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Star Trek/Green Lantern: The Spectrum Wars
Writer: Mike Johnson
Artists: Angel Hernandez and Stephen Molnar
Colorist: Alejandro Sanchez
Publisher: IDW Comics
Review by Ryan M. Holt
Did you ever wonder what would happen if two space fairing franchises collided like a meteor and a planet? Well wonder no more, as earlier this year IDW and DC Comics finally completed their Star Trek and Green Lantern crossover mini-series. Star Trek has had a long history of comic book cross overs, with the recent batch of IDW titles showing the crew of the Enterprise share the pages with Doctor Who, Planet of the Apes and more. In the past they have also crossed over with the X-Men with both the TOS casts and the TNG casts (the book pre-dates the movie by at least a year Patrick Stewart fans), and even the Legion of Superheroes.
Star Trek/Green Lantern takes place in the movie universe established by JJ Abrams in 2009 and after Blackest Night in the DC Comics Universe. The series opens with Ganthet on the run on a desolate Mogo, with six of the seven spectrum rings following him. As Ganthet is cornered and struck down, he activates a hidden protocol called the “Last Light” protocol, teleporting himself and the rings in his care into a different universe. Now while many fans will cry foul with Ganthet teleporting into the 2009 Trek universe, there is a very good reason for this, and it has to do with who was chasing him down.
Shortly after the “Last Light” protocol is activated, the USS Enterprise, captained by none other than James T. Kirk, finds a desolate rogue planet, devoid of all life. The away team beams down, and finds the destroyed husk of Ganthet, and brings the body, and the six rings laid out in front of it, on board for study. After Scotty leaves the rings in a Tachyon Field, they turn on, flying throughout the galaxy to find those that embody the emotional spectrum each ring represents. The following Star Trek characters get rings.
- Pavel Chekhov gets the Blue Ring of Hope
- Nyota Uhura gets the Sapphire Ring of Love
- Leonard ‘Bones’ McCoy gets the Indigo Ring of Compassion
- General Chang, from Star Trek: VI, gets the Yellow Ring of Fear
- Glocon, a Gorn destined for the Gorn Throne, gets the Red Ring of Rage
- Decius, the first Romulan ever shown in Star Trek, gets the Orange Ring of Avarice
As General Chang attacks the USS Enterprise with is new found powers of fear, a green glow envelopes the ship. When Ganthet activated the “Last Light”, it brought all of the current ring slingers over to the new universe as well. So Hal, Sinestro, Carol, Atrocitus, Saint Walker, and even Larfleeze are now flying though out the galaxy, the last survivors of their universe.
The best part of this, and any crossover, is seeing the two casts of each franchise interacting with each other. Hal tries to sit in Kirk’s chair, Scotty tries to reverse engineer the Power Rings, Larfleeze tries to get the Romulans to bend to his will. All of these moments are silly and goofy for sure, but you can’t help but grin as events unfold. Plus, the uniforms for the Enterprise Lanterns are awesome looking.
The final act in the story is awe inspiring, as Black Hand resurrects the entire planet of Vulcan as Black Lanterns. While this might be a rehash of Blackest Night it is so cool seeing Sinesto and General Chang command a fleet of fear powered Klingon Warbirds.
Angel Hernandez and Stephen Molnar do a great job bouncing between the two very different casts as far as art goes. The Trek characters resemble their 2009 counterparts, but Hal Jordan, who doesn’t have an actor equivalent to draw inspiration from, doesn’t feel out of place. The artists really did their homework on how each character should look, down to their posture on the bridge. The color work, as with most Green Lantern books, is vibrant and spot on, showing why each color in the spectrum is representative of their respective emotions, even when a lantern character isn’t present.
The Verdict
Check it out! It is a fun romp through an alternate universe viewed through two very different lenses without compromising the vision of either franchise.