(T)Raumschiff Surprise - Periode 1 (2004)

Interesting facts

(T)Raumschiff Surprise – Periode 1 is a 2004 German comedy film by Michael "Bully" Herbig. It is a spoof of the 1960s American television series Star Trek and parodies several science fiction films. The film follows the eccentric crew of the spaceship Surprise in the year 2304, who must travel back in time to the year 2004 to save Earth from a Martian invasion.

Production and allusions

After the success of Der Schuh des Manitu, Michael "Bully" Herbig had asked his Bullyparade audience to decide his next movie project. Open for selection were: a sequel to Der Schuh des Manitu; (T)Raumschiff Surprise; a movie about another regular sketch in the show centered on Sissi (which was eventually realized as the animated film Lissi und der wilde Kaiser); a "Movie No One Would Ever Expect" with the same name; or an advice to Herbig to kee…

(T)Raumschiff Surprise parodies the (mostly science fiction) films Star Trek, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace, The Fifth Element, Back to the Future, The Time Machine, Independence Day, A Knight's Tale, Men in Black, Minority Report, High Noon, The Matrix, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and Twelve Monkeys. (T)Raumschiff Surprise has a prequel scene to Der Schuh des Manitu when the protagonists travel back in time to the wild west.

The scene in which Kork and Spuck attempt to beam off the Surprise by stepping onto several lighted numbered floor panels, is a reference to the German TV children's game show Eins, Zwei oder Drei (the German version of Runaround). The panels are part of a triple-choice quiz system, and any children who stand on the correct panel (i.e. with the number of the correct answer) may collect points for their respective team.

Several characters from the original Star Trek movie are parodied. The main characters speak with a very strong Bavarian accent in the German soundtrack. Herbig once described the movie as "a group of girl-roommates on adventure". The names are all parodies of the original characters of Star Trek. Captain Kork (Christian Tramitz) is a take on Captain Kirk, korken means "to cork"); Mr.

"trash / junk". The characters act stereotypically gay. Kavanian also plays Jens Maul, a play on Darth Maul, Maul means "maw", despite the fact the character looks like Darth Vader, and Doc Pulle who is a parody of Leonard McCoy's character's German nickname, Pille, which means "pill". Pulle is a German colloquialism for "bottle", as in "eine Pulle Rum" (a bottle of rum) or "eine Pulle Bier" (a bottle of beer).

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