A LOOK AT THE STAR TREK TOS UK ANNUALS

 

As my Star Trek TOS posts are going down really well with a lot of you, I thought I’d continue the theme and take a look at the World Distributors Star Trek annuals we got between 1969 and 1986 here in the UK.

They all contained reprints of American Gold Key comics that were not so easy to pick up regularly in Britain at the time, as I believe they were simply carried over in freighters as ballast, and then sold off cheaply to wholesalers.

As there was eventually 61 Star Trek Gold Key comics released from 1967 until 1979 it wouldn’t have been an easy task to collect them all in the UK at the time.

Spotting a TV related Gold Key cover in the local newsagent was something that always attracted me, and to be honest it still would, even though they were, and are very much about style over content!

This Star Trek Gold Key comic issue 15, The Museum at the End of Time is dated August, 1972. I picked this up at my local newsagent probably around 1973 and remarkably managed to keep hold of it. The cover artist is George Wilson.

This is where the annuals come in.

Here’s a look at the covers, and occasionally a few points which some of you might find of interest.

The first annual was released in towards the end of 1969, around September just in time for the build up to Christmas.

This first annual isn’t dated on the cover but confusingly it would classed as the 1970 edition.

It contained the strips from the first three Star Trek Gold Key comics. The story from the third Star Trek Gold Key comic, ‘ The Invasion of the City Builders’ was originally published in December, 1968. It was written by Dick Wood, and drawn by Alberto Giolitti. It’s notable that the artist has drawn the figures almost identical to the figures on a panel from the front page of an Eagle comic (dated 8^th February, 1964), originally drawn by Keith Watson, and featuring Dan Dare in the story, The Wandering World. I wonder if Alberto was a Dan Dare fan?

Something that looks a little like Dan Dare’s personal spaceship, Anastasia also makes an appearance in a later annual.

A black & white version of The Invasion of the City Builders appears in the 1971 soft cover Star Trek comic album.

The covers for the 1971 and 1972 annuals.

The covers for the 1973 and 1974 annuals. The 1974 annual reprints my only Gold Key comic The Museum at the End of Time.

The covers for the 1975 and 1976 annuals.

The cover for the 1977 annual. This contained two Gold Key reprints – Sceptre of the Sun & The Psychocrystals.

It also had plenty of filler features, including this rather familiar looking six-wheeled vehicle, and a repeat of that Dan Dare panel, plus another drawing of ‘Annie’!

The cover of the 1978 annual.

The cover of the 1979 annual. This reprinted two Gold Key issues: A Bomb in Time & Furlough to Fury, Here’s a panel drawn by Alberto Giolitti from A Bomb in Time (Gold Key issue 36; March 1976) showing what is described as Research Satellite 5!

Although the above storybook is dated 1978, I class it as the 1980 annual.  It contains three Gold Key stories; Sport of Knaves; A World Against Itself; and No Time Like the Past. That last story features the  mysterious time portal known as 'The Guardian of Forever', which was first seen in the award winning episode, 'The City on the Edge of Forever'.

This book from 1979/1980 was published by Marvel/Grandreams and, although not technically an annual contains the Marvel comic strip for Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

In 1982, Stafford Pemberton published this 1983 Star Trek annual with the subtitle, “The Wrath of Khan” as another movie tie-in.

However, there are very few movie features inside, and the book simply reprints two more Gold Key stories: To Er is Vulcan & Operation Con Game.

The final Star Trek annual came out in 1986. Published by World International, it was all reprinted material including the end papers (from the 1978 annual) and the features. The Gold Key stories were ‘Ice Journey’ which had already been reprinted in the 1976 annual, and ‘Furlough to Fury’, which is in the 1979 annual.

It's the only annual to use the familiar TV type face for the title, rather than what was used for the Gold Key comics.