Wired for Trek!

The May 2009 issue of "Wired" magazine is guest edited by JJ Abrams - and contains a six page comic spin-off to his new "Star Trek" movie!



Sometime it pays for a collector to keep one's irons in the fire. A bit of pre-planning was needed. Until a while ago, I hadn't heard of this magazine before but, panicking that it the "Star Trek" issue might be too obscure to find here Down Under, I immediately went off on a scouring/scavenging mission to see which stores already stocked "Wired". To my horror, the Pitt Street Mall locale of Borders, in the CBD, is now gone, just weeks after the huge Angus & Robertson closed. Massive rebuilding of the old Mid City Centre, Imperial Arcade, Centrepoint - and I presume, eventually, Sky Garden?

Borders and Angus & Robertson's city stores were usually a great source of "air freight" copies of many international magazines. Local newsagents often only get sea-freighted issues, and stocks can be several months behind the USA. Mmmmm. Where to now?

Anyway, I did find a batch of the April issue at a Nepean Square newsagent (also one city store), and I asked my local shopkeeper about getting an issue of the June "Wired" put away for me. The tricky thing was, there's also a magazine titled "Wire" - and that's not the one! On spec., today, I dropped into the store - on the way to a (ugh!) dental appointment - and I was in luck! Yay! "Star Trek" reading matter for my stint in the waiting room!

Just as "Countdown" was IDW Publishing's four-part prequel to the 2009 movie blockbuster, showing how and why Nero and Ambassador Spock time-slipped back to the 23rd century, so this six-page story, "When Worlds Collide" by Paul Pope & K/O* (pp 112-117, bound into the 138 pp magazine, not an insert), also ties-in to movie: it's set during Ambassador Spock's enforced sojourn on the icy planet, thanks to Nero, and involves Spock having brief flashbacks to his youth, serving on the Enterprise with Uhura (in TOS), playing his Vulcan lyrette and 3-D chess, battling Khan in ST II, and pondering a puzzle toy given to him by Sarek, his father.

It's only six pages (now online!), but it's fun, and definitely not a Trek collectible I wanted to miss! It seemed like they had no issues for the shelf? Were they all already snapped up?

And speaking of puzzles, the issue is filled with mysteries, codes and ciphers, starting with Abram's brown-paper-wrapped "Mystery Box", purchased many decades ago by his grandfather, from one of those amazing old magic stores Aussies only ever used to read about in mail order catalogue pages on the back covers of US comic books in the 60s! (Well, until we found Weirdo's Magic Shop in Centrepoint in the mid 70s.)

I haven't had the time or patience to work out all the myriad of clues scattered through the issue - many more than "47" that's for sure - but now I am curious: did JJ ever open his mystery box?

* Screenwriters Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci.

Nostalgia for comics

IDW's comic mini-series "Countdown" to the new "Star Trek" movie has lots of fans reading comics for the first time in ages, or ever. Someone asked me today, "What's so special about comics?", as in why not just watch a movie or read a book?

For me, the magic of comics comes from nostalgia. My brothers and I were not bought comics as kids, although we did read the Sunday strips in the newspaper every week - including a wonderful, now-rare, newspaper introduction to the character of Batgirl, which ran during the weeks and months before Batgirl turned up on the third season of the wonderful "Batman" TV series in the 60s. And, if we were sick, Mum would buy us a few British comic books, "Beano", "Bunty" and "Sparky". And a "Phantom" comic was traditional in a Royal Easter Show showbag!

Then, perhaps every 18 months or so, we'd receive a brown paper grocery bag of comics, passed on from a cousin we hardly ever got to see. In that bag would be Disney and Harvey comics, plus the odd "Archie" or DC superhero comic. Once there was even... a "Teen Titans" comic! We would devour the whole pile over a week or so, often sitting in the tent belonging to the girls next door.

It was only many years later, when I'd see an interesting title on a newsstand, that I realised how expensive a single comic was, especially for the brief time involved in reading it. However, a beautifully drawn, well-written comic does withstand multiple readings, and even multiple casual browsings. So when I found Star Trek fandom in 1979, I rediscovered a few Gold Key "Star Trek" titles in second hand shops... and then Marvel's new post-TMP line. As bad as some of those were, the nostalgia was also strong. Different to watching the ST movie at the cinema, different to episodes on TV, and different to reading the Bantam novels, but better than Gold Key.

About the same time, I began to follow "New Titans", a revival/revamp of "Teen Titans" (again remembering that lone TT issue from my childhood) and the coming of Nightwing, when Dick Grayson abandoned his Robin persona. And then I rediscovered "The Fantastic Four", while researching their uniforms for a convention.

So, what's special about "Star Trek" comics? I dunno. They just are.

What I loved about the "Watchmen" movie two weeks ago: even though I barely new the original mini-series/graphic novel, and read the first four issues/chapters before seeing the film, it captured the nostalgia for days gone by that, for me, is intrinsically entwined with comics.

Data's debut (again, or B-4?)

Great excitement this week, with the release of issue #1 of "Countdown", a four-issue prelude to JJ Abrams' "Star Trek" movie.



Thanks IDW! Looking great. An explanation to the mystery should be here B-4 we know it!?

Update: Ah, the uniform matches with screenshots from the upcoming Star Trek Online!