# The Galaxy Quest appreciation thread \[spoilers\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 7, 2011, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345 "2011-12-07T04:04:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/81 "2011-12-08T04:12:01Z")
> [@Meatros](#): > > You seem to be - I read Ike as saying that Rockwell is good in everything except IM2. In addition to rockwell in galaxy quest, you have shalhoub. That is pretty much it. It may have been written in a clunky manner tho. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/82 "2011-12-08T04:50:19Z")
You were holding it upsidedown! With all that makeup I actually thought you were smart for a second! ---
**Author:** ![oliversarmy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/eb8c5e/32.png) [@oliversarmy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oliversarmy)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/83 "2011-12-08T04:59:46Z")
The thing I like about Galaxy Quest it is one of the few times I actually persuaded my kids to watch a movie with me and they really liked it. I like to imagine years from now that they will tell their kids: “Watch this movie. Grandpa liked it.” and the grandkids will like it, too. It’s a classic that no one really recognizes except, you know, SDMB folk. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/84 "2011-12-08T06:44:21Z")
> [@oliversarmy](#): > > It’s a classic that no one really recognizes except, you know, SDMB folk. [Apparently so.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=611837) ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/85 "2011-12-08T12:39:25Z")
Okay, I haven’t checked with others to see if this is official or just a fanwank. Sahloub’s character. Cheng? Is that a parody of the Star Trek habit of casting non-ethnically-matching actors into ethnic roles? Or (and this is my favourite idea) the writers of Galaxy Quest hadn’t come up with a name for the Chief Engineer when (Sahloub) read for the part, so all those lines were marked “Ch. Eng.” and he believed that \*was \*the character’s name? ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/86 "2011-12-08T14:31:13Z")
Shaloub’s character is named Kwan, so the racial mismatch is entirely with the movie cast, not the show-within-a-show cast. It’s possible his character was noted as ‘ChEn’ or ‘Ch En’ in the script and Kwan was too stoned to notice the CamelCaps or spacing, but there’s no indication of that in the movie, so far as I can tell, the creators have said nothing to that effect, and the joke’s just not funny without a racial mismatch - it’d be a totally valid way to name a character they didn’t have a name for. Why a man of Lebanese descent, who pretty much looks it, was cast as a character who’s clearly meant to be Asian (Korean playing Chinese, from the looks of it), I don’t know - that’s _not_ something Trek made a habit of doing. The only example I can think of is The Paradise Syndrome, where most of the cast were obviously white, made up to look native. They don’t necessarily match the actor’s national origin to the characters, but that’s not a trait unique to, or even particularly extreme in, Trek. Outside of characters who are based on the actor, or revised to make them similar to the actor, it’s pretty much a crap shoot whether the actor’s ancestry will match the character’s. But the race will match, for Trek and most of its contemporaries - have a Chinese character? They’ll at least be Asian (though whether Chinese, Japanese, or Korean is anybody’s guess). ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/87 "2011-12-08T14:43:29Z")
> [@Tengu](#): > > Shaloub’s character is named Kwan, so the racial mismatch is entirely with the movie cast, not the show-within-a-show cast. No, it is; it’s just that it gets referred to in exceedingly brief fashion. _“I’m not Tech Sergeant Chen,”_ he says at one point, adding that _“Kwan’s not even my real name.”_ ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/88 "2011-12-08T14:47:22Z")
So Shaloub’s character seems to have adopted a Chinese name for SAG reasons? Dude… ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/89 "2011-12-08T15:14:20Z")
> [@DrFidelius](#): > > Or (and this is my favourite idea) the writers of Galaxy Quest hadn’t come up with a name for the Chief Engineer when (Sahloub) read for the part, so all those lines were marked “Ch. Eng.” and he believed that \*was \*the character’s name? That might have worked if they were shooting the pilot, but the show was on for years so it stands to reason that someone would have clued him in or he’d be given scripts with an actual character name on them. I’m voting for “amusing racial-name mismatch”. ---
**Author:** ![Private\_Bin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c0e974/32.png) [@Private\_Bin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Private_Bin)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/90 "2011-12-08T17:26:45Z")
> [@DrFidelius](#): > > Okay, I haven’t checked with others to see if this is official or just a fanwank. > Sahloub’s character. Cheng? > Is that a parody of the Star Trek habit of casting non-ethnically-matching actors into ethnic roles? > Or (and this is my favourite idea) the writers of Galaxy Quest hadn’t come up with a name for the Chief Engineer when (Sahloub) read for the part, so all those lines were marked “Ch. Eng.” and he believed that \*was \*the character’s name? I’ve always thought that it was just sloppy casting within the Galaxy Quest world. The writers for the TV show had written an Asian character but when the show was made a white guy got cast. You can see Shaloub occasionally making weird squinty eye faces throughout the movie, and I always figured this was his character’s way of being Asian, when he remembers to. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/91 "2011-12-08T17:43:43Z")
> [@Private\_Bin](#): > > I’ve always thought that it was just sloppy casting within the Galaxy Quest world. The writers for the TV show had written an Asian character but when the show was made a white guy got cast. > > You can see Shaloub occasionally making weird squinty eye faces throughout the movie, and I always figured this was his character’s way of being Asian, when he remembers to. I thought the gag was that he was an aspiring actor named – let’s say “Fred Quinn,” maybe? – who showed up looking for a part, heard that “Chen” was the only role that hadn’t been cast, and figured à la Shalhoub: _“Hey, I can do Lebanese, I can do Italian, I can do Hispanic…”_ before taking it a ludicrous step further with _“…I can do Chinese.”_ And so he provided a squint and a “Kwan” and got the job. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/92 "2011-12-08T19:32:26Z")
> [@Tengu](#): > > They don’t necessarily match the actor’s national origin to the characters, but that’s not a trait unique to, or even particularly extreme in, Trek. You know James Doohan wasn’t Scottish, right? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/93 "2011-12-08T19:37:36Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > You know James Doohan wasn’t Scottish, right? He wasn’t born in Scotland, but he was the son of Irish immigrants. He’s still the same race as his character, even if he wasn’t the right nationality. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/94 "2011-12-08T19:38:33Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > You know James Doohan wasn’t Scottish, right? And, of course, Patrick Stewart isn’t French. ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/95 "2011-12-08T19:39:12Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > And, of course, Patrick Stewart isn’t French. He was barely French on the show. ---
**Author:** ![simster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/simster/32/1047_2.png) [@simster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simster)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/96 "2011-12-08T19:42:49Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > And, of course, Patrick Stewart isn’t French. and I’m fairly sure that Leonard Nimoy was not Vulcanian ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/97 "2011-12-08T19:51:59Z")
> [@simster](#): > > and I’m fairly sure that Leonard Nimoy was not Vulcanian But Michael Dorn is, in fact, a Klingon. ---
**Author:** ![simster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/simster/32/1047_2.png) [@simster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simster)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/98 "2011-12-08T19:53:12Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > But Michael Dorn is, in fact, a Klingon. And Kate Mulgrew’s race is still undetermined. ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/99 "2011-12-08T20:18:04Z")
> [@simster](#): > > And Kate Mulgrew’s race is still undetermined. I’ve seen “shrew” suggested. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [December 8, 2011, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345/100 "2011-12-08T20:22:08Z")
> [@mlees](#): > > I’ve seen “shrew” suggested. I believe it is Valkyrie. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-galaxy-quest-appreciation-thread-spoilers/605345.md?page=6)