Galaxy Quest
Galaxy Quest is (in the movie) an old TV show that was reminiscent of Star Trek. Tim Allen takes on the Captain Kirk role and does a wonderful job with it. Alan Rickman played the Spock role, Sigourney Weaver played Uhura, Tony Shalhoub was Scotty and Daryl Mitchell played Wesley Crusher (yes they’re mixing up Original Series and Next Generation). Rounding out the cast is Sam Rockwell who played a red shirtted security officer in his one (and only) appearance. The movie starts out in a Convention where the cast is appearing after not finding any roles after the show, except for Tim Allen. And the rest of the cast hates him for his huge ego. When the cast is contacted by a group of aliens who thought that the TV show was a documentary, the adventure begins.
The aliens (Thermians) have created a spaceship that looks and works just like the spaceship from the TV show. They are planning on fighting back against the evil reptile who has been harassing and killing their species. The crew soon realizes that this isn’t some fans who built a set on their backyard and they must put their differences aside to save themselves and the Thermians. Justin Long (in his first movie role) and a couple other science fiction fans help out by sub-space transmitter by pulling up deck plans and obscure references to episodes to help the crew fight back.
The very concept of science fiction comedy is not one that succeeds often. Too often it goes down the path of making too much fun of the fans or hitting the wrong notes science fiction wise. But Galaxy Quest does a great job of mixing in tweaking Star Trek fans with enough action and drama to remind the fans why they loved Star Trek in the first place. And the movie does a great job of putting the characters into situations where they are forced to confront their past, their hatred and their fears, while giving them room to be real heroes. All in all it’s a fun and exciting movie. Highly recommended.