In Review: Star Trek: Picard’s Academy #1

Story

Charting the early career of Captain Jean Luc Picard. This first issue sees Cadet Picard trying to fast-track his way to graduating from Starfleet Academy. However, the issue is he is not liked by his fellow students and has a rival who seems to be just as smart as he is in the form of Betezoid Student Cadet Reshan Dar. When he finds out that the next assignment requires teamwork. Picard chooses to try and do the assignment on his own and this is despite solid advice from his mentor Boothby who tells him that he needs to make friends his own age. When Cadet Reshin invites Picard to the Holodeck to re-run that day’s lesson. The two cadets come to blows about who was right. But soon find that their fight gets interrupted by a certain Vulcan.

The Artwork

Ornella Greco brings a Saturday morning cartoon kind of art style to this comic and it doesn’t look too far removed from the art style seen in the Star Trek: Lower Decks series. Of course, Picard has hair at this early stage of his career and his rival Cadet Reshan has bigger hair than him, which is kind of fun to see. In short the art style works and does not distract from the story.

Overall

Sam Maggs does a good job of setting things up in this first issue and brings us a Cadet Picard who isn’t particularly charismatic or likable. If anything he is a bit too serious and somewhat of a know-it-all. In contrast, Cadet Reshan is a little bit more of a fun character, but still a know-it-all but a little more of a risk taker. So much so that he is willing to cheat his way to the top.

Overall. This first issue looks like its setting up what could be a fun series. I look forward to seeing if the comics writer includes any of the stories told about Picard’s time at the academy that got mentioned during Star Trek: The Next Generation. As there are a few good ones that they could draw upon.