Essays below: (in reverse order of writing)
Year 6 Star Trek Reviewed, Year 6
Year 5 Star Trek Reviewed, Year 5
Year 4 Star Trek Reviewed, Year 4
Year 3 Star Trek Reviewed, Year 3
Year 2 Star Trek Reviewed, Year 2
Year 1 Star Trek Reviewed, Year 1
Year 0 Why Star Trek Reviewed
Star Trek Reviewed, Year 6
Annual Mission Statement, Year 6.
When I wrote my first essay, Why Star Trek Reviewed, this website was an idea. Judging from the comments I now get, it has become an institution. It is an honor when somebody who runs a fan film group tells me off. I may not do what they say, but this busy and creative person bothered to think about my work enough to get angry. That’s amazing. I am humbled.
I generally follow certain rules, but I reserve the right to make exceptions when I think it is warranted. When I break my rules, I often regret that decision. I still reserve that right. I generally don’t consider it a Headline when a Star Trek alum gets involved with a fan film group. If STR had existed in the 1980s, George Takai working for Yorktown: A Time to Heal would have deserved a Headline, because it was a first. But that film was set aside, and although now in active post-production, is still not out. During the last year, Stan Lee, the god who created the Marvel Comics universe, got involved with a Star Trek Fan Film. My Headline of that was not, in my mind, about that group, Star Trek: Equinox, which seemed to me to be unlikely to produce a film (their efforts, appear to have been abandon.) Stan Lee’s involvement spoke to the growing cultural importance of ALL Star Trek fan films. In the end, he worked with established fan film makers, at Starship Farragut and their offshoot, Star Trek: Isolation. He appeared in a short Star Trek Fan Film this year. This followed remarks by Tom Hanks and other major Hollywood voices that they had taken notice of and watched one or more Star Trek Fan Films. Just last month an interview with some Professional Star Trek Alum writers revealed that they, too, watch Star Trek Fan Films. Most of what is deemed important at Star Trek Reviewed is just FINDING completed films and audio productions to give my readers easy access to them. But I am amazed at how this community is being recognized by more and more people of greater and greater status.
There is also the question of access. There are groups I talk to regularly, and groups I only get whatever information the general public gets. Axanar has been a case in point. I had developed an on-line relationship with Alec Peters that went well beyond Star Trek. I have never met him in person, but he feels like an online friend. Nevertheless, when he announced his film, I was no more expecting it would actually be produced than anyone else who bothers to help other film groups before trying their own. (People who help others are more likely to succeed when they do their own film than those who have no film making experience.) My personal connection with Alec contributed to what some people complained was me giving Axanar unfairly favorable treatment. There are also Axanar fans that were angry that I didn’t cover every important update they released, but I don’t generally do that. I think those who said I treated them better than others are more likely on point than those who said I didn’t treat them well enough.
Axanar is also a tell-tail of the growth in importance by Star Trek Fan Films. Alec lives in Hollywood, works on props, and has taken acting lessons from a major Hollywood star for many years, so he had contacts. If the final film is as good as Prelude to Axanar, it would increase traffic, not only to Axanar, but to ALL Star Trek Fan Films. And if Star Trek Fan Films’ were still laughed at the way they once were, award-winning actors and actresses, and yes, Stan Lee, the creator god of the Marvel Universe, would not be getting involved. The Star Trek community has existed since NBC cancelled the original series. But in some ways, it is probably a more potent cultural force now than ever before. The Star Trek community has proven ready to provide those who show vision with the cash to realize that vision on film. It is interesting that Star Power here counts, but not for everything. Just as ideas counted in Star Trek, ideas count in raising money from the Star Trek community. Some proposals with great ideas which demonstrated ability by people no one ever heard of got funded, while some with real actors and actresses who worked on Star Trek got ignored. Great ideas, though, were not enough. Two of the best ideas for a fan film series are, in my opinion, poorly executed. Perhaps somebody who knows more about film will take up one of them and do a better job.
I’ve been riding this train for six years now, and it only gets more exciting every year. I continue to create new categories for films. The biggest change this year has been copying the Headline News onto the Star Trek Reviewed page on Facebook. Reminder to all that unless you ‘like’ Star Trek Reviewed posts from time to time Facebook will stop showing them to you. I also added links useful to Star Trek Fan Filmmakers to Blog 249, and the first two ‘audio books’ to Star Trek Audio Dramas (although they are listed at the end, not mixed in with the audio dramas, and I do not plan to try to list every one, only those I happen across.)
I’m looking forward to a year with a growing cast of fan films and fan film makers. As Stan Lee would say, Excelsior!
Star Trek Reviewed, Year 5
Because my apartment will be under construction, and I may not have access to the internet, I am posting this early this year (June 2, 2014). Also, several fan films have planned release dates near the actual anniversary date. Still, in my mind there is something special about running this website for five full years.
WEBSITE UPDATE
This year has not seen a lot of major revisions to the website. I have created new categories of fan films. One is trailers with no films, which is still under construction, here: http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/202.html . A second is Fan Mashups and Recuts, http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/214.html. which are made from professional footage. Due to copyright issues, I feel these are more vulnerable to being removed from You Tube, and I want to list them as I happen to find them, but not do a great deal more work about them. Anyone who would like to create an adjunct website for these films, and is willing to monitor them for removal on copyright claims, I would be happy to work with you to create an integrated index and table of contents. A Third is Czech Language Star Trek Fan Films. http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/227.html .
I have also added a collection of links useful to fan film makers at http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/249.html . Among these are You Tube instructions and programs for creating subtitles. If you are multilingual, and you are willing to create subtitles in your native tongue, you can be a treasure, like Ulisses Galazzo of San Paulo, Brazil, who has created many dozens of subtitles (possibly hundreds) and has earned his own Portuguese-language following. More of the fan film makers I speak with praise him than any other person in the fan film world. Subtitling in the original language opens a film to the deaf. In other languages, it expands the audience to millions of would-be viewers. Notable for their absence are subtitles in Chinese, Indian subcontinent languages, and Arabic. Far too rare are subtitles in Russian, French, German, and English. Most languages could use more subtitlers. If you want to make a significant contribution to fan films, this is a way to do so.
MAJOR FAN FILM RELEASES June 2013-June2014.
The biggest Headline of this year was the release of Act IV of Starship Exeter’s second episode. 7 years after the release of Act III, and 10 years after principle photography had wrapped.
Project Potemkin seems to be fulling the niche once occupied by Hidden Frontier, offering regular releases of ever-improving stories and acting in what is a true fan ‘series.’ Star Trek Reliant is also producing enjoyable work in quantity. At the high end, Star Trek Continues has jumped in with more-than-annual releases.
Star Trek: Outpost, an audio series, has won a series of awards for everything from “outstanding long form drama” to individual ‘best voice actor/actress.” These were not fan audio awards... rather they were awards which usually ignore fan films. I have been enjoying this series, and recommend it highly. If you commute and have a way to play it in transit, you’ll love it. But limit yourself to once a week. It’s not designed for listening to all at once. I know... I started it and ran through many episodes at first. Once a week until you catch up will work much better.
The animated “Star Trek: Time Warp” has completed over 10 hours of animated story, but still does not offer a full audio cast. http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/94.html . The artist, Brendon Bridges, continues to revise the films, and was reportedly going to create subtitles in English as his next step. It is not clear when, or if, there will be a full voice cast. Ever hopeful, I have not given this epic a Headline.
Curt Danhauser’s full length TAS-style cartoon was challenged by CBS and removed from You Tube on March 20, 2014. We still don’t know why.
The biggest ‘Find’ of the year was a 9 episode series, Star Trek: Bohemia, available only in Czech. It’s silver age, and it looks interesting. Perhaps some day they’ll offer us English or other subtitles so more people can enjoy it. In the meanwhile, if you speak Czech, it’s here; http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/122.html .
Other major fan film releases included “Kitumba” from Phase II, “Lolani” from Star Trek Continues, and Star Trekz Empire’s hour-Long animated story in three episodes. A new series, Star Trek: Antyllus, was started by established filmmaker George Kayian. Also releases from Star Trek: Reliant, Star Trek: Unity (England), the internet posting of comedy “Stalled Trek Amutt Time”, and Star Trek: The Romulan Wars are all worthy of note. There were many others, most of them enjoyable to watch. I encourage you to scan the collection of older Headlines to be sure you missed nothing. You’ll find them here: http://headlinesfromstartrek.blogspot.com/ .
More and more professional entertainers seem to be getting involved in more and more Star Trek fan films, some from Pro Star Trek, some from other shows. By the end of 2014, it appears there will be four TOS sets or partial sets around the USA for use by groups wishing to make their own Star Trek. One in upstate New York, one in Georgia, one in Oklahoma, and one in Los Angeles, California. In addition, there are partial sets on Long Island, NY and in Minnesota. Project Potemkin has a movie-era set, which it shares with others. Somebody is also restoring a TNG bridge from The Star Trek Experience in Las Vegas. Crowd funding is also being widely used to fund these efforts. Even venerable fan film group Phase II has a kickstarter going as I post this: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/startrekphaseii/star-trek-phase-ii-2014
You will continue to find links to completed, ready-to-watch Fan Trek at Star Trek Reviewed, as well as links to any reviews I can find. Headlines will continue to feature films that tell full stories that are newly released or found by me after they were released, and not previously listed or Headlined. Individual producer’s pages and paragraphs will include trailers, partial releases and some articles and interviews. I do not claim to follow every nook and cranny of every production. For that, you will have to follow them on their You Tube or Vimeo channel, their home website, Facebook, twitter, or however else they present themselves to the net. Star Trek Reviewed will provide you with one-stop information if, like me, you want to find ready-to-watch finished films in final form. In addition, dedicated pages and paragraphs will give you a collection of links which can fill in the history of a production. If you want to get involved, the fan filmmakers map can help you locate productions around the world. http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/4.html .
PARTICIPATING IN STAR TREK REVIEWED
No comment is posted without my approval. You can inform me of something via a comment, and if you ask I not post it, be assured it will never be posted. No spam will be posted. Sorry, Trek Nepal, I’m sure climbing in the Himalayas is a great experience, but you can’t post your info here. Same goes for those of you selling less interesting stuff. And starting your ad by thanking me for my blog then inviting me to your store won’t change your fate. One last thing. I also do not publish comments that attack individuals per se. I publish, comments that discuss the films as films, the writers as writers, the actors as actors, etc. If you write a review of a Star Trek fan film and let me know, I’ll link to it from within the main body of the Star Trek Reviewed discussion. Most of the cart blanche personal attacks are posted by people who do not identify themselves, or identify themselves with a first name and last initial, using a new account that leads nowhere. Even if I did publish personal attacks, an attack by a source that will not stand behind it is not credible and I would not publish such attacks. If you feel the need to try to post something of this nature but are not comfortable identifying yourself, know that I’m comfortable that the person you are describing is the one you see in the mirror, not the person you named. I won’t allow the attack to post. People who try to leave personal attacks against fan filmmakers on my blog will fail.
Finally, I end as I always do, begging for your help. If you know of any Star Trek fan film or fan audio production (not porn) which I have missed, PLEASE TELL ME. If you see a review of a fan film I have not linked to, PLEASE TELL ME. If you find a bad link on Star Trek Reviewed, PLEASE TELL ME. The website has grown beyond my wildest imagination, and I’m unable to check all the links regularly. My best resources in taking down bad links is YOU, dear reader. Thank you to eMBee for his many updates and corrections. He has made me feel much less alone in this enterprise (pun intended).
eMBee posted the following comment:
eMBeeJune 2, 2014 at 6:55 PM
thank you for your kind words. i would not be able to build my fan-film archive without your work. thanks to your site i have now collected more than 150GB of fan-film material totaling 142 hours in more than 340 episodes.
considering that an average tv show season is about 14 hours, that means i have collected (and seen) 10 seasons worth of fan films, and i have not even seen everything that's on your site.
so, yes, thank you for allowing me to find all that great material through your site!
to another great year!
Star Trek Reviewed, Year 4considering that an average tv show season is about 14 hours, that means i have collected (and seen) 10 seasons worth of fan films, and i have not even seen everything that's on your site.
so, yes, thank you for allowing me to find all that great material through your site!
to another great year!
Four years ago I began laying out this website. There are now four fan film groups which I would classify has ‘highly active’... that is they produce more than one episode per year. More may be on the way.
In addition, Star Trek Continues has released its first episode, the only fan film which can be said to compete with Phase II for recreating the original TOS feel. Another very high end fan film, Star Trek: Secret Voyage, is promising, but seems to have an unrealistic financial plan. There have been a number of other exceptional efforts this year, including the short, Star Trek: Deception.
Just introduced, I have started giving new Audio releases Headlines. Headlines have been expanded since it has gotten less and less realistic for fan film fans to scan the entire website to find new, minor releases. Headlines will still not include teasers, trailers, pre-announced release dates or incomplete releases. Headlines still mean something has been released in final form. For the most part, the release also tells a complete story or finishes one. However, I have accepted the fact that audio is generally done in the form of an ongoing serial, and as long as the episode is a full story of sorts, it will get a Headline.
This year Star Trek Reviewed has primarily just added new films as they are released, old ones as they are discovered,, and reviews and commentary as they are found, and continued projects begun in prior years. An exception: A list of fan films which are based on The Doomsday Machine and placed under my listing of the TOS episode, "The Doomsday Machine." I would like to expand the links in the subwebsite on Pro Trek beyond reviews, adding links to fan films that reference a that episode. I also made many links to reviews of Star Trek Into Darkness.
The only reorganizations have been the addition of an incomplete page for fan films made with ship animations only, no people (we only hear the people... or maybe not even that) and a slight re-ordering of the listings of Fan Filmmakers who have not released films. I have marked out two-letter listing starting with A (like (AC)) to hold fan films which say they are active when asked but which show little actual results for a long time. I define ‘a long time’ inconsistently.
As always, I hope this website will continue to serve folk who would rather spend time watching Star Trek Fan Films than hunting for them. I also want to thank the many fan film makers who were kind enough to contact me about their releases, ensuring I and hundreds of others who depend on Star Trek Reviewed would not miss their work. Finally, I want to thank the many fan film makers who have provided me with posters and photos to illustrate their work.
Star Trek Reviewed, Year 3
Three years have passed since I laid out this website, and began what I expected to be a the small task of linking to as many Star Trek Fan Films as I could find. (Ha!)
This year, Star Trek Reviewed has been reorganized to address the real number of Star Trek Fan Filmmakers and Fan Films, which are far more numerous than I imagined when I designed it. I have moved Pro Trek listings to its own website, “Star Trek Reviewed -TV and Movies.” This website is not well developed. There are links to reviews, to websites which offer a short summary of the TV episode, and some links to fan films based on that episode. Some link to the episode itself on the web. CBS has posted TOS in high definition. There may be some episodes listed that have no links at all, but there the overview links to Jammer’s Reviews.
I also moved Go!Animate to its own website. Far from complete, but greatly improved and updated, today there are over 100 Go!Animators, pages with listings. I have over 30 more waiting for their own page when I can get to them. Most of them also offer non-Trek work, but the list here includes only their Trek work, and a link to their home page at Go!Animate, or if they have closed that, on You Tube. That website is “Star Trek Reviewed-Go!Animate."
Headlines have also been revised. I continue to make a monthly list of Headlines which were posted, (at “Monthly Headlines from Star Trek Reviewed”) but more types of Headlines exist. The original standard “Headline” was a newly released film over 10 minutes in length, and tells a full story (not ending in “to be continued...” or other cliffhanger.) These are now labeled, “Newly Released.” I also sometimes Headline the beginning of a planned series, or a ‘season’ of a series which, like a soap opera, never offers a complete story, also labeled "Newly Released." Unless another film warranting a Standard Headline is released sooner, a Standard Headline is left at the top of this website for 7 to 14 days. Now, however, I have added other materials which get 3 or 4 days each. I rotate among films found since August 1, 2011. I realized at that time that this website has grown too large to expect people to hunt through it for newly found materials that were less than “Headline” worthy. So I do give these materials a Headline, but I label them to set them apart from major Headlines.
They get one of three labels. “Spooftakular” indicates a parody or comedy, “Featured Go!Animator” shows the work of a Go!Animator who did not have their own page before the reorganization and has not otherwise had a Headline. A “Find” is anything else which was either found long after it was posted, or which was too short or otherwise deficient to get a Standard Headline. These three rotate, offering a new item to view roughly twice a week when no Standard Headline materials are newly released.
I probably will revise Star Trek Restricted to operate in the same way as the new more integrated Star Trek Reviewed supplemental websites.
Notable events of the past year include the release of Brazil’s first major fan film and completion of the excellent Star Trek Aurora. We got to celebrate First Contact Day with a release of “The Child” from Phase II, and Star Trek Unity kept us well fed with garden fresh Trek last summer. There have been an unusual number of quarrels in the film community. The record number of films in the works was not matched by a record number of films completed. Nevertheless, relatively few are newly abandon. Yorktown II is now expected to be released in 2013, but after more than a quarter century, whenever they release it, it will be celebrated.
And if things go as planned, the next major Star Wars Fan Film, Star Trek 2 by Jar Jar Abrams, should be released in 2013.
Star Trek Reviewed, Year 2
Two years ago, on June 26, 2009, I began to lay out this website. The primary task was to create a single location which indexed as many Star Trek Fan Films and Star Trek Audio Shows as I could find, and to provide some reviews of these, and of Pro Trek. At two years, I can state that Star Trek Reviewed’s Indexing is now largely complete, and that part of the website is just a matter of upkeep. Comedies and Parodies which have significant output have their own webpages. Also, there is now a webpage which lists Audio productions in alphabetical order. I continue to contact film makers and track releases so that others can choose to just come to Star Trek Reviewed’s Headline News to find out what completed films have become available, or to check each webpage for partial releases. Why should 1000 people do this when it can be done by one, who saves thousands of hours for fellow Trekkers? (Headlines more than one month old are at the linked website Monthly Headlines From Star Trek Reviewed ).
The bad news is that I have almost entirely given up on keeping up with Go!Animate. Films move around, filmmakers change their names. That part of the website is not current. A new product, Fem Trekz also is offering a standard sets of characters for would-be animators, although these are original creations, in a somewhat altered, and updated, (more Asian) Trek Universe. So far, however, FemTrekz seems to be mostly sexual innuendo with little plot, and the characters act like young men in female bodies, obsessed with getting sex. There is nothing in the modules themselves that limit their use to such things. Star Trek: Mariner is another Flash animation entry based on the Star Trek Online universe.
But finding fan films is never really complete! Just this month I found two older fan film makers I had missed. One is quite old, dating to the 1970s, the other, in black and white, of unknown age. I also added a new lego fan film, a parody short (Cockney Star Trek), a Professional Canadian comedy (Wayne & Shuster’s “Star Schtick”) and a Video Picture Book (Star Trek: Angels of Acheron) in the Trek Games, Fiction, Comic and Prose section (I do add the video picture books I find since I know of no other listing, while the other types of Fan Trek have their own indexing websites). And, of course, I go through most of my active listings every few months to see if anything new has come out that I missed.
In addition, there is now a new section for the Catalan language (11.5 million native speakers). Let me again hold up the single Brazilian gentleman, Ulisses Galazzo, who has provided subtitles to many of the best Star Trek Fan Films in Portuguese. There are an estimated 178 million native speakers (another source says 191 million) of Portuguese, and my page which provides Portuguese Trek is among the ten most visited pages every month. Sadly, I cannot offer a section for Trek to native speakers of Chinese (Mandarin alone was estimated to have 845 million speakers in 2000, by another estimate as many as 1.3 billion speakers), Hindi-Urdu (240 million or 497 million), Arabic (232 Million or 246 million), Bengali (181 million or 211 million), or many other widely spoken tongues (Malay-Indonesian 159 speakers, Russian, 144 million or 277 million, Japanese 122 million, Punjabi 109 million, ...). I urge readers for whom English is a second language who speak these tongues to follow in the footsteps of fellow Trekkers and create subtitles in their native tongue. If there are already fan films in your language, consider adding more to them by creating subtitles for films not yet subtitled.
I have put off adding to reviews until I again have time for that. I continue to link to reviews done by others. For a long time, Randy Hall was regularly reviewing at Sci Fi Pulse, but he has been taken from that task by other commitments. Things remain on my “Stuff That has been Found but not Sorted” page. I suspect most of it is games, music videos, or abandon incomplete parts of films.
Many interesting film and audio projects are in the pipeline. It is impossible to know what will happen until a film is released. Certainly, when Star Trek Reviewed was started two years ago, I would not have anticipated that Yorktown II, a film shot in the early 1980s with George Takei, and abandon for over two decades, would ever be completed. Now, I hope to see it next year. Nor would I have guessed at the variety and creativity I would enjoy from Trek fans. Aurora, which offers 3D animation of a small private trading spacecraft, is one of the more original and praised projects which I hope to see complete it’s first episode this year. I’ve also learned to love Star Track. If SNL did Galaxy Quest regularly as a skit, it might look a lot like Star Track. Several animations sets in the Original Time Line after the destruction of Romulous are in the works. Other films that were steaming along two years ago now seem unlikely to be completed in the foreseeable future. But, as if Yorktown II can rise from the dead, I would hesitate to count any Star Trek Fan Film out for the duration.
Then, there are films which are done... sort of... and the question is, When the Headline? "Star Trek Specter" is a great, completed animation, with high quality animation, but some of the females are still voiced by the male animator. He has stated he's done with it, but I have not given it a headline in hope that this great work will be given better audio in the future.
Finally,
1) I urge film makers and audio drama producers to contact me when they are releasing films, or if they have released films I have missed. Partial film releases are noted on your dedicated webpage or, if you have not released a film over 10 minutes in length which tells a full story, your dedicated paragraph. Let me announce your work, so that those who turn to Star Trek Reviewed to help them find fan films and fan audio shows can enjoy it.
2) I urge film viewers and audio listeners to express themselves by making comments here, or Fan work reviews at your own blog which you tell me you have written. Keep it clean, cogent, and respectful, and I will link to it! The advantage of your own blog is that you can review and revise your comment.
And I close with the motto of Star Trek Reviewed. If you know of any Star Trek Fan Films (or audio shows!) which I have missed, (Porn is not a fan film, music videos, video picture books, and fan commentaries or just clowning by fans are not fan films) please let me know. I assure you I didn’t intend to leave it, or them, out! If you find Star Trek Reviewed useful, help others. Give it a link from your website, blog, Facebook or other webpage.
In the 10 months after completion of the above essay, I have had to do major work on reorganization due to finding a lot of new Star Trek Fan films and running out of space in certain areas. I have also updated the Go!Animate listings.
Star Trek Reviewed, Year 1
On June 26, 2009, one year prior to the date of this posting, I began a two day task. I laid out 250 blank pages and selected a title for Star Trek Reviewed. At the start, I planned to lay out links to what I assumed was the 40 or 50 Star Trek Fan Films that existed, produced, so I assumed by as many as 10 or 15 different producers, review the films, and then go on to audio Star Trek fan creations. The number of Fan Films so far exceeded my expectations, however, that I no longer expect to be able to go on to a broader set of fan creations. In fact, there are more than twice as many producers of Star Trek Fan Films than the total number of films I expected to find!
At one year, significantly more than half of those 250 webpages have already been used. In addition, I have, on the request of some groups who wanted to use Star Trek Reviewed as a source for children and teens, tried to separate out the non-G and PG- rated materials in a parallel website, Star Trek Restricted. Since I have watched only about 20 per cent of the fan films, some such materials may remain on Star Trek Reviewed. If you find any, please tell me and I’ll move it/them.
The traffic I see on Star Trek Reviewed keeps me working on it. Thank you, readers! And... please, comment, or drop me a line! I’d love to know what you like about Star Trek Reviewed, what you don’t like, and hear any ideas you have for improving it. I have had the delightful experience of hearing from about a dozen of you, and have gotten some useful, if sometimes painful, comments that, I believe, have resulted in improvements to the website. You can thank your fellow readers for the easy-to-reach Table of Contents that appears on the right side of every web page, for example.
I have tried to organize the films available for non-English language speakers, knowing they would have to translate my website to use it. http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/219.html [This link was updated in March of 2013 to match the new location of the information] There are a large number of German language Star Trek Fan films, and a Spanish fan film series. Dozens of nationalities, among them Czechs, Mexicans, Fins. Poles, Turks and Chinese, have attempted to make, or made, Fan Films. Websites already existed which offered subtitles in Spanish or Italian, but a Brazilian individual has been using STR to publicize the creation of subtitles in Portuguese. I only wish we could attract a similar individual or group to produce subtitles in Arabic, Russian, Chinese, French, Bengali, Urdi/Hindi, and other widely spoken languages. I have a regular visitor or visitors from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. I also get visits from Qatar and a number of other Arabic speaking countries. Did you ever consider creating Arabic subtitles? And my regular(s) from Moscow, have you considered creating Russian subtitles? A person whose native language is not English but who is fluent in English can make a major contribution to Fan Films by creating subtitles in their native language, or organizing a team to create an audio dub, ... or both! Most fan film makers will provide you with a script to work from. The English Language version of the stop-action animation, Star Trek Enterprise, the Next Generation is a second soundtrack for a German film. Some people think it’s better than the original.
[Just since posting this essay two events have occurred. I have separated out six languages into their own blogs, vis:
and, in the process, I have had a catastrophic loss of most of my other international film data. If anyone out there who reads this has any of the lost data, or knows a way to retrieve old versions of a blog, please contact me]
I have found over 50 individual film makers who have produced more than 10 minutes of non-parody films which tell a story, or which have produced an hour or more of Go!Animate animations. I still have not even tried to handle the parodies. http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/146.html And then, there are shorts, http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/147.html and crossover franchise films, http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/245.html and legos films... also called "brick". http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/148.html The last time I counted all of these films, in April, 2010 there were over 350 films. Many have been added since, and I would not be surprised if the number now exceeded 400. In addition, I have now set out my links to audio Trek groups on their own page. http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/247.html Kirok of L’Stok counted these at 180 episodes last December. I suspect the number now exceeds 200.
Most gratifying have been some film producers who had their films in a can, completed, which were not on the net because they didn’t think anyone would find them, or that nobody cared, who have put their films on the net because they could get a webpage on Star Trek Reviewed, and through that, be found. In other cases tracking software has shown that some not well known films are getting three times as much traffic from Star Trek Reviewed as from their own websites.
I have very incomplete indexes of other Fan produced creations including games, prose, comics, and unique creations like Enterprise Season 5. http://startrekreviewed.blogspot.com/2009/06/246.html I have added links to better indexes than mine to this list. Audio now has a separate webpage. I would like to hear from anyone interesting in creating a website for audio, and adding full releases of audio stories to Headline News. No partial stories, no pre-announcements... no final announcements. Completed, ready to listen to work only.
I put my first counter on the website on September 6 of 2009. Three months later, On December 5, that counter stood at 1645. In the single month of May 2010 alone, that same counter measured 1879 visitors, more than three times the rate of visitors.
Total visitors counted have also passed the 12,000 mark, but even that is fewer than the over 14,000 visitors the Fan Film Production Map has enjoyed.
I have had visitors from at least 71 nations, 48 states (No joy from Wyoming and North Dakota), and several territories. No Extra Terrestrials, however, have made themselves known. I guess that will have to wait until April 5, 2063.
Let me close where I always do. If you know of any Star Trek Fan Film which I have missed, (Porn is not a fan film) please let me know. I assure you I didn’t intend to leave it, or them, out! If you find Star Trek Reviewed useful, give it a link from your website, blog, or facebook or other webpage. It will not only direct your readers where to find it, it will raise its status on search engines.
Comments from when placed on top of website:
Kirok of L'Stok said...
Barb, may I be the first to wish your site a happy birthday! You have shown commendable staying power in your work here and Star Trek Reviewed has developed into a comprehensive, detailed and fair catalogue of what is available on the internet today. I look forward to seeing what you come up with in your second year.
Ulisses said...Thanks your blog, it's much more easy to me find on net newStar Trek's productions or releases. Every day I enter this blog to see what's happen.
Why Star Trek Reviewed: The Essay Which explains why this website was created.Comments from when placed on top of website:
Kirok of L'Stok said...Barb, may I be the first to wish your site a happy birthday! You have shown commendable staying power in your work here and Star Trek Reviewed has developed into a comprehensive, detailed and fair catalogue of what is available on the internet today. I look forward to seeing what you come up with in your second year.
ta'mey Dun, bommey Dun
Great deeds, great songs
Kirok of L'Stok
Great deeds, great songs
Kirok of L'Stok
Ulisses said...Thanks your blog, it's much more easy to me find on net newStar Trek's productions or releases. Every day I enter this blog to see what's happen.
Thanks, Barb.Ulisses
A. Purpose
STAR TREK REVIEWED is a viewer-oriented guide to Star Trek video and films produced by fans, and reviews of Star Trek Video and Films from all sources. It provides both sources for Star Trek and links to read reviews. In addition, over time, it will include my own reviews, mostly of fan productions. My own view is that the most important special effects in any video or stage play are good writing and good acting. BLOG 2 contains the complete Table of Contents.
Headline News: ONLY HEADLINES go here. What is more, Headlines will be delayed if the item is listed as available at a given time by at least a few hours past that time so that the readers of Star Trek Reviewed do not have to be frustrated by download mirror websites that crash from too much traffic, or delays in posting. By the time an item gets a Headline, it should be readily available without causing frustration. If it is only partially available (e.g., streaming video but not download) the Headline will note that.
Headlines also only include Star Trek films which are primarily tributes or dramas, and which are complete stories and complete episodes. If an item is added to "Parodies" or "Star Trek Names Not Associated with Star Trek Films" or a part of an episode is released, that does not make it into this "NEWS" section except under special circumstances. Nothing in 243 Assortment to sort out! has been processed, so if I came across the greatest fan film ever made, and it's there, I haven't figured out what it is yet. Future plans of fan film companies, no matter how important, are not the subject of this website, and are not noted in the news here. If you want to know their plans go to any Trek news website or to the individual fan film company website. Many Trek websites are mentioned in Blogs 248 and 249. This website seeks to answer only one question: Is there any Fresh Trek provided by Fans I haven't see yet and can watch without driving myself batty?
This blog helps my fellow non-costumed, non-convention going Star Trek fans find their way around the video and film productions of the Star Trek universe, particularly fan productions. Finding fan film productions can be a challenge, finding the ones worth your time, more so, so I've tried to do it for you. I'm sure I've missed plenty. Please let me know about all of those Star Trek Fan Films I've missed, or which are new, so I can add links to them from here.
Websites offering Star Trek Fan Films and professional Star Trek to watch or download from the web are linked from this blog, even if I have not had time to watch or review them myself... even if I never intend to (Professional Trek). There are also some Fan Films which have been posted on You-Tube and other video websites such as Vimeo which do not have websites. I have also worked to locate and link to those. I plan to write useful reviews of most fan film productions, which range from truly wonderful to truly awful, with much in between. That could take years, though. In the meanwhile, I link to reviews offered by others.
Originally I intended to add audio dramas after completing my review of Star Trek Fan Films. But that idea has died with the discovery that my original estimate of the number of Star Trek Fan Films was in the neighborhood of ten per cent of the real number. Some references in this set of blogs to all Star Trek dramatic productions may remain.
What is a fan film? Well, for the moment, it's a video or film Trek story produced for film or video. Such films that have significant amounts of completed video but are abandon without completing a full story will eventually go into Blog 140. Productions for live audiences which happened to have been filmed or videotaped are not fan films, and are placed in Blog 141. I cannot review fan films I cannot watch. Fan films I have been told exist, but I can't find, are in Blog 142. I will only review complete stories or episodes. Many fan film websites release individual acts in one story, sometimes over a period of years. If a fan film in four acts or four parts is being produced, and they have released 3 acts or three parts, I will acknowledge that the film exists, and assign a blog number to the production company, but I will not review it here until the film can be viewed in it entirety. In the case of many websites, only trailers and come-ons, or just announcements and banners have be issued, with no product at all. These will not be assigned their own Blog number, but will be listed, and, to the extent possible, classified in Blog 143. I have started to move fan film groups that appear to have abandon their efforts without significant production to blogs numbered at or after AA. Fan films that have release a single "Act" but that act could be mistaken for a teaser... I'll keep my right to make a call. It may or may not be assigned a blog number. Blog 144 contains links to small one-shot fan productions which, generally speaking, are particularly awful, or teen productions which I cannot recommend watching, even for the most avid Trek fan. Blog 145 originally, and, for the most part, still contains a list of Star Trek Fan films which are not only not in English, they offer no English subtitles or English dubbed versions, or at least no versions I can get to run. Some may be good, some awful, but I do not pretend to judge them. However, I now have made significant progress toward adding lists under each language group to all Star Trek fan films available in that language. There is a fan in Brazil who has been creating subtitles in Portuguese, and has been kind enough to post links as comments below this blog. There are also websites for subtitles in Spanish and Italian, which are linked. I also have a Blog to put short or groups of short films into. These films are either under ten minutes or fail to tell a story, or both. They are in Blog 147. Lego based Star Trek Films are mostly in in Blog 148 (Some French ones are in the Foreign Language Trek Blog). I have no idea what to do with these. Suggestions are welcome. Finally, Blog 149 contains websites and fan films proposing new ideas for Professional Star Trek TV shows or movies, or showing ideas which were proposed at one time but never developed into professional series or movies.
Anyone who had read a review and liked it, or written a review, is invited to add a link to that review as a comment on this website at the appropriate blog. I will then, if I am so inclined, add that review to the list of reviews on that subject. I retain the right to be arbitrary and capricious about what I choose to incorporate. However, no lewd or vulgar material will be incorporated.
B. Structure and Limitations
This website's structure is in the Table of Contents, Blog 2. Not included are Star Trek comic books, Star Trek novels, Star Trek games, Star Trek toys, prints, photos, lithographs, music, music videos... or other non-theatrical Star Trek products. I will provide links to guides and reviews to these things in Blog 248. However, they are not the subject of this website, and are far too numerous to list here. I have also given up my original plan to include audio drama after I completed my listing and review of video and film. Keeping up with video and film, without audio, will be as much or more than I can handle. As I come across them, I am listing, alphabetically, Star Trek Audio Productions, Star Trek Prose, Star Trek Games, and Star Trek Comics or Graphic Novels in Blog 246. I am not trying to make that list exhaustive or complete. Crossover Franchise Fan Films are listed by franchise, then alphabetically in Blog 245. Again, no attempt to be complete. Fan Film groups and individual major fan films, as well as crossover films which were made by two fan film groups are indexed in Blog 250. Eventually, I hope to expand this into a true Index for the website.
C. Professional Official Star Trek Video and Film
There have been six officially sanctioned and professionally produced Star Trek Television shows. The Original Series("TOS") (3 years, 1966-1969) the Animated Series("TAS") (22 shows, 1973-1974), The Next Generation("TNG") (7 years, 1987-1994), Deep Space Nine("DS9") (7 years, 1993-1999), Voyager("VOY")(7 years, 1994-2001), and Enterprise("ENT") (4 years, 2001-2005). That's 28 years of live action shows. I have no plan to write reviews of these series, but set out blogs 151 through 199 on on a year by year basis for links to online reviews of the professional television series. Blog 150 will lay out the organization and relationship of the shows to each other. As I find other people's reviews, I may add their web addresses to this blog. I may also add my own comments.
Likewise, there have been eleven officially sanctioned and professionally produced Star Trek movies. I do not intend to review movies 1 though 10. However, as I come across such reviews around the web, I may make links to them here. An overview of the movies and those who review them will be set out in Blog 200. The blogs that follow will be assigned, one to to each film. Star Trek XI, the J.J. Abrams Star Trek, is reviewed at Blog 211.
D. Plans for This Website.
My top priorities in building this website are set out in Blog 247.
E. To Be Determined
I hope to eventually incorporate Star Trek parodies in this review blog. However, I consider them the lowest priority among fan films. For the time being, I am listing them in Blog 146. Many are produced by fans, and some are halfway between tributes and parodies. However, some are commercials. Should a bad fan parody be included while a good commercial isn't? I will review them after I have reviewed the 'strait' Star Trek Fan Films.... if I even complete that task. More than seven months after creating this website, I'm still finding Star Trek Fan Films faster than I can watch them. Major comedy and parody groups and ongoing series will probably be assigned blogs at that time. I have already included some fan films that are more tributes than parodies, and parodies of historic interest, but not other parodies in some Blogs. I am now leaning toward giving Blogs to major Parody producers, but that is not a final decision. For now, I am not being consistent. I am also including work by teenagers when that work was extensive, and, in my opinion, worthy of inclusion, for completeness. And what to do with the productions which recast the major characters using children? Do these belong here? While I imagine most adult Star Trek fans would find these a bore, parents and Trekkie kids may not. Your comments on this subject are welcome. I moved Starship Mojave to it's own Blog/page, in spite of my initial reluctance.
F. History of Fan Film Reviews
I am not the first person to do this. But It's my hope that I'll create a
useful website. Here's a New York times video about fan films:
http://video.nytimes.com/video/2006/06/17/arts/1194817091706/star-trek-fan-films-on-the-web.html/
And the written article: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/18/arts/television/18trek.html?hp&ex=1150689600&en=b029ea26cee9eddc&ei=5094&partner=homepage/
Web addresses to other overall or fan film based blogs and magazines are in Blog 249. Websites that attempt to organize or list non-theatrical Star Trek are listed in Blog 250.
G. Why do this?
I am not what most people think of as a Trekkie or even a Trekker... but I like my Trek. Like, don't love. When I saw Star Trek XI, it gave me a headache. A few days later, I happened upon Star Trek: Intrepid. Star Trek: Intrepid filled me with delight. It was the thoughtful human interaction I expected from Star Trek, but was still escapist. It had those two most important special effects: thoughtful writing and good acting. It wasn't just a remake of something else recast as Star Trek. I wrote a review of both Star Trek XI and Star Trek: Intrepid on my regular blog. (Those reviews are now here in blog 109 and at http://startrekreviewed-tvandmovies.blogspot.com/2012/01/movie-11.html ). I saw Star Trek XI again five weeks later in an IMAX and enjoyed it, largely because I was no longer expecting Star Trek, and I could just accept it for what it was.
I wanted a guide to fan Trek for people who were casual Trek watchers. People who, like me, who were still among the 2.9 million viewers (TV Guide, 2/21/2005) watching Enterprise when it was canceled, but would never consider going to a convention, dressing up in a costume, or writing or developing one's own Star Trek materials. In fact, I'd bet about two and a half million of those 2.9 million viewers who remained fit this description. People who enjoy Star Trek, like a good cup of coffee, or a pastry... as a treat, not a meal.
I have no interest in watching a 2 minute film introducing a character in a planned series that may or may not ever be made. I certainly am not interested in reading thirteen pre-announcements of that two minute film Sure, if they make the series, and it's good, I'd like to watch it.... AFTER it's finished. But I'm not interested in doing what I find myself doing... tooling through fan film websites that had no fan films. Getting sent to watch films that were made by kids in their basements, or in their schools. All I want to watch is the GOOD STUFF. I want to be able to quickly go through reviews to decide what to see, like I do with professionally produced movies. I looked for a viewer-oriented website.
All the websites I found were for the very involved, like industry websites. They had 16 pre-announcements before the actual announcement that a 7 minute film was being released. I started keeping track so I didn't have to repeat dross in my hunt for high quality, or at least decent existing fan films. But, like a '49er panning for gold, I was coming up with a glimmer here, a nugget there, amidst the dross. Sometimes a REALLY BIG nugget. Of Gods and Men. Star Trek: Phase II. Star Trek: Exeter. GOOD STUFF. So, despite all the dross, I kept looking.
I finally decided to share my work by organizing it in this website. If Star Trek Reviewed helps no one else, it will help ME find the good stuff, when I want to find it, and not have to hunt through the dross again. I'll have a record that I already watched that stuff, or decided it wasn't worth watching. But if you read this far, maybe it will help you, too.
Note on April 14, 2010, about ten months after starting this project: I just found out my birthday, April 5, is First Contact Day. No wonder they always called me "Spock" in high school...
