So i've just started reading Star Trek: The Key Collection, and it may be the most bizarre thing i've ever experienced.
But first, let me establish my credentials.
I was absolutely raised on Star Trek. Some people's parents forced the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John on them; my parents indoctrinated me with Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Scott. Picard and co. didn't come along until i was 3, and i have vague memories of my family keeping me up late to watch their premier. Those may be false memories, but i'm sure it actually happened. I definitely remember my bedtime being adjusted on the nights of the premiers of DS9 and Voyager, and the Next Gen finale, like some kids got for the Superbowl, but that's neither here nor there. The point is, i knew how to spot the difference between a Vulcan and a Romulan before i knew the alphabet.
I also remember my parents having a box full of Star Trek comic books when i was a kid. And i remember them not reading them, they stayed in plastic bags and i was allowed to read them exactly one time in my youth, under close supervision. It's important to note that these were DC's Star Trek comics.
So i get older and i actually start getting into comics in general, and i've always had a hankering to revisit the Star Trek comics world. My dad had a TPB of The Mirror Universe Saga (again, DC's Star Trek) that i was able to read maybe ten times per year as a teen, but other than that, for some reason Star Trek comics eluded me. Maybe i wasn't looking for them that hard.
Via Wikipedia, i learned of the Gold Key run of Star Trek comics, which were produced while the original show was actually on the air. Imagine that! Comics produced while all of this was still fresh and new...they must be pretty close to their source material, right? The show and the comic must have influenced each other during the late 60s, right? They've even all got photos of the cast on their covers! This shit has got to be spot-on and amazing.
I naturally assumed that i'd never be given the chance to read these old gems. After all, they're old and largely obscure.
Then, in 2004, Checker Book Publishing Group began to issue TPBs of the Gold Key comics run. Last year at Gen Con, i managed to score all six volumes for five bucks apiece.
Yesterday i started reading them.
Where to start with how bizarre and wrong these comics are? The first issue alone refers to the transporter as a "teleportation chamber" and has at least twenty-five pads, rather than the traditional six, and calls phasers "blast-rays." From so-called "cannibal plants" to Kirk referring to Rand as "Honey" to flagrant disregard for the Prime Directive to Spock committing mass genocide in a fleeting bit of misguided circular logic, the series' first issue is kind of a train wreck that is Star Trek in name only. It's like it was written by somebody who had never seen the show, only had it described to them by somebody who'd seen an episode or two. It's strange because the entire first season had already run by the time they started making these (first issue: July 1967).
Also, McCoy wears a yellow shirt and the Enterprise flies through space with rockets. And tricorders are apparently "voice-radios."
But probably the most bizarre thing about these comics are the...shall we say, "colorful metaphors," which is to say, their swear word substitutes. This being the Silver Age, there was a lot of that going on. Superman always said, "Great Guns!;" Wonder Woman, "Great Hera!;" Green Lantern, "Great Guardians!;" Batman, "Great Scott!" and so on. But so far, with Star Trek, they haven't used an expression twice. Here's a list of Kirk's witticisms in the first issue:
"Howling comets!"
"Great Hannah!"
"Suffering stardust!"
"Great galloping galaxies!"
"Suffering solar showers!"
Now go ahead and try to picture William Shatner saying any one of those lines. I think this is too ridiculous even for the King of the Cheeseballs Himself. Oh and he also tells the away team that they should "Pray, guys. Pray" that Spock can successfully aim the ship's phasers - i'm sorry, the ship's "laser beam destruct ray" - at a tree.
I'm trying to keep this review to the first issue, just to show how ridiculous this was from the get-go, but i really can't resist mentioning that issue two gives the Enterprise a periscope. Because THAT makes perfect sense.
Anyway, i'm going to press on reading this stuff - partly out of morbid curiosity, but mostly because i've already paid for it. So i'm sure that i'll have something more to say on the subject the farther i get into it. Hell, i kind of just want to compile a list of the equipment used in the series. But since most pieces of technology are given names like "TV-radio" (as in, part radio, part TV), i'm probably going to plow through this pretending it's an adaptation not of Star Trek, but of Flash Gordon.
Which would be easy, except that all the caricatures are pretty well done. Except for Scotty, who for some inexplicable reason looks less like James Doohan and more like Basil Rathbone.
But first, let me establish my credentials.
I was absolutely raised on Star Trek. Some people's parents forced the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John on them; my parents indoctrinated me with Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Scott. Picard and co. didn't come along until i was 3, and i have vague memories of my family keeping me up late to watch their premier. Those may be false memories, but i'm sure it actually happened. I definitely remember my bedtime being adjusted on the nights of the premiers of DS9 and Voyager, and the Next Gen finale, like some kids got for the Superbowl, but that's neither here nor there. The point is, i knew how to spot the difference between a Vulcan and a Romulan before i knew the alphabet.
I also remember my parents having a box full of Star Trek comic books when i was a kid. And i remember them not reading them, they stayed in plastic bags and i was allowed to read them exactly one time in my youth, under close supervision. It's important to note that these were DC's Star Trek comics.
So i get older and i actually start getting into comics in general, and i've always had a hankering to revisit the Star Trek comics world. My dad had a TPB of The Mirror Universe Saga (again, DC's Star Trek) that i was able to read maybe ten times per year as a teen, but other than that, for some reason Star Trek comics eluded me. Maybe i wasn't looking for them that hard.
Via Wikipedia, i learned of the Gold Key run of Star Trek comics, which were produced while the original show was actually on the air. Imagine that! Comics produced while all of this was still fresh and new...they must be pretty close to their source material, right? The show and the comic must have influenced each other during the late 60s, right? They've even all got photos of the cast on their covers! This shit has got to be spot-on and amazing.
I naturally assumed that i'd never be given the chance to read these old gems. After all, they're old and largely obscure.
Then, in 2004, Checker Book Publishing Group began to issue TPBs of the Gold Key comics run. Last year at Gen Con, i managed to score all six volumes for five bucks apiece.
Yesterday i started reading them.
Where to start with how bizarre and wrong these comics are? The first issue alone refers to the transporter as a "teleportation chamber" and has at least twenty-five pads, rather than the traditional six, and calls phasers "blast-rays." From so-called "cannibal plants" to Kirk referring to Rand as "Honey" to flagrant disregard for the Prime Directive to Spock committing mass genocide in a fleeting bit of misguided circular logic, the series' first issue is kind of a train wreck that is Star Trek in name only. It's like it was written by somebody who had never seen the show, only had it described to them by somebody who'd seen an episode or two. It's strange because the entire first season had already run by the time they started making these (first issue: July 1967).
Also, McCoy wears a yellow shirt and the Enterprise flies through space with rockets. And tricorders are apparently "voice-radios."
But probably the most bizarre thing about these comics are the...shall we say, "colorful metaphors," which is to say, their swear word substitutes. This being the Silver Age, there was a lot of that going on. Superman always said, "Great Guns!;" Wonder Woman, "Great Hera!;" Green Lantern, "Great Guardians!;" Batman, "Great Scott!" and so on. But so far, with Star Trek, they haven't used an expression twice. Here's a list of Kirk's witticisms in the first issue:
"Howling comets!"
"Great Hannah!"
"Suffering stardust!"
"Great galloping galaxies!"
"Suffering solar showers!"
Now go ahead and try to picture William Shatner saying any one of those lines. I think this is too ridiculous even for the King of the Cheeseballs Himself. Oh and he also tells the away team that they should "Pray, guys. Pray" that Spock can successfully aim the ship's phasers - i'm sorry, the ship's "laser beam destruct ray" - at a tree.
I'm trying to keep this review to the first issue, just to show how ridiculous this was from the get-go, but i really can't resist mentioning that issue two gives the Enterprise a periscope. Because THAT makes perfect sense.
Anyway, i'm going to press on reading this stuff - partly out of morbid curiosity, but mostly because i've already paid for it. So i'm sure that i'll have something more to say on the subject the farther i get into it. Hell, i kind of just want to compile a list of the equipment used in the series. But since most pieces of technology are given names like "TV-radio" (as in, part radio, part TV), i'm probably going to plow through this pretending it's an adaptation not of Star Trek, but of Flash Gordon.
Which would be easy, except that all the caricatures are pretty well done. Except for Scotty, who for some inexplicable reason looks less like James Doohan and more like Basil Rathbone.
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