IDW Editor Andrew Steven Harris Aims High

IDW's Star Trek: Second Stage seeks to elevate comic book storytelling and attract both comic book and Star Trek fans.

As reported at Trekweb, IDW editor Andrew Steven Harris seeks to improve the Star Trek line of comics. "Ever since IDW hired me to take over its Star Trek line of books," he explained, "I had wanted to 'up our game', to take things to the next level, so that these weren't just a line of licensed comics, but were a real significant contribution to both comic book storytelling and Star Trek fiction."

The new Star Trek stories in the forthcoming IDW Star Trek: Second Stage comic series are meant to "...tell great stories," Harris said. "We're also looking to attract attention to those stories, so that they get as much attention as possible both among comics fans and Star Trek fans. Because the secret truth of it is that some comics fans still regard Star Trek fandom as an alien creature, and some Trek fans still look at comics like a ghetto form of storytelling."

Quality storytelling attracts high-profile creators to the titles, according to Harris. One of those who will be involved is John Byrne, who discussed his participation in the project in the article located here. Byrne, not a fan of doing likenesses of sometimes temperamental actors, was enticed by the chance to do Star Trek aliens. His work on the Alien Spotlight: Romulans issue, due out in February, was enjoyable enough that he elected to do a full-fledged Trek series, called Assignment Earth, which like the Star Trek television episode of the same name, will focus on the adventures of Gary Seven.

Increasing the number of titles per month is a risk, but Harris is confident about the quality of the stories and feels that readers will respond by supporting the series. "Star Trek: Second Stage is probably the most dramatic, ambitious line of Trek comics ever launched," he said. "...The idea I had was that we would expand our line to four titles a month, so that it would have the feeling of 'appointment viewing' for our readers, just like a weekly episode of the TV show. At the same time, however, each miniseries itself would have the feeling of a major event, like a Star Trek film, in which the story overall contributed in a significant or memorable way to the body of Trek fiction. I want each of our miniseries to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with major Trek novels, to be the kind of titles that people remember and talk about even as they're talking about their favorite Trek TV episode or film.

To read the article, head to the article located here.

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