The Star Trek: Prometheus trilogy, written by German authors Brend Perplies & Christian Humberg with translation assistance from Keith R.A. DeCandido, concludes with book three, In the Heart of Chaos.

This novel, which was originally published in German in 2016 in conjunction with the franchise’s 50^th anniversary, reaches the English-speaking world and finishes the story from book one’s Fire with Fire and book two’s The Root of All Rage.

With the ability to now reflect on the complete story and characters of the Prometheus trilogy, I find it to be underwhelming and largely forgettable. I enjoyed the second book the most of the three, and the final book In the Heart of Chaos probably the least. The ending was predictable, and the book continued the trend of the first and second of over-stuffing unnecessary fan service and episode references.

Prometheus never really felt like it amounted to all that much. The end of the second book intrigued me with a connection to a previous Star Trek novel trilogy, The Q Continuum, and with the alien from the episode “The Day of the Dove.”

But the execution was left wanting – the resolution to the crisis and the death of the entity that was causing chaos in the Lembatta Cluster was both rushed and underwhelming. In addition, there was almost no exploration of the alien energy beings, whose value to the story seemed to only be as a plot device to bring the story to a close.

The Prometheus trilogy felt like it was trying to say something about hated, but for what purposes and to what end? If the books had been attempting to comment on the rise of populism and tribalism over the last half decade, it falls well short of saying anything interesting because the hatred of the Renao was caused by an outside source – the alien energy being.

Unfortunately, the problems of the world today cannot be waved away as attributable to alien interference. Our problems lie much deeper.

The characters of the Prometheus and Bortas crew also left me disappointed. Ultimately, they were largely reframed retreads of other, better characters in the Star Trek universe. Some examples of this: the captain who lost his wife to the Borg and is emotionally distant from his crew as a result, the junior officer who is estranged from his homeworld but holds the key to bringing them back together, and the bartender with a friendly ear for the crew.

While I applaud the authors decision to set out with an original crew, the potential of having all those new characters are entirely wasted if we’re seeing pale shadows of other characters we know and like better. Give me Sisko over Richard Adams any day of the week if their characters and motivations are so similar.

In addition, the other characters suffer from clichéd storylines that I found very frustrating. Probably one of only a handful of characters with any real story arc to speak of is the Andorian security officer, whose heart of ice is melted over the course of the book so that she can learn to love again. You’ve read this, and you’ve seen it, a thousand times before, and Prometheus brings nothing new to the arc.

In addition, the book includes more totally unnecessary cameos from characters from the Star Trek pantheon. This book, we get a whole chapter updating us on the life of Kosinski, the warp specialist from the episode “Where No One Has Gone Before.” The end of the chapter even includes an appearance from Wesley Crusher.

These two characters do not reappear in the book at all, and their appearance was utterly superfluous to the story. Characters are also referring back to the events of episodes and movies from the franchise’s history constantly throughout this novel. The connection to Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home was the most tenuous instance of “remember when?” I could find.

Ultimately, the Prometheus trilogy was serviceable, but nothing special. The story felt like it was paint by numbers, the characters were boring and cliched, and the cameos and episode references were too much. As a German language story for a German audience, I hope it was fun and the kind of thing that they haven’t seen before. But for an English language audience, nothing sets Prometheus apart.

If anything, I was interested to see whether there would be much of a German cultural influence on the books. I am fascinated by how other cultures perceive Star Trek and would tell a Star Trek story. But we don’t get any of that in Prometheus – the characters and plot seem to have been purposefully created to be as anglicized as possible. I would have preferred something a bit more German, because at least then it would have been interesting and different.

If you enjoyed the first two books of the Prometheus trilogy, you’ll probably find a lot to like in In the Heart of Chaos. But for me, the book fell far below expectations and the promise that a foreign language trilogy of Star Trek books could contribute to the franchise.

While the Prometheus trilogy served as an interesting stop-gap during the drought year of 2018, we’re happy to enter 2019 where the ongoing novels set in the Original Series, Next Generation-era continuities will return to print, starting in April with the arrival of Dayton Ward’s TNG story Available Light.

But first, we return to the flashback line of Star Trek: Discovery tales, as the Sylvia Tilly-centered The Way to the Stars beams down next week from author Una McCormack.

Watch for our review here at TrekCore in the coming weeks!