Bridging The Generation Gap

IDW Publishing has joined with Paramount Pictures and ,J.J. Abrams' production company Bad Robot, are joining forces to publish a four-issue limited comic book series tied to next summer's Star Trek reboot released on May 8, 2009.

The first comic in the series called, "Star Trek: Countdown" will be released in January 2009 to the comic book direct market. The story is presented by Abrams and plotted by screenwriters Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman. It is written by Mike Johnson and Tim Jones and art by David Messina

Messina also provides covers for the series.

Series editor Andy Schmidt"There was a lot of back and forth about doing this project, how to do it, what it would be about, but what all parties agreed on was that we needed the right story and that it needed to matter. It had to count both on its own merits and when read in conjunction with the new movie . I couldn't be happier with the project and what it means to the overall Star Trek franchise!"

"'Star Trek: Countdown' lays the groundwork for what happens in the movie," said Orci. "It's our way of passing the baton from the The Next Generation characters and their movies to the new film.

A similar series of prequels were published to coincide with the release of Superman Returns in '06...One more marketing tool to keep fanboys (like me) happy till the film beams into theaters



Meantime--FirstShowing has news that the movie will be converted for IMAX theaters when it is released. However the film will be a conversion only, no 3D elements or specific IMAX-filmed sequences ala "The Dark Knight"