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Episode Studies by Clayton Barr

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Star Trek: Parallel Lives (Part 2) "Parallel Lives" Part 2
Star Trek #30
IDW
Written by: Mike Johnson
Story Consultant: Roberto Orci
Art: Yasmin Liang
Cover by: Cat Staggs
February 2014

 

The two Enterprise crews team up to formulate a method of returning to their respective realities.

 

Read the story summary at Memory Beta

 

Didja Notice?

 

This issue opens on stardate 2261.234. Unfortunately, this is before the opening stardate in "Parallel Lives" Part 1 of 2261.274!

 

On page 6, the two Chekovs speak a bit of Russian to each other. "Privet?" = "Hello?", "Da, privet!" = "Yes, hello!". "Vot eto da!!" is a Russian expression that basically means "Wow!!"

 

As Klingon officers briefly phase onto the Enterprise while caught in the anomaly on pages 14-15, they speak a few words of Klingonese. "Hlvmeh mah!" = unknown (mah means "we"). "Tlqaq!" = unknown. "Nargh chah!" = "They appeared!"

 

On page 16, someone who appears to be the mirror universe Kirk from the original series episode "Mirror, Mirror" is briefly materialized in the Enterprise corridor. He even looks like actor William Shatner instead of Chris Pine!

 

On page 17, Geordi La Forge (from the ST-TNG era of the original timeline) briefly appears in Engineering during the crisis!

 

On page 18, the two Chekovs formulate a method of escaping the anomaly and bringing the two Enterprises back to their own realities, a method involving Copenhagen logarithms. "Copenhagen logarithms" is probably a reference to Copenhagen interpretation, developed at the Institute for Theoretical Physics at the University of Copenhagen in the 1920s, which holds that quantum mechanics does not measure objective reality, but only probabilities.

 

On page 21, panel 3, the Starfleet emblem on Spock's tunic is on the right side instead of the left. On page 22, panel 1, Dr. McCoy's emblem is on the wrong side.

 

On page 22, the female Dr. McCoy says, "Dammit, Jane, I'm a doctor, not a metaphysicist."

 

Unanswered Questions

 

If it was Jane Kirk's mother who died with the U.S.S. Kelvin in battle with the Narada, as stated here and in "Parallel Lives" Part 1, how/when was Jane born? In the "mainstream" universe, Jim Kirk's mother was pregnant with him during this battle and was born only because his father made sure his wife escaped the Kelvin on a shuttlecraft before he was killed in the ship's destruction. 

 

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