Star Wars: X-Wing: Rogue Squadron (1996) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. Today I'm here to review the first book in the Star Wars: X-Wing series, Rogue Squadron, by Michael A. Stackpole. This is going to be the first in my Legends novel review series where I'll be reviewing, over a long period of time, as many of the Legends novels as I can. I won't be doing it in the usual publication order or in universe chronological order that many YouTube channels and blogs use for their Star Wars Legends book and comic book reviews. There will be spoilers since Legends ended nine years ago, and started nearly fifty years ago with the novelization of A New Hope in 1976. So let's get into it.

 The X-Wing series is my favourite series of Star Wars novels of all time. Because it's one of the few novels set in the Star Wars universe, Legends or Canon, that doesn't rely on Han, Luke, and Leia to be the main characters. Instead it focuses on Wedge Antilles and other minor characters from the Original Trilogy, like Admiral Ackbar and General Salm. It also introduces us to Corran Horn, who becomes one of the major Legends character in the New Jedi Order era and onward. And by major character, I mean someone who shows up for more than a few books, not a focus character like Jacen and Jaina became in the New Jedi Order series. It also introduces us to a new organization within the Empire, Imperial Intelligence.

Up to this point we'd had Grand Admiral Thrawn, Admiral Daala, and various petty warlords and Imperial factions that ended up not having anything to do with the Empire, now known as the Imperial Remnant. But I think this is the first time that Imperial Intelligence is focused on as the main baddies. on Wookieepedia's list of appearances for Imperial Intelligence, it doesn't give a first appearance for Legends, however the Canon page for the organization states that Imperial Intelligence was introduced in the Star Wars Sourcebook, which was published for West End Games's Star Wars: The Roleplaying Game (1987) and the earliest novel published that it appeared in was The Last Command by Timothy Zahn in 1993. 

Rogue Squadron consists of Commander Wedge Antilles (a Human from Corellia) as Rogue Leader, Peshk Vri'syk (a Bothan) as Rogue Two, Nawara Ven (a Twi'lek) as Rogue Three, Bror Jace (a Human from Thyferra) as Rogue Four, Gavin Darklighter (a Human from Tatooine) as Rogue Five, Riv Shiel (a Shistavanen (wolfman) from Uvena III) as Rogue Six, Rhysati Ynr (a Human from Bespin) as Rogue Seven, Erisi Dlarit (a Human from Thyferra) as Rogue Eight, Lieutenant Corran Horn (a Human from Corellia) as Rogue Nine, Ooryl Qrygg (a Gand from Gand) as Rogue Ten, Lujayne Forge (a Human from Kessel) as Rogue Eleven, Andoorni Hui (a Rodian from Rodia) as Rogue Twelve, and Captain Tycho Celchu (a Human from Alderaan) as Rogue Null/the squadron's Executive Officer.

We're also introduced to Emtrey, a military protocol droid assigned to Rogue Squadron, and Mirax Terrik, a smuggler who is Wedge's childhood best friend and whose father, Booster Terrik was sent to Kessel by Corran's late father, Hal Horn, during Hal's time in Corellian Security (CorSec). I love Mirax. She is one of my favourite characters in all of Legends and that's because she's smart, but flawed, she's brave but not stupidly so, and she's a more competent smuggler than Han Solo was. Plus she is a main character of these first four books so we end up spending alot of time with her. Particularly in comparison to characters like Lujayne, Andoorni, Peshk, and Bror, who get almost no screentime in the book. I mean Peshk Vri'syk has little to no dialogue and he doesn't have any kind of backstory, other than the fact that he's a Bothan. At least in this book. We end up learning a little bit more about him in the next book, Wedge's Gamble, through another Bothan character introduced there. Which is fine, but if I were reading Rogue Squadron as a standalone novel or it was my first time reading the series, I wouldn't know that we got more info about Peshk since he gets killed during the first attack on Borleias, and we get no character development or backstory for him in this book.

Corran Horn is an interesting character. I really like him, but I also understand that he's not the be all end all of Star Wars characters, be it from the movies, TV shows and comic books. He's flawed. He's a loner but tries to get along with the other squadron members. The fact that he's a loner is picked up on by Lujayne Forge pretty early on in the book, in chapter four in fact. It's the only actual conversation that Corran has with Lujayne, but it's something that both Wedge and Tycho see in him as well, and they help him to overcome that problem in this book, though it still creeps in from time to time. Especially when he's not with Ooryl and Mirax in later books.

I do like that this book is the start of Corran and Mirax's relationship, and they don't get together until between books 3 and 4, due to events that happen in the next book. I like that their relationship isn't a full blown romantic relationship in this book. It's an antagonistic friendship at first due to the fact that Corran's dad arrested Mirax's dad and sent him to Kessel for five years, but it eases up as the book goes on. Which is very different from many romantic relationships in novels that I've read. Both from the '90s and more recently. It's kind of on par for a Star Wars romance though since Leia and Han's relationship started off as antagonistic in A New Hope before blossoming into a full blown romance by the end of Return of the Jedi.

One of my favourite parts of this book is the briefing for the first attack on Borleias. Wedge, Ackbar, and Salm are wary of Laryn Kre'fey, the Bothan general who presents the New Republic's forces with his plan to capture Borleias as a stepping stone in their campaign to conquer Coruscant. And because they're wary, they question the Bothan, knowing that Bothans do things despite them not being good ideas. Even though Salm and Wedge had been at odds with each other throughout this whole book because of Salm's belief that Tycho can't be trusted due to his time being a captive of Ysanne Isard following a mission to Coruscant that went bad, and because of Rogue Squadron being a bit looser in terms of discipline and following regulations due to their status as the New Republic's spearhead, it shows that these two people, particularly after the Vladet incident a few chapters earlier, hold enough respect for each other to understand that they're on the same side, and want to see each mission succeed, even if they go about it in different ways. Plus, Kre'fey is a jerk and both are uneasy with him and his plan since it involves both of their squadrons.

Speaking of Isard, she and Kirtan Loor are interesting villains. As I mentioned earlier, this is the first time in the publication history of Star Wars novels that a particular branch of the Empire is the focus of the bad guys's side. Thrawn, Daala, Pellaeon, and the other Imperial leaders we've met up to this point have all been military or political figures in the Imperial Remnant, but this is the first time we get the head of a branch other than the main military, as the main villain. I hate Isard and Loor, but I love to hate them. Like, with Thrawn and Daala, and even Pellaeon, you have military geniuses in command, whose only goal is to re-establish the Empire. But with Isard, her only goal is to destroy the New Republic, and THEN worry about re-establishing the Empire, and she had assets in place to take steps in that destruction. Loor is just so arrogant and dumb, despite his photographic memory, that he is so easy to hate, which is great.

My least favourite part is Corran and Bror's rivalry. It's annoying because I knew people in high school and college who were in a fierce rivalry with each other for no other reason than they didn't like the other person and it's unnecessary. Also, every time I read this book, Erisi's behaviour is very suspicious, but not to the point where it reveals anything from future books. There's a spy in Rogue Squadron, though we don't find out until the end.

I also think that Stackpole has alot of difficulty utilizing the ensemble cast in this book. As mentioned earlier, the book focuses the most on Wedge, Corran, Mirax, Loor, and Isard, while characters like Nawara Ven, Rhysati Ynr, Erisi Dlarit, and Gavin Darklighter have almost no screentime outside of the POV of Corran or Wedge. Even Tycho doesn't get much screentime, despite being a close friend of Wedge. While it does get better as these books go along, but when Lujayne Forge, Peshk Vri'syk, and Andoorni Hui died later in the book, particularly Lujayne, it didn't impact me as much as Chewie's death in Vector Prime (1999) did, and definitely not as much as it would've if Wedge or Corran or Mirax had died instead. Particularly Wedge. I do have to say that Ooryl is one of my favourite characters in this book. Just because the Gands are such an interesting species, who, beyond the bounty hunter, Zuckuss in The Empire Strikes Back, we never see in Legends OR Canon, and now, because of Ooryl, I want Gands to show up in one of the Disney+ shows or one of the upcoming movies, so we can learn more about them. Especially because we always get Twi'leks, Rodians, Wookiees, and Mon Calamari.

I first read this book back in late 1998 when my best friend at the time, Garrett, lent it to me. In fact, if I'm not mistaken, this was the first Star Wars novel that Garrett lent me, and the third one I read, after Galaxy of Fear: Eaten Alive and The Han Solo Trilogy: The Paradise Snare. It's the book that made me a Star Wars fan. I'd watched the movies a few times, but when I realized we were getting brand new characters, and that Han, Luke, Leia, Lando, Threepio, Artoo, and Chewbacca weren't going to appear in this book, it made me realize that, Star Wars was much larger in scope as a universe than what the movies portrayed the universe as, I was hooked.

 Originally published on January 1st, 1996, it's easy to forget that Rogue Squadron was published relatively early in the Bantam era of Star Wars novel publishing. It came out before Shadows of the Empire, and before the Black Fleet Crisis Trilogy, but after the Corellian Trilogy and after the early one off novels like The Truce at Bakura and The Courtship of Princess Leia. It was reprinted in February 1996, which is the edition that I have as that's the one that stayed in print until some time between 2014 and 2016 when the Legends banner reprint that Del Rey put out after Disney bought the franchise in 2012. Wookieepedia doesn't list a date for the 2010s reprint, but most of the early Legends banner/2010s reprints came out between 2014 and 2016, with 2017 being the latest it would've come out.

Rogue Squadron was re-released again on September 7th, 2021 as part of the Essential Legends Collection, which is starting to look like is re-releasing ALL of Legends instead of a select few novels like it was marketed as when it first started in 2021. I prefer the original cover that depicts the first battle of Borleias but the Essential Legends Collection cover is cool too. 

Alright my friends, I think that's going to be it for me for today. I'll be back tomorrow for the next installment in my Marvel Star Trek comic book overview. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Donkey Kong Country: The Legend of the Crystal Coconut (1999) Movie Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well, for a Tuesday. I've got a movie review for you today. I know, it's been a while since I've done a movie review, but, I watched a movie last night and decided that I wanted to talk about it. I'm going to be talking about Donkey Kong Country: The Legend of the Crystal Coconut from 1999. Let's get into it.

The Legend of the Crystal Coconut is actually four episodes of the 1997 animated series, Donkey Kong Country, edited together into a feature film. Of course many TV shows have done this for home media releases including Gargoyles, Batman Beyond, The Adventures of Teddy Ruxpin, Justice League, and Darkwing Duck, among others. However, in this case, the episodes are all the ones featuring Kaptain Skurvy and his pirate crew. Before I get into the movie itself, let's go back and talk about the history of the show.

On October 17th, 1997 Teletoon began broadcasting. Now known as Cartoon Network (not to be confused with Cartoon Network in the United States), Teletoon was a cable channel dedicated to cartoons and animated series. In the first couple of years of the channel's history, it mostly aired shows produced here in Canada, with the occasional American show being broadcast. 

 One of the first shows to air on the channel was a 3-D animated TV show adaptation of Nintendo's Donkey Kong Country series. The series was also called Donkey Kong Country. It featured Richard Yearwood as the voice of Donkey Kong, whose name is shortened to DK by the other characters. I used to watch this show all the time when I was a kid. It was great. At least to me. I know there aren't very many people who have a fondness for this show. I loved it though.

The movie was interesting. I first saw this movie in either 2000 or 2001 when my parents rented it for me on VHS. My siblings were either away, or out for the night with my grandmother and I was going to be home with my parents, so they rented it for me. And I know it was either 2000 or 2001 because I didn't have my TV/VCR combo set in my room yet, so I had to watch it on the TV in our family room. 

There isn't a general plot to the movie, since it's four episodes of the TV show edited together. But the basic premise is that Donkey Kong and his pal, Diddy, have to protect the Crystal Coconut from King K. Rool, and his henchmen, Klump and Krusha, as well as keep it out of the hands of the pirate, Kaptain Skurvy and his crew, Kutlass and Green Croc. Naturally, DK messes up, alot, but he saves the day every time.

One of my favourite parts of this movie is when Krusha accidentally lets it slip that DK had given him and Klump the Crystal Coconut, and King K. Rool orders Klump to return it to Cranky's house because he thinks it might be a trick played on them by DK and Diddy. I laughed because only a few scenes earlier, King K. Rool didn't care how Klump and Krusha had obtained it, only that they HAD obtained it. Plus for a moment it actually felt like the bad guy was actually learning, but this is a '90s TV show. The bad guys never learn.

Another favourite scene of mine is when Kaptain Skurvy sings "Pirate's Scorn", which is a song that explains why Skurvy wants the Crystal Coconut. Funny thing is though, I never actually heard this song in the show itself until I saw this movie. Back when Teletoon first started it had an interstitial segment between shows called MusicToon. Basically it was music videos made from songs sung in the shows Teletoon aired at the time. "Pirate's Scorn" was one of them and I always saw it when I was watching reruns of Scooby-Doo, and episodes of an animated series I used to watch called Bad Dog. This was during the show's final run in late 1999 to early 2000. 

But I think my most favourite part is seeing these characters interacting with each other again. I haven't seen Donkey Kong Country since it ended in 2000, and I only ever saw this movie once, so it was fun seeing it again through this movie. It's not the best show ever, nor is this the best movie ever, but I had so much fun watching the show 25 years ago, and I had just as much fun watching this movie last night. And to me that's the worth of this show and this movie.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. However, I will be back tomorrow for a book review as I'm almost finished reading the first novel in the Star Wars: X-Wing series, Rogue Squadron. So until then have a great rest of the day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Star Trek: The Original Series S01E03, "Where No Man Has Gone Before" (1965/1966) TV Show Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. Today I'm here to talk about the second pilot episode of Star Trek, "Where No Man Has Gone Before". Despite rejecting "The Cage", NBC felt Star Trek had a strong enough concept that they ordered a second pilot, which was unprecedented at the time. There will be spoilers, given that this is an almost sixty year old show. Let's get into it.

The weirdest thing about this episode for me is that, despite it being the pilot for TOS, it aired as the third episode of the series, on September 22nd, 1966 (September 20th in Canada), a full two weeks after the series premiere, "The Man Trap". According to Memory Alpha, because this episode had alot of exposition, either the network or Desilu decided it wouldn't make a very good premiere episode. Yet, it's jarring having it come out as the third episode since the uniforms are different, the Bridge looks slightly different, and Uhura, Rand, Chapel, and McCoy aren't in the episode. Sulu and Scotty are, along with Kirk and Spock.

I actually remember watching this episode on CBC when I was a kid. Because of the different uniforms, Uhura, Rand, Chapel, and McCoy being absent, and the fact that the opening "Space the final frontier..." monologue is missing from the opening credits sequence, though it was added into the remastered version in 2007, which is the version I watched on DVD last night. 

The thing is, I remember watching TOS when I was a kid, even before I saw a bunch of episodes in the 2000s, when it first aired on Space Channel, but there's only one or two episodes, because, unlike TNG, I didn't have alot of episodes on VHS, and we didn't tape the episodes off the TV. I'll be honest, I appreciate what TOS did for TV in the '60s, and the fact that it started this amazing franchise that I love so much, but I'm not a big TOS fan. I prefer the six original TOS movies over the show, and TOS walked so that Star Trek as a franchise could run. I also just had way more exposure to TNG when I was a kid in the early '90s because, not only were new episodes still airing, but we had so many episodes taped off TV, AND I had most of the first season on VHS thanks to family members buying the tapes for me for Christmases and birthdays right up through 1996 or 1997. 

Having said that, I do enjoy this episode. It's still pretty raw in terms of Star Trek lore and the cast figuring out their characters, but it's a really good episode. For example, Spock steps up when Kirk is doubting whether he should kill Gary Mitchell, played by Gary Lockwood, after Gary gets turned into a god-like being during the Enterprise's trip through the barrier at the edge of the galaxy. As Spock says when Kirk asks him why he thinks he's right when Doctor Dehner, played by Sally Kellerman, who is a trained psychologist, says that Gary isn't a threat, "Because she feels, I don't". And that sums up who Spock is extremely well, even this early in the show. I feel like, outside of background details and personal history, Spock is the most fully formed character this early in TOS and that's why he feels right in this episode. Gene Roddenberry knew what he wanted Spock to be, and was able to get that almost right away, even as Leonard Nimoy was figuring out how to play Spock. 

Gary Mitchell, a character who shows up here, and then isn't mentioned again until the season 2 premiere of Lower Decks, "Strange Energies", is on the verge of being unlikable. Aside from how he treats Dehner before they get zapped, the way he treats Kirk in Sickbay when Kirk first visits him, and then the way he talks to Kelso, played by Paul Carr. And that's Lieutenant Lee Kelso, not Michael Kelso. Just in case you get confused with that. 

Dehner was a good character, but was wasted in this episode. Same with Yeoman Smith, played by Andrea Dromm. Honestly, Smith had less to do than Janice Rand, played by Grace Lee Whitney, did in the entirety of the first season of TOS, and the two movies she appeared in. Yeah, women in '60s TV were not written well, even in a show as progressive as Star Trek was. 

Overall, this is a pretty good episode, though if I'm being honest, I think "The Cage" is a better episode. "Where No Man Has Gone Before" is still good though. I just think it could've been better. But hey, it convinced NBC to pick Star Trek up as a series, so that's pretty good.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for this week. I'll be back soon with lots more reviews and posts. So until then, have a great rest of the weekend and I will talk to you later. Take care.

Marvel's Star Trek Overview Part 3: Star Trek Unlimited (1996-1998)

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. So, I'm back to discuss the second comic book series in the Marvel Star Trek line from the late '90s. This isn't going to be a very long post because I've never read this series before, so I don't have an opinion on it and there isn't much information on the series either. So let's get into it and talk about Star Trek Unlimited, published by Marvel Comics.

Star Trek Unlimited was a ten issue mini-series published by Marvel Comics from 1996 to 1998. The first five issues contain two stories. One is about the crew of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701, and the second is about the crew of the Enterprise-D or the Enterprise-E depending on when in the Star Trek timeline the story takes place in.

Issue #6 was part of the "Telepathy War" storyline that ran through pretty much every Star Trek comic book series Marvel was publishing at the time. I mentioned it briefly in last week's section on the Voyager comic series. This issue was part 4 of the storyline and is a TNG era only issue.

Issue #7 contained only one story, but it was a crossover between TOS and TNG thanks to Q and Trelane being involved somehow. Now I'm wishing I had read this series, because it sounds pretty interesting to have a single series with TOS and TNG stories included, since both series had just come off long runs at DC Comics at this point in time. 

Issue #8, not shown above, contained 3 stories, a TOS story, a TNG story, and a DS9 story. For the remaining two issues, issue #9 was a TOS issue, and the final issue, shown above, was a TNG issue. 

As I mentioned, I've never read any issue of this series as I haven't had access to it. The Marvel era of Star Trek comics weren't super available here when I was a kid. As I mentioned in the previous installment of this series, I was lucky that other people were able to find the two Voyager comics that I had when I was a teenager, and that I was able to find both of those issues again a few years ago. The vast majority of this era have been elusive because they just didn't sell well at the time, and those that do have these issues don't want to give them up necessarily because they've never been collected in any trade paperback and Eaglemoss's Star Trek Graphic Novel Collection hardcovers are pretty expensive. Not to mention that run doesn't collect all of the Marvel line. Just the Voyager and DS9 runs, and Early Voyages, which I'll be talking about in three weeks. 

That's it for me for today. Like I said, it's a short post this time just because I don't own any issue, so I can't talk about the artwork, and I've never read these issues so I have no idea what they're like as stories. The next two installments of this overview series will be short too because they're also runs I've never read and have never seen the artwork for. I'll be back soon with my review of the second TOS pilot, "Where No Man Has Gone Before". Until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Star Trek: The Cage (1964/1988) TV Pilot Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing okay. I ended up not going to Ottawa Comiccon this morning, which is why I'm doing this review rather than shutting myself off from the rest of the world until dinnertime. Today, in honour of yesterday being Star Trek Day in the U.S. and the 6th being Star Trek Day in Canada, I am going to review every pilot episode of Star Trek that I have access to. So that is Star Trek (1966-1969), Star Trek: The Animated Series (1973-1974), Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-1994), Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993-1999), Star Trek: Voyager (1995-2001), Star Trek: Enterprise (2001-2005), and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (2022-). This week I'll be starting with the original pilot, "The Cage" that was produced in 1964 but didn't air until 1988). There will be spoilers because with the exception of the first episode of Strange New Worlds which aired last year, all of these episodes are over 20 years old. So let's get into it.

Watching "The Cage" is like looking at a time capsule, because everything that became Star Trek started with this pilot, but at the same time nobody saw it on home video until 20 years later, and it didn't air on TV until TNG had already started. Though we did get a recap of it in the TOS season 1 episode "The Menagerie", which was the only two-part episode that TOS ever had. It's also familiar because this could be considered the pilot or proof of concept for Strange New Worlds being that Pike, Spock, and Una are all here, even if nobody else from the show is. Not to mention it's revisited in season 2 of Discovery and it's what inspired Akiva Goldsman and Henry Allonso Meyer to do Strange New Worlds. It's also what Gene Roddenberry wanted Star Trek to be in the first place.

One of the things that I love about this episode is that it's a rough draft of what Star Trek would become. The terminology is raw, the lore is not locked into place yet, it's just Star Trek. While Jeffrey Hunter's Pike is a pretty different character from Anson Mount's Pike, he's still recognizable as Captain Christopher Pike. I can see Mount's Pike reacting the same way that Hunter's Pike does in this pilot. Even going as far as having Una, simply known as Number One in this episode, setting a phaser to overload in order to convince the Talosians that they don't want to be in captivity. The problem I have with Hunter's Pike is that this is the only episode we get with him. However, I do like the slight character development we got for him. 

The Vina stuff wasn't great, but this was 1960s Television even if it never aired in the 1960s. Even still, having her only purpose being to seduce Pike is less than stellar. Especially for someone as enlightened as Roddenberry was, despite his many MANY flaws. Susan Oliver, the actress who played Vina did a great job. It's just the role wasn't great. 

I was surprised that Una's role in this episode is more than what I remembered it being. Especially compared to the character we know in Strange New Worlds. She actually takes command and figures things out without Spock or Tyler or Boyce making suggestions to her. Speaking of Doctor Boyce, I think I like Doctor M'Benga better. John Hoyt isn't as charming or as fun as Babs Olusanmokun is.

While looking primitive even by the standards of the original TV show, the Enterprise looks pretty good. You could tell they didn't have the interior sets fully planned out yet as we really only had four rooms shown and a very small section of the corridor. We had the Bridge, the Transporter Room, the Briefing Room, and Pike's quarters, which look very different from what Kirk's quarters look like in the show proper, and VERY different from what Pike's quarters look like in SNW. You can also tell that they are sets made out of wood and paint. 

The Talosians are probably the weirdest aliens we see in the early days of the franchise, simply because they aren't just people with really bad wigs on. The problem I have with them is related to the problem I have with Vina. Vina seems to have been there for 18 years, yet they didn't realize that Humans hate being taken as captives. Nor did they do so when the Enterprise arrived. I guess there wouldn't be a story if they'd done that, but still, this episode wasn't about misunderstandings between people from different cultures or anything like that. So it was just a bit wonky how that played out.

So I never saw this episode when I was a kid. It never aired in reruns on CBC, I never got it on VHS and I've never had it on DVD. The first time I ever saw it was in 2009. The remastered version of TOS had been airing for the last three years and Space Channel aired it as the final episode of the series. Then about two or three years later I was on one of the old Yahoo! Star Trek forums, and one of the people I talked to on there sent me an external hard drive containing every Star Trek movie and TV episode up to that point (11 movies, 5 live action shows, and 1 animated show), and "The Cage" was included. I'm still hoping to get TOS season 3 on Blu-ray since I have season 1 on DVD and season 2 on Blu-ray. 

Overall this was an interesting start to my favourite media franchise of all time. As I said earlier, not only does it serve as a what-if? pilot for TOS, but it serves as the pilot for Strange New Worlds. If you've never seen it before, I recommend checking it out as it's a rough draft for what Star Trek eventually became. 

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. I'll be doing alot of Star Trek content over the next little bit between my Marvel Comics's Star Trek overview, Star Trek book reviews, and these pilot episode reviews. But until then have a great rest of your weekend and I will talk to you all later. Take care.  

Marvel's Star Trek Overview Part 2: Star Trek: Voyager (1996-1998)

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. It's hot outside today, but it's September, so the cold is coming. Today I'm back for the second part in my Marvel's Star Trek overview series. In this part we'll be talking about the comic book based on the fourth live action Star Trek TV show, Star Trek: Voyager. This is the only '90s Marvel Star Trek comic that I read when I was growing up and I only ever had two issues of it. So let's get into it.

With a cover date of November 1996, Star Trek: Voyager #1 was released on September 25th, 1996. I've never read this issue, all I know about it is that it's the first part of a three part story involving a group of Talaxians that the Voyager crew are trying to rescue from a weird ion storm that trapped both ships.

Issue #2 was actually the second issue I got when I was a kid. And I actually didn't get it right after it came out. Instead I got it as a birthday or Christmas present in 2002 or 2003, so I was actually in high school when I got this issue. What's weird to me is that these Talaxians were hired by the Trabe to capture Voyager. The Trabe was a race that had originally enslaved the Kazon (the big bad of season 2 of Voyager) and when the Kazon rebelled, the Trabe lost their homeworld and a vast majority of their space fleet. In the TV show, the Trabe only showed up once in the season 2 episode, "Alliances", where after being under attack by the Kazon for several weeks, resulting in severe damage to Voyager and some casualties, Captain Janeway attempted to make peace with them, but ended up in an alliance with the Trabe instead, which also went south pretty quickly.

According to Memory Alpha, in an interview that Voyager comic book writer, Laurie S. Sutton said in an interview published in issue #9 of The Official Star Trek: Voyager Magazine which was published in 1996, that she'd originally planned to use the Kazon and have them take over Voyager, but, being that comic book issues are written about a year or so before the issue is due to come out, she started writing these first three issues while the Voyager production staff were writing the script for the season 2 finale, "Basics", which had Voyager being captured by the Kazon, so Paramount informed Sutton that her story would conflict with the season finale and so she changed the big bads from the Kazon to the Trabe, because they're the only other bad guys Voyager had encountered in the Delta Quadrant up to that point who wanted to take the ship, being that the Vidiians just wanted to harvest the crew's organs to replace their own to combat the Phage. Which I'll get into when I actually review Voyager at some point later on. 

I discovered the series when I got issue #13 for either a Valentine's Day or an Easter present in early 1998 since I couldn't have chocolate at the time since I was being completely tubefed at the time. I know it wasn't a birthday or Christmas present. This issue was part of a story arc that ran through the four comic book series that entirely took place in the 24th Century or included issues that took place in the 24th Century, which was all of them, with the exception of Early Voyages. 

The artwork in this series is weird. The first eight issues, as well as issues 10-12, were done by Jesus Redondo, and issue #9, and #'s 13-15 were done by Terry Pallot. As you can see from the cover of the first issue, Redondo's artwork is a bit more cartoony and all of the characters look angry, even if they aren't supposed to be. Pallot's art style is more realistic looking. I'll give you two examples.

The picture above is Jesus Redondo's artwork from issue #2. As you can see, it's much more cartoony than Terry Pallot's artwork, which you can see in the picture below it. Pallot's character designs for the show's main characters are much closer to the actual actors and actresses on the show than Redondo's character designs do

The series was canceled after issue #15, though there would be a mini-series called Splashdown that came out between April and July of 1998. I've only ever owned and read the two issues I mentioned before so I don't have that much actual experience with this series. 

Originally the Star Trek: Voyager comic was going to be published by Malibu Comics, which had been publishing the Deep Space Nine series since 1993. However, just as things were being finalized for Malibu to do the comic, Marvel bought the publisher, and Paramount had transferred the license from Malibu and DC, who had done the TOS and TNG comics up to that point, to Marvel, creating the Paramount Comics imprint.

1996-1998 was a very interesting time for Marvel as not only was the company on the verge of bankruptcy but Star Trek wasn't the only IP Marvel had the comic book license for during this time. They'd just lost the Disney license, and had wrapped up the comic book series based on Gargoyles they'd been doing, and they'd also been publishing two comic book series based on Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. One called Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and the other called Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Ninja Rangers. And of course Marvel had had everything from Star Wars to Transformers in the '80s. 

Overall, the Voyager comic is an interesting read if you can get your hands on it. Aside from the Eaglemoss hardcover collected editions, the Voyager series was never collected. There aren't even any trade paperback collections from IDW. So they can be pretty difficult to find. I've never even found any beyond the two I got when I was a teenager in long boxes at sales or even the back issue bins at comic book stores. But, if you do find some, definitely pick them up. 

That's it for this part of the overview. Next week I'll be diving into Star Trek Unlimited, a series that tells stories from TOS and TNG since neither series had their own Marvel Comics series this time around. It's also a series that I've never read before. So it's probably gonna be a shorter post than this one ended up being. Don't worry though I have other posts coming up before Ottawa Comiccon this weekend. So until then have a great evening and I'll talk to you all later. Take care.

A Dance with Dragons (2011) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty good. It's Ottawa Comiccon this weekend and I'm going on Saturday, which is cool because I haven't been in four years. Today though, I'm here to talk about the final book (so far) of A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin, A Dance with Dragons. I finished it before bed last night and I'm ready to talk about it. There will be spoilers because, while not a whole lot of major things happened in this book, there are some that happened near the end that I want to talk about. So you know the drill, if you haven't read this book or seen season 5 of Game of Thrones, please do so before reading this review, if you care about spoilers. Let's get into it.

As I've been through A Song of Ice and Fire, I've noticed that this series become less cohesive and more vignette style because of how disconnected every character's story is from everyone else's stories. Sure, there are some crossover as Tyrion encounters Aegon Targaryen, who is on his way to Westeros to retake the Iron Throne from the Lannisters, while Tyrion is on his way to Meereen to offer his assistance to Daenerys, but Jon Snow's story doesn't intersect with Daenerys's, Tyrion's, Jaime's, Theon's, or Cersei's stories anymore than any of theirs intersect with each other. 

I've complained about this in previous reviews of A Song of Ice and Fire, because it makes it difficult to keep up with everything going on. However, after thinking about it, this is pretty normal for Martin. For those of you who don't know, in 1987 Martin, along with fellow Science Fiction author, Melinda Snodgrass, who wrote several Star Trek: The Next Generation season 2 episodes in 1988 and 1989, began editing an anthology series called Wild Cards, which is about an alternate post-World War II history where superheroes and supervillains, known as Aces and Jokers, exist thanks to an alien virus that got spread after World War II. There's no real connection between any of the characters's stories in that series, and yet there is a connection because of the overall plot of the alien virus. 

I mention all this because that's exactly how A Song of Ice and Fire becomes as the series goes on. Whether we get Winds of Winter or not is something I don't feel qualified to speculate on, but, where Martin leaves things off at the end of the book, is a good place to end, because, just like in real life, people's stories go on even if you don't encounter that person ever again. Yes, Martin created Westeros and all of these characters, but, he wrote these books to be so realistic that the world continues on whether we see these characters in the books ever again. I'm going to go over this at the end, but I think Game of Thrones ruined the books for Martin. I'll get into why I think that later though. Right now, let's get into the book itself.

So, if I had to pick my favourite story in this book, it has to be Daenerys's. The reason being is that, despite Ser Barristan's urgings, Daenerys has decided to rule in Meereen and doesn't necessarily want to claim the Iron Throne in the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros. Combine that with her weariness of war following the constant battles with the Yunkai, The Sons of the Harpy, and other slavers, and I was not surprised when she hopped up on Drogon and flew away from Meereen. She'd been through so much over the course of this series, and when she had the opportunity, she ran away, because the pressure was too much. Especially because she'd had to forsake Daario, whom she loved, to marry Hizdahr zo Loraq, a Meereenese nobleman who promised her that he could broker a peace between Meereen and the Yunkai if she married him. After Daenerys flees on Drogon, Ser Barristan believes that Hizdahr married Daenerys to gain access to her Dragons so he can kill them. Of course, Hizdahr hasn't denied it as of yet, so who knows.

The other storyline that I enjoyed the most was Jon Snow's with the Night Watch at the Wall. Him dealing with King Stannis's wife, Queen Selyse, Melisandre, the treaty between the Wildlings and the Night's Watch, and everything else going on at Castle Black. I just found it to be more interesting than anything else going on in the book, besides Dany's storyline, which I've already talked about. I think what fascinated me the most is how Jon handled everything. Sometimes he handled things poorly, other times he handled them quite well. And that's what we do as human beings. Sometimes we handle situations poorly and other times we handle them well. It all depends on the situation and what experiences we have at our disposal to handle said situation.

When I read this book for the first time back in the summer of 2019, I already knew that Jon Snow would get stabbed by members of the Night's Watch before I ever started reading A Game of Thrones. I never read the synopsis of this book on Wikipedia or one of the many Wikis devoted to A Song of Ice and Fire. I knew because of the TV show. I've never watched Game of Thrones, but the day after the season 5 finale aired on HBO, my Facebook and Twitter feeds were filled of images of Jon lying in the snow, having just been stabbed. 

Game of Thrones was a phenomenon and a staple of 2010s pop culture. It changed geek culture forever, even before The Avengers came out a year later. It also changed television forever as well, giving rise to serialized storytelling and binge watching. So even if you were someone who wasn't watching it, you knew someone who was. If you were on social media between 2011 and 2019 you could not escape it. People posted screenshots, reviews, opinions, made speculation videos on YouTube, and memes were everywhere. So even though I've never seen a single episode, I knew about Ned's beheading in season 1, the Red Wedding in season 3, Jon getting stabbed in season 5, and the finale of the show in season 8.

I mention this because A Dance with Dragons came out almost a month after season 1 of Game of Thrones ended. In fact, it is the only book in the A Song of Ice and Fire series to come out while the TV show was on the air. So it's worth noting the popularity and influence that Game of Thrones had on the television landscape of the 2010s and the influence it had on geek culture.

Overall, A Dance with Dragons was a great book. It's a shame that the TV show may have ruined the books for Martin, as he has yet to finish the sixth book in the series, The Winds of Winter. Because he's 74, with him turning 75 years old in 15 days, people have begun to speculate that the sixth book, and the series as a whole will go unfinished. Personally, I think we'll get the sixth book in three or four years, maybe less, depending on how much longer the writer's and actor's strikes go on for, since Martin is primarily a television producer and writer, and House of the Dragon is most likely one of the shows affected by the strikes. But we shall see what happens.

Alright my friends, I think that will be it for me for today. I'll be back soon for the next installment in my Marvel Star Trek comic book overview series where I'll be discussing the first comic book series to be based on Star Trek: Voyager. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.