''Starhunter'' (and in the original Season Two ''Starhunter 2300'') is a Canadian

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

television series A television show – or simply TV show – is any content produced for viewing on a television set which can be broadcast via over-the-air, satellite television, satellite, or cable television, cable, excluding breaking news, television adverti ...

that aired for two seasons. The series was produced in Canada by The Danforth Studios Ltd. (a D'or/Jackson Company)"On set: Starhunter"
by Distin Dinoff at playbackonline.ca in association with

Alliance Atlantis Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. (commonly known as Alliance Atlantis and commonly shortened to simply Alliance or Atlantis and formerly traded as TSX:AAC) was a Canadian media company that operated primarily as a specialty service operato ...

with some photography in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

. Grosvenor Park Productions UK Ltd. was the co-producer from the United Kingdom, and Le Sabre SA, an affiliate of

Canal+ Canal+ (Canal Plus, , meaning 'Channel Plus'; sometimes abbreviated C+ or Canal) is a French premium television channel launched in 1984. It is 100% owned by the Groupe Canal+, which in turn is owned by Vivendi. The channel broadcasts several ki ...

, was the French co-producer, with major unofficial German participation by Das Werk. In season one, ''Starhunter'' starred

Michael Paré Michael Kevin Paré (born October 9, 1958) is an American actor. He is best known for his roles in the films ''Eddie and the Cruisers'' (1983), '' Streets of Fire'' (1984), and '' The Philadelphia Experiment'' (1984), and on the series ''Starhun ...

Tanya Allen Tanya Allen (born 1975) is a Canadian actress, best known as the harried assistant Audrey on the CBC sitcom '' The Newsroom''. At age 15, she began training at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City. In addition to her film and ...

, Claudette Roche and featured

Murray Melvin Murray Melvin (born 10 August 1932) is an English actor. He is best known for his acting work with Joan Littlewood, Ken Russell and Stanley Kubrick. He is the author of two books: ''The Art of Theatre Workshop'' (2006) and ''The Theatre Royal, ...

and

Stephen Marcus Stephen Marcus (born Stephen Mark Scott; 18 June 1962) is a British actor, best known for his role as Nick the Greek in the film ''Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels''. Career Marcus became an actor in 1984 after three years of training at Ar ...

. In season two Clive Robertson,

Dawn Stern Dawn Stern (born October 15, 1971) is an American film and television actress; she is also a model. Early life and education She was raised in O'Fallon, Illinois, where she attended EK and O'Fallon Township High School. Stern graduated from So ...

and Paul Fox were added to the cast, while the original actors except Marcus were dropped. Contrary to the wishes of the series creators, the investors in the second season blocked the return of Paré and replaced Melvin. Season one was nominated by the

Directors Guild of Canada The Directors Guild of Canada (DGC) is a Canadian labour union representing more than 5,500 professionals from 48 different occupations in the Canadian film and television industry. Founded in 1962, the DGC represents directors, editors, assistant ...

for a Best

Production Design In film and television, the production designer is the individual responsible for the overall aesthetic of the story. The production design gives the viewers a sense of the time period, the plot location, and character actions and feelings. Wor ...

award, and for a "Spaceys Award" by Space: The Imagination Station. The first run of the first season aired in Canada, from 1 November 2000 to 28 March 2001. Starhunter was syndicated in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

by Western International Syndication, going to air in the fall of 2002. The first season continues to re-run in many territories. The second season had its first run in Canada from 9 August 2003 to 3 April 2004. The name of the series was changed in the second season to ''Starhunter 2300'',"On set at Starhunter 2300 with John Holosko"
by Marise Strauss at playbackonline.ca although in the US, both seasons share the same title. For season one, special effects were handled by Das Werk from

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. For season two, they were handled by Optix Digital Pictures in Toronto, Canada. Music for the show's opening credits was composed by Donald Quan for the first season and by

Peter Gabriel Peter Brian Gabriel (born 13 February 1950) is an English musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, and activist. He rose to fame as the original lead singer of the progressive rock band Genesis. After leaving Genesis in 1975, he launched ...

for the second season.

Plot

''Starhunter'' follows the exploits of the crew of a retired luxury-liner refitted to serve a late-23rd century bounty-hunting crew, led by Dante Montana (Paré). The owning company's name, "Trans-Utopia Cruiseship HHS", was painted on her side but has faded, leaving some letters readable while obliterating others. The letters that remain have become her nickname, so she is casually known to the crew as the "Tulip". Non crew people and space transport hubs generally refer to the ship as the "Trans-Utopian". In the first season, ''Tulip'' is owned by Rudolpho deLuna who has hired Dante Montana as a bounty hunter. Dante took the job to provide a means of traveling while also financing the search for his son, Travis, who was abducted a decade prior by a group of brigands called Raiders. Aiding him are the ship's engineer Percy Montana (Dante's niece) and security officer Lucrecia Scott, a former marine added to the crew by deLuna to keep Dante focused on the missions given him. Lucrecia has a hidden agenda, as an operative for a mysterious organization called "The Orchard". The Orchard comprises scientists and researchers dedicated to unlocking, in hopes of controlling, alien genes called "The Divinity Cluster". When broadcast in Canada each episode began with a long message transmission from deLuna (usually to Dante) outlining Dante's current assignment and deLuna's philosophical thoughts about it. In the United States, these monologues were removed. In the second season, the show was restructured (and

retconned Retroactive continuity, or retcon for short, is a literary device in which established diegetic facts in the plot of a fictional work (those established through the narrative itself) are adjusted, ignored, supplemented, or contradicted by a subse ...

). Percy Montana emerges from

hyperspace In science fiction, hyperspace (also known as nulspace, subspace, overspace, jumpspace and similar terms) is a concept relating to dimension#Additional dimensions, higher dimensions as well as parallel universes in fiction, parallel universe ...

unaged, while fifteen years have passed in the outside universe. No characters remain in the show from the first season except deLuna. He attempts to assert ownership of the ''Tulip'' but since he collected on the ship's insurance when the ''Tulip'' was presumed lost, the insurance company now legally owns her. Percy claims ownership by salvage when the company shuts down. Travis Montana, Dante's son and Percy's cousin, joins the crew along with his sidekick Marcus Fagen. DeLuna brings Callista Larkadia, another bounty hunter. Percy describes the four as the "pretend cousin, big fat sleaze, little buddy, ndmystery slut".

Cancelled subsequent seasons

The show did not continue in production after season two despite pre-orders from US, European, Canadian and Pacific Rim broadcasters for a third season, leaving the story at a

cliffhanger A cliffhanger or cliffhanger ending is a plot device in fiction which features a main character in a precarious or difficult dilemma or confronted with a shocking revelation at the end of an episode or a film of serialized fiction. A cliffhang ...

. In the season finale, ''Tulip'' is trapped in

. As the countdown to implement the crew's desperate measure to return to the normal universe reaches

zero 0 (zero) is a number representing an empty quantity. In place-value notation Positional notation (or place-value notation, or positional numeral system) usually denotes the extension to any base of the Hindu–Arabic numeral system (or ...

, the show cuts to black and the credits roll. Creators and producers G. Philip Jackson and Daniel D'or left the series during the second season over business differences within the executive team of the parent company Greystone Studios International Inc., and went on to develop the science fiction

and

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

Ice Planet An ice planet or icy planet is a type of planet with an icy surface of volatiles such as water, ammonia, and methane. Ice planets consist of a global cryosphere. Under a geophysical definition of planet, the small icy worlds of the Solar System ...

''. Jackson was an uncredited writer on eight of ''Starhunter'''s second-season episodes. Posts on Sept 19 2014, on the website and Facebook Group of the film production company "Starfield Indie", state that the company has acquired rights to go forward with a third season of Starhunter, also being 22 one-hour episodes. A production date is not announced, except the Facebook group posts refer to a "best guess" of production starting in "February 2015". The same posts represent that the series will bring back most of Season one and Two regulars including explicitly Michael Pare. Unspecified new cast is apparently to be added to the ensemble according to the same source.

Starhunter ReduX

On Tuesday 29 May 2018, ''Starhunter: ReduX'', an updated and expanded version of seasons one and two featuring updated special effects, newly-shot footage and a 4K transfer in a 16:9 aspect ratio (the original was filmed in 16x9 anamorphic, but only released as 4:3), premiered on

El Rey Network El Rey Network (Spanish for ''The King'') is a media brand founded by Robert Rodriguez on December 15, 2013, that is currently owned in a joint venture with FactoryMade Ventures. Until December 31, 2020, El Rey was a cable and satellite network ...

across the USA. Among changes in Starhunter REDUX are some actor updates. Except for a brief moment in Episode 201R, actor Graham Harley has been replaced by the original Caravaggio actor Murray Melvin. Michael Pare appears in parts of the second season (he didn't in the original Season 2) and the character Penny Montana is played by original actress from season one, Heidi von Paleske. An extended scene was added with an older Tanya Allen as Percy Montana. These changes, involving CGI, green-screen and other processes were made as a part of bringing ''Starhunter: ReduX'' closer to the creators' original vision for Season two. The process seems to continue. "Starfield CreatorCo" (a new brand of Starfield Indie) is re-launching a further updated version of Starhunter REDUX on Amazon Prime on or about July 25, 2021 in the USA and UK, with Canada, India and Australia following in short order. This streaming release to be followed by a physical Media (Blu Ray and DVD) release worldwide about 3 months later. This further refreshed version is continuing in a reveal of further backstory integrated in prior Starhunter REDUX episodes.

Cast

First season

: Dante Montana *

: Percy Montana * Claudette Roche: Lucretia "Luc" Scott *

: Caravaggio *

: Rudolpho deLuna

Second season

* Clive Robertson: Travis Montana *

: Percy Montana *

: Callista "Callie" Larkadia * Paul Fox: Marcus Fagen *

: Rudolpho deLuna * Graham Harley: Briefly as Caravaggio *

: Caravaggio (Starhunter REDUX version of season two) *

: Dante Montana

Episodes

Series overview

Season 1 (2000–01)

Season 2 (2003–04)

Additional information

* Season two's theme song, ''Darker Star'', was performed by

. It is the instrumental version of the song ''Darkness'' from the 2002 album ''Up''. * Through 2006 and 2007, ''Starhunter 2300'' aired on A-Channel (a Canadian television network) from 3:30-4:40 AM every weeknight. * ''Starhunter'' was available on

Joost Joost () was an Internet TV service, created by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis (founders of Skype and Kazaa). During 2007–2008 Joost used peer-to-peer TV (P2PTV) technology to distribute content to their Mozilla-based desktop player; in la ...

for viewers outside Canada although some story-critical episodes are absent from the Joost site. Joost also presents the episodes in incorrect order (beginning with the sixth episode) rendering the broad story and character arcs difficult to follow
Joost
* ''Starhunter'' Season 2 was available on Netflix's Watch-It-Now streaming service until November 1, 2011.

Home releases

The two seasons of ''Starhunter'' are released separately on Region 1 DVDs, with each package bearing the somewhat misleading legend "The Complete Series." Much of the first season of ''Starhunter'' was first made available across two single-disc releases from

Echo Bridge Home Entertainment Echo Bridge Entertainment is an American independent distribution company. It acquires and distributes feature films, scripted and non-scripted series, documentaries, and children’s programming for home video, digital and television in the United ...

. "Volume 1" contains 8 episodes and "Volume 2" holds an additional seven episodes. Both were released August 31, 2004. Echo Bridge later released the complete first season as "Starhunter: The Complete Series" on May 29, 2007 in a 4-disc set. The set is presented in production order rather than original broadcast order, a difference which only affects the first six episodes. Given the largely standalone nature of each of these early episodes the exact viewing order doesn't matter much, except that it does place the intended series opener "The Divinity Cluster" as episode 4 instead of episode 1. In 2008 Echo Bridge reissued the first season in a 3-disc set. The first DVD still reflects the incorrect episode order listed above and is still mislabeled as "The Complete Series." The cover art was modified slightly, using mostly the same basic imagery as the previous 4-disc set but giving it a pronounced red color scheme as opposed to the mostly dark blue color scheme used on the previous 4-disc set. Alliance Home Entertainment released season one in a 4-disc DVD set in Canada as ''Starhunter: The Complete Series'' on April 19, 2011. Packaging and disc content appear to be largely identical to the previous 4-disc Echo Bridge release, including the incorrect episode order for the first six episodes.

Image Entertainment RLJ Entertainment (formerly Image Entertainment) is an American film production company and home video distributor, distributing film and television productions in North America, with approximately 3,200 exclusive DVD titles and approximately 340 ...

released the complete second season under the title "Starhunter 2300: The Complete Series" on November 23, 2004 in a 6-disc set.Starhunter 2300: The Complete Series DVD, Image Entertainment, Nov 23, 2004
at www.blu-ray.com The first season was also released on DVD in Germany in 2010 across a pair of 2-disc sets, each covering 11 episodes. These German releases are notable for presenting the first season in true widescreen, whereas all other DVD releases of these episodes are of a standard cropped 'fullscreen' presentation. Season 2 is currently unavailable in widescreen.

References

External links

Starhunter Redux
a
starfieldcreatorco.com
* {{IMDb title, id=0250750, title=Starhunter 2000 Canadian television series debuts 2004 Canadian television series endings Canadian adventure television series 2000s Canadian drama television series 2000s Canadian science fiction television series Space adventure television series English-language television shows Television series set in the 23rd century