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GALAXY QUEST

COVID-19 summary:

  • The USA of course still remains #1 in new cases with 147,434 and 10 states now showing the Omicron variant.  Watch a CBS news clip.  
  • #2 was Germany with 70,681 new cases and the UK #3 with 50,120.  However, the U.S. is at 441/million versus Germany at 841/million and the UK at 734/million.  And this rate is all over Europe, for Poland with 26,964 new cases is at 713/million.
  • Then there is South Africa, which had another increase, up to 16,055 new cases yesterday.  While that is "only" 266 new cases/million, their positivity rate is 24.3%. 
  • Botswana did not report.
  • Still with little to no Omicron, though, positivity rates:
    • Slovenia  42%
    • Croatia  40%
    • Ukraine  38%
    • Vietnam  8%
    • U.S. 7%
    • UK  5%
    • India  1%
    • Israel  0.5%
    • Japan  0.3%
    • Taiwan  0.0%
  • For those who forgot, positivity rate is the percentage of people who test positive for the virus of those overall who have been tested.

I bring back an old science fiction comedy today.  I was scanning through Prime for high-rated shows and stumbled across the 2019 Never Surrender:  A Galaxy Quest Documentary where Rotten Tomatoes reviewers scored it 100%.  This was 20 years after the film was made featuring the stars and production crew, so I thought, what's an hour, and began watching it.  Turned out is was as long as the movie itself, and was worthy of the rating, for it inspired me to then seek out the movie itself, which I had seen, but did not remember much, and certainly not the innuendos and purpose.

Coincidentally, I decided to watch a Netflix series on extraterrestrials, Another Life.  Why?  For just the opposite reason.  Rotten Tomatoes gave it 6/70 scores, and I'm sometimes curious as to why the discrepancy.  I have seen several where reviewers hated it, but audience thought otherwise.  I just about always felt that the audience was right.  There are two season, which was further proof that it had to be okay.  I only saw the first two episodes of Season 1, and thought it was pretty good.  I was troubled that their spaceships traveled at faster than the speed of light, and communication between Earth and somewhere in space many light years away was like talking to someone in Waikiki from just outside of downtown Honolulu where I live.  Galaxy Quest unapologetically is burdened by these impossibilities.

But about the GQ documentary, it was a blast.  Certainly, the sequence of watching is documentary first, then the film.  You will then appreciate all the good parts, like how the aspect ratio changes:

  • The long and complicated road to making the film, including the original choice of Harold Ramis as director.  (Who was replaced by Dean Parisot.)

  • A list of actors who might have been Captain Taggert.  (Alec Baldwin, Steve Martin and Kevin Kline were considered, but Tim Allen was selected to play the William Shatner role as captain of the Enterprise

  • Why Sigourney Weaver pushed for her role in Galaxy Quest.  (She plays a ditsy blond with breasts.)

  • Just how much ab-libbing was going on during the movie’s filming, including the invention of the Thermian-style of walking.

  • An interview with the casting director who insisted Tim Allen was perfect for the role.

  • Remembrances of Alan Rickman’s time on set, especially his wry humor.  (His subsequent death scuttled a sequel.)

The original 1999 film, Galaxy Quest got 90/79 ratings from Rotten Tomatoes, and was said to be an intelligent and humorous satire with an excellent cast.  Essentially, it was a parody of Star Trek.  Action at the box office was modest.  There was actually a half an hour mockumentary to promote the film that was made in 1999 that served as the model for the 2019 documentary.  But nothing much worked in 1999.

However, in time, audiences rose the film to cult status, especially from Star Trek fans.  Thus, this documentary which is worthy of your watch.

Of course The Rocky Horror Picture Show is #1.  However, Galaxy Quest is gaining ground at comic-coms.

I should add that I first went to Netflix to see if Galaxy Quest was there.  Nope.  Fortunately, Prime was showing it for free.  The movie began, and at an early point there was a commercial.  I thought, that was clever, to insert something like this to further mock the whole thing.  Then, a bit later another commercial, but this one showed the 2022 Mitsubishi Outlander, so these were real commercials.  That was the only negative part of Galaxy Quest on Prime.

So is this the end of Galaxy Quest?  Of course not.  It will live forever at comic-coms.  Plus, all signs point to an upcoming TV series.  Note that I did not give away anything. about the film itself.  So go on and watch the documentary, then film, both on Prime.  One final video of 10 Amazing Behind the Facts about Galaxy Quest.  And try to figure out what By Grabthar's Hammer means.

I now have a companion.  She sent me the following video.  Can't figure out why:


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