Collecting the fleet: Preview of the first few issues of the Starships Collection

Out tomorrow, in the UK (and in a couple of months in the US), is issue one of Star Trek: The Official Starships Collection. Having signed up to the test run last year I've already had the first three issues for a while (see my mini-review last week), and now Eaglemoss have let me have an advanced look at the next couple of issues as well.

Issue four features the Enterprise NX-01, which of the five ships I've seen so far impresses me the most. It has an incredibly detailed paint shop, with every marking, and bit of aztecing imaginable translated onto the model. It is also almost entirely made of metal, with just the nacelles in plastic (other ships in the series are about half and half), which makes it feel pleasingly substantial.

Issue five is one of my all time favourite designs, the D'deridex class Romulan warbird. Like the previous Klingon Bird of Prey, the paint job on this uses a more impressionist paint effect to give an idea of details across the hull, rather than making it a flat colour (I think this looks great), while adding in details where they've been established, such as the many tiny windows:

Here's my fleet so far:

As these are still well established and repeatedly seen designs, so I'm still looking forward to seeing how the magazine deals with a really obscure ship. But until then I continue to be satisfied with the balance of in-universe and real world information, giving a nice overview of each ship both on-screen and behind the camera. I'm finding the design articles particularly enjoyable. It's been nice to see Ships of the Line images appear a couple of times already; the NX-01 has a spread devoted to Doug Drexler's refit design, and the warbird makes note of Andy Probert's vertical warbird concept design getting fleshed out in his later Ships of the Line image. I've also had a look at the sixth magazine (but not the model yet), which focuses on the USS Voyager, including  a nice spread on the Aeroshuttle. Here are a couple of sample spreads:

Continue after the jump for covers and official model photos of the first few months issues, and make sure to check back over the next day or two to find my full review of issue one, the USS Enterprise-D.

Entertainment Earth are now listing up to issue eight for pre-order. They have posted a low-res cover for issue eight, the USS Excelsior, although at the moment it's pictured with the Voyager model:

Eaglemoss also sent me over a couple more images of the warbird: