Star Trek The Mirror War #1

Star Trek The Mirror War #1

IDW Publishing 2021

Written by Scott & David Tipton

Illustrated by Gavin Smith

Coloured by Charlie Kirchoff

Lettered by Neil Uyetake

Return to the Mirror Universe of The Next Generation with this brand-new series from writers David & Scott Tipton, where familiar faces and exciting new surprises await around every corner! To conquer the Mirror Universe, Captain Picard must first seize control of the ship-building planet of Faundori! The only problem? Faundori is inside Klingon-Cardassian Alliance territory…

I make no secret that I’m not exactly the biggest Next Generation fan but when it comes to the Mirrorverse well then I’m totally on board and with the first two issues I am completely and utterly on board with this. As I got into this issue, which by the way if you missed the zero issue don’t worry this one is easily understood as is or it is new reader friendly, I very quickly knew this was going to be a great book! And considering that these unfettered by the constricting morals the other universe possesses characters are infinitely more interesting to me. Also the last page and whom we see there honestly made me much happier than I thought I’d be and here’s hoping that we’ll see more of this person as the story continues.

I am a fan of the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how we see the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceptionally well. How we see the character development through the narration, the dialogue, the character interaction as well as how they act and react to the situations and circumstances which they encounter continues to bring these great personalities to the forefront. The pacing is excellent and as it takes us through the pages revealing the story, the characters and the mission, which thankfully still remains somewhat clouded, just instills that desire to see and learn more.

I greatly appreciate how we see this being structured and how the layers within the story continue to emerge, grow, evolve and strengthen. The layers do wonders in opening up new avenues to be explored and as they are they add this great depth, dimension and complexity to the story. How we see everything working together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is impeccably achieved.

I love Gavin’s work on the interiors here. He really manages to capture the characters' likenesses extraordinarily well and even adding those little touches that fimly entrenches them in the Mirrorverse. The linework is exceptional and how we see the varying weights and techniques being utilised to create this level & quality of detail within the work is astonishingly well rendered. That we see backgrounds utilised so prolifically throughout the book makes me such a happy camper as they enhance and expand the moments beautifully. They also work within the composition of the panels to bring out the depth perception, sense of scale and the overall sense of size and scope to the story. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a remarkably talented eye for storytelling. The various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work show a sensational eye for how colour works. The creativity and imagination that we see throughout the book really is extraordinarily great to see.

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There are some rather exceptional moments that happen throughout the book that really stand out and it’s a combination of words and visuals that do this. It’s nice to see that regardless of which universe this is, the Klingons and the dreaded Kardashian’s are enemies that need destroying. With some excellent writing and strong interesting characterisation wrapped up in these insanely strong interiors make this one hell of a good read.