Q: Why did you want to write a Galaxy Quest comic?

I think that Galaxy Quest got short shrift by being identified only as a Star Trek parody. When there really was a lot more going on in that movie. Galaxy Quest the comic will show you more of the mythology of the show, the actors and their relationships and the adventures they go on. You get to see more of the characters and see how their lives have been affected by the movie.

Q: Does the comic take place right after the movie ended?

The comic book opens with the final scene from the movie when they are showing the title sequence for the new Galaxy Quest series. The idea is that the actors are watching a screening for the new show, hoping it will get picked up and they can all have their old jobs back. But during this process a few terrible things start to happen in space and the government asks the crew to pilot their ship out to space and check it out. As we know from the movie the ship was made based on the actors movements and actions so no one else can work it. The government has no choice but to send the cast up in space.

Q: How are all the old characters doing?

Well you find out that the network that is working on the new Galaxy Quest series has agreed to kill Dr. Lazarus. So Alexander Dane is torn between staying in this character that he says he hates, or exploring new characters. Gwen DeMarco is in a relationship with the head of the studio. She still has affection for Jason Nesmith, who is now dating a young starlet since his fame is on the rise. Readers will get to see how the movie changed each character, especially Jason. Fred Kwan is trying to have a child with Laliari, which you see the results of in the fifth issue [featuring] the human/thermian love child.

Q: Are there going to be repercussions to crash-landing a space ship on Earth?

Yes the second issue reveals a lot on what happened after they crashed the ship into the convention center. A character [named] Colonel Stetson is trying to convince the world that it didn't happen, he's leading the government cover-up. After the crash, the crew spent a lot of time in Area 51 being tested and experimented by the government.

Q: What else are you working on these days? What about Hell Week? Wasn't this originally called Half To Death?

It was in the original script, but now it's Hell Week. It's teen slasher meets Groundhog Day. The main character is a catty sorority girl. She's the chick who nobody likes but gets murdered right away. But then she keeps living the day where she is killed over and over. The main character has no idea who the murderer is but each time she dies she rules out one suspect. She also becomes a better person through this process and begins to appreciate those in her life more. It takes place in a sorority during the 'hell week' period.

The new five-part series, subtitled Global Warning, takes the story in a somewhat expected direction by bringing in a Star Trek: The Next Generation-like spin-off series to accompany another threat to the universe that only a bunch of faded actors can prevent:

"Let's face it. Is there anyone who saw Galaxy Quest that didn't come away wondering about the continuing adventures of Jason, Sir Alex, Gwen, Tommy, Guy and Fred and Jane?" asks writer Scott Lobdell. "We've pined away for a sequel long enough! Now we're going to learn what became of these actors after their first greatest adventure together. Yes, they are excited about the re-launch of the franchise that made them cult icons, but don't think for a moment that success has quelled their quirkiness. And when they have to suit up again, and take the Protector out of orbit...? Let's just say experience isn't going to make their jobs any easier!"

IDW Announces 'Galaxy Quest' Comic Series [Comic Book Resources]

Starblazers. Desslok, leader of the Gamilons, tried to crush the puny humans over and over again, but finally lost his empire. So in season two, he decided to take revenge on the crew of the Yamato, who defeated his ambitions. He finally catches up to them in an episode auspiciously titled "Desslok's Victory," and pounds them with his gunships. Then he surrounds the Yamato with magnetic mines before the humans can fire their famous Wave Motion Gun. And then taunts his adversaries mercilessly. "Go on, take a shot." Ha ha ha ha. (I know it's sacrilege, but I actually prefer this scene in the English dubbed version.)

Battlestar Galactica. It takes less than an episode for things to go south between the Galactica and the newly discovered Battlestar Pegasus. Admiral Cain decides to execute the Chief and Helo, leading to a tense confrontation complete with the whirly cam. Commander Adama shows why you don't mess with Galactica, with his terse "I'm getting my men" speaking volumes. And then the phone comes down, because the space battle is on.

Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan. Star Trek pretty much perfected the art of hailing-frequencies bravado, as early as "Balance of Terror"'s Romulan Sub-Commander Tal. "Your ship is surrounded, Captain. You will surrender immediately, or we will destroy you." With Kirk responding, "Save your threats. If you board this ship, I'll blow it up. You'll gain nothing." But Trek's masterpiece of comm-taunting has to be TWoK, where Kirk keeps needling Khan's poor marksmanship, until finally he lures him into a disabling nebula by laughing at his superior intellect. "We tried it once your way, Khan. Are you game for a rematch?" The script says: "Khan's eyes bulge." And they do.

Serenity. This one's a bit different. Chiwetel Ejiofor's Operative is mournful and regretful after he slaughters dozens (maybe hundreds) of innocents to get to Mal. But he still needles Mal via the viewscreen, suggesting that all the carnage is Mal's fault. And he's successful in goading Mal to take rash action — just not maybe the action he was hoping for.

Avengers #94, part of the Kree-Skrull War saga. The Skrull emperor appears on a view screen to warn the Avengers that the Kree warrior, Mar-Vell, is creating the ultimate weapon, an Omni-Wave Projector. And then when the humans don't respond to his threats fast enough, the emperor launches Plan Delta, which sends an all-consuming fireball spiralling towards Earth.

Farscape, "Die Me, Dichotomy." In the second season cliffhanger, Scorpius takes over Crichton's brain via a neural chip, and the mind-controlled Crichton tricks Aeryn into letting him go. She chases after his module in her Prowler, leading to a harsh exchange. Scorpius asks her how the skull fracture is doing, and she threatens to shoot him down. "Make no mistake." Scorpius/John replies: "I believe you'll pull the trigger. I just don't believe - you'll hit anything." And then he goes into a dive. Sadly, this is just a few moments before Aeryn takes her chair-dive into the frozen lake.

Halo 3, "The Crow's Nest" level. The Chief and Johnson reach the Command Center and start making plans to attack Truth's army, but then Truth appears on all screens and says: "You are, all of you, vermin. Cowering in the dirt, thinking...what, I wonder? That you might escape the coming fire? No! Your world will burn until its surface is but glass! And not even your Demon will live to creep, blackened, from its hole to mar the reflection of our passage; the culmination of our Journey. For your destruction is the will of the gods! And I? I AM their instrument!" Okay, so that's not a space battle. But I love that speech.

Galaxy Quest. Jason and Sarris have many great confrontations over the viewscreen, including the first one, where Jason thinks Sarris is just acting, and the second one, where Jason calls Sarris stupid and ugly because he thinks the sound is off. But the best, by far, is the final jaw-dropping confrontation. Sarris reminds Jason that he's a General, who's seen war and death that Jason can't imagine, and Sarris won't blink no matter what. (This scene is lengthier in the original script, actually.) But Jason retorts that it doesn't take a great actor to recognize a bad one, and Sarris is sweating. And then we get to the classic exchange, "You fool. What you fail to realize is that without your armor my ship will tear through yours like tissue paper." To which Jason responds: "Yeah. Well what you fail to realize is... I'm dragging mines."

Babylon 5, "Between The Darkness And The Light. We're totally embarrassed that we missed this crucial showdown between Earthforce and Susan Ivanova, and super grateful that commenters Michael and BcBeBop pointed it out to us. I am going to start calling myself "the right hand of vengeance" and "the boot up your ass" in the same breath now:

Doctor Who, "Bad Wolf." Another one we're embarrassed we missed originally. Thanks to commenter AspiringExpatriate for pointing it out! I love how Christopher Eccleston's Doctor is just like, "No." As if it's not even worth arguing. It mirrors his awesome "No" in "The Long Game" when The Editor asks that long-winded philosophical question about whether a slave is still a slave if he doesn't know he's a a slave. I have to admit, every time I watch this scene I wonder why the Daleks don't just say, "Okay then," and exterminate Rose right then and there.

So what classic space talk-downs did we miss? Feel free to let us know in the comments, but only in the most trash-talking, mouth-running, space-taunting way possible. You fools! We're laughing at your superior intellects.

6. Trek is a poison dart of nostalgia aimed at the hearts of aging fan-dudes. The franchise caters to a fearsomely loyal cadre of dorks who recite Shatner's Promise Margarine commercials to each other. They also obsess over every minor detail from the show's 40,000 year history, leading to...

5. Obsessive continuity and reveling in cheese. Rumor has it the new Trek movie will feature tribbbles and the Guardian of Forever, and god knows what other callbacks to ancient episodes. Trek also groans under the weight of cliches it can never outgrow, from "beam me up" to "warp nine" to "shields down to 59 percent."

4. It's an out-of-date news flash. Trek's format is a Cold War relic, from the original show's running Soviets=Klingons metaphor to the post-Cold War "new order" of TNG and DS9. Most storylines relate to "our" superpower, the Federation, facing off against other superpowers or coping with third-world planets. Take away the Cold War as a reference point, and you have boring space opera.

3. It's no longer looking ahead. Like Star Wars, Trek is trapped in prequel-land. Enterprise bored us by filling in pointless backstory on the early days of Starfleet, but the J.J. Abrams movie looks to be twice as pointless. We already know everything we need to about young Kirk and the other Trek tots. Mining your own past is a prime symptom of idea bankruptcy.

2. We're tired of the clueless wanker with Aspergers who teaches us what it means to be human. Spock was sort of cute, so nu-Trek served up Data, Odo, that holographic doctor, Seven of Nine and T'Pol. It's not Trek without Rain Man trying to understand our human ways. We prefer the Cylons, who school us about humanity by screwing and killing us.

1. Sanctimonious preaching is in Trek's DNA. From the Prime Directive to the Captain's Log, the franchise was made for droning voices giving us lectures. Starfleet Academy must give would-be captains a special course in holding forth about the moral lesson in every conceivable situation. We're also sick of constantly hearing about how our heroes are too noble to share their advanced technology with other cultures.

In a nutshell, the only Star Trek we've liked in ages was Galaxy Quest, and that was mostly for Sigourney Weaver, Alan Rickman and Veronica Mars' dad.

• My Favorite Martian: This series premiered in 1963 and starred Bill Bixby in his pre-Hulk days as a hapless human who takes in a Martian who crash-lands his spaceship near Los Angeles. He passes him off as his Uncle Martin, who proceeds to do wacky things with his Martian powers, much like Jeannie or Samantha would do with their magic. It's vintage 1960s-era television sitcom material and worth seeking out on DVD or watching on YouTube. Just ignore the horrible feature film version they made in 1999 with Christopher Lloyd, Jeff Daniels, and Elizabeth Hurley.



• Spaceballs: Mel Brooks lampooned Star Wars and a slew of other science fiction films in this 1987 movie that gave us quotes like "I see your schwartz is just as big as mine" and "Prepare ship for ludicrous speed!" Once you've seen this, it's hard to picture John Candy wearing anything except a giant furry dog suit. 20 years later, it's starting to show its age just a bit, but it's still a classic.



• Red Dwarf: This British series about the last human being in the universe and his annoying holographic shipmate was one of the best things the BBC gave us, after Doctor Who. After an accident kills everyone onboard the Red Dwarf except for technician Dave Lister, the computer keeps him in suspended animation until the radiation dies down some three million years later. The computer also brings his former bunkmate and boss Arnold Rimmer to life as a hologram to keep him company.



• Weird Science: in 1985 Anthony Michael Hall and Ilan Mitchell-Smith used science, computers, and wore bras on their heads in an effort to create the perfect woman. They end up with Kelly LeBrock, who helps them change from nerds to studs with her pseudo-magic "science powers." It's vintage John Hughes moviemaking that tried to build on the success of the previous year's Revenge of the Nerds, and succeeded. Except it gave birth to a terrible television series.

• Mork & Mindy: This Happy Days spinoff appeared in 1978 and helped propel Robin Williams to stardom by letting him improv most of his scenes as a wacky alien from Ork. Mork reported back to his boss Orson at the end of every episode, telling him what he'd learned that day on Earth, which usually involved something happening with Mindy. They eventually got married and had Jonathan Winters as a baby. No kidding. I still have my Mork from Ork action figure, complete with egg-shaped space capsule.



• The Ice Pirates: This 1984 movie starred Robert Urich as the heroic Jason in search of the universe's most precious commodity: water. They spoof other science fiction films while hamming it up in b-movie style. You can also catch Anjelica Huston and Ron Perlman in this thing if you don't blink.



• Galaxy Quest: Hands down the best send-up of the Star Trek franchise and its fans. In the flick, Galaxy Quest is a canceled television show that lives on through fan conventions and autographs signings. Tim Allen parodies William Shatner excellently, but it's Tony Shalhoub steals most of the scenes he's in as the fumbling head of engineering.



• Mystery Science Theater 3000: This show made comedy out of making fun of movies and television shows that tried to be serious. Broadcast for the Satellite of Love, lone human being Joel and his two robot friends Tom Servo and Crow offered up alternative commentary on the shows that mad scientist Dr. Forrester would beam up to them. It spawned a feature film and two new alternative movie commentary programs, Cinematic Titanic and RiffTrax, both from MST3K former cast members Joel and Mike.



• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: This series has been a radio series, a book, a television series, a computer game, a comic book, and a feature film. In it, lone Earthman Arthur Dent finds himself hitchhiking through the galaxy with a writer for The Hitchhiker's Guide after the Earth gets blown up. Although the effects aren't that stellar (thanks BBC), I actually prefer the television version to the movie. If that means I have to turn in my offical geek card, so be it.

Famous names: Director Dean Parisot had previously worked with Steven Wright, and went on to direct episodes of The Tick and Curb Your Enthusiasm. Screenwriter David Howard has no other credits, and is presumed to be in his mother's basement playing World of Warcraft.

Crunchy goodness: 5

Stunt casting: Alan Rickman, who obviously hates the latex thing on his head as much as his character does.

Sights you'll never unsee: Your heart can't help but break for the Galaxy Quest cast as they stand in an empty parking lot for the grand opening of an electronics store.

Design breakthrough: The hallway of chompy crushy things, which Lucas also used in Attack of the Clones, though at least Galaxy Quest had the temerity to acknowledge that there's no reason for them to exist aside from bad writing.

Onion AV Club review