IDW Publishing has launched the first of four issues in their new movie tie-in series Star Trek:Countdown Number One, the official prequel comic to J.J. Abrams' bold relaunch of the STAR TREK feature franchise opening in theaters May 8th.
Issue 1 steers straight to the heart of this TREK 'origins' story by establishing Nero, a loyal member of the Romulan mining guild and soon-to-be father of his first son. As pictured in the cover art and story panels, Nero looks like every other 24th century Romulan — devoid of the shaved head and facial tattoos actor Eric Bana sports in the STAR TREK Trailers as the film's lead villain.
The story, conceived by TREK screenwriters Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman and written by Mike Johnson and Tim Jones, swiftly pairs Nero with Spock, now the openly recognized Federation ambassador to the Empire.
Readers might feel events fall a bit too quickly into place in Issue 1, but this may foreshadow that a wealth of "backstory" exists to be told in this four-part comic prequel leading up to events in Abrams' film this summer. This could bode well for both the entertainment value and movie tie-in relevance of Star Trek:Countdown, and it earns the first issue solid marks as a promise of things to come.
Since it's nearly impossible to review this comic without relating it to the upcoming film plot, fair warning that SPOILER-RELATED INFO FOLLOWS:
This opening issue sets up decades of peace and stability exist on Romulus, with Spock having been a resident there for five years. Yet external forces threaten catastrophic upheaval for the Empire as a star system threatens to supernova and devour neighboring worlds and stars in the Romulan domain.
Nero and his mining crew barely escaped the earliest stage of this unfolding disaster before returning to Romulus, where Nero backs up Spock's dire warnings to the Senate.
If this all sounds a bit familiar, you're right in that a nearly duplicate problem was set up in STAR TREK VI: THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY to put the plot in motion. Yet events of this impending doom would seem to fall hardest on Nero, if the implications set up about his wholehearted devotion to the Empire and his growing family play out as expected.
While Spock's dire scientific predictions about the Hobus star system failure are decried in the Senate, Nero backs up the Vulcan's warning to the point of taking it upon himself to save Romulus.
Nero enlists his mining ship crew to drill for the decalithium needed to forestall the supernova. It would seem that this act sows the seeds of Nero's suspected defiance of the Romulan Senate, which may result in his imprisonment hinted at in STAR TREK's second trailer.
The issue caps off with a confrontation by the Remans and a phaser blasting intervention by — wait for it — Captain Data of the U.S.S. Enterprise!
While the reference back to STVI isn't the most original creative stroke, Star Trek Countdown #1
otherwise makes a successful introduction to the backstory of STAR TREK. Issue Number Two will prove if its promise holds up.
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