997. Unforgiven / Echoes of YesterdayPUBLICATION: Star Trek v.2 Special #3, DC Comics, 1995
CREATORS: 1st story - Michael Jan Friedman (writer), Steve Erwin and Jimmy Palmiotti (artists); 2nd story - Mark A. Altman (writer), Ken Save and Ron Boyd (artists)
STARDATE: 5049.2 (Season 3); Unknown (after #45)
PLOT: In Unforgiven, Kirk takes time off to go camping with his recently deceased brother's three sons, one of which (Jason) hopes to join Starfleet. When Jason comes across a cloaked Orion ground fleet about to attack a dilithium mining company, he gets the whole family in trouble and captured. Kirk allows Jason to find a way out of their predicament and they cause problems for the Orions, forcing them to decloak and allowing the colony to properly defend itself.
In Echoes of Yesterday, another of Kirk's nephews (Peter) helps the last two survivors of the Sumellian race acquire time travel secrets from his Uncle Jim, so they can go back in time and save their planet from destruction. The Enterprise-A follows them into the past and prevents the Sumellians from disrupting history, but Peter is long gone. He's heading for Deneva to prevent his parents' death at the hands of the neural parasites. Kirk arrives there just in time to see his brother die and his nephew get infected. Kirk is knocked out in the ensuing drama and is beamed back up to the ship and promptly returned to the present. Back in the past, Peter flies into the sun to get rid of his parasite, just as the Enterprise arrives on the scene.
CONTINUITY: Sam Kirk died on Devena in Operation: Annihilate!, a mission which starts with a ship flying into the sun. We now know this was Kirk's time displaced nephew. The Federation President from ST V passes the torch on to the Federation President from ST VI. Carol Marcus (ST II) and Admiral Cartwright (ST VI) also appear. Kirk recently used the slingshot method of time travel in ST IV. The week the Enterprise-A visits in the past is a busy one. In addition to the destruction of Sumellia and the death of Sam Kirk, there was the official signing of the Organian treaty (Errand of Mercy) and the Guardian planet is put into a security zone (The City on the Edge of Forever).
DIVERGENCES: None.
PANEL OF THE DAY - You may now kiss the President.
REVIEW: Two stories that follow the same theme, repercussions felt from the death of Kirk's brother Sam, and both are pretty decent. Unforgiven features Kirk in some atypical R&R action, far from his ship, and casts him as his family's new patriarch. The second is more obsessed with continuity and has inferior art, but is still quite entertaining. I've got to face it, I'm a sucker for a clever time travel story, which this becomes once the Sumellian herring is out of the way. This is the second time Kirk has had to let a loved one die to protect history, so he must not be looking forward to the next slingshot trip! Both stories have witty dialogue and a fair bit of action too. A strong way for me to leave the main DC series.
Comments