In this review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Seeds of Salvation #2, as Nurse Chapel and the landing party discover what happened to the missing research team in the murky depths of a frozen planet, the U.S.S. Enterprise makes a shocking discovery of its own.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Seeds of Salvation #2
Written by: Robbie Thompson
Art and Main Cover by: Travis Mercer
Variant Covers: Skylar Patridge, Travis Mercer
Page Count: 28 pages
Release Date: October 15, 2025
This review contains spoilers
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Seeds of Salvation #2 begins on the U.S.S. Enterprise as Lieutenant Uhura uncovers a mysterious message written in an unknown language on the planet Poilant’s surface. Captain Pike orders her to decipher it in record time in order to maintain contact with the landing party.
Meanwhile, in a borrowed submersible, Number One, Nurse Chapel, Scotty, La’an, Spock and robot helper D-6 run across a giant squid that damages their craft. The team find refuge in a habitable underwater structure. Scotty is ordered to stay and repair the craft (in record time) while Number One and the rest of the team explore the facility to search for the missing researchers.
The landing party finds the same message Uhura did (although they don’t know what it is yet), and Spock curiously notes that more vines found in the research station above are present in this facility also, but both he and D-6 are uncertain as to how they could thrive in such a harsh environment.
Four life signs are detected nearby (where there should be five) and the landing party is shocked to come across the research team’s unconscious bodies ensnared in a tangle of creeping vines. Meanwhile, Nurse Chapel’s friend Jinare (leader of the research team) is awake and talking, and wrapped up in a costume of vines, looking like a botanical mummy.
“Jinare” (or rather the entity controlling her) explains that the vines are feeding on the researchers, and the landing party are next on the tasting menu.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Seeds of Salvation #2 ends with Scotty unknowingly stalked by the vines as he continues his repair work, while Uhura deciphers the alien message as a warning.
Analysis
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Seeds of Salvation #2 is a more satisfying read than issue #1, and it provides some intrigue by explaining the purpose of Poilant as a prison planet. Also the surprise reveal of what happened to Jinare’s research team adds another interesting twist and a new obstacle. The story moves fast, the art is decent and the story isn’t overwritten, but unfortunately, “The Seeds of Salvation” isn’t up to IDW’s usual high quality.
Robbie Thompson’s (Marvel’s Silk) script is unable to truly capture the various voices of these now well known characters. The dialogue just doesn’t sound right, with the exception of Scotty (who along with D-6 provide some much needed levity, but not much else). Spock is reduced to stating the obvious again, and the transitions and intentional parallels feel forced (that “thirty minutes” deadline for instance).
Also, it feels like Thompson dropped the ball by not hinting at the mystery message in issue #1 to build up suspense. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Seeds of Salvation #2 is an above average story with decent art, but it’s not on par with the quality of many previous IDW series, as well as their current offerings.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Seeds of Salvation #2, (and the series so far), feels like it would work best as a creator-owned, generic science fiction adventure story, with action, humor, horror and a few nice twists, but as a Star Trek story, the execution just feels unfortunately underwhelming.
Travis Mercer’s art is mostly good, especially the sequences with the giant squid and the creeping vines, and also Jinare’s “plant mummy” redesign, but the characters don’t always resemble their TV counterparts. Striking the balance between creative style and likeness is understandably tricky.
Mercer’s magic shines through in the landing party and the underwater sequences, in the bright light of the Enterprise bridge, the characters seem washed out and bland.
Final Thoughts
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Seeds of Salvation #2 is a marked improvement on the first issue by providing some answers, intrigue, a new villain and a fun action set piece, but the entire project feels lacking as a Star Trek story. This series might be for completists, or fans of the Strange New World TV series.
