Today at WonderCon in California, Star Trek comic publisher IDW held their Keep on Trekkin’ panel for attendees at the Anaheim-based convention, looking ahead to their ongoing — and concluding — Trek comic titles for 2018, and made a new announcement about an upcoming new venture kicking off later this year.
Thank you @sarahgaydos Kirsten Beyer @mikecomix @Scott_Tipton @David_Tipton @JK_Woodward for sharing news about the @IDWPublishing #StarTrek comics at #Wondercon pic.twitter.com/054e62jtXz
— Star Trek (@StarTrek) March 24, 2018
In attendance was IDW group editor Sarah Gaydos, writers Mike Johnson, Scott Tipton, David Tipton, artist J.K. Woodward, and Star Trek: Discovery writer (and Voyager novelist) Kirsten Beyer, who is co-writing the Discovery comics with Johnson.
Regarding the soon-to-conclude Star Trek: Boldly Go series, focusing on the post-Star Trek Beyond adventures of the Kelvin Timeline crew, Johnson recapped the recent “I.D.I.C.” storyline — which called back to the first Kelvin comic stories from several years back — and he again confirmed the series’ end, stating that IDW is going to “hit pause” until the future of the film series is known.
Beyer spoke to how the team worked to find comic stories to connect to the live-action Star Trek: Discovery series, and how there was a need to find tales to tell that could fit into the highly-serialized nature of the television episode.
Knowing that the first season was so heavily-focused on new Klingon characters, that gave inspiration to centering the first Discovery comic tie-in — “The Light of Kahless” — around T’Kuvma and the Klingon Empire.
The next Discovery comic series, “Succession,” kicks off in April, tied into the Mirror Universe and the characters introduced in the second half of Discovery‘s first season. The story will provide a look at the history between the Mirror Discovery characters — something only briefly discussed on-screen — like Gabriel Lorca’s history with the Terran Empire’s Michael Burnham.
Three of the first covers have been revealed so far, from George Caltsoudas, Elizabeth Beals, and Yoshi Yoshitani (above).
The IDW panel also recapped the plans for May’s Star Trek: TNG — Through the Mirror five-week event, which revisits 2017’s Mirror Broken tale by bringing in the Enterprise-D crew of the Prime universe and putting them up against their interdimensional duplicates. Each issue will be release during one week in May, with all five brought to life by different artists.
All five primary covers (above) are from J.K. Woodward, with interior art by Chris Johnson, Marcus To, Josh Hood, Carlos Nieto, and Debora Carita. A number of variant covers will also be released, as per IDW’s standard practice, from both the interior artists as well as concept artist Peter McKinstry.
The Star Trek: Discovery Annual release first announced back in December has a street date of April 4, and as previously reported, will center around Paul Stamets and Hugh Culber, focusing on their individual backstories, and the early days of their relationship.
The 48-page release features a pair of covers by longtime IDW artists Angel Hernandez and George Caltsoudas.
Finally, IDW made their big announcement about yet another Mirror Universe tale set to debut this summer… Star Trek: TNG — Terra Incognita. The six-issue miniseries follows the ongoing Next Generation saga started with Mirror Broken and continuing in Through the Mirror, but this time brings one of the Mirror characters over to the Prime Enterprise-D to cause havoc among the Federation crew.
Terra Incognita will continue to be written by Scott and David Tipton featuring artwork by Tony Shasteen, and covers from J.K. Woodward, Shasteen, and Elizabeth Beals.
IDW’s press release is below; while it specifies an August release in the text, the WonderCon panel announcement detailed a July release.
After the stellar success of Star Trek: The Next Generation: Mirror Broken, which introduced the alternate “Mirror” villainous version of the U.S.S. Enterprise crew to comics, and the excitement around the upcoming five-week mega-event Star Trek: The Next Generation: Through The Mirror, IDW now returns to the original, or “prime,” universe this August in Star Trek: The Next Generation: Terra Incognita, beginning a brand-new wave of episodic miniseries!
This six-issue miniseries reveals unique, focused stories where beloved characters find themselves in new, unfamiliar situations, in a format echoing the “done-in-one” nature of the television series. However, each issue also features a subtle throughline of an evil Mirror Universe crewmember established in the Mirror Broken and Through the Mirror series remaining on the ship, wreaking havoc while posing as his prime universe counterpart.
Featuring the best of both the Mirror and original universes, Terra Incognita is a unique new step in this riveting saga.
We’ll have more details on that upcoming tale as it breaks, along with our reviews of the Terra Incognita story when it kicks off this summer.
Keep checking back to TrekCore for the latest in Star Trek comic news and reviews!