STAR TREK (2026) #1 / Script by CHRISTOPHER CANTWELL / Art and Colors by DENNIS MENHEERE / Letters by JODIE TROUTMAN / Design and Production by DARRAN ROBINSON / Published by IDW ENTERTAINMENT

When I was offered a chance to preview the new IDW Star Trek comic, I was ready to give it a miss. Despite a lifetime as an unashamed geek, I never got into Star Trek. There are only so many nerd hours in the day and I have trouble enough keeping up with the Marvel and DC multiverses. The sum total of my Star Trek knowledge came from watching all of The Original Series during the pandemic and what bits and bobs I learned from Trekker friends and various parodies.

Still, the challenge appealed to me. I’d heard nothing but good things about the Star Trek comics ever since IDW took over the franchise. And I was curious how accessible the books might be to a total novice. Would there be any effort at explaining it all for newbies? Or would it just be presumed anyone reading a new Star Trek comic must already be familiar with the franchise to date?

This first issue opens in the thick of the action. The Enterprise-G is in the process of evacuating all four colony worlds of the Revlav system, in the wake of the planets’ electromagnetic fields collapsing. The good news is the crew are able to save a thousand colonists. The bad news is this is the second new home the Avuran people have lost.

A solution is offered when the Enterprise-G is assigned to explore a new sector of space beyond the known galaxy dubbed the Epsilon Corridor. What probes survived a five year survey mission have discovered three habitable planets. However, there is one catch – the Epsilon Corridor is subject to an intense time dilation effect, with five years in normal space passing for every one inside. This offers an interesting challenge for the crew of the Enterprise-G and their accompanying support fleet, even before they encounter strange psychic turbulence upon entering the Epsilon Corridor.

I drew comfort from the fact that this series is written by Christopher Cantwell, who is apparently a well-respected Star Trek writer. I knew him, however, as the writer behind the excellent 2019 Doctor Doom series. Cantwell does a fair job of introducing the cast and there’s a sequence in the middle of the book that allows the reader to learn the names, faces, and job titles of the core crew. This effectively replaces the traditional cast roster prefacing most superhero comics. And there are stylized datalog entries providing what few info-dumps cannot be worked into the narrative.

However, some base familiarity with the franchise is necessary. If you don’t know all the various races, the comic makes no effort to explain things like who the Borg are, why they are so feared, and why having two officers with Borg DNA on a single ship is a classified matter. There’s little that can’t be explained with a quick web search on the Memory Alpha wiki, but the story seems aimed at those wanting a continuation of the series Picard.

The artwork is similarly rough. There is a certain dream-like quantity to Dennis Menheere’s artwork which I thought fit the holographic simulations and nightmare sequences. Unfortunately, this same style is used throughout the book. The sketchy linework and crude stylized aesthetic seems at odds with the sleek, streamlined setting.

All in all, I found Star Trek #1 to be a mixed bag. There’s an engaging story at the core and a cliffhanger ending the encourages further reading. Unfortunately, the pacing was ruined by my needing to break to check reference books to find out who was arguing with who and why. Throw in art that seems better suited to cyberpunk than space opera and you have a comic that may please enthusiasts but won’t convert readers into Trekkers.

Star Trek (2026) #1 arrives in comic shops everywhere on September 23, 2026.