Star Trek: Mission's End is a Star Trek Expanded Universe comic miniseries, written by Ty Templeton and published by IDW Publishing in 2009. Taking place in the Star Trek: The Original Series timeline, it chronicles the final official mission of the U.S.S. Enterprise.
In the early days of the famous Five-Year-Mission, the crew of the Enterprise made First Contact with the inhabitants of the Planet Spaceship Archenar-IV, whose original crew had disappeared eons ago and since been replaced by the evolved descendants of the ship's insect population. During the contact, Kirk and Spock discovered that not only were the life-support systems of Archenar-IV were still running, but the ship's engine is so powerful and advanced that if people of Archenar-IV, known as the Archernarians, figured out how to make it work they would be have the most powerful weapon in the galaxy.
Five years later the Enterprise is back at Archenar-IV to formally induct the Archernarians into the Federation. The Archernarians are on the verge of discovering the power of their engine, and the Federation hopes if Archenar-IV joins it can replicate the engine's technology in secret and level the playing field. Kirk hopes the final mission of the Enterprise will be a smooth one, but unfortunately some Archernarians are violently against joining the Federation, and the Orion Syndicate wants the secrets of the Archenar-IV technology for itself.
Mission's End provides examples of the following tropes:
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: The Archernarians look like giant spiders, while their transport animal the Crawlers look like giant centipedes.
- Bittersweet Ending: The Archernarians depart to the Builder's dimension, taking away the threat of their starship. But the mess of the final mission has made Kirk decide to pursue an admiral position despite his reluctance, and Spock and McCoy decide to resign from Starfleet if Kirk isn't going to be their captain.
- The Cameo: Lt. Arex is still on the bridge.
- I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder: Said by the Trope Namer: "I don't know, I'm a doctor, not a philosopher."
- Machine Worship: The Archnernarians worship Archenar-IV's engine as a holy object, unaware of what it can really do.
