Review: Star Trek #11

The Truth About Tribbles Part 1

Writer: Mike Johnson

Artist: Claudia Balboni

It’s time for the new Enterprise crew to meet their deadliest foe yet: the tribbles!

There are some really nice touches in this new version of David Gerrold’s classic story The Trouble With Tribbles, not least of which is the fact that it doesn’t try to rewrite the original to fit the new characters, but takes some of the same set up and extrapolates in a completely different direction.

Beginning with an extended version of the scene on Delta Vega in the 2009 film which showed a tribble, this links to Scotty’s transwarping experiments and incorporates elements from More Tribbles, More Troubles as well as the original story.

Scotty’s nephew on Earth isn’t one we’ve met before (the timeframe really would be askew if Peter Preston, seen as a young cadet in The Wrath of Khan was at the Academy in 2258/9) and while it’s a great plot idea to multiply the effect of the tribble threat (sorry!) by bringing them to the Academy, you have to wonder why there are no safeguards against unknown organisms being beamed in.

The art this issue appropriately brings back memories of the animated series, and the likenesses are good. Ignore the suggestion on the cover though that this is replicating the scene with Uhura, Chekov and a tribble from the original story, and treat this as a completely new adventure, and you’ll enjoy it more.

Verdict: A neat twist on the tribble myth.  8/10

Paul Simpson