Terry McIntosh Threatens to Release More Axanar Records

Terry McIntosh threw down the gauntlet.

Axanar’s former chief technology officer made public the version of the Axanar feature script that Alec Peters quoted director Robert Meyer Burnett calling it “the best Star Trek movie script ever.” Fans who read the leaked script appeared to disagree.

The script that launched a lawsuit.

McIntosh, who resigned his position in May 2016, uploaded the screenplay to the AxaMonitor Facebook group early in the morning on June 28, 2017, following a post by Peters in which he misstated the order of events surrounding McIntosh’s resignation, claiming he’d been fired instead.

McIntosh’s apparent response:

You know what? Fuck it. Because Alec thought it was a good idea to talk smack, here’s the whole Axanar “feature” script. Blow me twelve ways to Sunday, c–t bucket (Alec).¹⁾

The August 2015 screenplay is marked as version 7.3, and the one Peters himself declared “fully revised and locked” on Facebook.

That post featured the script repeatedly referred to in the copyright infringement lawsuit against Peters and Axanar brought by CBS and Paramount Pictures in December 2015, which was settled in January 2017.

Terry McIntosh

Axanar spokesman Mike Bawden told AxaMonitor that script is far out of date, and that McIntosh is treading on tricky legal ground:

The current version of the screenplay for Axanar is Version 11. I’m sure [Terry] signed the same NDA as I did – and without specifically checking the document again, it seems to me that posting a copy of the script (even an out-of-date version) would be a violation of that agreement.²⁾

Meanwhile, in the Facebook group, The Real Truth About Axanar, Peters echoed Bawden’s reaction to the script being leaked:

The fact that Terry released an old version of the script today, the day after I posted the truth, shows you what kind of person he is. He violated his NDA and continues to be the kind of person he claims we are.³⁾

Alec Peters

Since McIntosh’s departure, relations between Peters and McIntosh, who was set to testify against Peters in that lawsuit, had grown increasingly acrimonious, with McIntosh boasting that he had documentation pointing to Peters’ mismanagement that resulted in spending $1.7 million with no film produced.

McIntosh seemed to be provoking Peters to take legal action, starting with filing a copyright notice with Facebook to get the script removed from the AxaMonitor Facebook group’s files. McIntosh stated on Facebook:

He’ll be a confirmed coward if he doesn’t. I insist that he does, because I want to see the real Axanar books and a discovery process is the best way to let me in.⁴⁾

McIntosh argued that a lawsuit against him by Peters would, under discovery required by a suit, open up financial and other records the former CTO claimed Peters wouldn’t want made public.

If McIntosh’s leaking the script was intended to push Peters to take legal action, Axanar’s producer wasn’t taking the bait. Peters posted on Facebook:

I wouldn’t waste my hard-earned money on suing Terry. Because frankly, I don’t care. His actions speak for themselves.⁵⁾

Peters is well known for making litigious threats on social media, such as when he had YouTube take down a pseudonymous fan edit of Prelude to Axanar, ironically claiming copyright infringement — the very accusation made against him by the owners of Star Trek. Prelude: Redux tightened the short film and eliminated Peters, who portrayed Captain Garth, from the cut.

While it is possible Peters will get Facebook to remove the screenplay, dozens of copies have been downloaded, and within hours posted on multiple websites. Peters would have to track down and issue takedown notices to each website.

A PAGE from the August 2015 Axanar script.

Axanar spokesman Bawden, however, doubted Peters would do so:

Given the number of changes made to the script since mid-2015, [Peters] may not even care. He’s focused right now on tightening up the drafts of his two scripts for the authorized Axanar segments.⁶⁾

One member of the AxaMonitor Facebook group, Johnpaul LeBrun, provided readers with this breakdown of the Axanar script:⁷⁾

By the Numbers (click to view)

By Johnpaul LeBrun
For those of you who don’t like pain - an amateur analysis of the “locked” Axanar film script. Christian Gossett asked the original question - how many pages have Garth doing something or saying a line. Answer 78 out of 106

He is also mentioned by name or by inference on four more.

So that’s 82 out of 106 (or 104 if you exclude the title pages) or 78% of the script.

There are 42 speaking roles and at least 20 non-speaking roles (assuming the “100 Klingons” were done digitally)

5 or 6 alien races are represented (Antosians are basically bald humans, so that would be easy):

• Vulcans
• Klingons
• Tellarites
• Orions
• Andorians
• Antosians

It’s difficult to determine how many ships would actually be depicted in the pew-pew scenes as the script is all over the place with the numbers but there are at least 80 Federation/allied starships and over 100 Klingon ships.

Sets that would need to be constructed/redressed for some shots I tried to be fair, and condense, as a lot of this stuff could be fudged by a competent team.

FEDERATION WAR ROOM
ARES CLASS BRIDGE
GARTH’S QUARTERS
KLINGON WAR ROOM
ARES CLASS C-I-C (at one point the script says “optical” so maybe this was supposed to be a digital set?)
KHARN’S QUARTERS
ARES CLASS TRANSPORTER ROOM
RESEARCH OUTPOST:MAIN ROOM
D-7 BRIDGE
D-6 BRIDGE
STARFLEET INTELLIGENCE: CORRIDOR OUTSIDE CELL
STARFLEET INTELLIGENCE: INTERROGATION CELL
ARES CLASS TURBOLIFT
USS ENTERPRISE BRIDGE
T’VAL - VULCAN SHIP BRIDGE
ARES CLASS CORRIDOR
INTERIOR: 602 CLUB

Exterior “locations” needed: at least 5, although 3 could have been fudged or redressed. Digital sets needed: at least 3 but as many as 7 (towards the end Alec starts putting “optical” tags on sets, perhaps as a mental aid because he was running out of money) Remember kids, they were only 30 days away from shooting.

Some of my favorite lines in no particular order:

• “STORM THE GATES!”
• “For chaos builds only darkness”
• “Just do it!”
• “One way or another, this war ends at Axanar!”
• “Beware the Ides of March, Captain”
• “A sharp knife is nothing without a sharp mind”
• “The crew is impressed as hell by what Garth has just done”
• “Garth of Izar’s legend grows”
• “Our radio is broken - we are only picking up show tunes”
• And finally - the worshipful V.O. that plays as Garth goes to sleep is by a young officer who is purposefully hand - writing a special tale about Garth’s exploits.

You are all welcome.

During the lawsuit, Peters’ attorneys claimed the script underwent further revision to reduce or eliminate possibly infringing elements. No version of those supposed later drafts has been seen publicly, nor a description of how it might avoid infringement given the defense attorneys’ claims that many elements of the Star Trek copyright were actually in the public domain.

In his statement denying summary judgment in the case federal Judge R. Gary Klausner disagreed.

Members of the AxaMonitor Facebook group began criticizing on the script almost immediately, centering on the idealized “Mary Sue” nature of Garth of Izar, the heroic starship captain portrayed by Peters in Prelude.

Meanwhile, on Reddit commenters used the script’s release to post harsh words about the screenplay, Peters himself and the failed Axanar feature project.

This is supposed to be the best Trek ever that shows us Gene’s optimistic vision and isn’t all about pew-pew but intellectually stimulating?⁹⁾

They also didn’t understand how shifty Peters was behind the scenes. He had a year to make the film between the fundraiser and the lawsuit. Instead he rented a warehouse, laid down carpet, and tried to build a studio instead of a fan film.¹⁰⁾

One Axanar critic quickly set up a website, Axanar: The Sporkings, just to critique the script, apparently on a page-by-page basis. For example, the reviewer takes aim at a lofty-sounding speech delivered by the Klingon commander, Kharn: “It’s a pretty little speech, but when broken down one finds it is like the waves upon the firmament, full of sound and fury, yet signifying nothing.”¹¹⁾

McIntosh threatened to leak more Axanar data, including donation records he has claimed prove Peters underreported the amount of money he had raised from Star Trek fans — apart from the publicly available crowdfunding data from Kickstarter and Indiegogo.

WHAT’S LEFT of the Axanar script is to be reduced to two short films to be produced in the same faux documentary format as Prelude.

While the feature film will never be produced, the terms of Axanar’s settlement with CBS and Paramount allow Peters to produce two 15-minute short films. Instead of the narrative format of Axanar, Peters opted to repeat the faux documentary format of Prelude, with two episodes constituting parts IV and V of the fictional “Four Years War” documentary.

With all the money raised for Axanar gone, Peters would likely have to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to produce the two short films without the benefit of crowdfunding, which was proscribed by the lawsuit settlement.

J.G. Hertzler

To keep fans’ interest in Axanar alive, Peters has claimed the Star Trek alumni actors who appeared in Prelude would return, stating as recently as June 25 that actors Gary Graham and J.G. Hertzler would appear in the short films.

On June 28, however, Graham said no deal for him to appear in the Axanar shorts had yet been struck. Meanwhile, Hertzler recently announced a run for Congress under the guise of Mark Twain, and signed on to reprise his role as the Klingon, Martok, in Star Trek Online.

In November 2018, Graham and Hertzler appeared at Axacon, attached to the project, though a shooting schedule had not yet been set.

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