If you drew a Venn diagram of the readers likely to enjoy the 2015-2016 crossovers of Green Lantern and Star Trek, I’ve got to imagine that you’d be left with a pretty select target audience. Lucky for me that I’m smack dab in the middle of it. IDW have so far published 2 mini-series, The Spectrum War and Stranger Worlds, both of which see the core elements of Geoff Johns’ epic 2004-2013 run literally dropped into the continuity of the JJ Abrams Star Trek movies. It’s not an obvious crossover, and familiarity with both storylines is required to get a full appreciation of the events. But I’m not ashamed to say that after 100+ comic books and many hours of movie and tv watching, I have that experience, and these comics knocked my socks off.
Writer Mike Johnson has had plenty of practice with the movie crew of the USS Enterprise, being a regular writer on the IDW comic series based on that property, but he does a fantastic job here of dove-tailing the likes of Kirk, Spock and Bones seamlessly with GL mainstays such as Hal Jordan, Carol Danvers, Sinestro and Atrocitus. It shouldn’t really be a surprise that these franchises fit together like hand and glove; both use protagonists as base representations of core human qualities, eg. logic, compassion and adventurism. Both are also heavily based on action-heavy plotting and megalomaniacal villains with doomsday device abilities (Star Trek especially so since the 2009 film reboot).
The art by Angel Hernandez renders the characters in a stylised but realistic format, such that likenesses of Chris Pine, and Zachary Quinto etc. can be readily recognised, but do not distract from the reading experience. Johnson’s plot is basically an increasingly spectacular catalogue of fan what-if’s, and Hernandez’ spectacular page layouts realise them like a cinema blockbuster. There are some unresolved plot threads left dangling for a third series to pick up, but as of mid-2018, no further adventures have been announced. I’ve got my fingers crossed for a continuation; like a peanut butter and jam sandwich, I was delighted at how well the two parts went together, and I’d be glad for more!
