IDW Publishing 2018
Written by John Barber & Mike Johnson
Illustrated by Philip Murphy
Coloured by Leonardo Ito & Josh Burcham
Lettered by Christa Miesner
The Enterprise is burning, brought down by the united forces of the Klingons and Decepticons. Captain Kirk and Optimus Prime have a plan to strike back, but can they bring their scattered Starfleet crew and Autobots together before Megatron wipes them out? The no-holds-barred Saturday morning mash-up continues!
The way that this story is told is really rather remarkable to me. Optimus Prime has been fighting what seems like an eternal war against Megatron but that war has been silent for some time. Why because Optimus Prime and his Autobots have been trapped underground on Cygnus seven but why and how? Those questions and more will be answered in this issue and I am not giving them away so you’ll have to read it for yourselves.
I do like the way that this is structured. How there are three separate arcs happening simultaneously that will all converge is done very well. Mr. Spock on the surface with Bones and Scotty are attending to Optimus Prime while Kirk, Sulu and M’Ress are underground and under attack by the Autobots. Of course what would this be if there weren’t Klingons who inadvertently find the Decepticons and try to strike up an alliance to rid themselves of Kirk and the Enterprise once and for all. Though I have to admit I like how each one of these segments is playing itself out. Oh yes and let us not forget that Lt. Arex has command of the Enterprise while everyone’s away.
The way the story unfolds and how integral the characterisation is to that is utterly delightful to see. Since Optimus was down for the count and he wanted Scotty and Bones to revive him, much to the delight of Bones, so naturally he had to take charge of going into the mine to see what was what after all that’s essentially who he is. Also really like how Mr. Spock is used here and while seemingly typical it really stretches the limits of what he’s capable of and it’s interesting to see. Meanwhile Commander Kuri of the Klingon Empire and his obsession with destroying Captain Kirk fits naturally into how we saw them playing out in the original series. We can always count on this heated animosity between any Klingon and Kirk being overly dramatic and quite honestly mystifying as if there is no one else in the Federation as hated as Kirk.
The interiors here are sensational to see they really look like the old animation cel’s that were used back in the day. I have some from the Super-Friends and this reminds me of those spot on. Even so there is some very nice attention to detail that we see here. You can’t get away without when dealing with the Transformers and it’s really great to see in these pages. Also the fact that this is exactly the imagery of the Star Trek cartoon when it comes to the crew of the Enterprise is awakening the kid in me again. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels shows off a solid eye for storytelling. Heck I am even impressed with the way that backgrounds are utilised here. This is some spectacular interior artwork to recreate something so classic and iconic.
With three issues left in the run time is running out for the Autobots and Kirk and company and if they want to get back to the surface, where the Decepticons and Klingons are attacking then they’d better move fast. This wasn’t something I was looking forward to when it was announced, more of a curiosity really but seeing it done in this classic cartoon animation style has made this one of those can’t miss stories. Seeing is believing folks and I urge you to see what the fuss is all about!