Star Trek premiered in the US on September 8, 1966.
It aired two days early on September 6 in Canada thus making that its worldwide premiere date. And in the next 30 years lot of other things happened in the universe and possible multiverse.
Then on April 28, 1996 Steve Troop’s Melonpool comic strip debuted online and today marks its 25th Anniversary. Along with Peanuts and Calvin and Hobbes, Melonpool is one of my all time favourite comic strips.
My introduction to Melonpool was in early 2000s when Steve shared the link to the first time travel saga from the comic strips on the BTTF.com forum. I was instantly hooked by the homage and references to the Back to the Future movies. I then went back to reading the early strips and eventually in the next few years got hold of all the Melonpool books to read all the strips chronologically. Reading those Melonpool strips back to back were some of the most joyous moments in reading for me.
In some ways Melonpool also rekindled my love for Star Trek. From the early 1990s I grew up watching Star Trek: The Original Series and Star Trek: The Next Generation on TV. By the end of the 90s there weren’t any Star Trek series airing in India. Star Trek: Enterprise aired for couple of years in the early 2000s. So when I began reading more Melonpool during the mid 2000s, I was missing Star Trek on television. So then I finally managed to purchase the Star Trek TOS DVDs and was so glad to revisit the series which I hadn’t seen since its original airing in the early 90s.
Melonpool features a crew of aliens, a telepathic dog, and a giant hamster who are stranded on earth with their spaceship the Steel Duck and the comic chronicles the life and misadventures of these characters. While the stories are infused with sci-fi and pop culture, lot of the plotlines stand on their own in terms of originality. Steve Troop’s beautiful traditional art needs to be revered for its simplicity and attention to detail. And the humor has me cracking up loudly on numerous occasions. As the stories progressed through the years the time travel stories became more intricate and intertwined. I remember watching Back to the Future Part II for the first time and the time travel elements were boggling my mind. Steve’s time travel stories evoked similar feelings for me on a different level.
I am grateful to have acquired the following original daily and Sunday strip artwork by Steve in 2012 and I had them framed.
The Melonpool website currently hosts a rebooted version of the comic. You can read the original universe storylines through books available on paperback and Kindle.
Also I found out last year that Steve has published a new series of comics titled Sit, Tilly. SIT. (“Meet Tilly, an Italian Greyhound whose adventures touch on pop culture, movies, workplace drama and the quest to get the next treat”).
The Ultimate Melonpool covers the first year of strips with artist commentary, including the evolution of the characters, sketches, and early incarnation of the strips before being published on the internet.
Old School Melonpool Vol. 1 includes the first year of strips without any artist commentary.
In an alternate universe the Melonpool comic is syndicated in newspapers and it was adapted into a popular animated series. Bigger part of the population have discovered the brilliance of Steve Troop.
In this universe you can still read Melonpool comics and discover a universe filled with laughter and memorable escapades for yourself.
Steve, a hearty thank you for creating Melonpool.
Thank you so much for this glowing review! If it wasn’t taking so long to update the site, we’d already be back to a new storyline that hopefully will rekindle your (and my) love for this little strip. I want to get Melonpool back to a place where I can update it when I want rather than being on a 5-plus year pause of a comic that wasn’t my best effort,
Your friend in time!
Sweet, thanks Steve. After the year we all have been through, any attempt to get back to the old days will probably take even more effort now. Hopefully later this year you’ll manage to crossover to the desired storyline and any occasional updates from then on will be most welcomed.