Harlan Ellison's The City on the Edge of Forever, Issue 2 was the second issue of a five-part Star Trek: The Original Series miniseries published in 2014 which adapted Harlan Ellison's original script for TOS episode: "The City on the Edge of Forever". It was adapted by writers Scott and David Tipton and painted by J.K. Woodward.
Description[]
- Solicitation text
- Harlan Ellison’s Hugo and WGA Award-winning teleplay, visualized for the first time! Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock and Yeoman Rand return to the Enterprise following their first encounter with the Guardians of Forever, only to find a darker, more vicious crew of renegades awaiting them! Can they return the timestream to its proper state? And will they even survive long enough to try?
Summary[]
Failing to stop Beckwith, the crewman has escaped to the past of Earth. At a light from Oyya, the Guardians retreat back to the city to consult the machines of the ancients but warn that the whole universe beyond the Gateway has changed. As the entities vanish, Kirk has Rand beam the crewmen up to the ship. When she, Kirk and Spock follow however they are greeted by a gang of ruffians and thugs who welcome them aboard their ship: the SS Condor. Kirk hardly takes this lying down and orders Rand to overload the transporter console, allowing the Enterprise crew to force their captors out of the room. With Spock, Kirk beams back down to the city, intending to follow Beckwith back and change things to what they were.
As the two materialize, the Guardians reappear and confirm that everything they knew never existed. Though they are initially unwilling to allow the two to follow, Kirk's fiery passion is enough to convince them, allowing the two to be sent back to some point before Beckwith arrived in the past. Before they leave however, the Guardians inform them that both they and Beckwith will be drawn to a "focal point" in time. The focal point will be blue as the sky, bearing the sun and the key to all things. The focal point must die but Beckwith will instead give it life. And if Kirk and Spock should fail, there will be no second chance to repair time.
The two men materialize in a 1930s street where Spock is appalled by the violent racism of the time, and the vaunted Earth heritage that humans seem so proud of. As if to emphasize his point, the mob targets him as a foreigner forcing Kirk to scare them off with a phaser. The two cut across alleyways and backyards and duck into a basement.
References[]
Characters[]
- Guardians of Forever • James T. Kirk • Nimblek • Owstian • Janice Rand • Spock • unnamed SS Condor personnel
- Referenced only
- Beckwith
Starships and vehicles[]
- SS Condor
- Referenced only
- USS Enterprise (Constitution-class)
Locations[]
- Gateway • Earth (New York City) • Oyya
Races and cultures[]
States and organizations[]
- Civilian Conservation Corps • Starfleet • United Federation of Planets • United States of America
Science and technology[]
- communicator • disruptor • machine • phaser • rifle • time portal • time vortex • transporter • tricorder
Ranks and titles[]
Other references[]
- alternate timeline • bread • city • coordinates • country • English language • Great Depression • history • logic • physics • soup • Starfleet uniform • Starfleet uniform (2265-2270) • sun • universe • year
Appendices[]
Related media[]
- TOS episode: "The City on the Edge of Forever" – the episode as aired.
- TOS comic: "No Time Like the Past" – In 2267, Kirk, Spock and McCoy traveled through the Guardian of Forever to an alternate timeline where the USS Enterprise (NCC-2101) was operated by Earthfleet.
- TOS short story: "Gateway to the Future" – Kirk and Spock visited the far future through a pillared time travel device protected by an elderly humanoid calling himself the Guardian of the Future.
Background[]
- Scott Tipton was the model for the bald Human holding the disruptor, located just right of SS Condor's captain.
- Chris Ryall was the model for the 1930's man wearing a hat on page 15 as Kirk and Spock materialize.
- The red-skinned alien at the transporter controls was of the race D'rel T'lor, and the two female SS Condor officers were Romulan and Klingon. (Artist's Annotations segment, printed in the omnibus)
Connections[]
Timeline[]
| published order | ||
|---|---|---|
| Previous comic: Harlan Ellison's The City on the Edge of Forever, Issue 1 |
TOS comics IDW Publishing |
Next comic: Harlan Ellison's The City on the Edge of Forever, Issue 3 |
| chronological order | ||
Publication history[]
- 23 July 2014
- First printed by IDW Publishing.
- 3 February 2015
- Collected in the hardcover omnibus. (IDW Publishing)
- 19 January 2017
- Collected in the Graphic Novel Collection's Volume 2 omnibus. (Eaglemoss Collections)
Translations[]
- 6 September 2017
- Italian: Collected in the Italian paperback release of Graphic Novel Collection, Volume 2: La Città Sull’orlo del Sempre – La Sceneggiatura Originale. (RCS MediaGroup, ISSN 977228074425770002)
- 18 February 2021
- Spanish: Collected in the Spanish hardcover omnibus as La ciudad al borde de la eternidad. (Editorial Drakul, ISBN 978-8412169249)
External link[]
- Harlan Ellison's The City on the Edge of Forever, Issue 2 article at Memory Alpha, the wiki for canon Star Trek.
- Preview: IDW's Star Trek: Harlan Ellison’s City on the Edge of Forever, Issue #2 at StarTrek.com, the official Star Trek website