Star Trek: Axanar Warps Past Kickstarter Goals (But you can still support it)

Increasingly often we report on new space projects funded or performed either in full or in part by crowd sourcing. It is perhaps only appropriate that one of the most powerful sources of inspiration for many in the space community, as well as in popular culture, is the subject of its own Kickstarter campaign.

Star Trek: Axanar will be a full length, professionally produced independent video which explores the Federation/Klingon war and the historic battle won by Captain Garth of Izar, who served as a source of inspiration to one James T. Kirk.  ST: Axanar is entering the last stretch of its funding campaign, and it has already been an unqualified success. With 45 hours to go as of 1:00 pm CDT today, it has warped past the original funding goal of $100,000 to an amazing $411,545, bringing it surprisingly close to the total project budget of $650,000 for the 90 minute film. It should be noted that at a time when all too many companies are quick on the lawyer trigger for any infringement, no matter how slight, fan productions such as Axanar are made possible by the willingness of Paramount Pictures and CBS to look the other way so long as they are made and marketed on a strictly non-commercial basis.

According to the description:

“Axanar takes place 21 years before the events of “Where no Man Has Gone Before”. It tells the story of Garth of Izar, the legendary Starfleet captain who is Captain Kirk’s hero and the role model for a generation of Starfleet officers. Garth charted more planets than any other Captain and was the hero of the Battle of Axanar. His exploits are required reading at Starfleet Academy.

This is the story of Garth and his crew during the Four Years War, the war with the Klingon Empire that almost tore the Federation apart, and whose resolution solidified the Federation and allowed it to become the entity we know in Kirk’s time.”

It is the year 2245, four years into the war with the Klingons.

Producers got a jump start with the just released 20 minute introductory video presented in documentary format titled “Prelude to Axanar”  which achieved a whopping 1012% of its own Kickstarter projection earlier this year.

Whether you liked the J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboot,  or could not get past the altered timeline and gaping plot holes, the emergence of Star Trek: Axanar, as well as other internet funded fan platforms such as Star Trek Continues, is a welcome development, particularly to a small screen thoroughly saturated by the plague/zombie/invasion doomsday format which seems to preclude the possibility that we have a future on Earth, much less in space.

 

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