Warning: contains spoilers for Star Trek: Day of Blood!Star Trek‘s comic writers have officially named Captain Benjamin Sisko’s dark and twisted opposite. Sisko returned last fall in the pages of IDW’s flagship Star Trek title, sent back to human reality to stop a powerful force slaughtering the galaxy’s god-like beings. This God War, which culminated in the franchise’s first-ever comics’ crossover, Day of Blood, was started by the Klingon Emperor Kahless – and now he has been confirmed as Sisko’s dark opposite.
In a Screen Rant interview with Star Trek writers Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly and Senior Editor Heather Antos, the creators were asked about the path to writing Day of Blood. Kelly reveals that once it was decided to center the series around Captain Sisko, they realized they needed an opposite number for him. Kelly elaborated, saying
If a story was going to be revolving around the mystery of who is killing gods of the Star Trek universe, we knew that what we needed was a villain who could be on the opposite side of that. And for us, that was Kahless, who was introduced, or was rather brought back into the world during Star Trek: The Next Generation. He’s a clone with all the memories and religious iconography of the original, but he hasn’t had the capability or the chance to seize the power he once had.
Kelly wrapped up by saying that Kahless, and Klingon honor, would be used as metaphors to explore the rise of populist demagogues.
Kahless Has Started an Intergalactic Bloodbath
Day of Blood has been building for the past year, starting with the publication of Star Trek #400, which has since become the touchstone for IDW’s revitalized line of Trek comics. The one-shot seeded the god-war, a story beat picked up a few months later in Star Trek #1. The Bajoran Prophets sent Captain Sisko back to human reality to find the culprit behind the massacre, who was revealed to be the Klingon Emperor Kahless. A clone of the original Kahless, the Emperor decided to fulfill the legacy of his namesake, taking it upon himself to rid the galaxy of the gods.
Sisko Chose Knowledge, Kahless Chose Ignorance
It is this mandate that makes Kahless Sisko’s dark opposite. Throughout Deep Space Nine’s seven seasons, Sisko struggled with the concepts of gods and faith; the secular-minded Sisko was believed by the Bajoran people to be the Emissary of the Prophets – a role he was never comfortable with. In the show’s final episode, he leaves human reality to study with the Prophets – all of which has given Sisko insights into the cosmos far beyond any of his colleagues. Sisko has peered behind the curtain and seen what makes the universe tick. Kahless, on the other hand, is a relic of an earlier time and has failed to achieve the glory of his namesake. This has eaten at him, and he sees only one way to reclaim and affirm his legacy – kill the gods. Kahless has greedily chosen to destroy what he doesn’t understand, where Sisko reluctantly accepted alien knowledge, leading to directly opposing missions.
Not only does Kahless’ campaign of terror threaten the galaxy’s political stability, it also has destabilized the natural order of the cosmos, and if Sisko and his comrades are not successful in stopping Kahless, then the universe itself will crumble. Kahless’ insecurities have manifested themselves in the darkest fashion possible, leading him to start Star Trek’s god war – and making him Sisko’s dark opposite.
Star Trek: Day of Blood #1 is on sale now from IDW Publishing!
