screenplay by Arthur Wallis
additional material by Paul Ebbs
directed by Patricia Merrick and Bill Baggs
music by Alistair Lock

Cast: George Telfer (Graham Winslet), Helen Baggs (Nurse), Andrew Fettes (Sergeant Ramsay), Bryonie Pritchard (Dr. Sally Arnold), Peter Trapani (Dalby), Graeme du Fresne (Palmer), Michael Wade (Lockwood), Jo Castleton (Natasha Alexander), Blaine Coughlan, Alex, Steve Johnson, Peter Trapani (Autons)

Review: As a rule, I try to concentrate on constructive advice when it comes to reviewing fan-made productions, simply because these aren’t shows with a ton of money behind them: they’re labors of love. However, Auton 3, the (thankfully) concluding chapter of the Auton trilogy, is nearly a decade old at the time of this review, so I’m not exactly sure this review will truly have anything new to say that the film’s makers haven’t already heard.

To offer a broad criticism of its biggest failing, Auton 3 compounds and magnifies the problems that began to creep into the story with the trilogy’s second entry. The whole “psychic influence” angle felt out of place in Auton 2: Sentinel, and it’s brought front and center here to serve as the main weapon humanity has against the plastic invaders. The interaction between Lockwood and the rest of the Autons is very strange indeed, and apparently a ludicrous number (said at one point to be “billions” - what!?) of enormous Nestene squids are buried alive somewhere on Earth, doing things and exhibiting powers that are simply out of line with nearly everything the Nestene/Auton stories established in Doctor Who. Those expecting this to feel like a part of the Doctor Who universe may be in for a shock.

Now, that said, I would’ve been happy had this last film wrapped up the first two and clarified some of their respective mysteries, and at least capped off a nicely self-contained story that simply uses some trappings of the Doctor Who continuity, but we don’t even get that - instead we get a grim, tentative ending and an hour of story that seems to hang together on coincidence and loosely defined psychic interactions with the Nestenes. There are some relatively nice CGI effects (for something made on video in 1999), but it’s ultimately a victory of style over substance. (I would say something about the squid-like Nestene looking nothing like it did in the 1970s, but that argument is rendered meaningless in retrospect when the first episode of the new Doctor Who in 2005 gave us a pit-of-molten-something as its visualization of a Nestene. I guess there are many flavors of Nestene, and a purple pulsating CGI squid is just one of them now.)

In the end, perhaps the Auton story would’ve been best served if its pilot-episode-ish first installment had been the beginning and end of it - something ripe with promise that invites the viewer to imagine what adventures lie ahead for Dr. Arnold, Lockwood & company. Instead, the trilogy takes increasingly strange turns that diverge from the established mythology more and more with each succeeding chapter, and never quite lives up to that air of promise hanging from the end of Auton. It’s a pity, but the new names in the writing credits perhaps give us the biggest clue to where fan productions were headed at this time: Nicholas Briggs, who wrote and directed the first two Auton videos, is absent for the third round, having signed on with Big Finish, which was launching its officially licensed Doctor Who audio adventures at around this time (Auton 3 was released in 1999). Internal political concerns within the BBC saw Briggs and other former fan production heavyweights such as Gary Russell distance themselves from BBV’s Bill Baggs, who had released and promoted all three Auton chapters; with new audio-only adventures featuring original Doctor Who actors as their original characters, fandom’s tastes - and spending habits - shifted decisively away from BBV’s “all-the-trappings-of-Doctor-Who-except-the-Doctor” video productions and toward Big Finish. Doctor Who fan films would soon be few and far between, but nobody could’ve realized that this gap would be filled, in just a few years, by an unexpectedly successful return to television for the franchise.

And ironically, when the TARDIS returned to TV, the new Doctor’s first enemies were the Autons.

screenplay by Nicholas Briggs
directed by Nicholas Briggs
music by Alistair Lock

Cast: Michael Wade (Lockwood), George Telfer (Graham Winslet), Jo Castleton (Natasha Alexander), Andrew Fettes (Sergeant Ramsay), John Wadmore (Colonel Wilson), Bryonie Pritchard (Dr. Sally Arnold), Warren Howard (Daron), Patricia Merrick (Charlotte), David Rowston (Dave), Nicholas Briggs (Mike), John Hawkins (Hardgraves), John Hansell (Davis), Jayson Bridges, Keith Brooks, Stephen Bradshaw, Vaughan Groves, Mark Moore, Gabriel Mykaj, Richard Smith, Blaine Coughlin (UNIT Soldiers), Steven Friel, Peter Trapani, Pete Cox, Rod Horne, Alexander Wylie, John Walker, Mark Jende, Matthew Bradford, Ian Taylor, Philip Clarke, Randalph Edwards, Loraine Malby, Peter Frankum, Keith Burton, Robert Dunlop, Caroline O’Sullivan, Thomas O’Sullivan, Andrew Hasley (Villagers)

Review: Released in 1998, the second installment in the Auton series seems like it should’ve been a shoo-in for exciting science fiction drama, with its interesting combination of characters having formed a somewhat uneasy team at the end of Auton, and the Auton threat still alive and on the move. The first Auton video felt very much like a series pilot, so surely Auton 2 would take that potential and run with it…right?

Sadly, the first thing Auton 2: Sentinel proceeds to do is to break up the promising team of regulars from the first chapter. Auton 2 is very much Lockwood’s story, with the skeptical but capable Dr. Arnold pushed into a minimal background supporting role. A new character, the psychic Natasha Alexander, is thrust into the limelight, largely fulfulling the same role that Arnold served in Auton: to be capable of helping deal with the Auton menace, but to also be extremely skeptical of the whole situation and of Lockwood.

If there’s one thing that just doesn’t really work for me with the second installment of Auton, it’s the weird combination of the black magic/twisted religion themes and the Autons. Sure, black magic, villains posing as vicars, and mind control have a long history in Doctor Who lore, dating back to the Pertwee era just like the Autons. But the two concepts never really meld together - Terror Of The Autons and The Daemons may have been part of the same season of Doctor Who, but they didn’t belong in the same story. The Autons are a relatively “hard” science fiction concept - plastic animated and controlled by parent creatures, whose control over the plastic can be broken by electromagnetic means - and to have them suddenly trying to exploit some supernatural force is very strange, as is the concept of battling them through some kind of psychic connection.

Where Auton 2 succeeds, however, is in a visual and directorial sense. The scenes of the Autons walking into the water, and later through a field of tall grass, are striking and unnerving, and the montage of the Autons beginning their massacre of the people of Sentinel Island is a shocking piece of very effective action directing and editing. A lot of violence is packed in without necessarily bringing a lot of gore with it - it’s very stylishly done. The real surprise at the end, however, is the full-realized CGI Nestene creature climbing atop the church; I was perfectly happy with Auton’s lo-fi effects, and wouldn’t have complained to see more of the same here. When the creature makes its appearance, it’s a stunning surprise, because until then Auton 2 sticks to the same practical-effects-on-a-budget mandate. It’s a bonus that it’s actually pretty good CGI for a semi-pro production dating back to the days when Babylon 5 was still on the air raising the CGI bar.

Visually striking and boasting some very good performances, Auton 2 is best watched when you switch off your prior knowledge of how the Autons and Nestenes behaved in Doctor Who. In the finest Who tradition, it’s also a cliffhanger leading into the third and final chapter of the Auton trilogy.

screenplay by Nicholas Briggs
directed by Nicholas Briggs
music by Alistair Lock

Cast: Bryonie Pritchard (Dr. Sally Arnold), George Telfer (Graham Winslet), Verona Chard (Janice), Reece Shearsmith (Dr. Daniel Matthews), Andrew Fettes (Sergeant Ramsay), Michael Wade (Lockwood), Roy Hughes, Gabriel Mykaj, Mike Parry, David Ringwood, Richard Smith (UNIT Soldiers), John Ainsworth, Gareth Baggs, Blaine Coughlan, David Ringwood (Autons)

Notes: Part of the code on the Auton crates - “RH / AAA” - refers to the late Robert Holmes, the veteran Doctor Who writer and script editor who created the Autons, and the BBC’s internal production code for the Doctor Who story in which they first appeared, Spearhead From Space. That story is also where the Doctor devised the unwieldly contraption that allows Dr. Arnold to battle the Autons.

Review: A cleverly-made “sidebar” to some past Doctor Who episodes, this opening volley in the Auton trilogy manages to attain quite a creepiness factor with an economy of effects and action. Auton also oozes - if you’ll forgive the pun - “pilot,” as its creators clearly had more story in mind than just this single installment. The characters are set up, the relationships (and potential problems thereof) are established, and yet they come together to win the day - or at least win the immediate battle in what promises to be a longer conflict. This is really the closest there’s been to a fan-made UNIT series, so it’s also refreshing to see that organization get an outing that makes it look bigger and a bit more effective than just, as Nicholas Courtney himself once put it, “the Brig’s Army”.

One minor nitpick that I had with the Autons as they appeared here - their appearance was dead-on, just as spooky as it was in 1970, but the sound effects were way off. The original sound effects for the Autons’ hinged hands and their “hand guns” still exist, and have even been published by way of the excellent 30 Years At The Radiophonic Workshop CD (which was certainly out before this film was produced in 1997); more to the point, those sounds were used in the first episode of the new Doctor Who, Rose, which also featured the Autons. I’m assuming that the makers of the Auton videos decided it would be too expensive to license those sound effects for use in their productions, but somehow, it diminishes the authenticity of the whole thing - they might as well have substituted other names for “Auton” and “Nestene” and “UNIT”. Odd as it may seem, those sound effects are so central to the Autons that it throws things off that much.

Overall, it’s an effective first installment, with some intriguing effects that, for their low-budget nature, aren’t any less effective at telling the story. Indeed, it’s actually a bit more creepy to see real goo coaxed into moving around (sometimes through reversed video and other tricks) without it being CGI. The story expands considerably on the abilities and nature of the Nestenes and their plastic pals who are decidedly not fun to be with, but it doesn’t break the mythos at all - if anything, it fills in a few blanks. Auton is low-key, low-tech fun, and there’s more where this came from.

written by Beo Fraser
directed by Beo Fraser
music by Daniel Chan

Cast: Brandon McConnell (Lt. Commander Ro Nevin), Michelle Laurent (Subcommander T’Lorra), Matthew Montgomery (Dr. Owen Vaughan), Julia Morizawa (Lt. Maya Stadi), Tim Foutch (Ensign John Gillen), Sharon Savene (Seram Archein), John Whiting (General Morrigu), Adam Browne (Caecus), David O’Neill (Vito), Jacob Hibbits (Jenaan), Sam Basca (Lt. Alex Wozniak), Ben Euphrat (Lt. J.G. Teles Shanaar), Ross King (Medical Nurse)

Notes: Ensign Gillin reveals that he hails from Thunder Bay, Ontario. T’Lorra apparently has Tal Shiar ties, and Dr. Vaughan once served on Starbase 395, where he got to know other Romulan officers. The Archein auto-defense satellites were first encountered by the crews of the Excalibur and the Intrepid in the crossover fan film Orphans Of War.

Review: In this second installment of Odyssey, Brandon McConnell takes over the role of Ro Nevin from the departing Bobby Rice, who had made the role his own on the fan series Star Trek: Hidden Frontier. I can’t tell if it’s the performance or the script, but the “new” Ro comes across as almost noncommittal as his crew bickers all around him. The story is standard “new captain has to visibly take charge” fare, but the problem is: McConnell as Ro never does take charge. In one early scene he asks, “Do I need to be here for this?” as two of his senior officers argue. Intentionally or not, that line points up pefectly the episode’s buggest structural weakness.

The Wine Dark Sea does have some interesting stuff going on with the bad guys, with hints of longer-range story arcs being set up between the blue-skinned space dominatrix who has seized control of the Archein, and her cabin boy. In this installment at least, the court intrigue among the Archein is more interesting than the Odyssey crew’s personality conflicts in the workplace.

Oddball tiny-detail that bugged me: why would a star chart on the main viewscreen display things in the same faux-ancient font as the show’s logo rather than the standard super-condensed Helvetica as the rest of the ship’s screens and instruments? I mean, I know we’re boldly going into fresh new territory here, but I’m a bit of a stickler for the “LCARS look” of the Federation’s computer systems. The computer-generated backgrounds demonstrate that a lot of attention was paid to getting that look right elsewhere, so I wonder why the exception here? Let’s not get into the away team not getting drenched by superimposed rain - hit ‘em with spray bottles of water between scenes, guys!

The Wine Dark Sea is a bit of a mixed bag, but it’s also not a long one, not even reaching the 40 minute mark. I’m still looking forward to the next installment - and an opportunity for McConnell to zing us with a brave new Ro Nevin.

Stardate not given: Captain John Harriman of the G.S.S. Conqueror captures two terrorists whose names are at the top of the Galactic Order’s most wanted list. With his mixed crew of humans, Klingons and Romulans, Harriman moves on to his next assignment: to deliver a message to the pacifistic secessionists of Vulcan. On Vulcan, Nyota Uhura feels an unusual twinge of worry about the planet’s secession from the Galactic Order, and after Vulcan’s orbital defenses are wiped out, it seems she has good reason to worry. The Conqueror is about to launch the devastating Omega Device to make an object lesson of the Vulcans: defy the Order at your own peril…

story by Sky Conway & Tim Russ and Jack Trevino & Ethan H. Calk
teleplay by Ethan H. Calk, Sky Conway & Jack Trevino
directed by Tim Russ
music by Justin R. Durban

Cast: Walter Koenig (Capt. Pavel Chekov), Nichelle Nichols (Capt. Nyota Uhura), Alan Ruck (Capt. John Harriman), Garrett Wang (Commander Garan), William Wellman Jr. (Charlie Evans), J.G. Hertzler (Koval), Gary Graham (Ragnar), Tim Russ (Tuvok), Chase Masterson (Xela), Crystal Allen (Conqueror Navigator Yara), Ethan Phillips (Data Clerk), Cirroc Lofton (Sevar), Lawrence Montaigne (Stonn), James Cawley (Commander Kirk), Jeff Quinn (Conqueror Helmsman), Seth Shostak (Enterprise Communications Officer), Shawn Shelton (voice of the Guardian of Forever), Crystal Conway (Grandchild), Madison Russ (Grandchild), Keith Batt (Navigator), Patrick Bell (Enterprise Helmsman), Giovanna Contini, David deFrane, Ronald Gates, Deborah Huth, Danielle Porter (Enterprise Bridge Crew), Sky Conway, Travis Sentell (Enterprise Security Officers), Jeanine Camargo, Heather C. Harris, Mindy Iden, Luke McRoberts, Moses Shepard (Vulcan Initiates), Elizabeth Cortez (T’Liel), Amy Ulen (Teacher), Rob Leslie, Joanna Mendoza, Linda Zaruches (Vulcan Citizens), Stewart Lucas, Scott Nakada (Conqueror Klingon Officers), Joel Bellucci, Tony Pavone (Conqueror Romulan Officers), Giovanna Contini (Conqueror Science Officer)

Review: Possibly the most eagerly anticipated Star Trek fan film project since New Voyages started welcoming top-line guests from the original series, Of Gods And Men is the brainchild of Tim “Tuvok” Russ, convention promoter/organizer Sky Conway, and two former DS9 scriptwriters, Ethan Calk and Jack Trevino. As with a great many Trek tributes centered around the Kirk era, Gods - or at least this first part of it - pivots on plot points introduced, but never resolved, by the original series. In this case, it’s the Guardian of Forever - which surely has to rank as the most imagination-stirring element to emerge from classic Trek, considering the number of books, fan films and other fiction that has revisited it - and Charlie X himself.

In the background of this, there’s an intriguing notion or two, as the alternate-timeline Chekov cites the quotation “He who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither,” and as Uhura questions - in the same context - whether the needs of the many really does outweigh the needs of the one. Something is clearly being set up here, but the payoff doesn’t even begin in this first half-hour installment of three. I’ve been complaining recently that the Trek fan flicks just aren’t doing their due allegorical dilligence - one of the chief reasons that Star Trek is remembered at all was its surprising (for the 1960s) freedom to comment on current events and other concepts of interest to the human condition. More often than not, the Trek fan films - enjoyable as they may be - have simply connected dots between points of continuity in the Trek universe, rather than following suit and taking advantage of the near-total freedom of having no network or advertiser oversight.

Gods seems to be indicating that it is indeed going to comment on something of great importance to today’s world, but by the end of this first half-hour, all we’ve done is destroy Vulcan in spectacular style. Part of me worries that if Gods is going to try to make some comment on the state of current affairs, perhaps something more subtle than an ultimate-bad-ass-variation-on-the-Mirror-Universe could’ve been employed - but perhaps I’m getting too far ahead of myself.

The cast is top-notch, with Walter Koenig and Nichelle Nichols - now a member of the cast of Heroes - recreating their characters at Star Trek: Generations-plus-a-dozen-years effortlessly. It’s also good to see Alan Ruck get to do something other than “aw shucks” as he hands command over to someone else - the movie drops a solid hint that he’s still in the captain’s chair of the Enterprise-B, and has been for at least a decade, and his portrayal of Harriman makes that a believable notion. Rounding out the cast in roles ranging from bit parts to characters that seem likely to become central to the action are DS9’s J.G. “Martok” Hertzler (again playing an expertly-made-up Klingon), Chase “Leeta” Masterson (as an even-more-delicious-than-usual Orion slave girl) and Cirroc “Jake Sisko” Lofton, Voyager’s Garrett Wang and Ethan Phillips, and Enterprise/Alien Nation mainstay Gary Graham, among others. William Wellman Jr. takes up the role of Charlie, originally played by (the still very much alive) Robert Walker Jr.; the age difference is such that it’d be hard to detect a lack of resemblance anyway.

Though shot partially on the New Voyages sets, and partially at Vasquez Rocks, Gods has a slicker look and tighter editing than just about any other amateur (if you can even apply that word) Trek production I’ve seen. The editing in particular is an Achilles’ heel of many a Trek fan film, and even the best among them could learn a thing or two from watching Gods. It’s tightly paced, and the rapid-fire banter among many of the pro actors is a joy to behold. Put those two together with some solid directing, and…well…depending on where the story goes, Gods stands to be better than Star Trek: Nemesis at the very least. I also appreciated the non-intelligence-insulting concept that doesn’t let any of the characters have a clue - at least thus far - that they’re in an altered timeline and “this isn’t the way it’s supposed to be.” There’s no handy Guinan pointing them back toward the “proper” timeline. Again, the comments apply only to the first half-hour - don’t let me down, guys.

But by all means, please do roll on parts two and three. That cliffhanger drives me crazy.

story by Brian Matthews, Rob Caves and Nick Cook
teleplay by Brian Matthews
directed by Jennifer Cole
music by David Beukes

Cast: Risha Denney (Captain Elizabeth Shelby), Nick Cook (Captain Daniel Hunter), Joanne Busch (Commander Robin Lefler), Lucy Faria-Cook (Lt. Commander Yanis Caed), Rick Corbett (Commander Ben Nostrom), Wayne Webb (Lt. Commander Matt McCabe), David Reid (Lt. C’Seris), John Whiting (General Morrigu), Nick Beckwith (Lt. Simmons), Tyler Bosserman (Lt. Commander Andrew Barrett)

Review: This clever little vignette, weighing in at around the 15-minute mark, brings together the crew of Hidden Frontier’s Excelsior and the crew of the U.S.S. Intrepid, a 24th century Trek fan series made in Scotland (see our review of Intrepid’s first episode, Heavy Lies The Crown). As much as I gripe about an entire story being shot against a chromakey background so CGI “sets” can be inserted later, Orphans Of War points up what may be one of the few advantages of shooting that way: an international cast can be in the same production without a budget big enough to cause an international incident. There are scenes which Nick and Lucy Cook of Intrepid shot during a visit to the U.S., alongside Hidden Frontier cast members like Risha Denney (who appeared on a monitor screen in Intrepid’s pilot episode), which is a neat touch - trying to get cast members on different continents to interact via two different greenscreen shooting sessions would test the mettle of Hollywood’s technical wizards, never mind fan filmmakers. Just this once, I take issue with one little bit of CGI more than I do the compositing: the automatic defense turret inside the Archein station looks like Playstation-circa-1997 animation, a stark contrast to the almost broadcast-quality external space scenes.

Orphans is essentially the Time Crash of 24th century Trek fan series - a light, breezy adventure whose main attraction is simply that it puts two different - but related - productions’ disparate elements together so we can see how they interact. There’s a lot of fun to be had in the short span of time for this adventure, such as Hunter extolling the virtues of cricket over baseball when a bit of lucky pitching is required to save the day, and ultimately that’s what it’s all about. It’s good to see some more Trek crossover - there was great untapped potential for it in the days of TNG, DS9 and Voyager, and since they were filming in the same city block rather than on different continents, that makes this particular crossover even more impressive.

story by Rob Caves
teleplay by Rob Caves
directed by J.T. Tepnapa
music by Dex Craig

Cast: Bobby Rice (Lt. Commander Ro Nevin), Michelle Laurent (Subcommander T’Lorra), Matthew Montgomery (Dr. Owen Vaughan), Julia Morizawa (Lt. Maya Stadi), Tim Foutch (Ensign John Gillen), J.T. Tepnapa (Lt. Commander Corey Aster), Sharon Savene (Seram Archein), John Whiting (General Morrigu), David W. Dial (Admiral Ian Knapp), Joni Bovill (Proconsul Yeshva), Karl Puder (General Korg), Sterling Greene (Captain T’Lek), Jennifer Cole (Grand Majan Archein), Adam Browne (Caecus), Jacob Hibbits (Jenaan), Hugh Gehrke (Centurion), Jacob Reitz (Klingon Tactical), David O’Neill (Vito), Mark Ashton Lund (Commander Conner), Andrew Foster (Chief Hars Bixx), Sam Basca (Lt. Alex Wozniak), Joanne Busch (Commander Robin Lefler)

Notes: Odyssey is a spinoff from the long-running post-Voyager fan series Star Trek: Hidden Frontier; the characters of Ro Nevin and Corey Aster are carryovers from that series. The character of Maya Stadi is intended to be a cousin of the deceased Lt. Stadi who ferried Tom Paris to Voyager in the pilot epiosde of Star Trek: Voyager.

Review: I’ll admit that I have seen only clips of the fan series Hidden Frontier, Odyssey’s progenitor, and barely have a working knowledge of its plotline, so there are a few things here which seem to be references to Hidden Frontier plot points that baffled me a bit. With this being the launch of a new series, albeit a Hidden Frontier spinoff, I wanted to stumble into the fray with no preconceived notions. Odyssey is a mightily impressive series from a standpoint of production values - almost all of the signature Trek alien makeups are outstanding (especially the Bolian, who looked so authentic that I’d swear Michael Westmore himself made the actor up), the costumes are more than credible, and the exterior space CGI scenes are up there with almost anything that Paramount itself put on the screen under the Star Trek banner. The actors are ready for prime time, and they have some sparkling dialogue to work with.

So what’s the catch? Egads, the sound mix. I watched Odyssey’s premiere episode on two different decently calibrated surround sound systems, but that’s all for nought when it’s decided at several junctures that the music and sound effects are more important than clearly distringuishable dialogue. It’s not a problem for much of the show, but during intense action sequences don’t count on hearing what anyone’s saying. There’s one key scene aboard the Klingon ship where I couldn’t make out one word of what was being said. I don’t know if the Klingon captain was swearing an oath to die with honor, if I missed a poignant goodbye from Aster to Ro, or if everyone aboard was intoing the lyrics to the Macarena in unison in a disturbing monotone. I couldn’t hear a word of it. When there is music, it positively blasts everything else right out of the sound mix, and when the explosions get going, look out - especially if you’ve cranked up the volume to hear the actors speak.

I’ll admit that I’m just not crazy about fan-made projects where CG backgrounds stand in for sets, as it tends to result in locked-off shots that sometimes just die on the screen. Tight editing helps here, but the inherent weaknesses of this approach are still very much on display. In some of the more tense scenes, even an artificial zoom-in or two would’ve helped; as it is, you only ever really see “camera movement” during exterior CG scenes. To cut from space scenes with almost Battlestar Galactica-like zooms and pans to locked-off interior scenes just makes the difference stand out more.

Even without having seen an entire episode of Hidden Frontier before, I was aware of the one aspect of that show which had, for better or worse, brought many people’s attention to it - a steady homosexual relationship between two of the regular characters. The makers of Hidden Frontiers and Odyssey have announced that the plotline of Odyssey won’t explore that relationship further (by the end of the show you’ll understand why), but it is featured in the pilot. The closest point of comparison that I can think of would be the BBC’s Doctor Who spinoff Torchwood, but this goes a little bit further than Torchwood. However, the relationship is written and played as a real relationship - the “ten minutes” gag would’ve been just as funny with a heterosexual couple - and as such it rings true and I don’t have a problem with it. It’s part of the characters involved and didn’t seem tacked on for the sake of titillation or exploitation. I’m not sure at what age I’d expose someone to Odyssey or Hidden Frontier though - if Torchwood, which gave us a lot of verbal flirt and insinuation and two whole kisses in an entire 13-episode season, is after-9pm viewing, I’d say use that as a guide.

What I’m not sure about is the near-duplication of the basic premise of Voyager - a ship hurled far away from the help, rules and regs of the Federation - even though the plot contrivances that serve to trap Odyssey in another galaxy are marginally more plausible than the pilot episode of Voyager. On this count, Odyssey will have to work hard at not becoming Voyager. Only time will tell if it can avoid following the same downward trajectory as that other famous lost Starfleet ship.

story by John Broughton
screenplay by John Broughton & Mark Hildebrand
directed by Mark Hildebrand
music by Hetoreyn

Cast: John Broughton (Captain John T. Carter), Michael Bednar (Commander Robert Tacket), Holly Bednar (Lt. Commander Michelle Smithfield), Paul R. Sieber (Lt. Prescott), Amy Sepan (Dr. Holley), Mark Hildebrand (General George Washington), Sean Mullin (Washington’s Aide), Jamie Hanna (Caleb), John Kirby (Alondar), Trey Thomas (Batarus), David Sepan (Baker), Bob McDonough (Galway), Jake Azachi (Akiva), Bruce Dennis (Hayes), Eric Lund (Michaels), Case Aiken (Anderson), Ron Gates (Gates), Dean Rogers (Morris), John Lenwell (Adams), Robin Madel (Solonai Tech 1), Richard Sprague (Fowler / Solonai Tech 2), Kevin Barber, Paula Barber, Adam Beal, Sue Gilmour, Christian Huet, Jim Rockwell, Anna Schlueter, Dan Schlueter, Julia Selwyn, Michael Steen, Helen Wheeler, Jeanette Wheeler, Nathan Yessler (Colonial Re-enactors)

Review: Another confident entry from the Starship Farragut team, it’s hard to look at For Want Of A Nail and spot anything major that screams “only the second episode produced”. There are minor issues, sure - it wouldn’t be a fan production without them - but the degree of polish here is impressive. The script demonstrates a sophisticated knowledge of the era of history being recreated, and the production makes a wise move by involving people who recreate that time period on their own time. Even if you’re not crazy about a “historical” adventure, you have to admire the shrewdness of that move - you instantly get performers, period costumes and props, a certain degree of authenticity, and a real feel of local color that you just don’t get in Hollywood.

If there’s one thing that hammers Nail, though - and I seem to recall making this same observation of The Captaincy - it’s pacing, pacing, pacing. Though it’s an improvement over that pilot episode, there are still myriad pacing problems. There are still folks here who sound like they’re reading lines and waiting for cues, and there are still occasional awkward pauses that seem to have come about in the editing stage. They’re getting better at it, but there’s still room for further improvement. That the “episode” runs neck-and-neck with some of the Star Trek feature films in running time brings three words to mind: tighten it up. (Please note that I wouldn’t be making this criticism if I hadn’t spent most of my adult life editing video for a living.) There are a few oddities directorially as well, with a handful of examples of very strange shot-framing that occasionally cuts off the face of a character who’s speaking. And honestly, the hinting-at-the-origins-of-the-Mirror-Universe coda did nothing for me. I didn’t need the story to go there to make my enjoyment of it complete.

But the good news is that there are so many other details to admire. The video quality is an overall improvement and the sound mixing is top-notch - while Farragut has no qualms about modernizing the look of their exterior space scenes, the strict adherence to classic series sound effects lends it a certain stamp of Trek authenticity. But even more than that is that they appear to have built a set for the alien planet locale, and a good set at that, complete with classic Trek-esque “flowing multicolored lights behind a panel” alien technology. If these scenes were shot with blue screen or green screen, then the compositing is the most seamless I’ve yet seen a fan production pull off. If the sets are practical, however, then bravo. That, along with some great (if slightly blue-tinted) location shooting, elevates Nail to a new, more professional level. The musical score is also one of the best I’ve heard from a fan production, very appropriate and effective, and it can be obtained from the composer’s web site.

Characterization continues to be a strong suit for Farragut - for the most part. The spiky relationship between the ship’s science officer and chief engineer is interesting, but in a couple of places descends into stretch-the-scene-out bickering without benefitting either character. The ship’s doctor makes a showing in Nail as well, and she’s equal-opportunity, seemingly ready to bite anyone’s head off. By setting a fan film in the 23rd century, one is able to keep things from getting boring by setting it in the era of the less-than-perfect, occasionally disharmonious Kirk era (as opposed to the nearly conflict-free 24th century), but there’s a fine line between real character development and random bickering for the sake of grafting drama onto the proceedings. The ship’s security officer (and his subordinates) make a good showing here, but the scene is really stolen by George Washington (as played by co-writer and director Mark Hildebrandt) and the period characters. The actors portraying the aliens do a pretty good job of summoning the original Trek’s “aloof one-off superior alien race who will never be seen again” vibe.

The pros outweigh the cons with For Want Of A Nail, and it’s quite enjoyable. The really nifty thing about Starship Farragut is that they came out of the starting gate strong and showed marked improvement - I’m eager to see the next adventure.

telelplay by Dennis Russell Bailey
story by Jimm & Josh Johnson and Dennis Russell Bailey and Maurice Molyneaux
directed by Scott Cummins

Cast: James Culhane (Captain Garrovick), Joshua Caleb (Lt. B’Fuselek), Michael Buford (Cutty), Holly Guess (Jo Harris), Patrick Scullin (D’Agosta), Elizabeth Wheat (Vandi Richards), Garry Peters (Kosnett)

Review: Hot damn. Now this is a Trek fan film. I’ll admit that I was originally skeptical of the first episode of Starship Exeter (see that review here), but as much as I admired their original intent to stick with lo-fi special effects, and as fun as that was to watch in places, here they managed to step up to the plate with some impressive CGI, and still didn’t betray the signature “look” of the original series. And this time they’ve got a story behind all this stuff which makes it even more impressive, and it’s directed well, and the acting has taken leaps and bounds. This is practically a real episode of Star Trek right here…but there’s just one problem.

It’s not finished. The Exeter team releases its episodes act-by-act, which is a neat idea if you’ve got a reliable production pipeline and can be fairly certain that things will happen on schedule. But I’m doing something I never thought I’d do here - reviewing an incomplete project - because there’s no telling when the fourth and final act will be made available. (There was a gap of over a year between the releases of acts two and three.) The Exeter team has somewhat predictably taken a public beating from fandom for this, which is a shame, because The Tressaurian Intersection is indicative of mind-blowing potential for a fan series.

The script, by pro screenwriter & novelist Dennis Russell Bailey (who penned the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode Tin Man), is bristling with good, brisk dialogue and interesting ideas. The characters, including a captain’s yeoman added to the cast as of this story, come alive and have distinctive personalities, and the cast clearly has the chops to bring these people to life from the page to the stage. (I also appreciate that there are folks in the cast who aren’t in their 20s - you can look at some of these people and believe that the characters they’re portraying are career officer material.) There are interesting character ticks, such as the ship’s doctor being unable to bring himself to refer to B’Fusulek as anything other than “the Andorian”, that add a lot without bringing the whole story to a halt.

It’s also deftly directed (take a bow, Scott Cummins) in such a way that moves the plot along at a decent pace but also gets those character moments in. Of all the fan films I’ve seen to date, I think The Tressaurian Intersection is the one that feels most like real live prime-time television.

Now all it needs is an ending, hopefully sometime before J.J. Abrams’ big screen Star Trek rolls out. How about it, Exeter?

written by Michael Reaves & Marc Scott Zicree
directed by Marc Scott Zicree
music by Alan Derian

Cast: James Cawley (Captain Kirk), Jeffery Scott (Mr. Spock), John Kelley (Dr. McCoy), George Takei (Sulu), Grace Lee Whitney (Commander Janice Rand), Christina Moses (Alana), John Lim (Lt. Cmdr. Sulu), Andy Bray (Lt. Chekov), Julienne Irons (Lt. Uhura), Charles Root (Scotty), Ron Boyd (DeSalle), Lia Johnson (Dr. Chandris), Mimi Chong (Demora Sulu), Natasha Soudek (Lt. Soudek), Mallory Reaves (Ensign Mallory), Kaley Pusateri (Sulu Granddaughter), Kurt Carley (Stunt Guard #1), Brian Holloway (Stunt Guard #2), Cali Ross (Ensign Juvenia), Cynthia Wilber (Lt. Wyndham), Kitty Kavey (Lt. Turkel), Katrina Kernodle (Yeoman), Katia Mangani (Dead Romulan #1), R.M. Martin (Dead Romulan #2), Don Balderamos (Dead Romulan #3), Steve Perry (voice of Pilot), Majel Barrett Roddenberry (Computer Voice)

Notes: The costumes for Sulu and his daughter were designed by Star Wars prequel art director Iain McCaig, along with his own daughter, Mishi McCaig. Fencing coach Tom Morga is also a stuntman who has featured in past Star Trek adventures, including Star Trek VI, Deep Space Nine and Enterprise. Michael Okuda is credited with “graphics” for this episode.

Review: The second New Voyages episode in a row to feature a crew member’s miraculous aging and the return of the original actor, World Enough And Time thrills me and bugs me in equal measure. It’s actually a much more effective story, in many places, than To Serve All My Days (the installment which brough back Walter Koenig as Chekov) - there’s some real emotional resonance here, rather than an odd conversation between the character’s old and young incarnations. It certainly doesn’t hurt that George Takei is simply magnificent as Sulu, giving the character more depth than his appearances in the original series and all of the original movies ever allowed. Helping matters considerably is that he’s not the only one - Christina Moses, as Sulu’s daughter from another dimension, is outstanding. Between these two, everyone else has to bring their “A” game to the table, especially James Cawley. If nothing else, these “special guest” episodes have helped to raise the acting bar on New Voyages.

But at the same time…how many charatcers are going to magically age so that the original actors can step into their roles yet again? Perhaps I wouldn’t be so skeptical of the whole thing had Takei and Koenig’s episodes not followed one after the other, but that’s exactly what happened, and it doesn’t just invite comparisons between the two, it demands them. The effects work in World Enough And Time is big-screen, big-budget stuff, put together by students at the DAVE School (headed up by former Babylon 5 FX supremo Ron Thornton). It’s pretty spectacular, though a lot of the FX muscle here seems to be concentrated on match-moving a swirling pattern of “iridescent energy” around the character of Sulu’s daughter at all times - an expensive thing for which, had this been a studio-backed show, a workaround would have been found just to eliminate the energy cloud keep the CGI budget to a dull roar.

Marc Scott Zicree (Star Trek: The Next Generation, Sliders, Babylon 5) hands in a script that seems to have a fairly obvious denouement; it’s to the credit of Takei and Moses that it still carries as much power as it does when it finally unfolds. But other than that, with its slightly predictable ending and tons of very un-Original-Series-like technobabble, World almost seems like a TNG script (a criticism which I seem to remember leveling at To Serve All My Days as well). Big kudos are also due for John Lim, who plays the younger “present day” Sulu; not only does he do a great job of acting like the younger Takei without being a mere impersonator, but he also gets to strut his stuff in his scenes.

There were also distribution problems aplenty with World; I understand that Cawley & company want to be able to give Paramount very precise figures on how many people are downloading and watching their episodes, and they want things to look spectacular. That’s great - but I had a hell of a time getting my video codecs close enough to the bleeding edge that they’d play this episode in its massive HD resolution. The delays leading up to the release were frustrating, and while I can see why the folks behind New Voyages want to know how widely their work is viewed, I find myself questioning why Paramount wants to know. I seriously doubt that New Voyages will ever get a studio thumbs-up and funding/resources from Hollywood, no matter what kind of numbers they can prove; it’s altogether more likely, in my cynical and jaded opinion, that the studio wants to know if enough people are watching that they should consider New Voyages a threat to the upcoming big-screen remake of classic Trek, and shut the fan-made productions down.

I liked World Enough And Time; it’s very effective and powerful stuff, and at over 70 minutes and with its elaborate effects, it’s like a lost Trek movie rather than an episode. But New Voyages needs to be precisely that: new. It’s been fun revisiting familiar faces, but it’s time to truly start carving a new path through the Trek universe and stop leaning on the show’s continuity so much that it becomes video fanwank. I have high hopes for the upcoming two-part David Gerrold story Blood And Fire, and Howard Weinstein’s episode, which promises to bring back Harry Mudd…but let’s start telling some new stories, and let’s start telling some stories that say something about the world around us - the one thing that has made the original series more evergreen than any of its spinoffs - instead of just saying something about the world of Star Trek.