As part of my new posting initiative (posting every day in March!), I hope to do more comic reviews on Sundays, so make sure to check back every weekend to see a review of the next chapter. If you have something you think I should check out for this, feel free to drop a comment. Now that introductions are out of the way, it’s time for the task at hand – It’s been a while since I took a look at this crossover to end all crossovers brought to us by IDW Comics. Fans have speculated for years as to which cybernetic villain would prevail in a hypothetical battle between Doctor Who’s cybermen or Star Trek’s Borg, and Doctor Who / Star Trek: Assimilation Squared is just what the doctor ordered. Sadly both armies of zombie androids are still on the same side as of issue three, we’ll see how long that lasts!
To recap the story so far, a Star Fleet outpost on Delta IV has been ransacked by The Borg, only they seem to have new upgrades or another race entirely helping them. This is of course The Cybermen from the Doctor Who universe, and for some reason these seemingly parallel dimensions have crossed allowing both villains to team up. It all starts when The Doctor and Amy Pond find their way into what they think is the past, only for it to be revealed as the Holo-deck on the U.S.S. Enterprise. Shenanigans ensue, and just when everyone is starting to get used to each other, The Enterprise itself gets attacked.
We finally get to see the new Cyber-controller, a vague term given to a myriad of different high-ranking Doctor Who villains that control the Cybermen. This time it is a Cyberman that has Borg implants. One only assumes that this new leader has assumed the roles of both Cyber-Controller and The Hive Queen, which is a terrifying thought! Captain Jean Luc Picard and crew scour their Star Fleet archives to see if there is any record of so called “Cyber Men” and come up with a few sparse records of contact with the NCC-1701 Enterprise commanded by none other than Captain James T. Kirk.
This scene made me chuckle a bit because it was sort of like Commander Data ran a Google Image Search for “Cybermen” and read off of a Wikipedia page or something. I guess the internet doesn’t change too much in the next few hundred years! This old-school crossover should be no surprise if you saw the awesome cover that this book is sporting. The Doctor collapses in pain as if he is just remembering something – his first encounter with the Star Trek crew!
The next few pages of flash-backs are pretty fun, and the entire tone of the comic shifts with the new setting. Gone are the painted panels by J.K. Woodward, replaced by vaguely “retro” ones depicting Kirk and Co. battling 1970’s Cybermen alongside The Doctor as portrayed by Tom Baker. I really enjoyed all of the tropes like Kirk trying to fight the Cybermen with his patented “double axe-handle” punch we’ve seen so much in the show. Also quite humorous was Mr. Spock finding out what Jelly babies are.
At the end of this issue, were still not sure what has exactly brought these two world together, but one can assume that some sort of time travel is happening considering The Doctor both remembers his time with Kirk and remembers not remembering it. Perhaps a cyberman slipped dimensions and ended up in Star trek? Who knows right now, but hopefully we’ll find out soon. Perhaps that is the most refreshing thing about Doctor Who / Star Trek: Assimilation Squared – unlike most crossover events, the tone of the book doesn’t seem to be preoccupied with a lead up to some massive battle, but a mystery of how exactly the cross-over even happened.
The next issue should be pretty awesome considering Guinan knows pretty much everything, it’ll be interesting to see if she knows about Time Lords and Cybermen.
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J.K. Woodward has stated that, as someone who grew up watching reruns of both the original Star Trek and the Tom Baker episodes of Doctor Who, it was a dream come true to illustrate the cover to this issue. It was his idea to have the Galileo Shuttlecraft and the TARDIS parked next to each other.
That’s awesome 🙂 His cover is pretty amazing as well, I’d love to get it as a poster TBH.