Picture Source: Overly Animated Podcast
I have been excited about this series, then titled Gary Space, since I saw the first episode on Youtube in high school. It stopped after three out of ten episodes, and I thought it was gone forever. Then in 2016 Olan Rogers (the creator of the show) all of sudden put up the pilot of Final Space, saying that TBS picked it up and that it would be coming early 2018. I was ecstatic! I waited patiently, checking every so often for any new that would come out. Then on February 15th, Olan Rogers had an AMA on Reddit and afterwards surprised us all by premiering the first two episodes. I poured a big bowl of cereal and watched eagerly like a kid on Saturday morning, and I can honestly say it was worth the wait since watching those three webisodes in high school.
A little bit about Final Space. It is the brain child of Olan Rogers, from my home city of Nashville, TN. Conan O’Brien serves as an executive producer and also does various voices. Olan Rogers also serves as the main characters Gary Goodspeed and Mooncake. The other characters are a group of fantastic actors and comedians. Including the great Fred Armisen (Portlandia) who plays the annoying (not surprisingly) KVN. Legendary voice actors Tom Kenny (Spongebob and everything) as HUE and John DiMaggio (Futurama and everything) as Terk and other voices. David Tennant (Doctor Who) plays the main antagonist the Lord Commander. Coty Galloway as Avocato, Steven Yeun (The Walking Dead) as Little Cato, and Tika Sumpter (Ride Along 1&2) as Quinn Airgone also have a starring role. Even Ron Perlman (Hell Boy series) plays the character of John Goodspeed, Gary’s father. This star studded cast is enough, for me personally, to check this out even if I knew nothing about this show.
The episode begins with our main character Gary float in space surrounded by debris, with his suit leaking oxygen, which HUE (his ship AI) tells him will run out in 9 minutes. The show then cuts to an earlier time before all of this presumably happens. Gary is awoken by HUE, the the Galaxy One’s AI, on day 1818. He goes through a routinely normal day only talking to only the robot compatriots that he shares the Galaxy One with, including KVN his Deep Space Insanity Avoidance Companion, who he calls the plight of his life. Gary thinks of himself of the captain but he’s actually a prisoner aboard the Galaxy One, which he has been on for the past 5 years with only a week left on his sentence. He videoblogs to a woman named Quinn, which in a flashback we learn that Gary was imprisoned trying to impress her by impersonating an Infinity Guard pilot, but in the process destroys 92 star cruisers and a small family owned Mexican restaurant. She has never responded in the entire 5 years he has been imprisoned.
While performing maintenance on the Galaxy One he stops to watch The Princess Bride while on his break. He is interrupted by a little green blob, who he says reminds him of a friend he had a long time ago and names him Mooncake. Cut to Tera Con Prime sector 18650. The evil Lord Commander interrogates and kills a man with his psionic abilities, who keeps laughing at his small size, about where E-351 is, which turns out to be Mooncake. Back on the Galaxy One Gary tries to hide Mooncake from HUE, while 4 bounty hunter ships encroach on their position. Gary is interested to know if they are lifeforms so that he can play cards with actual living beings. The bounty hunters board the ship and HUE activates the robots, which turn out to be a defense system. The lord commander broadcasts a hologram saying the ship is being searched for E-351 and to come forward or die. The bounty hunters and robots battle while HUE tries to convince Gary to hand over Mooncake because the ship is not equipped to handle this situation. Gary refuses and makes HUE lightfold (warp speed) even though it’ll add time to his sentence, which scares the bounty hunters off the Galaxy One. They lightfold into the oncoming path of asteroids and are unable to get out the way until the lightfold engines cool. Gary reaches his space suit just as the asteroids crash into the Galaxy One, sending him into open space.
While Gary is floating in space, HUE informs him that due to the moon’s gravity the asteroids will swing back around and hit Gary in 39 seconds. He asks HUE to formulate a solution to avoid the asteroids. HUE gives him a solution to perform an emergency blow out of his O2 tanks that has a 33 percent chance of working. However, the calculation only works for him without Mooncake. With them both he has a 0 percent chance of survival. He refuses to leave Mooncake and tries anyway and learns he will not make it back to the Galaxy One. As Gary runs out of oxygen and passes out, Mooncake destroys the oncoming asteroids with a beam as they are about to kill Gary.
Gary awakens back on the ship and thinks he saved himself. HUE informs him that he died for two minutes and his life was saved by Mooncake. They are then alerted to life form on deck 4A. He is held up by anthropomorphic cat telling him to hand over E-351 aka Mooncake. Gary responds by asking him if he plays cards, the cat drops his gun when the defense system robots show up. With the cat man, Avocato, taken prisoner they reluctantly play cards while Avocato explains that Mooncake is a planet destroyer, which Gary doesn’t believe. He tells him that the Lord Commander will stop at nothing to get Mooncake back. Gary promises Mooncake he will do everything he can to protect him as long as he provides him adventure. The episode ends with Gary going to sleep with Mooncake with one of the bounty hunter ships following closely behind.
Olan Rogers really exceeded my expectations with this first episode. It had the stupid jokes that a lot of the adult animated shows have without the raunchiness which can sometime be off putting. The cast is what should bring people in but the writing and great quality animation should keep them around. The season is set up for an interesting adventure with great characters all orbiting the almost insane, delusional, and sympathetic Gary. It looks as though we are going to see an emotional side of this story, which I assume has to do with flashbacks to Gary’s father during this first episode. The best of the part show by far is the animation. It is so well done, you can definitely tell that is where they put most of the budget. TBS definitely has a shot of this being hit. It’s a funny, well made show that draws you in with the first episode with the promise of a violent and crazy adventure ahead. You can count me in for that adventure aboard the Galaxy One.
Check out Final Space Mondays at 10:30 ET/9:30 CT on TBS
