Galaxy Quest is a parody of Star Trek, pure and simple, with a little Lost in Space thrown in. Dreamworks has provided an excellent disc, economically priced and continues in its grand tradition of offering a high quality product with additional material to fill out the DVD.

The film begins with a short flashback episode of the Galaxy Quest television show, featuring Tim Allen as the commander, his alien science officer, played by Alan Rickman, the strong and sexy Sigourney Weaver as a cross between yeoman Rand and Uhura, Tony Shaloub as the chief engineer, and Darryl Mitchell as Tommy, the pilot wonder kid. The story then breaks to a Galaxy Quest convention, where the stars are waiting to go on with their appearance to the audience, who are all dressed as characters. The stars are weary of the appearances and especially hostile towards Allen, who steals the limelight from them and makes a living from his showings at these conventions. The story takes a turn after Allen overhears what some fans really think of him and his fading career and after a drunken night, awakens to find real aliens recruiting him for a job on their ship. It seems the evil lizard general, Sarris, is threatening extermination of their species if they do not hand over the secret of Omega 13, which is a plot line used in the Galaxy Quest TV series. Of course Allen believes the aliens are just fans wanting him for another gig until he wakes up, confronts and defeats Sarris, and is returned to Earth by a not to Earthly means of transportation. Allen then recruits the other members of his "crew" to come and join help the aliens inn the peace negotiations with Sarris. Once on board, through the gags and funny take offs, the film does have some sobering moments for the crew, as they learn first hand about their hosts, who have built up their superior technology from the TV broadcasts (historical documents)and the peril that they face.

Picture- Dreamworks presents the film in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 anamorphic. The picture is sharp and clear throughout. A top transfer from Dreamworks, as most of their DVD's are. No artifacts or fuzziness and the colors were consistent ands well balanced. This is a show off disc for systems, and one you'll see playing on the big screen televisions in brick and mortar stores in your city. Sound-Sound was offered in Dolby 5.1 and 2.0 and again is of high quality, with excellent separation and effective mix of the original theater sound. I found it a little heavy in the front and center channels in balance but the surround speakers were also used in the action scenes. The sound was particularly powerful and you won't need to crank this up too much to enjoy the booming soundtrack.

The extras include production notes, cast and crew bios, a sneak preview trailer and regular theatrical trailer, a "From the cutting room floor feature" and a featurette entitled "On Location In Space". A good, solid package of extras for the price. No subtitles other than English were offered, and no other language soundtracks were on the disc. The interactive menus are well animated and contain music and short comedy bits in different menu areas. Oh, and then the e is Omega 13. Can't say anymore though.

I was pleasantly surprised by this light hearted movie, and it shows a little more humanity than I thought it would. The crew turns out to live up to their noble TV characters but also show their own self doubts and frailties. An excellent quality disc,very economical and the street price dips below $15.00 for this one. Trekkies beware-you are in for some laughs.