Fan Films... Unrated, Uncensored and Fueled by Fandom

Jay
Apr 15, 2015
5 min read

What exactly is a fan film? Think of it this way; Imagine you really like something… a book or series of books, a movie, TV show, comic book, cartoon, anything like that. In fact, you like it so much that you would like to make a video or short film of YOUR point of view of that something. Maybe you didn’t like how something ended or maybe you thought your view was better than what was available or maybe you just noticed lingering questions that you thought you could answer… and that is what you focus on for your film. That is a fan film… whether it be 15 minutes or 15 seconds.

Lately, there has been an influx of amazing fan films ranging from parodies to retellings to original spin-offs. Because I love fan films of every variety, I’m going to show you some awesome examples of each. So, without further ado – Here we go!

PARODIES-

There are some great parody films out there that are official and have decent budgets. Take, for instance, the Scary Movie franchise. They started off making fun of Scream, and then branched off into a dozen other horror and suspense franchises like Saw, the Exorcist and even War of the Worlds! And while these movies are great for a few giggles and side-splitters, my favorite parodies are made by guys just like you & me… people with virtually no money, probably only 1 camera and basic editing equipment.

Case in point: Dumb Drum. This group is based in Fresno and led by a guy named Bryan Harley. Together, with a group of his buddies, Dumb Drum is best known for their movie trailer frame-by-frame parodies… called “sweded”. They’ve done it all – Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Pacific Rim, Dark Knight Rises… even the Rocketeer. The Sweded Pacific Rim trailer was even mentioned by Guillermo Del Toro at an SDCC panel, saying it was ‘a masterpiece…’.

RETELLING-

After a lot of thought, I’ve decided that retelling and reboot are one and the same. Take the TV series Once Upon A Time, for instance. This show is a retelling and reboot for every single fairy tale they can get their hands on. In books, you have the many series out there written by Gregory Maguire (Wicked, Mirror Mirror, Confessions of an Ugly Step Sister) or Frank Beddor (The Looking Glass Wars trilogy) where they have completely retold and reimagined fairy tales from the very beginning. Disney has even begun making grand-scale live action reboots of some of their most famous animated classics (see Producer Mo gush on the subject in her blog, here.) such as Cinderella. They currently have 3 more in some stage of production – Beauty and the Beast, The Jungle Book and Mulan. Enough with the big money guys…

Case in point: GrittyReboots . This group of enterprising fellows takes popular video games, cartoons and such and turns them into completely retold and rebooted movie trailers. My personal favorite is the Adventure Time trailer, where Finn and Jake go on ‘one mommy of an adventure to save their world’ from certain doom. They have also done reboots for Calvin & Hobbes, The Legend of Korra, Pokemon, and the childrens’ book If You Give a Mouse a Cookie. Along with the finished films, they offer up ‘Behind The Scenes’ shorts on all of them, which is a very cool addition to their page.

ORIGINAL SPIN-OFFS-

In the traditional sense, the title might make you think of Mork & Mindy (which was a spin-off from Happy Days) or, to be timelier, maybe even The Flash (a spin-off of CW’s Arrow). But, in this instance, I mean fan films that are extensions or continuations of a movie or TV show.

Case in point: The work of Adi Shankar’s Bootleg Universe films. If you don’t recognize the name, you’ll recognize some films he’s had his hands in; The Grey, Dredd (which in itself was a reboot of the Judge Dredd franchise), Killing Them Softly and Lone Survivor. More recently, he was under fire for his fan film “Power/ Rangers”, his unauthorized short-film chronicling the Power Rangers team following their initial fame and fall from grace. It’s gritty, graphic and 14 minutes worth of uncensored awesome… plus it stars James Van DerBeek.

He has also offered up some great shorts in The Punisher: Dirty Laundry (starring Thomas Jane and Ron Perlman), Venom: Truth in Journalism (starring True Blood’s Jason Stackhouse - Ryan Kwanten) and an ongoing miniseries – Judge Dredd: Superfiend. These are some amazing videos, and though they are fan films, Adi Shankar has capital to throw at these productions. I would feel like I’m leaving some good stuff out if I didn’t also provide you with some other fan films...

TIE Fighter is a short animated film (made in the style of 80’s Anime films, I might add) in the Star Wars universe. It is 7 minutes you will not mind wasting on a cartoon…. I mean – close your eyes and imagine a Star Wars story done like Voltron!

Doctor Who Fan series created by VUE Productions is a great way for a Whovian to show love for the iconic TV series. One episode published in 2013 (The Doctors Forever) pits the 2nd, 4th, 10th and 11th Doctors together against the Master! This is a great mini-series to waste some time on in between new series of Doctor Who.

I feel I would be leaving out our favorite topics if I didn’t also point out some great Marvel and DC fan films, as well…

Of course, there’s always going to be the big name Marvel characters thrust into fan films. Spider-man is no exception to that rule. One of the better fan films for your friendly neighborhood Spidey is by “madeLEGITmedia”, titled Marvel Knights: Spider-Man. In this film, Pete does not seem to have landed his full costume yet, but the mask and the attitude are ever-present.

In terms of recently more relevant topics, I found a very comical Deadpool short by Bean Dip Productions called A Typical Tuesday. Complete with all of his externally internal banter, comic book-esque pop up notes and non-stop jabbering. It’s pretty funny.

Don’t you, not even for one second, think that DC fans haven’t also been making films! Ollie finds out the hard way that Dinah (Black Canary) isn’t as dead as he thought in Earth 3 – Thousand Pounds (concept). It’s only just shy of 6 minutes, but the concept for this series is strong.

In Justice League Dark ( One of JB's favorite topics), made by One Riot Ranger Productions, we meet up with John Constantine, Boston Brand, Zatana and a couple other great Dark characters. Check it out… if you dare… ooooooohhhhhhhhhhh. Ahem! Sorry, got a little carried away.

Anyway, you can check out these and many, many more on YouTube OR just watch out for our posts on Facebook to catch all the newest coolest fan films as we catch them.

As always #OutSpokenJays and let us know what you think. What are your favorite Fan Films out there?