CBS To Star Trek Horizon: Let That Be Your Last Fan Film

You know, I really wanted to make my next post about something other than the happenings surrounding the CBS/Paramount lawsuit against Axanar (I have been musing lately on the similarities between Trekkies and Van Halen fans, for instance). However, there has been some unfortunate collateral damage to this lawsuit that I feel I must speak up about.

Just this past Febuary, an intrepid young filmmaker named Tommy Kraft released his Star Trek fan film, Star Trek: Horizon, on YouTube (the trailer is above, and here is a link to the full movie). Set in the Enterprise era of Trek lore, it tells the story about the crew of the NX-04 Discovery and their, well, discovery of an ancient weapon that the Romulans hope to use to destroy Earth. Tommy spent 4 years of his life making this movie, and managed to raise almost $23,000 to complete it. This is certainly what I would call a labor of love, not to mention one of the better fan films I have had the pleasure of viewing, and I applaud him for his efforts (as well as his parents for supporting him in the pursuit of his dreams).

Horizon has been quite a success, if YouTube views are any indication. As it stands right now, the movie has been viewed over 975,000 times in the 2 months it has been out. While initially reluctant to, Tommy was eventually persuaded by one of the actors to follow up Horizon with a sequel. On April 17th, the following post appeared on the Horizon Facebook page:

"BREAKING NEWS: Star Trek - Federation Rising, a sequel to Horizon, will begin crowdfunding on Saturday, April 23rd at 12:00am EST. The countdown begins"

 

Unfortunately, a mere three days after the announcement, the following was posted to the page:

"BREAKING NEWS: “STAR TREK - HORIZON" SEQUEL, "FEDERATION RISING", SHUT DOWN.

Earlier today, executives from CBS reached out to me and advised me that their legal team strongly suggested that we do not move forward with plans to create a sequel to Horizon. While this is a sign of the current climate that we find ourselves in with Star Trek fan films, I want to personally thank CBS for reaching out to me, rather than including us in their ongoing lawsuit against Axanar.

It was conveyed that the reason CBS was reaching out to me was due to the legal troubles stemming from the Axanar case. Again, CBS did not have to reach out personally. The message I received felt more like they were giving me a heads up before we got too involved in another project, rather than a group of angry executives swinging a hammer.

On behalf of myself and Ryan Webber, my co-writer and co-producer on Federation Rising, we appreciate your initial support and are saddened that we cannot bring you what we believe was a fantastic feature film. However, rest assured that Ryan and I are committed to continuing our storytelling partnership with an original project. We also welcome other fan productions and fan film lovers to join us on this new venture."

Certainly, this has to be a body blow to Tommy and his writing partner Ryan Webber. However, in a classic case of making chicken salad out of chickens$%t, they have decided to move forward with this: 

 

From their Kickstarter page:

"Project Discovery is a feature length science fiction space epic that tells the story of a group of scientists and engineers uniting people all over the world in a common effort: taking humanity to space. The year is 2060, much of the world is caught up in unrest. Focused more on solving the problems we have on our home planet, people have given up on the notion of travel to the stars. Then, a multicultural group of scientists and engineers is able to captivate the world once again with a daunting plan: launching humanity's first faster-than-light spacecraft: The IV-202 Explorer."

This sounds like a neat idea! First off, it is a 21st century echo of what created the inspiration for the US space program (scientists and sci-fi writers used to have bull sessions post-WW2 about pushing for a "space race" with the USSR to keep the two superpowers from blowing each other to smithereens). Secondly, while I'm not saying that it has any actual connection to Star Trek, the timeframe it takes place in is around the same time of Zefram Cochrane's first test of his Warp Drive. Therefore, it seems to be like a First Contact-ish kind of story (without cyborgs from the future trying to ruin the party.....), and that is a movie I am seriously interested in watching. Being one who tries to put his money where his mouth is, I have donated to Tommy & Ryan's endeavors, and I hope all who read this do as well. Horizon showed what they are capable of as filmmakers and they deserve to have their efforts justly rewarded.

However, what they do not deserve is to be used as fodder for either side of the ongoing debate about the Axanar lawsuit. Tommy has steadfastly remained neutral on this matter, expressing only a wish that the matter be settled amicably. Tommy recently appeared on the TrekGeeks.com podcast to discuss in detail the call he got from CBS, and the current scene regarding CBS' relationship to fan projects. It is vitally important to actually listen to the podcast, and hear all of Tommy's words and, more importantly, the tone of his speech when he says what he says, as those are the things that get lost in translation when someone excerpts those words and drops out context, as the Axamonitor website has done.

Here's a good example (from Axamonitor's article):

Kraft, however, rejected that notion. “I've tried from the beginning to maintain a neutral standpoint on this,” he said, “There have been a lot of productions that have raised a lot of money … and a lot of feature-length stuff, but it was something about the Axanar project in general, I believe, that caused [CBS] to have a change of opinion. … It's too coincidental that everything was hunky-dory until this one production and then all of a sudden things change.”

Now, reading that, one could get the idea that Tommy had a change of opinion regarding the Axanar lawsuit. At the very least, that's how I read it.

Now, here's the full text of what he said:

"I've tried from the beginning to maintain a neutral standpoint on this, and what the reasons might be. And all I can say, that I know for sure, is there have been a lot of productions that have raised a lot of money, and there have been productions that have raised little to no money, and there's been a lot of feature length stuff, and it was something about the Axanar project in general, I believe, that caused them [CBS] to have a change of opinion. Now, whatever that may be, people can speculate on. And there are some facts to the situation that some people know and others don't, but there..it's too coincidental even if you don't have any facts that everything was hunky-dory until this one production and then all of a sudden things change."(emphasis added to show what was redacted)

That reads a little differently, doesn't it? Now, I can see taking out a few of the words here and there for brevity and conciseness, but Axamonitor's redaction pretty much removed all his moderation from that statement. 

Now, you may not think this is such a big deal. But today, someone posted a link to Axamonitor's article on a Star Trek page at Facebook, and it caused quite a fracas. While I'm certain the writer of Axamonitor's article thought he was just adding one more piece to his collection of "ammunition" to his case against Axanar, it had an unintended side effect. A number of people on the pro-Axanar side of things took the article at face value, and many were ready to drop their support of Tommy's project. I, however, took the extra step and listened to the podcast, and noted the discrepancy between what Axamonitor's article reported, what Tommy actually said, and the tone in which he said it. Finally, Tommy himself was brought in to the conversation and had this to say:

Tommy shouldn't have had to do this. No matter what your opinion on the Axanar lawsuit is, I think we can all agree that nixing Federation Rising is a terrible and unfortunate piece of collateral damage, that Project Discovery deserves nothing less than our full support, and that the Trek Geeks guys were correct in saying that Tommy has handled this whole situation with grace.

Note to commenters: As I have left my opinion on Axanar completely out of this particular post, I would appreciate that any comments made address the article topic and not the lawsuit.

CBS/Paramount vs. Axanar: The Fan-Film Web

Hello again, and welcome back to more of my thoughts on everybody's favorite fan film lawsuit!

Well, my last post garnered even more page views, and between my last two posts, they account for over have of the total page views I've had in the entire five years I've had this blog. Therefore, I think I'm gonna keep giving the people what they want.

First off, I want to give a shout-out to Reece Watkins for echoing my sentiments in his excellent blog post on Krypton Radio (and for having the presence of mind to use the more Trek-appropriate "Kobayashi Maru", as opposed to my rather pedestrian "Pyrrhic Victory").

Secondly, here are a couple of articles that I want to delve into a bit more. Tech Times interviewed Alec Peters and Robert Meyer Burnett of Axanar Productions, as well as Erin Ranahan of Winston & Strawn. Also, Axanar's PR Director, Mike Bawden, wrote an interesting post on Axanar's blog about the need for formal rules for fan productions.

I tend to agree with Mr. Bawden. While I don't subscribe to the populist notion that "Star Trek belongs to the fans" (at least in the legal sense), there is no denying that Star Trek has inspired abundant creativity in its fandom over the decades (if you're nice, I might recite a rather bawdy poem I wrote once called "The Final Frontier"). Modern technology has made expressing this creativity incredibly easy. Why, I could get some costumes, a green bedsheet, get some friends together, and shoot a fan film on my phone! The sheer proliferation of fan productions you can find on YouTube prove its ubiquity.

Ever since James Cawley made his first episode of New Voyages, Paramount (and now CBS) has basically looked the other way regarding fan films, as long as they gave away their product for free. On the one hand, that shows a measure of tolerance to behavior that fans would likely engage in regardless. On the other, this sort of "unspoken agreement" made, at least in part, the situation Axanar finds itself in today inevitable.

I've said before that Mr. Peters' stated goal for Axanar was to make a fan-film of a professional quality. That is quite a lofty goal, and the capital required to pull something like that off is beyond what any other fan production has raised to date. This lawsuit may very well have been brought about because Mr. Peters' ambitions for Axanar exceeded CBS/P's tolerance for the existence of fan productions. In other words, Icarus flew too close to the Sun.

But would this particular Icarus have flown so high if it knew the boundaries it had to stay in in the first place?

It's not like there's no precedence for rules and guidelines regarding fan projects. Lucasfilm holds an annual contest for Star Wars Fan Films, submissions to which are governed by rules having to do with, among other things, length and content. I'm not saying that these are particularly good rules, or that these rules should be the ones adopted by CBS/P in regards to Star Trek fan productions (five minutes is just long enough to get a Red Shirt killed....), but it does show that giving defined parameters for fans to use their intellectual property for creative expression can and does work.

I'm sure that there is some way to construct a set of formal rules, or perhaps some type of limited license, that any prospective fan production would have to formally agree to in order to proceed with the good graces of CBS/P. This may not be very remunerative for them in terms of actual money, but it would potentially buy them far more good publicity than bad.

It would also forestall the possible discovery that not all of what they claim to be covered by copyright in this lawsuit is actually so covered. As has been detailed elsewhere, there are indeed elements claimed in the amended complaint which are not covered by copyright (my personal favorite is when they claim the idea of "Science Fiction Action-Adventure" as a copyrightable element). Make no mistake, there is some peril for CBS/P here in that the courts may decide certain things that they thought they owned they don't, and that fan productions will have guidance on what they can and can't do that they no longer have complete control over.

And, ultimately, I believe that is what this lawsuit is all about. Not money, not fear of competition, but control. Here's the thing about control, though: Control is only good when it is consistent and predictable. Rules (when broadly known, easily understood, and applied constantly) bring about consistency and predictability. "We can't give you guidance because that may be construed as giving license", and "If you do something we don't like, you'll hear from our lawyers" does not.

“Direct Financial Benefit” and Vicarious Infringement. Or, I Don’t Think That Means What You Think It Means

Well, last week’s post brought this blog back from the dead, and did it with a bang! I had more page hits in the two weeks than I’ve had in the entirety of the blog’s history! Apparently, this got shared around Facebook rather extensively, and last week, David Post, who writes for The Volokh Conspiracy on the Washington Post website, linked to my post for his op-ed piece on the Axanar lawsuit (calling my post an excellent summary of the background)!

Since I’ve garnered so much attention, I figure it would be near criminal of me to let this blog lay fallow again. Fortunately, I have more to say, and specifically on the topic of the last post.

As I said in my last post, Mr. Peters has a number of detractors. They are the ones who go on about how Mr. Peters used the money donated for Axanar to build a “for-profit” studio, or Mr. Peters’ salary, or how he “sold coffee” to fund the production, and how all this was his way of “making money” off the IP of Star Trek. Moreover, they say this is why CBS and Paramount are suing Axanar.

For his part, Mr. Peters has said repeatedly that this lawsuit is not about money, but about allegations of copyright infringement. Presumably, he’s in a better position to know what CBS/P’s concerns than the general public is. However, there is a line in the complaint which alleges the defendants receive a “direct financial benefit”. The detractors have used that line to bolster their narrative, and call Mr. Peters a liar.

It does seem to pose an apparent paradox. How can a lawsuit not be about money when it says “direct financial benefit” right in the complaint? However, to paraphrase a line from The Princess Bride, that line doesn’t mean what they think it means.

The suit claims all the different type of copyright infringement that can be claimed, of which there are three. The first is direct infringement, which is rather self-explanatory. The other two are what are known as “secondary infringement”. It is somewhat analogous to aiding and abetting infringement. These are called contributory infringement, and vicarious infringement.

In order to claim vicarious infringement, two things must be true:
1) The person this is claimed against must have the right or ability to influence or control the actions of the infringing party.
2) The person this is claimed against must receive a direct financial benefit from the actions of the infringing party.
One example of this would be if a theater hires a band to play music, and that band plays copyrighted music they don’t have license to play. Another would be a flea market or swap meet renting space to a person who sells pirated DVDs. In either case, the venue owners would be guilty because they have control over the actions of the infringing parties, and they benefit financially from the infringing actions. For a more concrete example, this is one of the two ways Napster was found guilty of copyright infringement (contributory infringement being the other).

Now, of the three types of infringement that can be brought, only vicarious infringement carries with it the necessity of proving a financial component to it. And sure enough, if you look at the complaint, the only place that phrase occurs in the complaint is in the section which alleges vicarious infringement. Therefore, mentioning “direct financial benefit” is basically boilerplate language for making that allegation. So while the language is there (mainly because it has to be), the intent which it is a part of is to allege copyright violation. In which case, Mr. Peters is not lying when he says this suit is about copyright. Only those who practice the dark art of Pedantry could argue otherwise.

Moreover, (and this is where me being not-a-lawyer comes in) I’m at a loss to figure how that type of infringement comes into play in this particular situation. Personally, I’m inclined to go with my previous speculation that this complaint was written mainly to intimidate Axanar Productions into bending to their will.

But, most importantly, I don’t see how the paying of salaries, building out a soundstage, the amount of money donated to the production, or any of the other things the detractors bring up to say that it’s about money and Mr. Peters is a liar fits into the specific meaning of the phrase “direct financial benefit” as I’ve just outlined above. It’s really not a brush one can paint the production with.

In other words, I’m pretty sure that phrase doesn’t mean what the detractors think it means.

Paramount/CBS vs. Axanar: Where No Fan Film Has Gone Before

I should change the title of this blog to The Blog Of Nine Lives for the amount of times I have let it lay fallow....

Anyone who knows me knows I'm a Trekkie. And if you don't know me, now you know, I'm a Trekkie. I was reared on Original Series reruns. I saw pretty much every Trek movie the weekend it came out. TNG, DS9, Voyager and even Enterprise were appointment televison (or, at least, I'd watch the tape as soon as I got home....).

There was a pretty bleak time there for lovers of Trek, from 2005, when Enterprise was cancelled, until May 2009, when the first rebooted Trek movie came out. (There are those who would say the bleak times haven't ended yet, but that's a blog for another day.....). In the interim, there has flourished what I like to call the Golden Age Of Fan Films.

Now, fan films, particularly for Star Trek, have been around almost as long as Trek itself is. But in the last dozen years there has been a veritable explosion in the creation of Star Trek fan productions. With CGI software becoming more accessible, and websites like youtube making it possible to distribute them to a wide audience, the ability to make and distribute fan films of surprisingly decent-to-good quality has grown by leaps and bounds. There are fan productions that seek to fill in the rest of the USS Enterprise's original "five year mission", such as James Cawley's Star Trek: New Voyages (the Godfather of the modern Terek Fan Production!), Vic Mignona's Star Trek Continues (their Mirror, Mirror sequel "Fairest Of Them All" is, in my opinion, the best original series fan episode made). There are others that take place in the same timeline, but on different ships, such as Starship Exeter and Starship Farragut. There are plenty more that explore the era of Then Next Generation, Deep Space 9, and Voyager. And recently, Star Trek: Horizon, which takes place during the Star Trek: Enterprise era, made its debut. I could go on and on about all the different productions out there, but that's not what I really want to talk about.

Sometime in 2012, a man named Alec Peters announced he intended to make a fan production called Axanar. Axanar is to be the story of Captain Garth of Izar (from the original series episode Whom Gods Destroy) and his actions during the Battle Of Axanar during the Four Years War with the Klingons. In announcing his project, he set the bar for himself rather high. His goal was to produce a film that had the look, feel, and quality of a Star Trek movie you or I would plunk $15 to go see at a movie theater, but do it for a small fraction of the cost of a true Hollywood production. This meant that his cast would be filled out with actual actors, and directed and produced by people who do this kind of work for a living.

The first step in this journey was to make a 20 minute short called Prelude To Axanar. Filmed as a mock-documentary with the flavor of something you might see on the History Channel (other than Ancient Aliens), this would act as a proof-of-concept that could show that Mr. Peters could pull off what he intended to do. Using the recent advent of "crowdfunding" via Kickstarter, he managed to raise $100,000 to make Prelude. Here is the result:

Prelude To Axanar

With the results in hand, he proceeded to fundraise via a Kickstarter (and later, another at Indiegogo) campaign, and managed to date to raise a staggering $1.2 million dollars! That may seem like an insane amount of money, but given the lofty goals set, that means that he is trying to make this movie for about 1% of what it cost to produce 2009's Star Trek.

Now in the process of procuring and outfitting a soundstage in which to film, and finalizing the script for shooting, Axanar Productions hit a fairly nasty speed bump. On December 30 2015, CBS (who owns the rights to Star Trek televison) and Paramount Pictures (who owns the rights to Star Trek movies) slapped Axanar Productions and Mr. Peters with a copyright infringement lawsuit.

Now, my intention is not to discuss the merits of the case. On the face of things it would appear that CBS & Paramount do own the rights to Star Trek, and, perforce, all Star Trek fan films infringe on said rights. Also, the extent of my legal expertise amounts to hours of watching Judge Wapner, Divorce Court, The Practice, some of Boston Legal, a season and a half of Better Call Saul, and whatever I can look up on Google and Wikipedia. That and about $3 will get me a latte at Starbucks. Rather, I'd like to discuss the public relations aspect of their actions.

Now, while it is true that any Star Trek fan production may potentially infringe on their intellectual property, the fact of the matter is that CBS & Paramount have looked the other way when it has come to fan productions for well over a decade. Generally, their attitude has been, "As long as you give it away for free, we'll pretend to not notice." Besides begging the question of why Axanar and not all the other productions, right off the bat this has the appearance of a David vs. Goliath situation. And almost no one roots for Goliath (well, except maybe the Philistines....).

Now, to be certain, there is something that CBS and Paramount expect to gain from taking this sort of action. So much so that they are willing to potentially alienate a portion of the Star Trek fanbase in the process. Now, if one looks around the wide, wonderful world on the Internet (Giving Stupid People A Voice Since 1993!), one can certainly find a ton of speculation on the subject. There are those who think that Axanar is somehow a threat to the upcoming Star Trek Beyond. Personally, I highly doubt that. There are still others who are actually rooting for Goliath (I guess Philistines still exist!) because, well, they think David's kind of a dick and he's running a scam to line his pockets. I doubt that even more. If salaries, "for profit studios", and coffee were really what CBS & Paramount were honked off about, they'd have put that in their complaint.

What I will speculate on is what kind of response CBS/Paramount (herein, they will be known as CBS/P, as I'm tired of typing both names out!) expected, and what actually happened.

I suspect that CBS/P expected to scare Mr. Peters and Axanar Productions with the suit into rolling over, playing dead, and begging them not to continue the suit if they promised to go away. If you read the original complaint, it smacks of someone trying to bludgeon their target into submission. Plus, the simple fact that a big studio with (presumably) millions to burn on lawyers is no match for a small production company with limited resources. They probably thought that the best they might be able to muster is a lawyer the caliber of Saul Goodman.

Well, that's not what happened. Mr. Peters managed to engage the services of Winston & Strawn on a pro bono basis. W&S has extensive experience with intellectual property law, and apparently like taking the side of David. Look around for anything on the GamesWorkshop vs. Chapterhouse lawsuit, and you'll see what I mean.

At any rate, W&S took a look at the complaint, saw how vague the infringement claims were ("thousands" of copyrights, "innumerable" violations......), and proceeded to file a motion to dismiss that said, "Hey, what exactly are we violating?", "Which one of you owns what?" and, "Um, we haven't made the movie yet. Isn't this a little premature?"

The Lawyers for CBS/P responded by filing an amended complaint, in which they list in excruciating detail all the ways they claim Axanar infringes on their copyrights. Here's a link to the amended complaint: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2757228-Axanar-Klingon.html

It's quite a lengthy list! It is a fine example of lawyers throwing in everything they can think of (I swear I saw "kitchen sink" listed somewhere.....). There's a couple problems with it, though.

1) Many of the things they try to claim are not protected like copyright. Names, short phrases and such are not copyrightable. To get a more detailed breakdown of this issue, please check out The Back 40K Blog, as they have provided a much better breakdown of the problems with some of CBS/P's claims then I ever could.

2) By throwing in so much stuff, the lawyers for CBS/P have opened up their clients to ridicule in the public media. Here's a couple of examples:
 Helpful CBS Lawyers Explain the Many, Many Ways a Star Trek Fan Film Is Ripping Them Off
Paramount Claims Crowdfunded 'Star Trek' Film Infringes Copyright to Klingon Language

But the kicker is Justin Lin, the director of the upcoming Star Trek Beyond, decided to put his two bits into the conversation!

https://twitter.com/trailingjohnson/status/709285689095917568

I don't know about you, but having the director of your upcoming blockbuster Star Trek movie publicly calling your efforts to sue a fan film "ridiculous" seems to me to be not good for CBS/P. Naturally, this got even more press on the situation. More importantly, it got more people putting eyes on the Axanar Productions, their website, and their Prelude To Axanar film (the latest round of press has bumped its YouTube views over two million). The net result is there are now more eyes of the "Joe Public" variety on the situation than CBS/P expected. I'm willing to bet those eyes are more likely to root for David than they are Goliath. I'm also willing those are eyes they are counting on to watch Beyond this summer, and to pony up 5 bucks a month to watch the upcoming series on CBS All Access starting next year.

So, my question is this: at what point will the something that CBS/P want to get out of this lawsuit not be worth the public ridicule and alienation that is occurring? At what point will they realize that the victory they seek to claim may end up being Pyrrhic?

Bar Rescue: Best Employees

Like Lazarus, my blog has risen from the dead......again!

I have become a huge fan of Bar Rescue. For those not familiar with the premise, Jon Taffer, an expert consultant to the hospitality industry, comes into a bar that is in danger of failing, identifies the problems, and remodels the bar and retrains the employees, ostensibly leaving the bar in better condition than when he came in.

This show has become so popular, there is a website devoted to tracking the success of the bars called Bar Rescue Updates. It doesn't always paint a pretty picture of every bar shown in the episodes, but it's a good place to go and get additional information and discuss the show.

I like this show so much, I have decide to do some Best Of and Worst Of lists. Today's list comprises the best employees shown in each of the episodes. By "best" I mean the ones who are shown as competent, caring, and loyal.

4) Zusie-The Shot Exchange. Zusie is perhaps the most competent bartender I've seen shown in any episode. Most episodes, you see the bartenders getting overwhelmed during the "stress tests", not able to make drinks correctly, not able to make multiple drinks at one time, etc. Not Zusie, she was able to do her job correctly and quickly during the stress test while the rest of the staff more or less went to pot or tried to burn the place down. During the episode, it's let known that she has been working at The Tailgate for 14 years. That's dedication! Plus, she's cute as hell! On the downside, she doesn't talk a whole lot during the episode, so I couldn't get a gauge on her personality.

3) Chloe-Headhunters. Headhunters was the most disgusting bar ever shown on the show. The rundown exterior, with the letters peeling off the marquee just screamed "DON'T COME IN HERE!" This was the episode where there's a cockroach in Mrs. Taffer's drink, and another in the bottle it was poured from.

The owner Steve is a sociopath (we'll get into that more in another post). He runs a disgusting bar, and worse he doesn't pay his employees! All the people working there make tips only. Chloe first starts to shine during the Taffer-mandated bar clean-up. When Steve starts to rag on the employees for not keeping the bar clean, she lights into him about his business practices and how since none of them get paid, none of them are willing to spend hours doing something for free. Most times, an argument like this should lead to someone getting fired. But she's absolutely right.

Chloe is barely functional as a bartender, but that has more to do with lack of training than deficiency in her character. Despite working for a despotic lunatic, she (and the staff) cares deeply for this place. When Taffer has a sitdown with Steve and the employees, he tells them that the only way he will perform a rescue on the bar is if the staff is willing to make a go of it. If they don't he says he will gladly help them all find jobs at another establishment. From this point in the episode on, it's clear that Chloe is the heart and the leader of this bar. With some training, I could see her becoming a really good bar manager for a much better place.

2) Bryan "Syck"-OFace Bar. OFace, infamous for #TafferWalks. I really felt for Syck. The burly security guard was the only person that seemed to be in tune with Taffer and care about him being there to help. This clip says it all.

Sure enough, he doesn't work there anymore, and I'm sure he's better for it.

1) One-Eyed Mike-Piratz Tavern. To be honest, I've thought about putting Bryan on top, but I've decided just based upon his edit in the show to go with Mike from Piratz. Here's a guy who, due to an injury taking one of his eyes, quite literally has limited him in his employment chances. Being a Pirate is literally one of the best options this guy has.

This is the biggest, most talked about episode of Bar Rescue (at least, until OFace came along). A bunch of people who basically ran a restaurant in order to live out a pirate fantasy. Now, don't get me wrong, I get the allure of playing pirate. I used to participate in ren faires and belonged to the St. Charles guild, whose motto was "Nobles by Day, Pirates by Night!" Name faire name was Commordore Luc Bonchere. However, playing pirates at the expense of an operating business is an expensive avenue to take!

Now, to be fair, Taffer took a tack that was 180 degrees in the direction of the pirate bar. I get why he did that; he wanted to get the corporate lunch crowd. It's a smart idea. But by flying in the face of the fantasy these people we trying to live was inevitably going to run into a wall of resistance. And boy! did he get it!

I put Mike at the top because of all the people at Piratz, he was the only one who appeared to actually give the new direction a chance (at least, in the episode). The man who stated flatly he wouldn't wear a shirt and tie, donned just that and went to the local businesses to pass out fliers for the remodeled restaurant. Plus, he had a charm about him that made him so likeable. I didn't get that from anyone else in the episode.

Well, that's it for this list. I know there may be others out there I've missed. Please feel free to make suggestions as to who else should be on here.

Review: Star Trek Into Darkness

(Note: There will be some spoilers)
 After 4 years of waiting, I decided to forego a good night's sleep and catch the midnight sneak preview. So, after a day to think about what I saw, what do I think?

 It's good, bordering on great.

 I know there are some die-hard Trekkies (Yes, I said Trekkies! "Trekkers" sounds ridiculously stupid and PC in my opinion) don't consider the movies made by JJ and company to be "real Star Trek". I could not disagree more. I am rapidly approaching my 44th birthday. I became a fan of Trek when I was seven, and have watched every single minute of film in the Trek universe. In short, I love Star Trek. I AM a Trekkie. Now, I may not put on Spock ears and go to conventions (though I DID have a Captain Kirk gold command shirt when I was seven, even wore it to school), but I love the universe Roddenberry, Berman, et. al. have created over the decades. Therefore, I think that my opinion on whether these movies are "real Trek" or not holds just as much weight as any other fan.

 This movie is "Star Trek".

 What makes it Trek to me is that the characters, as played by the new actors, are people I care about. Abrams has assembled a fantastic group of actors to portray these iconic characters, and I hope they stick around for more than just the third movie they're contracted for. Kirk, as played by Chris Pine, goes through the transformation he needed to make to become the Captain of the Enterprise. At the start of the movie, he's still a bit of the cock-sure punk who thinks it doesn't matter what the rules are, as long as he's doing what he thinks is right. Through the course of this movie, you see him learn some humility, and Pine makes it believable.

 Spock is still dealing with his planet getting sucked into a black hole, and as a result, his emotional control isn't quite what it should be. On top of that, he and Kirk are still struggling somewhat to actually be friends.

McCoy is still as irascible as ever, though the analogies he spouts started wearing thin. Fortunately, they did for Kirk, too, and he knocked it off.

 The rest of the cast is fine, though they aren't given as much to do (except maybe for Scotty).

 As for who's new this time out, we get Alice Eve as Carol Marcus. Her function in this movie is to help move the plot forward, and not much else (besides provide a bit of gratuitous underwear modeling). I would like to see her character expounded upon in the next film.

 Peter Weller as Admiral Marcus. Why isn't this man getting more work in Hollywood? He masterfully chewed scenery as the Starfleet Admiral willing to do the wrong thing in the interests of protecting the Federation. He's definitely an "ends justify the means" kinda guy.

 And now for the "big bad", Benedict Cumberbatch as "John Harrison" aka Khan. Yes, they used the biggest bad of the original series era for this movie. I have to digress for a moment. Like many other Trekkies, I consider The Wrath of Khan to be the pinnacle, the acme, the "ne plus ultra" of Star Trek movies. Ricardo Montalban gave the performance of a lifetime as the superman driven mad with revenge. That having been said, I do not consider this character inviolate, and is as fair game as anything in this new Trek universe. And Cumberbatch gives a fine performance. I'd say his Khan, in terms of motivation and characterization, is a mix of "Space Seed" Khan and "TWOK" Khan. He is driven for vengeance, but since he hasn't spent years dwelling upon the target of his wrath, he isn't mad with it. thus, he is able to be smooth and manipulative to achieve his ends.

 As for the "whitewashing" of this character? It doesn't bother me so much. Cumberbatch is a joy to watch (as anyone who has watched "Sherlock" can attest), so what if he doesn't look, act, or talk like a typical Sikh? Montalban played Khan with a Mexican accent, and the only thing that made him somewhat believable was the color of his skin. To me, it's disingenuous to criticize the casting of one, without doing the same for the other.

Like the '09 movie, this is one good-looking movie. I like the new warp effect better than the last movie, as it evokes more of the effect from the original movies. It works well in 3D, too! I like the added sets of the enterprise interior. Yes, Budgineering is still there, but it is not as obtrusive as before, and I LOVE the setting they used for the warp drive! Also, I really liked the multi-level open deck area. I wonder where exactly that was in the ship?

As for the story....while I liked it......it wasn't quite as good (still good, though). The problem, I think, is that it feels somewhat rushed. It seems to me they've crammed a 3-hour story into a 2-hour movie. If there's one thing that this movie (and the '09 movie) suffers from, it's that Star Trek has primarily been story-telling format made for television. All of the Original Series and Next Generation movies had hours and hours of story-telling and character interaction to draw upon, so that certain things in those movies could be told in a sort of shorthand. Since the new movies don't have that, they have to cram a lot of that into a much shorter period of time. This is why you get things like (in the '09 movie) Kirk promoted from cadet to captain, and warp travel taking only minutes between Earth and Kronos.

The upside is that the powers that be actually listened to some of the complaints about the first movie. Early on, Kirk gets busted back to the Academy, though Pike puts in a good word and gets him back as his first officer. that, and with the movie jumping a year ahead before they embark on the "5 year mission", plus with the evolution of the character, having Kirk back in command seems much more believable.

There are references and homages throughout to original series movies, particularly TWOK. They were, for the most part, well done. Hardly the "rehash" some have been criticizing Into Darkness as. Going into the movie, I already knew that the "death of Spock scene" had been recreated for this movie, word for word at points, with the characters reversed. I dreaded this moment, because I could see no way that doing this would equal that iconic moment. The death of Spock and subsequent funeral were probably the only times I ever got misty-eyed watching a Star Trek movie. To my surprise, the scene actually worked! The reversal of the characters, and the way they played it out, fit the dynamic and character arc of this Kirk and Spock, and I found myself getting misty-eyed, even though I knew Kirk wasn't going to stay dead. Even having Spock yell "Khan!!!!" kinda worked.

In the end, while it didn't exactly measure up to the '09 movie, it was still entertaining and quite good. I will watch this at least once more in the theater. First, to make sure I didn't overlook anything, and second, because I watch to watch it in a full house. Some movies are best seen with a whole audience, and I think Into Darkness might just be one of them.

Back From The Dead: The Blog Returns!

Well, howdy, ho! I have returned to the blog after six months. One of these days, I might write this thing on a consistent basis.

Today's post is going to be a veritable potpourri of thoughts. First up, the 49ers. In following the title of this post, the glory of the Niners has certainly experienced a resurrection this year! Today, they sit at 10-2. They have won the NFC West and they are in the playoffs for the first time since 2002. After six seasons, Alex Smith has developed into legitimate NFL starter. Okay, quick show of hands: Who predicted this level of success for the Niners going into this season? Yeah, neither did I.

What has been happening in the Land of Red & Gold is a tribute to the value of good coaching. If you look at this team, barring the secondary, the personnel is not vastly different than the team that took the field for Singletary in 2010. The 2010 team I felt had some good pieces; they just needed to be utilized properly. Harbaugh has utilized them to hilt. And what he's done with Smith is nothing short of amazing. Or is it?

Alex Smith has had the deck stacked against him from the get go. He was picked too high in the draft (thus elevating expectations beyond his ability level). He was thrown into service midway through his rookie year with an offense that brought whole new levels of suck week after week. Since the Offensive Coordinator position was a revolving door of coaches, each year brought a new offense for Alex to learn. The one time he had a coordinator two seasons in a row, the guy was perhaps the worst OC to ever man the booth at Candlestick. Finally, his first two Head Coaches threw him under the bus publicly. Combine that with with a skill set that needed to develop to be effective, and you have the recipe for Smith's career coming into this season.

Most everyone under the sun (myself included)thought that Smith's time as Niner was done following 2010, and that he would be nothing more than a semi-competent backup QB. Jim Harbaugh looked at the twisted wreck that was Smith and saw a hot rod. All he had to do was give Alex the things that had been denied him. He's given Alex Smith an offense plan that was competent. He's trotted out the offense slowly, waiting until Smith had a good grasp of what he was being asked to do before opening up more of the playbook. But most importantly, he's had Smith's back.

And look at the results. Smith no longer resembles Steve DeBerg. While his yardage numbers are not stellar, he no longer is making the crucial mistakes he used to do. Amazing what a person can do when someone believes in them.


I have more to say, but it will have to wait until after the game!