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Exclusive: Young Captain Picard commands the U.S.S. Stargazer in Star Trek: IDW 20/20 one-shot
IDW Publishing's big 20th anniversary celebration rolls on this month as the mini-major refreshes five of their major licensed titles with a time-traveling series of oversized one-shot releases.
The January party sparkles with some of pop culture’s most treasured properties as Ghostbusters, Jem and the Holograms, My Little Pony, Star Trek, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles uncover characters' secrets and mysteries shot 20 years into the future or tugged back to the past.
SYFY WIRE has scored an exclusive preview and creator chat for this week's festivities starring the younger version of Captain Picard in Star Trek: IDW 20/20, smartly written by Peter David (Fallen Angel, The Incredible Hulk, Spider-Man 2099) and out-of-this-world art by J.K. Woodward (Fallen Angel, Star Trek: The Next Generation).
Set 20 years before he took the helm of the U.S.S. Enterprise-D, Jean-Luc Picard squarely sat in the captain’s chair of the U.S.S. Stargazer (with hair!). Picard served with honor and distinction aboard the Stargazer vessel for years as he ascended up through the ranks to become the most respected captain in Starfleet. This early mission recalling a time when he was still forging his legend reveals that Picard, though now an undisputed icon in the Federation, was still merely a man back then.
"I was extremely excited when I first heard about this project," Woodward told SYFY WIRE. "Not only does it take place in an era I always wanted to explore, but it allowed me to work with Peter David again after almost 10 years.
"I think what makes this issue so much fun for me personally, is it gave me the opportunity to create a species more or less from the ground up, and it gave me multiple scenes to work in, from the high-tech to the primal. I knew from page one, it would be both enjoyable and challenging."
A personal privilege Woodward often indulges in while providing art on Star Trek books is putting fans and friends into small "walk-in roles."
"In this story, I included many friends," he reveals. "The first of which, I met on last year's "Star Trek: The Cruise" after a painting demonstration. Two guys, both named Mohammed, but everyone called them "The Mo's" and they landed the Nav and Ops position in this comic after I made one of them into a Vulcan. Another friend, Holly, I met at the CBS archives where she worked at the time. She's become the occasional cohost on my podcast (Go Trek Yourself) and I've always considered her a greater "Trekspert" than myself and as valuable a Trek resource as she is a friend. So I put her in the monster maroons and set her to work as security officer in the transporter room."
Beam into our early look at IDW's Star Trek: IDW 20/20 in the full gallery below and tell us if you'll be checkin' out Picard's lovely locks when the one-shot drops Jan. 30.
