1194. PassagesPUBLICATION: Starfleet Academy #6, Marvel Comics, May 1997
CREATORS: Chris Cooper (writer), Chris Renaud and Andy Lanning (artists)
STARDATE: Unknown (follows the last issue)
PLOT: The Academy gets a new commandant, Decker gets a new eye, and Omega Squad is set to get a new recruit. They meet him at Goldstein's funeral when he's thrown from a bike into her grave. Edam Astrun is the most gifted telepath on Betazed, recruited for the post-shapeshifter threat Starfleet, but contemptuous of other cadets. He proves his worth, however, when he draws the right physics knowledge from a professor to close a dangerous singularity in a lab. Later, a murder attempt is made on his life, for which Nog is accused...
CONTINUITY: Boothby appears. Admiral Brand takes a sabbatical after the events of Paradise Lost. The cloaked aliens are Jem'Hadar.
DIVERGENCES: None, although you may question some of Edam's telepathic tricks.
PANEL OF THE DAY - A Titanic moment.
REVIEW: Unless he doesn't recover next issue, Edam Astrun is the new member of Omega Squad. I'm unsure about him. First, he uses his telepathy the way a mutant from the X-Men might, and while it suits comic book conventions, it does put a strain on the Star Trek format. Secondly, just as Decker is mellowing out re: Nog, we get another character to be the jerk. It's the kind of manufactured conflict à la Voyager that is hard to sustain and if sustained, imperils the character's likability. Still, I'm willing to give him a chance, arrogant version of Tam Elbrun though he be. Elsewhere in the issue, the new commandant Admiral Pradesh provides a blank canvas for Cooper's new "principal", but we've got nothing except another arrogant character for now. Bootby gets a sweet scene in relation to the funeral. Lip service keeps being paid to T'Priell's Romulan sleeper subplot, and there's a mysterious scene featuring Jem'Hadar (though that's not obvious unless you look intently at the silhouettes - in fact the background is misleading on purpose). The pay-offs to all these should be interesting.
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