From XXX to TNG: how a Star Trek PORN FLICK became an awesome NEXT GENERATION fan film!

WARNING – THIS BLOG IS RAUNCHY!
(But no nudity!)

Let’s talk about porn. (I knew that would get your attention!) There is something called Rule 34 which basically states: “If it exists, there is porn of it.” This is especially true for established television and movie franchises. If you don’t believe me, here’s just a few examples of actual porn films that even have their own Wikipedia entries:

And it doesn’t stop with live action. Not even children’s cartoons are safe! This is a rabbit hole that you probably DON’T want to go down (I’m actually kinda sorry I did), but if you absolutely must prove to yourself that Rule 34 is real, lock the door, go to Google, toggle to image search, and type “Disney porn” or even “Bugs Bunny porn.” (On a lark, I typed “Star Trek Lower Decks porn” and…holy crap! It’s everywhere!!!!)

Why don’t studios like Disney or Warner Brothers or Paramount stop all of this smut that is obviously exploiting their intellectual property, cheapening it, and displaying it in ways it was never intended to be seen? There’s a few answers. For one thing, the cost of legally going after so many infringers (even finding them all!) would likely bankrupt the studios. Remember that the AXANAR lawsuit cost CBS and Paramount an estimated $1 million over a year’s time. Multiply that by infinity—which is probably how many pornographic images and videos of copyrighted content there are out there online—and you can probably understand the “see no evil, hear no evil, sue no evil” philosophy that prevails.

But there may also be another factor in play: pornography might legally qualify as PARODY, and parody is protected speech under the doctrine of Fair Use. In other words, can you just slap a XXX-rating on something, show some nudity and sex, call it a “parody,” and go to town with whatever copyrighted content you want? Or is that just a myth? I could easily write a lengthy blog about this very debate, but fortunately, I don’t have to because STEPHEN CARLISLE beat me to it seven years ago…and you’re welcome to read it here.

Of course, Star Trek is well represented in the “porn parody” arena. And while I am certainly not a connoisseur of fine (or not-so-fine) pornography, I checked out a few examples while researching this blog and was quite underwhelmed. I ended up fast-forwarding through the sex scenes looking for plot, and was always left disappointed. If I had to review the few bits of Star Trek porn I saw, the words “stupid,” “awful,” “boring,” “disgusting,” and “a complete waste of time” would appear frequently.

But there is one Star Trek porn parody that not only bucks that trend but is truly worth watching…albeit without the sex scenes. And indeed, that’s pretty easy to do, as there is a special 27-minute cut of the film that has ZERO sex scenes and is actually a really, REALLY good Star Trek: TNG fan film!

Continue reading “From XXX to TNG: how a Star Trek PORN FLICK became an awesome NEXT GENERATION fan film!”

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.