'Star Wreck,' from Finland with love

[Dan Dassow]

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/herocomplex/2009/11/star-wreck-is-the-best-finnish-star-trek-parody-ever.html

Los Angeles Times
Hero Complex
For your inner fanboy

'Star Wreck,' from Finland with love
November 10, 2009 | 9:21 am

Linda Whitmore is our specialist here at Hero Complex when it comes to classic ôStar Trek,ö and today she checks in with a report about ôStar Wreck,ö a parody that required her to boldly seek out life forms in a Nordic sector of the universe. -- Geoff Boucher

What would happen if the Starship Enterprise and "Airplane" crashed into the Babylon 5 space station somewhere in the skies above Finland?

The loopy result would be ôStar Wreck (The Imperial Edition),ö the Starfleet parody from a Finnish writer-actor-producer named Samuli Torssonen and his crew of amateur moviemakers. Seven years in the making, the farce opens on the bridge of the USS Kickstart with the not-so-cosmic sound of a toilet flushing û the menÆs room, it seems, is conveniently located right next to the vesselÆs command center. ...

The film is being released on DVD in the U.S. on Tuesday. "Star Wreck" is also available on the Internet. HereÆs my Q&A with Torssonen, the scrappy, warp-driving force behind ôWreck." The 31-year-old native of Tampere, Finland, is fluent in English, and good thing because when it comes to Finnish I never got started. ...

LW: When did "Bablyon 5" air in Finland? What led you to introduce the "Babylon 5" angle? IÆm a "B5" freak also -- so I got all the ôin jokes.ö

ST: ôBabylon 5ö aired in 1998 when we began to write the story. There was a huge battle between the fans of ôStar Trekö and ôBabylon 5ö on the Internet, and we considered that pretty funny -- it was only TV series! So we came up with this idea, what if you actually put the two shows in a deadly space combat. Who will win? Of course, when ôStar Wreckö was finally ready, nobody remembered ôBabylon 5ö anymore. ...

LW: Have you gotten any feedback from anyone in the real "Star Trek" camp?

ST: No, but J. Michael Straczynski e-mailed me and asked for a couple of copies of the film on DVD. ...

[Jan]

Somebody had given a copy of the movie to JMS at a con a while ago. I wouldn't blame him for not putting disks from strangers in his computer, though.

Jan

[Dan Dassow]

Somebody had given a copy of the movie to JMS at a con a while ago. I wouldn't blame him for not putting disks from strangers in his computer, though.

Jan

Someone (hint, hint, Jan-MS) should suggest to Joe-MS that he should have a work laptop (that he backs up religiously) and a play computer that would not have valuable work information on it.

[Jan]

Someone (hint, hint, Jan-MS) should suggest to Joe-MS that he should have a work laptop (that he backs up religiously) and a play computer that would not have valuable work information on it.

I'm the LAST person who should ever advise *anybody* about tech. I'm reasonably sure that JMS knows about (and probably owns) gadgets I won't even know exist for another couple of years.

And I'm sure he's gotten positively devoted to backing up after the hard drive disaster he had a while back.

Jan

[DaveNarn]

I saw the original movie on Youtube, they had done such a nice job recreating the B5 ships - that's what I was mostly interested in.
I was disappointed after buying the movie iTunes only to discover the B5 ships had all been replaced with very bad substitutes.

Wonder if Warners had threatened a lawsuit?

[KoshN]

I saw the original movie on Youtube, they had done such a nice job recreating the B5 ships - that's what I was mostly interested in.
I was disappointed after buying the movie iTunes only to discover the B5 ships had all been replaced with very bad substitutes.

Wonder if Warners had threatened a lawsuit?

That would be MY guess.

[KoshN]

I'm the LAST person who should ever advise *anybody* about tech. I'm reasonably sure that JMS knows about (and probably owns) gadgets I won't even know exist for another couple of years.

And I'm sure he's gotten positively devoted to backing up after the hard drive disaster he had a while back.

Jan

Still, the idea of having a work computer and a play (sacrificial) computer, is a good one. Don't put anything that might be suspect in the work one, and don't put ANY work in the sacrificial one, EVER.

It's the only way to be sure.

[Jan]

That would be MY guess.

Studios in recent years have been fairly lenient about fan work as long as there's no profit involved. Since DaveNarn mentioned *buying* it on iTunes, I'd guess that once profit entered into it, WB wouldn't have much choice but to forbid the use of its property.

Jan