A new artist has joined IDW’s Star Trek: The Last Starfighter comic for its seventh issue, and with that comes a new arc that boasts a noticeable tone shift into horror. If you haven’t been keeping up with previous issues, fear not: you can dive right in and get Star Trek frights—featuring Captain James T. Kirk during the time of the Burn—without missing a beat. Here’s the description for issue #7: “The crew of the USS Omega are desperately trying to hold the Federation’s vision of a united galaxy together, but they’re failing. The spirit of cooperation is dead, but Starfleet’s mission might not be, thanks to a research station on the aptly named Deep Space Hope. There, one last shining ray of possibility remains in an ever-darkening universe. A way to put everything back in its rightful place… if only Sato and his crew are bold enough to seize it.” Issue #7 comes from writers Collin Kelly and Jackson Lanzing, artist Hernan Gonzalez, colorist Lee Loughridge, and letterer Clayton Cowles and hits shelves today, May 20. io9 has an interview about the new issue with Kelly and Lanzing, and we also have an exclusive peek at the artwork for issue #8 to boot.
Star Trek: The Last Starship issue #8 artwork. © IDW io9: Issue #7 kicks off the third chapter of Last Starship, and things are only getting worse for the Omega and the Federation. How would you describe the way the tone shifts as we enter this new arc for the book? Lanzing: We’re going full cosmic horror. Kelly: “Stare into the abyss and shudder as it stares back” kind of stuff. Lanzing: Honestly, it’s more of a horror than we’d even intended when we first outlined. This chapter demanded it. This story has been a survival thriller (in Chapter I, “The Burn”) and a political drama (in Chapter 2, “The Chain”), but Chapter 3 is called “The Hope”—and that’s because it’s the story where we dash all hope for an easy solution against the rocks of the burning universe. This is the story of how everything falls apart for the USS Omega—and it’s a moment we’ve been leading to since issue #1.
