Tuesday, December 27, 2016

"The End" Week: Dreadstar #64!


It's one thing to have an off issue, but it's another to go out on one: from 1991, Dreadstar #64, "Franchise and Empire" Written by Peter David, pencils by Angel Medina, inks by Bill Anderson.

Peter David had been writing the Jim Starlin-created Dreadstar for a good two years, and had written a number of Star Trek novels and comics as well. For a while there, he also had a rep as a "funny" book writer, in that there were more jokes than usual for that time; and although he could go dark as needed. This issue featured a broad parody version of Star Trek, and is pretty awful.

Which is fine, since not every at-bat is a home run; but the letters page also promises a three-issue prestige format mini-series, Dreadstar Rising, that now only lives on Peter David's Lost Works. Publisher First Comics would go under before their attempt to switch from monthly titles to prestige minis got any books out. (Badger: Bedlam might have been the only one that was released, and I hadn't been sure about that until I looked it up!)

Three years later, Dreadstar would return for a mini-series with Bravura/Malibu. Which wasn't bad; and a damn sight better than this issue.

1 comment:

Mr. Morbid's House Of Fun said...

I had a random issue of David's run, where the team's fighting killer space ants. Good Angel medina art tho.