Casting The New Adventures of Galaxy Quest TV Series That Does Not Exist

by Mallory Ortberg · September 22, 2014

gq1If you are anything like me — and you are — you watched Galaxy Quest at least four times this weekend. You already know that it is commonly referred to as “the greatest Star Trek film of all time,” that Takei loved it despite initial misgivings, that Tony Shaloub’s stoner subplot was imperfectly cut to get a PG rating, and that David Mamet (!) thinks it’s one of the most structurally perfect movies ever made. You’ve read the oral history of Galaxy Quest enough times that it’s become perfectly clear just how much the rest of the cast hated Tim Allen:

Parisot: I was a little nervous about Tim, because I cast everybody except for him. But Tim was perfect, just perfect for this role.

Alan Rickman (Alexander Dane/Dr. Lazarus): Tim Allen used to kick the door open to the make-up trailer. We would be all lined up and he would say “Number one is here!”

Rockwell: If the chairs were taken, Tim would shout, “That’s fine, I’m first on the call sheet, but I’ll go take a walk and come back when you’re ready!”

Weaver: I think that is the only persona Tim has. There’s a lot of waiting around. Tim never stopped joking.

Shalhoub: A lot of fart jokes with Tim. Some weren’t jokes, some were actually farts.

Pyle: It was like working with 12 year old boys.

Parisot: You can’t get annoyed at Tim. Tim is like your little brother who comes in and just goofs around. Maybe it got annoying for Alan, but you could never tell whether that was Alan being in character or Alan actually responding to Tim.

And you know, of course, that for the last fifteen years, there’s been periodic talk of a Galaxy Quest TV show. It would be perfect. Why wouldn’t it be perfect? Star Trek went from television to film; Galaxy Quest should do the same in reverse.

Let us cast it.

Captain Jason Nesmith 

gq2

Part of the gag of Galaxy Quest was that, like the Star Trek movies at the time, most of the cast was approaching over-the-hill status. So, like the Star Trek franchise, we’re going to have to reboot younger, because I want like, a solid thirteen seasons of this. And I want Jake Johnson. He can mug with the best of them, and he has that weird sometimes-handsome, sometimes-weird-looking quality that Shatner had in his glory days. He’s also much less irritating than Tim Allen, and that’s a necessary quality when you’re going to be spending an hour a week with a character for the next couple of years.

His character on New Girl once described himself as “fat, old-fashioned Coney Island strong,” and that’s exactly what an Expy of Captain Kirk out to be. Johnson’s in.

Fuck Tim Allen, for real, though.

Gwen DeMarco

gq8

Naya Rivera is perfect for Gwen DeMarco because her character is basically “Sexual Yelling” and we already know she can pull that off; plus it’s a great way to get out of playing a teenager for the next fifteen years. The fun part about DeMarco is that you’re practically playing two characters: one a carefully voice-modulated computer bimbo (think the girl who voiced the robot in the Steve Guttenberg episode of Party Down), the other an infuriated wreck on the verge of constant breakdown (“This episode was poorly written!”)

Alexander Dane 

gq6

Richard Ayaode is British and I like him enormously. I did not put any more thought into this casting choice.

That’s a lie! His shaman character on The Mighty Boosh was always dripping disdain. That’s the entire character, right there. He’s got this on lock.

Fred Kwan

pudi

So, part of the Kwan gag is that it’s a non-East Asian guy playing an East Asian guy, a nod to the sometimes-outlandish racebending of the original series. Great!

I also think it’s enough of a change of pace from Abed on Community that it would be a legitimately good decision for his career. Kwan is supremely chilled out among a cast that is constantly throwing a shit fit. Bring back the stoner subplot that was originally cut — you can have stoners on TV now, right?

More importantly, Danny Pudi was born for sci-fi TV work. He should have been on TNG. This is the best substitute I can offer him.

Guy Fleegman

gq5

BRING BACK SAM ROCKWELL. It’s perfect; he will be the Stacey Dash of the GQ franchise, showing up in whatever new manifestation the series takes. What was once the most expendable character becomes the most consistent.

Tommy Webber

gq9

Hear me out before you run away from a nearly-shirtless Corbin Bleu. Tommy Webber was probably the most thinly-written character in the movie; he was The Black Guy and he wasn’t very good at driving. But he was supposed to be a washed-up former child star trying to figure out who he really is, and who better to bring that kind of desperate, angry energy to the project than a former supporting member of the High School Musical cast?

Thermians

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Lake Bell could pull off that creepy voice in her sleep. She’s kind of a big deal now, so I think the most we could get her for is a semi-recurring character — which, on an episodic TV show, is all the Thermians would be, I think. But she would be so much fun every time she showed up.

The Mighty Boosh S3

It should be illegal for Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt not to work together. Without Barratt, Fielding is an irritating tryhard with a tendency to socialize with Russell Brand. They should be constantly showing up in American television as wonderful, weird, carefully-realized characters who appear for three to five minutes and linger in your mind forever.

Okay, I guess, someone make this happen now, is what happens next.

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94 Comments

  1. threatqualitypress +90

    I think it’s funny that Galaxy Quest does such a good job of redeeming Tim Allen’s character that you tend to think that Tim Allen the person was redeemed by the end of filming, too.

    Turns out not, I guess. Such is the power of cinema.

  3. leider_hosen +15

    I love Galaxy Quest more than many things and I can’t stop giggling aggressively at my desk about this.

  5. EPWordsnatcher +35

    After extensive Google research, I have determined that Sam Rockwell doesn’t age. He will allegedly be 46 in November, but would you know it to look at him?

    No, you would not.

    (This is all to say that I’m massively in favor of all of this.)

      2. elesmi +47

        Patrick Stewart must have taught them his secret. Perhaps he officiated over this Satanic ritual.

        (I am now trying to picture Patrick Stewart participating in a Satanic ritual. He keeps breaking down laughing, and it goes badly.)

        1. Unreadaethel +3

          I swear there’s an American Dad episode that features Patrick Stewart leading a satanic ritual. My google-fu is failing me, however.

          1. elesmi +1

            That sounds AMAZING. I’ve somehow never heard of American Dad, but Google has informed me that Patrick Stewart is the most prolific guest star on the show. And that Seth Green wrote it. I think I have a new show to watch.

          2. Unreadaethel +6

            Seth McFarlane, unfortunately. Fortunately, there are fewer rape jokes on American Dad than there are on Family Guy. And there’s way more Patrick Stewart.

          3. elesmi +1

            Oh, drat. Brain, why do you have to get my hopes up by misreading things? Alas. At least Patrick Stewart is still promising.

    2. jhsaxena +78

      Once I saw Sam Rockwell in a video store. I was buying Moon, which stars him, and the guy at the counter told us to turn around and there was Sam Rockwell wearing unlaced boots and a huge coat, with like 14 DVDs of movies nobody had ever heard of. It was beautiful.

      1. PunnyDreadful +19

        Oh man, I would have just shouted “You were great in The Assassination of Jesse James!” and run out of the store tittering. That man can mewl better than anyone.

      2. mirandawmeyer +4

        CRYING ABOUT THIS

        I have a deep and manic love for Sam Rockwell that rears its head at odd moments, this apparently being one of them.

        Also Moon is just really really really great.

  6. osutein +64

    So, is the idea of the Galaxy Quest TV show that we’re watching the *actual* in-world Galaxy Quest TV show, or a TV show about the making of the TV show Galaxy Quest? Because I think we need both.

      1. osutein +75

        How awesome would it be if at 8/7c we had GALAXY QUEST the TV show, a straight Firefly-esque space opera that subtly and hilariously spoofs Star Trek and other sci fi, followed at 9/8c by GALAXY QUEST: BEHIND THE STARS that follows the hilarious mishaps and sniping of the cast and crew as they made the episode of GALAXY QUEST we just watched?

        4. tinypaperme +8

          So is GQ: BTS the actual actors and crew sniping and mishapping, or is it the actual actors/crew playing the actors that are the characters on the show sniping and mishapping?

          Not that I wouldn’t watch either way, but still.

          2. osutein +30

            Basically, in GQ, Naya Rivera plays Lt. Tawny Madison. In GQ:BTS, Rivera plays actress Gwen deMarco. In the show at 10/9c, “Galaxy Quest: Behind the Stars that Are Behind the Other Stars”, Rivera plays herself playing deMarco playing Lt. Madison. In “The Unathorized Galaxy Quest Story”, based on Pudi’s salacious, self-serving memoirs, the character of Naya Rivera/Gwen deMarco/Lt. Tawny Madison will be played by Andy Serkis in a motion capture suit.

    3. Grabthar's Chisel +4

      There were two linked shows on British channel ITV called Echo Beach and Moving Wallpaper. The first was a soap about people in a seaside resort in Cornwall, and the second was a sitcom drama about the making of the first. So, for instance, one character in Echo Beach moved up to a more prominent role because, in Moving Wallpaper, her actor was sleeping with one of the producers. That’s the sort of thing we should have for the “both” answer.

  7. blushingflower +14

    I had not read the oral history before, and now I am busy contemplating the glory that Alec Baldwin would have brought to the film.

  8. catweazlol +81

    Thank you for reminding me that Corbin Bleu exists because it made me remember the time I was out to lunch with my family and my tween cousin got really excited and said “Oh my god, they named one of the dishes after Corbin Bleu!” and then was really embarrassed when she realized that Chicken Cordon Bleu predated Corbin by many years.

  9. Mike +93

    I strongly disagree. The ideal casting for a Galaxy Quest show is the same as any other show/movie: Alan Rickman plays every role, with varying degrees of perfect disdain.

  10. gloriana232 +16

    AGH Richard Ayaode and Noel Fielding! Is it bad I “discovered” them through Big Fat Quiz of the Year? Maybe not

    1. ramina +10

      No, absolutely not. Because they are amongst the best teammates, even if they aren’t the Goth Detectives.

      NO SHAME

      1. helvetica547 +4

        The Electric Mocassins!
        How could you not love someone who ends their punchlines with naval policy (yes, I might have recently rewatched most Big Fat Quizes, so?).

        1. ramina +5

          (I rewatch them CONSTANTLY. Except for 2008 because I can’t stand Sean Lock. The decades ones from last year and the year before are personal favorites. Also ‘Can’t Cook, Don’t Have To Cos I’m Sat Next To Gordon Ramsay’)

          1. helvetica547 +4

            I spent the entire year taping episodes of “Friends” and editing out the commercials. This in the age of VHS. That is pausing, waiting, waiting, unpausing. Saves you on the DVD purchases.
            Also the time he just went off on a tangent about the plumbing in his apartment. And his and Noel’s “Was it your mum, Jimmy? Was it your mum? Was it? Was it your mum?”
            I just love him so much.

  12. lorannen +28

    Kudos to Mallory, for choosing the most-Laliari picture of Lake Bell in existence (that I know of). Bell would KILL IT.

  13. jfruhlinger +36

    Sam Rockwell was my first (and so far only) LA celebrity sighting. He was getting tacos at Guisados in Echo Park for lunch. He looks … UNCANNILY like Sam Rockwell. Like, the sleepy eyes, the mussed hair, the stubble. THEY’RE ALL REAL.

    1. projectbeks +13

      If they were still in existence, I would tell you to GET THEE TO A VIDEO STORE
      Alas, they are not. GET THEE TO NETFLIX OR SIMILAR

  17. sofie_fatale +103

    omg I can’t tell if I’m missing the entire joke but I feel compelled to comment, for posterity, that baby Corbin Bleu literally played Young Tommy in the movie! So he’s even MORE perfect and probably already knows the lines.

  18. Hththe1st +54

    Does anyone else ever feel like Nathan Fillion is cosplaying Capt. Nesmith 24/7 and loving the hell out of it? No, just me, then? Okay.

    1. Unreadaethel +36

      I think that roughly 50% of Castle is just Nathan Fillion cosplaying Nathan Fillion, bouncing around going “this is my job this is my job holy crap you guys, this is my job.”

      1. tinypaperme +9

        I concur. The other 50% of him his cosplaying Nesmith.

        I read somewhere that the creators of Castle named the character “Richard” so that when people said “Rich Castle” too quickly, it sounded like “Rich Asshole.” (Citation needed.)

  20. thewildland +52

    LOOK AROUND YOU, CAN YOU FORM SOME SORT OF RUDIMENTARY LATHE

    (Seriously though, there is almost nothing in this world that pleases me as much as Galaxy Quest, and ne’er shall come the day when I do not want to watch Sam Rockwell in quite honestly everything.)

    1. G.L. Dryfoos +1

      At this moment, it becomes clear that fans of this show should insist on being referred to as The Rudimentary Lathes.

  21. rolotomassi5 +12

    Lake Bell is very funny and talented, but I think Lauren Lapkus (correctional officer Fischer from Orange is the New Black and all around Comedy Bang Bang all star) would be a better alien.

        1. Vera_Knoop +2

          Er, sorry. I don’t have particularly strong feelings about her either way. I just think they look very much alike.

  22. Vera_Knoop +24

    I want this to happen, and I want it to get so popular that when anyone writes “GQ,” this is the first thing we think of.

  23. janecpb +71

    I just started wheezing/laughing at the “rudimentary lathe” quote and my boss asked me what I was funny. I gasped out “Galaxy Quest” and he did perfect rendition of “You are our last hope” and now I have to go home early because I forgot my inhaler.

  25. fancypants89 +1

    oh my god, an article about galaxy quest featuring references to the steve guttenberg episode of party down AND to childrens hospital?? too good.

    2. Grabthar's Chisel +1

      You know what you have to do. (But it might already be “Fanservice” or “Ms/Mr Fanservice”.)

  29. johnwthompson +8

    Sigournery FOREVER. Such grace and class and tough-as-nails benevolence. Not like that overpraised hack, Meryl Streep

  30. Electric Landlady +5

    I 100% support all of this but would also like to bring back Enrico Colantoni please. He can be the Majel Barrett of the franchise.

  32. Grabthar's Chisel

    There were two linked shows on British channel ITV called Echo Beach and Moving Wallpaper. The first was a soap about people in a seaside resort in Cornwall, and the second was a sitcom drama about the making of the first. So, for instance, one character in Echo Beach moved up to a more prominent role because, in Moving Wallpaper, her actor was sleeping with one of the producers. That's the sort of thing we should have for the "both" answer.