Villordsutch reviews the collected edition of Star Trek / Legion of Super-Heroes…
“IDW Publishing and DC Comics are proud to present the greatest tale of the 23rd century! Or is that the 31st century? As you’ll see here, it’s both! Eisner-nominated writer Chris Roberson and Star Trek and Legionnaires veteran artist Jeffrey Moy partner up to bring you the most bizarre partnership of any century! The crew of the Starship: Enterprise and the Legion of Super-Heroes come face to face as they deal with a changed history and timeline that neither knows the cause of. Traveling to the past and the future to find answers, both teams must work together to set things right.“
Now I have no knowledge about the Legion of Super-Heroes (LoSH) at all. Diddly squat! Nowt! Nadda! Zip! And of course zero. If you too have the same amount of information, you’re probably thinking ‘why should I care about this collection?’. Well I can say now “You should!” as this is a rather cool comic collection to own.
Crossover comics have the habit of sticking your favourite characters together to do one thing, which is to quickly milk you of your cash. You normally feel jaded and a bit miffed at the lack of story or direction. Well not here.
We all know Star Trek and in the first few pages you’re brought up to speed on what LoSH do and who they are; with that we weave straight into the Trek story which takes us into a ‘Mirror, Mirror’ style universe where the humans took a different path. This isn’t however the ‘Mirror, Mirror’ universe, but it appears that early in human evolution, an intelligence interfered bringing the humans to a dominant role across the galaxy, long before the 23rd Century. Our LoSH and Trek heroes appear on Earth (the central hub of the Imperial Planets of Terra) due to a violent temporal eddy and a transporter incident at the same time (respectively). Instantly both parties are met by angry mobs baying for blood and Imperial Officers attempting to wipe the crew off the face of this dystopian planet (again respectively). We are pulled along through phaser fights with old Trek enemies and time travel to prehistoric Earth, with old Trek and LoSH stories and characters brought into play. It’s packed with everything that makes a good comic and with a good story that runs through the core. The person to thank for such a great story is Chris Roberson (iZombie, Elric: The Balance Lost) who makes this comic one of the best crossovers in a long time.
The artwork Jeffrey and Philip Moy (Gen13, World of Warcraft) echoes a great time in comics; I could be reading this back in 1987 by the look of it. The characters are drawn clearly down to their facial expressions, with ship battles giving us an exciting view of Klingon Battle Cruisers along side a Constitution class ship, and others, destroying a planet below that didn’t walk the line. The force field generated by Cosmic Boy on page 34 makes the panel look like a lenticular print (it isn’t). I should also thank Romulo Fajardo Jr (G.I. Joe, Kato Origins) for the colours which are excellent throughout, from the swirling time vortex to the look given to our heroes of the comic. I’d even go so far as to thank the lettering people but there are three of them so I’ll just send hugs.
There is nothing really negative to bring up about this comic. The moment you feel a slowing down, the story changes gear and refreshes. Star Trek / Legion of Super-Heroes is a truly good buy, and you should. Do it now! The review has finished, so go and buy it! … I can wait all day!
Villordsutch – Follow me on Twitter.
Originally published June 4, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
