You've probably seen the new trailer for Star Trek Beyond, if you haven't it's well worth checking it out, you can see it via our Videos section on the News page. Thankfully it's much better than the original trailer but honestly the only way Paramount could have produced a worse trailer right about now would be if Sony's new Ghostbusters somehow turned up in it.

Whilst an actually good trailer for an upcoming Star Trek movie is something to celebrate and talk about there may have been some better news announced during the release of the new trailer.

At the event last night at Paramount, which also saw the studio dedicated a street to the memory of Leonard Nimoy, JJ Abrams stated that in the next few weeks an announcement would be made stating that the lawsuit against Axanar would be dropped. Abrams even attributed that to Justin Lin, the director of Star Trek Beyond who came out in support of Axanar and other fan products recently (you can read the story HERE).

Now it is important to point out that just because JJ Abrams says something that doesn't make it reality however Buzzfeed reporter Adam Vary claims to have now received an email from a Paramount spokesperson confirming that "CBS/Paramount lawyers have said that they are in settlement talks and plan to set up guidelines for future fan films." what these guidelines would contain was not alluded to.

Alec Peters, head of Axanar ProductionsFor those that aren't aware, Axanar is a crowd founded Star Trek fan film based on the events of the Four Years War, The Four Years War a mid-23rd century war between the Federation and the Klingons, a prelude to the cold war seen in Star Trek: The Original Series and the Star Trek films.

Whilst the Four Years War has never been covered in canon it is detailed in a book of the same name which was a sourcebook for Star Trek: The Role-Playing Game published by FASA and the Return to Axanar adventure scenario which was published alongside it. Last year Axanar Productions released Prelude to Axanar, which served as a proof of concept and introduction to the film and tells the story of Starfleet Captain Garth of Izar during the Four Years War building up to the Battle of Axanar. In the fan production, Garth of Izar is portrayed by Alec Peters who is also the lead developer for Axanar Productions.

Despite Axanar Productions claiming to have been in contact with Paramount and CBS and having no objections from either a lawsuit was filed in which Paramount and CBS claimed that Axanar Productions had infringed on "thousands of copyrights" relating to Star Trek episodes and films. The Axanar team sought to have the case dismissed saying that neither CBS nor Paramount had provided enough clarity regarding which copyrights have been infringed but with the motion to dismiss denied on the 10th of May and a trial date set for the 31st of January 2017 it looked like a court battle was inevitable.

FNS has been covering the developments in the CBS/Paramount vs Axanar Productions case since the very beginning. Check out the following articles to explore the history of this precedent setting case.

Axanar Productions sued by Paramount and CBS
Star Trek Beyond director supports Axanar
Axanar: CBS/Paramount still haven't provided evidence

Be sure to also check out Three of Seven's editorial 'Is This the Death of Fan Films?'

What do you think? Is the Axanar saga finally coming to a close? What sort of guidelines do you think will be established for fan projects?