Original title: Chief O’Brien at work.
Title of this edition: Chief O’Brien at work.
Author: Jon Adams.
Gender: Fantasy, Sci-fi.
Saga: Star-Trek.
Editorial: City Cyclops.
Edition year: 1, 2015.
Prizes: —
Synopsis [Warning: Spoiler]: Chief O’Brien is a character of the TV series Star Trek the next generation, he is in charge of transporter, however, through the series it becomes clear that he is completely irrelevant as crew members can order directly to the Enterprise’s computer to be transported from anywhere in the spaceship to anywhere in the planet or nearby spaceships. The only times he appears in the show are when “something horrible happens to Chief O’Brien”, the rest of the time, he is waiting in the transporter room for someone to be transported (and that is a huge amount of time waiting if you think about it).
Personal Review: This book started as a web comic (we spoke about it back in 2014 TNG: Chief O’Brien). Then it turned into a Kickstarter project (we proposed it as project of the week back in 2015 and pay for a copy). Now it is 2016 and the book is now real.
I have to say that this book is for Star Trek fans and to nobody else, and even between Star Trek fans, you have to have watched the Next Generation, other way the jokes will be completely nonsense to you. For instance, if you haven’t watched the Next Generation, you will not know who Riker is, and what is funny about him (he is like the official Casanova of the Star Trek).
Something I really like is when it breaks the 4th wall and demonstrates how it was broken in the TV series. “Chief O’Brien, transport me back to the ship from the planet” “planet? what planet? Do you people realise that I work in a room without any windows and nobody ever tells me where we are?”. It is great, because in the TV series it doesn’t seem to be an odd request… but only because the viewer knows everything, that’s why when crew members request transportation, it is natural to us to assume that everybody shares the same amount of information that we have. Brilliant.
On the other side, something I don’t like about the book is that the format limits the jokes. Sometimes repeating the same frame over and over makes a joke, but if you do it all the time, then it is there only to fill space (and you have to do it in order to fill the space in the selected format of the book).
Just to finish with something good, be aware that the book has hidden messages, can you find all of them? [Spoiler to one of the messages]: Put the book under sunlight and then in complete dark.
the Brick In the Sky 