INSPECTOR SPACETIME Gets Its Own Community
Well, it didn’t take long for “Inspector Spacetime” to become its own Internet sensation.
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On the season opener of NBC’s “Community”, Abed was shown a piece of video – a clip from the fictional British show “Inspector Spacetime”. It’s clearly a send-up of “Doctor Who”, complete with phone box, sonic thingamajig, and a companion. That small bit was enough to start a firestorm of Internet activity.
According to TV Tropes, “Inspector Spacetime” began in 1962, just one year prior to the debut of the Doctor on the BBC. A fan has even written up the beginnings of a production history. There’s already a poster by Jonny Eveson.
And a t-shirt. One wonders if Dan Harmon, the creator of “Community”, is going to get his piece…
It’s even spawned a Tumblr page (which looks like it can be traced to someone named Shlomia in Jerusalem) with several “I Can Haz Cheezburger” style images and fan-styled artwork. And a Facebook page. And a Wikia page.
All this in less than a week.
And what’s even more interesting is the consistency with which everything seems to be coming together. Several of the “show” storylines, characters and dialogue are showing up in more than one place, as if the show really existed and these items were part of it. A selected list:
- Naughty Monkey
- The Sloughers
- Circuit-Chaps
- Associates named Jeffrey (who seems to die a lot), Mary Sue, Lily, and one Rory Williams.
- Blogons
Granted, many of these seem to come from the TV Tropes piece, but it’s amazing to see how they’ve been accepted as “canon” (or is that “fanon”?)
And the actors who have “played” the Inspector – a veritable “Who’s Who” (ahem… sorry) of talent: Alfred Gough, Benny Hill, Liam Neeson, Stephen Fry, Daniel Landlord, Travis Richey, and even Peter Sellers.
Lest we forget, there was also a TV movie starring Steve Carrell, who never got a chance to play the Inspector again, save for several audio adventures…
Speaking of audio, the show has even spawned its own genre of music: Sprock, which is short for Space Master Rock.
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It’s not trending on Twitter yet, but it’s only a matter of… when.
