After more than a year, IDW Publishing returns to their successful 2017 anthology title Star Trek: Waypoint with a brand new set of stories to close out 2018!

While not technically classified as an “annual” release, perhaps a sign that more Waypoint stories will come over the next year, it’s great to see this title back after spending the last year in the world of Star Trek: Discovery and the evil Terran Empire incursion into The Next Generation.

After the conclusion of the Kelvin Timeline story in Boldly Go and the end of John Byrne’s Star Trek: New Visions series, we’ve certainly seen somewhat of a reduction in IDW’s Trek comic output. Aside from the Discovery and Mirror Broken sequels — and the crossover Star Trek vs. Transformers miniseries — it seemed to me as if IDW’s plans for Trek were starting to sunset a bit, even with the announcements of the one-shot Star Trek 20/20 flashback tale and six-issue The Q Conflict miniseries coming in 2019.

Now that Chris Ryall is back as editor in chief — after leaving the role (and IDW entirely) back in March 2018 — perhaps we’ll see a ramp up in Trek comics for 2019, bringing in new artists and storytellers to join mainstays Scott and David Tipton, Mike Johnson, Angel Hernandez, and J.K. Woodward in print.

But enough of that for now, today we’re here to talk about Waypoint — and friends, I love an anthology. Sure, you may have to pay a little more — at $7.99, this is a bit pricier than a monthly release — but readers get an assortment of talent and stories in this special issue, one that I wasn’t sure we’d see again.

This year’s Waypoint collection includes four tales from throughout the Trek timeline, with spotlights on Deep Space Nine’s Ezri Dax, a check-in with post-V’Ger Will Decker, a heroic tale featuring Data’s cat Spot, and a look back at the legend of the Federation from the far future.

In the first story, “Only You Can Save Yourself,” we get a wonderful visualization Ezri Dax’s relationship with the Dax symbiont, as she uses the memories of all its previous hosts to save a group of Starfleet survivors from a beleaguered station attacked by Andorians.

Written by Dave Baker and drawn by Nicole Goux, I liked the premise of Ezri showcasing the variety of talents and expertise her hosts the symbiont has lived in over twelve lifetimes, but the artwork had sort of a cartoony vibe to it and I’m used to the Andorians being members of the Federation.

I have to ask, when did the Andorians leave the Federation and institute a neutral zone? Or is this just a bunch of rogue rebels or privateers who have no qualms in attacking Federation outposts? I hope I’m not showing my ignorance but I was somewhat puzzled by this aspect of the story, and it would have been helpful to include a bit of an explainer for readers who don’t follow the novel series.

Editor’s note: The Andorian government seceded from the Federation for several years after the events of the 2011 novel ‘Paths of Disharmony.’

The second story, titled “Consider Eternity” by Brandon Easton and drawn by Josh Hood, is a great ‘whatever happened to…’ tale that sees an encounter between the Will Decker — after his merging with V’Ger at the end of The Motion Picture — and the Q Continuum. I have to say that the art was truly great, and Hood does a great likeness of John de Lancie, I have always been fascinated by V’Ger and enjoyed seeing a return to a cool Trek storyline.

Easton really captures Q’s sarcastic approach to winning friends and building relationships in this story. As he tries to teach the fledgling Decker/V’Ger entity what it means to be an omnipotent being, we see the beginnings of Q’s awareness of humanity. It makes for an excellent segue to “Encounter at Farpoint,” and I’d love to know how he came up with this idea.

“My Human is Not,” the third tale from writers Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly and artist Sonny Lew, was a touching examination of the relationship between Data and his cat, Spot. It’s interesting how the Lanzing and Kelley suppose that to the cat’s perception, Data is indeed human, yet it’s also endearing to see the devotion of a faithful pet in that it is able to recognize its human by its behaviour.

It’s a subtle way of manifesting Data’s success in his search for humanity that ties nicely into the established canon of the series — and like the Porthos Enterprise story back in Waypoint #4, the furry companion gets to take part in the action of the tale.

In the final story, Matthew Dow Smith assumes both pencilling and scripting roles with “Histories,” and brings us to a planet a thousand years after the Federation has vanished from the galaxy. This species looks back at their first contact with Starfleet centuries earlier with violent disdain for the Federation, in a similar manner to the events of Voyager’s “Living Witness.”

When one member of their race challenges that interpretation of those historical events, his integrity is called into question, and while this is a familiar theme, the end of the story didn’t really reconcile the historical schism. For me, it fell a little short, but given that the scope of the story was to be fairly limited, perhaps my expectations were a little too high?

So, which one did I enjoy the most? Out of them all, I’d have to say that the nod has to go to “My Human is Not.” Why? Well, I just liked the affirmation of Data’s humanity from Spot, even though he cannot perceive it, and we know that his responses and concern for the cat are the human things to do. Even though he may not know why, Data is forced to do these things in pursuit of that ideal and that is the most accurate exploration of a character out of this anthology.

With my questions expressed, some answered or others that will hopefully reveal themselves in time, I can enjoy this collection of stories that span over fifty years of Trek history. It’s eclectic in its collection but I can’t find any fault with the selection of time periods.

All are entertaining stories in their own right. Kudos to IDW for giving writers the chance to showcase their talents on this book — and hopefully 2019 will bring us more Waypoint tales from around the Federation.