Q drops in on nuTrek, and other comics news

July is looking like it's going to be pretty exciting for Star Trek comics. io9 have announced issue thirty-five of the nuTrek ongoing series will be the first in a six part story featuring Q! io9 spoke to the series' writer, Mike Johnson, about The Q Gambit, who revealed a few details about the story, including what it is that draws Q to the new timeline:

At first: curiosity. A beloved Trek character from the original timeline makes a cameo appearance at the beginning of the story (issue #35) and tries to convince Q to leave the new timeline alone. But Q can't resist a new sandbox to play in and cool new toys to play with: toys like Kirk, Spock and the rest of the Enterprise crew. Ultimately we'll learn that there is something unique to the new timeline that affects Q directly, although he would rather the humans not know what it is.

Johnson also revealed that this will take place at the leading edge of Q's personal timeline, so all the Q adventures we already known from the prime-timeline have already occured from his point of view. Johnson also talked a little about Q's take on nuKirk and Spock:

Q is intrigued by Kirk's refusal to accept no-win scenarios. It drives him a little crazy, actually. Spock is more of a puzzle for Q given that he is only half-human. For Kirk and Spock, Q presents a challenge on an order of magnitude beyond what they've encountered in their still-young careers. Nero and Khan were dangerous, but neither had control over space and time the way Q does.

UPDATE: StarTrek.com have now posted about this too, and their summary seems to suggest even more crossover in this series:

...the mischievous Q sends James T. Kirk on a quest that will witness the Enterprise joining forces with familiar faces from Trek lore, beginning with the crew of a very familiar space station.

So there's only really one "very familiar space station" in Star Trek, Deep Space 9 (sorry Vanguard). With six issues to play with, could we be seeing Q take the nuTrek crew into crossovers with each of the other Trek series? (I've no inside information, just speculating.)

StarTrek.com also confirm the new-to-Trek artist credited on the cover is Tony Shasteen, who's previous credits include Batman and Vampire Diaries comics.

Also recently announced for July is the first ever all prime-series crossover comic, Flesh and Stone, which IDW have now posted a slightly longer description of in their press release:

Star Trek Special: Flesh and Stone, written by longtimeStar Trek scribes Scott and David Tipton, takes place at a Starfleet medical conference, which is crashed by a deadly metamorphic virus. The EMH and Doctors Beverly Crusher, Julian Bashir and Katherine Pulaski (with some help from Leonard McCoy and Phlox) join forces in a race against time to find a cure - only to discover that the answers lie in another place and time! The clock is ticking and only the medical officers of Starfleet can save the day.

And as if that's not enough excitement for one month, July will also see the release of issue two in John Byrne's New Visions photo-comic series. Byrne recently posted a few panels from that issue on his forums:

One of the little things I've started doing -- part of the whole "characters appearing even tho they don't have dialog -- is spotting various guest stars into the backgrounds. People who played a character on one episode, and then were gone. For instance, in the second issue is a short backup that has a three panel appearance by Marla Magivers. It takes place before the Khan story, so I figured she'd be wandering around somewhere!

Chris Ryall also recently posted a preview from one of the photo-comics on his blog. This page has a different sort a guest star, with Gabriel Rodriguez, the artist of IDW's Lock and Key series, appearing:

Back on Byrne's forums, Byrne also gave some details on the eventual omnibus edition of the New Visions comics: The first omnibus will contain three of the double-length issues, including the first photo-comic, which was released as a stand-alone annual. That issue is also set for a reprint to coincide with the publication of issue one of the ongoing series, and will have a rebranded cover, putting under the New Visions banner.