Fan film – Fan Film Factor

Meet this year’s JUDGES for the 2026 Star Trek Fan Film SHOWRUNNER AWARDS…

The submission window for the 2026 Star Trek Fan Film SHOWRUNNER AWARDS is now open and will remain so until midnight Pacific Time on May 31, 2025. Any Star Trek fan film released publicly between January 1, 2023 and December 31, 2025 is eligible for entry regardless of the person or team producing it.

The online entry form is located here…

https://www.cognitoforms.com/JonathanLane1/_2026StarTrekFanFilmSHOWRUNNERAWARDS

As usual, our judging panel remains at twelve, made up of people who have, themselves, served as showrunners on one or more fan films or series. This provides each judge a unique and personal perspective on what goes into making a fan production in our nearly two-dozen categories. In other words, our judges are knowledgeable and experienced in filmmaking which, I truly believe, brings a high level of expertise to our competition—along with our sister contest, the DIRECTORS CHOICE AWARDS, which just wrapped up earlier this month.

And it is for this reason that, each year, I publish a blog spotlighting our judging panel and what they have accomplished in the world of Star Trek fan films specifically. We’ve got two new judges this year plus one “swap.” The swap is GLEN L. WOLFE for DAN REYNOLDS. They are the co-owners of WARP 66 STUDIOS in northern Arkansas and the co-showrunners of THE FEDERATION FILES fanthology series. Each year, one of the two of them “tags out” to give the other a turn. So in 20256, Glen will be taking over Dan’s spot, who in turn took over Glen’s spot in last year’s competition.

Our two new judges are both from “across the pond” in Europe. One is relatively new to being a showrunner, although he’s already had a multi-year career in Star Trek fan films. The other is a bit of a legend and someone whom I’ve been trying to talk into being a Showrunner Awards judge since we first launched this endeavor five years ago…

2025 Star Trek Fan Film YEAR IN REVIEW (part 2)

Yesterday, we began looking back at many of the major (and not-so-major) Star Trek fan films released in 2025—and there were a LOT! So many, if fact, that I felt I needed to divide this Year in Review blog into two parts. Part 1 covered January through June. Now, let’s finish out the final six months and see what Trekkie fan filmmakers had to offer us. There’s some really great stuff on this list…

2025 Star Trek Fan Film YEAR IN REVIEW (part 1)

It’s the end of another year, and I’m still here, you’re still here, and so are Star Trek fan films! Admittedly, I’ve been less prolific in 2025 than I have in past years because I’ve gotten involved with mentoring my sons Jayden’s high school robotics team, The Bagel Bytes (named after their first sponsor back in 2001, Noah’s Bagels). And I’ve kinda gone all-in, assisting the team with marketing materials and e-mail communication, finding sponsors (including RODDENBERRY ENTERTAINMENT!), filming and editing team videos, helping them set up a Patreon campaign, and a whole lot more. I’m with the team 2-3 times a week, helping out the coach, and just marveling at these amazingly talented teens! But putting in all of those free volunteer hours is leaving me with much less time and energy for this blog.

That being said, I’m still organizing the annual SHOWRUNNER AWARDS, interviewing many Star Trek fan filmmakers, and even assisting some of them with their fan films (as I did twice this past year!). And of course, my regular YEAR IN REVIEW blogs have been an annual tradition since my first one back in 2017. And each year, I remind my readers who predicted back in 2016 that CBS/Paramount’s fan film guidelines would utterly destroy Star Trek fan films that our little sub-sub-sub-genre is still very much alive and kicking.

And indeed, even nearly a decade later, Trek fan films continue to be produced and posted to YouTube—quite a lot of them! Buy, hey, don’t just take my word for it. Check it out for yourself below. In fact, there were so many to cover that I’ve split this year’s compilation blog into TWO parts!

Many of the following fan films were ones that I had intended to cover here on Fan Film Factor, but life and robotics got in the way. So instead, I’ll be spotlighting them here with short blurbs for each one. There’s probably at least a few you haven’t seen, and I strongly recommend that you check out any that intrigue you—and possibly some that don’t, as you might be pleasantly surprised. Let’s dive in…