DC Comics's Star Trek Overview: Introduction

 Hey everyone! I hope you all had a great weekend. So I've been struggling to figure out what comic book or comic book series to tackle because I've been itching to go into the history of certain comics and I couldn't decide on which ones to tackle. So today I'm going to be starting an 11 part overview on the Star Trek comics published by DC Comics from 1984 until the license for Star Trek comics returned to Marvel in 1996. This introduction is going to serve as a history of Star Trek comics in general up to when DC Comics got the comic book license in 1984, as well as my own personal history with the Star Trek comics published by DC Comics. So let's get into it. 

Star Trek comics have been in constant publication since 1967. At this point TOS had only been around for one season and Western Publishing, who would publish the first original novel for the series, Mission to Horatius, in 1968, owned Gold Key Comics, who were famous for comics based on TV show and movie properties, such as Disney, the Looney Tunes and others, began publishing a comic based on Star Trek (1966-1969). This comic book series is bizarre and deserves it's own blog post, but it ran for a total of twelve years and 61 issues before Western, then known as Whitman Publishing, lost the license to the series.

In 1979, as Star Trek: The Motion Picture was about to be released into theatres, Marvel Comics gained the comic book license for the then upcoming movie, as well as the series as a whole, which was only Star Trek, Star Trek: The Animated Series (1973-1974), and The Motion Picture at that point. The first issue was published in 1980 and was the first part in a three part comic book adaptation of the movie. After issue #3, the series went in it's own direction, chronicling the adventures of Captain Kirk and his crew on the refitted U.S.S. Enterprise following the events of the movie. The series only ran for two years and 18 issues before Marvel's license ran out in 1982, around the time that Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was coming out. I had three random issues of this series that my sister got for me as either a birthday present or a Christmas present sometime in the 2000s.

My history with Star Trek comics, and comic books in general, began in 1992 with Star Trek #31, and Star Trek: The Next Generation #31. Star Trek #31 was the second part in a four part storyline where Sulu and Uhura end up becoming witnesses for a criminal trial during the Enterprise-A's mission to Quatrin, whose inhabitants I mistakened as TOS Ferengis when I was a kid. TNG #31 is part two of a two part story which involves the return of Captain Thadiun Okona from the season 2 episode "The Outrageous Okona". Both of these issues not only began my lifelong love of comic books, which was sustained by my love of Batman, but it began a lifelong journey of finding single issues for all of DC's Star Trek publication run since very few of them ever got collected in trade paperback editions, even after IDW got the Star Trek license in the late 2000s, and the hardcovers from Eaglemoss are pretty expensive.

The last issues that my dad bought for me were Star Trek #75 and Star Trek: The Next Generation #74, both published in 1995. I would later gets TNG #'s 79 and 80, the final two issues of the series, but these two were the last that my dad bought for me regularly, after three years of getting them for me. Star Trek #75 was the third and final part in a three issue storyline that followed the relationship of James T. Kirk and Dr. Carol Marcus, as well as the advancements in Kirk's career, from his time as a Commander, to his promotion to Admiral following the return of the Enterprise from it's first five year mission under Kirk, between Star Trek and Star Trek: The Motion Picture. TNG #74 is part 4 of a 5 part series where the Enterprise-D has to face the Tholians (from the TOS episode, "The Tholian Web") after several Klingon and Federation outposts, Starbases and starships are attacked by them. There's also Borg involved, but since I've never read issue #75, I don't know how Hugh and his Borg group from the season 6 finale/season 7 premiere, "Descent", are involved. 

Of course I continued to get a few issues from this series here and there during the late 2000s and early 2010s, in order to get the issues that my dad ended up not being able to get for me during the three year period where he was buying them for me in the '90s because that's what most comic book stores have available in their back issue bins, and they're what most sellers at comic book conventions, and geek sales have available at their booths. But at some point I'm hoping to grab the full main runs of both books.

This post is probably going to be the shortest one in this series, since my history with DC's Star Trek comic book line is pretty straightforward. The rest of this series will be longer, since I'll be talking about storylines, other issues of the series that I had and things like that. 

That's gonna be it for me for today my friends. I will be back tomorrow for my review of the first episode, or first two episodes, of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, which drops on Disney+ tomorrow morning. And then on Friday is part 2 on my overview/retrospective of the Disney Sing-Along Songs series. So until then have a wonderful rest of your day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.