Review by Ian Keogh
The Doctor, Matt Smith version, has landed the Tardis on the Enterprise holodeck, an accident attributed to two universes colliding due to the Cybermen becoming aware of the Borg. Volume 1 concluded with a falling out between the two cyborg lifeforms, and the Borg asking the Enterprise for help. Mindful of his time as a Borg, Captain Picard is resolutely against giving it.
Swayed by Guinan’s acceptance of the Doctor and his companions, the remainder of the Enterprise crew are inclined to trust their intentions as good, but a sceptical Picard requires greater persuasion, as seen on the sample art. He’s being shown the future consequences of his refusal.
J.K. Woodward paints over pencil layouts provided by Gordon Purcell, with little of Purcell left on the finished pages. With around ten likenesses of actors reproduced extremely well, Woodward strangely has persistent problems with Karen Gillen’s Amy Pond and Arthur Darvill’s Rory Williams. While there’s more action here, too great a concentration on head and shoulders portraits remains a problem.
As before, the writing team of Scott and David Tipton capture the assorted personalities well, and earn bonus points for featuring Amy and Rory in strong roles alongside the remaining cast. This concluding volume features more action than the first, with the standout sequence being a small party infiltrating a Borg ship for information. Even knowing none of the cast are going to come to any harm in a crossover, the writers assure continual tension.
There’s a satisfactory resolution true to the philosophies of both title participants, and while Assimilation2 would have been better presented as a single complete volume, fans of both franchises should have the fun.
