Star Trek: First Frontier on Kickstarter

[CorporalCaptain]

Umm... not everywhere.

View attachment 17743

re: the thing in the water, it's the villain's lair from The Spy Who Loved Me. It's impossible to take the shot seriously. If it's supposed to be an Easter egg, it needs to be only ten billion times more subtle.

https://jamesbond.fandom.com/wiki/Atlantis

 

[fireproof78]

I do laugh whenever I see one of these fan films that incorporates “the true spirt of Trek”, whatever that means, they always seem to devolve into a massive space battle at the end. Isn’t that what the complaint about NuTrek always is? That is just action and space battles?

And that it is "too dark." Except, this whole fan film is about a captain dealing with PTSD and thinking about leaving the Fleet, and having to process through some dark emotions, as well as a bombing on a Starfleet ship. And that's "the spirit of Trek?"

 

[Tom Servo]

And that it is "too dark." Except, this whole fan film is about a captain dealing with PTSD and thinking about leaving the Fleet, and having to process through some dark emotions, as well as a bombing on a Starfleet ship. And that's "the spirit of Trek?"

Exactly. That almost proves to me that its more about the look with a lot of these people then the story. If JJ Trek and Discovery looked like TOS and TNG, but had the same plot line, they’d be okay with it. But because they look like modern productions, somehow its a big ole problem.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Umm... not everywhere.

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Guys, we're not gonna use CG. We're gonna google for photos and spam everything in using MS paint!

I can't lie it's kinda cute, but doesn't work as part of a "serious" film.

 

[Maurice]

Guys, we're not gonna use CG. We're gonna google for photos and spam everything in using MS paint!

I can't lie it's kinda cute, but doesn't work as part of a "serious" film.

It's just jarring to see a film with some decent quality sets and acting and even the occasional nice shot suddenly lapsing into imagery right out of Star Trek: Natures Hunger, which is something so much smaller in budget and scope.

 

[STEPhon IT]

Oh boy... I felt I was hard of hearing trying to watch this darn thing. And I only caught bits and pieces of it. Also is it just me or is this film's climax the ending of the Babylon 5 telefilm "Call to Arms" (i.e. the Crusade prequel/pilot) with a different result.

Overall, this felt like an 80s indie parody of a 50s B movie in Star Trek drag. Like Amazon Women on the Moon minus the camp.

Note to fan films: Please please drop the brooding, traumatized starship captain that doesn't want to be a captain but still does and learns he really does want to be a captain after all. I'm sick of watching How the Captain Got His Mojo Back. ("His" because the majority of fan film captains are dudes.)

32 minutes of this film and still zero adventure, I would love to see the characters upbeat and are already out there in outer space. This fanfilm doesn't feel like Star Trek at all.

 

[Irishman]

So freaking good, Eric!

is this your first credit in a production??

 

[Maurice]

This probably really belongs in the Fan Productions forum, and there's an ongoing topic there already. @Michael can maybe merge it with that thread?

 

[Shatinator]

Because of the wonky sound mix, I may have missed it. Is it ever explained who the retro 1950s evil aliens are and what their motives are at all?

Yeah Bixby, kind of .. I think they are referred to as the Sa'ra a "genocidal" species that comes out of long hibernation every century or so. Awakening with a species instinct to 'destroy all'. I would imagine what a biological only Borg would be presented as. The Vulcans and Romulans know of them. But for reasons not made clear, Starfleet just doesn't give the Vulcans a call and ask for intel.

 

[UssGlenn]

Yeah Bixby, kind of .. I think they are referred to as the Sa'ra a "genocidal" species that comes out of long hibernation every century or so. Awakening with a species instinct to 'destroy all'. I would imagine what a biological only Borg would be presented as. The Vulcans and Romulans know of them. But for reasons not made clear, Starfleet just doesn't give the Vulcans a call and ask for intel.

I got the impression that everything you listed in that post, was the intel. And no one knows more than that. I kept expecting the Andorian Linguistics Whiz to figure out how to properly communicate, and thus give us a Horta situation where we find out they aren't actually a genocidal force of nature. The "why did they take hostages" bit clearly seemed to set something like that up. But nope, just blow them up. Totally Spirit of Star Trek there guys...

 

[jackoverfull]

Because of the wonky sound mix, I may have missed it. Is it ever explained who the retro 1950s evil aliens are and what their motives are at all?

Yes, just a species that has come out of hibernation and is hell-bent on destruction because that’s their nature.

Seen it yesterday, as others have noted the sound mix is VERY problematic and the direction and script sometimes confusing, the acting, on the other hand, is often very good.

The confusion was so much that at times I wasn’t really sure what was going on, for example I have no idea on why they were going outside the ship at warp.

Story was relatively simple but the character have a lot of potential, if a sequel is ever made I hope they get explored more.

Effects were quite a letdown...I was really curious on how the enterprise model would look and well...they would have been much better off using CGI, imho.

The pacing was a real issue too and the Horner score felt very out of place to me.

Probably the same footage could be cut much tighter and with a better audio mix turn out being a great film, but right now it feels unfinished to me.

All in all, anyway, thumbs up for the effort and hope the special version remedies the issues of the current one.

 

[jackoverfull]

Almost forgot: why does April order to kill the unconscious alien in sickbay? That felt very wrong to me, but maybe there’s something i’m missing.

 

[Professor Moriarty]

So proud of you Eric. Marvelous!!!

 

[GeorgeKirk]

This is definitely Gene's Vision. I know because I've had the power to read dead people's minds ever since I fell into that vat of radioactive chemicals. A lot of your Supreme Court justices fell into the same vat; it's why Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia knew that George Washington didn't want anybody to be able to afford healthcare.

 

[Michael]

Can't merge threads from two separate subfora as a mod, so I just moved it to Fan Productions. If she feels so inclined, @jespah can merge the two threads from here.

 

[fireproof78]

The pacing was a real issue too and the Horner score felt very out of place to me.

Yes, that definitely stood out to me, especially since it was ridiculous for the shuttle to go all the way around the ship only to go back to the shuttlebay.

Almost forgot: why does April order to kill the unconscious alien in sickbay? That felt very wrong to me, but maybe there’s something i’m missing.

I thought the alien had activated the bomb thing they ended up finding in the next scene.

 

[jackoverfull]

Had it? Then why didn’t it explode in sickbay already?

 

[fireproof78]

Had it? Then why didn’t it explode in sickbay already?

I'd have to rewatch it but I think it was based on a radio countdown frequency that the alien was giving off. I think I followed that correctly.

Someone else can clarify if I missed something (I'm sure I did).

 

[Maurice]

It always breaks my heart a little when these fan productions fall so short of the mark. I really pull for people to do something amazing, but they almost always end up with subpar scripts and stories and a lot of technical issues. In the case of this film, the audio issues make the story rather hard to follow. The pacing is a train wreck, which doesn't help...it takes the story for-freaking-ever to get going.

 

[jespah]

Can't merge threads from two separate subfora as a mod, so I just moved it to Fan Productions. If she feels so inclined, @jespah can merge the two threads from here.

All set.