Review – Star Trek/Green Lantern #4 (IDW Publishing)

Publisher: IDW Publishing
Title: Writer: Mike Johnson
Artist: Angel Hernandez
Release Date: 14th October 2015

We’ve crossed the halfway mark with this crossover event, and the story has been fully established, with all the main players set up and in position. What we haven’t yet seen is any confrontation between our baddies and our heroes. Will issue #4 finally kick the conflict into high gear?

Issue #4 begins by dishing out the final missing pieces of the story, firmly establishing Nekron as our main threat. Hal Jordan seems despondent as he repeats the story of his doomed universe, in which nothing now lives except the dead. When Kirk replies that with such a ‘no-win scenario’ on their hands Hal is lucky he is on this particular ship it really begins to feel like this issue will finally be taking full advantage of the potential of this crossover. Putting a defiantly unbeatable Captain Kirk alongside a more pessimistic Hal Jordan justifies the effort taken to bring these characters together in the first place, where a simple butting of heads story between two big egos could have come across as cliche. As a side note, it is also hilarious to see characters being changed by their power rings, with Dr McCoy having inherited an unusually compassionate bedside manner.

Not only does the action fully kick off in this issue, but it does so in many directions at once. We are not given a simple good vs evil setup of two sides, but each of the more ‘evil’ Lantern colour corps is out for their own agenda, with some causing havoc for rage and greed being beaten back by a dominating Sinestro who seeks control and order in this new universe, who is then attacked by the Federation and our good Lanterns. Sinestro’s fear attack upon the Enterprise reveals what our Trek heroes fear most, and leaves Hal Jordan in command of the Federation flagship by the end of the issue. My only complaint with the story would be that Nekron’s plot is almost relegated to a ‘post-credits scene’, and we are yet to really see his threat intersect with the action of our main cast.

Art-wise, Angel Hernandez does excellent, bright and, most appropriately, colourful space battles. In particular he captures the more up-close-and-personal aspects of fights from the perspective of those flying around with power rings. There has never been a more asymmetrical fight in a Star Trek comic than two small humanoids trying to fight an entire space station, and it is really neat to see such small participants flying around, weaving and dodging, and getting smashed by photon torpedoes.

Rating: 5/5.

ARTWORK PREVIEW
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