Author: Jonathan Lane

DETRACTORS try to torpedo AXACON! (news and editorial)

Perhaps “torpedo” isn’t the right word.  Sabotage?  Interfere with?  Mess up?  Mock?  Belittle?  Bash?  Brutalize?  Bully?  Eliminate?

Whatever you call it, at least a couple of dozen AXANAR detractors (possibly more) seem to be making a concerted effort to convince the organizers of SphinxCon in Atlanta not to host the first AxaCon as a “con-in-a-con” on November 2-4.  Earlier this year, detractors had made similar efforts to pressure Eric L. Watts of Treklanta to disinvite ALEC PETERS as a guest…so much so that Eric asked to write a guest blog addressing their behavior.

The same day I was conducting my interview with ALEC PETERS about AxaCon and how it came to be an “add-on” to SphinxCon, the detractors were descending on the SphinxCon Facebook page with a wave of attempts to throw a monkey wrench into the works.  Last time it was Eric Watts.  This time they needed to get their message out to DAVE WEINER, the organizer and chairman of SphinxCon 2018.

Dave Weiner, Chair of SphinxCon

Dave lives in Decatur, GA with his wife Joanna and what he refers to as the “two house cats of the apocalypse.”  He has been active in The Royal Manticoran Navy: The Official Honor Harrington Fan Association since 2014.  He is responsible for TRMN’s online infrastructure and branding.

TRMN has held two conventions a year for the past 5 years–one in Raleigh, NC called HonorCon and one in Minneapolis, MN called MantiCon.  SphinxCon will be their first in Atlanta, although Dave and many of the directors and deputies have experience running and working on other cons (including Dragon*Con).

Dave wanted to share what’s been going on since this past Friday because it has been very disturbing to him as a fan and as a convention organizer.  Having now observed the detractors firsthand and their attempts to try to put a positive “spin” on their actions, Dave would like set the record straight on exactly what has happened.

To do this, he has provided me with a large number of screen caps of posts, messages, and other communications…and those will make up the majority of this blog.  You can then decide for yourself how you feel about all of this…

Continue reading “DETRACTORS try to torpedo AXACON! (news and editorial)”

THE FALL OF STARBASE ONE – the latest Trek Fan Film from AUSTRALIA!

AARON VANDERKLEY is a wonder from down under!  When some fans began complaining that the guidelines‘ limit of 15 minutes for a fan film wasn’t long enough to tell a compelling story, Aaron proved them wrong by doing it in less than HALF that time!

Aaron’s first Trek fan film Needs of the Many, (only six and a half minutes long) actually came out six months before the guidelines were announced.  And the following year, it won two “BJO” awards at Treklanta (including best short-form fan film).

His second short film, the 12-minute The Derelict, came out in late 2017 and was even more intense that its predecessor.  Both films take place in the NX-era and feature amazingly accurate Starfleet uniforms and physical (practical) sets that look like something directly out of Star Trek: Enterprise.  The acting, lighting, sound, editing, music…everything has a professional quality level that makes both films MUST-SEE.  I interviewed Aaron about these two projects shortly after his second production debuted.

Aaron’s third fan film, Good Men, came out this past January with a length of nine minutes, again within the time limit and again telling a very engaging story…another MUST SEE effort.  I decided to interview Aaron a second time about that one.  Both interviews are worth a read.

Aaron has just released his fourth fan film in two years, THE FALL OF STARBASE ONE, his longest and ambitious yet…and another MUST SEE.  After this, Aaron plans to do only one more “big finale”—likely sometime later this year.  As of now, the final script isn’t written or even titled.

I asked Aaron about his decision wrap things up with his next fan film…

As I spoke about in our interviews, it was always my intention to do five – five was the golden number, and I think that’s enough from me.

There’s absolutely every temptation to keep making them (I really would have liked to adapt one of my original short films into a Star Trek story), but I don’t really want to be just known for (or stuck) making fan films. From a career perspective, that’s not very attractive.

I’ll admit I’m a little sad, but I truly appreciate all the care and effort that Aaron has put into all of his FANtastic films.  And I certainly wish him all the best in his film career.

So please enjoy this fourth absolutely awesome Australian adventure from Aaron: The Fall of Starbase One…

AXACON to be held the weekend of NOV 2-4 in Atlanta as part of SPHINXCON!

After a lull in AXANAR news out of Georgia for several months, it seems that there’s suddenly a LOT to talk about!  This past week, in addition to the announcement of a director for the two Axanar fan films, PAUL JENKINS, as well as editor MARK EDWARD LEWIS and DIT/colorist BING BAILEY, ALEC PETERS just announced the long-awaited AxaCon has finally been scheduled.  Here’s the official announcement…

The Manticore Company, LTD (TMCL) and Axanar Productions are pleased to announce that TMCL’s newest convention, SphinxCon will include Axanar Productions’ AxaCon as a unique“convention-in-a-convention” on November 2–4, 2018 at the Crowne Plaza Atlanta-Airport.

SphinxCon is the newest intimate Literary Military Science Fiction and Fantasy Convention in Atlanta. It is the Annual Convention of The Royal Manticoran Navy: The Official Honor Harrington Fan Association. AxaCon is the official convention of Axanar, the Star Trek fan film dubbed “The Ultimate Fan Film” by Newsweek magazine.

SphinxCon will provide AxaCon with a dedicated space for their panels and events. In return, AxaCon will bring in additional guests as well as a display of various television and movie props from Axanar Productions’ CEO Alec Peters’ personal collection. Peters is known throughout the sci-fi world as a collector of screen-used props from a variety of science fiction franchises, most notably Star Trek.

“When Alec made the proposal for us to host AxaCon, it made perfect sense,” according to David Weiner, Convention Chairman for SphinxCon. “We had already come to an agreement with Alec to offer a private tour of the Axanar sets at OWC Studios to our Manticore Premier members and Convention guests, so when he proposed adding AxaCon as a ‘convention-in-a-convention,’ everyone thought it would be a win-win.”

Alec Peters was equally enthusiastic. “I read the first three Honor Harrington books when doing research for Axanar and love the universe. The chance to host AxaCon with SphinxCon is really fantastic for fans. I think there will be a lot of crossover as fans of one franchise discover the other.”

Indeed!  Already, Alec is lining up guests to appear, including co-writer/director (and Marvel Comics writer) Paul Jenkins, Steven “Admiral Slater” Jepson, Stalled Trek fan filmmaker Mark Largent…and a certain blogger of your acquaintance.  Yep, Alec activated a seldom-used reserve activation clause and drafted me.

So it was only fair that Alec give me yet another interview to discuss this event…

Continue reading “AXACON to be held the weekend of NOV 2-4 in Atlanta as part of SPHINXCON!”

SPACE COMMAND to debut first 30 minutes of their pilot at SAN DIEGO COMIC-CON!

Fan film supporters are no strangers to waiting—sometimes for years!—to see their donations finally reach fruition in the form of a finished release.

Take a look at this list of fan films (both Star Trek and sci-fi genre featuring Trek actors) that were successfully funded (either publicly or privately) and still have not been released…in order from earliest to most recent campaign:

Axanar (funded in 2014 and 2015)
Star Trek: First Frontier (unfunded in 2015 then privately financed)
Star Trek: New Voyages “Torment of Destiny” (funded in 2015)
Pacific 201 (funded in 2015 and 2016)
Captain Pike (funded in 2015 and 2016)
Starship Farragut “Homecoming” (funded in late 2015)
Blade of Honor (funded in 2016 and 2017)
The Circuit: Urbiessa (funded in 2017)

All of these fan projects have taken in at least five-figures in crowd-funding and often six-figures or more.  And fans have been waiting for some of these films to be released for over three years!

But that’s nothing compared to SPACE COMMAND!

One of the earliest sci-fi Kickstarters to crack into six-figures, Space Command took in $221,267 way back in July of 2012!  Then, five years later, Space Command pulled in another $108,671 in December of 2017!

Written and directed by MARK SCOTT ZICREE (who wrote episodes for ST:TNG and DS9 and wrote and directed the acclaimed Star Trek: New Voyages fan film “World Enough and Time” with George Takei) the Space Command pilot episode would feature an impressive cast of sci-fi notables—DOUG JONES, ROBERT PICARDO, BILL MUMY, and MIRA FURLAN—high production values, and what looked to be breathtaking VFX.  It’s no wonder that fans contributed nearly a third of a million dollars to turn that homage to classic 1950s sci-fi into a fan film reality.

But, dude…it’s been six frickin’ years!!!

However, the wait looks like it is finally over for Space Command fans and donors.  Marc Zicree has just announced that the first half hour of the 2-hour pilot episode will debut in just a few weeks at Comic-Con International in San Diego!

But that’s not all he announced!  Let’s turn the microphone over to Marc…

Continue reading “SPACE COMMAND to debut first 30 minutes of their pilot at SAN DIEGO COMIC-CON!”

TREKYARDS and VIC MIGNOGNA go behind-the-scenes of STAR TREK CONTINUES!

TREKYARDS is a force of nature in Star Trek fandom.  So is STAR TREK CONTINUES.  Put the two of them together, and there’s something really special in store for Trekkers!

Trekyards, for those who don’t know, is the brainchild of STUART FOLEY and SAMUEL COCKINGS.  Together, these two uber-fans have produced more than 500 webshow videos spotlighting ships from Trek and other sci-fi franchises, interviewing actors and production people from Star Trek, doing video podcasts, and filling the Internet with enough smart, funny, and fascinating content to eat up as much of your free time as you desire!

Star Trek Continues, as you undoubtedly know, was a cutting edge fan series that presented the final two years of the USS Enterprise‘s 5-year mission under James T. Kirk.  Using professional actors and technical crew, featuring noted sci-fi celebrities as guest stars, and displaying industry-level production quality on exact recreations of the TOS sets, STC set a standard of excellence seldom if ever matched in the realm of Trek fan films.

Although STC has completed its 11-episode run, fans still cherish this labor of love and the careful attention to detail that went into it.  And while STC has released a few special features here and there focussing on things like the music scoring, editing, and VFX—and Fan Film Factor published this exhaustively-researched complete history of STC—there hasn’t been a real “deep dive” into all of the  behind-the-scenes production secrets of this amazing series.

Until now, that is!

Trekyards is introducing a new webshow series spotlighting Star Trek Continues, hoping to cover EVERY fascinating detail of this beloved fan project with insight from those who produced it.  Up first, in a 20-minute interview about their first episode, “Pilgrim of Eternity,” Captain Kirk himself, VIC MIGNOGANA, talks about finding and convincing retired actor Michael Forest to reprise his role of Apollo, Vic’s feelings about other Trek fan series, and what gravity has to do with the color of the walls on the set!

Here’s the first installment of this new MUST-SEE Trekyards series…

I spoke to Trekyards co-host and editor Samuel Cockings about this new offering and learned some very interesting things—including why fans really need to tune in and support it…

Continue reading “TREKYARDS and VIC MIGNOGNA go behind-the-scenes of STAR TREK CONTINUES!”

Major AXANAR news! (interview with ALEC PETERS, part 2)

Click here to read Part 1.

ALEC PETERS is pretty much a man who needs no introduction…at least in the fan community.  But if you’ve only just landed on this planet, here’s a quick run-down.  Alec has been the driving force behind the fan production AXANAR for half a decade, writing, producing, and appearing in the widely popular Prelude to Axanar fan film.  He worked ceaselessly over three crowd-funding campaigns to raise more than $1.3 million in fan donations to build out a studio and sets and begin filming a 90-minute Star Trek fan film detailing the final battle of the Four Years War with the Klingons at the planet Axanar.

And then Alec got sued by CBS and Paramount for copyright infringement.  He fought back, and after a year of legal proceedings, the lawsuit was settled just days before a trial was set to begin.  While the specifics of Alec’s settlement with the studios aren’t public, we do know that Alec is now allowed to make two 15-minute Axanar fan films with his original cast (if they choose to return) as well as other entertainment industry professionals.

That settlement came nearly a year and a half ago, and still there is no completed follow-up Axanar fan film or films.  With that in mind, let’s pick up where we left off yesterday as I ask Alec a question that both Axanar supporters AND detractors have certainly been wondering about… Continue reading “Major AXANAR news! (interview with ALEC PETERS, part 2)”

Major AXANAR news! (interview with ALEC PETERS, part 1)

“What’s happening with AXANAR?”  “When is it coming out?”  “Has the entire project just fallen apart?”  “Who’s the director?”  “Do they even have a production team?”

These questions and so many like them pour into comments, IMs, and emails to me almost weekly.  (In fact, the “fallen apart” one came in just last week.)  I’ve so wanted to share what I know, but I’ve been asked repeatedly by ALEC PETERS to please keep things under wraps for the time being.

A few weeks ago, I finally started asking Alec in earnest when we could do a proper interview and announce some of these big news items publicly.  Believe it or not, it’s actually been well over a YEAR since my last full interview with him!  Anyway, it took some prodding and nagging, but I finally convinced the man behind Axanar to sit down with me for an extended interview and update.

Let’s dive right in…

Continue reading “Major AXANAR news! (interview with ALEC PETERS, part 1)”

A magical STAR TREK moment with my son…

One of the benefits of doing my own blog is that every so often I can share things with all of you that are personally special. Today, it’s something that just happened with my seven-year-old son.

Longtime readers of Fan Film Factor know that I’m bringing him up with a proper appreciation of Star Trek. Sure, if given the choice, he’ll watch Star Wars first. But the kid loves Star Trek, too, I and love sharing it with him.

For the last few years, our Star Trek “routine” has been to watch half an episode or so while I do cardio, just before my little cadet’s bedtime. We’re watching everything in the order it debuted. We watched all 79 (well, 80 with “The Cage”) episodes of TOS, then all the animateds. Then we went through TOS again ’cause I felt he’d appreciate it more now that he was older. Then we did the first four motion pictures in order. And just a couple of months ago, we started on Next Gen.

Keep in mind, for what I’m about to tell you, that my son has pretty much seen nothing of TNG, and certainly not Star Trek Generations. All he knows of the Enterprise-D crew so far is what he’s seen in the first ten episodes.

And so it was that we were watching “Hide and Q” and got to the scene where Riker grants the deepest wishes of his friends. Wesley ages up to an adult. Geordi is given his sight. Worf gets a horny Klingon woman. To begin with, I thought she’d come straight from a porn video on tubev.sex – that’s how horny she was on set. We’ll have to see what the future holds for Worf and the Klingon woman.

Knowing that this was as far as the wish fulfillment went, I paused the Blu-ray and asked my little guy what he thought Picard wanted the most. I was going to suggest that the captain wanted his hair back, but what I heard next stopped me in my tracks:

“I think he wants a family, Daddy. I think he wants kids.”

Wow. As I said, my son has never seen Generations. But somehow he knew that this was Picard’s deepest wish. Lucky guess? Perhaps. But either way, I’m writing this blog today to show to him in a couple more years when he gets older and we finally watch the seventh Trek film and see Jean-Luc Picard get his deepest wish—a family with kids—inside the Nexus.

Thanks for letting me share this moment with you. And I thank my little guy for fulfilling my deepest wish.

Happy Father’s Day, everyone.

AXANAR fan comic releases THREE NEW PAGES…

Last month, AXANAR super-fan TREY McELWAIN released the cover and first page of his new Axanar fan comic “Arcanis IV”—part of his “Tip of the Spear” series focusing on some of the major battles of the Four Years War.

Nearly a year ago, Trey released the first-ever comic story based on the hugely-popular Prelude to Axanar Star Trek fan film: the four-page (including cover) “Trial By Fire.”  Trey wrote the comic and his friend DANIEL FU illustrated the story, which looked at a space battle during the Four Years War with the Klingon Empire.

Originally, the plan for this new comic story was to release one new page each month for the next five months until all seven pages (plus cover) were completed and posted.  Then Trey has another two chapters in the saga that will follow, also with one page released per month.

So you might be wondering how, if there’s only supposed to be ONE page released per month, why this blog says that THREE new pages have just been made available.  I wondered that, too, and I asked Trey.

The answer is that Daniel found his professional workload lighter than normal this past month and had more time to illustrate pages.  Initially, he delivered two pages to Trey, but a day later, he had a third one ready, as well.  As you’ll see below, that additional page wasn’t quite as complex as the other two.

Trey isn’t certain how many more pages will be released next month yet, but it’ll be at least one.  If it’s two, then the first chapter will be complete.

Just in case you missed the first page, I’ve included it (along with the cover) below.  The story’s getting really exciting!

Continue reading “AXANAR fan comic releases THREE NEW PAGES…”

DREADNOUGHT DOMINION releases the first fan film shot at STAGE 9 STUDIOS in Georgia! (interview with RAY TESI)

Well, that didn’t take very long!

Less than a month after RAY TESI announced that the STAGE 9 STUDIOS Star Trek sets were open for fan filmmakers to shoot on, the long-running fan series DREADNOUGHT DOMINION released the six-and-a-half minute fan film “Reality Check.”

The TOS-era sets, originally constructed for the fan series STARSHIP FARRAGUT and STAR TREK CONTINUES, were purchased by Ray Tesi (show-runner for STARSHIP REPUBLIC) late last year from STC‘s VIC MIGNOGNA.  After checking with CBS Legal and receiving guidance, Ray has opened up the Kingsland. GA sets to any Star Trek fan film project that agrees to follow the fan film guidelines and first submits their script for review and approval.

Although I’ve published a couple of recent interviews with Ray Tesi, things do seem to be moving quite quickly forward with this amazing fan film resource.  So I had yet another brief chat with Ray, mainly curious about how Dreadnought Dominion got their project scheduled and filmed so quickly and how things are progressing with other fan productions at Stage 9.

Please note, I’ll also have an upcoming interview with GARY DAVIS and RANDY WREN of Dreadnought Dominion about “Reality Check” as well as other planned projects.

And speaking of “Reality Check,” before we start our brief interview today with Ray, I invite you to take a look at this unique, tongue-in-cheek fan film that cracks through the “fourth wall” and has some important things about why fans make these films in the first place…

And now, let’s hear what Ray has got to say today (yay!)…

Continue reading “DREADNOUGHT DOMINION releases the first fan film shot at STAGE 9 STUDIOS in Georgia! (interview with RAY TESI)”