[The Australian Panther]

Well it does say,

Feel free to talk about anything and everything in this board.

 
So September 8th was officially Star Trek Day.   

59 years ago today, a strange new world, new lives, and new civilizations, all broke onto America's television screens. On this day in 1966, was the premiere of Gene Roddenberry's masterpiece: The original Star Trek.

So next year will be the 60th anniversary. 

  The year of 2026 marks a historic chapter for Star Trek as the legendary franchise will celebrate its 60th anniversary on next year's Star Trek Day (Sept. 8, 2026).
Today, in celebration of this year's Star Trek Day, it was announced that the 60th celebrations will officially begin in January 2026, featuring notable partnerships, new launches and memorable moments throughout the year.

https://www.startrek.com/en-un/news/star-trek-60th-2026-fan-centric-celebrations

What's this to do with comics? Well quite a lot actually. Starting wiith Gold Keys Star Trek comics ( which we can't yet host) there have been many Star Trek comics from many publishers.

I should point out that in fact I am not among the great Star Trek fans, but like most of us I have seen the movies and watched many of the shows.

However I'm a bigger fan of Gene Roddenberry's other masterpiece,  Andromeda which Gene Roddenberry's widow, Majel Barrett brought to fruition and produced.

The New Systems Commonwealth Wiki - Andromeda (TV series)
https://andromeda.fandom.com/wiki/Andromeda_(TV_series)
Note - 5 seasons.

QQ, gotta ask, 'Got your tickets for the cruise yet?'

cheers! 

[SuperScrounge]

I love Classic Trek, the Animated series, and NextGen.

DS9 felt off in the better, brighter future Star Trek was supposed to embody, but it did have good episodes.

Voyager was almost anti-Trek, Classic and NextGen were about going where no man had gone before and Voyager was "let's get home!" Still had some good episodes.

Enterprise... 3 episodes in and I was calling them the lunk-headed space tourists. The crew of Columbus's ships would have made better explorers than those losers.

Then we had Trekboot where the thoughtful intelligent sci-fi was jettisoned to make for a summer popcorn flick.

Sadly the 50th anniversary resulted in... Star Trek: Discovery. Ugh! and I thought Enterprise was bad.

Andromeda was basically Star Trek flipped on its head, the Commonwealth was the Federation, the Neitcheans were the Vulcans, etc., etc.

I liked the pilot movies for Earth 2 (& even the 2 follow-ups), The Questor Tapes, and Spectre, but sadly they hardly ever rerun the last two.

One interesting thing about Star Trek was how they would takes stories that might have run on other shows of the time and then have a twist that the other shows couldn't do. Errand of Mercy was basically a war show (Captain Hero and Sergeant Sidekick visit a neutral town or village to get them to side with the Allies, but then the Nazis take over and the hero & sidekick must show the Villagers how bad the Nazis are, except in Star Trek the villagers turn out to be supremely powerful beings who put a stop to the war.) Balance of Terror was a submarine show in space. Devil In The Dark was basically a western, etc.

One problem NextGen had was that there were fewer types of shows on at the same time than there were in the 1960s.

I also have the DVD-ROM with scans of all the Star Trek comics published at the time of release, with the exception of the crossover with the X-Men and the newspaper strip.

Sadly Star Trek comics were never quite as good as the shows, although a few came close (DC's sequel to Mirror Mirror probably being the best).

[beabaker]

I'm excited for the 60th anniversary this year!

The original series and the cartoon had a bunch of writers and I'm sure some of them were active in the 50s and early 60s... which means I bet there's some comics on this site already written by some of the people behind the first two shows. Freelance writers are always bouncing around different mediums, after all. I wonder what's out there?

[SuperScrounge]

For Classic Trek:

Jerome Bixby - Wrote some text pieces for Indians #5, Fantastic Worlds #5, and Lost Worlds #5. Possibly also wrote some Lost World comics under the house name Thornecliffe Herrick and a text story as Harry Neal in Fantastic Worlds #7. He also edited books for Fiction House.

Gene L. Coon - Wrote a text article for Fightin' Marines #6 (St. John)

Theodore Sturgeon - Not counting adaptations (or ripoffs) of his stories, he wrote all but the first two Iron Munro comics for Street & Smith (which are not public domain). He also wrote two text stories for Calling All Boys #7 & 9.

[paw broon]

Apart from a few episodes, I'm not a big fan of original ST, much preferring a fair bit of Voyager and Pike' s new/old adventures.
Janeway is imo a great character and captain.  Pike is great fun.
ST strips were in British comics. What do you think of the Byrne photo comics?

[gregjh]

I was never a Trekkie but I do follow the culture wars so I'm aware that modern iterations of Star Trek have been utterly awful and the latest attempt was canned after just one season. This is the problem with any classic series or films, they will attempt to ruin it for a few more dollars.

[The Australian Panther]

Paw said,

Apart from a few episodes, I'm not a big fan of original ST, much preferring a fair bit of Voyager and Pike' s new/old adventures.
Janeway is i a great character and captain.  Pike is great fun.
ST strips were in British comics. What do you think of the Byrne photo comics?

Funny how people's taste can be so different.
I'm a fan of the first series characters, more than the series itself.
Too much talk in NextGen. But I did like their first movie.
Otherwise Deep Space 9 for me - although it's flawed. I'm still waiting for a movie.
Halfway through a DS9 comic book anthology.   
I have the whole series of Enterprise on DVD but have only watched seasons 1 and 2 which I quite enjoyed.
Never watched the Star Trek Animated series but I have the Stargate animated series, which I quite enjoyed.   
There are an abundance of comics - most major publishers have had a go, but they won't be on CB+ for quite some time, still well and truly in copyright.
Superscrounge, thanks for the Sturgeon tip!
 

[SuperScrounge]

Never watched the Star Trek Animated series

It's not bad, not quite as good as the Classic series, but original series writers and actors were involved, so it's a lot better than any other cartoon spinoff that I can think of.

but I have the Stargate animated series, which I quite enjoyed.

Stargate: Infinity? ? ? 

Oooooh... there's a thread at NitCentral where a number of us Stargate fans were discussing this when it was announced and when it came out... we weren't happy with it. (Although I did admit at one point that if it didn't have the Stargate name it would be just another sci-fi cartoon.) At the time Stargate SG-1 was really flying high and none of the SG-1 creators were involved with the cartoon. Years later when Stargate: Universe came out I realized that Infinity was much, much better than Universe.

Superscrounge, thanks for the Sturgeon tip!

You're welcome! 

[paw broon]

To go back to your post on new ST series, Some of them aren't awful, in fact ST SNW is excellent. It may not appeal to fans of the original series, but it is well made, beautifully filmed, exciting, entertaining, sometimes surreal, comedy, good stories. I stick by my opinion that a lot of Voyager was good viewing and Janeway is a great captain.
I also enjoyed Stargate.

[The Australian Panther]

Sadly Star Trek comics were never quite as good as the shows, although a few came close (DC's sequel to Mirror Mirror probably being the best).

Thinking about  "Mirror Mirror.' The original TV episode predates DC's Crisis. But not DC's two Flashes crossover and the alternate evil justice league. So, were Gardner Fox's DC books an influence on Star Trek writers? Hmmmm.