Canberra Oz Comic-Con
Posted On : September 4, 2023 Published By : Rebecca Hayward
Ross Manuel – STARFLEET International, USS Animus
I have the pleasure of knowing Ross already from work, so he was kind enough to give me an interview about STARFLEET International and, more locally, the USS Animus chapter.
STARFLEET International is, as the name suggests, an international fan club made of over 200 differ-ent chapters, dedicated to the Star Trek universe. STARFLEET International has now been going for over forty years, having been originally founded in the 70’s. You can join your closest chapter, become a member of their ship and find your own place in the crew roster, with plenty of activities and conversa-tions to be had around like-minded Trekkies! Chapters have been known to fundraise, roleplay both online and in person, and do onshore teambuilding through trivia, escape rooms and more.
Ross is the Captain of the USS Animus, our local chapter that covers the ACT and the NSW Southern Tablelands. He has been involved with the Star Trek community for twenty years, 6 of which he has currently spent with the Animus. Canberra Trekkies generally joined the roster of the USS Tydirium of Sydney but the creation of the Animus helped them stay a little bit closer to home. The founding mem-bers of the USS Animus were actually quite involved in the Assassin’s Creed franchise and have drawn influence from the games to bring the Animus to life. The name, as well as their logo harkens back to Assassin’s Creed, and though Star Trek is very much the name of the game, the Animus’ beginnings have not been forgotten.
The USS Animus follows a literary narrative, but a crew member can simply dip their toes into the wa-ter or jump straight in. Captain Manuel mentioned that some members choose to stick to formalities and address each other by rank, others simply use names. Nobody is forced to act one way or another and the Animus is welcome to all who wish to board her or simply visit. Crew members participate in activities such as cosplay, RPG/TTRPG (role-playing games/tabletop role-playing games), creative writing, prop building, video games/MMORPG (massive multiplayer online role-playing game) and social gatherings. They also turn up at events like Oz Comic-Con to recruit new members and meet fel-low Trekkies.
I learnt a lot of interesting Star Trek facts from Ross, including a particularly fascinating one about col-our blocking uniforms and TV filters, and had the lucky opportunity to have a cuddle with a thankfully docile tribble.
Captain Manuel’s favourite shows with the Star Trek universe are The Next Generation and Strange New Worlds, and his favourite Captain is Picard (as it should be).
If you’d like to boldly go where no man has gone before: www.theanimus.org
www.sfi.org
Live long and prosper!
The Full Article can be found here https://curieux.com.au/2023/09/canberra-oz-comic-con
On 2 September 2023, Captain Ross Manuel and the rest of the Manuel Clan took the Captain’s Skiff Aquila to visit the Australian War Memorial’s Technology Annexe otherwise known as the Treloar Centre for its annual Big Things in Store event. As the Memorial is undergoing an extensive expansion and development, a lot of the museums larger installations have been in storage, some of which have been for three years. joining them was Commander Jasmin Manuel’s father, a veteran of the ADF and quite convincing Sir Patrick Stewart look-alike. The experience was educational, particularly to the two cadets as they learned firsthand experience from their Pa, who was somewhat humbled to see his extensive military career now museum exhibits, but the whole away mission was a chance to reconnect with our history and to impart it onto the next generation. Both cadets were enthralled with the various pieces of technology and were full of questions. In all a great start to the Father’s Day weekend
October is traditionally the start of the quiet season for us as the weather gets to hot to host conventions or outside events and people move about for the holidays.
We have been asked to at attend the October Geek Markets event at the end of the month, then we are no events planned on the books. We do plan on having an-other dining in event in October, as well as an end of year meeting/Christmas party so please let us know if you’d like to attend.
By now you’ve probably seen an Instagram post or event listing for “The Captain’s Table”, which is just an overly fancy way of saying we are gathering as a group for dinner.
The tradition of The Captain’s Table exists in real world maritime vessels where guests are invited to join the captain at their table or in their private dining room. In Trek this was routinely shown in Enterprise where Trip and T’Pol regularly ate with Captain Archer while they discussed ships matters, and that is where we draw our inspiration. Though we also draw from the Star Trek book series that infers that the “Captain’s Table” exists in a pocket dimension that manifests wherever it needs to be. Sometimes its at a fancy restaurant like our September Dining night, or it can be as simply as the McDonalds at EPIC (now that is a story for another day), but if you are ever able, know that we have a Captains Table during or at the end of every event, there is always a chair for you, and everyone is welcome
By now you’ve seen these two Chibi Andorians around our display, on our social media and in our crew roster, and you’re probably wondering just who are they, or why are they around. Well allow me to introduce you to AnnaZey vas-Nan and MistHrey ses-Var aka Anna and Missy (get it) and they serve as the Travelling Trekkies and our unofficial mascots (along with Betsy) and sport our old pattern uniforms. Initially they served as a way to interact
with the rest of the Fleet that we are apart of, the original plan for the Traveling Trekkies came to me as most of you know I work in a museum and I’ve seen an influx of Flat Stanley’s, Garden Gnomes and other personal objects being taken inside to tell groups back home what it’s like (usually surreptitiously being pulled out of the satchels of well-dressed businessmen) and decided that as we are a part of global group that we can get to know each other and better understand the “International” part of our name. That was of course much like a lot of things relating to the Animus’ history, happened just before the Global Pandemic shut everything down. They managed to reach a number of international chapters just before the events shut down, but have been languishing in inactivity since save for the occasional local event I’ve snapped them at. I plan on restarting the program in the near future as it was an interesting thing to see them pop up at museums and events across the globe, you can see their mission reports on our website at http://trekkies.theanimus.org
| EVENT | WHEN | NOTES |
|---|---|---|
| Gamma.Con 2023 | 10 Sep 2023 | Thoroughbred Park |
| Dining In Night | 01 Oct 2023 | Southern Cross Club |
Thank you once again for being an amazing member of the crew of the USS Animus. Its be-cause of your amazing contributions on the server, at events, online and in person that keeps this group functioning for the past four years. This is the first physical newsletter we’ve put out, the first of many going forward.
I always say that you get out of this group what you put into it, the Animus is very much your group as it is the founding members, we are always up for a meet up, or a chat about the amazing franchise that serves as the core focus of this group.