many parts is the story arc?
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All of the "ST Ongoing" stories are two-parters, including this one, AFAIK. #9 and #10 have already been announced as a replay of "The Return of the Archons", with the usual twists.

Countdown was suppose to be "canonical" by Oris has refuted some of it, AFAIR.
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No tie-ins are canonical. If the writers decide to use material onscreen it becomes canonical.
 
Countdown was never meant to be canonical. Orci has said as much. It was just meant to be a tie-in, like any other.
 
As I posted in the original thread for the ongoing yesterday I thought this was a very good issue, probably my second favourite of the series so far, and yes this is a follow up of sorts to "Star Trek" since it deals with some survivors of the Narada, and the solitcs suggest that it takes place fairly close to after the events of the film.
 
Pauln6 said:
Nice if Rand gets another guest spot but (unless the Andorians and Tellarites include a fair few females) it still looks like they might have an issue with ongoing sexism in the comic.
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Golly, way to judge before seeing! Kirk's boarding party security team consists of two redskirts: Rand and another female. The bar aliens appear to be male, female and assorted transgendered species. We don't get close enough to the bearded Tellarite to see if she is female. :guffaw:
 
Therin of Andor said:
Pauln6 said:
Nice if Rand gets another guest spot but (unless the Andorians and Tellarites include a fair few females) it still looks like they might have an issue with ongoing sexism in the comic.
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Golly, way to judge before seeing! Kirk's boarding party security team consists of two redskirts: Rand and another female.
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Just looked now - awesome! The second redskirt has Zahra's hairstyle from the TOS episode so if it's her that's two supporting characters they've re-used. My work here may be done :bolian:

EDIT (spoilers): Ok, I've read the story now and it was very enjoyable. It builds nicely on the loose ends from the movie and each of the characters gets to contribute in a small way. I thought Spock's interrogation was a bit sloppy and threatening to forcibly mind meld with someone leaves a very nasty taste in the mouth especially after the rape and torture parallels in both Enterprise and Nemesis.

The all-female security team is a small step in the right direction but, sorry Therin, it was a very small one and my initial cynicism was proven after all. All the Romulans were male, all the Vulcans were male, the second landing party was all male, and even in the bar scene male to female ratio was about 8:1. I will give credit for the small step but they still have a very long way to go!
 
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I found this issue to be far better-written than most of the previous six. Sounds like they're building a decent original story arc.
 
Quadrants done differently in nuTrek. Sol is the centre now rather than being somewhere in the Alpha Quadrant.
 
Yevetha said:
Would they kill a movie character in comic?

I am really curious.
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I think it's extremely unlikely that they will kill a central character in one of the comics. However, they may do something like Battlestar Galactica and re-use third and fourth tier characters like Rand, Boma, and Zahra so that when one of them dies, it has more impact than a random redshirt.

At the moment though, only Boma has been given any depth, so only his death would have meaning. Rand might be a top candidate for a future death but given that she was once a central character in TOS, I would hope that they would spend some time developing her as a character first. If they intend to use her in the movies, I would hope they give her two movies worth at least before offing her and I would have thought that they would most likely want to kill her onscreen.

Having said all that, I'll be sad if they do kill her, as Rand is a character who has a lot of potential to fill the gap in the female dynaimc especially, as seems to be the case, if they modernise her so that she contributes more than hot coffee.

I'd probably look to increase the recurring supporting cast and to make them more distinctive (so more aliens and more crew from other departments). That way when one of them dies we are more likely to care. I'd experiment by introducing one of each of the 'classic' alien races from TOS and TMP and give each of them a story moment to see which of them captures readers' imaginations. For my part, I'm quite fond of Andorians, Zaranites, and Deltans.

It's worth considering that Will Decker was mid-thirties at the time of TMP so he would be a little older than NuChekov and Ilia might be about the same age as NuChekov so they could even feature them as junior crew and spend some time developing plot-lines that could have been introduced in Phase II (albeit being aware that TNG did go on to mine that territory, Deltans seem far more interesting than Betazoids). It could add a dimension if Matt Decker features in a re-telling and might give them more to work with if they ever wanted to tell NuTMP.
 
Isn't it generally a standing policy with tie-in media that no major or even minor characters be killed unless they get permission from the parent company?
 
Yevetha said:
Would they kill a movie character in comic?
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Not if they plan to use the actors in the contracted sequels.

Admiral_Young said:
Isn't it generally a standing policy with tie-in media that no major or even minor characters be killed unless they get permission from the parent company?
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Every tie-in is vetted twice: at proposal stage and at final draft stage. Every detail is scrutinized by CBS Consumer Products, not just proposed deaths.
 
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