The Comic Book Longbox: Star Trek: Debt of Honor (DC Comics, 1992)

 Hey everyone, welcome to The Comic Book Longbox, where I talk about the comic books of my past and present. Today, because I was completely unprepared for this post, I made the decision to write about a graphic novel that I don't own anymore. So let's get into it and talk about the 1992 DC Comics graphic novel, Star Trek: Debt of Honor, written by Chris Claremont with art by Adam Hughes and Karl Story.

I actually had two copies of this book. My dad bought one for me at the Hobby Centre after it had come out sometime in October, 1992, and then in late January, 1993 I received another copy from the cast and crew of Star Trek: The Next Generation when I went to visit the set on the Paramount Lot in Los Angeles. The one I got from the cast I kept sealed in it's polybag, and the copy my dad gave me is the one I kept for my reading copy.

The story of this graphic novel is that, following an encounter with a bug-like alien race that destroyed the U.S.S. Farragut, shortly after the ship encountered a dikronium cloud creature, which resulted in the death of Captain Garrovick, James T. Kirk spends the rest of his career encountering this bug-like species after major galactic events such as the encounter with the Planet Killer ("The Doomsday Machine"), V'GER (Star Trek: The Motion Picture), and the Whale Probe (Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home). Finally, shortly after Kirk gained command of the Enterprise-A, he and his crew embark on yet another unsanctioned mission, to ally themselves with the Klingons, commanded by Commander Kor, and the Romulans, commanded by Kirk's old friend, Commander T'Cel, a half-Vulcan, half-Romulan, woman who he met during the Farragut incident. 

Obviously, I can't talk about the book much beyond that since I don't own it anymore. But, one thing I do remember from when I read it last was that Kor and his Klingon crew still looked like the original TOS Klingons despite the bulk of the book taking place between The Voyage Home and Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. 

DC Comics didn't publish very many graphic novels and collected editions as this was published in 1992 and the collected edition wasn't as common as it is nowadays. And, of course, I only had this graphic novel and one Star Trek collected edition, which I'll be talking about another time. Honestly, I remember really liking this book. I remember reading it quite often when I was little. There's this gorgeous two page spread of the Enterprise-A sitting in spacedock, awaiting orders from Starfleet Command, and there's a decent wide shot of the Bridge, and that made this book closer to when The Final Frontier started rather than the ending of The Voyage Home. Which is weird because the ship was a complete mess at the beginning of The Final Frontier and it seemed like their shakedown cruise at the end of The Voyage Home was responsible since Starfleet hadn't had time to work out all of the kinks of the "new" ship. Trust me, when I get around to reviewing the Star Trek movies, I'm going to talk about the Enterprise-A in more detail.  

IDW reprinted this book back in 2020 so I think I'm going to see if I can get my hands on a copy so I can read it again. And if I do get it then I'll come back and do a full review on it. But right now I just wanted to talk about the original edition that I got when I was a kid. Especially because one of my copies was given to me by the cast and crew of Star Trek: The Next Generation. 

I think that's going to be it for me for today. I'll be back tomorrow for The Book Nook, my new series on the books in my collection. This week I'll be talking about Star Wars: The Essential Chronology, which I no longer have. Then join me back here next week for another Comic Book Longbox post where I'll be talking about Batman: Knightfall Part 1: Broken Bat, which I also no longer have. Don't worry I'll talk about a comic I do have in two weeks. So until then have a wonderful evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.