Captain Timothy Ryan - The new and level-headed captain of the Challenger. Due to his expert leadership, he and his crew manage to complete their mission and set up friendly communications with the Specks.

When I first received Space Specks in the mail, I was almost certain that I would hate it. I'm not really big on Star Trek in general (though in recent years I've begun to really enjoy the original Trek series), and what we have here is movie made by a Star Trek fan, for Star Trek fans. It seemed doomed from the start! Thankfully, Rick Dunbar managed to prove me wrong because Space Specks is a very fun sci-fi flick.

When a deadly viral outbreak occurs at a distant star system, the USS Challenger is sent in with a vaccine. Aboard the ship we have the newly appointed Captain, Timothy Ryan, his trusty First Officer, Max Grant, helmsman Sara Starr, the chemically telepathic Katie Covell, Andy Luna47, the ship's android, and weapons operator Tuk. The daring crew of the Challenger is well on their way with the vaccine when they are contacted by Admiral Morgan. Apparently contact was lost with a planetary outpost on the fringe of the galaxy. Since the Challenger is the fastest ship in the fleet, they are ordered to go there and remedy the situation.

Once they arrive they find that one of the planets satellites is merely out of place. With the use of tractor beams, the satellite is correctly positioned. So now the crew of the Challenger can complete their mission and return home now right? Wrong! Andy Luna47 (henceforth known as Andy) notices brief temperature fluctuations on the hull. After scanning with the ship's computers, he discovers that a tiny (1 centimeter!) ship is blasting away at the Challenger. Attempts to move away from the tiny vessel fail, especially when it magnetically attaches itself to the craft. Several attempts are made to drive the miniature attackers off, but they still cling on (wonder if they're familiar with the Klingons! Woohoo! Bad Star Trek joke!).

Communication with the small beings on the ship also proves to be entirely useless. The aliens are representatives from the Speck Empire, and continuously demand surrender from Captain Timothy Ryan. Eventually Ryan does submit to the Specks in order to continue with the Challenger's original mission and to stop the Specks from killing themselves. (The little buggers were about to ram the Challenger with their damn near microscopic ship!) Ryan tricks the Specks into going to the planet below and then takes the Challenger to its original destination. Moments before they finally deliver the vaccine, they receive a garbled message from Admiral Morgan, concerning the outpost they had visited earlier.

Captain Ryan and his crew soon arrive on the scene and discover a Rafi warship orbiting the planet. Just when it seems that a battle will break out, the Rafi stand down and demand to know who Ryan had surrendered to. They soon depart, laughing all the way when they learn that Captain Ryan had succumbed to the Specks. With the Rafi taken care of, Captain Ryan turns his attention to the Specks. Apparently the lilliputian aliens have decided to try and ram their ship into the Challenger again. The Specks harmlessly bounce off of the ship's shields and for the first time ever, claim defeat. At the end, just as everything seems to be fully worked out, a more advanced Specks ship arrives and begins blasting the paint off of the Challenger's hull. Doh! Here we go again!

Now, this isn't the full description of the film's proceedings as there is a lot happening on the Challenger in between and during each mission. Herein lies the film's main strength. Since writer/producer/director Rick Dunbar didn't have a lot of money for fancy effects (though the computer effects used in the film are quite impressive), he relies on character development to keep things moving. While Captain Timothy Ryan (Tom Sellwood) is a bit two-dimensional, all of the other characters are fleshed out quite well. Andy Luna47 (Lou Zammichieli) is a highly emotional android who is terrified of being replaced with a newer model. Because of this, he's constantly trying to impress Captain Ryan. Andy also begins to have feelings for Lt. Katie Covell (Clio Berney) as the film progresses.

Katie as you may recall gets highly aroused when using her "psychic drug." During one of her "episodes," she makes a pass at Andy. This leads to a humorous scene in which Andy asks sexual advice from Captain Ryan. Another romance begins on the ship between Max Grant (Greg Salomone) and Sara Starr (the beautiful Krista Welter). Max is a dedicated First Officer, fully intent on getting the much needed vaccine to its destination because he has more at stake than the others. His sister is living on the infected planet and is in danger of catching the highly contagious disease. In the meantime though Max tries to catch the eye of Sara Starr. Sara is committed to her career and refuses to "fraternize with a fellow crew member." Of course by the end of the film she gives in and gets a little more friendly with Max.

All in all, I enjoyed Space Specks quite a bit and commend Rick Dunbar on a job well done. With limited funds he managed to build decent sets (in his mother's garage no less), find some capable actors, and garner some commendable CGI animation. Unfortunately, the film has one major problem: it's pacing. Space Specks was derived from a spec script for Star Trek. You have to figure that the Trek script was for a forty-five minute episode, which meant that Rick would have to beef it up in order to turn it into a feature-length film. This results in a lot of padding that merely increases the film's running time. If the movie was cut a bit shorter, I think it would run a lot better, but that's just my opinion. Thankfully, the majority of the cast delivers good performances (most notably Lou Zammichieli and Tom Sellwood), which helps a lot during the movie's slow spots.

It's been roughly two years since I last spoke with Rick Dunbar. The last I heard, he was sending Space Specks to several film festivals and conventions, and starting work on a new movie. His new film was supposed to be Murphy's Laws, The Movie, in which a teenager desperately tries to gain the notice of the girl he loves. Naturally everything that can go wrong for him, does. According to his website, Rick has halted the production indefinitely, due to lack of funding. Currently Rick is trying to start up production on a new film entitled Bottled Genie. This tale revolves around "an alcoholic genie with an attitude problem!" Here's hoping that Rick gets this movie made, it sounds hilarious!