OUTSIDE SOURCES WANT TO CLAIM RIGHTS TO AEGIS' "ISCANDAR"

Houston, TX - Some indie projects are so hot and fresh, everyone just seems to want to be part of the action. Very recently, the studio uncovered an IMDB page that was not authorized by the studio, which was being maintained by a third party that had members claiming to be part of the production, claiming to fill positions like "assistant director" and "second unit camera and electronics." The studio has opted to contact IMDB and inform them of the infringements that are occurring on the page and insisting certain person(s) be held liable for the false IMDB page that is listed under Minotaur 1.1. Of course, most people who now follow the new studios name "Aegis Films presents" know that as of May 2021, the series was renamed as ISCANDAR.

During the summer of 2020, in efforts to train a new team to the studios large line of future projects, the studio was involved with a new team of actors and crew from San Antonio. Some of these new team members were part of the production team that helped one, Ramiro Avendano, during his five year pipe dream of producing his scam project, "Zombie Reign" - which eventually became "The Oath" that was being produced in Las Vegas, Nevada from 2018 to 2020. Back then, this "team" rode on Avendano's promising success of the ill-fated zombie film project as they expected millions of dollars for being part of that monstrosity. After the zombie films failed launches, it seems that some of the remaining cast and crew were hungry to leech themselves to another promising project in the local area.

 

Other persons involved in their claim of being part of the ISCANDAR production, is an investor who paid Avendano an alleged $460,000 for a film that has never has never seen the light of day, or will ever come to be. Readers should be reminded that D. R. Quintana wrote the script to this series, cast the entire project, and created character developments for the Minotaur and ISCANDAR projects a little over eight years ago; years before the new team from San Antonio and the upstart investor from The Oath ever crossed paths with this projects creator or any part of the series production efforts.

 

This same investor is also responsible for the cancellation of a private screening of a recent full feature film that was directed and produced to completion by D. R. Quintana and his team during 2020. He has attempted to also lay claim to the feature films ownership, trying to force the studio director to sign over his legal copyright in an attempt to take complete ownership of the feature film and claim that he created the entire production himself. The reasoning behind these two attempts to steal on these two particular projects is purely speculative at best. But what is sure is that the outside parties know, beyond a doubt, that the director spent a lot of his personal time and energies to make these projects come to life with very little support or assistance from anyone around him. Previous experience has shown that thieves within the indie films scene never work alone and very rarely do they ever produce anything successful that hasn't been stolen from some other local production.

Since production re-started at the beginning of the year, the ISCANDAR series has started to take a life of it's own, each week as the studio set out to shoot new scenes for the 9 part first season of Aegis Films' new addition to it's studio name. Created and directed by D. R. Quintana, an independent film producer with quite a history of developing and producing extensive SyFy feature films and web series, this long awaited gem of a project has been in several long phases of development with at least four to five recasts in the acting department, and that is just in the last three years.

The hardest part in casting the roles in this series has been the lack of finding actors who can sell portraying military-style officers, keeping in shape, and also being able to deliver the techno-garble of dialog that always accompanies a good SyFy series. Over the course of eighteen months, the studio finally landed just the leading actress for headlining the series; after that, the director will tell you that the supporting actors fell into place in a much-much shorter time.

"For a long time, we wrote scripts and scrapped them," says Quintana. "We spent weeks trying to redefine the series to keep it at an arms length of anything ever seen or heard from in other web series or Sci-Fi shows. All of this was happening at the same time Paramount and CBS were breathing down the necks of other fan productions for Star Trek fan films, limiting them on what could be produced, with time constraints, property usage, and just adding logos, titles, and music for productions created by their own fans. I didn't want any of my original ideas to be wrapped up in some format bullshit that would require to lose all rights to my original work; just so it would wind up in control of a few assholes that are having problems coming up with good entertainment on their own."

So for many years, the ideas, plots, & storylines within ISCANDAR has remained secret to only a few people in the production team. It's only been in the last five months that the studio has released photos of crew uniforms and ship's concept designs for fans to preview on the projects Facebook page. And to the surprise of Star Trek fans who were expecting another fan production, they witnessed a different looking format of production, something more professional and distant from many of the other fan productions in known Star Trek fandom circles.

 

To begin with, the studio had to bargain on the development and design of a new ship with qualities, some technologies, and propulsion systems with a well known CGI gaming programmer in Croatia, by the name of Alex Meshu, to help create the drop ship, ASV ISCANDAR which will make it's debut before the actual mother ship, ASV MINOTAUR, is ever seen by viewers. Quintana developed a unique story line between ships to facilitate that something incredible had happened to the original crew that was still in another part of the galaxy.

"We wanted an organic feel to the first ship seen by the viewers of the series," says Quintana. "The Iscandar is manned with a small crew, but is highly maneuverable and packs quite a punch in battle. But this series is more about science than it is about space battles and constantly encountering an unknown enemies time and time again. As in real Navy vessels, this smaller ship is meant to be a gentle reminder that something bigger is out there, ready to make it's appearance when things tend to get out of control."

Some interesting incoming emails and notes about the cast has seemed to draw the attention of other SyFy film producers looking to break away from conventional casting for their film productions. The studio has presented female characters thus far who are in fantastic shape, wear their uniforms professionally and also bring a sexiness to the photos released on Facebook and other venues. Off camera, the actresses seem to always be in the best of spirits and there seems to be good camaraderie between the cast and crew; something that the series creator and director demands from his team during production.

"For the series, I wanted the crew to seem like they've been working together for many years," continues Quintana. "Building a good team through some detailed and intensive character development has made way for the cast to understand the parables between their characters on how they have to deal with the duality of being a scientist and a potential deep space warriors."

On and off set communication is the key to the success of any project which requires character actors to portray lone time friendships. The cast of ISCANDAR had done a magnificent job in creating an atmosphere of "military-style respect" between the ranks of of the crew; more-so leading credence to senior officers like, Admiral Tera Escher, prescribing the upmost maturity and military bearing through her entire performance, something that most of the cast and crew make comment on each time Zara Majidpour steps up on the set to shoot her part as the mission commander. The Captain of the series will be played by Dru Rovito, taking the part of Captain Jadrian Quest, a character that will tie-in the timeline between ISCANDAR and the ST-BEYOND series that was launched in April of 2006. It has been said on more than one occasion that the two actresses are very excited to be working together on this series.

 

Quintana added that with the addition of Saira Ramos [as CDR Ka'Jol] into the project has presented some unforeseen grit that wasn't expected during the initial phases of the series screenplay. During the principle shoot of the first episode in Marfa, Texas, the director noticed that her performance far exceeded what was expected from her. Ramos is best known in the studio circles for her work in the Secret of Angelika5 Series that ran for five seasons from 2009-2013 and a recent episode of SPECTRE ZERO. Her part in ISCANDAR has been the perfect fit for a co-star to help launch the series in its debut sometime this fall as the moves to a streaming format.

"We honestly don't know what to expect when season one of the series is launched," added Quintana. "We guarantee solid story telling and some good science in the show. There will be some comedy and a taste of the darker things to come as the series progresses. We can guarantee that there is no "dark government" or an enemy that you can't see. All of the elements to develop a good series will be presented for all to see with a little mischief and mystery to solve along the way."

 
The studio says that the production to the series, even though it's gone through several stages of progression, produced over the course of seven years, and changed from one set of actors to another, claims that it has all been done on purpose to distance itself from other SyFy productions that have a tendency to mimic Star Trek or Star Wars fan film formats. But the studio admits that it will be up to the fans to decide where ISCANDAR is either just another "chance" film project that will eventually fail or an extension of an older idea that needed a little jump start to make its point.

***This blog entry was developed from studio Liner Notes and Director commentary by Beatrice Holland and Dillon Mason, Q Storm Production Assistant Writers.