Why Hello There, Transmedia

For any media fan worth their salt, story continuity is a big deal. Witness the "Star Wars" nerd trying to untangle the various timelines of the Extended Universe tie-in novels. See "Doctor Who" enthusiasts try to account for several bizarre story decisions made in the 1996 TV movie. Any "Highlander" fans who are still trying to keep track of all the various members of Clan McLeod have my deepest sympathies. Oh, and that whole alternate universe twist that the 2009 "Star Trek" movie pulled on us will no doubt be fodder for Trekker arguments for years and years to come. Such is the nature of fandom, which will remember, reflect, and obsess over all the minutiae that the actual producers of our media content are far less successful at keeping track of.

So it tickles me to no end that the studios are now paying outside companies to come in and help them stay on top of story and character continuity in their major franchise properties. A Los Angeles Times article published yesterday took a look at the rise of transmedia, specifically at the work of a company called Starlight Runner Entertainment, which specializes in developing and maintaining shared universes and ongoing continuities for easy translation to multiple media platforms. It used to be that writers put together their comprehensive bibles for the universes of television shows and other serialized media in advance. Now they can be created after a one-shot film or video game has hit it big, when unexpected opportunities for sequels and ancillaries require a media universe to start expanding in a hurry. And everything from pop-stars to toy lines can have an ongoing storyline with continuity, in order to keep their fans invested.

Why is this happening now? It seems that the studios have finally noticed that their fans pay attention to continuity across many different kinds of media, and it's actually a benefit to make sure that Captain Jack Sparrow stays in character, whether he's appearing in a "Pirates of the Caribbean" young-adult prequel book or in a MMORPG. It reinforces brands, makes marketing easier, and so on. And in the age of increasing cross-platforming, where different developers handle video games, spin-off television shows, novels, and merchandise, it takes more effort for everyone involved in a franchise to keep all the details straight. Apparently it's too big a job for the studios to take care of themselves anymore, especially when key creative talent is here one day and gone the next. If James Cameron drops dead tomorrow, it's reassuring to know that somebody has the master plan for the "Avatar" films filed away somewhere for safekeeping.

On the other hand, there are drawbacks. Too much cross-platforming can result in watered-down and confusing content. One of the most notorious examples is the ambitious Japanese ".hack" ("Dot Hack") franchise, that spread its story out over several anime series, video games, comics, and other media. The two ".hack" anime that I watched were well designed and had great worldbuilding, but also suffered from really lousy stories that were noticeably hampered by their piecemeal nature. To fully understand what was going on in one anime series, you needed certain background knowledge from playing one of the video games. It was one of the most frustrating experiences I ever had with a franchise, and I can see some of these new transmedia proponents making similar mistakes. "The Matrix" was another property that tried to insert bits of its plot into associated video games and other media, which few appreciated because the later movies were so badly received.

The bigger danger is that big, detailed master plans are inherently constraining. It's all well and good to have handy lists of character traits and universe timelines, but when you're talking about orchestrating universe-wide events to unfold over various media in different platforms, each individual component can suffer for it. You lose the flexibility and the creative freedom to take characters and storylines in more interesting directions when there's the constant worry of adjusting everything else in a property's universe to match. "Iron Man 2" had a plot that was treading water, and seemed more interested in setting up the "Avengers" movie than doing anything exciting with Tony Stark. I'm not looking forward to seeing Samuel L. Jackson being shoehorned into the new "Thor" and "Captain America" movies for more "Avengers" synergy. Building a consistent universe for these characters is all well and good, but not when it comes at the expense of basic storytelling.

I can only imagine what it must be like to work at one of these transmedia companies, trying to hash out a direction for "TRON" movies that may never be made, or figuring out how to redesign Strawberry Shortcake to translate better for video games and comic books. It's gratifying to see the monetization of activities that have been so closely associated with traditional fandom - extrapolating universes from media properties and then policing their continuity and consistency. But I'd caution for creators to tread carefully. We're not all minutiae-obsessed uber-fans, and while good continuity is a perk, it's not a necessity, and should remain secondary to actually turning out good content. You won't find a "Doctor Who" fan giving up the show just because some moron writer had the 8th Doctor declare he was half-human instead of pure Gallifreyan in the TV movie.

Maybe they could fix that through retroactive continuity. Or even regular continuity. We are talking about an alien being with a time machine here. I bet it was all a sinister Dalek plot. Oh well, that's a post for another time.

Criterions on Hulu! Criterions on Hulu!!

What's the magic word to get a pretentious movie fan to sit up and pay attention? Criterion. As in the Criterion Collection, the video distribution company that has set a standard for classic film releases on DVDs and Blu-Ray discs and has become practically synonymous with prestigious world cinema. Today, thanks to the power of Criterion, every cineaste and wannabe that formerly scoffed at Hulu Plus's efforts to muscle in on Netflix's streaming video turf (including me), is doing an about face. Word has come down that Hulu has sealed a deal with Criterion that will allow them to offer hundreds of titles from the esteemed Criterion film library to Hulu Plus customers, currently being offered at $7.99 a month. This will include a few select supplemental extras for certain films and even reproductions of some of the Criterion booklets. And Hulu has promised the films will run without ad breaks. Any commercials will only be played at the beginning of the presentations.

What does this mean for your friendly neighborhood pretentious film nerd? As a happy Netflix customer, I'm caught between the urge to rejoice and the urge to panic. Netflix has well over a hundred Criterion titles in its Instant Watch streaming library right now. The licenses for these films will expire in June, and the new deal with Hulu means that they won't be renewed and will no longer be available through Netflix's streaming service after that date. I'm already busy reordering my Instant Watch queue, to try and get through as many of the available Criterion titles as possible before they're yanked and end up behind the Hulu paywall. By my own count, there's about forty titles I haven't seen yet. That's perfectly doable at the rate I go through movies, but I never like being rushed.

But what about the new Hulu Plus service? There's been some grumbling already from users who don't like the idea of any commercials at all, those outside the U.S. who will not have access to the service, and Netflix subscribers who wish Criterion had made the deal with Netflix, because they don't want to deal with the hassle of multiple subscriptions. I'm not sure yet where I stand yet. On the one hand, I've never had any trouble with the Netflix streaming service and I'm perfectly happy viewing Criterion titles in this format. On the other hand, the sheer number of titles a viewer would get access to through the Hulu Plus services is extremely tempting. I certainly wouldn't mind an advertisement or two if it means having a huge chunk of the amazing Criterion library at my fingertips. $7.99 a month for the privilege is certainly reasonable too.

But do I want to give up Netflix to do it? I can't see myself using both of these services at the same time. I love Criterion films, but that's not all I want to watch. There are at least forty 2010 films I still want to see, and Hulu isn't about to start offering those for rental or streaming. For the moment, I'm in wait and see mode. I'll watch the Criterion titles that I have available to me now through Netflix, and wait for some feedback and reviews of the Hulu service before I test the waters. I can see myself taking a break from Netflix in a few months to try out Hulu Plus, but I highly doubt that it's going to be a viable substitute. For one thing, I'm using the Netflix plan with one DVD out at a time, which means that all of the Criterion titles available on Hulu are still available to me through Netflix - just not instantly. Though I think that Netflix's available film selection doesn't compare to Blockbuster or Greencine or some of its other competitors, they're still far better than Hulu, which has a library of mostly television shows.

What I find the most interesting about this development is that it's a change in tactics for Hulu, which was struggling to justify why it was charging for premium content that just didn't seem very premium. The Criterion deal is a huge coup for the company, putting them directly in competition with Netflix and other streaming services for desirable content. Their offerings are nowhere near on par with Netflix yet, but this is an important first step. Now if Hulu can land a distribution deal with another major company like HBO or Warners, which have been vocally hostile toward Netflix over the last few months, the fight for subscribers could start getting really exciting.

Where Do You Get Your Entertainment News?

Since I spend so much of this blog commenting on entertainment news, I figured it was a good idea to spend a post talking about where I'm actually getting my entertainment news from and how I stay in the loop.

When I was a kid, there were only two ways I could get any real entertainment news. One was the weekend edition of the Los Angeles Times, that my parents would bring home along with the local Chinese-language World Journal from the supermarket every Sunday morning. I read the Calendar section cover to cover, and especially loved flipping through the pages and pages of ads for films currently playing in theaters. I even saved a couple of the ones that were printed in color. My other source was "Entertainment Tonight," with Mary Hart and John Tesh. The fact that it featured so much celebrity gossip didn't bother me much back then, because there as always the possibility that I was going to see set footage or maybe clips of a new trailer or learn what project Steven Spielberg was going to do next. Thus, I didn't hear about most movies until I started seeing their marketing campaigns, or reviews popped up on "Siskel & Ebert."

As a teenager, when the Internet stormed into my life and refused to leave, it became all about the upstart rumor mill websites like Aint It Cool News (AICN) and Dark Horizons, which not only displayed no interest in Brad Pitt's love life, but turned their spotlights on the kind of films that I loved back then - the big action blockbusters and geek properties. After years of picking through mainstream sources for tidbits of real information, suddenly all the casting announcements and early reviews and set visits I could ask for were right there. I still check AICN daily, though their reviews are a mixed bag and many of their scoops come in later than other sources. The site's writers are solid film nerds who can provide a lot of valuable context and commentary. I enjoy many of their features and columns, especially the more nostalgic material. I just don't look to them as my primary source of entertainment news anymore.

These days my priorities have shifted again, and it's all about the news aggregators. I'm no longer interested just in production details, but developments in the wider entertainment industry too. I like the Cinematical movie blog, recently acquired by Moviefone, which is a good mix of reviews and deal announcements and general interest material about films, aimed at your average film nerd. I also check the Google News Entertainment section, which is a good barometer of the stories that are getting the most attention, though they usually include too much celebrity gossip - what the majority of the American public thinks of when they hear the words "entertainment news." Is it entertainment? Sure. Is it news? Not to me. I don't care if a newly single Scarlett Johanssen may be hooking up with Sean Penn until it starts to affect somebody's career.

The two big non-aggregator sources I check in on regularly are the various Los Angeles Times entertainment blogs and the Nikki Finke-edited Deadline website, which both provide news about the business deals and studio earnings and the other statistics that are at the real key to keeping up with Hollywood. Sure, the business end of things can be dull, and the middle-aged executives aren't nearly as much fun to follow as the creative talent - until you realize that these are the guys who finance, greenlight, and decide the fate of all the movies and television shows that come out of Hollywood, and are the gatekeepers for most of the content produced outside it too. You want to know why the 23rd James Bond movie has been delayed for so long? Take a gander at what corporate raider Carl Icahn has been up to for the last year. Even though I don't have the background for deep analysis of their antics, I've found it vital context for everything else going on.

Finally, it bears mentioning that I don't get much of my entertainment news from the traditional trade papers, Variety and the Hollywood Reporter. Variety especially cultivates its elitism and exclusivity to the point where I find it practically useless. I don't have the money to spend on the print publication, and the extreme security measures on their website are too much of a hassle. Practically everything they report on is now available through free sources, or is analyzed, commented on, and dissected by a dozen blogs and sites within a few hours. I used to fantasize about having a subscription to Variety, or even something like Entertainment Weekly, but these days the Internet has brought access to the same content to everyone, even the lowly amateur blogger like me.

Did you hear who's picked up the distribution rights to that Elmo documentary from Sundance? Not yet, but I know how I'll probably be finding out.

"Akira" Casting and Racebending Redux

A few days ago, the rumor went around the internet that James Franco is in talks to star in a film adaptation of "Akira," playing the role of biker gang leader Kaneda. I winced and I cringed, waiting for someone to speak up and point out that Kaneda is a Japanese character, and if Franco was playing the role, this was racebending, and we could expect another "The Last Airbender" – style casting ruckus on our hands. Part of me wants to let it go, to not say anything and not rock the boat. Another part of me wants to grab the directors by the scruffs of their necks and shake them like bad dogs, while demanding to know why they insist on being so dense. The directors attached to "Akira," by the way, are the Hughes brothers ("Menace II Society," "The Book of Eli"), who are African-American and therefore firmly in the category of people who Should Know Better.

The "Akira" casting situation isn't as egregious as "Airbender." An early script moved the action from Neo Tokyo to Neo Manhattan, suggesting that we'll be getting a heavily Americanized adaptation that will retain few Japanese elements. The lead character probably won't be called Kaneda - a name which has proven notoriously difficult to pronounce in the dubs of the 1988 anime - and won't be of Asian descent. This will avoid the possibility of a verboten yellowface performance, essentially by erasing the Asian characters and replacing them with new Caucasian ones - a practice critics call "racebending." It's a common tactic, one that's been used in many other recent films like "Dragonball," "21," and "Extraordinary Measures." Of course, the title will remain "Akira," in order to capitalize on the notoriety of the famous Katsuhiro Otomo manga and anime.

And this is the real reason that the whole racebending debate has exploded over the last year, and why we'll be seeing the debate come up again and again in the years to come. There's a bumper crop of properties in Hollywood's development pipeline right now, that either feature Asian characters or have Asian origins - "Cowboy Bebop," "The Runaways," "Death Note," "Robotech," "Ghost in the Shell," "The Weapon," and "Oldboy," just to name a few. I expect we'll be seeing more of them once the nostalgia wave hits Gen-Y in ten to fifteen years, the generation that grew up with the mid-90s anime boom. Hollywood has proven that they're perfectly willing to mine these properties for new film projects, but very few will be staying true to their source material and feature lead characters who are Asian.

A common excuse for racebending is that it's a matter of economics. There are no superstar Asian or Asian-American actors who are marketable, recognizable names, capable of carrying major commercial films. Sure, we have Jackie Chan and Jet Li, but they're both foreigners who learned English as a second language, and they're graying quickly - not exactly who the studios want headlining their slick action blockbusters. We've seen Hollywood try borrowing existing foreign stars from Asia, like Jay Chou and Rain, but this isn't going to be as effective in the long run as having Asian stars that have come up through Hollywood itself. If we have a deficit of Asian talent, the obvious way to fix the problem is to start putting some real effort into finding young Asian actors and actresses, and giving them the opportunities to grow into the stars the studios are going to need for these future projects. Our Tom Cruises and Will Smiths were not made overnight.

That means taking risks on Asian actors that the studios haven't been taking. The more resistant studios are to casting Asian actors, the more exacerbated the problem becomes. There's no reason that the role of Kaneda couldn't have gone to a young Asian-American actor like Aaron Yoo ("Disturbia," "21," "Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist") or Sung Kang ("Better Luck Tomorrow," "Fast & Furious"), except that these two have been stuck for too long in supporting roles and never got their break. There's no reason an Asian-American actor like Daniel Wu, who became a superstar in Hong Kong despite being unable to speak Cantonese until he was in his twenties, couldn't have become one in the U.S. The trouble is that so many of the roles these actors could have played have been reserved for Caucasian actors. This is one of the reasons last year's "The Last Airbender" casting fiasco raised such a storm of vitriol. It was not only a blatant example of racebending, but also represented a huge lost opportunity for American audiences to get to know some young minority actors.

There's nothing intrinsically wrong with the idea of an Americanized "Akira" adaptation, but there's no escaping the sense that the material is being compromised. The central image of "Akira" that everyone remembers is Kaneda on his red motorcycle, roaring through neon-lit Neo Tokyo. There's no reason why a character like Kaneda has to be Japanese, but in this day in age there's no reason why he couldn't be - why our Asian actors can't play the heroes on the big screen. Racebending isn't going to fly for much longer. The audience is catching on and the existing fans of these properties are not happy. Hollywood better start getting proactive about this, or they're going to lose a lot of potentially lucrative franchises.

"127 Hours" Goes By Fast

2010 may be the year of the films about people in tight places - literally. We've had "Frozen," about three skiers trapped on a ski lift, "Buried," which stuck poor Ryan Reynolds in a coffin for the entire movie, and now James Franco gets his arm pinned under a rock for "127 Hours." How do you make feature length films about dilemmas like this? "Frozen" never strayed far from its three protagonists and the winter landscape. "Buried" pulled off the gimmick of never leaving the confines of the coffin. As for "127 Hours," director Danny Boyle took a different approach.

"127 Hours" is based on the real-life experience of mountain climber Aron Ralston, who was trapped in a canyon in the remote Utah desert, after a boulder came down on him. Ralston was an experienced climber and had enough gear to survive for several days, but the odds were against him. He hadn't told anyone where he was going, his supplies were limited, and he finally had to do the unthinkable in order to make his escape. If you don't know the particulars, I won't provide spoilers, except to say that what we see of the act in question really isn't as graphic or gruesome as some of the press has made it out to be. In fact, the movie is surprisingly short on terror or horror or anything of the sort. Rather, it keeps its focus on the internal thoughts of Ralston, who just isn't the type to lose his head in a bad situation.

The opening sequence sees Ralston playing guide to a pair of lost hikers, Kristi (Kate Mara) and Megan (Amber Tamblyn), who view his daredevil extreme sporting exuberance with some incredulity at first, but are quickly won over. He wins the audience over pretty quickly too. Ralston's personality is a big reason why the film works as well as it does. He's smart, likable, charismatic, funny, and down-to-earth in the best way. He spends those 127 hours in the canyon mounting multiple battles of man vs. rock and then man vs. self, and doing his best to stay upbeat in the pauses between. It may seem a gimmicky conceit that Ralston makes videos to his parents while he's trapped, sometimes narrating new developments to the camcorder like a game show host, except that this is what the real Aron Ralston actually did. And thanks to James Franco, at his most genial and scruffy, we believe it. Franco does a great job of embodying so much of the ordinary and extraordinary in the same person. He keeps Aron Ralston relentlessly alive and immediate, and it's impossible not to root for his escape. I think it's the best performance we've seen from him so far, and I'm glad he's been getting so much attention for it.

But as much as Franco fills the screen, this is Danny Boyle's movie. The fact that his hero is stuck in a narrow canyon for the bulk of the running time doesn't stop him from sending the camera off in a hundred different directions, often at breakneck speeds. As Aron fantasizes about an ex-girlfriend, or being at a party he was invited to, or a bottle of soda sitting in his car on the other side of the desert, the camera travels with him. At one point he dreams about a sudden rainstorm turning the canyon into a raging river, submerging him in water. The visuals are so tactile, you'll find yourself holding your breath. And because this is Danny Boyle, there's rarely anything slow or languid or dreamy about these fantasies. Smash cuts and split screens abound. This is "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" on crack.

Except, "127 Hours" has a happy ending. Sure, Aron Ralston is never going to be the same after his ordeal, but there is an unmistakable sense of life-affirming triumph at the finale of the film, and it's such a great, unexpected high. The film is pretty intense, and I'm not sure I'd sit through it again in a hurry, but it would be worth it for the euphoria that ending. After the dark, gut-wrenching intensity of "Frozen" and "Buried," I wasn't looking forward to "127 Hours" at all, but Danny Boyle and James Franco surprised me. They actually turned a wilderness survival picture into a feel-good film, and a damn fine one at that.

And I'm so glad Boyle decided to work with Indian composer A.R. Rahman again. This was one of the best scores I've heard all year.

"Young Justice" and the State of American Anime

I checked in on a couple of the Friday night Cartoon Network action shows last week, after hearing some good things about "Young Justice" - essentially a junior version of "The Justice League" starring various DC Comics superheroes' sidekicks. I took no small amusement from the fact that their version of Superboy is moody and prone to fits of rage, and the team's only female member, Miss Martian, is an eager-to-please sweetheart who wields her sizable powers without a trace of aggression or menace. Any anime fan will instantly recognize them as the brooding seinen hero and the magical girl heroine. There are Western equivalents of these tropes, of course, but I rarely see American cartoon characters so easily identifiable as anime types, and it was hard to ignore them both popping up in the same show. However, there was also a much more typically Western comic-book hero in Robin, who did the Spiderman-style banter and puns, Kid Flash was a cocky little horndog, and apparently there's a more assertive female character on the way to balance out Miss Martian. I haven't forgotten Aqualad - he just didn't feature much in this episode.

It's been about ten years since anime and manga went mainstream in the US, and I've watched anime influences slowly make their way into Western cartoons. You don't really see much of it in the comedies like "Spongebob" or "Chowder," or the ones aimed at very young audiences like most of the Disney Channel cartoons, or the ones aimed at adults like "Futurama" and "The Venture Brothers." But in the action shows, which are the ones I always like best and tend to follow, you can definitely see where anime has made its impact. At first it was only visual styles that were being adopted, like in "Teen Titans," and then you had some that were deliberately patterned after Japanese formulas, like "Super Robot Monkey Team Hyperforce Go!" and "W.I.T.C.H." Then there were shows that tackled Asian subject matter like "Avatar: the Last Airbender" and "Hi Hi Puffy Amiyumi." There were even a few ill-fated co-productions like "Oban Star Racers" and "IGPX: Immortal Grand Prix."

But the thing that always struck me about what many dubbed "American anime" was how unlike typical anime it usually was once you got past the visuals. All right, there's really no such thing as a typical anime, but the ones that are the most popular in America are always the action shows aimed at your average young adult viewer. These are the ones you're the most likely to see on SyFy or Cartoon Network at odd hours, and teenagers jawing about online - "Bleach," "Full Metal Alchemist," "Gurren Lagaan," "Evangelion," etc. Though a lot of them are still aimed at kids, immediately it's apparent that these shows are a lot darker, the themes are more serious, and the characters more intense. There is no Broadcast Standards and Practices department standing over the anime creators' heads, bent on neutering any content that looks the least bit traumatic. It's certainly what drew me into my decade-long relationship with anime in the first place. These were cartoons with some real bite that could appeal to adult audiences. There have been many pretenders, but few serious attempts to replicate this stateside. The only one I can think of that had much visibility was "Afro Samurai." Remember that awkward mess?

Nonetheless, you can clearly see a progression in Western action cartoons towards darker, more sophisticated material and looser content standards. Take "Teen Titans" and "Avatar: The Last Airbender," probably the two most commonly cited examples of American anime. Once you remove the manga-style visuals and the Japanese theme song from "Teen Titans," you've got a pretty standard American superhero show. You could always see the creators holding back for the sake of their younger audiences, but its bigger storylines got pretty dark for its afternoon timeslots. Two years later, "Avatar" pushed itself farther and was much more ambitious, featuring complex characters and themes. It also upped the ante on its action scenes and deliberately drew from Eastern philosophy and culture for its story. Many viewers assumed the Nickelodeon show was dubbed anime. In part this is a reflection of trends in the larger media - the comic book and superhero genres getting grittier, cartoons being driven out of Saturday morning to cable - but anime has certainly played its part, since it was often in direct competition for the same audiences and gave kids different expectations for cartoon content.

I don't think you could have had a show like "Young Justice" or a "Generator Rex" ten years ago, where the young leads are in so much constant peril and getting knocked around like pinballs by the bad guys. Sure, there are always adults around keeping an eye on them, maintaining an illusion of security, but it's a far cry from something like "X-Men: Evolution," where an adult Wolverine or Storm took care of all the real fights, while the teenage characters only had minor tussles among themselves. We're getting to the point where I could see a "Bleach" or an "Inuyasha" coming out of American television - maybe in another ten years or so, when the kids who grew up on anime start running things. This is not to say that I think that anime-style extremes are where American cartoons should be headed. "Avatar" was kid-friendly, and a better show than 90% of the anime I could name. However, for those of us who want to see cartoons taken more seriously and live up to their unrealized potential, pushing at these boundaries never hurts.

"Young Justice" is a fun show, and I think it gets a lot of benefit out of incorporating some of these anime-inspired elements into the mix while retaining the classic western superhero themes. Superboy may act like a "Gundam" pilot, but his character arc should be chock full of good old-fashioned teambuidling and de-angsting. And good banter. Nobody does good banter like the Americans.

Meta on Fan Documentaries and "Star Wars Begins"

There are two kinds of media-fan documentaries. First you have the documentaries that are made about the fans themselves, such as "Trekkies," which explored the "Star Trek" subculture and "Ringers: Lord of the Fans," which charted the impact of the Peter Jackson "Lord of the Rings" trilogy on the established Tolkien fandom. And then there are the documentaries about media properties that have been mounted by the fans themselves, usually without the official involvement of whoever actually has the rights to the films or television shows being examined. I've run across several of these floating around the Internet, including fan-made documentaries about "Firefly," "Doctor Who," "Return to Oz," "Johnny Quest," and the "Karate Kid." The two different breeds of documentary frequently cross-breed, such as in the "Troll 2" magnum opus, "Best Worst Movie," or "The People vs. George Lucas," but I mostly want to talk about the latter variety - the documentaries made by amateurs.

One recent example is the fourteen-part "Star Wars Begins" that Cinematical's Erik Davis has been raving about. Its creator, Jambe Davdar, describes it as an "unofficial commentary to Star Wars," which incorporates footage from the original film trilogy with behind-the-scenes footage, interviews, deleted scenes, alternate takes, and bloopers. This is probably the most high-profile fan-made doc out there at the moment, and a unique case for a couple of reasons. Like all fan-made documentaries, "Star Wars Begins" is clearly a labor of love that was meant to fill an informational void left by the official production company. The difference here is that "Star Wars" has had several documentaries covering its creation already. You have Ken Burns' "Empire of Dreams: The Story of the Star Wars Trilogy," and the History Channel's "Star Wars: The Legacy Revealed," each running at least ninety minutes apiece. I even remember "Star Wars" getting a good chunk of an episode of the PBS "American Cinema" installment that covered the "Film School Generation." How much of a void could there be left to fill? For a serious "Star Wars" obsessive, plenty I guess.

Another issue, related to the first, is potential legality problems. All fan-generated work falls into a gray area of intellectual property law, but most rights holders have no reason to go after fan-made-documentaries for obscurities like "Return to Oz," since the potential audience is tiny, the fan documentarians never make a cent, and the rights holders have little economic interest in creating their own documentaries. Also, in America at least, there are various exceptions to copyright for critique and informational uses that documentaries have a better case for than most. Most importantly, there's no real harm going on, so there's no reason to cry foul. "Star Wars" is a different matter. The Lucasfilm business empire clearly still has an economic interest in the kind of material covered by "Star Wars Begins," especially the footage that has never been officially released. As I mentioned in a previous "Star Wars" post, George Lucas and company still get a lot of mileage out of releasing bits and pieces from their archives, like the never-before-seen alternate opening for "Return of the Jedi," which will be included with the new "Star Wars" Blu-Rays. It could be argued that "Star Wars Begins" would lessen the value of some of this material by making a good chunk of it so freely available.

On the other hand, this bootleg archival footage has been around for decades, and any "Star Wars" fan worth their salt has seen it already. Lucasfilm is also much looser about fan-generated content than many others. They recognized a long time ago that unofficial, but loving fan films and spoofs like "George Lucas in Love," and "Thumb Wars" help to keep interest in "Star Wars" going. They even help to sponsor the Official Star Wars Fan Film Awards every year now, though IP issues are probably a big reason why the Best Documentary category disappeared after the first year. "Star Wars Begins," which is a very complimentary, positive expression of one guy's passion for the "Star Wars" universe, is in the same spirit as other fan films. So, I expect Lucasfilm will happily ignore it as long as Davdar keeps emphasizing that the documentary is unofficial and doesn't give them a reason to ring up the lawyers.

After all, it wouldn't look very good for Lucasfilm to come down on someone for putting all this time and effort into such a geeky paean to the original "Star Wars." Frankly, I wish some of my favorite media fandoms could generate a documentary like this - or rather, generate the passionate, talented media fans that could generate a documentary like this.