io9: fanfilms

Create Your Own Doctor Who Movie And Become Famous! [Doctor Who]

Charlie Jane Anders — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 13:00:00 PST

Are you the next Steven Moffatt or Graeme Harper waiting to happen? Finally your genius at creating the next instalment of time-traveling action-comedy Doctor Who will be recognized! By one PBS station in California, anyway.

PBS station KTEH, in San Jose, is having a competition for Doctor Who fan films. The best ones could appear on the air — but only if you live in California. Entries from outside the state will be eligible for online-only recognition, which may matter more to you in any case. To help you get started, the KTEH crew posted their own film about the Ood, called "The Impossible Apartment." Apparently it only took them a couple hours:

Full details, and contest rules, are at the link. [KTEH]

Padmé Wins as Best Star Wars Fan Film of the Year [Fan Films]

Annalee Newitz — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 11:45:00 PDT

George Lucas' favorite fan films are parodies — he's said in interviews that he thinks a good parody will often lead people back to the original story and turn them into fans. So it's no surprise that Lucas picked a popular parody, Padmé, as the winner of this year's Star Wars Fan Movie Challenge at Comic-Con. The short film is a mashup of teen pregnancy comedy Juno and the familiar Star Wars universe. There's even a cool song. [Padmé via Atom]

How Zeb Wells' Fan Films Got Him a Job Writing Amazing Spider-Man [Zeb Wells]

Graeme McMillan — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 08:00:15 PST

What is the best way to get a job writing Marvel Comics? Apparently, the answer may be "Make a fan film where a drunken Supergirl complains about an anorexic Thor, who is responsible for bathing the Hulk, before they all learn to become a pop band." That was the route taken by Zeb Wells, former indie filmmaker turned one of the new writing staff of Amazing Spider-Man. View the video in question and find out what led from that to getting paid to write jokes for Spidey after the jump.

Real World Metropolis was the second fan movie in a row made by Wells that won Wizard Magazine's now defunct "Direct To Video" contest (Superhero Birthday Party having won the year before), and at a Wizard-sponsored convention that year, his acceptance speech caught the attention of Marvel editor Axel Alonso:

So they show it - a spoof episode of The Real World, with super heroes in the house. Not blisteringly original but my friends make up for it by being funny as hell. I got to give a little speech afterwards. I got up there and took some friendly jabs at [Marvel Editor In Chief] Joe Quesada and [star Marvel writer] Brian Michael Bendis, spending ample time addressing the timely subject of how worthless my friends and I are - one of the few subjects I'm an expert in.  The next day I heard that Axel was looking for me, almost threw up, then ran into him in a bar that night. He asked me to send him some ideas for [now-cancelled anthology title] Spider-Man's Tangled Web. We went back and forth a bit and eventually he told me to just write it. It was pretty rough, but he helped me tighten it up. I'm sure I don't need to say it, but he's a damn good editor. And then I was off and running, head still spinning.

From there, Wells bounced around the company, writing short runs on limited series or books about to be cancelled, until his announcement as one of the four writers on staff for the three-times-per-month relaunch of Amazing Spider-Man. A roundabout route, sure, but at least not one that involves writing three Back To The Future movies (Bob Gale is also part of the new Spider-Writing team, alongside Eli Stone creator Marc Guggenheim and former She-Hulk writer Dan Slott). Wells' first issues on the title ship in April, giving you just one more month to consider how dysfunctional he can get away with making the character when corporate bosses are watching.

Real World Metropolis [YouTube.com]

Be Kind Rewind Opens A Hole In The Space-Time Continuum [Be Kind Rewind]

Kevin Kelly — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 16:30:10 PST

By now you've probably seen a few commercials for Michel Gondry's Be Kind Rewind, where Jack Black accidentally magnetizes the movies in buddy Mos Def's store. They decide to create fanfilm versions of movies like Ghostbusters, Robocop, and 2001: A Space Odyssey and pass them off to unsuspecting customers. However, now the director himself has gone and "sweded" the trailer for the film on his own (with Swedish actors), opening up a meta-reference that might cause the universe to implode. Check out the video above, but just hold onto something in case a freak wormhole opens up near you.

Final Proof That Star Trek Is Just Retro Cheese [Star Trek]

charliejane — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 08:00:00 PST

Skip J.J. Abrams' new Star Trek movie, and watch this fan-made film instead. Both films will consist of pathetic tributes to a dead franchise. The only difference? The fan film Of Gods And Men will be way more fun because it's not even trying to be taken seriously, judging from this trailer. But Of Gods And Men, with its huge cast of veteran Trek actors, is also just more proof that Star Trek is only good for nostalgia.

It's sad to see so many old Trek actors whoring themselves out for fan projects. This one is the motherlode: you get to see Tuvok from Voyager give Uhura from the original series a mind meld. Walter Koenig is back as Chekhov, and original series actors Grace Lee Whitney and Lawrence Montaigne also reprise their minor roles from 40 years ago. And some guy who played a captain in one of the movies plays that role again. The actors who played Harry Kim, Neelix, Captain Sisko's son and a bunch of other supporting roles turn up playing new characters. You can literally sit there and play spot-that-obscure-Trek-actor.

Star Trek: Of Gods And Men, according to this just-released trailer, will premiere its first segment on Dec. 22. This, not, the J.J. Abrams dud, is the future of Star Trek.